II - Atonement
"I'm too old to recover, too narrow to forgive myself." - Lillian Hellman, The Children's Hour
•••
Jim barely stirred as he rolled from his back onto his side and faced away from the sunlight pouring in through the windows.
He had a brief yet fleeting thought of how if he was going to be sleeping half the day he needed to invest in some blackout curtains, but consciousness started to fade just as suddenly as it had come.
The next thing he was aware of was the sound of water running in a sink.
His forehead lined and he cringed in pain as he popped an eye open and glanced around the already bright room.
Nothing seemed amiss and he no longer heard any water.
His limited sight landed on the bottle of alcohol on the nightstand; well, the empty bottle.
He didn't remember finishing it off before he'd fell asleep.
What did it matter anyways?
When he'd seen Bullock at the police station just the day before he'd boasted about how not working a day job allowed him get drunk whenever he wanted.
With another groan he rolled into the center of the bed on his stomach and face planted back into his pillow.
He was nearly back asleep when he was jarred again, this time by the sound of a cabinet door creaking open, then clicking shut a short time later.
Was someone in the house?
Raising back up he glanced over his shoulder to the open doorway of the room and lazily blinked as he waited for any sign of movement or another noise for proof.
But there was nothing.
Only silence again.
Deciding to just try and go back to sleep with the hope that maybe in a few hours he'd wake up without the feeling of someone trying to drill through his skull into his brain.
The headache was so bad he was having trouble focusing his vision.
Or maybe he was still a little drunk -it was getting harder to tell anymore.
Lifting his face back up from the pillows, he tried to readjust and get comfortable -but he immediately caught the scent of coffee brewing.
He didn't imagine that. He was one-hundred percent sure he was no longer dreaming, no longer fading in and out of the waking world.
As quietly as possible he slid out of bed, grabbed the gun from the nightstand and made his way towards the kitchen.
Which in the small, shabby house he'd been renting wasn't a long trek at all.
"Are you still so upset with me that you're really going to shoot me?" Bird questioned when she heard him behind her in the kitchen and saw his reflection in the door of the microwave.
Turning around to face him, her eyes fell to where he still had his gun drawn and she added with a raised brow, "Even after you took it so hard the last time I was shot?"
"Back to not taking anything seriously, I see." Jim gruffly answered with a shake of his head as he lowered the gun to his side.
He knew very well she was referring to the impact her death had had on him when everyone believed she'd been killed.
"What are you doing here, Bird?" He asked as he stepped further into the kitchen and laid his gun down on the nearest available counter space.
"I wanted to see where you were living." She answered, glancing around as if she hadn't already been there for quite some time; she politely said, "It's nice."
He scoffed.
It wasn't nice and he knew it.
It was cheap, fully furnished and available for him to immediately move into.
The truth was the house was barely worth the low rent.
And now looked even worse with how messy it was.
Turning slightly he glanced back into the living room where the surface of the coffee table was covered with various items; mostly junk mail he hadn't bothered to throw out and fast food trash.
The kitchen counters were littered with takeout containers that had he not been so drunk he might have thought to put them in the fridge before passing out.
He hadn't cleaned at all since he'd move in. He didn't even own a vacuum.
Bird pulled her bottom lip between her teeth as he watched him look everywhere in the room except for at her.
"I brought you breakfast." She finally spoke again in an attempt to draw his attention back to her.
"From that little diner we found over on West 27th, remember?" She asked as she brushed past him to get into the living room and picked up the bag from the couch, "It was the night we saw that awful play but we bailed out before the final act and left everyone? The food was so good, but the coffee tasted like it had been sitting there for a week?"
With that she nodded back into the kitchen where the pot of coffee was almost finished brewing, silently explaining why she'd been making coffee.
Jim watched her in silence before his gaze fell to the floor, he remembered that night clearly.
Wayne Enterprises had gotten a number of tickets to a play being put on and Bird was one of the employees who'd been given a pair of them.
The night was supposed to end with a diner at one of the most expensive restaurants in Gotham.
One of the many company sponsored events that neither he nor Bird cared much for attending in the first place.
"Here." She darted over to him and held out the bag for him to take, "I should probably get going anyways. Bruce has his meeting with the board today."
Jim blinked as he stared back at her thinking to himself how out of place she looked among the interior of his run down house.
If only they were in better surroundings it wouldn't have felt much different from when they were living together. He was usually just making it down stairs as she ready to head out the door to her job.
Much like now, he'd be in his boxers and an undershirt and she'd look flawless with barely a hair out of place.
She'd be heading off to make real changes for the city and his plans usually involved hours in front of the TV watching true crime shows and getting angry and frustrated at seeing all the mistakes made in the handling of the cases by the detectives.
Mistakes he, himself, wouldn't have made with lives at stake.
From there he'd be slapped with the harsh reality that he wasn't a detective, so it really didn't matter how differently he thought he could have handled things.
That was when his drinking in the middle of the day started.
"Jim?" Bird said, lightly shaking the bag in her hand, "Here. You should eat something… aside from cheap takeout."
"What is this?" He sighed, pulling the bag from her hand and setting it by his gun on the counter.
"Breakfast-" She began to repeat.
"I mean what is this?" He motioned between them, "What are you trying to do?"
"I'm not sure, but…" Bird answered with total honesty, "You can't keep going like this, Jim. This monster of the week gig, the isolation…"
Her voice trailed off and fear crept in.
