Title: Criminal Acts (14/?)
Author: StargazerNataku
Rating: PG
Genre: Drama
Characters: Detective Gerry Stephens, Renee Montoya, Jim Gordon, Batman
Summary: Even after twenty years in the Gotham City police department and there were some cases that never got easier. It began with an overdose…and continued with a new understanding.
A/N: Thanks to my beta gaudy_night, and all my readers who have made it with me thus far!

Chapter 14

Bruce Wayne stood outside the door to Jim Gordon's hospital room, listening to the rise and fall of voices inside. He could barely hear the words, but he did not have to really; he would get the full conversation later once he listened to the recording that was currently in progress inside the room. There would be time for that later, he knew, glancing down the hall to note a nurse turning the corner. He did not hesitate, but knocked instead. Everyone knew that Bruce Wayne never hesitated, even in a situation such as this.

The voices stopped and there were footsteps. An instant later the door opened and Stephens was revealed on the other side. Bruce put on his widest, most cheerful playboy grin and spoke. "Detective, taking advantage of visiting hours too?" he asked.

"Yeah," Stephens answered. They studied each other for a moment.

"Let him in, Gerry," Gordon said from the bed, a slight rebuke in his voice. The man stepped aside and Bruce stepped past him, moving to one of the chairs set beside Gordon's bed. His gaze took the man in carefully, noting the weariness and the shadow of pain in the deep lines of his face.

"I've gotta get back, Commish," Stephens said from near the door. "Have to close up this case we're working on. I'll try to meet with our…colleague later, and I'll drop by tomorrow, okay?"

"Sure, Gerry, thanks." Stephens nodded and the door closed behind him. Wayne and Gordon were left staring at each other for a moment, before Bruce smiled and set the package he was carrying on the table attached to the bed. "What's that?" Gordon asked him.

"Well, Commissioner, I imagined you'd be getting pretty bored, so I just brought a few things to keep you busy while you're out of action." He drew a mini, portable DVD player from the bag. "And I got some movies too, but I didn't know what kind you liked so I just got a selection…I got some action movies, some dramas, some comedy…oh, and Casablanca and The Maltese Falcon. Those are courtesy of Alfred; he seems to think that everyone ought to like those old movies…But they're all in there for you, so it'll be easier for you to kill time while you're getting better. I was laid up once from this car crash and I went practically insane, and that was only for a few days, I can't imagine how you're doing it."

"Thank you, Mr. Wayne. It's very thoughtful of you, and will be very helpful to me." Bruce grinned, every inch the thankful playboy.

"No, Commissioner, thank you. I owe you a lot more than just a teeny DVD player and some movies. I do understand when someone's done me a huge favor, and I do understand gratitude."

"It was little enough I did," Gordon answered.

Bruce felt the 'Brucie' mask cracking just slightly but spoke anyway. "No, it was a great deal, Commissioner. You very nearly died, and I didn't. Just a little scratch, and from how badly that hurt, I can't imagine how badly you must hurt. I had to come down and thank you."

"You're welcome," Gordon said, studying the man carefully, almost surprised.

"Was I wrong to come? You seem confused."

"Well, it…"

"Not really in my character to notice, is it?" Bruce gave a little laugh. "I may not be the smartest man alive, Jim, but I know when someone's done me a huge favor, and I can tell when I very nearly had something…terrible happen. I know enough about life for that."

"I know you do," Gordon finally said. Their eyes met and the gaze held for a long moment, before Bruce turned away.

"I guess you do, don't you. I never thanked you for that, either." He sighed. "I came today because I felt it was time to try to repay old debts with the new," Bruce said. "See how you were. If everything is…" He hesitated a moment before giving a half smile. For a moment, suddenly and surprisingly, Gordon watched the mask slip, and he no longer saw the playboy. He saw instead the terrified and grieving eight-year-old in every line and feature of the billionaire's face. "Okay. I would have come sooner, but…" he paused, his eyes closed and there was a moment of silence before the billionaire's smile returned and the pain disappeared from his eyes, smoothing the planes of his handsome face. "Well, you know how it is. A little here, a little there…time goes crazy, and you don't want to be in the way."

Gordon looked at the man seriously for perhaps the first time, and then nodded. They sat for a long moment in silence, both trapped in memories of different sidewalks, Wayne lost twenty years past, Gordon only a few weeks, remembering the look of horror on Wayne's face as he lay bleeding, dying. He cleared his throat carefully, still sore from the breathing tubes, and watched Wayne open his mouth to speak again. Hoping he would, Gordon was disappointed when the man shut it again, but he did not blame him; Gordon could not think of anything to say either. There was a long moment of awkward silence; they were two very, very different men and it was always hard to find common ground despite or perhaps because of the horrors of their shared past. "You are feeling all right?" Wayne finally asked, somewhat lamely, and Gordon had to laugh, even though it hurt. Wayne looked up with a confused but pleased smile containing more honesty in it than usual, and Gordon bit back a comment on the awkward nature of the conversation.

"I was shot twice, Wayne," he said instead. "Feeling all right is rather distant at this point." A look crossed over Wayne's face, and Gordon felt a sudden swell of guilty discomfort. "I'm sorry, that probably…" The terrified looks of boy and man merged into one face in his mind, hard to ignore and even harder to avoid.

