Title: Life Is Good: XII
Author: D C Luder
Summary: The second addition in the Series of Three storyline. Se three months after his full recovery, the Dark Knight is back with a vengeance.
Rating: T
Infringements: All recognizable characters belong to DC Comics, not DC Luder.
V
It was just before six-thirty when I heard them outside of my door.
We had been out late the night before, busy with the gangs that were starting up problems again. Tim had been back in school for some time so it was just the two of us and the city. As a result of all of the extra activity, he decided that we would partner up together for patrols instead of splitting the city in half and meeting up later.
By the end of the night, I could hardly keep my eyes open. He took me to his home, to sleep for the night. Even though my mask covered my face, I think he saw me smiling.
We had walked the rooftops to Milton Ave, where the car was concealed in a long forgotten alley. We got in and he pulled out onto the avenue as I settled into the deep seat. I fell asleep almost instantly and hardly stirred once we got to the cave.
I woke the next morning in a guest room, dressed in flannel pants and a large sweatshirt.
And to the sound of cries of pain.
Infantile cries.
I jumped out of bed and raced across the room, hardly making a sound on the carpeted floor. After pressing myself against the door, I listened intently to the voices outside.
Mattie bawled in between coughing fits, which reminded me of the seals on TV. I could hear him talking to her quietly, trying to soothe her. And even more so, I heard Selina talking.
At first, I thought it had been to him, but then I figured she was on the phone after he remained silent to her questions.
"Well, it's not too high, only 100, but the coughing has changed, there's more wheezing. Okay, but should we---. We tried that. Yes, the humidifier next to her bed. Nothing. She acts sleepy but she just can't seem to settle. Okay, okay, we'll bring her down."
The hall was deprived of conversation, and only the sound of her cries could be heard.
Then my door opened.
I saw that Selina had taken Mattie and was headed back in the general direction of their room. He stood in the doorway, dressed in jeans and a dark long sleeved shirt. Three hours ago, his face had been calm, free of worry. Now it was darkened, the corners of his eyes tight and burdened.
As I looked into his icy eyes, I saw something I had never seen before, at least in him.
I saw fear.
"Cassandra, I need you to stay here, we have to take Mattie to Leslie."
"Sick?" I asked, my voice soft with my own growing concern.
He glanced in the direction Selina had gone and nodded, "She had a cold last week, but it's getting worse," his voice softened as he looked away.
"I can't go?"
He sighed, looked down at his feet briefly before looking back at my face, "Do you want to?"
I nodded rapidly.
He turned away, "Get dressed; we're leaving in two minutes."
I was ready in one.
When I exited through the front door, he had already pulled out an SUV, the engine humming. I looked through the windshield to see him sitting behind the wheel with the seat next to him empty. After a closer look, I saw that Selina was in the back, setting Mattie up in her car seat and covering her with a light blanket.
After opening the door, I hopped into the "shotgun" seat as Tim called it and buckled up. Without pausing, he shifted the car into drive and sped off.
I looked into the back again. Selina wore a wool coat over a tee shirt and flannel pajama pants. Usually she was concerned with her appearance, but not at that moment. All of her attention was on her child.
Their child.
Mattie fussed, her arms moved about and her face was flushed and dampened with tears. Selina leaned over in the seat, placing a hand on her daughter's chest, "It's okay, love, we're going to get you better."
She caught me looking and offered a smile.
I smiled back and then put my eyes frontward. Every few seconds, I would glance to the back and when I moved gaze to the front again, I would look at him. As Batman, he was always alert, but never tense. Tension did not lead to any sort of focus, but being aware of your surroundings did.
The muscles of his shoulders and arms were flexed and strained against the form fitting sleeves. His knuckles were white as his hands clenched the wheel. His face was perhaps the most intense feature about him. Lips pressed tightly, eyes squinted in concentration. The tendons of his neck stood out more so than usual.
His eyes cut through the darkness of the dawn fog.
He was very tense.
