There is a 3-foot wall of stone where the study used to be, several square feet of wooden stakes tied with orange plastic flags where the master bedroom will soon be, and a large, smooth slab of drying concrete where work on the pantry has begun. Bruce walks alongside it all in Italian leather shoes, the mud and plaster caking on the edges of the soles while Alfred eyes him, glaring exasperated daggers at how he's ruining the custom work. If he's honest with himself, he doesn't even think about what he's wearing, only interested in the painstakingly slow progress unfolding before him. Delays in international shipping have stalled progress on several portions of the manor, the entry door stuck somewhere on a ship in the Sargasso Sea and hundreds of tiles tied up in Greek customs for reasons his head aches too much to understand.
It's been over a year since work has begun on the first room, and the few foundation stones that were salvaged from the fire are the only familiar aspects of the strange, spidery, half-constructed behemoth in front of him. It's dragged out long enough to be ridiculous. He mumbles this to Alfred, who reminds him of his pledge to rebuild it brick by brick, exactly as it had been.
The foreman tells him that it's safe to stay in one of the finished portions if he wants to return. Bruce looks at the plaster and drywall dust littering one of the "finished" rooms, bent nails and opened plastic packages underfoot, and tells him as politely as he can that he'll wait until the job is done.
In all of his visits here, he's found bits and pieces of detritus left behind in the fire, some too burnt to bother with and others singed keepsakes that he slips into a pocket when no one's looking. As construction moves forward, he's conflicted – he wants it to be finished, but he's anxious thinking of small memories getting paved over and buried beneath progress. Almost better to leave what's left of the original, he thinks, than to bury everything that once was. He keeps his mouth shut, though, following the foreman into one of the finished rooms.
The men he's hired have done their work well, following old blueprints and photos and records, but the smell is too new, too fresh, so much so that it makes his stomach turn. The floorboards, fresh red maple from Maine, don't creak, and the large bay window one of the men's cranking open is just a shade off-color. It's too clean and new, the only mark on the panes a faint outline of the manufacturer's sticker before someone peeled it off, and he can't stand it.
They ask him if he likes it, and he nods, turning out of the room before they can read the opposite from his expression.
When he's walking out, Alfred following, two of the workers drop a windowpane while carrying it up the newly finished staircase. Another week's delay there, he thinks. Shards fly, men duck and curse, and Bruce keeps walking, saying nothing as Alfred follows him, waiting for him to enter the car and then closing the door behind him.
With everyone, it seems, gone, the manor far from finished and his nights noticeably freer, he doesn't see any reason for Alfred's help anymore. The older man reacts as Bruce expects he might, upset but quietly dignified, and he goes to pack his things for a long vacation with little argument. Bruce promises it's only temporary, and Alfred's look in response says that his very life is going to depend on that, thank you very much.
Bruce sees him off, lifting his suitcases for him into the back of the limousine, and they exchange tight-lipped hugs and handshakes before Alfred slips into the back of the car, the first time in a long time.
Before he shuts the door, the younger man promises, again, that it's not forever. The door shuts and he watches the limousine drive away, leaving him alone for the first time he can ever recall.
When he returns to the penthouse, he sees it for the first time as what it is – a pad, a temporary holding cell, suspending him in purgatory eighty stories above everyone else. It's fitting, because he doesn't know what to be now. Friends of his father are alienated from him after his display nearly two years ago, just before the manor was burnt down; without his dearest friend, as well as the man he'd let be destroyed, he doesn't have the will to entertain; and without Batman, without the identity he'd created, he isn't sure what else to be. He had tried to help, truly and sincerely, but no one believed him to be on their side.
His footsteps echo in the large bedroom, the sound almost deafening. He reaches out to touch something, anything, to feel something tangible when he has nothing inside to cling to. There are no traces left of Batman, now. Most of the equipment had, of course, been burned when he'd prepared to turn himself in, and he'd hidden the rest after Dent's death.
He's full of resentment that has no clear target, and he doesn't want to admit that the level of his hatred scares him. He knows only one other person with such blinding malice inside.
Gordon, who's not spoken to him in months, insisted that he could never be such a person. Bruce knows he's wrong.
