Disclaimer: Standard thing, I don't own any of it except Anna. I'm just borrowing it, and I'll return it all in due time.

The present

Anna didn't even know where to begin. She just sat there, staring at Bruce. The whirlwind of emotions she was experiencing was barely allowing her enough time to properly categorize each individual feeling. Anger, that was certainly the front-runner, hurt, betrayal, abandonment, the negative emotions were out in full force. Yet she had to admit that deep down, she was relieved that Bruce was okay, that he was alive.

"I want to know one thing," she managed to choke out, in a strained voice. "Were you kidnapped? Held against your will? Did someone keep you from contacting us?" If that had been the case, though she strongly suspected it had not, then his extended absence and subsequent reappearance would be easier to swallow. If that were true, she could shift her anger from him, to whoever was responsible.

Bruce looked her evenly in the eye, and answered, "No. I wasn't."

She felt like she had been sucker punched, a physically ill sensation. Staring at Bruce, she suddenly wanted nothing more than to hit him, to exact a physical toll for the emotional agony she had lived with for all these years.

He had left because he wanted to, and remained hidden all of his own volition. Did he not care about her at all? Or Alfred? About the suffering that they had been through, or what his disappearance had cost them emotionally?

Anna took a deep breath, trying desperately not to cry. Not here, there would be time for tears later, but this was not the time. It was too much, she felt claustrophobic, trapped. Seized by a sudden, intense desire to get out of that room, out of the house all together, and most of all away from Bruce, she jumped off the couch, brushed past Alfred, and fled. Into the hall, out the front door, and down to the stable. Her sanctuary.

Back in the family room, Bruce sighed deeply. That had gone as badly as he had feared. He didn't blame Anna for being so hurt and angry; he knew he would have reacted very similarly in that situation. At least, the person he had been before his journey would have.

The problem facing him now was what to do about it. He didn't want to tell Anna his plan. Not that he didn't trust her; even in her current angry state he knew she wouldn't knowingly betray him. But he didn't want to burden her with the responsibility of his secrets, and most of all, he didn't want to endanger her by imparting that knowledge. That was the whole reason for the secrecy, and dual-identities in the first place, so that he wouldn't bring harm to the ones he loved.

If he lied to Anna now, and didn't tell her the truth about his plans for saving Gotham, and she found out about it later, he would lose her forever. He had hope that she would forgive him for leaving the way he did, given time. But he was under no illusion that she would allow him to deceive her again, not with out an excellent reason, and she was unlikely to see his grounds for keeping her in the dark as acceptable excuses, despite the logic and good motives behind them.

Lying to her was not a good plan, but neither was telling the truth. He could feel frustration brewing within him, something he hadn't felt since before the monastery. Ducard had been explicit in his instructions about controlling emotion, and how vital it was for a successful warrior to attain that level of control. Then again, Bruce reflected bitterly, Ducard had been speaking of emotions in relation to your enemies, not little sisters.

"Does she still go down to the stable when she's upset?" Bruce inquired of Alfred.

"Yes sir," Alfred replied.

Trying to decide whether to follow Anna, or let her have her space, Bruce felt a vague sense of déjà vu. He had been faced with a similar decision on his last morning at the Manor, when Anna had begged him to allow her to attend the hearing. He felt a sudden urge to explain to Anna why he had left in the first place. It was unlikely that Rachel would have given Anna the details of the argument down by the docks, and he owed his sister that much.

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Anna was standing outside of Esperanza's stall, having spent the last half hour crying into the mare's shoulder, when she heard the main door slide open and closed, and then footsteps on the hard, wooden floor. She turned to see who it was, praying that it was anyone but Bruce, and found that her prayers had been in vain. Turning back to face the horse, listening to him walk towards her, she felt the anger that had begun to subside in the quite confines of Esperanza's stall blaze up again, hotter than ever.

"Anna," Bruce said softly when he reached her.

She whirled on him, nearly blinded with furious tears. Tired of trying to deal with this situation like a rational adult, she loosed her tongue and let him have it.

"You left, Bruce. You disappeared and left me and Alfred to pick up the pieces of our lives. Alfred had already put this family back together once, and you made him do it again. Did you even think about that Bruce? Did you? About the months that we spent worrying about you, dreading every knock on the door, the nagging fear that every time we answered the phone it would be bad news. When Rachel told us where she saw you last, we assumed that Falcone did you in. We've spent 7 years going through hell, waiting for them to find your body, waiting for some sort of closure, anything so that we could truly move on. When we signed those papers last year, declaring you legally dead, it tore my heart out. I felt like we were letting you down, giving up on you. Now, after all that struggling, all that pain, you waltz in, and we realize that we've been trying to bury someone who wasn't even dead. You didn't even have the decency to let us know you were alive."

She took a ragged breath, and continued. "It takes effort to make someone like Bruce Wayne disappear. You had to work to keep yourself hidden, and did a damn fine job of it too. All for what? Why? Why?" Her voice scaled up, until the last word came as a shout. She raised her hands and gave Bruce a hard shove.

"What was so important that you saw fit to torture us like that?" Anna shoved Bruce again, finding the physical outlet for her fury immensely satisfying. Tears streaming down her face, she was too upset to find any more words to make Bruce understand what he had done to her. Unable to articulate her feelings any longer, she beganstriking his chest with the sides of her fists, sobbing violently.

Bruce didn't try to stop her, even though a few of the blows landed hard enough to hurt. If she needed a punching bag to cool her temper, he could deal with that. She was right, he had been incredibly selfish. He had been so caught up in finding himself, defining himself that he had neglected the ones he loved. He deserved to be raged at.

Finally, Anna's sobs diminished, and the rapid pace of her fists slowed. She hung her head, and drew a long, hitching breath.

