Disclaimer:I do not own any Batman Begins/Dark Knight characters. All other characters are mine.
"Sorry." - Improbable Dreamer
The SWATs descended on them violently, it wasn't long before Cat was separated from Douglass and fighting two armed men with a gunshot wound.
She was punched twice across the face, and by the time they were lying in pools of their own blood, Cat was battered and bruised, staggering up the stairs as the world flipped around her. She spat blood onto the cement steps below, and struggled with the hatch to the roof. She was aching, cold, tired, and Joker's fearful words rang through her ears like a constant ringing.
What the hell had gotten him so afraid?
Eventually, she stepped out onto the roof and the rain hit her face like glass shards, cutting at her eyes and seeping through her clothing. Cat held the vent with a white-knuckle grip; the cool metal had no further reaction on her numb fingers.
Below her, staggered gunfire echoed, the deafening clang of shattering glass and the all-out roar of violent conflict. Even the moon had taken safety behind the late-night haze of cloud, and the only source of light over the rooftops were the SWAT helicopter searchlights, appearing as pale cylinders in the falling rain.
Cat smeared makeup and rain from her eyes. Trying to focus her vision and remove the blinding stabs of light from the thundering helicopters.
"You want me?" She screamed up at the sky, as a whale of a helicopter passed lazily overhead.
"Come on! Come on and get me!"
It responded with a low groan of metal, and the mechanical hum passing overhead didn't cease or even remotely acknowledge her existence. Cat slumped forward, draping her aching body over the vent and pressing her face against its cool exterior. Her chest felt like it was slowly being strangled by a boa constrictor, and each breath was deeper and wheezier than the last.
Cat looked down at her hip, letting out a strangled hum of concern as the blood from the gunshot ran down her torso and leg, diluted into a pale orange from the falling rain. Salt tears stung from her eyes, reactivating the cuts on her face in a stabbing pain.
"Come get me, come get me." She sang softly, tapping out a rhythm with her blood-stained fingernails.
She heard a whoosh like a falling banner, or a billowing sheet, and the crunch of boots against gravel. Cat swung herself from the vent, hanging her head and slumping her shoulders as the pain hit her in dizzying waves.
"If it isn't the Batman?" She crooned, glaring up at him with hooded eyes. Cat wrung her belt from her waist and began creating large and hypnotic circles near her thighs. "You here for me, sweetheart?"
The figure made no response, his black cowl masking his expression.
"We don't have to fight." He finally replied in a low and hoarse command, like rocks grinding against concrete.
"Right," Cat laughed, slicking her hair back with her free hand. "And someone pushed from a ten-story rooftop doesn't have to fall."
She swung the chain low, the weighted ends skidding along the gravel before hooking securely around Batman's right leg. But before Cat could haul the rope, Batman brought his braces down and caught the tether with his forearms, using his brute strength to send the chain in a jarring arc that brought Cat crashing down into the gravel.
She got up, slowly, painfully, rubbing gravel from new holes in her elbows and knees.
"Look at you go!" She grinned, despite the blood that was now dripping from her nose and curving around her lips. "Did I pick the wrong madman?"
Cat swung the whip again, watching Batman follow the clock-work motion to knock her down. In the last moment, however, she flicked her wrists upwards and caught him around the middle, cocooning him in a loop of silver, she brought her boot down on the chain and watched him lurch forwards violently, smacking his forehead against the vent with a sickening crunch.
Cat walked up to him deliberately, rolling the chain securely around her forearm. She grabbed Batman by the 'ears' and pulled him backwards to face her. Blood trickled down his chin, his mouth was hanging open slightly and his teeth were stained scarlet. He had an odd dazed expression, and seemed to be looking past her rather than at her.
The rain was falling harder now, as if the entire ocean had been evaporated into the clouds and fallen to Gotham in a violent rush of a watery-curtain.
Cat swung her fist, smacking Batman on the jaw, and she wiped the blood from her scraped knuckles as his head lolled back again.