All this time she'd been assuming there had been no one since her, but now she wondered if that was really the case.
For someone who liked to play the lone wolf hero, she knew Jim didn't actually like to be alone.
Turning around she started to leave, but after taking a few steps she couldn't move any further.
"Has there been anyone else?" Bird asked, "Since me?"
Even if there had been, she had to know the truth.
She looked over her shoulder at him, their eyes locked and he truthfully answered, "No."
She closed her eyes and let out the breath she'd been holding on to.
Jim watched her as she crossed through the living room, swooping her purse up from the couch on her way to the door.
Just as she'd started to pull the door open, he cleared his throat and asked, "What about you?"
When she turned back to look at him, he clarified, "Has there been anyone else?"
"No." She promised, pausing a little longer before trying to explain, "I wasn't trying to get away from you, Jim. I just…"
With a wordless shrug, she offered up a small but sad smile before leaving and pulling the door shut behind her.
Once she was gone, Jim pulled in a deep breath and leaned against the counter, rubbing his hands over his face.
He'd thought about Bird's return to Gotham nearly all the time she'd been away.
To begin with he wasn't sure that she was coming back at all and even if she did, he wasn't entirely sure what to expect.
She looked good and seemed to be in a much better place than when she'd left.
He wanted to be happy about that; be happy for her and deep down a part of him was, but happiness in general was an emotion far down on the list of what he felt these days.
After rubbing his tired and achy eyes once more, he crossed the small kitchen and opened the cabinet to grab both a coffee cup and something to make it stronger. A splash - or several should do it.
But as he pulled one of his only clean mugs down, he saw the bottle of alcohol he'd kept pushed towards the back of the cabinet was empty.
"Damn." He muttered to himself as he shut the door a little too hard and poured out half a cup of the piping hot coffee Bird had set to brew while she as there.
He'd have bet his latest Arkham monster of the week check that he'd just bought that bottle.
For a fleeting moment his mind went back to when he'd first woken up and saw the empty bottle of the nightstand with no memory of finishing it off.
Shrugging it off and telling himself that it had been rough couple of days with seeing Bird again, he took a drink of the coffee and then carried the mug with him into the living room where he came to a dead stop when he saw the small table he kept most of his drinking stash was still covered with bottles -but they were all empty.
Jim then proceeded into the bedroom, feeling for the flask in the pocket of the jacket he'd been wearing the day before. A now empty flask -which he dropped to the floor and headed back into the kitchen.
Every single bottle of alcohol he'd had in the house was empty.
Every.
Last.
One.
Even the bottles he'd hidden; not sure who'd he'd been hiding them from.
Maybe himself.
He'd been collecting enough liquor that before Bird came through and poured it all down the drain, he probably could have opened a small bar with it.
How long had she'd been in his house, he wondered.
Going through every nook and cranny until the place was dry.
It wasn't until then that he realized his hiding places must have been so obvious to her because they were the same as where he'd started stashing bottles at Bird's townhouse.
Something he thought he'd hidden well.
Always picking up another bottle on his way home -just in case.
Getting home and hiding it behind something else. In the back of a cabinet or behind something in the closet.
He'd even hidden a bottle away behind the folded towels in the back of the linen closet.
Always with another excuse in mind.
He hadn't realized how much was already in the house.
When she started to spiral down, she'd flip when he move things around, so he hid them to avoid a fight.
He'd even convinced himself for a while that he was keeping the alcohol hidden for Bird's own good.
That alcohol never helped anything. Never made anything better and she was better off not having the temptation of drinking her problems away within reach at any given moment.
Advice he'd failed to follow himself.
Most of all, what he didn't want to admit the most was that he knew it was becoming a problem.
That all the other excuses were moot. At the end of the day he'd been trying to hide it from Bird; he didn't want her to know how bad he was struggling.
But she'd known all along.
Known his secrets. His hiding places.
The contents in his stomach started to churn.
Anger.
At himself for falling so far.
For not seeing just how much she'd been aware of things he'd convinced himself were hidden.
Guilt.
If he hadn't been so caught up in trying, but failing, to hide his own downward spiral than maybe he'd have seen how badly Bird was coming undone.
Shame.
All this time he'd blamed her for how things ended. For taking off the way she did.
Only now, looking back, he couldn't pinpoint many reasons she'd have wanted to stay.
Splashing the strong coffee into the sink from the cup, he turned the water on and swished a few rounds in the mug, before getting some of the cold water and taking a small drink.
He then tossed the mug into the sink, not caring enough to notice when the water splashed up onto the counter and then over the edge onto the floor beside him.
He needed to go.
To be anywhere other than the run down house he called home.
Suddenly restless with the feeling that anywhere was better than where he was.
Maybe the bar over on Spears Street that opened earlier than all the others.
The patrons were usually all male, twenty or more years his senior.
The types who kept to themselves. Each with their own load of sorrows to down.
••• flashback •••
"Two hours." Jim said, unable to hold back a sigh as he held the brochure in one hand and rubbed his face with the other hand.
Glancing over to where Bird was standing he waited for her reaction, but she was too distracted by the shine the glitter on the posters outside of the theater had in the lighting to hear him.
"Hey." He nudged her and made sure she was listening before he held up the booklet and repeated, "This play is going to be two hours long… at the least."
