Disclaimer: I do not own Batman Beyond, it belongs to its respective creators and animators.

Summary: The incident with Melanie and Wayne's resulting talk about Selina Kyle left Terry more troubled than he might have let on; even more so when he stumbles upon pictures Wayne has of his former affairs. The only thing he could think was Bruce Wayne was a man-slut, well, no…that was too harsh, after all, it came with the cowl. A look at gender performance in the batman-verse and its effects on desire.

A/N: So...has anyone else noticed that the male bats seem to have lots of lovers? On this fanfiction site and others I have come across a disturbing expectation for the Bats to be with many women, multiple women at a time even. There is this expectation that they are just so desirable and the epitome of masculinity that they must have a woman on the hook.

Terry was almost an exception, but then there was the bubble-girl, Max, Melanie, and Catwoman. I'm using Terry as an outsider observing a trend in Bruce Wayne (also in the Robins) that because he hasn't grown up in the Bat-family can be critical about. He came into their world with an already established identity (well as much as a teenager can have) and his desires already fairly well nailed down. Dana was his off-and-on girlfriend whom he does eventually marry-that's a hell of a lot better than Dick or Bruce ever did.

Anyways, I tried to be humorous but this issue does bother me (even though I know the comics and cartoon are geared toward a male audience who may have a grudge against women that is understandable though perhaps not entirely justifiable). Please enjoy, and at the end of the chapter are defined terms, which may help with reader comprehension ~ with love, depressedchildren

Part of Wearing the Cowl

Silence pervaded the space between them and all Terry could think was…shit, that's rough. Old man Wayne was staring down at his empty teacup, perhaps giving Terry time to process the whole Selina Kyle…affair? What he had been through with Melanie paled, drastically, in comparison; though, for a whole other reason, it was far more problematic.

They had started the talk a few hours ago down in the cave but had moved up to the kitchen when it came to Catwoman's betrayals. Terry had let the old man gather himself in the silence as he had made the tea, and by the time it was ready, Wayne had been ready to continue talking about Catwoman. Now they were done and Terry's mom was going to be freaking out if he didn't come home soon.

Wayne stood up, "I think I'll be off to bed." He shifted the hand his cane was in and looked at Terry for a moment. He took a few steps toward Terry, who was seated with his back to the kitchen entrance, before he spoke again, "Why don't you do maintenance on the car and turn off lights?" Terry looked up at the old man in alarm. Wayne was trusting him with locking up the cave and doing the car's maintenance!? Shit, that was a huge step in their relationship.

Wayne then set a hand on Terry's shoulder and gave him a grim smile that said, yeah, it sucks when they turn out to be villains, or well, something more eloquent than that but had the same sentiment behind the smile.

So maybe the offer for him to lock up the cave was part a show of trust but also an offer to let Terry cope with the hard decisions he made with Melanie. Part of Terry also suspected the old man needed to be by himself for a little while too after disclosing so much personal information and rehashing his affair with Catwoman.

Terry nodded his head and began moving toward the cave's entrance while the old man began climbing up the stairs—Terry stopped trying to convince the stubborn old man to move to one of the bedrooms on the ground floor; though he didn't dare suggest he get a chair to help him up the stairs, he liked having his head attached to his neck.

As Terry made his descent into the cave he kept replaying the last two days in his head, and all he could ask himself was what the hell was I thinking?! Melanie was so far away from his type he just…his brain short-circuited every time he even began thinking about why he had even given her the time of day, let alone kissed her.

Speaking of cat-women, Melanie had been like a jungle cat scoping out prey: lurking in the shadows, behind pillars, crouched and ready. She was waiting for a masculine man to be ostracized from the party inside, and then she pounced with her pouty lips out and her arms pressed to her sides to accentuate her breasts. She played the defenseless, lonely girl and Terry fell for it, he fell for it like some cis-male who felt obligated to protect women because…god knew why, it was what cis-males did? Like they thought women were so inferior they needed protection.

Terry mentally scoffed at the notion as he began running a diagnostics test on the car. He then checked the fluid levels and checked the fuel. He was still shaking his head in disgust with himself as he went to the cave entrance and typed in the codes the old man had made him memorize before he moved over to the super computer to shut it down. He was still pissed with himself at how he had acted with Melanie; he wasn't that sort of guy!

He was about to change the computer's status from active to standby—so it would alert the old man and start up if there was any police activity—when a folder caught his attention. There was no name on it. Really? Could the old Bat make it any more obvious that this was not a folder be to poking around in?

Terry moved to the security feeds to see if the old man was recording the cave today, but thankfully he wasn't. Terry erased all evidence that he had opened the security feeds from the drive because he just knew the paranoid old man would check the access logs later. Thank you, Max, for the far too informative lesson on covering your tracks.

Terry sometimes worried about his computer-smart friend, well more like acquaintance…they really only had one class together and she had tutored him a few times in computers. Sometimes Terry worried the girl was more obsessed with computers than she was with real-life, though Terry really didn't know the girl so he shouldn't judge her. Maybe she had just found her niche within rows of binary, maybe it as an escape?

Shaking his head, he then clicked on the ever so suspiciously unmarked folder. Damn. Terry felt his jaw drop as thumbnails lined up the whole space of the folder. These thumbnails were all of different women hanging off of a young Bruce Wayne's arm. Damn. Well they weren't all different; sometimes one girl would last for a few thumbnails.

