Never Again

A Batman Beyond ficlet by YT

The Batman universe belongs to DC Comics, and the Batman Beyond series to Kids' WB. I'm just borrowing them for a while, and I'm not going to make any money off this story, so please don't sue me. If you want to reproduce this story in whole or in part, please e-mail me to ask first. That said, please enjoy and review.

Something happened to you, didn't it? And it wasn't just that you got old.

I push the glass case shut, knowing that I can never open it again, never wear the suit inside. Never wear the mantle of Batman again. It feels like closing the lid on a coffin. The red-and-black suit has only seen a few months of use, and I am only a graying, tired man reflected in the glass door of the case. The new suit is a dream never realized, and I am a ghost.

For a moment I waver, thinking that maybe I've made a mistake. Why am I doing this? I try to convince myself that my main reason is the frailty of age. My heart can't take this anymore. I almost got killed tonight because my body is no longer strong enough to handle the demands that being Batman places on it.

But I know that's not the whole truth. It would be fitting for me to die out there, as Batman, even if it's just because of a bad heart. Then the world will probably find out the true identity of the Dark Knight. But I always anticipated that would happen someday. I'm not afraid of dying, or of being found out after I do. That's not why I have to put the suit away. There's another reason.

It is not my body that's grown too weak. It's my resolve. I picked up a gun and broke the promise I made to myself a long time ago, the promise that created Batman in the first place.

My desperation, my physical weakness, is no excuse for what I did. It doesn't make a difference that he was a criminal, or that I didn't actually pull the trigger. I pointed a gun at him. A gun, the tool that so many criminals use against innocent people. A tool that is all to easy to use for the wrong reasons.

For a few moments I sunk down to the level of a common gangster, the same kind of person I've been fighting all my life. There's no way I forgive myself for that. If I've fallen that far once, it might happen again. I can't take the risk that I might actually pull the trigger next time.

I leave the costume case behind, walk slowly up the stairs to the power switches. I hold my hand over them, and look out over the sum total of more than four decades of work—the computer, the Batmobile, the relics of my career. My real career.

Now I have to leave it all behind. I have to lose everything I stood for, everything I've devoted my life to and sacrificed so much for. Parting with it hurts. But I just can't do it anymore, and I can't pretend otherwise.

"Never again," I tell myself. As the echoes of my words fade away, I flip the power switches, one by one. Each one I touch blankets a part of the cave in inky darkness, makes a sound like the lid of a tomb slamming shut. How appropriate—after all, I'm burying my whole life down here.

I reach the last switch, and my hand hovers over it for half a second. This switch is for the lights for the display cases where the costumes stand—my old suit, Tim's, Barbara's, Dick's, and the new Batman suit I completed a few months ago. Although I can't see the cases from where I'm standing, I can imagine the costumes in my mind's eye, perfect in every detail.

Once I shut down this switch, once the light over those costumes is gone, it's all over. Really over.

I don't want to hit the switch.

But I have to. Even if I turn everything back on and put on the suit again, go out again, I won't really be Batman anymore.

I push the little lever down, and the last light goes out with a loud sound that echoes in my mind long after it has ceased echoing from the stone walls of the cave.

Never again.