Final Farewell
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Bruce had been alive a week ago. Granted, his hands were a little shaky and his breathing sounded worse than usual, but he had been alive. This means that Diana is having trouble wrapping her head around the fact that he is dead. He is gone; still, cold, and nestled in the soft velvet lining his cherry wood coffin. It had been roughly a year and a half since they'd seen each other last. Had she not stopped by after preventing a nuclear meltdown in Peru, scrubbing up in the second floor guest bathroom, she wouldn't even have gotten that half assed goodbye.
Somehow that stings more than his actual death.
Immortal, Diana's had the privilege over the years to watch her friends and comrades go out like lights. Shayera. Wally. Donna. John. While Man's World advanced with flying cars and spaceports, cancer cures and AIDS prevention, those that she loved still fell ill or aged…and died. Even Cassandra, with her strength to move mountains and lasso from Ares, has aged beyond recognition. Selfishly, she'd thought that Bruce, who had hung on longer than anyone expected, would continue through to the next century.
She stands up straight, wearing black stockings that haven't seen the light of day since Helena passed and a skirt suit reminiscent of Lois Lane-Kent. Of course, Diana's reflects the new Spring fashions, which it should, considering it had only been bought two days before. Kal stands beside her with his shoulders slumped forward. His hair is slightly longer, salt and pepper at the temples, and his sad blue eyes crinkle in the corners with fine wrinkles. And as long as the Sun stays small and yellow, that's about as old as he should ever look. All S.T.A.R. labs has to do is keep the reactions going, a little gizmo launched off every billion years or so, after the initial period, and the last son of Krypton will be just fine.
Her ceremonial Amazon garb would have been more fitting for a warrior's funeral, but this is Bruce Wayne's funeral, not Batman's, and even now they can't afford to give his secret away. Television crews are stationed everywhere, vid sets rolling to pick up every angle, and Diana wishes they would just go away. Bruce wouldn't want it to be like this, but the last wishes of a dying billionaire go unheeded by the clamoring masses. So she stands there, dressed like a widow in sensible shoes and a veil half covering her face and holds tightly to Kal's coat sleeve.
Here they are nobodies; perhaps thought to be relatives of Terry's visiting as moral support. After all, Diana Troy disappeared a long time ago and Clark Kent, Kal's earthly persona, died fifteen years ago when his wife did. Obviously, Barbara had said, there was no logical reason for Superman and Wonder Woman to attend this public fiasco. She wonders what Bruce would have to say about the two of them, side by side and untouched by time.
Quite frankly, she doesn't think he'd say anything at all.
For some reason, Diana always believed that Batman would be buried with Bruce. Not because she ever thought the Mission would fail, but, because she'd had a naïve hope that he would complete it within his lifetime. No more children losing their parents over pocket change and pearl necklaces, no more deranged psychopaths terrorizing the alleyways, and Gotham City safe as houses. But Terry stands off to the side, flanked by Dick, Barbara, and Dana, and she knows that it's not meant to be. Diana wonders if Terry will pass on the cape and cowl one day, to his own child, an orphan off the streets, or if the Mission will be buried with him. That thought alone makes her stomach twist uneasily and she doubts it anyway; the idea is probably enough to make Bruce turn in his grave.
League business will go on like usual. The new Batman, still new even if Terry has carried the mantle for more than a decade now, is elusive at best. His mourning, moving, and marriage will have little effect on the day-to-day activities of the team. She and Kal will return to the Fortress of Solitude, suddenly a very fitting name, and monitor the universal goings on. Sometimes they'll assist the new Leaguers but, more often than not, they'll be three galaxies away fighting some big bad before it has a chance to come to Earth. Loss prevention and sage advice seem like the only things they are good for now days.
They are respected relics, not unlike DVD players and hybrid cars.
Some important dignitary, whose name Diana doesn't care to remember, delivers the eulogy. She doesn't listen to the words and knows they'll never be able to grasp at the full goodness of Bruce's life. He was a brilliant detective, defender of the innocent, the one who kept the League honest, and a human who stood equal among metahumans. He was the third part of their whole, Bruce, Clark, and Diana. Without him, there's a cold, pronounced emptiness wedged between herself and Kal. She wonders if that's what he meant when he said he was sorry.
They had wanted to be pallbearers, to accompany him on this last stage of his journey, but the privilege had been denied to them. After all, it wouldn't do any good for some overanxious reporter to get nosy, pick up their voices on audio, and trace them back to their heroic sources. Kal said, voice dripping with distain, that even the idiots reporting the news these days can usually put two and two together. Especially when they have computers doing most of the work for them. Terry's protective over his future with Dana and is more careful, bordering on paranoid, about his secret than Bruce ever dreamed of being.
Instead, Kal leads her to the coffin, his hand gentle on the small of her back, and she bends over to kiss Bruce one last time. Ever since Lois died, all anyone could ever talk to her about was closure. Barbara, Cassie, Kara, everyone, wondered when they will finally come out in the open about their feelings for one another. But even with Bruce dead, her first real love buried, Diana knows it will never be that simple. She and Kal have lived together for the better part of seven years, he cooks her breakfast and she helps tend to the various alien beings enclosed in artificial environments. They've been having sex, making love, fucking, depending on the mood that day, for about nine or ten.
It was out of respect for Bruce, and Lois's memory, that they were never vocal about it. And anyway, Diana thinks, they're too old to play games and labels are more fitting for infatuated teenagers than beings such as themselves.
Tomorrow will be the same as yesterday and next week the same as a year ago, except, of course, that Bruce is dead and there's no cooperating power in Heaven or Hell that can bring him back.
After laying a rose down on inside the coffin, Diana grabs Kal's hand and starts walking towards the cathedral doors. There will be plenty of time to visit privately with Terry in the following weeks, but today all they can do is look after each other. So Diana fights back tears as they take off into the sky, swearing she can hear the Batwing zooming off ahead of them.
If the gods are merciful, and she is allowed to die with Kal someday, Diana knows they will be reunited with Bruce in Elysium.
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Fin
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Notes: The Helena in question is Helena Sandsmark, not Helena Bertinelli/Huntress. In Greek Mythology, the Elysium fields were the final resting place of the souls of the heroic and virtuous. "Kal" refers to Kal-El, Superman's given name. This fic is loosely based on the Justice League episode "Epilogue." The reactions in the Sun's core fuse hydrogen into helium – the gizmo in question is theoretical, basically a way to keep the Sun in its yellow star phase. Obviously that wouldn't be a problem for about 5 billion years, but it's a general nod to Superman's powers and supposed immortality due to such.
I hope you enjoyed, even if it was a bit angsty.