Chapter IV: Silence is gold, but gold has no value.
Bruce walked into the gas station, and took out his credit card to par the man who was at the counter.
"This is your first time here isn't it" The gas station attendant said to him.
"Yes actually, how did you know?"Bruce asked him suspiciously.
"The only people who come here are those who need to be here" the attended answered him cryptically.
"I don't need to be here, I'm just stopping for a refill, and I'll ne on my way" Bruce replied to him.
"Oh you can go, but you won't, you the fog wouldn't be here if you wasn't supposed to be here" the attendant said to him as he walked to the back room.
"What does that supposed to mean?" Bruce asked.
"It means what it sounds" the attendant replied from within the room.
Bruce then stepped behind the counter and into the backroom, but he found no one, the room had no windows, no door, no floorboard, but the man was gone.
Realizing that something is wrong he quickly ran towards his car and started driving as fast as he could out of town, he drove for one minute, two minutes, but the town wasn't ending.
So he stopped the car, he made a mark on the edge of one of the towns exist, and then sped off to the other one in opposite direction, after a while he stopped, looked at the ground again as saw the mark he made on the other edge.
"Magic!" He spit out as he hit his head gently against the steering wheel.
"I…HATE….MAGIC!" he said to himself as he got out of the car.
From a hidden glove compartment he took out a spare utility belt and Batsuit, he got out of the car and started walking through the town.
"Very well then, whoever or whatever you are, if you want to play, then let's play!" he said in a low voice.
"Yay yay let's play!" the voice of a child was suddenly heard.
Bruce turned to his left and saw a little boy run towards him, but what really surprised Bruce was that little boy's appearance, he was wearing a straight jacket, he had chains around him and he had an insane man's restraining mask on his head.
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Back at the New Themysciran embassy Dianna was furiously punching a sandbag.
"That stubborn, pigheaded man, I am about to confess and he says he needs time, and I was stupid enough to so say yes RAAAAAAAAAA!" Dianna said as she delivered a furious punch which made the sandbag.
"That's men for you, always complicated, guess it's no wonder some women switch teams" Donna replied to her sister as she saw her getting dressed to go outside.
"Well I tell you, I am not going to sit at the manor and wait like some house wife for her husband to come home, I'm going to go and find him and give him a piece of my mind for his need for ;me; time"
"And how are you going to find him?" Donna asked.
"That is a good question, we will need someone who has great knowledge"
"The CIA?"
"Someone with great cunning"
"The KGB?"
"Someone which all knowledge is known"
"The oracle at Delphi?"
"No someone who is nicer and more British"
"Alfred!" Donna said with a smile as she watches Dianna go to get Alfred.
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"Who put these things on you?" Batman said to the boy as he kneeled besides him to try and take them off.
"I've always had them on, there's a key which unlocks them, but I couldn't reach the door knob were it was, but I was always afraid to go there so I needed help, are you going to help me mister?" the boy asked him.
"That's the only reason I exist son" Batman thought to himself as he tried to open the locks on the chain, seeing as none of his picklocks worked, it meant that it was enchanted and the original key was needed.
"Where is the key?"
"In an old building on the south edge of town, I can take you there" the boy said to him and Bruce followed him.
As they walked Batman noticed just how full of life the boy really was.
"Let's play a game!" the boy said.
"We don't have time for games" Batman replied.
"Why?"
"Because we are in trouble"
"People are in trouble all their life, so why shouldn't we try to have fun while we fix the trouble?" the boys asked.
"You can't have fun, you can't get your guard down, you are vengeance, you are the night, the night has no joy" Bruce thought to himself
Just then he heard movement in an alley way and seeing a shape there he quickly threw several batarang at the shapes in the alley disabling them.
As he approached, what he saw shocked him.
The creature's face was nothing but skin, his hand were in fact gloves and upon opening them Batman noticed that a gun's an small weapons were pouring out of them, he further examined the creatures he noticed they also didn't have reproductive organs.
"This kind of thing shouldn't be biologically possible" he thought to himself.
He got up and he then picked up the child and using the shadows of the town he started moving quicker he continued to run, jump and leap from building to building until they reached their destination.
"That was fun, can we do it again when this is over?" the boy asked.
"For whatever reason for?"
"Just to enjoy ourselves" the boy replied.
"Just for fun, just to have fun"the words echoed in his mind as he looked up at the building were the boy said the keys were, he looked up and his eyes went wide under the cowl.
The building was a movie theater which read "The Mask of Zorro".
"I was always afraid to go in there, are you afraid to go there?".
Bruce was silent as he opened the door.
In front of him stood what seemed to be a two faced being with arms coming from every possible direction, it was a myriad of muscle and bones without a single visible weak spot, next to him two pyramid heads started walking from besides him and they booth lifted their heavy blades to attack batman.
Bruce grabbed the boy he jumped dodged and backed away, he then launched smoke grenade which concealed the area with smoke, he jumped behind one pyramid head and gave a powerful swing kick to the area of the liver making the first one go down in pain
The second one noticed this and he brought his giant blade upwards and then down on Batman, but Batman side stepped the blade, gave a combination of powerful blows to the stomach and then grabbed the head and rammed the pyramid into the ground trapping pyramid head like an ostrich.
