CLARITY:

STILL

And miles to go before I sleep.

It could not be said that the Batman was entirely sane. Not by any stretch of logic. No sane man would do what he did-could do what he did. His madness was what made him so terrifying and unpredictable. James Gordon often wished he could reassure his people that the Batman wasn't dangerous, but that would be a lie. The Batman was absolutely dangerous, because that was what he needed to be; that was what Gotham needed him to be.

Gotham was a city tormented into madness, and so also was its protector.

Gordon remembered one notable occasion, when he and Batman were both new to Gotham. He was working a stakeout, sitting in the rented apartment for hours on end, the bitter Gotham winter numbing his bones slowly through the building's ancient insulation. The narrow window his rickety chair perched before was rippled with age and drafty, the sub-freezing wind coming in gusts through the cracks. He'd brought a heavy blanket, draped over his lap, was wearing a thick coat, and was nursing a scalding-hot cup of coffee, but he was still cold. Stakeouts were boring. The subject of the stakeout was an old factory, suspected to be the headquarters of a heroin-dealing gang. If their tip was correct, there would be a major shipment tonight. Until things started happening, though, it was just boring waiting. Good officers had tricks they used to keep focused, to keep their minds on track. Some counted windows, others categorized the passing vehicles. Gordon played his own game: Spot The Batman. Or, since he had yet to actually find the Batman, Spot The Places The Batman Would Hide If He Were Here. He looked for all the dark corners, jagged rooftops, impossible perches, and deep shadows the likes of which he'd seen-on a couple rare occasions-the Batman appear out of.

A few buildings away from the factory was an abandoned office complex, built long ago enough to be bedecked in gargoyles and elaborate stonework. This was Gordon's prime choice as a Batman hotspot for the night. As he was scrutinizing the building, he noticed a slightly darker patch beside one of the gargoyles. He snatched up the binoculars on the floor beside him, and focused in on the shadow.

Hunched over on the edge of the rooftop, back against the driving snow, was the Batman. From the buildup of ice on his cape and cowl, he'd been there for a while. The massive shoulders were hunched, drawn up around the horned head, and a very faint cloud of steam billowed out from below the mask, proof that the Batman was indeed a living, breathing human being. Jim shivered as a particularly strong gust of wind whipped through the cracks in the wall, and he could see the Batman gather his cape around him a little tighter, a shiver rippling through the fabric. He shifted his armored form on the ledge, and Gordon was shocked to see him wince, seemingly in pain, as he moved.

Gordon abruptly lowered his binoculars.

For some reason Jim had never considered that Batman did the same work that the GCPD did. Stakeouts, evidence checking, tailing criminals. He had never thought, when Batman appeared with a file of evidence and an unconscious criminal, that it meant that he'd spent the last several nights on the rooftops, waiting and watching to catch the crook red-handed.

But there he was, shivering in the cold, apparently wounded, without even the thin protection of drafty walls. Gordon felt the urge to do something, to reach out, to make contact, to…

He didn't know. It didn't really change anything, this epiphany. Batman was still merely a shadow Gordon had been lucky (or unlucky) enough to be graced with. Still a distant, constant figure, and Gordon was still just a cop who could only try to keep up with the vigilante.

But…if Batman were human, if he could feel pain…Gordon hadn't really let himself think about it, before, but it meant that he could be killed. Could be wounded. Could be exhausted, aching, bleeding. And still fighting. Still protecting.

Most people would have thought that to find their larger-than-life hero merely human a disappointment, but to Jim Gordon it only made him greater.

The Batman was merely a man-a man who felt cold, but spent the nights on rooftops in the snow in hopes of catching a criminal. A man felt pain, but braved it to keep others from feeling it. A man who could be killed, but risked it to save lives. A man who, by virtue of being merely human, was something more.

Gordon watched the still figure on the rooftop until it vanished with the rising sun.

But I have promises to keep

And miles to go before I sleep

And miles to go before I sleep.

He could calculate to the day the number of years since he first donned the mask, but he won't. He could tally up the villains imprisoned by his hands like a sportsman keeping score, but he doesn't. He marks progress as he did at the beginning-with clean streets, low crime rates, smiling faces, though never faces smiling at him. And so many years later, so many anniversaries of too many deaths, he still watches over the city at night, forcing aching bones and sore muscles into impossible feats of human strength that should have been beyond his reach a decade ago.

The cold cuts deeply these nights, in a way he didn't remember it doing when he was barely thirty and full of idealistic rage, with still-new black Kevlar and unscarred fists. Back then, he could spend his nights swinging around the city, his morning training, and his afternoon in the office, and not feel the creeping need for sleep for two or three days. Back then, he was so certain that someday he would be able to hang up the cape, that someday Gotham would shine again. That he could be what the city needed, so assured that he'd chosen the right path, even as madmen arose to counter him. He'd burned so brightly, so darkly, in those early days.

Then Harvey fell—the best of them, twisted and scarred into something out of a nightmare. And the Joker kept killing, and killing, and killing, and there was nothing Batman could really do to stop him. Dick tumbled into his life, and Barbara, and Jason, and things were better for a while, but Dick left and Barbara got shot and Jason was murdered. For a long time, he wondered if he'd chosen the right thing, if he should just…stop. But he kept going, because Dick had left, and Barbara had gotten shot, and Jason had been murdered. And someone had to remember, to continue, to make it worth it. Time heals all wounds, they say, and he'd agree—but some wounds scar. Soon enough, there was Tim, and Cass, and so many other young faces that looked to him to make the world right again. And he tried to, for them, he really did, but there was so much wrong…

They were all grown now, grown or dead. And they left, to find their own way in the world, scattering across the planet, using what he taught them in a dozen different dying cities, leaving him alone with Gotham, the way things had started. Just the Batman and his city.

He dragged his scarred body to the rooftops of Gotham every night, shed the familiar terrifying shadow of the Batman across the streets. And when he felt like he ached too much to move, let alone fight, he remembered that it was working, that Gotham was getting better. It was safe to go out at night in parts of the city, now, and most of the large gangs had been destroyed. He'd made progress—Gotham was healing. And he forced himself to move, to fight—just one more night, he promised himself, each time he pulled the horned cowl over the aging face of Bruce Wayne.

As much as he wanted to be able to retire, to watch his city walk on her own, he knew that it would probably never happen in his lifetime. He would haunt the city's shadows for the rest of his life, slowly stitching her back together, until some night he got too old and slow and stupid to keep up. The city would claim him, like she'd claimed his parents and promised to do to him so many years ago. It would be a good ending.

The Batman would continue without him, he'd ensured that. It was important. So long as she needed him, Gotham would have a Batman.

The nights were colder, and he ached deeper than before, but the Batman still lurked in every shadow across Gotham, and the city slept in peace, blanketed in a layer of snow.

A/N: This is part of a Batman oneshot series called CLARITY. The rest are on my profile-if you liked this, please read the rest!