AN: This is a crossover between Naruto and Batman, but it will also incorporate Teen Titans, the Justice League, and Young Justice. I couldn't put all the characters I wanted in the caption. Robin, Star Fire, Wonder Woman and Superman will heavily influence this story. I am planning to attempt at romance if it feels right, but I'm not gonna promise anything. Anyways, that is all. Enjoy it.

Apricity

Prologue

Motifs.

Beliefs.

Truths.

That was what separated Naruto and him. They both believe passionately in their cause and were willing to die for them. They both fought for friends or family—alive or dead—and the very right to exist and to continue to do so. They fought for freedom. They fought for what they thought was right, flawed as it may be. And there lied the crux of the issue. What they thought—what they believed.

Sasuke slowly staggered back onto his feet using his one remaining arm as leverage, swaying from side to side. Splotches of blood leaked down what remained of his left stump—forming a trail and staining the desolate stone red. Like ink blots, like crimson tears in memory of a long-forgotten friendship.

If he was being honest with himself, he missed those times—times where Naruto was able to annoy him so much so that it made him forget. Whenever the boy had gotten right on his face and proclaimed the dumbest things—becoming Hokage, winning over Sakura, defeating him. Those were the times when he had been forced to forget. Forget all the pain, hatred, and lies; remaining blissfully unaware. In those times, he did not see the dead. He did not hear their screams. He did not feel their anguish.

Eventually, however, it all came back; like it always did.

Naruto could not help him completely forget. Nothing could. Everything he had ever believed was a lie, there was no forgetting that. The truth had disappeared into this moral vacuum and all that remained was a vacuous well of lies—echoing of the walls like a siren's song, allowing people to believe whatever they wanted without consequences. That is what Naruto was asking of him now. To ignore and forget and move on—to let bygones be bygones and go back to the very place that fabricated the web of lies that eventually destroyed his clan. There would be no justice for all the wrongdoings Konoha or the rest of hidden villages committed day in and day out, not now that there was 'peace'. The dead would not receive any justice, and the living would not change. Sasuke could not accept that. This system that was the Shinobi world did not work and needed to be beaten, and he would do it.

His head spun as he forced one foot in front of the other. Nausea struck at him, and before he knew it, Sasuke was on his knees and emptying the contents of his stomach. The vomit mixed in with the blood, the red of the blood and the white of the vomit painted a grotesque portrait of human suffering on what remained of the statue of his ancestor. Spots danced at the edges of his vision; promising to take him away from the pain, from the heartache. He could feel the wind whispering in his ear, and the crashing of the waterfall beckoning him. It spoke of dreamless sleep and an end to suffering. Sasuke was almost tempted to give in. But then he blinked, and the faces of the dead, the same faces that had haunted him since the age of seven, flashed before his eyes—and he was there again, witnessing their deaths and powerless to stop any of it.

Mikoto.

Fugaku.

Itachi.

His pain urged him forward. The cloud fogging his mind lifted out of pure will. He couldn't lose. Not till he erased the very idea of shinobi from the face of the world. The hidden villages would fall and, with it, the very system that plagued their world. He would not stop until changing was the only option humanity had left. Even if it was through force. Yes, that was he would do. In order to create, he first had to destroy. He looked towards the form of his best friend lying five feet away and closed his eyes. A resigned sigh escaped his lips, a testament to his torment.

Peace.

That's what Itachi, Naruto, and Konoha preached.

Sasuke had heard that word enough times now that just the sound of it made him want to puke all over again. His clan had been slaughtered in the name of some vague notion of peace. Konoha had orchestrated a massacre and called it peace. They had broken his brother and called it peace. They had butchered civilians and women and children and called it peace. They let the hapless cries of the innocent go unheeded and called it peace. They had watched the Uchiha district burn and turn to ash and preached about the will of fire and called it peace.

If that was what they considered peace, Sasuke would show them war.

The Elemental Nations was a world where the strong ruled with an iron fist and the weak just watched with bent knees. There was no limit to the amount of suffering a person was willing to inflict on someone else—no matter how innocent, no matter how young, and no matter how old. To quench their thirst and hunger, there wasn't a line people were not willing to cross. Peace was an impossible feat to achieve because of that very fact. There would always be conflict, human nature deemed it so. Dark, vile, selfish and despondent it may indeed be, it always prevailed.