"No more flirting." She growled, pulling her switchblade from her pocket and striking him on the torso. His body armour was thick, and despite the razor-sharp blade, the cut was relatively small. Cat brought her hand back for another swing with the knife, only to have the Batman grab her elbow forcefully and smack his head against hers.
She felt her teeth vibrate from the impact and she was compelled to bite down on the side of her tongue, hard, filling her cheeks with hot metallic liquid. She fell backwards onto her rear into a puddle of muddy water, staring uncomprehendingly at the pair of boots before her. Cat eventually spat the blood to the gravel and stood up shakily, clutching the bullet wound between grasping, white fingers.
"You're gonna have to attack sooner or later-." Cat circled him like a ravenous tiger, stumbling slightly.
"-Or I will kill you."
Batman threw a punch at her abdomen, one which Cat deflected with her chain and instead strung up his arm tightly. She sprung forwards with his arm still at her mercy, forward-rolling over his broad shoulders and landing shakily behind him. She yanked on the chain while looping it once around his neck. He punched himself in the throat, viscously, which sprained his arm as well as choking the air from his lungs.
"I'll kill you, you son of a bitch!" She screamed suddenly, her voice melding with the thundering rain. "I'll kill you for what you've done!"
Batman pulled a gun-like object from his belt, shooting it at her knee. The harpoon zipped through the rain like a lightning bolt and impaled just below the kneecap, bursting through the flesh and bone and poking its metal head out of the back of her knees. Cat wailed and clutched at her injured knee, having only moments to experience the agony before Batman retreated the grapple and pulled her, bouncing along the gravel, towards him.
The adrenaline managed to block most of the pain, and Cat cut the cord with her knife quickly to release herself, standing up with the grapple-head still skewering her leg. Cat kicked him squarely in the chest with her good leg, he staggered back slightly but was barely fazed by her attempt. Batman sprung forwards with his forearm arcing towards her face. It was her turn to stumble backwards, and she choked on her own blood while falling to her knees.
The hits kept coming, pushing her further and further into the unconsciousness of agony. Her wounds were taking their toll, spilling her blood freely and slowing her movements. Cat managed to dodge his next punch, and the next, each attack was closer and closer to striking its target and she found herself struggling for breath as the minutes passed.
The Batman seized her neck with an iron grip, swung his arm back and struck her with a viscous uppercut.
"That's enough." He commanded finally, stepping away from Cat as she lay on all fours. Her crumpled body was heaving in shallow, raspy breaths.
"C-coward." She wheezed, spitting a white molar over her shoulder and getting gingerly to her feet.
She stood before him, bleeding, bruised, dizzy, swaying slightly on her stance, and hot tears were streaming from her eyes not unlike the blood from her wounds. And yet, she glared absolute daggers at him and held her broken fists up to her chest to fight. It was this mad look in her eyes that stayed his hand, the sheer conviction and rabid violence.
Caterina would die fighting the Batman, happily.
"That is enough!" This time, there was a desperate edge to his yell, and she merely responded by smeared her streaming nose, coating her mouth and chin in gruesome red paint.
"This is for Ash." Cat snarled, seemingly having gained all she could from the satisfaction of hand-to-hand combat, and she pulled a handgun from her biker jacket, aiming for the bridge of Batman's nose.
"This is for my brother, you son of a bitch."
And the two of them froze, like statues held in place. Cat's elbow was quivering, skin and blood flashed through gashes in her clothing, glistening in the passing helicopter's spotlight.
Batman was staring past the gun in her hand, past the blood, straight into Cat's eyes. He looked at her, really looked at her.
It was too easy and absolute, he could leap forwards and throw her stumbling backwards. The rooftop was barely 15 feet wide, and it would be only seconds before her feet left the edge and she fell, down, down, far too quickly.
He took in all her features in a matter of seconds; black eyeliner was smeared across her eyes in jagged ovals, blood coated her mouth and stretched it into a deranged grin, her hair hung in limp tendrils around her pale face.
