"All things truly wicked start from innocence."
- Ernest Hemingway

"Wake up. Love, get up. You need to go. Now."

His British accent is urgent on the word, alarming me as I slept. His rough hands shook my shoulders alarmingly as I slept, my body curled in a bawl with his jacket over me, a symbol of his protection over me. My eyes squinting, I notice it's dark outside still. The sun isn't up. I look up at him in question.

His handsome face looks down at me with fear.

I have never seen fear in him.

He has dark blue eyes, stubble around his mouth and on his chin. He rakes a hand through his light brown hair in stress, and he says urgently again, "Please, Chloe. You need to get up!"

I sit up, rubbing my right eye.

Not aware of my impending fate, of the seperation about to take place.

While struggling to wake up, a few masked mercenaries charge into our cell, reaching for me, and he leaves my bedside. I back up against the cold bars in fear, as he violently hits them, or throws them into the cell's bars, killing or knocking them out. I hear their bones crack, the twist of their arms.

Blood from the attacking mercenaries spread on the cobblestone beneath me, pools of red liquid staining the stone.

He's killed them in my defense.

I tremble.

"What. . .what's going on?" I stammer, barely getting the words out of my mouth when he comes after me and physically lifts me and has me in his arms. He covers his head with a hood, and his mouth as well. His eyes are only visible.

He is stronger than anyone I've ever met, proving so as he carries me like a child out of the cell, which has been destroyed during the riots, prisoners going insane.

As prisoners fight, while havoc and chaos wreak on the prison like a virus, he runs with me in his arms. I hold onto him for life, and I tighten my grip. He settles me down behind a few barrels, the two of us are together, hiding.

Only for a moment.

"What's going on?" I stammer, looking at him, tears stinging the sides of my eyelids. I attempt to blink them away.

"They're going to kill you if you don't escape," He removes the covering of his mouth, our faces inches apart, "You need to get out as fast as you can. Don't use the rope. Jump. Once you're out, run as fast and hard as you can. Get as far away as possible. Do you understand me?"

I let a tear slide down my cheek and hit my trembling lip. I nod, knowing he is looking after me.

"I won't go without you." I insist, my voice uneven and quivering.

I looked at his eyes, the most emotional and tell-tale aspect of him. You could tell everything he was thinking just from looking in his eyes, there was so much emotion in them.

I felt my heart throb so rapidly, I swore it was hitting my ribcage.

"No. I won't make it. Not this time. Only you." He says quietly, looking down, then at me.

I looked down, trembling, "No. . .no, I won't leave you here to die."

"Calm down, love. Now's not the time for fear. That comes later." He said, quoting something I had said, cupping the right side of my face in his hand.

He always knew what to say.

I nodded, a small smile coming to my lips, my eyes brimming with tears. A few tears fell from my eyes, but I tried to smile through them. I arched my eyebrows and gave in, closing my eyes and kissing him, linking my arms around his neck.

"I love you." I murmur, and he kisses me one last time in response.

We are together for the last time.

We break apart. He puts the cover over his mouth again, and looks around him. He leans over me and lifts me easily, running, carrying me to the stone walls, ropes hanging down in means of escape attempts. He brings me to the stone and helps me.

As he lets me go, prisoners go after him, charging at him. He is strong, muscular.

But not enough to take on fifteen prisoners at once.

Tears run down my face as I stand above on a stone platform, the night sky above me inviting me to escape into the outside world. I look down and I see them attacking him. "Go! Chloe, damnit! Go!" He barks at me, the attackers tearing at him, ready to rip him to pieces.

I see his eyes, those eyes that were so emotional, as they overtake him.

"I love you." He says in a murmur, and looks up at me, and he disappears.

I scream out his name, a heartbreaking plea, but I recieve no response. I choke out a sob and realize he is gone, no longer by my side, my second half ripped apart from me.

I climb as quickly as I can, out of a prison deemed impossible to escape. I stand at the top and look at the dark night, the moon hanging high above the desert, the villages in the distance. The air is cool in the summer night. He's not here. I remember what he had told me, to run as fast as I can, to run far away and do not look back.

Almost blinded by tears, I run into the night.

My eyes took a minute to re-focus, my vision faltering and shaky. I blinked a few times, and I was thrown on the ground, knocking the wind out of me for a minute. I get kicked in the stomach, buckling over in pain.

I was thrown in front of a man with combat boots, a shaved head, extremely muscular, a respirator mask on his mouth, dark combat pants and a bullet-proof vest.

I choked on a cough, my wave of blond hair in my eyes. I attempted to sit up, and the two men who were dragging me had two guns pointed at me. The older one looked at the man who was in front of me, combat boots in my face.

I was in Gotham City Hall. I looked up at the man, the monster I was thrown to. I look at his eyes, and I feel so much shock that it almost stops my heart for a minute.

Dark blue, emotional.

Bane.