Characters with a glaring Lack of Empathy for others in Fan Works.
- Harry in Fate Ends very much loathes his false persona "Shen Yuan", and a huge part of it comes from Shen Yuan having "as much empathy as a moldy nut".
- Aliens/Once Upon a Time fanfic Monsters: Robin shows no remorse for the fact that his actions caused the death of almost everyone in the colony or any of the other horrible stuff he does.
- Bill Cipher, like in Gravity Falls, has this in A Triangle in the Stars. It doesn't last.
- Thousand Shinji: Subverted. Shinji is very empathic... because understanding people is a necessary prerequisite to manipulate them. And being empathic does not mean he is sympathetic. He may understand someone else's troubles without caring for them.
- However later it is proved that he does not understand everybody as well as he would like to believe, and not giving a damn about someone else's troubles came back to bite him in the bum later.
- Deconstructed in With Pearl and Ruby Glowing; several characters have Personality Disorders or Autism giving them low or nonexistent emotional empathy, but that doesn't mean they don't experience sympathy or love, and some are able to learn cognitive empathy. Meanwhile, it's reversed with Bruno, who suffers from hyperempathy
, which forces him to feel everything felt by everyone around him and is so stressful he ends up in a mental hospital, and that's before he gets caught by a Human Trafficking ring and is kept alongside other prisoners who are all obviously miserable. He later tells Mirabel, who was ostracised for her lack of empathy after an NPD diagnosis but still wants to be a good person, that she has a gift and can help people better than he ever could because she won't become an emotional wreck when around hurt people like he does.
- All Assorted Animorphs AUs: One of the Marco-halves in "What if Marco was the one split in half in #32?" is single-mindedly fixated on destroying the Yeerks, no matter the cost. By the end, he kills Eva, Alloran, and Tom just because he saw them as distractions, even though two of them are related to the Animorphs.
- Acedia in the Avantasia Protag AU series. Although since he's a literal demon of sloth and despair, it's not exactly surprising.
- A Cry In The Park has Louise spend five harrowing days trapped in a well after Logan Bush pushes her into it. Even though Logan didn't know the well was there, he never once feels guilty and initially is more worried about what his parents, and Louise's parents, will do to him. His mother Cynthia is no better. Throughout the entire ordeal, neither of them cares about the thought of Louise possibly dying. Cynthia repeatedly tries to defend Logan saying if the well had been covered Louise wouldn't have fallen in, while everyone else responds that Logan's always been a horrible bully and he deliberately antagonized and planned to hurt Louise before she fell. Which isn't even getting into that he ran off and didn't tell anyone Louise was trapped; had two teenage girls not overheard Louise's screaming for help, she might've been trapped for much longer or potentially died down there.
- Bob calls Cynthia and Logan out on this when Cynthia reaches a new low by implying Louise might've deserved what happened because of the way she acts.Cynthia: You know, you're not as high and mighty as you like to think. Your daughter is a crazy little brat! She's not innocent in this, you know! You know that she antagonizes my boy!Bob: So what?! I know she's not perfect; she's not an angel. She can be cheeky, she doesn't always listen to me; sometimes she makes me wanna tear my hair out! But she doesn't deserve this! (To Logan) How could you be so cruel? Don't you care at all? Don't you care that any injuries she has are because of you? Do you know what the doctor told us? He said she could have a back injury! She may need a wheelchair! Because of you, she could be in a wheelchair for the rest of her life. He's told us to start preparing for the worst! You had no right putting your hands on my daughter, and I swear to God, if you touch her again, I will tear your head off your shoulders.
- A side fic featuring deleted chapters has Cynthia's friends reading her the riot act over this. After demanding to know why she's being snubbed, Cynthia's friends exclaim that Logan's actions may potentially lead to a little girl dying and she still acts like he's done nothing wrong. Even as they remind Cynthia of how Logan's bullied and mistreated their own children, her friends are appalled that she's truly incapable of feeling any sympathy or remorse.
- Bob calls Cynthia and Logan out on this when Cynthia reaches a new low by implying Louise might've deserved what happened because of the way she acts.
- In A Monster's Nature, Brandon never manages to emotionally connect to other people; even when he admits to his love interest Caitlyn that he can't take the thought of losing her, he just pays lip service to feeling sorry for her after the death of her mother (Caitlyn privately speculates that he still resented Erika's attempts to keep them apart), although he does show genuine concern for Caitlyn herself more than once.
