History Main / CannotKillTheirLovedOnes

* ''Manga/FairyTail'': In the final arc Erza and Wendy are pitted against Irene Belserion, one of the 12 guards of the Spriggan Empire who reveals herself to be Erza's mother. She explains she was a dragon slayer whose power turned her into a dragon. Zeref gave her back a humanoid form centuries later, but the loss of her senses drove her mad and she had planned to take Erza's body after she was born. However her motherly instinct prevented her from going through with it and she gave up Erza for adoption to protect Erza from herself. In the present time, Irene claims she doesn't care about Erza anymore and tries kill her. After taking a mortal blow from Erza, Irene has enough strength to finish her weakened daughter. But when given the chance, finds she ''still'' can't go through with it as deep down she still loves Erza and ultimately kills herself in the end.

* ''VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening'': [[spoiler:When Robin is revealed to be Grima, Lucina realizes that killing them will prevent her bad future from happening, and Robin can choose whether to let her without a fight or resist before Chrom steps in to prevent it and suggest finding an alternative way to prevent Robin from becoming Grima. If Robin is married to either Chrom (if female), and thus is Lucina's mother, or Lucina herself (if male), Lucina is unable to go through with killing them at all.]]

*** In Luke's backstory involving Kylo, Luke realized Kylo held tremendous power and potential within the Force during his Jedi training. But likewise much darkness as well which scared him into thinking that Kylo could become just like his grandfather, Darth Vader. In an act of irrationality, Luke was set to kill Kylo in his sleep but managed to catch himself and ultimately couldn't do it. However, in tragic irony, Kylo woke up and saw Luke standing over him with the lightsaber. This supposed betrayal of his uncle was all the motivation Kylo needed to join the Dark Side.

* ''Webcomic/{{Homestuck}}'': After Jack Noir gets merged with Jade's dog Becquerel, "Bec Noir" can no longer bring himself to kill her. So he orders his minion the Courtyard Droll to do it instead. And when CD succeeds, [[spoiler:Bec Noir kills him in a fit of rage, then carries Jade over to her Quest Bed so she can resurrect]].
* ''Webcomic/SchlockMercenary'': When Kaff Tagon's girlfriend and mother were infected with a GreyGoo weapon, his father Karl ordered him to firebomb them all, but Kaff [[https://www.schlockmercenary.com/2012-10-21 hesitated]] long enough for the nanomachines to spread. Hypocritically, Karl [[https://www.schlockmercenary.com/2012-10-28 blamed him]] for years, even though Karl had the same incendiary grenades and didn't do the deed either.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Invincible|2021}}'': PlayedForDrama. Despite Omni-Man being willing to kill the Guardians of the Globe along with countless civilians, as well as inflict a NoHoldsBarredBeatdown on Mark for refusing to join him in [[spoiler:conquering Earth for the Viltrum Empire]], Omni-Man is unwilling to kill his wife Debbie and his friend Art Rosenbaum. [[spoiler:He also cannot bring himself to kill Mark after beating him, especially after Mark declares he would still have him as his father even after outliving everyone else he cared about, which leads him to abandon his post and leave Earth out of guilt. While this does prove that he cares about his family more than he would like to admit, the fact that he still harmed them horribly (physically in Mark's case and emotionally in Debbie and Art's case) through his actions and words makes it clear that they're not happy about being spared. Debbie and Art are last shown in Season 1 [[DrowningMySorrows drowning their sorrows]], not knowing if they understood the real Nolan Grayson and questioning why he spared them in the first place. Mark is left heartbroken by his father's actions and remains conflicted about him despite the atrocities he's committed.]]

** In the anime version, Yuuri can't bring herself to [[MercyKill kill Kurumi to prevent her zombification]]. In the manga, however, it is unclear if Yuuri would have acomplished it, since Miki arrived with the cure before she could decide.

* In ''Series/{{Westworld}}'', Teddy is given a new narrative by Dr. Ford where he has a nemesis named Wyatt. However by the season one finale, he finds out that Wyatt is actually a personality imbedded on his girlfriend, Dolores. When Dolores starts her rebellion against the humans, Teddy remains at her side, trying to make sure she doesn't devolved into her violent state. However, Dolores reprograms him into a killing machine because she believe his NiceGuy personality wouldn't help him survive. When Teddy regains self-consciousness, he's dismayed to what Dolores did to him. As he confronts her, he admits that she's his cornerstone and made a promise to protect him. But he knows that he couldn't protect her from ''herself''. Because he's horrified to what Dolores had become and couldn't bring himself to kill her, [[spoiler:[[DrivenToSuicide Teddy shoots himself in the head instead]].]]

* ''Film/{{Sneakers}}'' was the original TropeNamer and provides the page quote. Cosmo, unwilling to kill his former friend Bishop, finds a loophole.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Invincible|2021}}'': PlayedForDrama. Despite Omni-Man being willing to kill the Guardians of the Globe along with countless civilians, as well as inflict a NoHoldsBarredBeatdown on Mark for refusing to join him in [[spoiler:conquering Earth for the Viltrum Empire]], Omni-Man is unwilling to kill his wife Debbie and his friend Art Rosenbaum. [[spoiler:He also cannot bring himself to kill Mark after beating him, especially after Mark declares he would still have him as his father even after outliving everyone else he cared about, which leads him to abandon his post and leave Earth out of guilt. While this does prove that he cares about his family on some level, the fact that he still harmed them horribly through his actions makes it clear that they're not happy about being spared. Debbie and Art are last shown in Season 1 [[DrowningMySorrows drinking their sorrow]], not knowing if they understood the real Nolan Grayson and questioning why he spared them in the first place. Mark is left heartbroken by his father's actions and remains conflicted about him despite the atrocities he's committed.]]