Barely ten before seven, we pulled into the rear lot behind the clinic. There was only one other car and I knew who it belonged to. The sweetest, nicest woman to have ever lived.
Dr. Leslie.
She stood at the rear entrance, which was wide open behind her. Her long white doctor's coat covered pale blue scrubs but did not conceal her concern. Her face was solemn and her hands were crossed over her front, hugging herself.
As soon as the engine was cut, he stepped out of the vehicle and walked over the back door to retrieve Mattie. She had stopped crying but still acted uneasy. He lifted her out of the seat and carried her away, holding her close to his chest and covering her with the blanket.
I sat there, still buckled, in the seat and watched as he and Leslie quickly made their way into he clinic, the door shutting behind them.
It wasn't until I felt Selina's hand on my shoulder that I realized I wasn't alone.
And that I was crying.
V
"Well, she's vocal, so she's passing air."
I walked briskly, Bruce following me with his long strides, holding Mattie to his chest as she mumbled in between coughing and bouts of tears. As we made our way down the hall, he paused at the door to the first treatment room on the right. He had spent many a night there, but the last had been when he had been shot two years prior.
I turned back to face him, "Bruce, I need her in the Peds room."
"But why can't you treat her in here?" Even without the mask, I saw the powerful influence of Batman in his stance. Great criminal masterminds cowered at the sight of him, even men of the law were afraid of him.
"Don't even start with me, Bruce. All of pediatric equipment is up here, not in there. All that's in there is a jar full of spent bullets and a few Batarangs you've left behind." His mouth opened to protest, but I cut him off, "Don't make me send you to the lounge."
He growled and continued on down the hall.
Selina's call had come to my home phone just after six. She seemed frantic and worried and could hardly keep her nerves settled long enough to explain to me what was going on. Bruce had taken the phone from her and then chronologically delivered vitals, stats and anything else he could possibly know about how is daughter was doing. He then gave the phone back to Selina for her to give her view of the matter.
The week before, Mattie had come down with a bout of sniffles and coughs. She had just been enrolled in a playgroup and no matter how clean a baby is, it isn't clean enough. One child in the group had brought the cold bug in and they all had left with it. Being her first real illness, it threw Mattie back a bit, and Bruce took four days off of work to be with her during the day so that Selina could rest up for the night shift. When he brought her in for a check up three days ago, he looked dead on his feet but Mattie had been bouncing in his arms and ready to explore my office.
And now she had relapsed.
I practically pried the child from Bruce's hands and set her up on my exam table. I handed her a soft doll and pulled up the crib sidepieces in case she decided to move around. She laid on her back, clutching the doll and watching our every move around the room. "Bruce, get me a swab out of the jar over there."
He stared at me if I had said it in Greek before jerking slightly and retrieving the swab. While he did so, I retrieved a sample tube to put the swab in to keep it from any contamination. I also selected a small tongue depressor, an otoscope, digital thermometer and a small jar of Vicks chest rub.
Bruce had returned to the table and was rubbing Mattie's front side gently. She smiled lightly but then coughed. I stood by, listening carefully. As Selina had said over the phone, there was some wheezing, but nothing too bad. Her stomach rose higher than I would have liked when she drew in breath and moved too much when she exhaled. She moved her head and her arms up in the air, letting out a slight whine. She wanted to be held.
After she began kicking out a bit, I decided the best way to do this was to have Bruce hold her. I had him sit in the rocking chair next to the wall and sat beside him on a stool.
She dropped the doll and clutched onto his shirtsleeve.
As she sat up in his arms, her breathing improved and she hardly coughed once. I listened to her heart and lungs carefully, during normal and distressed breathing. I took the cotton swab and gently opened her mouth to take a sample from her throat. That set off some fussing but Bruce calmed her quickly.
Her ears were clean and her throat was hardly irritated from all of her coughing. The lack of redness or swelling unfortunately suggested a lower respiratory tract problem instead of the run of the mill common cold. As did the wheezing and irregularities in her breath sounds.
