Chapter 14

"Bruce," Lex answered the phone. "Always a pleasure to hear from you," he said charmingly. "How can I be of assistance?"

"You need to fix your woman," Bruce growled.

"What's wrong?" Lex said immediately in a tense voice. "Is she hurt?"

"I made up with her," Bruce said in exasperation, "and then she lost her mind because I'm dating Shayera."

"Oh," Lex said slowly. "She's jealous?" he asked hesitantly.

"No," Bruce growled. "It's some female thing. She thinks Shy betrayed her somehow."

"Oh," Lex said with a little more understanding than Bruce was demonstrating.

"Look, I did my part," Bruce growled. "So you need to fix this. Shy doesn't need this shit."

"I'll see what I can do," Lex said cautiously. "I am touched that you thought to call me, Bruce," he added with a little more humor in his voice.

"You're the damn genius," Bruce grumbled. "Figure it out."

He hung up the phone just as John stormed into the room.

"Batman, what the hell?" John yelled in an accusatory voice. "You're dating Shayera?" Bruce stared at him.

"What the fuck is going on today?" Batman asked the Universe in frustrated confusion after a brief pause of disbelief. He looked at John warily.

"I trusted you!" John yelled at him, getting up in his face. "You were the one person on this team I knew I could count on. And now you're dating my girl?"

"Your ex," Bruce pointed out sharply. "Pretty sure Vixen's your girl."

"You know that's not the point!" John snapped.

"I really don't," Bruce said tersely. "What's the problem? Shy said you told her it was definitely over." John stared at him for a moment like he'd been slapped.

"I was angry!" he said when he found his voice. "We were having a fight."

"And yet," Bruce said, with a lot more snark and accusation in his voice, "you're still dating Vixen. Explain to me how much you want to be with Shy?"

"Well, not at the moment!" John spluttered.

"Uh huh," Batman growled at him.

"Things might not work out between me and Vixen," John protested. Batman just glared at him.

"So Shayera's not allowed to move on?" he asked in a dangerously low tone.

"Not with you," John snapped. "You're my friend."

"What is the hang up with being friends?" Bruce exploded in frustration. "First Diana and now you. If you're our friends, you shouldn't care. Especially since you're both dating other people."

"It's the basic bro code," John yelled at him. "You don't date your friends' exes." Batman just stared at him.

"Last time I checked," he said pointedly, "there weren't that many superheroes to go around. So pretty sure you can't call dibs on everyone you reject."

"I didn't reject her!" John yelled again.

"Yeah," Bruce said, getting up in his face, "you did. So deal with it," he snarled, whirling around John to stomp out of the room, his cape flaring behind him.

He almost hit J'onn as he stormed out, who was about to enter.

"Oh! Batman," J'onn said, quickly fading to translucent to avoid being trampled. "Is the Green Lantern... ?"

Batman jerked his thumb angrily towards the room he had just exited. J'onn sighed.

"I'll talk to him," he muttered, but Batman was already gone.

"John," the Martian Manhunter said in a tone of weary patience as he entered the room and saw the Green Lantern looking practically murderous.

"Can you believe this shit?" John yelled at him in frustration.

"No," J'onn said, pinching his eyebrows. "I really cannot." That response actually seemed to subdue John a little bit, who began pacing the room as he rubbed his head occasionally and tried to make sense out of his fight with Batman.

"I trusted him," John said venomously after a minute of silence.

"And how has he broken that trust?" J'onn asked, even though he understood why John was upset, whether he agreed with the logic of it or not. But perhaps talking about his feelings would do John some good, J'onn theorized. John gave him an angry look, however, as if J'onn was accusing him of being the one in the wrong.

"Please," J'onn said patiently, raising his hands up in appeal. "I am Martian. I want to be sure I am understanding the nuances of the situation. Perhaps we could sit and you could explain…?" he asked John. John sighed but he took a reluctant seat at the conference table with J'onn.

"Batman broke the code," he said to J'onn. "You don't date your friends' exes."

"I see…" J'onn said slowly. "This is a well-understood human social construct?"

