Second Chances Chapter 18: The Battle, a batman fanfic

Warning: Language . . .

Dinner was quiet. Everyone could tell there was some trouble in paradise but no one had the nerve to ask what it was. When Bruce excused himself to work in the Batcave before he left on another never-ending patrol, Elle borrowed Dick's phone and dialed a number, then she put it on speaker. Tim picked up on the third ring.

"Am I interrupting something," Elle asked apologetically.

"Nah," Tim answered sprightly enough. "The phone was just in the other room. I'm not as fast as I used to be unlike some people who can heal in a day."

Elle smiled. "Why do I feel like I should apologize for that as well?"

Tim laughed. "Don't. I was just feeling a little jealous of that particular talent. What's up? Looking for another bo-staff lesson?"

She rolled her eyes and then met the gazes across the table from her. Dick and Damian were watching her suspiciously. It only proved that they had good intuition.

"I was wondering if you could come back over to the manor tomorrow? Around 10 am would be good," she suggested.

"I, uh, yeah, I suppose I could. I might need a ride," Tim stuttered. "What's happening tomorrow?"

"Practice," Elle announced.

"But you said . . ."

"Not the bo-staff," she added quickly. "Remember the party and the entertainment?"

Dick and Damian's eyes widened in response. She could almost see Tim's face doing the same.

"Oh . . . Um, you were serious about that?" Tim asked a little weakly.

Elle blew out a breath in frustration. "Come on, it isn't that bad! You all act like I'm asking you to burn down an orphanage or mug an old lady or something."

Tim's laughter came through sounding a little tinny through the speaker phone. "Right. It's not that bad . . ."

"Speak for yourself, Drake," Damian huffed.

"So, you'll be here?" Elle continued despite Damian's outburst.

"I'll be there," came his reply with a sigh.

If Tim sounded a bit resigned, she shrugged it off. None of the boys had been enthusiastic about her plan but they had agreed in a moment of weakness and Elle was not above ruthlessness in order to get what she wanted.

"See you then, Tim. Thanks," Elle chirped as she hung up and then searched out Jason's number.

"You know, I haven't passed out the invites yet," Dick told her. "We could still call this whole thing off."

"If you all would just trust me on this," Elle said without looking up. "You'll see. Bruce wouldn't want to miss this for the world."

Damian scowled. "What would that be? Watching his sons make fools of themselves in front of the entire Justice League? Yeah, I could totally see how embarrassing him in front of his colleagues would be a worthy aspiration of a hero like the Batman."

They could hear the ringing of the phone again.

"You know, that's a good idea, Damian," Elle said as she set the phone down on the table.

Damian frowned. "What's a good idea?" He glanced at Dick who shrugged.

"We should videotape the whole thing," Elle announced.

"Wait! What? I didn't say that!" Damian shot Dick a panicked look. "I didn't say that!"

Dick leaned his elbows on the table and dropped his face into his hands. "Doesn't matter anymore, Damian. She already has it in her head."

"Argh," Damian dropped his head against the back of his chair. "This will be the worst night ever!"

"Oh, ye of little faith." Elle stuck out her tongue at the two of them even as Jason picked up. The sounds of fighting and things being smashed could be heard in the background.

"Not a good time," he yelled.

Elle looked up at Dick startled. "Oh! Um, are you okay?" she asked Jay.

"Sure. Never better," Jason said followed by sounds of gunfire. "What's up? Make it fast. I'm kind of in the middle of something here."

"I, uh, I . . ." she stammered, looking at Dick helplessly. "Oh my gosh, what do I do?" she asked him in a panicky stage-whisper. She nudged the phone a little closer to him.

Dick smirked, taking over the call. "Do you need backup?" he asked loudly so Jason could hear him over whatever was going on there.

"Nah, I'm good. Get to the point, though, will ya?"

"We wanted to know if you could show up here around 10 am tomorrow," Dick continued. Elle appeared to be in the midst of a mild freak out.

"Gah! Why so early?" Jay yelped. "Oho, you have to be quicker than that to get the best of Red Hood!" A grunt was heard followed by a heavy thud.

"Because that's when we need you," Dick said calmly.

More gunfire, more crashing, more screaming and then silence. Jason sighed. "Is it important?"

Elle's eyes were huge. She didn't speak but nodded.

"Yeah," Dick told him. "It's important. Show up on time if you still want company for your shindig."