Relieved of his alter ego and his normal trappings of billionaire bachelorhood, he ventures out to the normal world below with no other concerns weighing on his mind. He remembers what his father said about leaving the workings of the company to more interested men, and understands the sentiment completely. Day in, day out, he signs the checks and leaves, trusting others to do what he can't bring himself to anymore.
Maroni is dead, but the freakish plots of their last enemy have done their work, the streets returning to the decaying state they'd known before Dent had shown up to save them. Iron bars now cover the windows of businesses that had just worked up the courage to remove them. Trash litters the alleys, piling up to first-story windows, the smell gagging passersby who discreetly cover their mouths with handkerchiefs. There's no guarantee of safety for anyone, now, with criminals arrested by haggard, overworked officers and churned right back out into freedom by an equally strained court. The mob had hated Dent, for obvious reasons, but no one had imagined what a supposedly crazy nobody was going to wreak upon them.
A man's scream rings out when he passes a payday loan shop (the dingy, half-carpeted, badly fluorescent-lit shop that replaced the reservation-only French restaurant), the sound pulsing in his sternum. A knife flashes before plunging into the man's chest again. He gurgles for help, but a random stabbing doesn't attract the authorities' attention as it once did.
He stares for too long, and their gazes lock, the man's eyes full of agony.
Bruce looks away, and it dawns on him that he truly does not care. He had tried to save them, tried to exact justice for a system that had let his father's killer go free, and they had still turned their backs on him for what they believed he had done.
He wishes he could have been the one to stab the man.
Arkham scares Bruce, not because of its obvious deficiencies and high-profile patients and the general air of hopelessness, but because if he was anyone else, his stint as Batman would have landed him here long ago.
When the streets become too much, he decides that he has to come here. The man who has unraveled everything in a matter of days is kept here, unpunished for his crimes, kept sedated while others are jailed, all too cognizant of the lives he's ruined through his antics.
It isn't fair. Bruce gains entry, feigning an interest in visiting the man who has destroyed the city and therefore negatively affected his company's image, he lies. Psychiatric facilities are not typically forums for staring and gawking at the infirm, this he knows, but the receptionist waves him in anyway.
A doctor meets him, giving a limp-fish handshake before taking him on an unnecessary tour, likely stalling before taking him to see who he'd come for. There is a cafeteria on the right side of the first hallway, and it's shared by both the staff and the patients, although there's a hard wall of reinforced glass between the two glaringly different groups. No one is helping the more incapacitated inmates, and the scene on the patients' side reminds him of the biblical lions' den. He wouldn't be surprised if the daily headcount is lower at the end of each mealtime.
He doesn't see who he is looking for. A nurse gets up, refilling her coffee at the machine, staring blankly as the cup fills. A few drops splash onto her white scrubs, but she doesn't even seem to notice. An orderly smacks a patient, and Bruce flares his nostrils, shooting a glance at the doctor to say something.
Nothing is done. In here, it seems, the only treatment is crude, violent correction or massive indifference. He wonders briefly how well some take such treatment, and thinks that there are likely more than a few bandaged and broken limbs among the staff.
"Come on," the doctor says, softly, like he has as little faith in this place as Bruce does.
The hallway is sticky, dust and hair matted to drying puddles of bodily fluids. There's a janitor at the other end of the hallway making more of a mess than when he started, spreading nearly-black mopwater over the sticky stains. The stale, antiseptic scent is terrible, like an old elementary school restroom. He wonders if sedation masks the odor at all.
"End of the line," the doctor says, indicating that they've reached the end of the minimum security wing. The elevator that opens smells even worse than the hallway, the air mustier, the sense of utter despair almost palpable.
The elevator lurches downward clunkily, slowly, until it suddenly plunges. Bruce grabs onto the safety bar, staring at the doctor, who doesn't seem to notice anything until he hears Bruce's muffled gasp. "Does that," he says. "No one's been hurt yet."
He takes a dignified deep breath, but keeps his hand on the safety bar. "I'm not interested in being the first," he snaps. "You're telling me this place can't spare enough to repair this?"
The doctor bristles. "No. We can't."