"Uh, sure," John said, giving him a look. "Everyone knows. It's the Rule."

"Perhaps Batman is unaware of this rule," J'onn said. "He is, as he himself says, not a people person." John frowned but didn't say anything.

"Explain to me why this rule exists," J'onn persisted. "I do not understand the reasoning behind it. If you yourself have moved on, why should your friend not be with your former lover? If they were abusive or otherwise harmful to your well-being I could understand the concern. But Shayera, as I see it, was neither of those things."

"She betrayed me," John pouted. "That was harmful."

"Yes," J'onn said slowly, "but we forgave her for that. You yourself did not want her ejected from the League, even though you recused yourself from the vote."

"She had a fiancé, too," John pointed out.

"I still fail to see the logic of why Batman should not be with her," J'onn said. "She had a fiancé, yes, which was deceptive and hurt you. But she is clearly not dating anyone else now." John began to grumble under his breath.

"John, please," J'onn said reaching out to him. "We cannot have these fractures in the League."

"Why is it always my fault?" John exploded at him. "I'm not allowed to be hurt that my friend stabbed me in the back?"

"I do not believe that Batman's intention was to betray you," J'onn pointed out rationally. "He is not that socially adept," he added with a small quirk to his lips.

"No shit," John glowered. "But that doesn't mean he should have done it."

"Yet he has done it," J'onn said. "And now we must deal with it. How can I assist you in doing so?"

"You can't," John snapped, getting up from the table. As J'onn looked after him with a troubled gaze, John sighed. "I just - I need some time," he muttered. J'onn nodded.

"You are not on duty again for several days," he said. "I would suggest remaining on Earth in the meantime."

"Yeah," John grunted, heading out the door.

In the monitoring room, Shayera was calmly going over the roster list that she and Batman had been hammering out all morning as they tried to decide who would be best for the internal assault on the Legion of Doom, who best on the perimeter, and who on the secret perimeter that not even Lex and Diana would know about. Not that Shayera didn't trust Diana, but she could be compromised. Telepaths existed, after all. She barely looked up from her work as Clark entered the room.

"Shayera," Clark said to her, sitting down next to her.

"Hi, Clark," she said cheerfully. "Batman and I have been working out our tactical teams -"

"That's great," Clark interrupted her. "Diana is on her way down here to have it out with you about dating Batman."

"What?" Shayera said, looking startled. "Why is she upset? She's with Lex!" Clark sighed.

"I'm sure she'll explain it to you," he said to her. "Just… try not to escalate the situation, ok?"

"Why would I escalate?" Shayera said in confusion. "I don't even understand why she's angry at me -"

"You don't understand?" Diana snapped as she barged into the monitoring room. "Well, let me enlighten you."

"Diana," Clark said, standing up, "Shayera. Let's take this to a private room."

"Fine," Shayera said, looking troubled as she followed Clark and a steaming Diana to the empty Council Hall.

"Diana," Shayera said pleadingly as the door shut behind her, "I thought you were happy with Lex."

"I am happy with Lex," Diana said. "That has nothing to do with this."

"It doesn't?" Shayera said, looking even more clueless.

"You were my friend, Shayera," Diana said to her angrily. "I trusted you. I told you how badly Bruce had hurt me. And then you turn around and date him?"

"You hurt him, too," Shayera said slowly. "And I'm friends with both of you. I didn't tell him what you told me," Shayera said suddenly, thinking she had the problem figured out. "I kept what you said in confidence, Diana."

"That's not the point!" Diana yelled. Shayera stared at her and slowly crossed her arms.

"Then I'm missing the point," she said, raising an eyebrow. "You're happy with Lex and I didn't share your secrets with Bruce. So what's the problem?"

Diana made a frustrated noise and glared at Clark.

"Explain it to her," she ordered him. Clark shook his head.

"Diana, I get that you might be jealous -"

"I'm not jealous!" she shouted.

"Or hurt," Clark said, "but Shayera and Bruce weren't trying to hurt you by starting a relationship with each other. You have Lex and they found each other."

