CHAPTER FIVE

Bruce

When the limo door closed and the passenger partition came up, Sasha's hand immediately found its way to my knee. I didn't stop it. A mile out and she was on my lap, urgently kissing me. I was returning the favor with gusto. I'd never seen this side of her. During her security contract with the Wayne Corporation, our relationship had been consummately professional. It was a facade she wore well, but as she caught my lip gently between her teeth and cooed wickedly at the physical reaction, I realized that there was far more to Sasha Bordeaux than met the eye.

We emerged in the garage, Alfred smoothly making his exit from the vehicle with a perfunctory farewell to the both of us. If he noticed her flushed cheeks and slightly swollen lips or my muss of hand swept hair, he didn't comment on them. The gentleman's gentleman. We were beyond caring. Hand in hand like a couple of high schoolers, we made it past the den and up the stairs to the suite that contained the master bedroom. My bedroom, in theory if not practice. It was the size of a handball court with its own bar, a swimming pool of a hot tub, and an expansive walk-in closet. It was immaculate. Untouched. Unlived-in. I could tell that it puzzled Sasha as I watched her take it in.

But she simply said, "Care to pick up where we left off?"

And we did. To a point. It was over a year since my last intimate encounter. Not quite a 'monastic vow,' but much closer to one than Sasha or anyone else would have suspected. In fact, the last time Bruce Wayne got laid had not been in a bedroom or even indoors at all, but rather on the rooftop of an abandoned warehouse in Gotham's Bowery district. Selina and I hadn't even bothered taking off our masks

In a sense that had been easier. Even with the masks, there was a certain...truth to my relationship (if it could be called that) with Catwoman. We both knew there was no future. And, on the occasional lonely Gotham night, neither of us had cared.

Sasha cared. Like most people, her face and body language were an open book to me- a skill I couldn't turn off even if I wanted to. I could see the dilation in her pupils and the capillary response in her cheeks and the hitch of breath in her throat when she looked at me. It wasn't anything like love, yet. But she cared alright. As did I. Or at least I thought I did. But how could that be when every time I saw Diana-

I forced my thoughts back to the moment. Sasha and I were now on the bed. She was rolling me over with surprising strength for her frame, straddling me in the dim light. Her blazer was gone, her eggshell blouse completely undone. What I could make out in the dim lighting was spectacular.

She smiled when she saw whatever must have crossed into my eye. "Thought I lost ya there for a second, soldier."

"Pretty happy with what I enlisted for at the moment."

She grinned, a sliver of the upper Midwest peeking through her voice. "You ain't seen nothing yet." Her fingers traced the roadmap of scars adorning my torso. More than a decade of violence written on my body, and yet another reason I avoided bedding most of the women on Bruce Wayne's arm. What kind of billionaire playboy has stab wounds and bullet holes?

"That . . .almost feels like a shrapnel wound." She ran her thumb along the dusting of scar tissue on my lower hip. "I've got one just like it right. . ." she guided my hand up her body to a small spot just below her left breast where a long-healed ridge interrupted the otherwise-flawless expanse of skin. "Right here."

"Damn," I whispered.

Her satisfied smile at my reaction made me think she'd drop this line of questioning altogether. No such luck. "What the hell do you do in your free time, Bruce Wayne."

"Would you believe skiing accident?"

She chuckled. "Where were you skiing? Beirut?"

"Yep." I took her hand away from the scar in question and gently kissed it. "I'm pretty clumsy on the slopes, and I have the bumps and bruises to show for it. Judge away though, I can take it."

"Fine," she sighed. "Lie to me. It's alright." I could tell from her tone she wasn't serious, but the words froze me in place as her mouth descended back upon mine. I couldn't tell her the truth about how I'd gotten the shrapnel wound or any of the other scars I bore, each with a story I could never share. As always, the woman in my bed didn't even know me.

I could feel her withdraw enough to speak. "And. . . I lost you again." A resigned sigh. "This isn't going to happen tonight, is it?"

I felt a flood of equal parts guilt and relief. "I'm sorry Sasha-"

"No, it's okay. It's okay." She rolled off of me, propping her head up in one hand to meet my gaze from the side. "You are such a goddamn enigma, Bruce Wayne. You're the first billionaire I've ever met with combat wounds and-" she flicked my stomach- "not an ounce of body fat. You have this whole playboy reputation and yet I haven't had to work this hard to get in a guy's pants since my very gay senior prom date."

I couldn't help but laugh, grateful that despite her confusion she didn't seem to be upset. "How do you feel about enigmas then?"

She curled into the crook of my arm, her cheek resting gently on my chest. "I like to solve them. One day I'm going to solve you, Bruce."