I had a good idea on what was ailing the Wayne baby.
"Bruce, has she been having bouts of rapid breathing?"
He looked up at me, "Yes, after coughing."
"Any other time?"
He paused, his eyes falling back to Mattie, "Yes. After activity, but she hasn't been up and about lately so I haven't seen it recently."
"So there was breathing issues before hand?"
"Not problems, I--- more like she was out of breath from running around."
I sighed and then reached for Mattie's hand as it clamped to his shirt. Her hands were a bit chilly, but then again she had just been in a car for the last twenty minutes or so. I traced her small fingers and she moved them a bit but then retook her grasp on his shirt.
Daddy's little girl.
"Bruce, we're going to need x-rays."
He nodded and then rose slowly, keeping her close to his body. So protective...
"It's a lower resp condition, isn't it?"
I nodded slowly.
"Not pneumonia, no fluid in her lungs. Asthma?"
I smiled a bit, thinking back to how he would diagnose himself as a child when he came in for check ups. Before hand, Tom had been his physician but after he passed on, I took up the care of Bruce's health.
I recalled one occasion where Alfred had brought him in one weekend when Bruce couldn't have been more then eleven. He had a cough and fever and promptly explained his symptoms as he sat on the exam table. Alfred stood at the door, a smile on his face, "Looks like someone has found the medical section in the library."
He had replied in the midst of removing his shirt, "Well, they have to be read by somebody, what good's a book if it just sits on a shelf?"
Later, Alfred and I had joked that Bruce would be a great doctor someday. Little did we know the path of life he had already laid out for himself and it's affect it would have on all of us.
V
As I stood in front of my dressing mirror, I realized how dreary the day had become. Instead of my usual garb, I had dressed for town, with dark slacks and a nice sweater over a dress shirt. Master Bruce said to be comfortable since he didn't know how long the day would grow to be. Any other trip into the city was usually casual, most commonly for shopping or running errands.
This one, however, was not.
Master Bruce had woken me at five thirty. He had returned from is patrols a handful of hours prior and by the look of his form, I knew he hadn't slept at all. Dressed in sleeping wear, his robe and with his still damp hair from a shower he had taken earlier, he had knocked at my door and then waited intensely for me to answer.
I had wrapped my own cotton robe about my form before opening the door. I knew at once what was the cause of his concern. Miss Mattie had been battling a cold the week prior and had been a bit off since her recovery a few days earlier. And even though my quarters are a floor below and three rooms away from his quarters, I had heard worried voices and the cries of the young child.
He requested me to look her over and I complied at once.
Instead of being in the nursery, Miss Mattie was in Selina's arms as she sat on the sofa by the bay window. She coughed a bit, the force moving her small body, then resumed to whimpering cries.
At the sight of me, Selina's face brightened, but not enough to mask her fatigue and sadness. Master Bruce recited the child's vitals as I checked them and also described her behavior through the night. It didn't take too long for me to suggest a trip to Dr. Thompkins was in order. He agreed readily and sought out the phone to call her.
They left shortly after, taking Miss Cassandra with them. The child looked positively frightened, for she held such a special bond with the child. As we all did.
I took upon myself to inform the other members of the family.
First and closest was Barbara Gordon. She took it well and promised to get a hold of Tim at school.
After a few tries, I finally broke through to Master Dick's "office" phone.
A tobacco-charred voice answered, "Grayson's desk."
"I wish to speak to Officer Grayson, is he available?"
"Nah, he don't work here no more, can I take a message?" and hoarse laughter.
"This is Alfred Pennyworth, may I ask to the whereabouts of Officer Grayson?"
"Sure, he ain't here no more, he ain't anywhere no more."
"I beg your pardon?"
There was brief shuffle and change of hands before Master Dick's voice said, "Sorry, some people don't have manners around here."
"By what did that gentleman, and I use the term loosely, mean saying that Officer Grayson no longer worked at the Department?"