"Damn. Right, okay, then. I'll be there but there'd better be coffee," Jason agreed crabbily. "I'm not a morning person."

Elle nodded again. Dick smirked. "There'll be coffee. Ten o'clock, Hood," he reminded him.

"Got it. Anything else?"

"Nope. Enjoy your evening." Dick smiled and leaned back in his chair. He waved a finger in the direction of the phone and Elle disconnected the call gingerly, as if she were afraid something would grab her through the phonelines. "You okay?" he asked her.

"I can't believe he picked up the call in the middle of a fight," she murmured.

Dick shrugged. "Jay was always something of a multitasker."

Elle started laughing, so what if it sounded vaguely hysterical. "Oh, my God! What am I getting myself into?"

Dick slid out of his seat and moved around the table to pull her up into his arms. She sagged against him and tucked her face into his neck.

"Is it too much?" he asked, worriedly.

It was why he had wanted to keep his identity secret from her for as long as possible despite her need to know about what they did. As much as she was fascinated with the knowledge that his family were night time vigilantes, she really wasn't of his world. It was why he had always preferred to date women within the superhero community. They handled the stress easier than a civilian might.

She sighed. "No. No, it isn't too much. It was just . . . unexpected, is all. I'm sure I'll get used to it . . . eventually." She giggled again.

Dick smiled down at her. "What now?"

"I was imagining calling you in the middle of something like that and asking you to pick up a loaf of bread and a gallon of milk on your way home," she snickered at the thought.

Dick chuckled as Damian rolled his eyes.

"You two have an entire wing to get all cozy in now," the boy said disgusted with their cuddling. He hopped down and headed down the hall. "I'm going to warm up downstairs before patrol. You coming with us tonight?"

Dick dipped his head and looked at Elle. "You mind?"

She stepped back and shrugged. "I'm good here if you want to go."

"Alfred will be here if you need anything. Milk . . . Bread, just call and I head home right away," he told her.

Elle shook her head. "Why would you do that? I promised I wouldn't call you while you're patrolling except for emergencies."

Dick sobered remembering the last emergency. She hadn't called him but 911. "I want you to call me if you need me. I don't care what the reason is."

She shook her head again, a little more vigorously. "No. Only if it is an emergency. I promised."

Dick looked torn. There was still a contract out on the both of them. He would be safe enough as Nightwing. Deadshot didn't know his identity but he would likely know Elle's whereabouts. The manor was protected but a bullet could still get to her, the windows weren't bulletproof. Maybe he could talk to Bruce . . .

"Maybe I'd better stay home," he muttered. "There are still people after us."

"You haven't been out on patrol for weeks now," Elle said. "Leslie gave you the thumbs up a couple of days ago. I know you've been getting antsy. You should go."

"I don't like leaving you alone," he complained.

"You just reminded me that Alfred is here, so I'm not alone. I can work on the lists and get the invitations ready while you're gone."

"Hm," he murmured, obviously torn. "You could work on them downstairs," he suggested. "Alfred could help."

Elle grinned at him. "Now, you're just being ridiculous." She kissed his chin. "But I love you for it. Go! Go be Nightwing and save the world!"

"Not the world," he corrected. "Just Gotham tonight. Although I'll need to make a trip to Bludhaven soon before the riffraff believe I'm gone for good and take over."

"I'll be down before you leave to wish you luck," she promised.

"You'll be down before I leave to get a glimpse of me in my costume," he said, knowingly.

Her eyes twinkled mischievously. "Hm, yes," she murmured teasingly. "There is that."

"You're such a pervert," he laughed at her.

"Just for you, my love," she smiled at him happily, her earlier temper long forgotten. "Only for you."

He caught her face and rewarded her loyalty with a kiss. Elle's hands around his waist slipped lower.

"Hey! Are you coming down or not . . . Oh, ugh! Gross!" Damian made gagging noises. "Jeez, get a room, you two."

Elle jerked her hands back around but they both started laughing. Damian turned on his heel and left as quickly as he had arrived.

"I'm coming, Dami. Keep your tights on," Dick called over his shoulder. He winked at Elle. "Give him another couple of years. It won't seem so gross to him then."

Elle's eyes widened as she realized something. "Oh, my gosh! Can you imagine, Damian in the throes of teenage angst?"

Dick shuddered dramatically. "Considering how he is already . . . That is a scary thought."