I didn't reply. In the stillness, the motion-activated lights dimmed completely. "One day I'll let you," I almost said. But that would have been a lie too.

Sasha snored.

It wasn't unpleasant. More of a soft sigh than anything. I could feel the warmth of her breath caress my shoulder as we lay in the master bedroom, coiled in luxury linens fit for a mogul. The 2000 thread count sheets were too soft. Suffocating as always.

Sasha's lithe, athletic form swelled and fell peacefully next to me in the moonlight that filtered through the curtains. The navy pantsuit scattered haphazardly around the room, along with my suit. I was fairly certain some of the damage that had been done to my Armani dress shirt was irreparable even for a tailor of Alfred's prowess.

I knew that he'd be up and about, which was almost enough to keep me in bed next to Sasha. Questions were inevitable, and most of them I wouldn't even have the answers to. I tried to recall the meditation techniques Lady Shiva had taught me years ago.

All to no avail. Sleep wouldn't come and I wasn't sure I wanted it to. I exited the bed more stealthily than necessary-I was beginning to suspect that Sasha was the type of deep sleeper who could slumber through an apocalypse. I found a robe- never worn- in the walk-in closet I never used. I tossed my phone in the pocket, shrugged it on, and padded out into the hallway. I had a few new messages, mostly ignorable. I wondered absently how Diana had fared and tapped out a quick text:

[Hey Diana. Any news on the Amazon party crasher?] [send]

As I trotted down the stairs, I could hear Alfred in the expansive living room at the bottom of the winding staircase to the first floor. My butler was not so much buttling (a real word, I've learned) as laughing heartily at the television while sipping tea from the couch.

"Somehow I figured you'd be busy with a feather duster" I joked, walking past the couch and to the kitchen island where, as I'd hoped, the freshly-brewed pot of Early Grey rested.

"Ha. Perhaps when I've finished all the reruns of Fawlty Towers," came the clipped British reply. "Turn on a light will you?"

I obliged as I re-entered the room, tea in hand. I took a seat perpendicular to Alfred. Still trim in his late fifties, my butler had unbuttoned his vest and rolled up his collared shirt sleeves just enough to reveal his singular tattoo: Latin script on the outside of his right forearm that read Qui audet adipiscitur. Who Dares Wins: the unofficial motto of the British SAS. The four members of his patrol during the Falklands War all had the ink, according to Alfred. Most people looked at him and saw an immaculately refined butler. But there was a reason he knew how to patch bullet wounds and disarm improvised explosives. Like Sasha and myself, Alfred had the scars to prove it.

Oblivious to my thoughts, he paused the program and turned to me. "Somewhat surprised to see you out and about, Bruce. I'd have figured the company upstairs far more enticing than myself."

"She's asleep," I said.

"But no rest for the wicked, I take it." Alfred steepled his fingers. "She's the first one you've bedded in some time. I'd have thought you'd look a bit more...chipper."

"Nothing happened," I was quick to say.

He arched an eyebrow.

"Well, the beginnings of something might have," I conceded. "But no one was 'bedded.'"

"Unless I drastically miss my mark, the lady was more than willing," Alfred commented. "And forgive me for saying sir, but you should be so lucky."

"Thanks," I said sarcastically. "I don't know, Alfred it just wasn't the right time."

"Then why not send her home after the dinner? Why bring her here?"

"Because I wanted it be the right time." I laughed to myself. "If that makes any sense. And I think she was starting to have questions." I lowered my voice. "She asked me if I'd taken any monastic vows recently"

We shared a good laugh at that. I swear Alfred almost snorted his tea back out of his nose. After a while, his face became serious again. "So is it a matter of the right time, or the right person?"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

He shot me a knowing look. "It's too late in the night for subtext. You and Diana seemed to get on rather well at the gala. She always was my favorite one of your paramours."

"Diana was never one of my paramours."

"Well, you've certainly fancied her for long enough." Alfred sighed. "Some of your problems are incredibly complicated, sir. World-ending affairs. This is one of the few that is embarrassingly simple. The bad news is: you're torn between what you know you want and what you think you need. In many ways, you've already made the choice. But you fear you're on the cusp of making the wrong one, and the guilt has paralyzed both relationships."

I forced a laugh. "Alright then, Dr. Pennyworth, I'll play along. What's the good news?"

Alfred crooked a smile at me. "Not five years ago, you would have lied your way into a beautiful woman's bed without a second thought. In fact, you did-many times." He raised his cup in a mock toast. "And look at you now, sir. Scruples. Restraint. A reticence to consummate a relationship built on deception. The good news, dear boy, is that you just might be turning into a better person."

"I think the main takeaway here is that I have an incredibly judgmental butler."

"You always have and always will," he assured me.