"Mhmm." She hummed, tucking her curled hair behind her ears and offering up an empathetic look when she reminded him, "I don't want to be here anymore than you do."
He held back another sigh for her sake.
It was true, she wasn't thrilled about spending their Friday night with people she didn't care to associate much with outside of the office, but he also knew it was different for her.
They looked at him differently than they did Bird; though she never seemed to notice.
Jim wanted nothing more than to flag down a taxi and go home, but he stayed for her -even if he'd have been much happier spending the night in.
Bird's eyes drifted back over towards the sheen and sparkle of the glitter posters in the bright lighting outside of the large, historic theater until she heard her name called again.
In unison, both Bird and Jim plastered on smiles as they turned to greet the rest of the group they'd been waiting on that night.
The small group grew by the minute until the last couple showed up.
One of the company executives, who's name seemed to be lost on Jim, apologized for making them wait. Harshly blaming the delay on their driver's incompetence with no uncertain words, while his wife nodded along and kept a hold of his arm.
"Hopefully our limo driver can do a better job." His wife finally spoke, "Get us all to our dinner reservations after the show."
The group thinned out some once they were inside of the theater.
A few heading to the restrooms or stopping at the concession for snacks before they planned on taking their seats.
Bird had wandered off towards the gift shop and Jim found his way over to the bar.
He was going to need to a drink or two -possibly three or four to get through the night.
"This is going to be a long night, huh?" John, one of the men from Wayne Enterprises in their group asked as he stepped up next to where Jim had just ordered his drink.
"Yeah." Jim agreed with a smile, before diverting his gaze back to the bar.
"Shush." Alice, John's wife said as she joined her husband and reminded him, "Critics have been raving about this play."
"Well who am I to argue with dozens of rave reviews?" Her husband bellowed a laugh before he swooped up his freshly prepared drink from the bar.
"So, Jim, have you decided what you're going to do now that you're days at GCPD are over?" Alice asked in a chipper tone.
She seemed completely unaware of how her attempt to make polite conversation had left Jim feeling like he could crawl out of his own skin.
And he didn't miss the expression on John's face as he waited on an answer.
Beginning to feel awkward herself from the extended silence the trio was standing in, Alice cleared her throat and attempted to give deepen the conversation, "You worked security at a company event not too long ago, right?"
"Yeah." Jim downed the rest of his drink and motioned to the bartender for another.
Her attempt to give him an out had only left him feeling worse; knowing Bird was the only reason he'd been asked to head up security for one of Wayne Enterprises high profile events the month before.
When he'd gotten the call and temp job offer, Bird had tried to act like she knew nothing about it, but he suspected she was trying to get him out of the house more.
"Maybe you could work private security?" Alice continued, stepping up to the bar and ordering a drink for herself.
"Maybe." Jim nodded with a tense smile, before turning around entirely to face the bar and order yet another drink.
This was the part he hated the most when they'd go out with Bird's co-workers; the questions about if he'd decided what he wanted to do yet.
The judgmental looks that would follow.
At on such event someone had even made the comment that if they didn't have to work, they probably wouldn't either.
Little did they know that he had his own money in savings. He wasn't freeloading off of Bird and as much as he tried to let the insinuations not get under his skin, he'd be lying if he said it didn't make him feel as though he'd shrunk down to the size of a pea.
Bird walked through the large theater lobby with her bag of items she'd just purchased at the gift shop.
She didn't see Jim at first and almost turned to head towards the company sponsored balcony seating, until she remembered the bar was open before the play and during intermission.
Sure enough, that was where she finally spotted him. Standing next to John and Alice, with a drink in hand.
Her pace slowed to a stop as she watched him downing the alcohol like it was water.
She noticed him drinking more and more over the last few weeks. It wasn't a big deal when it was a few beers a night, but now the beer bottles sat in the fridge while new bottles of the hard stuff kept showing up in her cabinets.
At first she'd thought the increase in his drinking was due to him being out of work for so long. That he'd sit there miserable from the free time and so she'd gotten him a job working security a few nights at a company event in hopes that he'd start to feel some purpose again.
But that hadn't been the case.
"Starling-" Alice called out when she spotted her, "Bird!" She quickly corrected herself and waved, "Over here."
"There you guys are." Bird feigned surprise, pretending as though she hadn't been watching from afar.
As she walked closer she added, "I was just about to go to the box and see who was there."
"Yes!" Alice's eyes widened, "We should take out seats soon, but first some snacks."
With that she smiled and looped her arm with her husbands as she led the way over to the concession stand.
"You okay?" Bird asked as she faced Jim.
"Yeah." He nodded, setting the empty glass down on the bar and asking, "What's in the bag?"
"Oh." She chuckled to herself and opened the royal blue paper bag containing her purchase, "I picked up something for Oswald."
Jim's brows raised while he watched her pull out a small, hand painted penguin figuring complete with a glittery purple top hat.
"That's…" Jim's voice trailed off, not sure how to finish the sentence.
"He's either going to love it or hate it." She beamed with another small laugh.
Leaning forward and catching a glimpse inside of the bag he asked, "Is that another one?"
"Yes." Bird nodded, pulling out the matching figurine and admitting, "I know exactly where I'm going to put this one. There's a spot on the mantle for it."
"Ah." He breathed trying to match her expression, but couldn't sell the lie.
"Come on." She said after returning the items to the bag and holding out her free hand to him, "Let's go."
