Rick Deckard is the protagonist of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? but he is far from a hero. Deckard is a morally ambiguous man who aspires toward wealth and success because he believes it will fulfill him. He becomes disillusioned with his work as he develops empathy for the same androids that he is ordered to kill. Deckard’s wife Iran accuses him of being a murderer due to his work as a bounty hunter. Deckard is initially able to ignore this insult; he believes Iran is simply trying to goad him. The more time he spends with androids, however, the more her insult burrows into his thoughts.

Through the Voight-Kampff test, Deckard uses empathy and its absence to decide whether someone is an android or a human. If they do not show the requisite amount of empathy, he judges them to be an android and he is licensed to kill them. When Deckard begins to empathize with androids, Iran’s insult manifests in his mind. He begins to suspect that his job is not an amoral exercise of the state’s will. Due to the sophistication of the androids, Deckard fears that Iran may be right: He may be a murderer.