They reach the bottom with a surprisingly soft thud. When the doors open, the cold and the dank set his bones to an almost immediate ache. This, he thinks, must be the last stop, the refuge of the lost, the corner where the hopeless and the truly hated are shoved. No one would deserve it, he thinks, especially if the person was expected to improve.
Bruce half-listens to the doctor's explanation of why they're keeping the most dangerous patients down here. High suicide risk, he says, even with heavy restraints and sedation. Too risky to keep them on a higher level, especially in some of the oldest rooms still containing windows. Their behaviors are too threatening to other, relatively more stable patients. Punishment. Satisfaction needed to be made due to their transgressions.
Bruce stops listening and glances into each passing room. They're all empty.
At the end of the hall, there's a woman outside the last heavy, reinforced door. She's staring through the window, one much larger than the windows on the minimum security wing. The doctor explains they're for easier viewing, as the patients down here must be monitored almost constantly.
Bruce wonders why he keeps speaking in the plural, for it's obvious they've shoved this patient where it's long since been deemed inhumane to keep anyone, even for this place.
There's a puddle of green water in the corner, and the woman's white heels are on the edges of it, becoming stained. She can't take her eyes off the patient. This has long become a circus, Bruce fears, and he assumes that she's one of the many affected by the madman's deeds.
He stands to the side until she turns to look at him. Her eyes are red and shiny with unshed tears. He tries to smile. "Did you lose someone?"
She cocks her head and furrows her brow. "In the hospital…hospital explosion," he clarifies.
She shakes her head. "No," she replies, "I'm his psychiatrist."
Bruce swallows hard, wondering if her tears are from information overload or unimaginable stress. "That must be quite a job."
He gets a smirk in return. "Easier than you think. All they've ever asked me to do is medicate him. He may speak occasionally, but it's…it's sad to listen to. I don't think I could ever really speak to him in the way that he wants me to."
"And how is that?"
She seems to think about it. "To agree with him," she says. "To understand him."
"No one would want to understand him."
"I disagree," she says, almost violently. "I want to understand him. I just don't think I have the capability."
"Why would you want to?"
Her cheek twitches, and she wipes at her eye. "So that I could help him. To break through. The frustration I feel in denying treatment when I could be doing something better. There's so much pain there-"
He clears his throat to drown her out. He can't listen to her garbage. He tries to change the subject. "Can I ask why you're crying?"
She sighs and looks to the doctor, who's looking more uncomfortable by the second. Bruce looks at both of them, back and forth, waiting for one of them to speak. They take too long, and he loses interest, going to look through the window.
He's lying there, his head lolling to the right on the tiny pillow, and his limbs are restrained. He's wearing only the standard-issue uniform, the short sleeves not fit for the cold surroundings, the legs too short, exposing part of his lower calf. The ancient thick leather restraints make his bony limbs appear even more pathetic. The furniture in the room consists only of the bed that he's lying on and a toilet in the corner. There aren't even sheets on the mattress – another suicide risk, he remembers the doctor saying now.
The man on the bed barely moves, his chest moving so slowly that Bruce thinks for a minute that he's dead. He can't hear inside, but every movement looks labored and painful.
The doctor finally speaks, but Bruce doesn't bother to turn around. He keeps his gaze locked on the man on the bed, and only turns his head when the doctor says something that makes his heart sink.
The woman hides her face, Bruce can tell out of the corner of his eye, and he tries not to let his own reaction show. He asks the doctor to repeat, and swallows.
The doctor does so, and Bruce eventually nods. His enemy, the man who has tested and unraveled everything good men have worked for, is, in this doctor's opinion, not likely to live much longer. The doctor only says that he's sorry, but there's nothing more to be done.
Bruce understands – if they cannot legally kill him, they'll slowly neglect him until it comes for them. Powerful anger and petty satisfaction mix inside of him, and the woman beside him cries fully.
He can't understand her tears and wonders if she's heavily medicated too. He's getting angry now. "Why are you crying? Don't you know what this man did? What he could do if he continued to live?"
She wipes at her eyes, shielding her face from him. She explains, her voice thick, that despite all he had done, it was better for him to live as an example, a unifying figure, than for him to die and for everyone to forget.
The doctor intervenes before Bruce can respond. "Mr. Wayne, if you wish to enter the room and see the patient, I'll call a guard in to watch. I have other patients to attend to today."