"Home?" Jim half-joked.
"To our seats." Bird corrected, stepping closer and grabbing onto his hand to pull him along with her before he had the chance to hit the bartender up for another refill.
The minutes seemed to slowly tick by.
Nearly painful for Jim with every glance at his watch as the show trucked on.
This wasn't where he wanted to be.
Aside from Bird, these weren't the people he'd willingly spend time with.
He'd tried to focus on the play, tried to follow the plot line in hopes time would speed up or at the very least move at a normal rate and not lull by.
But it wasn't helping.
Add how uncomfortable the seats were and he was not a very happy camper.
He glanced over in Bird's direction when he felt her hands on his arm.
Almost as if she could read his mind and knew he'd spent the last ten minutes wondering why the hell he'd agreed to come to this event in the first place, she slid her arms around his arm closest to her.
Leaned in and rested her head on his shoulder, cuddling up to him as best she could with the arm rest between them.
Letting out a breath, Jim relaxed more into his own seat, not even realizing how tense he'd been until her closeness and warmth had calmed him.
Reminded him why he'd agreed to spend his night at the theater.
When he felt the weight of her head raise from his shoulder he looked over at her to see she was staring at him; at the ready to say something.
She glanced over towards the stage first and then back to him, he'd expected her to comment about the play. Maybe bring up the dinner they were attending after the show.
"Did we set that documentary to record?"
Jim's brows furrowed.
"What?" He whispered back.
"The documentary." Bird repeated, revealing her thoughts had also been light years away from their current setting, "About that cult in Canada years ago."
"I remember." Jim nodded, adjusting in his seat and leaning in further towards her.
"Yeah." She nodded back, "Did we set it to record?"
"I think so." Jim answered.
Bird watched while a smile slowly formed on his face. Angling the corners of his mouth up as he continued to stare at her.
"What?" She questioned. Eyes darting back and forth, unable to stop her own smile from creeping up.
"Nothing." Jim said.
Pulling his eyes away from her face, he looked straight ahead at the stage for a moment or so before admitting, "Just thinking how much I'd rather be at home right now."
"Me too." She agreed, curving her body against his side again. Head returning to his shoulder as she let out a heavy sigh and complained, "And I'm starving. How much longer till this is over?"
Checking his watch again and seeing only a relatively short time had passed since the last time he watched the hands tick by, he answered with a sigh of his own, "Over an hour."
"Let's go."
"The concession stand is closed during-" Jim began, but she didn't let him finish.
Instead she clarified, "No, I mean let's go. Go. Get something to eat and just go home."
Letting out a weak laugh, Jim kept his voice low as he whispered, "Lead the way."
•••
Jim had thought she'd been kidding; but next thing he knew, only the ghost of her touch remained on his arm and shoulder.
Quickly and silently, she'd slid out of her seat and sneaked away.
In a state of near disbelief, he got to his own feet, giving a strained smile and awkward nod to one of Bird's co-workers when they'd looked over at him, before he ducked out of the box seating.
He'd found Bird a few moments later, at the end of the hallway messing with the door marked emergency fire exit.
She'd disabled the alarm and pushed it open, a laugh on her lips as they spilled outside onto the fire escape and the chilly night air swirled a dusting of glittery snow in the air around them.
He remembered the cold of the metal beneath his hands as he'd grabbed the railing for balance.
The taste of her lips as she kissed him once they'd climbed down the ladder and had both feet on the sidewalk.
The scent of her perfume in the air, tickling his face when she'd tightly grabbed his hand and started running from the theater, pulling him right behind her as she did.
As if they making a grand escape -in search of a getaway car.
He hadn't even thought to ask why they were sneaking away.
The front exit would have worked just fine.
If he were by himself, he'd have just went out the front.
But he wasn't.
He wasn't alone.
He had her and she had him.
And in the nonsense of those moments Bird seemed to exist on a different plane.
Living by her own rules and in those moments he got to share in it with her, he felt like it too.
The rest of the city melted away into a blur through the windows in the back of the cab they'd hailed down.
"I'm so hungry!" Bird had called out to the driver once she's slid in and shut the door.
She'd ignored Jim's suggestions of going to one of their usual favorite places and instead instructed the taxi driver to surprise them. To take them to somewhere with great food that served breakfast late into the night -because she was craving bacon and wanted waffles.
It was the first time he'd put up an argument all night.
Saying he'd rather go somewhere where he knew the food would be good.
Somewhere familiar.
But she'd shushed him with a kiss.
Making it clear his argument would be pointless.
That she was getting her way -she usually did.
Several minutes later they were walking into a small Mom-And-Pop diner that was open nearly all night with the most delicious smell of cooking food wafting out into the street.
They were still dressed up from the theater.
More than a little over dressed for such a casual, homey eatery. All eyes were on them when they came through the doors.
Bird hadn't seemed to notice and after a few minutes neither did Jim.
Nothing else seemed to matter outside of those moments when they were in them.
Bird was herself. Living her life unapologetically so and it was contagious.
A night that started out with nothing but anxiousness and dread had turned into such a fond memory.
He remembered looking at her from across the table of the small corner booth they'd been seated in.
The way her eyes lit up when their waiter had set her plate down in front of her.
One of those many moments when it really struck him just how much he loved her.
It was one of the last really good nights they had before things started to change.
Bird was alive. Full of life.
It was practically seeping from her pores.