His face twisted in pain as he began to dredge up the meager remnants of his chakra. Lighting began to coalesce in his right hand and the chirping sound of a thousand birds shattered the stillness of the dreary dusk. He wobbled closer to the only person he had ever considered a friend. This was the price to pay for what he wanted to achieve. This was the price to pay for his ideals. With each step he took, the heavier they became. Sasuke knew it would always be that way. After this, the whole world would be his enemy, but that was fine.

He was fine with being the villain if that was the cost for revolution.

When Sasuke woke up, he felt like someone had dragged his head on a layer of fiery embers a hundred times over. His head was pounding—so much so that when he felt something touching him on his forehead it took him a few seconds to realize that it was his own hand. Face crumbled in a grimace and eyebrows scrunched behind his left hand, Sasuke woke up screaming. He used his other hand to hoister himself up on the bed so that his lower back laid comfortably against the sleeping pillows behind him. He was fully awake, there was no drowsiness to be seen as he took deep breaths and removed his hand from his head before looking up at the white marble ceiling above him. Faces flashed by, one after another; hatred and accusation in their eyes as they screamed and screamed and screamed.

"Stop!" Sasuke shouted at the lungs, but it was to no avail. "Damn it! Damn it! Damn it!" he cursed and cursed as he grasped at his head as if he wanted to crush it and shook it repeatedly. His mind felt like it was being ripped apart over and over again and he was powerless to stop any of it. Tears slid down his cheeks, leaving a trail on his frail skin, his nose was running and the childish shrieks that escaped him reverberated throughout the room. And then Sasuke stilled. He lowered his hands, lips and hands trembling all the while. There was something wrong, he could tell. The faces, he had seen those faces before. The accusation, the blame, the fear. It was like staring at the child Itachi had left in the Uchiha compound, with nothing but corpses as companions.

"Please," his voice was a whisper at first. "Mother," he called to the empty room. "Help me," he pleaded, willing everything away till his mother's smile was the only thing in his mind. Sasuke grasped and grasped for that smile that never failed to alleviate his worries. It was that smile that made the world look like a better place. It was that smile that reminded him of why he did what he did. It was that smile that made living not seem like the chore that it was. It was that smile that kept him from obscuring into madness. It was all he had left.

And it was not there.

When he thought of his mother, another dead person took her place. "No! No! No!" his hands were now gripping the dark comforter and the fitted sheets so hard that his knuckles lost all its colors. There was something utterly wrong—so wrong that it made his hair stand on end and his eyes to widen in fright. For what felt like the first time in his long life, his immaculate brain, the brain of an Uchiha, that was specifically hardwired with neurons and synapses specifically configured so that it was capable of processing and recording information at a rate unprecedented on an immaculate level—it was failing him. Sasuke could remember every day of his life as clear as the stars in a frosty night thanks to his eidetic memory. And yet, why could he not remember the face of his mother?

"Please, mother…Itachi…please…" he called and called, but there was no answer. There would be no answer. He was alone—so utterly alone. The mattress under him was cool and firm and the sheets over him felt soft and warm. When he was younger in age, this is what he imagined what a cloud would feel like. Now, however, it felt like he was trapped in a bubble—completely trapped and quickly running out of oxygen. Something in the meddle mess of his mind that had been taught to act on instinct was telling him that there was someone coming. Sasuke was too busy panicking to give it any thought—so busy was he screaming his lungs out.

Then there was someone firmly touching him arms, as if to keep him entrapped. "Master Bruce," there was a firm voice. A voice that pulled him away from the dark pit of despair and to the world of the living. He glanced up, eyes entirely too blurry and wet from the tears to be able to discern what was in front of him. There, in front of him, stood a man—with hair as bright as the sun, eyes as blue as the sky and smile as wide as the ocean. That face…his heart wrenched just at the sight of it. That was Naruto, he knew that. And then he blinked and he remembered—Naruto was dead.

The flames of Amaterasu had burned his body from existence.

And then he blinked again, slowly and confusedly and so utterly lost. A hand was on the side of his cheek now, caressing it gently in a way that reminded him of his mother's touch. But it was not her—even when forgetting her face, he knew. She was dead. Maybe it was Itachi? No, it couldn't be. His brother was also dead. Maybe this was hell then? A chuckle bubbled at the back of his throat at that mere thought. It was a hallow laughter, with no joy or humor behind it. Hell? For one with an immortal body and a soul as black as the night sky? Sasuke doubled over with titter until his throat perched—because there was no such thing. There wasn't a hell out there that would accept him after what he did. The tears did not stop and the pain did not stop, but he was far too gone to care.

