The Metropolis sun was too bright. Happy, yellow and warm. It never failed to irk Bruce when he came over to the Boy Scout's city. How the sun could shine here like a glowing fireball of joy yet be dismal and dank just across the bay in Gotham was beyond him. Nevertheless, he was here. Outside. During the daylight. In the park.
He pushed a huff through his teeth. It was his own damn fault.
And his quickly developing habit of not being able to say 'no' to her.
A subtle touch here, a strategic pout there. Those eyes. That voice.
Sucker.
Resigned to his fate, he folded himself onto a bench along the path and draped his arm over the back. He might as well attempt to get some work done. A tap of his thumb to the faceplate of his phone opened the interface. He checked his email for the latest research and acquisitions Lucius set up and found an update on the new tail rudder for the Flying Fox Alfred was working on. Things were moving along nicely despite his not being in the office, or his other new office for League preparations. This little foray into Metropolis was a fact-finding mission that quickly devolved into what would pass for a relaxing afternoon spent walking in the park. Complete with the ubiquitous ice cream.
As if they were normal people.
Bruce had never been part of the normal human race. He tried to explain that to her. Yet, she never seemed to allow him this…what did she call it? Self-effacing pretense? That light of inspiration he called her, that beacon of hope wouldn't allow him to remain in his comfortable brooding darkness for very long when she was around.
A small person hopped up onto the bench next to him. A child. Bruce turned his head to give the kid warning glare but was stopped cold. The little boy, about five, six at the most, wore a miniature version of the Batsuit. With the dark grey textured Kevlar pattern and the newest armor detailing on the shoulders.
A fucking replica Batsuit costume.
Complete with a cowl and little padded muscles across his chest.
What the fuck?
Bruce eyed the little man with a scowl. Who in their right mind allowed their child to dress up as the Batman? He wasn't a superhero. In fact, he was a criminal. A vigilante who scared the shit out of criminals in the dead of night. Not something a child should be exposed to. Especially not one so young.
His jaw tightened and he glanced around for the child's mother. Why was this child on the bench unsupervised?
No one in the vicinity seemed to belong to the boy, or have any interest. A whole new level of annoyed surfaced ticked at the corner of his jaw.
The kid looked up at him. Big round dark eyes glinted from the cut-out holes of the cowl. A grin marred with two missing front teeth.
"Hi."
Bruce narrowed his eyes. "Hi."
"What's your name?"
"Bruce. What's yours?"
"Batman."
Bruce surprised himself with a half laugh. "Hi, Batman." Smart kid, not giving away his true identity. He surreptitiously checked for any parental figure, a nanny, an older sibling at the very least and came up with none. "What are you doing here in the park?"
The boy stood up and wiggled against the back rest in that way that only a little kid with too much energy could accommodate. "I'm waiting for bad guys."
He arched an eyebrow. "Have you seen any?"
"Nah. I'm just waiting. Just in case."
"I see."
"What are you doing in the park?"
"I'm waiting for a…friend." A wince drew his eyebrows together and he cleared his throat. He wasn't sure what made him stumble over the word. It was just a word. In a ridiculous conversation. Diana was a friend. And this kid was a five-year-old. It's not like he comprehended the nuances of what exactly this friendship really was or how Bruce struggled to define the parameters of it.
The boy's sneakered feet tapped at the uneven wooden slats of the seat. Red LED lights strobed from his heels with each movement. "I'm waiting for my mom."
"Where is your mother?"
"Over there talking to that lady." He pointed an outstretched chubby finger straight ahead.
Bruce followed the line. A short woman with shoulder length black hair stood chatting with Diana. They looked engrossed in conversation. Diana's expressive eyes and sincere smile lit up brighter than the sun. And a jingle of sensation fluttered in Bruce's chest. He looked away from the brightness, back to his charge. This was going to take a while.
"So kid, can I ask you a question?"
"Yeah?"
"Why Batman? Why not Flash or better yet, Superman?"
"I like Batman."
"Yeah, but why?"
"Because he's cool." He jumped off the bench and landed straight legged on his feet. His polyester felt cape flopped behind him. "Pow, pow, boom." He hooked three rapid fire punches. A little spittle flew from his pursed bow-shaped lips.
Bruce shifted his Ferragamos out of the splash zone. "What makes Batman cooler than the Flash? The Flash is fast, he could run all the way to that merry go round over there and back before you could blink your eyes."
"Batman has a cool car." His mini-doppelganger scrambled up and jumped off again. A thud of a stick-legged landing. Agile this kid was not. But then again, he was only five.
"That he does." Bruce could feel the echoed vibration of the turbo engine in his hands as real as if he were holding the steering wheel of the Batmobile. It was indeed a cool car. "Pretty fast too. Not as fast as Flash though."