- In Worlds Apart, Quentin Travers is so unconcerned about Buffy’s emotional well-being that he is willing to pit her against what he believes to be Angelus when the aforementioned vampire nearly sent the world to Hell the last time Buffy faced him (Granted, he was unaware of their deeper history, but what little Travers knew should have made it clear that pitting Buffy against Angelus without her strength would not be psychologically healthy for her).
- Dangan Ronpa: Assassinating Friendship: Komaeda Nagito wants nothing more than to put his Luck cycle to good use by supporting whoever has the most Hope and ensuring they survive Vorpal Pier's mutual killing game. Unfortunately, he subscribes to an all-or-nothing philosophy. Any sign of wavering, of self-doubt or weakness, and he will dismiss you as 'just another piece of hopeless trash'. This even extends to Amami Rantaro, whom he once wholeheartedly supported until Rantaro took his own life to ensure Nagito survived.
- In Dragon Ball Z Abridged, after Piccolo destroys Dr. Gero/Android #20's right arm.Dr. Gero: You miserable reprobates! What have I ever done to you?!
Piccolo: ...Pretty sure you vaporized half a city.
Dr. Gero: I meant recently!
Piccolo: That was an hour ago.
Dr. Gero: Semantics!
- Seventh Horcrux sees Harry demonstrate this to almost ridiculous degrees after he is essentially possessed by the horcrux fragment in himself, although he does improve over time.
- What Lies Beneath: When everyone thinks that Hiccup and Zephyr perished when their house caught fire during a raid, Jerrik tactlessly says that they won't have to worry about securing an heir since Astrid is pregnant and hopes that her second child takes more after Astrid than Zephyr did. Astrid responds by going from bottomless grief to wanting to murder him in an instant and no one stops her until she gets a few hits in.
- Zim the Warlord: Irken Reversion: Gaz reflects at one point how she doesn't feel sympathy for other people except for very rare occasions.
- In The Seven Hunters, Calin is very clearly a sociopath. He thinks very little of his fellow packmates and shows no emotion as several of them are lost during a battle. He even puts on a fake smile and a cordial demeanor as he is telling a rival pack they are about to be exterminated. Calling him callous would be an understatement.
- An Alternate Keitaro Urashima:
- Kaolla Su kept harassing Shinobu and her other friends at school, heedless of how uncomfortable she was making them. When one of their brothers asked her to stop, she went crying to Naru and Motoko about how he was being a 'meanie', leading to the pair assuming he'd done something perverted and beating him senseless, sending him to the hospital. Not only do none of them care about how an innocent boy was hurt, Su gets upset at how Shinobu's friends paying more attention to the injured Takuya than to her.
- Naru shows absolutely no sympathy for Motoko's Humiliation Conga, even coldly declaring that it 'serves her right' due to how Naru herself was mildly inconvenienced when Motoko's fall from grace began.
- As of Chapter 30 of Infinity, Enlil suffers from this. For instance, not understanding why Precia is upset that Alicia's brain has been overwritten and is currently serving as Enlil's new body. Or why the protagonists are upset. This turns out to be foreshadowing. Enlil lacks empathy because Yggdrasil actively suppressed it.
- Dodged a Beetle shows this to be Tikki's biggest issue:
- Firstly, she completely fails to reassure Marinette that she's capable of saving the day as Ladybug, telling her simply that she must be Ladybug Because Destiny Says So. Her inability to convince Marinette that she truly has what it takes spurs her to pass the Earrings on to her new friend Lila instead.
- Tikki then makes matters even worse by blithely telling Marinette that it's just as well that she gave the Earrings to Lila, and that her newfound status as a Secret Secret-Keeper makes her a liability. When Marinette naturally starts panicking at that, Tikki simply and bluntly tells her that she needs to do a better job controlling her emotions.
- Fashion Upgrade: Lila, Lila, Lila. She quietly revels in Marinette's suffering and happily anticipates watching her crash and burn under the stress of preparing an entire fashion show in just two months. And once her classmates skyrocket to fame after the success of their play (which Lila was unable to participate in thanks to her efforts to sabotage Marinette), she couldn't care less about their success beyond trying to leverage the opportunity to ride their coattails to fame herself. She even goes so far as to mentally insult and belittle them while putting on a sweet act to try and stay in their good graces, culminating in trying to outright bully Mylene into taking her along to a private audition.