Happiness in her eyes, her smile, the sound of it in her voice.
She was alive.
And then she wasn't.
Or at least it felt that way to him.
Now he was left wondering how much he'd been responsible for the light in her eyes dulling.
Struck down by wondering how long her smiles been empty before he'd noticed the change.
How long she'd felt hollow. Alone.
••• present day •••
Bird pulled in a gasp of air, deep enough it rattled her bones and caused her lungs to ache.
With her mouth wide open, desperate for air, she sucked fabric in between her teeth. It stuck to her tongue.
Sputtering the black fabric out, she shook her head and tried to raise her arms but they were tied down to the chair she was sitting in.
Her eyes were wide beneath the fabric bag over her entire head, but she couldn't see anything. Just a glow from the lights in the room seeped in.
For several frantic seconds, all while still trying to catch her breath, Bird tried to piece together what had happened.
The only way to figure out where she was would have to start with piecing together where she'd been.
Wayne Enterprises.
Nodding to herself, she remembered making it to the main office building of her family's company just in time for the meeting her brother was holding with the board.
She'd stood at his side, with Alfred lingering behind them, as Bruce claimed to have knowledge of the secret organization pulling the strings in Gotham. Threatened to send what he had to both the federal government and the media if the leader of the clandestine group didn't meet with them before the end of the day.
Bird remembered standing in near silence herself, carefully studying the faces of everyone in the room. Trying to pinpoint who looked the most scared or too dramatically confused.
Then she'd went to her own office. Scheduled some visits to various shelters in the upcoming weeks for the company to get photo ops. Push how much good they were doing out into the media. Raise more money.
She'd left work early.
Gone home.
Ordered dinner from one of her favorite places.
Almost on cue, she felt her stomach growl from hunger.
That's right, she thought. She ordered food in but she'd never gotten the chance to eat.
Her phone had rang within a handful of seconds after she'd sat down at the dining room table.
Jim.
Her eyes blinked rapidly, her hear forward, blocked gaze angled down into the darkness.
She'd seen his name and number on the screen. Remembered the hesitation she had in flipping the phone open to take the call.
Unsure if she should be anxious or happy he was trying to get in contact with her.
The first attempt on his end since she'd come home.
Yet another thing in her day that had gotten interrupted. She never got to answer the phone.
…Because someone had been in her house.
She closed her eyes, her own breath creating an uncomfortable humidity inside of the hood, causing the fabric to cling to her forehead.
She remembered seeing the curtains blowing out into the room from a gust of wind, she'd caught the sight from the corner of her eye.
Something so normal that she didn't think it was odd, until she remembered she closed up all the windows because the cool evening air had put a chill in her house.
So much so that she'd still been wearing her coat when she sat down to eat.
That's where everything was hazy. Unclear.
All she was sure of was that someone was in the house with her -and whatever they'd used to bring her down was much stronger than chloroform.
Someone grasped onto the black hood covering her head, and hastily jerked it up in the air. Snatching several strands of hair straight from her scalp as they did.
Her chest rose and fell heavily, taking in the air from the room as quickly as possible.
Her lungs felt scorched. Like she'd been breathing in ash.
There was a taste in the back of her throat comparable to bitter tea, left to steep for far to long.
"Bird." An older woman's voice called out, "Bruce."
The siblings both looked at one another as they sat midway down a table large enough to seat at least twenty people. Both tied to chairs, directly across from one another.
Neither of them having realized the other was there until they heard their names.
Bruce looked as frazzled as she felt.
He looked at his sister, seeing her hair fuzzed out on the sides, sticking out in static on the top.
There was a darkening bruise on her forehead, he saw the dried blood on her cheek from where the skin had split open from being hit.
Bruce diverted his eyes down to the glossy wood table.
The last thing he remembered was hearing commotion downstairs and finding Alfred on the floor.
Unconscious? Dead?
Bruce couldn't be positive if his butler had been breathing.
He hadn't gotten much of a chance to check on him before someone had grabbed him from behind, pressed a wet cloth over his mouth and noise and everything went black.
Looking back at his older sister, Bruce realized she must have put up much more of a fight then he'd been able to.
"You wanted to talk?" The woman asked, after she'd given them a few moments to get their bearings.
They both jerked their heads to look her way in unison.
Like mirror reflections of the other.
Bruce's mouth was open, he was still having a hard time catching his breath.
Bird seemed a fraction more composed. Appearing more angry than startled.
"Oh…" The woman chuckled upon realizing she was still wearing her owl mask.
"Forgive me." She smiled as she pulled the mask off and laid it down on the table.
Bruce's eyes widened as he stared at the woman's familiar face.
He couldn't remember her name -but he knew her.
Bird, however, had given the woman a once over and then seemed to be focused more on the mask.
"Better?" She questioned, directing her gaze towards Bruce from where she sat at the head of the table.
"I know you…" Bruce swallowed hard, "I've seen you at Wayne Enterprise's events. You… you've been in my home." He remembered seeing her at the various get togethers his parents would throw.
"My name is Kathryn." She introduced herself.
"You're the leader of this thing?" Bird asked.
Side-eyeing the man dressed in all black, his face also covered in a mask, who was standing behind where her brother was sitting.
She was also well aware someone was standing behind her too.
"I represent the group you've asked to speak with." Kathryn corrected while eyeing the younger woman.