"He's got cool gadgets like batarangs and a grappling hook." Batman Lite kicked and did a karate chop. "My mom said I'm not allowed have a batarang."
"Understandable."
A pout drew out his glossy lower lip. "But I wanted to bring one to school to throw it at that big dummyhead, Francesca Becker."
"Why?" Bruce turned to regard the boy. Such a violent desire. Even Bruce's emotionally out of touch senses heard the fear in the boy's voice.
"Because she's mean to me. She punched me in my stomach."
Anger coiled in Bruce's gut. "And what did you do?"
"I barfed my snack."
Bruce shook his head a narrowed his gaze. "Does she do that a lot? Hit you?"
"Sometimes. Sometimes she just says mean stuff."
Bullying often stemmed from something else. A sense of powerlessness in another part of the perpetrators life. This Francesca was just a child too. But it angered Bruce nonetheless. That was no excuse. "Is she bigger than you?"
"Yeah. But Angie punched her. But she got sus-sended."
"Who's Angie?"
"She's a third-grader."
"Older woman. Smart man." Bruce's eyes involuntarily flicked to Diana. His chest puffed out as his gaze took in her radiance as she spoke with the woman. He shook his head and dragged his eyes back to the boy.
"So this Angie got suspended because she was defending you from this bigger bully?"
"Yeah, she said she didn't want me to get hurt."
"That's pretty special to have a friend like that." And then the thought occurred to him. "She's like your Wonder Woman."
This little kid, his bat costume, his unfair situation shed a glaring light on his own circumstances. If Bruce wasn't such a cynic, he'd think this was planned by Barry to prove a point. A point that Bruce was vehement didn't exist. No matter what the buttinsky speedster––or Alfred, for that matter––insisted upon.
"Angie has red hair."
Bruce chuckled. "Nevertheless, this Angie girl has your back just like Wonder Woman has Batman's."
"I guess so." He jumped from the bench again and threw a series of awkward punches.
Bruce checked the status of the mother. She and Diana were just about at the cart to order. He had a moment. "Try bending your knees when you land. Drop your butt so you have balance. And when you make a fist, keep your thumb out. If you punch something, and your thumb is inside your fist, you could break your thumb."
"Like this?"
"Yeah. Keep your fist tight, and curl your thumb around close." Bruce demonstrated with his own fist. "See this flat surface, that's what you punch with, not your knuckles. But you only punch to defend yourself. Got it?"
Little Batman threw a series of punches.
"Hit my hand." Bruce held up his palm. "Arms straight from your shoulders." He hit, once then twice. "Yeah you got it. But remember only if you need to defend yourself. If your enemy comes at you, duck or lean to the side to avoid the hit. Don't hit first."
"Like this?" He dodged and weaved. A little sloppy but it was a start.
"Yep. And if your enemy is big, she might lose balance and fall because of her momentum."
"What's mentum?"
"Momentum. It's when something is moving and can't stop easily."
"You sure know a lot about fighting."
"I had a good teacher." Alfred was the first to teach him how to fight. Bruce was pretty sure he'd regretted that day ever since.
"Khai, are you bothering this nice man?" The mother corralled the youngster away from Bruce.
"Mom, I'm Batman," he whined.
She offered an apologetic smile. "I hope he wasn't talking your ear off."
Bruce stood. "It's fine. We were having a conversation. Isn't that right, Batman?"
Little Batman nodded his head. The mask slipped down over his eyes and he shoved it up with his hand. Diana arrived with two ice cream cones––also something he agreed to only because she asked. He never ate ice cream. Not since he was just a bit older than Little Batman's age.
"You're tall."
"Khai!" The mother's horrified expression made Bruce bite back a smile. "You don't say that to people. It's rude."
"It's all right, I am very tall." Diana chuckled that musical laugh and Bruce's heart fluttered. He cleared his throat.
"Diana, this is Batman." Diana crouched down to eye level with the child, still graceful and elegant in her summer dress and heels. A beautiful grin parted her smile wide.
"It's lovely to meet you, Batman." She shook his hand firmly but slid a glance to Bruce from the corner of her eye. Bruce felt the corner of his cheek tug into an ironic smirk. He could practically see all the ways she would tease him about this the first chance she got. But he saw something else there too. Something he didn't know how to label.
Khai's face turned with a serious twist of his mouth like he was considering the weight of the world. "Are you Bruce's Wonder Woman?"
Bruce froze.
Diana's red lips slowly turned into a surprised, "Oh."