- I See What You Do Behind Closed Doors: This is one of Adrien's Fatal Flaws. Even after he starts dating Marinette, he refuses to do anything about Lila or anyone else bullying her. When Marinette calls him out on this, he's actually outraged by her daring to question him, but attempts to cover for himself by claiming he was just "lost in thought". This bites him in the butt when Marinette unknowingly pulls the thread by asking what's been weighing so heavily on his mind; despite knowing that Marinette is highly empathetic, Adrien is so self-centered that the notion that she might express concern that way didn't occur to him as he never would've done it himself. He then impulsively decides to reveal his Secret Identity to her, and it all unravels for him from there.
- The Karma of Lies: One of Adrien's Fatal Flaws is that he only cares about how he might be personally affected by something. Since trying to expose Lila might upset his friends (and would definitely upset her), he decides to stand aside and let her scam them. As he told Marinette, it's fine so long as he knows she's lying, since that means she'll never be able to trick HIM.
- Since the Agrestes have plenty of money, he presumes that everything Lila is stealing from his friends is easily replacable. When Plagg points out that most of his friends don't come from wealthy families, he blows him off, claiming that they wouldn't give up anything they couldn't afford to lose.
- When Marinette discovers that her friends have donated all the clothes she made for them to one of Lila's fake charities, he 'reassures' her that she can just make new clothes to replace everything. Because it's not like there was any sentimental value to the original pieces, or that the time or effort she invested in making them was worth anything.
- Adrien also dismisses the impact of Hawkmoth terrorizing Paris since Ladybug's Miraculous Cure restores the damage done — including anyone who was hurt or killed. He treats this as a magical Reset Button that erases all consequences, enabling him to treat protecting Paris like a game and a chance to flirt with his partner. The emotional or psychological toll simply doesn't register to him.
- Lila, naturally, doesn't care about who gets hurt so long as she personally benefits. Unlike Adrien, however, she proves far more perceptive, and is actually aware of how people are being hurt... and while she isn't remotely bothered than this, it also helps her recognize when to cut and run.
- Alya and most of Marinette's classmates don't care about how they've hurt Marinette by exploiting her generosity and ignoring her in favor of Lila. When trying to reconcile with her, they try appealing to her sense of empathy, asking her to think about them and how they've been hurt while refusing to acknowledge their mistakes.
- The Lament Series (ChaoticNeutral):
- Gabriel's Lament: Not only did Gabriel never care who might get hurt during his terrorist spree as Hawk Moth, he never considered how his son felt about being locked in a Gilded Cage or having his life be so tightly managed by his otherwise neglectful father. When he got to make his Wish, his apathy about how others would be affected by by reality being rewritten enabled somebody else to find the Butterfly Brooch and become the new world's version of Hawk Moth. Unfortunately for him, his beloved Emilie becomes one of Paris' defenders, while his thoughtless treatment of their son builds up so much resentment in Adrien that he gets perma-akumatized into Chat Blanc.
- Chloé's Lament: Chloé's complete lack of concern or care about anyone other than herself renders her completely unable to comprehend the notion that others DO care about that sort of thing. This bites her in the butt when she Wishes to trade places with Marinette, assuming that she'll get all the adoration and accolades Marinette formerly enjoyed while the other girl winds up Hated by All... as she's unable and unwilling to see that it's her own selfish behavior that made her so despised.
- A Price to Pay shows this to be a Fatal Flaw shared by Gabriel and Adrien, as the latter betrays Ladybug and helps his father rewrite reality with his Wish. When Tom Dupain-Cheng is killed in a car accident Gabriel caused in the new timeline as the price for bringing Emilie back, Gabriel blatantly bribes his way to legal victory, then laughs at the verdict. Emilie is so disgusted by his disregard for the pain he's caused that she divorces him, disowning Adrien for how he supported his father. Meanwhile, Adrien simply can't wrap his mind around the notion that Marinette might not want to help him "fix" the unintended consequences of his father's Wish, accusing her of being petty for holding a grudge over the whole "betrayed her and helped kill her dad" thing.
- Recklessness: Faced with the sight of Adrien and the Dupain-Chengs sobbing over Marinette's bloodied, freshly murdered body, Alya shrugs and dismisses their grief as 'needlessly dramatic', reasoning that this won't matter after she makes the Wish and rewrites reality.
- Weight Off Your Shoulder has Future!Alix/Bunnyx. Due to her Time Travel powers, she takes a blasé attitude towards all the suffering Hawk/Shadow Moth inflicts upon the world — she knows it works out eventually, and blithely tells Marinette to "suck it up" and tough through it. When she accidentally reveals that Shadow Moth will eventually get his hands on the Miracle Box and become Monarch, she blows off Marinette and the Kwamis' horror and refuses to even consider helping them avert that tragedy. What's a clear Bad Future to them is no big deal to her, and she cares more about preserving HER timeline above all else.