He couldn't ignore how similar she was to the psychopath, her actions and her face was so much like the Joker that it scared him. But her eyes were shining with tears and anger, no scars lined her lips, and a chunk of her ear was missing from evident torture.
Caterina was far too small to hold the weight of that face, far too innocent looking, far too broken. It occurred to Batman, suddenly, that it was all a skin.
Her madness was skin deep.
In one unexpected and fluid movement, he reached a gloved hand behind his head and grasped the cowl. Cat watched him cautiously, as he pulled the mask over his head without hesitation and dropped it at his feet.
"Caterina." His voice was low and pained, and he slowly knelt into the gravel with earnest fear.
"Caterina, look at me."
She was staring past his face, her eyes wide and the gun slowly lowered. Cat's green eyes slowly slid across Bruce Wayne's features, taking in every tell-tale part of his face, desperately trying to find fault.
"I-I..."
A slight tremor shook her head, and fresh tears fell from her eyes.
"I can't…Bruce… W-What...F-fuck." Cat could only choke out single-syllables and she bit the top of her lip in desperate thought, before finally deciding to bring the gun up again, this time pointed between the eyes she knew so well, the eyes she had woken up to, the eyes that had brought her so much comfort once-upon-a-time.
"It's okay, Cat, I'm here now, I wasn't before, I'm here for you now."
She opened her mouth to scream, to release some of the horrid emotions swirling through her stomach like poison, all that came out was a few moments of silence, and a barely audible plea.
"You killed him? You knew who I was and you…you…you fucked with me."
Bruce could do little but swallow a lump of raw emotion, and let a small hum of agreement escape his lips. His hair was already slicked to his scalp from the thundering rain, and yet the stabbing cold barely registered with him.
"How could you? I…I'm a fucking killer but I've never heard something so… you deserve this, you fucking deserve this."
She pulled the safety from the gun violently, loading a bullet into the first chamber and holding It up again with a scarily steady arm.
"I was afraid." Bruce murmured and didn't so much as flinch, pointedly ignoring the threatening weapon to stare deeply into Cat's eyes.
"I was so afraid, that I lied, I lied and ruined your life. Ash-…-your brother, I didn't kill him, I destroyed him. And I thought, somehow, I could partially redeem myself if I loved you. And I did, Cat, I did everything I could to love you, but your stature and eyes…I saw him, every single day, I saw him. It was my penance, I was haunted by a real ghost every fucking time I looked at you-."
Cat was crying again, her lips curled into a disgusted snarl. Bruce took a shaky breath and decided that she deserved the truth, the truth about absolutely everything.
"-But I'm not sorry for that, at least not now, I have so many debts to repay that sometimes I have to let them go. 'Richest man in Gotham', but I have more debts than I can possibly repay, your brother is now one of those lost casualties. No-"
He stood up, taking a few careful steps forwards and ignoring the flashes of fury that passed over Cat's face.
"-I'm repaying another debt now, perhaps the greatest one that I have." Wayne stopped a few feet from the outstretched gun, taking Cat's lack of action as invitation to proceed.
He undid his utility belt and the sash laden with impressive gadgets and deadly weapons was thrown behind him, landing in a puddle with a deep splash. Now unarmed, Cat's lip suddenly quivered and she seemed less sure of the gun in her hands that was still pointed at Bruce's forehead.
"I'm sorry." He murmured. "I'm so fucking sorry for killing Caterina Morgan."
The rain slowed, and stopped, making the night around them stagnant and silent.
They waited, breaths held, eyes fixed together. Bruce waited to die, Cat waited to pull the trigger.
And yet, in the passing seconds, neither happened.
Her handgun well and truly lowered, falling helplessly to sway slightly beside her buckling knees. She stared at him as if seeing the situation from a new and horribly surprising perspective. Cat slumped forwards, knowing that he would catch her in his arms and hold her close.
"B-Bruce!" She wept deeply into his shoulder, shuddering with the effort and pain.
"I think…I think I'm fucked up."
He quickly disarmed his gloves and undid the latches, allowing him to run his own fingers soothingly through her hair.