The touch had retracted and there was that voice again—begging and pleading, but Sasuke did not care. All he could see was darkness and pain and he did not care. What remained of his heart cried and urged him to find some kind of light, but Sasuke did not care. And then there was a sharp snap and he was facing the other way. At the back of his vague mind, Sasuke realized he had been slapped. It had been as loud as a clap, with enough power behind it to snap his face back and leave a red welt behind. His mind completely stilled in panic, unable to process what just happened. His body, however, was not in the same wavelength. It had been conditioned to act—no matter the circumstances; whether he wanted it to or not. Instincts took over and he was moving with no thought behind it. Sasuke tensed his muscles and, in a convulsive gesture, sprang from his bed—his mind did not register the deep, high shout of surprise. In the blink of an eye, he was on the other side of the room before anything else could happen, before the voice could move to stop him. His bare hands and feet had a secure grip against the corner of the walls as they kept him suspended from the carpeted floor and against the ceiling.

Sasuke was far too gone, and his body was acting far too weird. His left arm felt like it didn't belong and yet it did, his legs felt too short and too weak, and his senses felt too unstable. The tears clouding his vision and spit blocking his breathing did not help either. Before he could even gather his bearings, his left leg crumbled beneath him. He let out a strangled gasp as he attempted to gather his grip. However, he was disoriented; his body disobeyed him, like it could not do what he wanted it to do. And then he was falling—and then Sasuke woke up. The voices, the faces, and the pain disappeared with adrenaline coursing through his veins. He flipped sideways and pushed against the cool wall with his right leg. Sasuke met the ground with his feet and bended knees like a feline. The bones on his knees cracked under him like it had never done before, but his head hurt too much for him to care. His left arm—which was feeling remarkably natural and nothing like the fake that had been made of Senju DNA—went instinctively for the seal on his right wrist to summon a shuriken.

When nothing happened, Sasuke looked down in annoyance as he breathed heavily with exertion and dread. What met his eyes was a bony, pale wrist and small hands that were too pretty and too docile to belong to the war-torn body it belongs to. There was that feeling again—like he didn't belong. That this was not where he was meant to be. What was wrong with him? Was this a genjutsu? Had he been poisoned? No, that was not possible. He was immune to both and no one had the gall to do such a thing—he had killed enough people to get that point across adequately well. What other explanation could there be then? His body couldn't possibly be this weak and this small. This—his vulnerability—it was appalling—this powerlessness was disgusting.

His head snapped up as he straightened from his crouched position as something slowly began to approach. There was another person in the room, he knew. He could hear the soft footsteps against the carpet. He could feel the vibrations along the floor. He could smell the cologne. And more than anything, he could taste the fear. It wasn't the fear that he was used to, however. It was something else—something his mother had displayed often enough when he attempted something dangerous. There it was again—at the mere thought of his mother, some dead woman showed up when he blinked. She was likely someone he killed, but Sasuke had no idea who. He shook his head in effort to shake the disturbing image off. The man continued to cautiously approach, and though non-threatening, Sasuke could not trust his life on something so trivial. He had learned that lesson early in life. He could only see blotches of white and black—the only colors the room seemed to consist of. His head and eyelids felt so heavy and wet and he hated feeling so weak and vulnerable; so powerless. Sasuke breathed a deep breath and wiped at his eyes. The colors swam into focus as he settled his heart and the calmness of battle took over. A frail-looking old man came into view. He was staring at him with concern and hands in a calming gesture as he slowly approached.

"Master Bruce," he spoke in that soft voice, eyes full of concern and a tinge of wariness, and those clothes—they looked familiar. He had seen them somewhere before. It was a black suit; consisting of a jacket with a white shirt underneath, a blazer, a pair of trousers, and matching shoes. It looked constricting and entirely uncomfortable, but the man moved effortlessly across the carpeted floor with grace and quietness. That mannerism looked eerily familiar and he did not know why. He did not know a lot of things. "It's me, Alfred. I won't hurt you."