- Phoenix's Tear: Reignition: Muu senses when Gray Wolf's connection with him is abruptly severed, and idly muses that this likely means that they died. He doesn't care one whit about their passing, more interested in what else he sensed at the time.
- Abraxas (Hrodvitnon): Like in canon, Alan Jonah. He has no compunctions against having anyone who becomes more trouble than they're worth for him killed in cold blood, and if neither that nor his inhumane experiments on Monster X (half of which is a formerly-human being) are bad enough, then his Playing with Syringes with turns multiple victims into Artificial Zombies definitely is.
- Throughout Cain, the only person Katsuki ever feels sorry for is himself. As he escalates his already Barbaric Bullying to even higher levels of cruelty, he accuses Izuku of "pity-baiting" and trying to get him in trouble. Notably, after All Might pulls him away from trying to break into the Midoriya's apartment, Katsuki starts crying out of frustration over not getting his way, leading to this exchange:Toshinori: Young Bakugou, Izuku has been struggling all his life...
Katsuki: (sobbing) Fucking how!?
My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
- Escape from the Moon: In her true identity of Spliced Genome, Doa literally doesn't care if what she does is good or not, only if it's interesting to her.
- In Getting Back on Your Hooves, this is what makes Checker Monarch so utterly terrifying. At the same time, however, it's also her Fatal Flaw, as she is unable to anticipate ponies acting on compassion rather than act the way she's trying to manipulate them.
- Horribly Averted by the interrogator in You Obey. Played straight by Queen Chrysalis, whose reaction to forcing him to torture a prisoner is to only dryly remark what a drag it is that changelings experience what they inflict on those they torture.
- A Crown of Stars: In the proper series nothing was as important to Gendo as Yui. As long as he managed to save her he did not care for the pain his actions and behavior caused on people like his children or the girl his son loved. It bit him in the arse later when Yui returned, expressed how disgusted she was at his actions, and said she could not forgive him unless he earned their children's forgiveness first.
- Advice and Trust: Gendo, to even higher levels than shown in the series proper. He's downright angry when the pilots opt to try and successfully save their friend from Bardiel, purely because it wasn't what they were ordered to do.
- Neon Genesis Evangelion: Genocide:
- Even after everything, neither Gendo nor Ritsuko cared about the welfare or mental health of the NERV pilots. Keiko gets hurt and Asuka has another break-down? Who cares?
- Kluge is obsessed with destroying NERV one way or another. At a point he blatantly and nonchalantly says that innocent lives don't matter to him at all.
- Persona: The Sougawa Files has two villains who are extremely lacking in empathy.
- Nobuyuki Itou is the Big Bad for most of the story, and displays many traits of a psychopath, this trope being one of them. He spends most of the fanfiction trying to kill a bunch of teenagers (with one exception) who... didn't really do anything wrong; the most they've been doing are rescuing their friends. He's even willing to ransack The Hero's apartment, beat her sister to near death, and leave behind a threatening note. Guilt for any of this? Zero; he views it as justified because it's for "the good of Sougawa".
- Yuudai Honda works for Nobuyuki as his head scientist and treats the kids... oddly. Similarly to Nobuyuki, he shows no guilt for some rather immoral actions, though he's played more for comedy. That is, until he's revealed to be the main villain, where his actions proceed to eclipse Nobuyuki's in sheer uncaring — he experimented on a girl implied to be his daughter for fourteen years, treated her as a "sacrifice" for his greater goals and called her "it", desires to turn the entire city into blissful husks because they'll all be happy that way, and mercilessly beats down The Hero in a brutal Curb-Stomp Battle complete with Mind Rape. Yikes. As mentioned, like Nobuyuki, he shows no regret for any of this. The best part is, he's fully aware of his lack of empathy, and even factors it into his plans at one point.
- Poké Wars: Uxie seems to be incapable of understanding anyone else's feelings. He casually discusses and plans genocide with the ease of someone planning a dinner party.
- Stress Relief:
- Agent South Dakota treats Agent Connecticut as completely disposable. She rapes C.T. and then moves on with her life until the next time she needs to use her to relieve some tension.
- Agent Wyoming completely blows off South violently attacking her brother, Agent North Dakota, and even finds it entertaining. Basically, any time a fight is about to go down, Wyoming will be asking you to Pass the Popcorn.
- Agent Florida trumps both of them! He has a friendly conversation with the guard he was assigned to take out and kills him just as casually without remorse. Even while noting that the man has a daughter. He treats the fact that she'll never see her father again like a mild inconvenience.
