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When Deckard saw Roy Batty’s face on the screen, his photograph looking like a mugshot rotating, he had known he was different. The women replicants were all undeniably beautiful, designed to be that way, but Batty was not like them. He was worse. A handsome face with sharp blue eyes. Those eyes held something deeper. Dangerous. Of course he was dangerous, he was a fugitive replicant that Deckard would have to retire, but the danger was a tempting one. The danger of drinking a fine wine with poison slipped into it.
It reminded him of the rabbit Rick owned as a child, a real rabbit— not artificial— many people thought that they were friendly creatures but Rick had learned that was false. The rabbit was sleek and pretty, a white coat that was soft to the touch. But Rick could never feel that coat under his hand, the rabbit would bite before he could come close. Rick had learned to become content with simply watching the rabbit, sitting and gazing at it as it ran around in its pen, and eventually the rabbit began to gaze back at Rick. They had come to an agreement, Rick couldn’t touch it but he could stick his hand into the pen and the rabbit would sniff it. The rabbit bit at first, leaving Rick with bleeding fingers, but eventually they grew used to each other. And then the rabbit died. They never bought a new one, Rick didn’t get over the loss.
Batty’s handsomeness was strange. The light shade of his hair made him stand out, a replicant like Rachel could blend in with her dark hair and eyes but Batty had the beauty of an alien. It was almost possible to tell he was a replicant from his looks alone, blue eyes too piercing and eyebrows too light to fully be seen. Rick’s longing for him made his urge to get the job over even stronger. His urge to project this longing onto Rachel instead, protecting her instead of protecting the violent fugitive that was Roy Batty.
Meeting the replicant in person made it even worse. The fear. The great fear. Like Roy had said, it was an experience. Exhilarating. The man wanted to kill Deckard. And it was his job to kill Batty. No, he had tried to correct that in his mind. Not kill. It was not killing. Retiring was the word he would keep repeating in his head. The thrill of the hunt was what Batty experienced while Deckard felt he was more of a cowering prey. Wounded.
But on that ledge, when Batty had let him slip for a moment, his predator showed him mercy. Mercy that he wished he hadn't been given. Roy Batty died with his dignity, legs crossed and head down, but Deckard knew the strange, violently intelligent man would have preferred to die by Deckard’s hands.
Deckard tried not to think about that as he stared at Barry’s dead body. Staring and looking through it. He already knew it was over, he didn’t need to be interrupted to have it told to him. He didn’t want to leave the ‘corpse’ but he did. He had finished the job. Four replicants dead. He had only killed two. But the artificial blood was on his hands.
And when he went back to his place and kissed Rachel away, fear coursing through him, he wished that he could have experienced a world where Roy was in her place.