" Robin is dead."
Are words that Batman doesn't say. He doesn't say anything, really. He takes Dick's body back. It's black and bruised and covered in ash, except for the words splattered over his chest in spray-paint yellow.
Ha. Ha.
Joke's on You, Batman.
He's. Well, he's not hollow. He's angry. Scared. Numb. Shock.
" Master Bruce- Master Bruce?"
Alfred's voice cracks through his mind, struggling to be heard through the haze.
" Master Bruce, are you alright?"
No. No he's not.
Bruce splays Dick's dead body down before him. It's broken and small and the skin is cut and bruised and broken. His eyes are glazed from behind the mask, puncture wounds dug into his shoulders. He was seventeen. Seventeen and nearly an adult, so close to being an adult, and he's dead, now. Dead.
" He's dead." He croaks out. " He's dead, Alfred."
Alfred stays silent on his end. " The Joker, sir?" he asks, tentatively.
Bruce swallows. " Ro- Dick. He's dead. He's dead, Alfred." Anger was seeping rapidly into his voice. Rage quivered his body. " The Joker killed him. I'll kill him. God, I'll-"
He stops. Snorts. There's a wrangled, screaming noise erupting from his throat, except he doesn't let it make its way out of his mouth.
" Oh, God." Alfred repeats from the comm. " Listen, Master Bruce."
" Alfred." Bruce says. " He's dead."
" I know. Sir. Please, you have to come back, first."
No, Bruce thinks. I need to chase after him. I need to find him- repay what he did.
I-
The Bat had promised once, that he wouldn't kill. Bruce can't do it. they killed Dick. They killed Robin. He-
He clenched his fists.
Robin was dead.
" I'll give him- I'll give Dick a burial." Bruce says. " He- he wanted to go to college."
Alfred knows this. They both know this.
He says it anyways.
Bruce doesn't- no. He never thinks that his parents would want him to use guns. Wouldn't want their kid to use guns. Maybe Dick wouldn't want his father to use guns either.
But he does. He needs to. He hasn't gotten any closer to solving crime since he started. He payed for it. With- with Dick. With Robin. With Dick Grayson, his son, his fucking son who was, is, forever, seventeen and dead because he couldn't protect him, couldn't save him-
He needed to find the Joker.
" Master Bruce, are you sure about this?"
" It was him, Alfred." Bruce growls. His voice is hoarse and angry. He hasn't slept for three days. He'll do it tonight.
" Master Bruce, consider."
" He killed him, Alfred." Bruce says.
" So you're killing him?"
" I haven't killed him. I haven't killed anyone for years. Look where that got us. Nothing. This city isn't improving- I haven't changed anything. Dick's dead because of me."
" If you're blaming yourself, sir, then-"
No.
Bruce turns off the comms.
Arkham Asylum glows green.
Correction, it glows white and gray and black. But when the Joker's in there, it always seems to glow that color, as though absorbing the insanity inside him and letting it billow through the gates.
He doesn't go the usual way. He knows where to go. The black corridors. The padded walls.
Him.
the door creaks.
" You." He says. He forces his tone to be neutral. Even.
The Joker leans back. " Me." he drawls, as though he didn't kill-
He grins. Tattoos are spread over his face and body, and Bruce thinks viciously for a moment that maybe he should cut all of those open-
No. He's here to kill the Joker. Not to be a sadist. It's more than he deserves. Bruce is giving him more than what he should get.
He doesn't give the Joker a change to continue. He roars, lunging at him. He can feel bone crack as he punches him, strong and bloody and bruised. The Joker laughs.
Bruce teeth tighten.
" You killed him." He growled darkly. " You killed Robin."
Another punch. More laughter, more rage. More punches. " You killed my son."
He steps up, red edging his vison. He lifts his fist, heart pummeling.
He rams his hand down onto the Joker's skull-
Blocked.
He doesn't register it for a moment.
Blood. Knife wound.
He's grinning. Bruce can see that he has a few teeth knocked out.
" You know, I'm a meticulous guy, Bats." the Joker gurgles out from his throat. Bruce snatches the knife in his hand, throwing the Joker against the wall with the other. He doesn't stop talking.
" I've done lots of things. Ha! And sure! I remember killing that one. Birdboy, so innocent and headstrong, ran into a warehouse. Hero complex. Got killed right alongside the hostages. "
" You. Don't. Get. To. Talk. About him."
Stilted. The Joker gurggles and laughs again, and his voice is hollow and scathing and sandpaper-like in Bruce's mind.