"No, it's all right," Bruce said. They sat silent for another long minute before Gordon, despite the pain, gave a little chuckle. "What?" Bruce asked, confused.

"Is this as awkward for you as it is for me?" he asked, his tone amused and even friendly.

"We could always talk about…" Wayne searched for something, anything to say.

"Sports?" Gordon asked hopefully. "They say you play polo..." The other man smiled as though laughing at a private joke.

"I do," he answered easily before launching into a short anecdote that was supposed to be hilarious but ended up being only vaguely amusing to Gordon. Mostly about Wayne ending up in a Jacuzzi with the majority of the female French national equestrian team after a match, it was a convoluted story about the women's sympathy over a spectacular fall off his horse.

"I used to play football," Gordon said after he laughed politely at the reminiscence. "But none of our games ever ended like that."

"More's the pity," Wayne said with a laugh. "There was this one girl—Giselle was it? No, Gabrielle. No, that's not it either. Might have been Georgette…" He paused, thinking deeply. "Well, whatever her name was, she was fan-tastic. She could do this thing…"

"Enough, Wayne," Gordon commented, but his tone was relaxed. "I don't think I need to know."

"Probably not. It really should have been illegal, but I don't want to give you any ideas, because it was well worth any man's time."

"I don't make the laws, I just enforce them."

"Touché." The silence was more comfortable this time as they sat together. "Did they say when you'll be released?" Wayne finally asked.

"They're not sure," Gordon says. "But it will probably be another six to eight weeks at least."

"That long?"

"That long. I'm not too upset about it. The longer I stay here, the more chance they have to catch the man who put me here in the first place. And the better I'll be when I do finally get home. It'll be hard; going to have to find somewhere to stay."

"Why?"

"I live alone."

"Alone? Aren't you married? The paper mentioned your children…"

"Divorced, Mr. Wayne. Went through over a year ago. Barbara and the kids are back in Chicago now."

"Oh." A pause. "What happened?"

"You sure don't have qualms about asking loaded personal questions."

"Sorry." The million-watt smile returned. "I just think it would take a foolish woman to walk out."

"On me?" Gordon laughed, but there was no bitterness in it. "Wayne, she had plenty of reasons to go, all of them good. She worried a lot about me never coming home, what effect that would have on the kids when—there was never any 'if' in Barbara's mind—it did happen. Then…when it was our children in danger…" He stopped, saw the cold steel of the gun pointing at his son's temple, watched Dent pulling him out of Barbara's arms, and saw his son's pleading face, begging his father to do something to make him safe…

"You must miss them."

"All the time," Gordon managed, forcing away the memories. "But they're safer there."

"Why didn't you give it up, go with them?"

"There are days, especially lately, I feel like I should have."

"Why didn't you?" Gordon was quiet for a long time, thinking on his response. It was a question he had asked himself nearly daily in the year since he had come home to an empty house, and his nightmares were always the answer. Nightmares of this man as a child, clutching his father's coat in his grief, a harsh reminder of what he had lost to a mugger with a gun. Of the first murder case Gordon worked as a detective, two eleven year old girls who'd been kidnapped, raped and asphyxiated on their way home from school. They never had found who was responsible. Killings, rapes, assaults…murdered cops, children who lost parents and parents who lost children, solved and unsolved, that he had worked. Gordon knew as well as Barbara did that these things had a deep impact, even though most individual cases merged together in his memory over the years to become a memory of Gotham alone: dark, bloody, hopeless, demanding, pained.

"I have the belief…the hope…that if I can stop a murder here or a drug deal there, I'll save lives. I'll make this city a better place, somehow, and people won't have to deal with the aftermath of hell on earth. That maybe, Gotham can be saved, and everyone can have a little bit of hope." Gordon kept his gaze squarely on the bed, not at Wayne, and tried to hide his sudden surprise when Wayne spoke with a momentary crack in his pleasant tenor voice. He should not have been; he knew that some things struck close to home even with the most seemingly carefree billionaire playboys. Jim Gordon knew firsthand that Bruce Wayne was all too familiar with the dark side of Gotham City.

"That's an honorable goal, Commissioner," he said. "I think it will pay off in the end."

"Yeah?" Gordon asked. "There are days I'm not so sure." Wayne gave him a slight smile.

"It already has, Jim." Gordon nodded; he knew that, knew the situation in Gotham was better now than before, especially since Batman started patrolling her dark streets. But there was still, and always would be, the frustration of not being able to solve all the problems at once, to not have to be in a position where his children could lose their father. "Your children should be damned proud of you, if they're not already." Bruce got to his feet. "I should let you rest, I've stayed too long and you look absolutely exhausted."

"I appreciate that, Mr. Wayne." The man's playboy grin returned and he inclined his head to Gordon before slipping out of the room. Gordon closed his eyes, so surprised at the glimpse under the man's mask he wondered momentarily if the whole thing had been the painkillers talking and that Bruce Wayne had not just been there, understanding. When the nurse came in a moment later to check on him, however, blushing beet red and giggling, Gordon knew what it meant. He puzzled that over for only a few minutes before fatigue overtook him and he slipped into sleep.