"Oh hi Alfred. Him, oh that, yeah, I got a promotion kind of..."
"Master Dick, how splendid."
"Yeah, Sergeant Grayson now."
"Very good sir, Master Bruce will be so pleased to hear it."
Master Dick sighed, "Yeah I bet. So what's going on, you're actually lucky you caught me I was just heading home, had to work the night shift and all... Alfred?"
"Master Dick, Miss Mattie has fallen ill---"
"She's still sick?"
"More so of a relapse rather than a continuation, sir."
"Is it bad, I mean serious?"
My silence confirmed his suspicion.
"Oh, God, Alfred where is she?"
"They took her to Dr. Thompkins for now, but she may require attention outside of the good doctor's abilities."
"I'm on my way. You call Bruce and tell him I'll be there as soon as I can."
With that, he hung up, most likely dashing through the labyrinth of desks at the station. He, too, was worried, although he would never voice it as Ms. Barbara would.
Like father, like son, I suppose.
After a short commute from Bristol, I arrived at the clinic a little after seven-thirty. In the rear lot, there were a few vehicles, but a vacant space in between Dr. Thompkins' sedan and the SUV Master Bruce had driven earlier. Even once the vehicle I drove was evenly placed between the two, I paused before exiting.
I was the rock.
They needed me.
Their child was in the grasp of an unknown ailment.
The rear entrance to the clinic lead the way into a dark, dank hall that very few had to ever pass through. I had done so for years. I first checked the emergency exam room that Dr. Thompkins had reserved especially for her masked patients. I wasn't all too shocked when I didn't find the ill child, but instead her rattled mother and favorite babysitter.
Ms. Kyle sat on the edge of the gurney, her hands in her lap, shoulders hunched and head hanging low from her neck. Her hair had been pulled back into a bun, revealing the same worried features I had seen over an hour earlier. Beside her and laying horizontally, was Miss Cassandra. She had been covered with a heavy wool coat, of which I recognized to be Master Bruce's. Her lids covered her eyes and her lips parted slightly in a way that only slumber would allow.
"Alfred?"
My gaze returned to Ms. Kyle. She looked at Cassandra once before slowly sliding off of the gurney and onto the linoleum floor. She then walked passed me and out into the corridor. I offered one last look at the sleeping adolescent and then followed suit.
Before I had even begun to shut the door she asked, "Do you know anything?"
"I have just arrived, Ms. Kyle, I have yet to seek Dr. Thompkins out."
"Oh," she looked away, "Bruce came back for a bit, said they needed x- rays."
"To rule out any foreign bodies in her lungs, madam."
"Right."
She wrapped her arms around herself and stood a bit taller, "I want to go see her."
I was unaware as to why Ms. Kyle had been left out of the examination of her daughter, but I knew it was quite unfair for her to keep wondering. Leaving Miss Cassandra to her well-deserved rest, I lead her to the radiology room, which was a brief navigation through winding halls and dead ends. The room itself was divided in two: the actual radiography machine on one half and the observation and controls on the other side of a lead lined barrier. We paused at the door briefly before walking in.
Dr. Thompkins was at the controls, lining up the exact images she desired to take. I noticed Ms. Kyle's shoulders tremor slightly and I gently touched them with a hand. She turned, smiled, and then set her gaze on the other side of the room.
Master Bruce, garbed in a lead apron, stood next to the radiograph table. Miss Mattie was laid out upon it, stripped to her diaper. She was in some form of a support cradle that disabled any movement from rolling or writhing. Although the terrifying piece of equipment loomed above her, she laid still as her father caressed her face.
After taking a few shots at varied angles, Dr. Thompkins turned around and nodded at us both. She then turned to Master Bruce, "We're all set, and you can get her dressed again and take her to the back."
He nodded, slipped the apron off and then lifted his child off of the table.
