"Seriously?" Was the only question that came to Alias's mind when she burst into her room. She didn't want to believe Breaker, but this made her reluctant about him telling the truth or not. But no, Breaker wasn't joking; he was sitting there in the most docile manner possible in the centre of her room, although the sheet of sweat on his forehead perceived otherwise, with the Arkham Knight aiming a pistol at his temple. "Knight, put the gun down."
"Not until you tell me the truth."
"What...what are you talking about? I have nothing to hide."
"It's funny you say that because you have plenty. I've been watching you closely, Alias, and you're not what you say. In fact, you should be dead." She blinked.
"What? I-I don't understand..."
"I've got guys finding out who you are, everything about you...you really don't know who you are, do you?"
"What are you―" Alias's sentence was cut short as a pair of hands clamped something around her throat from behind, and the Knight raised his head as she crumpled onto the floor and clawed at the carpet as the agony rushed through her muscles and restricted her response to screaming away the pain. She rolled onto her back as her face twisted and warped, tears pouring down her cheeks and her face flushing red.
"These were located on-site where Syndicate tried to ambush us, neat little collar. From the looks of it, they used the collar to keep you sedated and was strong enough to limit your powers." The Knight moved away from Breaker, who let out a quiet, shaky exhale of relief, to squat in front of Alias and see her slowly fall into a trance, her usually glassy eyes dulling away and her struggling lessening. He placed a gloved hand around her throat and she shuddered. "Enough to make you mortal. Didn't know that, did you?"
"...s-sir," Breaker cut in, although he felt his opinion was going to get him killed but realised Rex wanted to step in. "You're gonna kill her."
Alias reached for the Knight with tired eyes, her fingers curling around his forearm as strength spilled out of her, the unusual collar providing more use than it was worth. He didn't think it was going to work at all. "You're right." The Knight grabbed the collar and ripped it from her neck and hesitated at the bruising it left behind, but Alias was too busy recovering to notice. She gritted her teeth while the burning sensation bubbled and fizzed but gradually numbed away. She rolled again, onto her chest.
"I...never knew...I was dead," she finally answered him, her voice as strained as her attempt to push herself off the floor and held up a weak hand in rejection when Rex wanted to help her up. "I only know...what they wanted me to know..."
"Your cause of death was hypothermia and the location was London. You're a long way away from home and you didn't even know."
Alias had gotten off the floor and straightened up, losing her balance just when she found it and fell into a pair of muscular arms. Using them as support she steadied herself, her legs still shaking under her weight. "You say it...as if I wanted this to happen."
He packed away his firearm, "I never said you did."
"But, just now...you lost your faith in me. You thought I...surrounded myself in lies...to hide myself away. So tell me..." She pushed herself off the blonde man and staggered towards the Arkham Knight, falling against his chest as her knees buckled under her. "Are you...just as broken as me?" The Knight only looked at her, unable to fathom a suitable reply as she collapsed onto him, the strenuous amounts of pain she was forced to endure enough to suspend her. He didn't mean to put her through that, he wanted to prove something; before he let her fall he swept her off her feet seamlessly, putting her in the bridal carry with her head resting on his shoulder.
"Sir..."
Any excuse will do. "...Breaker, I need you and Rex at HQ in 20. Start going through combat exercises with the combat specialists until they know it yesterday."
"But what about Alias? Is she gonna be okay?" He let his digital gaze rest on her face, so calm and content in contrast to her rosy face and purple neck. And the face that was hidden underneath furrowed its brows. He didn't realise how different she was until now. Even when he made her go through all of that, he was expecting a punch or two or possibly even a bullet somewhere fleshy. But she didn't get mad, not even slightly upset. So why? Why didn't she scream out, try and rip out his throat? Why didn't she disarm him and just shoot his visor? Why didn't she, simply, kick his ass?
Because Alias was different.
"She'll be fine. Just get to HQ stat." Breaker, who was still shaken up about being held hostage against his own will by his superior ally, found it challenging to get up from his chair but with the help of Rex they blinked out of sight, and the lone henchmen in red and grey briefly nodded before leaving Alias's room.