"Men!" Diana growled. "Hera!" She glared at Clark and then back at Shayera as she muttered several choice curses under her breath, invoking several deities and not a few profanities before getting ready to storm out of the room.

"Diana!" Clark said sharply. "We need to work this out. For the good of the League."

"Tell that to the traitors!" she snapped as she left in a whirlwind of fury. Shayera bit her lip as she and Clark looked at each other.

"It's not your fault," Clark said to her. "Not really," he amended. "Emotions around dating can be… complicated… on Earth."

"I'll say," Shayera muttered, looking sad and troubled less than angry now that Diana had left the room. "Bruce and I weren't trying to stir things up, Clark," she said softly. "All we did is realize how right we are for each other."

"I know," Clark said comfortingly. "And honestly, I'm really happy for Bruce that he found someone to love. It's been a long time coming for him. Even though it's kind of a mess right now with Diana and John."

"Oh, no," Shayera said. "John, too?"

"John, too," Batman confirmed with a glower as he came into the room.

"I guess John doesn't surprise me so much," Shayera admitted. "He's jealous, I guess."

"He says I betrayed him," Bruce corrected and Shayera's mouth opened.

"What the fuck?" she said. "What is up with all this betrayal bullshit? Jealousy, I can understand. But betrayal? I'm beginning to think that humans don't understand the meaning of the word."

"Right?" Bruce growled. Clark sighed.

"J'onn and I will talk to them," he said. "Some more," he added dismally as he left the room.

As soon as he was gone, Batman pulled Shayera into a tender hug.

"Are you ok?" he asked her, looking into her eyes with some concern. "I'm sorry Diana came after you. I know things had been going better with her."

"Yeah," Shayera said a little glumly as she held onto his waist. "Well, the truce was nice while it lasted," she sighed.

"I called Lex and told him to get her sane again," Bruce said to her, bending down to give her a kiss.

"You called Lex?" Shayera said in surprise.

"Yeah," Batman grunted. "I don't want Diana fighting with you. She's your friend."

"So you called Lex for me?" Shayera clarified, a pleased smile lighting her face up. A tiny smile curled up at the edges of Batman's mouth.

"You're my girl," he rumbled. "I made the sacrifice." Shayera's eyes melted with emotion as she pulled him into a deeper kiss, which Bruce enjoyed for a minute before breaking it off in sudden hesitation.

"What's wrong?" Shayera said with concern. Bruce's stomach knotted up as he looked down at her. He didn't want to tell her what John had said but ... he didn't want to hide it from her, either. She deserved to know.

"John told me he didn't really reject you," Batman muttered miserably. "He said he might want you back if things don't work out with Vixen."

"That asshole!" Shayera said with venom. Bruce swallowed.

"So, you regret -" he said slowly.

"No!" Shayera said in shock, realizing what he was thinking. "No, Bruce," she said, reaching up to give him another kiss. "He did us a favor," she said with a smile, slipping her hands out from around his back so she could cup his face.

"I love you," she said, meeting his troubled eyes with her warm ones as her thumb stroked his cheek under his cowl. "And I like you better, too, remember?" she said to him with an intimate look, getting the tiniest of smiles back from a nervous Bruce. "And, you're my best friend who I should have been with all along. Ok?" she asked him gently, pressing little kisses to his jaw.

"You're sure?" he muttered as she kissed along his stubbled face.

"I'm sure," she said, meeting his eyes with no doubts. "The Gotham Gargoyle belongs to the Big Grumpy Bat," she smiled up at him until he slowly relaxed. "For always," she said, and finally Bruce let go of his last bits of tension and bent down to kiss her back with relief, tugging her tightly into his body with a grip that said that he needed her more than he was able to manage to convey with his words.

"And John?" he couldn't help asking her, though, when they finally let go of each other. Shayera grinned.

"He's an asshole," she said, "for dating someone else in the first place if he wanted to be with me. And for thinking I'd wait around forever to see if it worked out for them. But I'm glad," she said to Bruce, kissing him again softly, "because I'm happier with you. And we wouldn't have gotten together unless he'd been such an asshole."