Suddenly, Ms. Kyle stepped forward and approached them. She smiled at her daughter, tears brimming her eyes, and then leaned over and kissed the child. She smiled at her mother and spoke quietly, "Mah-mie happie." Master Bruce's arm reached around his soon to be wife as the tears broke and spread across her cheeks. I stood by Dr. Thompkins as we watched the small family embrace in the middle of the radiology room.
As I watched the scene before my aged eyes, a quote rose up in the deep recesses of my mind. Muriel Spark, an English poet, had always been fond of family life and used it in her work on several occasions. As I watched the couple embrace and as their child rested within the entanglement of their forms, I smirked slightly, no matter how dank the moment was. For "parents learn a lot from their children about coping with life."
As Miss Mattie giggled, I knew it to be true.
V
My alarm went off at seven. I hit the snooze three times before I finally dragged myself out of bed. I had decided to skip out on the homework last night to enjoy a fraction of my already lame social life. Although we had a great time in town, I unfortunately had to get up two hours earlier to tackle my statistics.
I sat at my desk, my elementary stat book opened to one-thirty, my warm cherry cola at hand for the caffeine fix I so desperately needed. We had six problems assigned to us, each of which would take up at least of page.
Problem number one: Find the range, variance and standard deviation for the following sample of raw data. 10, 9, 345, 43, 11, 65, 4, 78...
Yeah, time to check my away message.
I turned my monitor on and saw I had two messages received by my "Slowly getting lost in my Stat book, get at me". One was from a guy in my Human Resource class that wanted to know when our term paper was due and the other was from Barbara.
OraBG99: Tim I need to talk to you!
Okay. I sent a reply.
JediTimmy: what's up?
OraBG99: Secure?
JediTimmy: definitely, why the c & d?
OraBG99: I just wanted to let you know that Mattie's sick.
JediTimmy: k, but y?
OraBG99: Sick as in she's been taken to Leslie sick.
JediTimmy: she ok?
OraBG99: Alfred just called me, said they had x-rays done at Leslie's and that they were going to see
a respiratory therapist at Mercy.
"Shit," I muttered before replying.
JediTimmy: what's wrong with her?
OraBG99: Alfred said that it's probably asthma.
JediTimmy: at that age, how did she get it?
OraBG99: Sometimes it just happens, and plus her living in that big house, not even Alfred can get all of the dust.
OraBG99: When's your last class?
I thought quickly, it was a Friday so..
JediTimmy: 2:20
OraBG99: I'll update you then okay?
JediTimmy: sure thing
She signed off abruptly and I tried to get back to my books. Asthma was serious in any individual but in a toddler? That was a frightening. Although if they catch it early and can start treating her, then it wouldn't be that bad. Right?
I closed my statistics book and set it on the floor. After cracking my knuckles, I went at the computer, searching for articles relevant to toddler asthma. I actually found quite a bit, scanned it for an hour or so and then compiled a document that had most of the important things in it: symptoms, treatments, factors affecting a child with asthma and whatnot.
I emailed them to Bruce and Barbara with a small note attached: Here's what I could find, you need anything let me know, Tim.
It was the least I could do. After all, whenever the Batclan was in trouble, Robin had to be there to swing in at the last minute and save the day. Or at least pose as the decoy.
With thirty minutes before class, I finished my assignments, showered, shaved, dressed and even had breakfast bagel in the dining hall. While everyone else made their way to their classes, their minds were filled with anxiousness for the weekend to start. Their smiles were true and care free. I played the part, laughing it up and joking along with the rest of the gang.
As I walked quickly to my first class, Paul Henley jogged to catch up with me, "Man, you got anxiety problems about being late to class or what?"
"Nah, just to get the day over with," I replied.
He laughed and slapped my back, "Hot date, Drake?"
"Something like that," I mumbled as I made my way to the stairway.
"Well, that is something to get excited over, isn't it?" he joked before turning off for his own destination.
My anxiety wasn't for the clubs or having a good time.
Mine was for my Family.
V