He gave her a quick peck on her forehead and followed his little brother to the Batcave.

After Dick and the others had left, Elle wandered up to their rooms and entered the office. Her phone was buzzing as she entered. Frowning, she slapped her back pocket but, of course, it wasn't there as she could see it on the desk. She ran over to pick it up.

"Hello?"

"I've been trying to reach you for an hour, damn it!"

"Nice to talk to you, too, Aiden," she sighed as she sat down. "I forgot my phone. My apologies."

Her brother grunted. "It's done. And you owe me a million on top of the companies."

She blinked. It had only been a few days. "It's over? You're sure?"

"I just transferred the money to an offshore account a couple of hours ago. From what I can tell, he's the only one after you," Aiden told her. "Now, when do you uphold your end of the bargain."

"I have the paperwork all ready for the transfer. You can wait until next week or you can come to Gotham and pick it up earlier." Elle unlocked the bottom drawer and pulled the bundle of legal documents out. "I've already worked it out with the board; they won't give you any trouble. The documents only need your notarized signature."

"What about the building?" Aiden asked, referring to Hamilton Industries headquarters.

"It's yours," Elle told him. "You will be pleased to know that I will be changing the name of my four companies to reflect my ownership and moving my company base closer to my home. I'll leave the name, Hamilton Industries, to you."

Her brother whistled. "How did all of this go over with the board?"

"They dealt with it. I can be pretty convincing when my heart is set on something," she admitted.

"Huh, so I heard. Do I want to know how you finagled this? Dad was pretty clear in his will," Aiden murmured.

"Poppa's probably rolling over in his grave, I'm sure, but I never agreed with his actions and he knew exactly how I felt about the matter," she muttered.

It had taken a great deal of doing, both on the phone and in person, while under the guise of meeting with psychiatrists. She felt a twinge of guilt about keeping Dick in the dark about it. He knew how she felt on the matter, though, and she didn't think he would care one way or the other about what she did with her inheritance. But Elle considered it a Hamilton family matter and dealt with it as such. She had always kept Hamilton family business quiet and locked away from prying eyes before. It would be difficult to break those habits now. But soon it wouldn't matter since she would no longer be a 'Hamilton' officially.

Her father and mother were gone. There was nothing holding her to Chicago except for the business. If Aiden was satisfied, he would leave her alone. She would keep half of the business, move it closer, and make a new family, this one without ugly jealousies and hated sibling rivalries. Hopefully, Dick would understand.

She continued, "I might have to go to Chicago for another meeting or two before the split is completed, after that we are done. If we happen to meet at a public function, we will deal with one another with civil formality and go on. No ugliness for the press. I'm sure they will write whatever they wish anyway but without our input. Agreed?"

"Hopefully, we won't meet in public," Aiden groused. "But that will be agreeable."

"I'll do my upmost to stay out of Chicago and out of your way," Elle told him.

"What about the house? Are you selling it?"

Elle was silent for a long time. "I . . . don't know yet."

Aiden grunted. His way of saying goodbye, she supposed. "Be in contact with you when I get to Gotham. Answer your damned phone this time," he said and hung up.

"Hate you, too, brother dear," Elle muttered into the ether as she ended the call and tossed the phone amidst the scattered papers of her guest lists.

It was almost over with. She leaned back in the chair and ran her hands through her hair. Almost done! She reveled in the almost-freedom from the quiet horrors of her early home life and welcomed the promise of the future that beckoned her. No more hiding in the shadows.

This called for a celebration. Elle pulled up a list of restaurants in the Gotham area that served surf and turf. She made a face as she made reservations for two for tomorrow night. Dick would have his surf, and she would hunch her shoulders and force herself to enjoy her turf this time but, next time, he was going to eat his seafood without her.

Personally, Elle would have been happier to eat a charcoal dinner for him than this. Ugh! What one had to do for love . . . But maybe Dick wouldn't be so ticked at her for going to Aiden to stop the assassination attempts if . . .

"Oh, who am I kidding? Dick's going to kill me for this."

The silence that followed was broken by the sound of a cricket chirping and spurred Elle to rush into the other room and bring out Mook. The tarantula enjoyed hunting for his prey. Elle could stand guard so that the spider wouldn't get away from her. Last thing she needed was for Mook to get lost in the enormity of the manor. She watched as he tracked down the errant insect but at least there would be one less of the annoying insects to drive people crazy. Everyone would be a little happier for that.