For someone he intentionally wanted to put in her place, his mind was confused at the mixed emotions that sparked every nerve in his body, and it annoyed him; like he was being complimented and insulted at the same time. Before, when he would even be in the same room as Alias, all he wanted to do was floor her after she beat him in hand-to-hand combat in front of the now combat specialists. Now, however, after spilling every feeling she knew to him, he saw a woman lost between revenge and solitude, lost in the wind and following its direction. A woman who didn't know the difference between living and living in death.
Alias was just as ambiguous as himself, which was why...which was why he didn't want to leave her. Wait. Wait, wait. Did he...did his mind just do that? The thing? The thing where, even though he hated her with a burning passion, he loved her just the same? Loved her? He...he loved her. He'd fight himself not to admit that but here he was, looking after her when he was the one who pushed her. Damn, she wasn't persistent or desperate for love, she was searching for it somewhere inside the shell of a broken man. She somehow found it in him, and he had greedy intentions to steal it off her so he could understand what it felt like, what it felt like to love.
To be loved.
He sighed, side-glanced at her king-size bed and sauntered over to it, gently placing her down on the mattress and attending to her heels that kept its lustre finish. Putting the heels against her bedside, he decided to sit on the bed for easier removal of her cardigan, and slipped off one sleeve before having to raise her upper body off her bed to successfully strip it off. Something sparked and the Knight brought up his hand, "Rex, is her suit ready?"
Rex had simply appeared with a faint pop with what the Knight asked for, accustomed to Alias's tastes, that displayed the side she was on; same camo print and the Arkham symbol was brandished on the entire back. Once he was handed the suit and Rex winked before vanishing, it took the Arkham Knight a good five minutes to replace the dress with the suit but took him a couple seconds to recall what he saw.
A distant memory adorned on her left hip in the form of a scar, the shape of an S with four numbers beside it: 0001. He was just pissed off because he didn't notice it until now and because he didn't take out Syndicate himself. Even so, they were back on-grid haunting Alias with poltergeists brave enough to try and not just take her out but him too. Batman's first, Syndicate can wait for the apocalypse for all he cared.
He didn't take into account how much time he was wasting and it encouraged faster movement, going through her bedside for an untouched IV catheter and carefully introducing it into the vein in her backhand, pulling out the needle subsequently. She had told him that if she were injured at any given point, even though her blacking out wasn't unexpected considering, to fill her up with cryogenic blood to help her regenerate what was lost. Maybe that's why she was so careful, she didn't have a regenerative factor: a major weakness to many but at least she doesn't make it obvious. Fastening the catheter in place with a strip of tape the Knight joined the tip of the drip to the catheter and hung it on her backboard, the blue liquid already being sucked from the pouch, through the tube and into her veins.
Alias exhaled slowly, and her glossy lips parted as she unconsciously moved her head to the side. There were some things the Arkham Knight couldn't understand, and one of them was lying in front of him. He made her cry, stretched her beyond her limit, even lied to her.
Almost killed her.
She wasn't just Alias. She was a woman who was driven onto the road of immorality, cracked and broken beyond recognition. Lost her childhood, lost her future, lost her family. She lost everything. So why would she cling onto him, the Arkham Knight, a man who was also driven onto the same road? A man who was forced to drop his beliefs of humanity and change it into vengeance?
Vengeance. That was what she meant. Under her tears, she had told him something. You weren't the only one Batman left behind. The Knight stood up, she needed him? Batman...made Alias the same way he made the Arkham Knight.
Same story, different names.
He clenched his fists, festering anger wanting to rise up his chest and beat the everloving crap out of anybody It spanned throughout his muscles and flesh, burning him raw from the inside that his fists couldn't stop shaking. Someone he...cared deeply about...Alias was just as broken as him, and Batman was going to pay with his life.
"Batman dies," he repeated his words again, letting it echo around the room, only with an edge of ferocity that added to his demonic tone. "Tonight."