"But also, if I'm such a good person then why can't I stop thinking about Diana even when I'm with someone as amazing as Sasha?"

"Wrong question. Boring, obvious, rote. A more interesting query would be why it is you feel that a relationship with Diana is impossible in the first place."

I leaned back, my eyes traveling to the high ceiling and the ancient chandelier that hung there. "You know, sometimes I have this dream. It's the future and after giving my entire life to the cape and cowl, I am this. . .this lonely recluse in a decrepit manor. No family. No legacy. Just an old and bitter man filled with regrets."

Alfred said nothing.

"The scary thing is," I continued, "the dream isn't terrifying. It should be, Alfred. But it isn't. In the dream, I've accepted this existence even though it's caused me to lose everyone I ever cared about. Everyone who ever cared about me."

His look was one of sympathy. "That will not be your future, sir. Why should you be terrified of such a preposterous scenario?"

"If not that, then I stop being Batman at some point."

"Naturally."

"And then what?"

"A beach? A life of meditation on a quiet island somewhere?"

I was already shaking my head. "Gotham will always be my home. No beach, no island. But perhaps a family."

He blinked. "A fam-you're serious, aren't you? How long have you felt this way?"

I thought back the past year. No alien invasions, no world-ending threats. An enduring peace for the first time in living memory. "A year, give or take."

Puzzle pieces assembled behind his eyes. "You want what your father and mother had" he surmised. "Someone to grow old with. Have children with."

"Yes."

He looked almost sorry for me. "Your dilemma becomes. . .clearer. You asked me earlier about being a good person. In my humble opinion, goodness isn't in what you feel. It's in what you do. Pursue a relationship with Ms. Bordeaux. . .or don't. But you don't need me to tell you that prevarication will only end in heartbreak. She strikes me as a serious woman. She and Diana both. Treat them as such and perhaps you'll finally be able to capture a decent night's sleep instead of interrupting my midnight tea."

I had to smile at the glancing tease. "Any more pearls of wisdom for me?"

"Just one-perhaps a word of warning the next time you plan on peeling one of your dates like a ripe plantain in the back of the limousine."

"Most judgmental butler of all time," I repeated, rising with a stretch. "Enjoy your Bri'ish si'cawms."

"Never attempt that accent, sir. It's beneath you. And please do get some sleep."

"Believe me I plan on it."

But my phone had other plans. Just then, it began to ring insistently from my robe's pocket.

Alfred frowned. "A prank call? At this hour?"

"No, I muttered, squinting at the screen. "It's...Diana."

Diana

Paradise Island

There really is no place on this earth like Themyscira. If the island can truly be said to be part of this earth. Bruce had often speculated on our joint Watchtower shifts about the possibility that Paradise Island occupied a dimensional phase space. I probably understood about half of what he said, but there was something cute about Batman casually explaining quantum physics like an MIT professor. Not that talking is how I'd have preferred to spend all those lonely nights."

I climbed into Philippus' rooftop bath, enjoying the sumptuous view of Themyscira's unsettled plains and mountains it provided. A smaller moon shimmered in the warm, mineral-infused water. My clothes from the outside soaked in a basin next to me. I wouldn't be needing them anytime soon. Not until my fate as Wonder Woman was decided in the duel.

I retrieved my phone from the bottom of the tub, a typical resting place for the device once I'd found out that it could work perfectly at scuba-level depths. Years ago, Bruce had ensured that all core League access had access to a mobile device with extra layers of encryption and access to private satellite relays. The idea being that even without our official JL earpieces, we could still be reached no matter where on the planet we were. That was the boast anyway. I didn't honestly suspect that a cell phone could get a signal on a magically concealed island.

Surprise of surprises: it could. I had a signal.

And I had an unread text from Bruce: Hey Diana...

The text was simple, just checking to see if out I'd learned any more about the 'party crasher,' Artemis. The thoughtfulness behind it made my heart do a bit of a flip, and I couldn't help but wonder if he was in that big mansion of his with the woman I'd seen him seated with at the gala. Not that it was any of my business.

Hey Bruce- I started to text. I stared at the words and hated them. We didn't text very often and I much preferred a conversation. Would it be too needy to call in the middle of the night? Probably, in Man's World.

I didn't care. I hit 'call.' and set the phone down in speakerphone mode on the arm of the tub. It probably violated some Themysciran rule or another to make a call to the outside, but it was the least of my problems. I heard two rings, then three. I wondered if I shouldn't just hang up and pretend later that I'd dialed by accident-

Click

He picked up. "Diana?" Crystal clear audio even from eight thousand kilometers and half a dimension away.

