[This is different than feeling small. This is different than feeling like a disappointment. This is feeling like poison, like sickness. He looks at Dave, he hears him, and he tastes krypton in his throat.]

No? Too bad. 'Cause it's the truth. And if you don't want me hiding things from you, then you're not going to get it.

[He knows it's dramatic and stupid, but he knows that his silhouette would be a nightmare with a change in headgear. So he changes it. Dirk pulls off his shades. Orange eyes, directly on Dave. He doesn't care if it's melodrama. He needs Dave to believe him.]

You want to know the truth about me being rational? I was bullshitting you and me both. I told you it was to get an advantage, but it isn't really, that's just what I said to justify coming back for these fights. The truth is that when I heard that Reaper talk to me in my own fucking voice, I wanted nothing more than to make it shut up. I didn't rationally decide that your pain was worth learning how to fight them; I just tricked myself into thinking you'd never find out. The exact same way I tricked myself into thinking it's rational to Strife them instead of admitting to myself that it's just my totally irrational mind going through another one of its batshit double loop-the-loop rollercoaster trips of a thought process to justify more narcissistic self-destruction.

So no, it wasn't the rational thing, and no, you getting hurt isn't an acceptable loss against a strategic advantage. That was never what this was about. This was me, being a self-absorbed dick, again, and thinking I could escape the consequences of my fuck ups.

[He takes a breath. Water in his lungs but it feels like air. He's pretty sure he's about to break the shades in his fist, but hey, it's just a dream. Who cares?]

You deserve better than that. You're worth more than that. I'm sorry for everything I did and said to act against that.