His heart might have actually stopped as he felt the strange need to shift on his feet, now trapped in the yawning space awaiting her answer. He couldn't look away. He refused to acknowledge the tingle of anticipation in his gut over her response. He was a man who needed no one's approval. A lone soldier in a war of necessity. He only sought out the team because he was ill-equipped to handle supernatural alien threats as a mere human. Not because he needed to belong to anyone…
But then she smiled warmly at the child before she stood, tall and graceful. Her gazed collided with Bruce. The gravity surrounding them shifted as she held the electrifying stare for a long, significant moment before giving her response. "Yes, I suppose I am."
He drew in a breath when the air began to crackle between them. Vaguely aware that his heart felt a bit lighter at her admission. His Wonder Woman…Still he could not look away.
"Cool." Little Batman was bored already and focused on his ice cream.
"We really must be going. Khai, say good bye." The mother must have sensed the private moment that passed between him and Diana because she quickly took her son's hand and with a knowing grin, led him down the walk. Bruce's miniature doppelganger looked back and waved over his shoulder.
Diana slipped her arm through his and leaned close. The scent of her perfume was soft and sophisticated as if someone had bottled her true essence. "You made a friend."
"I was looking out for a child who was abandoned in the park." Bruce felt his mouth tighten into a stiff line. "That mother should have child protective services called on her."
She huffed a dismissive laugh and lead them down the opposite path. "That mother was buying her son a delicious ice cream on a beautiful summer day. Not every circumstance has such a nefarious undertone, Bruce." She made a point to taste her ice cream. "She was a lovely woman and we had a nice conversation."
"What kind of mother let's her kid dress up as the Batman?" That was still surreal on a level he couldn't quite comprehend.
They walked on and a grin spread over her lips, her eyes alight with that flirtatious gleam she possessed when she debated things with him, usually to the counterpoint of whatever his opinion was. "I saw you. You were teaching him how to fight properly."
"There's a bully at school."
"It is very admirable that you would help."
"Every child should be taught how to defend themselves." He shrugged.
"My mother would not allow me to fight when I was young." She pealed the wrapper from her cone. "She put me off, insisting that fighting would not make me a hero."
"Kind of ironic coming from an island full of warriors."
She hummed. "My aunt felt differently. She disobeyed my mother and trained me in secret. Until my mother found out."
"What happened?"
"She made me train harder than any warrior she ever had. I didn't learn until much later that was because I was the God Killer."
"The God Killer?" Bruce's eyebrow immediately ticked up. Her random tidbits of her past were like gems in a minefield. Dangerous territory but oh so interesting once unearthed.
"That is a story for another day." She sighed. "My point is that my mother didn't want me to fight because she believed it would protect me. Mothers do all kinds of things to protect their children."
"Like die in a gutter for no reason at all?" His steps slowed to halt, surprised with himself for that unguarded declaration. Where the fuck did that come from?
She regarded him for a moment. The fact that she didn't flinch meant she knew. She was a smart woman, probably did her own extensive research like he had. He'd come to expect nothing less from her. He chanced a glimpse. Instead of pity, compassion showed in the depth of her dark eyes. Though she would never direct anything so base as pity at him. Or anyone for that matter. "I don't pretend to know how awful that was for you, but I would surmise, knowing you as I do, that your mother died trying to protect you."
Her hand curled around his as soft as silk and strong as steel. She turned him to face her. "You told me that I could be a beacon, an inspiration to others. And yet you still don't see yourself as a hero. You question why a child would want to emulate you. To wear your mantle with honor." Her lovely smile spread with confidence in her words. "I have news for you, Bruce Wayne. You are a hero. An inspiration to others. To me."
"Princess––"
"Eat your ice cream. It's melting."
He glanced at his hand to find chocolate dripping over his fingers. An annoyed huff escaped his lips as he switched hands and held his other away to not drip on his trousers. With an amused chuckle, she plucked the untouched cone from his hand. Her pink tongue came out to lick at his ice cream, catching the errant drips. She closed her eyes and practically moaned in delight. "This truly is Man's World's most wonderful achievement."
A surge of heat spread like wildfire in his gut and he smiled despite himself at her genuine, unrestrained pleasure. Her beauty entranced him, since the moment he laid eyes on her, and he drew close. Too close. The sweet scent of chocolate and cream mingled with her breath. "You know, there are a lot things men are good at. Not just ice cream."
"Hmm, yes." Her eyes narrowed and then she laughed out loud, tapping his chest with the palm of her hand. If she wanted to she could crack his sternum. He'd be lying if that didn't both turn him on and scare the shit out of him, since she'd pushed into the stack of crates for being an asshole. Instead, she stepped back with a tempting lick of her lips. "Stop being fresh. We have work to do."
Bruce rolled his eyes. "That's what I've been trying to tell you all afternoon."
Frustrating, stubborn woman.
She walked away from him down the path. That annoying reluctant smile he always got when she was around returned. Sighing, he licked the sticky chocolate from his fingers and followed. She was right. It was delicious ice cream.