His body flinched at the name unconsciously, shoved as it was into his face and he did not know why. He never heard that name before. Bruce, was that the name of someone he killed? Possibly, but Sasuke wasn't sure and not knowing what was happening was starting to piss him of. And yet, the older man knew Sasuke somehow—which wasn't surprising considering his reputation. Still, the older man daringly approached, and if he knew Sasuke by reputation alone then he wouldn't have dreamed of doing such a senseless thing. Which meant that he knew Sasuke personally—which was absurd. Aside from being completely out of reach from human contact, Sasuke never forgot a face—much less someone who personally knew him. His mind was floundering, and he reached for it with his right hand at an unsuccessful attempt to lessen the pressure while keeping his left eye at the old man. His head throbbed in a way that it never had before, and his vision was darkening by the second. His left leg suddenly gave out from under him, but his left knee and left hand were quick to regain his balance. The pain in his head was so unbearable that he barely even noticed.

A twisting gush of anger welled up in him. It was familiar feeling and it was so easy to give in to that anger and he latched on it. It was too easy—and it felt liberating to feel something other than pain and more pain. Anger gave him an objective—a goal and a target. It made him act. Sasuke narrowed his left eye at the man, directing all that anger and frustration at the only target he had. The man faltered in his step, and that gave Sasuke some satisfaction. To command such power—the feeling was otherworldly after feeling so repulsively weak.

It was invigorating.

Sasuke wanted to demand some answers as the man resumed walking, but he was in no position to do such a thing. Which, of course, meant that he had to escape. Just the thought of running made his stomach twist in disgust, but it was either that or passing out on the floor with a man he did not recognize in the same room. No matter what he could deem in the man's actions—the soft words and the soft touch that so reminded him of his mother—Sasuke could not and would not take a chance. He held no delusions of the way people felt about him. He was a liar, a cheater, a murderer, and a destroyer. The scum of all scum. He did not deserve or wanted love. He was not a likable person and his deeds portrayed as such. People considered him a devil of sorts, as they should, after all he had done in the name of his revolution.

It was unwise to stay in someone else's vicinity. He was a lot safer out there then in here.

It was an unfamiliar room and he had been in too much pain to properly study the layout, but he had gotten a glimpse of two escape routes. One being the opening along the wall right next to him that most likely led to another room. And then, Sasuke gave the doors at the other corner of the area a brief glimpse. That was the most obvious way out and it most likely led to a balcony of some kind. It was a large and lavished room and the man was old, which meant that there was no way the older man was going to be able to stop him from going out the balcony. Still, he did not think he would be able to run for long—not with this weak and powerless body. Which meant that, he gritted his teeth so hard in frustration—he would a need a weapon to protect himself.

Though he wanted to curse himself for being so weak, Sasuke instead preoccupied himself with finding a weapon. He hadn't expected to find a knife or anything of the like—not with his luck, but there was nothing he could use to efficiently kill someone. The room consisted of a bed with far too many covers, a table right beside the bed with a large computer on top of it, a flat-screen television taking up the whole wall in front of the bed, and heaps and heaps of books organized on shelves under the tv. And yet he could not find one weapon? Sasuke heaved a sigh before inspecting the top of the marble table right next to his escape route for something to use—anything. And then, just as he made to reach for a globe of sorts on top of the table—he noticed something that gave him pause. As a kid, he had been trained to navigate using the stars. It was one of the few tasks that Sasuke had enjoyed learning in the academy. The white globe with a golden handle that he had been reduced to used displayed the very same star constellations he had learned as a child.

Except, the constellations were all in a completely different order.

While that was puzzling in itself, beside it stood a picture that captured four people. Sasuke's eyebrows scrunched in confusion as he recognized the old man—the very same old man that was now about to block his escape route. Sasuke could not say he knew them, but what his heart hurt and tears renewed wallowing at the corner of his eyes as everything stilled. There was nothing around him except those faces—smiling and laughing without a care in the world. All that anger and frustration was quickly forgotten and that bottomless pit of despair once again threatened to envelope him.

Alfred Pennyworth looked frightened for but a moment as he stared at the slackened form of his master. He came to a stop as he rounded the bed—right between his young ward and the balcony door and black curtains keeping the sun at bay. "Master Bruce," he said evenly, hands going behind his back in attempt to hide the shaking his limbs and so that he could retain his composure. He looked down at the vulnerable child—and he could not help but curse himself for not being able to do anything as the child's heart broke right in front of him. He wanted to hug him, but Bruce was in a sensitive place right now. Anything could set him off, and so Alfred did what he could. He offered his support, "I am here for you—I will always be."