* ''Literature/ColdDays'': Mab orders Harry to kill Maeve. It turns out that the reason for this is because as cold as she may be, she simply cannot personally kill her own daughter no matter how much she wants or needs to.
* ZigZagged. In ''[[Literature/DarthBane Darth Bane: Rule of Two]]''. Young Zannah is confronted by her cousin Darovit, who tries to threaten Darth Bane with a stolen lightsaber. Not want Bane to kill her cousin Darovit and unwilling to kill him herself, Zannah uses the Force to [[LiteralDisarming disintegrate Darovit's right hand]]. A decade later, [[spoiler: she spares his life again, not because she cares about him, but out of pragmatism. She uses her Sith sorcery to drive him mad and leaves him to be found by the Jedi, who assume him to be Bane.]]

* ''Film/{{Evil Dead|2013}}'' (2013): David prepares to burn the cabin while his possessed sister [[Creator/JaneLevy Mia]] is locked in in the cellar. He is ultimately unable to go through with it.

* In ''The Gray Jedi: Merciless Indifference'', the fourth entry in ''Fanfic/TheGrayJediSeries'', Zari admits to Des -- her lover and the father of her children -- that she can't bring herself to kill him if he falls under the villain's MindControl.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheLegoMovie'': After Emment manages to escape from Lord Business's goons. Good Cop/Bad Cop is called into Lord Business's office who decides to test his resolve by having him "Kragle" (read: super glue) his parents. Good Cop hesitates when ordered and can't go through with it which Lord Business sees as a weakness and has his Good Cop face rubbed away with nail polish. Without his good side to balance him out, Bad Cop goes through with the orders to kragle his parents.

* Unlike in the original, Michael Myers in ''Film/Halloween2007'' has no wish to kill Laura after finding out she's his sister.

[[quoteright:190:[[Manga/SchoolLive https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/zvxntvbm_8.jpg]]]]
[[caption-width-right:190:This isn't even the worst thing that happened in that episode...]]

!!Administrivia/NoRealLifeExamplesPlease

** Averted ''hard'' by Belos himself, who is implied to not only have [[spoiler:killed his own brother Caleb]], but to have [[spoiler:created numerous duplicates of him over the years, only to kill them as well.]]

* Manga/FairyTail: In the final arc Erza and Wendy are pitted against Irene Belserion, one of the 12 guards of the Spriggan Empire who reveals herself to be Erza's mother. She explains she was a dragon slayer whose power turned her into a dragon. Zeref gave her back a humanoid form centuries later, but the loss of her senses drove her mad and she had planned to take Erza's body after she was born. However her motherly instinct prevented her from going through with it and she gave up Erza for adoption to protect Erza from herself. In the present time, Irene claims she doesn't care about Erza anymore and tries kill her. After taking a mortal blow from Erza, Irene has enough strength to finish her weakened daughter. But when given the chance, finds she ''still'' can't go through with it as deep down she still loves Erza and ultimately kills herself in the end.

*** In Luke's backstory involving Kylo, Luke realized Kylo held tremendous power and potential within the Force during his Jedi training. But likewise much darkness as well which scared him into thinking that Kylo could become just like his grandfather, Darth Vader, if he was tempted to the Dark Side. In an act of irrationality, Luke was set to kill Kylo in his sleep but managed to catch him and ultimately couldn't do it. But in tragic irony, Kylo woke up and saw Luke standing over him with the lightsaber. This supposed betrayal of his uncle was all the motivation Kylo needed to join the Dark Side.

*** In Luke's backstory involving Kylo, Luke realized Kylo held tremendous power and potential within the Force during his Jedi training which scared him into thinking that Kylo could become just like his grandfather, Darth Vader, if he was tempted to the Dark Side. In an act of irrationality, Luke was set to kill Kylo in his sleep but managed to catch him and ultimately couldn't do it. But in tragic irony, Kylo woke up and saw Luke standing over him with the lightsaber. This supposed betrayal of his uncle was all the motivation Kylo needed to join the Dark Side.

** In ''Film/TheLastJedi'', Kylo attacks the Resistance ship that has his mother, Leia, on it. Despite having killed his father in the previous film, when he has a clear shot at the ship where Leia is, he is unable to fire. A moment later, another pilot does it instead. Luckily Leia survives.

* ''VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening'': [[spoiler:When Robin is revealed to be Grima, Lucina realizes that killing them will prevent her bad future from happening, and Robin can choose whether to let her without a fight or resist before Chrom steps in to prevent it and suggest finding an alternative way to prevent Robin from becoming Grima. If Robin is married to either Chrom (if female) or Lucina (if male), Lucina is unable to go through with killing them at all.]]