Bruce watches the man's breathing. He mulls over going in, what good it would do, what possible closure he could get when the man doesn't know who he is. The man suddenly coughs violently, the strain in his neck evident as he's pinned to the mattress, and Bruce decides that now could be his only chance.
He turns to the doctor and nods. The doctor nods back, and begins to walk away, coaxing the crying woman with him. She drags her feet and he whispers words that Bruce strains to hear, but still cannot.
He's soon alone, and the solitude is already unbearable in this terrible hall, for he's left alone with thoughts that chill him. Without Batman, without a modus operandi, there's nothing to convince him to spare this man's already short life, and he's not sure he's strong enough to keep from doing it. It's not fair for him to get away so easily, he thinks, not fair to not be punished again and again for what he's done. What he's taken away. For unraveling what he'd believed he could fight for, spitting in his face and literally laughing at him.
Bruce clenches his hands into tight fists until it hurts. Everything hurts. The man doesn't deserve to live, but his heart aches for vengeance, for miserable suffering for the rest of his life, for years and years. And yet, the man is a product of the same society that had turned its back on Batman after their unmasked savior had been destroyed.
He knows, has told himself over and over again, that he is only one event away from being the poor soul strapped on the mattress inside that awful room, and if anyone were to expose him, he'd be locked away in a cell like this, Arkham or simply the penitentiary.
The guard arrives, looking annoyed, and he figures any chance he has at changing his mind about going is likely gone. He steps aside to let the man open the three locks on the heavy rusted door, and nods grimly when the guard tells him not to hesitate if anything should happen.
He steps in when the guard holds open the door, and suppresses his jump when it slams behind him. He glances back to see him standing just outside, his gaze directly on both of them, ready to burst in and incapacitate the patient if necessary.
Taking one closer look at him, Bruce doesn't see how he even has the energy to keep breathing. He is gaunt, skin sallow, his face terrifying and yet sweetly sad with nothing to cover it. It has always struck Bruce at how much the Joker has separated himself from everyone through layers and layers of fabric, much like he had (no, nothing like it, he repeats), and how truly domineering he appeared when he showed himself. This was not a man who dressed fine because he prided himself on his appearance, but because he used that appearance as one of his best weapons. Without the coat, Bruce remembers, he was a slight little man, wiry but tough (certainly tough).
He hardly recognizes the criminal here now. It's hard to tell if he's asleep, sedated, or just focusing every molecule of energy on functioning. Bruce wonders what he is truly dying of – neglect, regret, despair, or emptiness. When he looks at him, he sees a wasted life, and one that could have been like his. A coughing fit begins again, terrible and gurgling, then wheezing, until it finally stops.
Bruce doesn't believe in God, he doesn't think, but the best way to describe the scene he's experiencing is that the deity has realized his greatest fuckup and is trying to hide the evidence by killing him young. He's surprised to feel sad about that.
He has to concentrate and have words with him. He walks closer, his shoes making a creaking sound as they peel from the sticky floor. When he's by his side, the sound of labored breathing makes his own lungs ache in what he doesn't want to be sympathy. It's obvious that his pain is intense, his eyes squeezed shut against everything, like he's willing himself to be gone from it all.
He swallows. It's awkward. He doesn't even know if the man can articulate words or see what's going on around him. The need to lash out is agonizing, but, damn him, the man on the bed is so pathetically fragile that it would be like hurting a child.
Bruce has long accepted that things are rarely fair, but he's never hurt like this.
He has to do something, anything, get some kind of closure before he loses his nerve. He remembers the walk here, the crime and decay and filth that had crept back into place before it had all been shot to hell, and sighs. "You got your wish."
The bed shakes just slightly with a spasm, and Bruce sees him tighten up, sweat beading on his forehead with the effort. Bruce waits for him to respond, but seconds pass and he realizes that it was just a flash of pain. Maybe it's better like this, he thinks, for him to get closure, to accept what had been done without the Joker receiving satisfaction for it.
