They say that your life flashes before your eyes before you die. They say that time stretches to infinity before you at the moment before you pass. They say death is quicker and easier than falling asleep.

For the man behind the wheel of the Lamborghini that evening, it is none of the above.

But if he'd had the chance to say his piece before his world went white, as the hero in movies always did, as is the right of the old man who passes peacefully in his sleep, surrounded by family, it'd go something like this:

Bruce Wayne is a man of many faces, and to each of them belong a regret.

There's the little boy who can never forget his parents' murders, who has lived always with the what-ifs clouding his mind, the echoes of unsaid words off worn gravestones.

There's Batman, the Dark Knight of Gotham, scarred with regret, physically, mentally, and emotionally. When he stalks Gotham by moonlight, he is ever accompanied by the ghosts of those he'd been too late to save.

There's the father, so proud of his sons, unable to voice that feeling, wrapping his own uncertainty with gruffness and unrelenting demands for excellence.

And finally, there's Bruce, the man, who'd loved so fiercely , knowing always the race of time against him, not knowing that it'd been a sprint all along, not a marathon. He thinks of Clark, all the years they'd had together, the mere weeks that theyd actually officially been together, recalls the moment he gathers his courage and presses his lips to Clark's, their mutual surprise that he'd been the one to acknowledge this thing that had been building up between them for years. They slipped easily into place from old friends to lovers. And though he could see the practicalities that had been in waiting, he wishes he could have seen the light earlier. If he'd known that he'd never be coming back from that board meeting he'd never have been saving himself for the marathon when he should have thrown himself into the fray with complete abandon.

Clark would be devastated, he knows. There's a very real chance the world would lose its greatest defender, and all because Bruce had been careless enough to die right after he'd started dating him. Clark must have considered Bruce's eventual death; he had never been the type to back away from a challenge. But the fact of Bruce's mortality is a challenge even Superman cannot overcome.

How had it felt, Bruce wonders, to know that even love couldn't last forever? That even optimistically thinking, they'd only have a few more decades together at most, if they were very, very lucky, considering both their superhero-ing tendencies? A few decades is nothing compared to eternity, and Clark could very well live that long.

So Clark must have considered it. But Bruce doubts he'd thought of what he'd do if those decades were suddenly slashed to a few weeks. After all, contingency plans are Batman's job.

"I'm sorry, Clark," he wishes he could say. "I'm so sorry that I have to ask you to be strong, to walk the world without me." He wishes he could kiss him again, could make love to him one more time, to see Clark's smile. He wishes he could tell him how happy he'd been, the last weeks of his life, even though they'd been mostly the same as they'd been for years, albeit with more of Clark's smiles, if that were possible, and a whole lot of amazing sex.

Bruce looks into Death's eyes with the regret that his last thought had been an apology to the man he loves, that he'd never get a chance to apologize for thinking that instead of "I love you."

Or perhaps it goes simply like this:

When the air erupts in screaming metal and blinding pain, in the last split second of his life, Bruce Wayne is glad of Batman's contingency plans.