" Oh, please." Joker says. " If I can keep track of my tools, you can keep tra-"
He doesn't finish. Bruce roars and smashes his head in against the floor.
He draws his fist back. One more. He can smash in his brain from here. The-
" What the hell is going on in there?"
Guards.
No matter.
Bruce pauses, breathing heavily. He gets up, glaring angrily at the bloodied form of the Joker.
" Leave." he says from inside the cell.
" Batman?"
He grits his teeth again. " Leave."
There's a slight hesitance. Bruce scans. Six. Funny.
It isn't, but saying it in his head mclears away some of the fog.
" You don't kill." One of them says, brown hair and mousy. " What are you doing, you don't-"
" And where's Robin?" asks another.
He twitches. Can't respond to that. Can't.
" Unimportant." There's a hesitant silence from the guards. White light slips through the slits in the door. Someone clicks their hand on the doorknob.
" You can't stay here. Leave."
He doesn't respond. Can't respond. How dare they-
" Batman." he says from behind the cell. Bruce glares from through the doorway at them. To their credit, they don't run away immediately. " Batman. If you don't leave- we have to go in."
There's a warning in that.
Bruce grits his teeth. Counts his options. Turns around.
Not worth it.
He leaps out.
Robin died. Robin died because he wasn't able to save him, because he was too lenient-
The Joker ran out of Arkham a month after he left. Bruce hasn't been able to get any trace of him. He's- he's allying himself with the lower criminals. Styling himself a mob boss. Anger rolls inside of him.
Too lenient.
He starts to become harsher, to criminals. At least, that's what the newspapers say. Bruce can't care less.
" What are you doing?" His voice is harsh and growly- even without the modifier. The boy- twelve- twelve, maybe younger- like Dick was- he forces that out of his head.
The boy snorts. Brash.
" What, you going to kill me?"
I don't kill- the words are on nearly off of his mouth, past his lips, before he chokes them back. " Hand back the tire iron. That is your warning." he says, instead.
The boy snorts. " What makes you think I have a tire iron."
Bruce opens his mouth. Closes it. No. He isn't- not. " Leave." he says simply, letting the rage seep out through him. " And don't come back."
It's been six months. Six months, and even with the violence- iron smelts red-hot in Bruce's eyes. He can't sleep. The wine bottle is half empty beside- and oh, his parents would hate him, if they could see. If. Maybe they don't. Can't.
" Master Bruce, in my time-" Alfred's voice is casual, worried from the Cave entrance. "- whenever a man stayed up this late, they were either entertaining a lady, or was off hiding a body."
" Next week, Alfred." Bruce responds. The Bat-Brand.
Funny name. Somewhere in his brain, he knows that Dick wouldn't've approved. God. Dick. Bruce knew he wasn't a good parent. Brother. Authority figure. He-
Dick was seventeen. He was going to leave for college. Bile pushed in Bruce's throat, tears stinging at his eyes, only half-way because of the smoke.
He remembered being upset at him leaving.
" Really? A date? I shudder what you might pick up after a month surrounding yourself with nothing but gunpowder." He stopped. " Unless you plan on committing a murder, which I will have you know I am fairly certain is illegal in at least fifty states."
No.
Not murders. " I won't kill them."
" Ah," Alfred nodded at the fire held out in Bruce's hands. The long metal stick he used to clasp it was turning red at the ends. Fire. " An impromptu tattooing, then?"
Bruce didn't answer. Alfred stared at him for a long moment, as if judging, wondering, thinking.
" I doubt Master Dick would have wanted you to do this."
Bruce shook his head. His eyes were heavy. " It's not. It's not about him." Except that it was. Because Alfred didn't believe him for a second, and Bruce didn't either. " It's about them. The criminals. They've… increased in their actions. I need to, too."
Batman stays in Gotham. Usually, he doesn't care much about the rest of the world.
Then aliens attack.
The new god. New. God.
Rage bubbles inside him. No reason. Not really. He's saved people, and Bruce can accept that. Begrudgingly.
But this is an alien that he doesn't know about. That could wipe them all off the planet at a moment's notice. The same one that deprived a child of her mother. A city of its skyscrapers.
His employees.
" It's an old saying, Master Bruce, but this much screen time cannot be good for your eyes."
Bruce grits his teeth, snapping out of his thoughts. He turned off the computer.
" Only observing, Alfred. We don't know what a new superpowered being could do. They're calling him Superman already, do you know that?"
Nicknames. Aliases. Bruce didn't… The Bat wasn't supposed to be an alias. It was just something he said to strike fear into the hearts of villains. Then.