"Is Alfred, okay?" Bruce choked on the breath of air he'd tried to pull in, "You didn't have to hurt him!"
"He wouldn't have let us meet alone." Kathryn dismissed. Not answering the question about if the butler was okay.
"You tried to kill us!" Bruce's voice shook, "You were behind Indian Hill. Hugo Strange was hired by you-"
"Is that why you're here Bruce? To ask questions you already know the answers to?" Kathryn scoffed at him.
Bird's eyes were on her brother now. Watching as his entire body trembled like a small animal caught in a snowstorm.
His emotions were all over the place. She could only guess this thoughts were darting around in his head quicker than he was able to process.
It reminded her of the night they'd went after Matches Malone.
Bruce's eyes met his sisters. A deepening vertical line appearing between his brows as he stared back at her, not sure why she was picking now to remain silent.
"Who are you." Bruce looked back at the head of the table, "What do you call yourselves?"
"Our name is unimportant." She dismissed.
"Now…" Kathryn let out a heavy exhale as she gripped the handles of the chair and pushed herself to her feet. The short heels on her shoes click-clacking with every step as she started to circle the table, "You both made a threat against us."
A predatory gesture, Bird knew it well.
It was a move she'd often used to unnerve people in situations where she had the upper hand.
"You have referred to evidence that you've uncovered of our existence." Kathryn continued her steady, but slow paced walk encircling the table, "We would like to know what you've found."
"Nothing." Bird answered, her eyes staying with Kathryn as she walked behind where Bruce was sitting, "Nothing certain."
"Until now." Bruce chimed in. Now seeming to either be mirroring his sister's calmer composure or finding an anchor within himself to grab onto.
"A bluff?" Kathryn's painted red lips curved up in a smile. Her dark lined eyes widening in amusement, "Nicely played."
"It wasn't just a bluff." Bruce shook his head, "The more I studied my company's doings. The more I found things that could only be explained buy your organizations existence. Still… I had to know for sure."
"And now we do." Bird smirked.
Kathryn came to a stop at the end of the table closet to where they were seated. "And what now?" She questioned.
"According to you; we already tried to kill you once." Kathryn straightened her posture.
Subconsciously trying to make herself appear more imposing.
"I began all this because I wanted to solve my parents' murders." Bruce explained, "Six months ago I concluded your organization responsible."
"And have you changed your mind?"
"No." Bruce answered as Bird shook her head.
"But…" His tone faltered a bit, "There are other considerations now."
"Such as your own life." Kathryn's thinning lips pursed together in an unsettling straight line.
The age lines around her lips deepening, appearing almost hollow.
She paused for a breath, "And the lives of those close to you." She added, "Alfred Pennyworth. Selina Kyle. James Gordon…to name a few."
"I see now." She continued, starting her trip back to her seat at the head of the table, "Why you've gone to so much trouble. You're wanting to make a deal."
"Yes." Bird admitted.
"What do either of you have to offer?"
"Wayne Enterprises." Bruce threw out a little too fast.
Bird's eyes cut over to where he was sitting.
They should have thought this plan all the way through. At least come up with a basic script to go off of.
"You cannot give someone what they already posses." Kathryn reminded him.
She stood now in front of her seat, but didn't sit down.
"I'm not finished." Bruce interrupted, "If I die... my shares will be turned over to the federal government. Investigators will comb through every file. Every single asset." He let it sink it before questioning, "Are you ready for that level of scrutiny?"
"That would be unfortunate. But we would weather the storm." Kathryn argued, "What else?"
"The Wayne name still has meaning. It's a symbol of light, of hope. For a group such as yours that could provide a useful distraction." Bruce continued.
Bird arched a brow. Clearly her brother had formulated a script of his own, he just hadn't bothered to share it with her.
"You are an impressive young man." Kathryn complimented, before cocking her head to the side and starting up on her rejection of that idea too.
"Forgive my little brother." Bird spoke up, "He's brilliant but still too young to understand how Gotham works."
Bruce's eyes cut over to her, but she wouldn't look at him. She kept her eyes locked on Kathryn.
"That's more my area of expertise." Bird continued, "For your group to thrive and continue to live in the safety of shadows you need complacency. For everyone to go on about their lives and not start poking around."
"And?" Kathryn pushed.
"And!" Bird's voice raised in a mocking tone, "If the last two surviving members of the Wayne family wind up dead -well, just look at how our parents' murders caused such unrest in the entire city."
Seeing she had her attention, Bird continued, "That was the reason for having some low-level thug framed for the crime, right? To try and put minds at ease. Stop talk of conspiracy theories. Keep people from picking at the threads because eventually everything would come undone."
"You're organization is actually safer with us alive; keeping your secrets, than it would be if you we were dead and everyone started sticking their noses in places that wouldn't be good for you." Bird offered a tense shrug, "That's the cold hard truth."
"The Waynes…" Kathryn breathed with a sentimental look, "Always such a smart bunch. Sometimes too much for their own good."
Bird and Bruce looked at each other. Waiting to find out what was going to happen next.
"I happen to agree with you, Bird." Kathryn announced, "For now, that is, you are worth more to us alive rather than dead." Her voice lowered as she repeated, "For now."
Bruce's gaze fell to the table. He understood now why Bird had been so quiet. She'd been trying to let Kathryn do the talking; let her show her hand before they'd show theirs.