The Joker's face is twisted in agony, the scars dark and vicious against skin that looks as thin as ricepaper, and Bruce suddenly needs to look anywhere but directly at it. He glances over his arms, bony and bruised; over the asylum issue-pants, where the outline of his knees is clearly visible, and to his feet, poking out from frayed hems, looking cold and gaunt. There are clunky restraints over his ankles, too, and Bruce notices with slight horror that his right foot is too close to the radiator, the skin turning blistered and red.
It seems he cannot gaze anywhere at this man without being disgusted in some way. He doesn't want to feel sympathy, but he steps closer, touching the ankle briefly to scoot it away from the hot metal.
He wipes his hand on his pants, feeling violated. The Joker moves again, his eyes cracking open this time. He's not looking at Bruce, or the wall, or any part of his body or the deplorable state of this room. Bruce feels like an intruder into this man's last days, and kicks himself for feeling shame.
The Joker's breath turns to gurgling, rattling, which Bruce knows is not good. He looks to the side, away from this dying, too familiar character beneath him, and speaks. "You were right," he says softly, like he's hoping it won't be heard.
He's always been told not to fear anything, and he's faced what he still does fear, but this is the pinnacle, the one thing he feels he cannot tackle because it will tear him down too. He's a bloody hypocrite, feeling smug over this man who, for all he knows, experienced the same sadness but had no one to bring him back from the brink.
The Joker could have been rich, poor, a married man, a homeless man, an evangelist or an addict, happy or depressed but Bruce doesn't bloody know, and he simply cannot dole out punishment without that certainty.
He startles a bit when the Joker moans very softly, his legs twitching like someone deeply asleep. He speaks again, so defeated. "You won. You proved your point."
Beneath a mask of sickness rather than makeup, he sees a faint, true smile. Bruce's fists clench but again he stops himself, willing himself to keep from hurting someone already teetering over death – there has to be something to separate them. The strong do not prey on the weak. The Joker believes that they do, but he, Bruce, would not prove him right.
He caves and says it again. "Your vision. It's here." He wonders how the Joker feels about not seeing the results of his master plan, staring blankly instead at the water-stained ceiling with eyes glassed over by pain.
Bruce knows what he's thinking, knows that the Joker expects him to leave him to rot, expects him to gloat and lord his position over him now that he's truly helpless, chained and dying.
When the chips are down, these civilized people – they'll eat each other.
Bruce reacts like the Joker's actually said it again, glaring and shaking with internalized rage. No. He is not that person.
There's another moan of pain from the bed, and Bruce will take no more. "I'm having you moved."
There's no reaction but a forced swallow, and Bruce repeats his words, like he doesn't even believe what he just said.
He turns and motions to the guard that he's done. The door is so heavy that the guard uses both arms to open it, grunting. "Done?"
"Get me in touch with Dr. Arkham," Bruce says, ignoring the question. "I'm having this wing shut down, and him moved."
The guard cocks his head. "Ain't no way they'll let him up with the rest of the patients. Hell, he's killed four of them."
"I don't think the man in there now can lift his head," Bruce responds. "Please take me to Dr. Arkham."
The guard shrugs, but gives in, walking Bruce back to the elevator. When the doors close, Bruce feels nauseous as the car lurches upward.
He hasn't left him to die, as the Joker said any civilized person would. He hasn't broken his one rule, as the Joker has said he will never do.
He has simultaneously proven the Joker wrong and right. He shuts his eyes, trying to stop the battle in his head.
When he finally returns to his car, he grips the clutch tightly as he peels out of the parking lot, clinging to it like a prisoner who's finally experiencing the outside world again. That place hits too close to home, and he hates that it feels comfortable, familiar, like he knows every stairway and hallway before he even encounters it. He never wants to be there again, certainly, and his chat with Dr. Arkham has ensured, hopefully, that he should never need to.
He looks into the rearview mirror, his gaze focusing briefly on the middle floor of the east wing, where they've agreed to move the Joker, Bruce funding all future treatment. Bruce knows that despite his charity, the gesture is akin to giving a blind man glasses, but he has done all that he can. If he dies, it will not be upon him.
He's heading home, but he doesn't really care where he ends up, so he pulls off into an alley about a mile from it, getting out for a walk. The air is slightly crisp, the humidity just mild enough that he walks without sweating. It's approaching dusk. Rush hour is nearly over but the restaurants aren't busy yet, and the sidewalks are satisfyingly empty. He strolls slowly, hands jammed into his pockets, looking at nothing in particular.