When the child did not respond, Alfred followed his gaze once more. His features seemed to age a few years as he looked at the picture. It was one taken just two years ago, back when the entirety of the Wayne family had been alive. Alfred, as it was customary in a Christmas morning, was serving handmade Christmas cookies and hot chocolate to Thomas and Martha Wayne as Bruce ripped open presents left and right under a Christmas tree that brightened the whole room. Alfred grimaced, closing his eyes and bowing his head. Everything had changed—Bruce most of all. Where before he had been a kind and expressive child, in a mere week after the death of his parents, Bruce had shut himself off the world. He hadn't left his room in all that time. Alfred seldomly saw him throughout the day. He had to force the child to eat and drink and at night—the nights were the worst. There was always screaming and nightmares—sometimes coherent but more often than not nothing ever made any sense. He said names with such emotion behind them—Mikoto, Itachi, Naruto. Always those names. He cried—sometimes all night until he fell asleep only to wake up screaming hours later. Bruce spoke of death, of justice, and of vengeance—and Alfred could only watch in helplessness.

Bruce had been clear that he did not want to see anyone for help, but Alfred was beginning to think that was the only option he had left. "Master Bruce," he called gently, bending over so he could be face to face with the seven-year-old. "Master Bruce," he repeated himself again when the child did not respond. "Master Bruce," this time his voice was a lot firmer and his ward—the most precious thing in Alfred's world, reacted...

Just not in the way Alfred had expected.

"Shut up!" Sasuke gritted through his teeth as he grasped at his head and fell to his knees, all the while looking at the picture. "This isn't real, it can't be!" There was something wrong. Why was his face in that picture? Why did he recognize these people? Fear clouded him. This had to be a genjutsu. It had to be. But even though it must have been a genjutsu and he really ought to have been looking for ways to escape, he instead looked down and away from the picture. He couldn't look at them; he couldn't bear to think about those faces—they were dead. His mother—that was not his mother. No, he did not know the dead woman that kept replacing his real mother. He did not know them; therefore, they were not real.

"Master Bruce," Alfred said with a calming tone he had often used during his days of service, reaching from the child but not taking one step closer. "Just breath. I'm here to help you."

Sasuke did not look up at the old man. Alfred, that was his name, his memories corrected him—Alfred Pennyworth, his butler and surrogate guardian. But he wasn't supposed to know that. He didn't know Alfred. He didn't know Martha and Thomas Wayne. Most of all, he did not know Bruce. They did not exist. He was the son of Uchiha Mikoto and Uchiha Fugaku. The Waynes—they did not exist. He was Uchiha Sasuke, the last of the Uchiha and the Demon Daimyo. That's right, that is who he is—or who he was. Uchiha Sasuke—and he had the power to do anything. He snapped his head up so quickly his neck hurt. "Release!" he snapped, and his chakra flared, because he could and would break through this illusion and when he did there would be hell to pay. He was going to kill them, the people behind this—and when he was done, they would be begging for mercy. He would cut off their tongue so they could not speak, their ears so they could not hear and, finally, gorge out their eyes so they could not see. They would pay—he would make sure of that.

"I don't know who you are," Sasuke continued when nothing happened, breathing vehemently. "And neither do I care. Whoever you are, once I find you, I will kill you." His chest was beginning to pain him as his chakra flowed from the bottom of his stomach to his eyes at an outrounding rate—too fast and far more than he usually needed. Activating his Sharingan was a gamble he did not want to take, not in his condition, but he did not have much of a choice.

In the next moment, as he saw Alfred's stunned eyes and gaping mouth and dumbstruck face, the feeling of exhaustion crept over him, chakra draining out of him. He didn't even have time to think about what the hell went wrong before his body failed him.

"Master Bruce!" a voice of horror said as Sasuke collapsed to the carpeted floor.

AN: Just a story I had in mind that I had to get out. Obviously, Sasuke is reborn as Bruce Wayne. Of course, I won't be just replacing him as Bruce or Batman—that would just be boring and a waste of time. He will be his own character with his own form of Justice. Sasuke won't be Godlike, otherwise there would be no story. You can expect a dark and often unstable Sasuke that, oftentimes, will be cruel and unapologetic. You have to figure, Sasuke was pretty much a God that achieved all the power he ever wanted to shape the world as he saw fit, but lost all the humanity he had left because of it. That will be what this story is about, him finding something to live for. Also, on that tirade Sasuke went into about his clan and Konoha and peace—I took that part from a story that used to be part of this site. However, I cannot give credit to the writer because I cannot find it anywhere on my favorite stories list and I can't remember the name. If you recognize it, feel free to leave a review with the name of the story. Thank you.