"It's going to be okay, it's all going to be okay."
Cat made a strangled wail, a blood-curdling sound that echoed through the quiet night air.
"I killed those people, Bruce, some of them begged me to spare them…and I-I didn't."
Bruce wrapped his free arm around her waist. "Is that why you're crying? Because you feel remorse?" He kept his tone even and strong, convincing himself that he was doing the right thing.
"No." She sniffed and leaned away, keeping her face barely an inch from his, her expression was completely shattered.
"I'm crying because I don't."
Bruce had barely registered this, or what her broken expression meant, before she stepped from his embrace with her eyebrows furrowed in grief.
He forgot. Bruce had been so busy comforting her and reassuring himself, that he had completely forgotten about the gun; and how it was still in her possession.
Blood pounded in his ears, and his tongue felt too large for his mouth, he tried to move but shock had rendered his legs into useless and lead-like.
Cat grimaced slightly, swung the gun around and pointed it directly under her chin, aiming for the stars.
The terrifying serial killer with bloodstained hands was shaking with fear, tears falling from her eyes. Caterina Morgan was showing him a side he had never seen before, she was absolutely and undoubtedly afraid. It was obliterating, to see her as this empty shell, this emotionally shattered husk that could only see one way out.
She took a deep breath, her eyes fluttered closed, and her finger pulled downwards on the trigger.
Bang!
The black handgun fell to the gravel, a parade of noises echoing in its wake; A gruff shout of alarm, a tinkle of a chain, a body falling to the ground. And then, as if the night had deemed the show over, silence completely fell over that rooftop.
"Caterina!"
Bruce was kneeling beside her and he shook her shoulder violently, staring at the pooling blood beneath of her head.
"Caterina, please, get up. Jesus Christ! Caterina! I'm here, okay? It's going to be…It's going to be all okay."
He lifted her head gingerly from the gravel, his hands tangling in her blood-stained locks.
"Fuck. Caterina? I need you…I need you to wake up, can you, please…Please." His voice broke and faded into a grief-stricken wheeze.
Cat's eyes were dim, as if a light behind them had blown, she stared up and past the man cradling her, her mouth still and parted gently.
Bruce continued to plead as he held her close, dropping his head in the crook of her neck and shaking with equal parts anger and fear.
"I-I didn't do it again, I saved you, I have to have saved you. Fuck, wake up, please?"
The figure in his arms was still for a moment.
For two moments
And then Caterina took a shallow breath and twitched in agony, her eyes gloriously filling with emotion and consciousness. He stared at her in disbelief and let out a bark of relieved laughter, throwing his head back to stare up at the sky as he felt Cat breathe against him.
Luckily, Caterina was weakened by her wounds, and had struggled with the task of pulling the gun's trigger. The hesitance was all Bruce needed to dive forwards with little thought, throwing Cat viscously to the ground, where she hit her head on the edge of the large vent.
He spent a few minutes kneeling on the rooftop, Cat's torso held tightly in his arms and her blood-stained head lolling against his shoulder.
"You'll be fine." Bruce muttered, adjusting himself beneath her to allow him to pick her up bridal-style, wary of her many wounds. "You're strong, he can't hurt you, Joker can't cut you. It's all on the surface, okay?"
He stood up and made his way slowly towards the stairwell that spiralled down into the Prewitt building.
"Where they take you," His voice was soft, meant only for her ears. "It'll be hell, I know that, but you've got thick skin, you can take it." He pulled the mask over his chin that he saved from the rooftop, and noted the evident police barricade that waited at the bottom of the stairs.
"Wait for me." Bruce muttered, walking up to the SWAT team in long and purposeful strides.
He watched them bind Cat in handcuffs and straps, keeping her completely still on the stretcher. They carried her off slowly, marching her down the corridor.
Caterina Morgan, on the brink of death, with one good leg and a bullet lodged in her hip, was strapped with 12 restraints to a hospital bed and was escorted by 14-armed SWAT guards.
Bruce watched and thought that the image would've made her smile.