He's done a good thing, but things still don't feel the same as they once were.
After a solid hour, he reaches the waterfront, and he stares out, straining to see all the way to the other side. Lights move and blink, but he can't make out anything definite across the vast expanse. A few more moments, and he gives up, feeling lost.
It's darker, and he picks up the pace just a bit. No one dares to be out alone now, not even him. He keeps his head down to avoid eye contact with anyone, tries to become invisible even though there are many now who wouldn't hesitate to prey on the weak and inconspicuous.
There you are, Joker, you were right again.
It still shakes him to the core to think that, and he wonders when it will all boil over.
A scream rings out, shadows playing against the wall, and he sees that it's someone being attacked by two others, the fight obviously unmatched. He wants to walk by, wants to push it aside because he can't help in the way that he wants to anymore. He speeds up and the screaming starts again. It's harrowing, bloodcurdling, and relentless.
He lines up his knuckles.
When he's done, the would-be victim looks up at him, eyes grateful despite fear, and he feels at peace for the first time in awhile.
His phone is ringing in his pocket as he's entering the penthouse, and he smiles when he extracts it and sees the name on the display.
"Just who I wanted to hear from," he says, and knows that Alfred can hear the smile in his voice.
"You've come to your senses, then, Master Wayne?"
He chuckles a bit at the tone in his voice, and nods before realizing that Alfred can't hear that. "Yes, I suppose I have."
Alfred is more than surprised to hear about his voluntary visit to Arkham, but he says nothing as Bruce tells him of his orders to move the Joker to more reliable care. As he talks, he second-guesses himself over and over again, wondering out loud at why he would bother to save the man who had overturned everything that he'd worked for. By the time he's finished talking, he's almost convinced that he should return, take it all back, insist on condemning the man to a painful, lonely death. It's what anyone else would do, he's sure.
To his surprise, Alfred disagrees, telling Bruce to leave it be. Bruce shakes his head and stares out the window, Arkham just slightly visible in the distance. "But you said it yourself, Alfred. Some men," he stumbles, looking down at his shoes. "Some men just want to watch the world burn. And it has. You saw it. It's turned to ash here."
"And some men, Master Wayne, are the phoenix from those ashes," Alfred replies.
He remembers the look on the face of the person he'd saved today, and sets his jaw. Neither of them say anything for several moments, but Alfred doesn't hang up. Bruce clears his throat. He's too proud to grovel, and luckily he doesn't have to.
"So, I'll be returning this weekend, Master Wayne."
Bruce smiles. "Good. You've been missed."
They grunt their goodbyes, and Bruce hangs up, finally feeling free.
There are still several portions of the manor to be rebuilt, which is fortunate, as Bruce scans the blueprints with the foreman and announces that several rooms will not be built at all. Even Alfred is surprised at this, and when the foreman goes to spread the news, Bruce is approached immediately, chastised. "Might I ask the reason for this sudden change of heart, Master Wayne, or have we simply just run out of money?"
Bruce chuckles a bit. "I know I wanted to rebuild it as it was, Alfred, but I don't see the point." Alfred waits for elaboration, which Bruce doesn't quite know how to articulate. "I'm a different man than my father, Alfred. Wayne Manor was his house. It's no longer mine."
Alfred, ever gracious, doesn't disagree, but his confusion is still evident. "With respect, Master Wayne, I would still think it a polite gesture to honor the memory of the man whose family I served for the better portion of my life."
Bruce isn't taken – the need to become, to be reborn, to set himself apart is too great. "My father told me not to be afraid," he says, "and I'm afraid of what would happen, Alfred, if I tried to be the same man he was."
"Never," Alfred says. "Regardless of the foundations, sir, you're not him."
Bruce smiles. "That's it, then."
They walk, surveying the progress, before Alfred speaks again. "But I should hope, sir, that your plans for…foundation improvement have not changed?"
Bruce looks ahead. "The southeast corner?"
"Precisely, sir."
Bruce smiles and keeps walking, his gaze finally looking forward for the first time in awhile. "Not one bit."