"I got your text," I said lamely I could hear some shuffling on the end and I listened as intently as humanly possible, and then some, for any telltale signs of female companionship. I could hear his footsteps and the creak of an old wooden door. No 'Bruce! Come back to bed' at least.

"You know, I'm getting a weird network message," he said. "Are you in a tunnel?"

"I'm. . . in Themyscira."

"What? Jesus is everything okay?"

Absolutely not, I thought. "Perfectly fine. Just homesick I guess," I said.

"Well, that's a lie." His voice was neutral, free of judgment.

I closed my eyes and leaned my head back in the water, nothing but stars in my view. "Don't tell me you can do that mind-reading thing even over the phone."

"Works better face to face, but then deception isn't really your forte."

"Well I'm in the bath, so if we were face to face you'd be seeing a lot more than my micro-expressions." Why did I say that?

"Ha," he said, clearly a bit flustered. "Very funny. But the jokes make me think whatever's going on must be serious. What happened, Diana?"

Bruce had an annoying habit of defusing flirtation by turning it into a joke. Still, he'd nailed me pretty good. I'd called him without thinking through the prospect of having to admit how thoroughly my life had been upended, and now I was delaying. It was time to just come out with it.

"The woman's name was Artemis," I began, "and she wants my title as Wonder Woman. . ."

Bruce

I listened intently, pacing in the first-floor library of the manor as Diana described everything that had occurred since leaving the gala. Her meeting with Artemis, her return to Themyscira, and the shattering revelations waiting for her on the island. I was as much a stranger to the politics of Themyscira as any man, but by the end of her story, I was furious on her behalf.

"How could your own mother do this to you?"

"She says she has no choice. Artemis' following means that she could really start a war if she desired. A civil war-sister against sister. I can't even imagine such a catastrophe." I could hear the bitterness in her voice. "What an idiot I was to think that because we were not men we could be immune from petty tribalism."

"Even still, Themyscira has a better track record than most," I pointed out. Judging by the wordless sigh I heard in response, it wasn't helping much to cheer her up. So I changed the subject. "This Artemis, you think she's actually going to be a problem?"

"I don't know what to think. She seems to have my base powers. I've defeated her before in battle, but one of the finest warriors I know seems to think that I'm outclassed. That Artemis has gotten a lot better since. The closest comparison I can think of is Aresia."

I recalled the rogue, androcidal Amazon we'd fought in the early days of the League. "She was tough, but you fared well against her."

"'Well' may be an understatement. . .I don't know. I'm trying not to worry about it for now."

"You've gotten a lot better since your time on the island too, you know." I was trying to cheer her up but I meant every word. The Diana I'd first met years ago during the Martian invasion was a skilled warrior but a neophyte nonetheless. Several years and hundreds of battles later, I now considered her the most powerful fighter on the planet. I wasn't going to tell her that directly, but I tried to project confidence into my voice as I said, "If you ask me, Artemis is the one who's drastically underestimated her opponent."

"I suppose we'll find out in a few hours," she said. "If I beat her-"

"When you beat her."

A tinkle of laughter. "Right. When I beat her."

"It'll be a good story for the next time we're both on monitor duty," I said.

"I wish -" she began. It snagged my attention like a hook on a fishing line. I wondered briefly if the connection had fizzled, but no- whatever she'd been about to say, she'd evidently thought better of it.

"Diana?"

"I should probably let you go," she amended quickly. It's late in Gotham I'm sure, and you probably have things to do."

I thought guiltily of Sasha asleep right upstairs. "You're probably right."

"Wish me luck?" Her voice was just above a whisper.

"Always," I told her. The silence lingered, full of thoughts that, as ever, would remain unspoken. The foolish indulgence of fanciful desires. . .just another way to torture myself with impossibilities.

"Goodbye, Bruce."

"Goodbye, Diana."

To be continued

Author's Note:

Lots of talking this chapter. Sustained action to come. I wanted to do a bit more to peek under the hood of Bruce as a character at the start of the story. The fact that there has been such sustained peace in the world and the universe for a year, give or take, really has an impact on these characters in different ways. For Bruce, what if it allows him to think about a future that doesn't involve Batman? The nightmare scenario he describes to Alfred is basically a premonition of his fate as an elderly Bruce Wayne in the Batman Beyond series. I think this is a realistic obstacle to a 'happy ending' for him and Diana even though they both care for each other deeply. The internal conflict this creates is attractive for storytelling purposes and relatable to me as I write now, having experienced both successful and unsuccessful relationships firsthand.

As always, in the absence of a beta reader, I apologize and take responsibility for any typos or grammatical oopsies to be found. Hopefully, such peccadillos don't distract from your enjoyment of the story. If you liked or even hated what you've read, please drop a review. And thank you for reading.

-C