Everyone had always spoke of how quiet Bruce is, his whole life he'd heard comments like that -but now, for the first time, he was starting to feel like maybe he talked a little too much.
"Still… your offer is not sufficient." Kathryn said, "We will also require that you both cease all investigation into both our existence and your parents' murder."
Finally, she took her seat again, seeming much less tense and more at ease with them and her own decision of letting them live, "Any violation of that in the slightest -and our agreement is void."
Hearing the swoosh of liquid in a glass bottled, Bird turned her head to the side to see the man standing behind her wetting a white cloth. The enforcer behind her brother was doing the same.
"Ah, hell." Bird muttered through her clenched teeth.
She felt like she'd barely survived the first round of that stuff.
"We need your answer now." Kathryn's voice deepened again.
Neither of the siblings seemed willing to offer either a yes or no up to her.
Both of them taking turns watching the other and looking at the enforcers behind them.
"Now." Kathryn ordered.
"I agree." Bruce said. The words sounded strained.
Painful like he'd had to carve them from his own flesh.
"Deal." Bird breathed, giving a single decisive nod to Kathryn.
"I am so happy to hear that." She beamed a near threatening smile at them, "Needless to say you will not see me again."
Bird and Bruce looked at each other. Each of them watching as the the masked men stepped closer to their sibling with the saturated cloth in hand.
"Goodbye to you both." Kathryn said.
•••
Alfred rubbed the back of his head, breathing through the pain as his vision was still blurring with each new jolt of pain that shot through him.
He'd been hit so hard on the head by the intruder that he was half-surprised his skull wasn't cracked open.
Some time ago he'd woken up on the floor of the study, the first thing he was aware of had been the white-hot pain in his head that radiated down through the rest of his body.
-The second was his concern for Bruce.
Mustering all of the strength he could manage, he'd pulled himself up off the floor and began a room-by-room search of the entire manor. Only the scouring had been to no avail.
Back to the study, that's where he was headed, to pick up the phone and call the police.
But as he rounded the corner of the doorway, he caught sight of Bruce lying on one of the couches. "Master Bruce!" He yelled, rushing his way.
But once he got to him, Alfred saw Bird lying on the other couch.
"Lady Wayne!" He shouted.
He'd spent the next several minutes going back and forth between them. Monitoring to make sure they were both breathing and showing signs of life and patting them on the cheeks in an attempt to revive them.
"Master Bruce. Come on, now." Alfred patted his face, "Master B, wake up."
He could see movement beneath the youngest Wayne's eyelids. His eyes starting to roll around just before his lashes fluttered.
"There he is." Alfred smiled, as Bruce finally looked at him.
"How did I…" Bruce groggily mumbled, "How did I get back here…"
"I haven't got the foggiest-" Alfred began to explain.
But then both Alfred and Bruce were startled by a loud gasp as Bird woke up, violently and all at once, even flipping herself off of the couch onto the floor in a state of panic and struggle to breathe.
"Lady Wayne!" Alfred turned all his attention to her as he grasped onto her and helped her up from the floor, "Are you alright?"
"How did…" She huffed, looking around confused, "How did I get here?"
"I don't know." Alfred answered the same question he had moments before for her brother, "I came in here to phone the police and here you both were."
"Alfred!" Bruce stood up, wrapping his arms around him and squeezing so tight it nearly took the air from him, "You're alright. I was so worried!"
"I'm fine, mate." He chuckled, returning the warm embrace, "You alright?"
Stepping out of his arms and walking a few steps away with his back towards them, Bruce ran his fingers through his own hair.
Alfred started telling them how someone had gotten in the house without even making a peep.
"I saw them, Alfred." Bruce said.
"Correction." Bird wobbled as she rose to her own feet, "We saw them. And we only saw one of them. A woman."
"We spoke to them." Bruce turned to face her.
"And?" Alfred waited.
"It worked." Bruce's face twisted up. Contorting like he was in pain, "They agreed."
"What?" Alfred looked between the siblings, "Just… just like that? To stop coming after you?"
"On the condition that we stop digging." Bird explained.
"We can't investigate any of it. Not Indian Hill. Not the corruption in the company. Not my parents' murder." Bruce named off, his expression deepening by the second, "Alfred… it was the only way. We had to promise."
Tears stung at his eyes and he cringed at the sound of the whine in his own voice.
"You weren't the only one they threatened, were you?" Alfred asked. Knowing it would take much more than the threat of danger to Bruce's own life for him to make such a promise.
"No. We weren't." Bird spoke when her brother seemed to lose his voice and started nervously chewing on the end of his thumb.
Alfred looked between them. Wishing more than anything he could have been there to help them, to see what they saw, because he had a feeling he'd never get the full story of what happened in that room.
"Do you intend to keep your word?" Alfred questioned.
"I don't know." Bird's voice was a near whisper.
"Yes!" Bruce said, looking over at her in shock.
As if they hadn't just had the same conversation with Kathryn, in which she'd threatened the lives of everyone close to them.
"I do." Bruce added with more confidence.
"And..." Alfred's voice was soft, "And how do you know that they'll keep theirs?"
Bruce's eyes widened, his gaze darting over to where his sister was standing, silently asking -needing, her input.
She'd been there with him. Handled the situation better than he had and he needed to know what she thought.
"I think they'll keep their word." Bird finally said, quickly holding a hand up to show she wasn't done talking, "For now, at least. I think we can take a breath. We've bought some time to figure out what we're going to do. But I don't trust them. Sooner or later we'll end up crossing paths with them again."
