Chapter Three: Trust is a Vice
I was taken to my cell. Bruce stood past the security door. He watched me with a skeptical eye, as if I were a member of post-European Africa. Confused, arrogant, and simply annoyed. The security door opened as soon as my cell door was closed. Bruce entered in a suit- as one should when conducting business. In his hand was the letter.
He stood in front of me a condottiere, a man who's fear has escaped him.
"Glad I could be a part of that process." I said, finishing my thought aloud.
Bruce laughed, he knew what I was talking about. "Is this," he waved the letter as it were a chew toy. "true?"
"If it wasn't true, then why are you here?" I asked him.
"Because I have a hard time believing it." Bruce replied.
I stood up, and almost moved to straighten out my trench coat, only to remember that along with most of my belongings on my person, it was confiscated.
The only original clothing I had on me at the moment were my boots, which they graciously let me keep so I can die in them. Funny, they always let you keep what you wear on your feet. A reminder that the life you once had is over. I used to be a mercenary. Now I am a prisoner.
Prisoner. Interesting occupation.
"Interesting that you say that Mister Wayne." I said.
"Why?" He asked.
"What an ill thought out question. Why, you say? Why! Why anything Bruce?" I swelled to almost manic proportions, I pressed myself up against the steel of the door and through my mark of shame I smiled deviously. I have never seen myself smile, so I have no idea how to make one, but I know what deviousness looks like so I did my best interpretation of it.
"Did you even bother to read it?" I asked, raising my voice a bit.
"I did," Bruce said, "and I cannot believe it."
"You cannot believe the words of your own father?" I asked, stepping back away from the door.
"Not when it comes from you." Bruce replied. "For all I know it could be counterfeit."
I nodded, understanding his rendering, and sat down on the bed.
"I knew your father well Bruce, I respected him, I trusted him. I would never forsake him. He took me in before Ra's al Ghul poisoned my mind and controlled it. This was before you were born Bruce, you must understand this. Your father was a compassionate man and your mother was beautiful too." I said.
"For a while they were family to me. When you were born I left, I decided that you were more important to fill their time with. After that Ra's approached me, he knew of my yearning, my search. He trained me in darkness, he ushered me into his world. I took to it like a fish to water, but I'm sure this was explained to you before."
I paused and looked up at the light overhead, it was flickering. The television was talking about a war. War was man's third mistake. The first two were inability to listen and murder. The third was war. History has proven that we are stupid when it comes to these three sins. We keep on building vices and tearing down virtues. I would be a hypocrite if I say that I do not do this. Pitiful existence.
"On the night of your parents death, I stopped the accuser as he ran down an alleyway on the side of the theatre. I didn't go in, but I could hear the play, I used to be a thespian you know. I beat the living out of him and was thirty milliseconds from killing him when that arrogant Gordon came along after comforting you saying:
'there were too many of those tonight."
Gordon left, took you home, I disappeared into the world. The rest you know."
"If you were such great friends of my parents," Bruce said, "then why did you betray everything they stood for?"
"Who said it was me?" I told him. "For it was Ra's al Ghul's symbiotic nature. It was not mine. For if it were mine then the entire world would be engulfed in dictatorship- not anarchy. Sin was the belief of Ra's al Ghul. The belief that we all sin and cannot regain redemption. I believe the opposite: Direction and Corruption, those are my beliefs. That in order for peace to restored we must strive for new directions, and in those new directions, to shape society to follow them, we must be corrupt. Direction and Corruption go very well together don't you think?"
"You're lying to me Bane." Bruce said. "I think you're telling me this to gain sympathy."
"If I were trying to gain sympathy from you Mister Wayne I would've gotten down on my knee and submitted." I stood up again, "I believe I am standing at the moment."
I looked over to Mister Francis Xavier. He walked towards the cell and opened it. I exited and Bruce looked into my eyes, there was no remorse. There was no sympathy. Only hatred, persecution. Nuremberg.
For the third time I walked the mile, as I began to do so I heard the opening of paper. I knew that Bruce haven't even touched the damn thing. Fury was the emotion that registered with me:
"How pathetic are you!" I shouted turning back. Francis stood in my way. That however, didn't stop me:
" You hypocritical bastard! Trust is no longer a virtue but a vice, is that it?"
"Now Bane, take it easy." Francis said.
I placed a hand over his face and squeezed.
"What of love, is that a vice too?" I asked. Ironically, I wasn't showing Mister Xavier any love at all, but rather, sucking the life from him. He screamed, I felt the skin slowly start to cave as my finger pressed deeper and deeper into his skull and face. It was glorious.
"Did Miss Kyle give it you?"
Bruce nodded. "She did."
I nodded as well, confirming my stance, "Why then, do you denounce what you know to be true?"
Bruce couldn't answer me.
"And they say I'm the manic-depressive one." I said.
Bruce smiled at this, finding humor in my misery. He read it over a second time, when he was finished he placed it in his suit jacket pocket and said:
"I'm sorry, but even with this evidence. I can't trust you."
"You don't have to trust me." I said, "You just have to listen to me, listen to your father Bruce."
"He didn't write this." Bruce said. "You did."
I released Mister Xavier. He caught his breath and called for assistance as if that were going to stop me from making my position clear. My quarrel was not with them but with Bruce, I walked towards him, militantly and unwavering. Consistent eye contact was made. Bruce just stood there, smiling as if he were the Cheshire Cat.
"Did you speak to Mister Pennyworth?"
"I did," Bruce answered, "he assures me that what this says is false."
"May I remind you that he lied to you before Mister Bruce. How then can you trust him to tell you the truth? Don't you see that you have no choice but to believe me?"
"That doesn't matter." Bruce answered.
"Interesting answer."
Reinforcements arrived. The entire prison guard was in the hallway.
"Bane!" One of them called, "stop walking and put your hands in the air."
I sighed and rolled my eyes.
"Cliché statements gentlemen?" I turned around and complied, "is that what you're reduced to nowadays?"
Bruce smiled and looked at me. "I best be going."
"If all you came to do was insult and humiliate me then you have failed," I said turning back, "the only thing you have shown me is that you are nothing but an inhuman worm, a sadistic devil with nothing to do. Maybe Nicolas deserve to die."
He stopped, like I knew he would.
"Never speak his name again." Bruce said.
"Then help me!" I barked, wolf mentality again. "You know that these fools won't and you're not fit to do so. For God sakes Bruce, I am your godfather, the only one who's still standing for you!"
"You tried to kill me." Bruce said.
"If I were really trying I would've done it, but I didn't Bruce. I merely broke your back. Don't think I won't do it again if you walk out on me!"
"Alfred stands for me." Bruce replied, going back to what I said before.
"For how many more years?" I asked. "You need me Bruce. I'm all you have left."
He sighed. The guards raised their weaponry, I was face to face with the legion of death and all Bruce did was sigh.
Pitiful existence.
"Bruce," I said in almost a whisper to what could be my final words for I would not resist the guard. There would be no point in it. No justification:
"You have to listen to me. Your father wrote that letter and gave it to me to give to you in time. I should've given it to you years ago. I hoped you would've dealt with pain better than me. I hoped that you would've understood misery and learn that the world is dark and morbid but it doesn't have to be that way."
He said nothing he simply walked away and through the security door.
"Why do we fall Bruce?" I asked.
He said nothing, the security door closed behind him.
I watched as Bruce made a phone call from the security desk.
I counted as the guard placed their fingers on triggers.
Five, four, three, two...