Author's Note: Part of an experimental project to write at least one short every day for the next year. We'll see if I actually manage to meet my goal. This is The 365 Project, 6 January.

Disclaimer: "Batman Beyond" is the property of DC Comics and used for entertainment purposes without permission or intent to profit.

Between hanging up the suit and Terry's becoming Batman, how did the old man take his self-enforced retirement?

"Night Things"
By J.T. Magnus, 'Turbo'

He couldn't sleep. Years of catching a couple hours of sleep in the late afternoon, a couple more later in the evening, then making up the rest in the mid morning had taken their toll in an unfortunate way; his schedule, his body rhythms. It was infuriating. First he felt tired; but when he laid down, the feeling vanished. Then, he finally started to drift off to sleep, but he never actually got there, something kept him away, some part of his mind that kept going that it was wrong not to be out and active at this time of night. There had been a couple of nights early on where he had actually gone so far as to drink himself into a stupor so as to sleep, something else that hadn't sat well with him, not after years of moderation and few vices. He had put an end to that quickly. It wasn't worth it.

Part of him was thankful that politics had forced Jim Gordon's retirement, he owed the old cop too much and if Gordon had still been Commissioner, he wasn't sure he would've been able to resist responding when the Batsignal was lit. Even then, it had been a struggle for the first few weeks. He had to remind himself on a regular basis that Gotham had no need for a Batman who was no better than the gun-carrying thugs and criminals that he had fought for so long.

For about a week after he had finally gotten control over the instinct to respond to the signal, he had walked the manor, room by room, mentally remapping them each and taking inventory of the contents. He now knew exactly how many works of art hung on the walls, what artists, what periods; vases and suits of armor that lined the halls, he could tell anyone who asked where and when they were from; he had straightened and reorganized the books in the library, even finding some in other rooms and returning them to their proper places. That had only made the situation worse as it had added thoughts of his lost friend and caretaker, he had stopped walking the manor after that.

It hadn't taken him long, either, to end the visits from the likes of Diana and Kent who each came around at times to attempt to convince him to 'use the opportunities he was presented with'. It just made him that much more bitter. Like a greyhound was bred and trained to race, he had trained and purified himself to fight crime and make a difference in Gotham and now that had been taken away from him. The Justice League and even Wayne Enterprises didn't matter. The whole reason he had hired people like Lucius Fox to run his company was so that he wouldn't be needed to do the job himself and could devote more time to Batman's quest. But the immortal princess and the Kryptonian couldn't see that, didn't understand how it felt when someone reached the point where they got so old that they couldn't do something that they had literally devoted the majority of their life to doing.

The second he had been forced to pick up that gun, Batman and everything he stood for died and he had taken Bruce Wayne with him. Now the body was just marking the days until it finally gave out and allowed him some peace. Maybe when he was dead, Bruce sometimes thought, he could finally sleep.

Author's Note: Inspired partially by my own bout with a case of insomnia last night, which is why you get today's 365 Project entry so early.