Riddler. Penguin. Bane. All of them. Joker. Still controlling the mob. Couldn't reach him. Couldn't, not without starting off a new gang war.
Robin. Dick was always so bright and- and. No.
Aliases meant he had something to hide. Bruce knew he wasn't a saint.
And Superman was no Dick Grayson.
Superman was a Kryptonian. For now, he saved lives. As of the future, he could wipe out the entire human population and Bruce would be able to do nothing to stop it but watch.
( Like Robin? )
No. Bruce's a reasonable man. He can't wait for something to happen. He needs to start now.
Besides. It isn't- it isn't as if- well, if it comes down to it, Bruce won't need to do anything, anyways.
Bruce has been dreading this day since Dick died. The first year. The first birthday Dick will have without him ever aging.
He spends the morning at his graveside.
No patrolling.
Can't stay listless, either.
He sighs. Pulls up his computer.
More on the alien it is.
It's been a year since Superman's appearance.
" Lex." Bruce's smile is warm and perhaps forced, and awkward, but Lex's is the same, so at least he isn't too odd.
" Bruce!" Lex responds, chirpily, jerkily. " I've heard a lot about what you've done in Gotham- very nice work, the crime rate? Decreasing tremendously, for now, I suppose, you know what they say- crime doesn't sleep, and neither does the city. Or God."
Bruce nods politely. Lex grins obliviously at him, waiting for a response. He pauses. " I never quite believed in a god," he says.
Lex snorts. " Oh, funny you should say that. In Metropolis, we're already contemplating whether or not to build a statue of Superman." His face froze stony for a moment, and Bruce almost caught it slipping. " Odd, for you, I suppose, and for me. Superman? A god? The way you hear people talking about him, you'd think he had his own cult."
" Hm." The party has just started up now. Lex continues. " But I'm curious about Gotham. You have one, too, right? The Bat?"
" The Bat is not Superman." Bruce says. He blinks in acknowledgement, murmuring a 'Thank you' as he accepts a new glass. " He doesn't… have lasers for eyes, as one thing."
But Lex has already continued. Bruce whips up as he hears him speak. "- and that… apostle, of his. Bright, dear, Robin, if I remember. He hasn't been on the scene for a while, as I heard! Your own thoughts, Bruce?"
Robin. It's all he can do to not rip apart the glass in his hands. No. Stupid. Robin's been dead for over a year. He can't- can't show it.
He swallows. " Can't say I know."
Needs to leave. Now. It's none of Lex's fucking buisness- no, it's not his fault, either, Bruce doesn't even know much about LexCorp, there's nothing to think of his words other than that of a well-meaning-
" Sorry. I think I had too much wine."
" That's champagne."
Same difference.
If he caught Lex Luthor's momentary glare at him as he left, then he most suredly thought nothing of it.
" Alfred!" Bruce can hear his voice screaming in his ears- blowing out smoke in his path. He's running. Rampaging. The manor- oh, God, it's burning.
Alfred. Not again. He can't let him die too. Not like Robin. Not-
Images flash unwarranted into his brain. Alfred, dead, in the same way as Robin- God, if it's the Joker this time, Batman refuses, refuses refuses refuses to let him live, consequences be damned all the way to hell-
He knows he shouldn't. All firefighters tell you the same thing, over and over-
Don't run into a burning building.
he does.
The ground floor is alright, sort of, it's the back that's on flames, but the smoke is billowing in front of him, and he can't see or smell, and maybe he'll die of smoke inhalation, but he needs to find-
" Right here, Master Wayne," Bruce snaps upright. There are marks near his eyes, he's sure, from the frantic screaming of his heart and tears and-
" Alfred, what happened."
Alfred stepped out of the door, coughing. " Better to explain when you're outside, Master Bruce. I called the ambulance. And don't run into burning buildings."
Riddler. It's always the Riddler.
Bruce can't bring himself to… care, in a way.
" How?" he asked. Alfred doesn't respond. He looks forward at the remains.
" As you might expect." he says. " It doesn't matter."
He turned around. " Planning to rebuild it, Master Wayne?"
Bruce blinks, doesn't respond.
It's slow, but there's an angry, tired sort of… emptiness flooding through him.
Resigned and angry and upset and-
All at once, really.
" No." he says, like a judge. Raspy, thick.
" Not this time."
Superman spends his time around the world, saving people. Batman watches from behind his screen. Analyzing, thinking.
No. Nothing he can learn from this.
Rewind.
Black Zero.
There.
Wonderful.
Bruce is older than is father was, ever will be. That might be the only thing that matters.