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[No money was transferred in the making of this story]

[Resistance is Futi-wait what?]


The Once and Future Thing: Epilogue

"That's a rather frightening grin, Batman," Wonder Woman stated as she spooned another mouthful of pink jello. "We're not going to find a body hidden on the Watchtower, are we?"

Batman blinked under his cowl, unaware that he was projecting his (admittedly sadistic) glee at Chronos's current circumstances. He closed his emotionless shutters as quickly as possible, before turning to Wonder Woman and nonchalantly replying, "No. It's nothing important."

Diana wasn't convinced. She wiped her lips with her napkin and teasingly quirked her brow. "Lying to the Spirit of Truth huh? And badly at that. Surely you can do better than that, Mister Wayne?"

Batman shifted uncomfortably in his seat and tried to direct his attention entirely towards the bare table in front of him.

The light chuckling from Green Lantern, seated beside him, made that almost impossible.

The Space Cop stood from his seat and brushed crumbs off his uniform. He paid Batman no attention as The Dark Knight's bone white eyes followed his every move menacingly, as if he was trying to telepathically break him in two. Before John couldd step away from the table, Batman cleared his throat in as loud and raspy a sound as possible, and said through gritting teeth, "Going so soon, Lantern?"

John chuckled. "Oh trust me; I'd stay if I could. But now that we're finished playing Time Lord, I have some…things that need to be taken care of." He slapped the Detective lightly on the shoulder, and grinned at Diana as he passed behind her. "Have fun with him," he teased.

"'Time Lords'? Now you have to tell me what's up," Diana prodded.

Batman leaned back on his chair, his face still as unreadable as he could make it around her. He contemplated telling her everything: from his embarrassing gaff when she (somehow) snuck up behind him all the way to when he and his older self witnessed, with pure shock and horror, her disappear into nothingness as time swallowed her up. It would be good for him to get it off his chest, he told himself. If he was every truly distracted by her, it was the times where he warred internally with the far more emotional core he buried behind darkness and solitude.

He should tell her, he repeated over and over again, staring at her patient eyes. He should tell her.

Unfortunately, the decision was taken completely out of his hands, as another boom-tube opened up in the rear corner of the cafeteria with a roaring crash. Out from the swirling chaos of time came Booster Gold, tumbling head over heel into a poorly placed refuse can. Bits of garbage were flung into the air, coating him and Skeets in a layer of foul smelling colours. The entire cafeteria was stunned into silence, except for Batman who had a healthy dose of annoyance for time travellers growing inside of him.

Discombobulated, Booster Gold bumbled his way over towards Diana and Bruce, a look of terror firmly plastered on his face. It was at this point that Batman realized this Booster Gold looked completely different from the one that was currently on the team (and may or may not have been in the background of the cafeteria in this episode). His hair was wild and dishevelled, turning almost a whitish grey. He looked thinner, older, and little crazier than Batman was comfortable with. He finally reached the duo's table, still dripping garbage from his uniform.

"Batman! Wonder Woman!" he shouted excitedly, "you've gotta come back with me!"

"Booster?" Diana questioned.

Batman ignored his equal surprise at the time traveler's appearance and asked, "Where?"

"To the future!" Booster started picking off bits and pieces of the garbage he had tracked over the cafeteria floor and handed them to Skeets, who disintegrated them instantly. He was still busy flinging the junk off his uniform as he opened up another boom tube. "Quick!" he addressed Batman and Wonder Woman, "get in the boom tube!"

"Not without you telling us what's happening," Batman demanded.

Wonder Woman crossed her arms and shook her head in agreement. "Yes. Do we become super-villains or something?"

Booster looked almost shocked as he finished pulling the last banana peel from his gauntlet. "No, no no no you and Bruce turn out fine!" He leaned in closer and lowered his voice. "It's your kids Diana! Something has gotta be done about your kids!"

With a surprising burst of strength, he locked onto both Batman and Wonder Woman's wrists, and hurled them into the maw of the rip in space and time. Taking one second to glare at his younger counter part, Booster, followed by Skeets, leapt in after them. They tumbled through time and space at an accelerating rate, with a wind like roaring drowning out the constant string of exasperated groans coming out of Batman's clenched jaw. Booster caught up with them mid tumble, and Wonder Woman turned to him.

"Don't we need some sort of cushion?"

"Cushions?" Booster replied, "where we're going, we don't need cushions….."

The End


Fight me.

Also, since this comment seems to appear on every story that has Batman and Wonder Woman in it, regardless of whether there's even romantic hints or if any of these...err..."complaints" are even mentioned, allow me to apply my own critique to it.

From: "Ag" [Edited for proper grammar]

"Batman with [the] daughter of [Z]eus is like [a] mouse under the [insert specific mountain name here] [M]ountain ["s", as it would likely be 'mountains' plural]. [T]he [N]ew 52 is doing perfectly [and] [SM] and [WW] are perfect for each other[.][WW] need[s][:] a strong man who can take care of her in every way[no s], who make[s] her a woman, [and] who can take care of [D]iana not as angel [insert notion of who or what she should be treated as, in order to make the "not as" portion of the sentence work, here].[Not "and"] [S]uperman also need[s] a strong woman who loves [C]lark [and] [K]al[,] not only [S]uperman like [L]ois [L]ane [does].
[The] [P]ower [C]ouple is perfect. [A]nd for the last time[,] [S]uperman is more humanity comes from [I think it should be "get's his humanity more from" but I honestly had, like, 12 brain hemorrhages reading this so...] his parent[s][,] not a bitch like [L]ois [L]ane.

Response: K. Whatever. You do you. If this is what you truly believe, then it's what you believe. It flies in the face of comic history for most of these characters, not the relationship per say, rather your interpretation of how the character..."act", and a wee bit (actually very) sexist, but whatever, it's your opinion and you're entitled to have it.

Except for what you said about Lois Lane. Bitch, she fabulous, mmmhmmm *snap snap*.