Bruce reached out and gently put his hands on her shoulders. She jerked away from him, and looked up, a fresh spark of anger clearly visible on her face.

"Don't touch me," she said hoarsely.

With a sigh, Bruce gestured to a bench along the wall. "Will you sit with me?"

Anna gave him a wary look, and he was relieved to see that the anger was gone from her eyes. He took a seat on the bench, and watched as Anna sat down on the opposite end, as far from him as she could get.

"Anna, please understand. By telling you this, I'm not trying to make any excuses for the way I left. I made a very selfish choice, and it was beyond inconsiderate of me to place a burden like that on you and Alfred. But that choice was made, and I can't change that now. What I can do, is explain to you why I made it, and hope that even if you can't forgive me for it, you will at least understand it," Bruce said quietly.

She regarded him solemnly, and then nodded. Well, at least she's willing to listen, Bruce thought. That's a start.

"That day, I went to the hearing with one thing on my mind. Justice. I was convinced that the DA's office was belittling the memory of our parents by releasing Chill, regardless of what he had to offer in return. So if the courts weren't going to carry out justice, I was." Bruce paused for a moment.

"I took a gun with me to the hearing," he saw Anna's eyes widen at that confession. "I left the courtroom before the verdict, and retrieved the gun from where I had hidden it earlier by the car. Then I went back up the steps and waited. My plan was to shoot Chill when he came out, right there in front of all those cameras and witnesses. I was going to kill him. I knew I would be caught, and I didn't care. That man had killed our parents, and it was my fault that he had the chance to do it. By killing him, I guaranteed that he was paying for his mistakes, and then I would pay for mine," Bruce said.

Anna stared at her brother in disbelief. She had been right; he had taken a gun with him. Over the years, she had wondered off and on what exactly he had intended to do with it, knowing that whatever it was, it couldn't be good. Now she knew, and even though it hadn't happened, the thought of what Bruce had planned to do that day terrified her. She hadn't known that Bruce's guilt over their parents murder had run that deep, that he would be willing to sacrifice everything just to ease that pain.

She sat there, listening to him recounting that day, and felt her anger dim slightly. Having a reason now, for his sudden departure helped. But it still didn't explain where he had been for seven years, and why he had never contacted them.

When he finally finished, she didn't say anything. Bruce watched her, wondering how she would react to what he had said. He hoped she wouldn't immediately press the issue of where he had been since he left, that what he had told her would be enough for now.

Anna toyed with a lock of her long hair as she considered everything she had just learned. It explained a lot, but it raised at least as many questions as it had answered. She knew Bruce was waiting for her reaction, so at last she cleared her throat and spoke.

"I've wondered for a long time exactly what you had planned that day. After you disappeared, I went through your bag, looking for phone numbers to friends, or anything useful. I found the bullets, and I knew that you had them for a reason, and since I didn't find a gun, I knew that whatever you intended to do with it would most likely happen that day. In the back of my mind, I was afraid that you had committed suicide, that Chill's release had hit you that hard. I guess in a way you did, you killed your life here when you left it behind," she said thoughtfully. "I never told anyone about that box, not even Alfred."

"Anna," Bruce began, but stopped when she held up her hand.

"I appreciate your explaining what happened between you and Rachel, and what you went through then. It helps. But it doesn't take away the hurt that has accumulated in all this time, and the reasons why you left don't explain why you stayed gone. Why didn't you write? Just so we could stop worrying? That first year, Alfred was at the mailbox when the mailman pulled up everyday, waiting to see if we would hear from you. Hoping that in this batch of envelopes we would find some solace, something to celebrate." Anna said.

"All we ever got was disappointment," she continued, "And we could only handle so much of that. After a while, we stopped looking, and our hope died. Life slowly regained its equilibrium, and we went on. But moving on is not the same as forgetting, and you were always there in my mind, a shadow that cast itself over the bright moments of my life. There was always that thought, no matter how wonderful things were, that Bruce should be here, that you should have been the one hugging me, giving me the keys to my first car, putting me on that plane to Paris when I left for college."

Anna looked up at Bruce, tears standing in her eyes. "Now you're back, you're alive, something I didn't think was possible. Damn it Bruce! You've blown my life to bits again, and I'm tired of having to pick up the pieces and glue them back in place. I don't know if I can do it this time." She forced her fingers through her thick hair, a pained expression on her face. "Where have you been?"

When Bruce didn't respond right away, she said, "Even if you answer that question, that doesn't make everything okay. Knowing why you left and where you spent the last few years won't change the fact that you did leave. You can't just come in here and explain it all away! How do I know that you won't do it again?" Anna broke off, her increasingly uneven voice betraying her rising emotions.

Finally, she stood up and took several deep breaths. "I need space Bruce," she said simply. "I can't sort this all out in one day. I need you to respect that."

"Okay," Bruce replied.

That seemed to satisfy her, and she headed for the door. When she reached it, she stopped and turned back to face him down the aisle. "Bruce, don't misunderstand. I am glad that you're alright." Anna called to him. Then she hurried out the door, sliding it closed behind her.

Bruce waited a few minutes to give her time to get back to the house, then left the stable and followed the path up to the back door. When he got inside, Alfred was waiting nearby.

"Is everything alright Master Bruce?" Alfred inquired.

Mentally reviewing the days events, Bruce smiled slightly. "Not yet. But I think it will be eventually," he said

To all of my reviewers: Thank you so much! Hugs for everyone! Pookie Power 2005, how did you know that Krispy Kremes were my favorite? Perhaps because there are few things in this world that can rival the wonderfulness of a hot, hot, hot Krispy Kreme donut? Ahhhh, bliss.

So what did you think of the showdown? Please let me know!