Bruce nodded.
He wanted to say something. Have an answer to what and why this was happening to them, but he didn't.
He wanted to thank her for keeping it together better than he had under pressure, give her credit for the time they'd been bought. But he couldn't.
The tears were growing in his eyes, the lump harder to swallow down in his throat.
It was too much.
Without another word he, he turned and quickly left the room.
Salt water splashing down his cheeks and onto his sweater before he even reached the stairs.
Alfred stared at the doorway that Bruce had left through and then back to Bird with a questioning expression.
Offering up something that resembled a smile, she weakly nodded, "Go on. I'm okay."
Once she was alone, Bird dropped into a seat on the couch and rubbed her hands over her face.
Leaning forward she let out a heavy breath, the motion of exhale feeling like it could fold her body in half as she stared down at the floor.
Deciding that she was either going to go home or start a kettle of water for tea, Bird put her hands on the couch to start to push herself back up in her exhausted state. But the palm of her hand landed on something hard.
Looking over she saw she'd pushed her hand down on the pocket of the long coat she'd been wearing. Clumsily she pushed her hand inside of the pocket and wrapped her fingers around the object -her cellphone.
Flipping the phone open she saw she had a missed call and voicemail from Jim.
The call she'd never gotten the opportunity to answer earlier.
She pulled in a deep breath, as she brought the phone to her ear and played the message.
Picturing his end of the call in her head as she did.
"Bird." Jim began his greeting, letting out a heavy breath into the phone, "It's me.
There was a scraping sound as he dragged the glass cup across the uneven table top closer to him and looked at the small amount of liquid left. Just enough to cover the bottom of the glass. Distort the view of the table.
"I just…" Another breath whooshed against the speaker in the phone, "It wasn't all you, okay?"
Jim's forehead lined. He brought the glass to his lips and drank the rest of it down. Barely enough for a swallow.
It only made his mouth feel drier.
He'd had too much to drink. Picking up the phone was a bad idea. He'd known that from the second he'd started dialing her number.
It had even crossed his mind that maybe she'd changed her number. Or still hadn't replaced the phone she'd tossed into the river months before.
Maybe that was why he'd gone through with the call. Half full of hope that he wouldn't get through. Then at least he could say he'd tried.
"I just keep looking back, you know?" He paused, as if he'd really get an answer, "All the ways I messed up. How it wasn't what you'd signed up for and I know I let you down. I wasn't who you needed me to be-"
Jim stopped mid-sentence. His pity party starting to bubble with anger.
He'd finally started to take some of the blame for how things had soured between them.
As much as he'd have liked to, he knew he couldn't pin all the blame on her. This was just another one of his many failures.
"But you didn't have to leave." His voice was muffled from the pressing the phone so tightly against his face, he could hear the plastic creak in his hand.
Leaning forward he rested his elbows on the table. One hand still clutching the phone and the other hand against his forehead as he leaned on the surface.
Each second of silence ticked by like an hour. He'd nearly expected the recording to cut him off. Maybe that's what he wanted. For it end the message right then and there. Save him from himself.
"I don't know." He finally said in a much softer voice, "Maybe you did. But I didn't want you to. Even when things got bad, even with the fighting… my life was better with you in it."
"I miss you." He admitted, "Missed." He corrected a little too quickly.
Putting an awkward amount of emphasis on the past tense version of the word.
As if he didn't miss her anymore. As if he could sell the lie through the phone since she wasn't in front of him to see the pain on his face.
"I… I don't know why I called." He muttered more at himself than to her, "I guess you just needed to hear… or I needed to say it, to tell you that the blame isn't all on you."
Bird closed her eyes, the phone pressed tightly against her ear as she listened to the message.
One that seemed to be full of rambling and somehow still not have enough to it.
His voice was a little raspy. Speech slurred, but not too much.
He'd clearly had too much to drink, but not enough that he'd be able to blame it on a drunk-dial.
"Lady Wayne?" Alfred popped his head into the room.
"Uh, yeah?" Bird cleared her throat. An attempt to rattle the emotion in her voice loose.
"I just put the kettle on." He explained, before questioning, "Hungry? Master Bruce has requested pancakes."
With a hopeless sounding laugh, Bird tucked her phone into her pocket and said, "Pancakes sound great."
•••
A/N - I'm sorry for taking so long to get this chapter finished and posted!
Hopefully you'll think it was worth the wait?
I started a new job in early June and trying to adjust and find time to write has been difficult, to say the least.
I'm still super excited to be in season 3 now and have this story posted and I hope you're all really liking it so far.
Thank you to everyone who has added this story to your favorites and/or subscribed to follow.
And I owe a huge thank you to: AGBreads, xenocanaan, Shadow knight1121, Miss Victoria 20, ThatMysteriousSlime, xxXWolfsLullabyXxx, DancingDorisDay, Love. Fiction. 2018, Munyue, amerlia, Havana, movielover251, Rasiel Hasu, SmellYourScentForMiles, TVDobsession, Katniss789, and to the Guests who reviewed the beginning chapter of Devil's Playground.
Your support and kinds words honestly mean everything and are responsible for me getting this chapter finished and posted even with my 40+ hour work weeks!
I'd love to know who is still reading Bird and what you guys all thought of the chapter! ^_^
Thanks for reading.