"So you're saying we should send him a thank you note?" Batman asked her with a wicked smirk. Shy's eyes lit up.

"Yesss," she said with an evil grin. "We totally should."

John's simmering rage only got worse when he made it home to his tiny New York City apartment later that night and checked his mail. Because stuffed in among the bills and junk mail was a handmade card.

"Dear John," it said on the front in crayon. He raised an eyebrow as he opened it.

"Thanks for being an asshole!" it said on the inside. "Love, Bats and Shy." John cursed as he crumpled it up in his hand and threw it across the room.

He felt tears welling up as his chest tightened. Is this what he got for trying to do the right thing? For sticking by Mari? For being a good friend to Batman? For looking out for the League?

Dammit, he didn't deserve this. He sniffed and impatiently shook his tears away, but as he sat down wearily at his vintage dinette, John realized that he had absolutely no one to call for support.

He couldn't very well call Mari and complain to her about his complicated feelings towards Shayera. And Clark and J'onn were clearly fed up with the lot of their dating Founders. Hell, J'onn had already lectured him once today and Clark had scolded him a few days ago. What could he do, anyway, call them to tattle on Batman and Shayera?

Batman was his closest friend in the League. John constantly felt frustrated at being the only one of the Founders with military training, except for Shayera - which was a big part of the attraction to Shayera in the first place for him. Sure, they were all superheroes, but being in the military gave John a lot more knowledge about security, discipline, order, logistics, teamwork - knowledge that others on the team often lacked as they haphazardly went around trying to solve problems their own way independent of each other in the early days before the League - and in the early days of the League, too.

Batman, though, was practically military grade himself with his personal dedication to training and his innate understanding of tactics and strategy, and John found it much easier to get along with him because Batman understood the importance of not relying on powers instead of plans.

So John didn't want to admit how much it hurt to not only see him dating Shayera but to get their mocking card. An empty sigh rattled through John's chest as he considered his other friends.

The rest of the Lantern Corps wasn't that fond of him to begin with thanks to his commitments to Earth and the Justice League, not to mention that John preferred to keep his emotions, thank you very much, instead of eliminating them as the rest of the Lantern Corps strove to do.

His old Marine buddies - well, half of them had died in action over the years as many of them had stayed in the service. And the others, some were still on active duty and the rest, he didn't know how to show up talking about some interpersonal bullshit when some of them were dealing with so much worse, from PTSD to divorces.

It was hard to admit to being weak, anyway. To anyone. Feeling so vulnerable was an unusual feeling for John and one that he didn't know how to handle. Hell, he'd handled it after Shayera's betrayal by getting with Mari, so he wouldn't have to feel so alone and broken and sad. But this wasn't something that he felt right about bringing to her.

John stood up with a grunt and changed himself into jeans and a t-shirt with a leather jacket over. Adding a cap and dark shades to complete the disguise, he walked out of his apartment and hailed a cab down to a bar a good enough distance from home that he might not be recognized.

Throwing himself onto the beat-up stool with a world weary sigh, John ordered a Jack and Coke. "Make it a double," he told the bartender, who eyed him sympathetically.

"Lady troubles?" he asked John.

"You don't know the half of it," the Green Lantern muttered.

As the evening wore on and John continued to drink alone, slumping ever more pathetically on the scratched wooden counter as time passed, he was completely unaware that someone in a dim back booth of the bar was watching him intently. Except for a dazzling purple jewel in her silver barrette, she was mostly unremarkable although sexily dressed for her date.

When her companion for the evening went to the restroom, the woman picked up her phone and dialed a contact.

"What do you have for me?" a deep voice asked without preamble.

"You'll never guess who's drinking alone at the bar I'm at," Star Sapphire murmured.

"I'm not in the habit of guessing for information that I pay well for," her employer snapped. "And my time is money."

"Fine, it's the Green Lantern," Star Sapphire grumbled, annoyed. "He's getting good and sloshed and none of his little friends are here to hold his hand."

"Oh, that's excellent news..." the villainous voice practically purred. "Here's what I want you to do..."