Chapter 4: Identity Crises

Sitting on a wooden bench at a dark, empty park, Saitama massaged his throbbing temples as a chilly breeze scattered some fallen leaves across the grass. The memory of using his rapid punches to obliterate the Riddler, his henchmen, and even his innocent captive kept replaying in his mind, torturing the hero as he attempted to get a grip on what had happened.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with me, but I just want to go home,” Saitama sighed out loud as he leaned back on the bench. “The supermarket was having a bargain later this week. Slightly-damaged cabbages were 75% off…”

Standing up, he knew that sitting there wouldn’t help him return to his home dimension. Racking his brain for answers, he remembered the greyish cube that the Joker had activated to bring him there in the first place, where Saitama snapped his fingers as he realized that locating that device would be the obvious course of action.

Dashing out of the park, the overpowered hero immediately ran into his next problem: this “Gotham City” was huge, and he’d totally forgotten the specific alleyway that he’d been teleported to.

“Crap, it’s still nighttime here so nobody is out on the streets, and I need to ask for directions!” Saitama lamented to himself. “I guess I’ll try going door-to-door…”

Clearing several neighborhoods in a matter of seconds, the caped baldy eventually arrived at a row of houses and came skidding to a halt in front of one of the doorsteps. Pounding his fist into the solid oak door, Saitama could eventually hear approaching footsteps as a porch light was switched on. Moments later, an old lady nervously opened the door and peeked her head out.

“Um…may I help you?” She asked nervously.

“Pardon me, ma’am, but have you seen a wrecked car with a dead clown inside?!” Saitama asked loudly, his face filled with intense determination. Unfortunately, this terrified the elderly lady, and she promptly slammed the door in his face.

“Ah well, onto the next one,” the hero chuckled with a small smile. He then proceeded to visit the remaining 27 houses on the street, only to end up with many doors being slammed in his face and those who did answer had no idea what he was talking about.

After finishing the neighborhood, Saitama found himself weary over dealing with people, and as he turned around to take a last look at the darkened houses, more disturbing thoughts began to enter his mind.

“These useless people. Wouldn’t it be hilarious if I were to make them all suddenly explode?” the bald hero asked himself, which resulted in a stupid grin spreading across his face as he began to laugh out loud. Curling his right hand into a fist in his red-gloved hand, Saitama aimed it at the neighborhood and reared his shoulder back.

As he threw the punch, the hero came back to his senses just in time and was able to redirect the blow skyward at the last second, resulting in a mile-wide hole getting blasted through the dreary clouds above.

“What the hell is wrong with me?!” Saitama exclaimed as he fell to his knees, his gloved hands gripping his smooth, round head. “I almost murdered every single person in this neighborhood!”

With his previous thoughts combined with the incident with the Riddler earlier, there was no doubt something wrong with the one punch man. Having only been whisked away out of his dimension mere hours ago, Saitama knew that something recent must happened to him to change his behavior in such a drastic way. Thinking back to the fateful encounter with the joker, he suddenly remember when the villainous clown had cracked open his own tooth to breathe some unknown chemical in his face.

“That disgusting green gas, is it turning me evil?” Saitama asked out loud with a sigh. “Well that’s just great, that means I’m going to have to go to the doctor’s.”

Returning to his feet, the bald hero looked off into the distance to spot the same hospital that he’d laid eyes on early. Shaking his head to clear it of any further thoughts of violence, he bent down and jumped high in the air, coasting over the city below as he flew in an arch towards the medical center.

“Yeah, Bruce, it’s gone. Like the whole building has been reduced to a fine dust,” Nightwing said as he spoke into his communicator, running a finger over a tipped-over shelf amidst the ground floor of what used to be the warehouse. “I don’t know what that man’s powers are, but this destruction wasn’t well thought out. Innocent people could have gotten hurt.”

“Well, do you feel like speaking to the gentleman yourself? I just caught him on CCTV. He’s heading towards a Gotham Health center,” billionaire Bruce Wayne spoke through the other end of the communicator. “But Dick…be careful. I have a bad feeling about this guy. Let me know when you’re about to engage.”

“Of course, in fact I was about to ask if you wanted to join me, but I forgot about your fight with Killer Croc the other night,” Nightwing replied with a wince. “How’s your shoulder, by the way?”

“On the mend, I’ll be fine in another night,” Bruce stated flatly. “Did you need me to send Robin to join you then?”

“I’ll be fine, the kid will only slow me down,” Nightwing said through a slight smile. “I’ll let you know when I make contact.”

Hanging up, the dark-clad hero used his incredible agility to leap and scale a building, running cross the rooftops of a neighboring factory complex as he dashed towards the nearby hospital. He wasn’t sure what to expect from the strange, white and yellow-caped man that he’d watched from a distance, but with his destructive abilities being made abundantly clear, he wanted to take no chances.

His hand brushing over his well-stocked utility belt, Nightwing continued on in the darkness of the chilly Gotham night as he awaited confrontation with the one punch man.