The second one then started getting up but Batman took the first one's blade and delivered a roundhouse slash with the dull side of the blade so hard it send the second one down again.
Batman then stood up and looked and the strange creature before him and said.
"We can do this the easy way or the fun way, and please choose the fun way, since I steel need some warm up".
"And why is it that you never have fun?" the boy suddenly said to Batman.
Batman looked at him and saw that something changed in the boy's demeanor, he as now serious, no longer fun loving.
Just then the creature before Batman slip itself and multiplied like an ameba would becoming two.
There's got to be a way out of this"
Two then became for.
There's always a way,
For became eight.
There has to be a way to end this! Bruce screamed in his head as eight became 16, sixteen became 32, and 32 became just too much and Bruce collapsed on his knees.
The creatures then started advancing upon him.
"It never ends, it never ends" Bruce lamented to himself as suddenly the creatures stopped just a few inches from him and suddenly they collapsed like a stack of cards.
"It never ends and it will never end, you try to fix the world's problems by scaring them, but you cannot fix the problems you can only make them lesser until they seemed none existent" The boy said to Bruce as Bruce looked at him.
"And you punish yourself for that, for not being able to do more, to not be able to see the end of the mission among other things you punish yourself for"
Bruce's mind then suddenly snapped with realization, he knew human psychology and symbolism well and then he realized it, the strange creatures in the alley ways were a representation of how he always suspects everyone, how they all have hidden motives, how he perceived everyone to be the same in that regard.
The pyramid heads represented the great monsters he faced any how they seemed strong and invulnerable.
And the multiplying arm creature the endless struggle, and how he fixed one, another just appeared and how he tried to convince himself that one day he could stop them from appearing.
"But that means that you are…"
"You know what I am Bruce, I was born here just outside this theater, here was where the first and possibly only time in your life you thought of your own happiness, here you did something with your parents which made you happy and you think that because of that, because you did something for your happiness you're parents paid the price" The little boy said as he walked towards Bruce.
"So from then on you always avoided doing things for yourself, being happy, having fun, because you thought that if you did someone you care would pay the price…"
"…..So you locked me away, deep inside you, in chains and gags, to make sure that you would never hurt somebody, that's why you always push others away, that's why you stay in the dark, you've carried that burden long enough Bruce, now set yourself free" The little boy was now inches from him.
In Bruce's hand the key suddenly manifested itself and slowly but surely he undid the chains, the straightjacket and the mask, before him now stood a young Bruce from all those years ago.
"I'm going to go see the picture, you want to come along?" the younger one asked.
"No thanks, the wife is expecting me back home" Bruce said as he left the theater.
He walked down the streets not bothering to try and conceal himself something told him that what the down wanted done he accomplished it.
"Looks like the fog's about to lift" the gas station attendant said to him as he tossed Bruce the keys to his car.
"I have just one question for you, was this all real, or did this all just happen in my mind?" he asked him.
"Does it matter?" the attendant said as he walked away, a siren was heard and the fog started lifting, A moment later Bruce looked at the sky and saw the familiar shape of his wife landing nearby him.
After an uneasy moment Dianna suddenly rushed forward and hugged him tightly.
"I want to kill you for your selfishness, but I also want to kiss you because you're alright, you had me worried husband, I've been searching this area for hours for you" Dianna said to him.
"You-you knew all along?" Bruce said with shock as he broke the hug.
"Of course I knew, champion of truth is my title, do you remember what I said to you that dinner with your friend and my mother, I said you could expect discretion from me" Dianna said to him with a snicker on her lips.
"But if you knew then why did you wanted me to confess the other night?"Bruce asked her.
"Because I wanted you to let me in, I love you Bruce and I want you to open up to me" Dianna said to him as she took his face in her hands.
At this gesture Bruce slowly but surely took grabbed his cowl and after looking into his eyes for a moment Dianna slapped him on the cheek.
"What was that for?" Bruce asked her as he rubbed his sore check
"That was for taking so long to let me in" Dianna said with a scowl, she then with a smile on her face gave Bruce a passionate kiss.
"And what was that for?" Bruce asked confused.
"For letting me in" Dianna said with a smile.
She hits me and at the same time kisses me for the same reason, Women!"Bruce thought to himself as the two of them got into the car and he started driving.
As they drove away from the town Bruce took the key which was in his hand he took the key with which he freed his young self and threw it out the window.
"What was that?" Dianna asked.
"Oh juts something that I don't need any more, now about what you girls are searching for…."
Bruce trailed off as they drove towards Gotham.
As they drove away back in the town the attendant looked as they disappeared on the horizon and said to the person next to him.
"You think they'll be alright now Maria"
"The town only makes them confront their inner demons, what they do after that is up to them, they can redeem themselves or condemn themselves, but I think they will be fine, let's go home James" she replied ash they both walked towards the town.
Read and review, let me know if I should continue