Terry leaned back in the chair and just blinked a few time as he looked at the old man's little, black datafile. The only thing he could think was Bruce Wayne was a man-slut, well, no…that was too harsh, but then Terry saw the bar on the side of the folder that said there were more pictures. Okay…so maybe he was a man-slut. Terry refused to use the term playboy, it was too glorified of a term for what it really meant: he slept around and went through women like tissues.

Despite himself and his disgust, Terry scrolled down. There were a lot of red-heads and brunettes, he noted almost absentmindedly. Terry shook his head in disgust, it wasn't like this was some photo gallery to jack off to; no, this was a photo gallery of past exploits, a reminder for the old man that for a little while he hadn't been an old, bitter, lonely man.

Terry's gaze moved over toward the original batsuit before his gaze flickered over to the one he had been donning. His gaze shifted back to the folder and he quickly closed out of it before erasing his presence. The realization dawned on him quickly while he was erasing his presence: it comes with the cowl.

Batman was the symbol of hyper-masculinity. He was the ultimate cis-male—excusing the tight costume, of course. He protected the weak. He used his own brawn and brains to battle foes and bring about justice. Hell, he saved damsels in distress! And Bruce Wayne, had embodied all of that cis-male glory in his own life: he was the "playboy" billionaire—Terry still called him a man-slut in his head—who had women flocking to him and hanging off of his arms.

And Terry… he realized that he had felt some of that when he wore the cowl. He felt powerful, he felt like a protector, he felt very different from who he really was. When he wore the cowl he was strong, he could banter with the best of them, assume a more…heteronormative attitude…he felt like he was lying to himself. And that was why Melanie had been so terrible.

She shook the foundations of who he thought he was. It was like…the Batman persona had affected himself and his actions. No…that made it sound like he was not at fault because he was entirely at fault. As Batman, he was that symbol of hyper-masculinity, and what do cis-males do? Fall prey to the pretty cis-female who bats her eyes and presses her breasts against him.

For those two days, Terry…he had begun performing like Batman without the cowl…at least in regards to heteronormative expectations of desire. He wasn't some teen or middle-aged man facing an identity crisis; he knew who he was, he had always known who he in both gender performance and sexuality. He had known who he was since he met Dane Tan at that dance, since they first brushed off the femme boys in favor of each other. Two guys who dressed normatively masculine and who desired another normatively masculine male.

The Batman persona had crossed into Terry's personal life in a way he was not comfortable with. He was a monogamous guy, he was happy with Dane…even loved him. So it had crushed him when Dane said he had had enough of waiting for him, of being his security blanket, and maybe he had assumed some of his Batman persona to make himself feel stronger than he had felt? He assumed the performance of someone he was not.

It wasn't that Batman changed his desires, he could barely go past kissing with Melanie, but…Terry ran a hand through his hair. Slag. If he wasn't careful he'd probably end up like a man-slut too, after all…isn't that what hyper-masculinity meant? Sleeping with women, using them one after the other?

Terry shook his head as he stood up from the computer. No, he would not become that; he would not let the Batman persona change him that way. Terry heard his phone vibrating and he quickly picked it up as he put the computer to standby.

"Terry sweetie, where are you?"

"Hey Mom, sorry to keep you up and worried, I'm just doing a security sweep around Wayne's and then I think I'm going to head to Dane's." Terry started making his way toward the stairs.

"Oh! Are you two done fighting?"

"Not exactly…" Terry licked his lips nervously as he looked back around at the cave before he shut off the lights. "I'm going over to apologize."

"Okay, do you think you'll stay over at his place?" If she knew they were dating she wouldn't have allowed him to, but she was from an age where she assumed gender performance dictated sexuality.

"Maybe," Terry closed the grandfather clock after him before he began moving toward the door. "I'll text you." Terry ruffled Ace's head as he passed by the dog and made his way for the door.

"Okay." Terry locked the door behind him, "I love you dear…and I hope you two sort things out."

"I hope so too." Terry murmured, though he knew Dane was going to have a serious talk with him about Melanie, and Terry would explain it as best he could. They had both agreed that sexuality was more fluid than most in their community cared to believe, but it wasn't that he really desired her…he just had been well…playing at cis-male. He'd never let this happen again.

End

A/N:
I apologize for not warning you, dear readers, that Terry is gay in this, but it helped to further contrast himself from the rest of the Bat-family and give him a further critical look at gender-performance and desire in this group. If you are mad, I understand I was only using this as a critical lens through which to examine the issues. I'm a theory head and so tried to disrupt the sex-gender-desire matrix, and for me this was a rhetorical look at the power of the batman persona. Thank you for reading, I hope it wasn't too appalling ~ love, depressedchildren

Below are terms and some references if you would like to learn more about the concepts:

Gender Performance: Essentially, without getting too into theory, it is how masculine or feminine one dresses, speaks, walks, and acts. It is fluid and can change depending on situation and location. Often women are encouraged to take on a more masculine performance when they are in leadership positions-see Hilary Clinton, her performance has become progressively more masculine (e.g. less skirts, more conservative neck line, shorter hair). Judith Butler discusses this in length in her book Gender Trouble.

Heteronormativity: norms based on heterosexual relationships which also effect all relationships, even homosexual relationships (for instance, if one ever asks a gay couple "who's the man" that is a heteronormative expectation). Within heteronormativity are expectations based on socio-economic class, race, what exactly attracts a person to another(so sex organs are the heteronormative expectation, can't be ankles or necks).

Cis-male/cis-female: I've seen this written cys and cis, and I'm just going with cis. So a cis-male, is biologically male, performs a masculine gender, and desires females' sex orifice, but on women who perform a feminine gender. That's a crude definition, and then cis-female would be the opposite.