- The writer has confirmed that the Counselor's lack of response about South molesting C.T. is because of this."By the way, if it ever seems like Price really doesn't give two craps about what happens one way or another, it's because he doesn't."
- Rosario Vampire: Brightest Darkness:
- The original Jovian and Jacqueline Kikion display this masterfully, as shown in Jovian's merciless execution of Apoch in Act III chapter 41. Rason even outright states in Act IV chapter 24 that the two have no regard for the lives of others. In Act V chapter 35, when Render and Leon call Jovian out for murdering innocent humans who had nothing to do with their fight, Jovian responds:Jovian: You speak as if I care.
- Having been the Kikions' original master, Hokuto is just as much disregard for life as they do. Throughout his screen time, he repeatedly blows off any and all pain and anguish he causes, insisting that it's all for a "higher cause." His idea of causing a distraction while he breaks into Yokai Academy's secured levels to steal an Artifact of Doom is setting Kuyou loose on the academy, and his idea of proving a point to Moka that human/monster coexistence is a fool's dream is by deliberately breaking The Masquerade and trying to get Tsukune and co. killed by humans while making Moka watch. On top of it all, he is an adamant nihilist who considers all forms of life, human or monster, to be meaningless trash.
- Hex has little concern for the affairs of lesser beings. In Act VI chapter 52, when the group chews him out for not willingly helping Complica even though it's in his power to do so, Fang Fang remarks in disgust that even if they are "lesser beings" to him, at least they understand the value of life, to which Hex responds:Hex: It's not that I don't understand. It's just that I couldn't care less.
- Evil Falla has a disregard for other people's lives that borders on sociopathic, openly comparing everyone around her to worms and bugs and having done such things as send her own little sister Complica to her death For the Evulz. She even openly states that nothing matters to her more than power, not even her own family.
- The original Jovian and Jacqueline Kikion display this masterfully, as shown in Jovian's merciless execution of Apoch in Act III chapter 41. Rason even outright states in Act IV chapter 24 that the two have no regard for the lives of others. In Act V chapter 35, when Render and Leon call Jovian out for murdering innocent humans who had nothing to do with their fight, Jovian responds:
- Silva from An Emerald Unearthed does not give two fucks about anyone other than himself. Killing is as natural as breathing to him. He’d kill his subordinates, rivals, and people’s loved ones. When she thinks Emerald died when she messed up a jump from a window, he doesn't seem particularly perturbed by it. And he won’t even acknowledge why Emerald might have a problem working with him after killing her parents.
- Several characters in Prison Island Break, most notably Shadow, Scourge and Mephiles. Shadow learns to become a kinder, less selfish person as time goes on. Scourge and Mephiles don't. Omega also has shades of this, being a robot programmed to follow orders and nothing more. However he frequently overrides his own programming as he starts to empathize with the inmates, leading him to defy several orders and even help them on occasion
- Hellsister Trilogy has Satan Girl and her son Berserker/Nemesis. The former is a mass of negative emotions given sentience and physical form, hence she lacks pity or compassion and regards people as playthings to be toyed with and then destroyed. Her son exhibits her same sociopathic ruthlessness, exacerbated by Darkseid's grooming.
- Lex Luthor from Kara of Rokyn has become utterly incapable of understanding or caring for other people after decades spent hating Superman. Whoever isn't on his side simply deserves to die, and Lex refuses to admit it's him who has systematically pushed everybody away.
- In Gensokyo 20XX, apparently this is the case with Yume Ni "Yu" Yakumo, a child, be noted, who apparently has this, seeing as she tried to throw another kid over a railing, the which of could have either killed or injured her, along with a nonchalant to eager tone about the other kids being her bitch. This isn't also helped in that she is also the bully.
- In Warp, decades of making harsh choices for the greater good have rendered Doctor Mother almost unable to feel pity or remorse. In her defense, her answer to being told she'll be killed by one of her victims is that she obviously had it coming.Victoria Dallon: You called her Garrotte. After you took her name. She's in the asylum now, struggling to come to terms with all the people her body chose to kill. She came here because she wanted answers. She wanted to know who had done that to her and why and — And you don’t care.
Doctor Mother: If we could control the results of the formula, we would. We cannot, and I won't insult your intelligence by feigning remorse for trying to do something about our imminent extinction in spite of that lack of control.
- In Colossus Joins Weapon X, most members of Weapon X feel nothing but clinical detachment for Colossus after abducting him to make him their new weapon, with the most they show towards him being a clinical disinterest in his suffering.