Well, everyone except the cricket, she supposed.

"How're you feeling?" Bruce caught up with Dick before he made off toward his room in the other wing. "First night back out as Nightwing?"

"I should be asking you that. Maybe tonight you can catch up on some much needed sleep." Dick said.

Bruce scrubbed a hand over his face. "Looking forward to it," he admitted, exhausted. "But you never answered my question. How are you feeling?"

Dick smiled. "Never better. It felt good to be back but also a little odd."

"Odd? How's that?"

Dick paused on the landing. "Running rooftops in Gotham. With the exception of that night four months ago, it's been a while."

Bruce nodded. "It was nice having you back, though. I missed working with you. The night went rather smoothly despite you having been absent so long. Might never have known you ever left."

Dick laughed. "The magic is still there, isn't it? But you've got a new Robin now. Another one . . . Although, I have to say, Damian's doing pretty well, all considering. Still a bit of a hothead."

"He'll learn. We butt heads a lot. Alfred claims it is because we're too much alike," Bruce rubbed the back of his neck. "While you're here, it would do him good to learn from you for a change. You've always been better with him than I have."

"Sure, I can do that," Dick nodded. "Maybe I can learn something new from him as well."

"He seems inordinately fond of you for all he claims to hate the smiles, the teasing, and the affection that you always bring with you," Bruce smirked.

"He's become inordinately fond of Elle, you mean," Dick shrugged easily. "For all that Talia and the League of Assassins trained him, he's still just a child, Bruce. Despite what he claims, Damian craves what he's been missing all these years. Elle's proven that. She gives him that acceptance he wants and the affection he needs no matter that he pretends to sneer at it. He could just as easily avoid her if it truly bothered him."

Bruce hummed at Dick's theory. "But instead, he searches her out and stands still for it when she insists on hugging him. Although, I'm sure you are right, somehow, I don't think he would accept that sort of thing from the rest of us."

"He will," Dick assured him. "He brushes me off but it is only after I've gotten in at least one good squeeze," he said, laughing. "Damian knows Elle is emotional and, as such, he knows that she will lavish him with love. Although, he pretends to tolerate it, he still soaks it all up like a sponge and keeps coming back for more."

"Yes, but I wonder if it is too late for me to start giving him a bit of that now," Bruce frowned as he looked off in the distance. "Would he think that shows of affection a sign of weakness coming from me?"

Dick slapped him on the shoulder. "You've never been very affectionate, and even when you tried, it came off as awkward. I could always tell you were uncomfortable doing that sort of thing."

"That isn't exactly a ringing endorsement for a father, is it?"

"I've always known it," Dick smiled, "even if you couldn't say it."

"I don't suppose it's too late to work on that," he murmured.

"Well, don't hurt yourself," Dick teased. "If you wanted to throw the word my way, I certainly wouldn't have a problem with it. But maybe you should start small. You know, a head rub or a pat on the back. I always been fond of those shoulder squeezes."

Bruce looked at his eldest. For all that Dick had been with him the longest, he had gotten more than his fair share of Bruce's temper and indifference at times. He clasped his son on the back of his neck.

"I'll work on it," he teased and then yawned. "But now I'm for bed."

"It's late. Elle's probably awake and waiting on me," Dick told him.

"Does she do that every time you go out?"

"Most of the time," he grinned. "But I find I don't mind it as much as I thought I might. She's not a morning person, thank God!"

Bruce watched Dick climb the steps towards his and Elle's wing. When he was almost to the top, he called out to him. Dick glanced back over his shoulder.

"Love you, son."

Dick's eyes widened as he froze. Then, suddenly, he grinned.

"Love you, too . . . Dad," he said. Dick waved good night and disappeared down the hallway opposite.

Bruce yawned again as he walked into his room. The household was asleep and Gotham as safe as he was able to make her for the night. Good thing since he was exhausted. Too many long nights and too many meetings during the day.

Tonight's challenge had been a gang rivalry that had extended more than two blocks down by the waterfront. It had taken three of them, plus GCPD's finest, two hours to break it up. He had been grateful for Nightwing's assistance. They had all been dragging by the time they reached the Batcave but he noticed that Dick's steps grew lighter as they entered the manor rather than flagging as had his and Damian's. But then Dick wasn't heading to an empty bed.

Bruce might have been a touch jealous if he weren't so damned tired. An empty bed looked fantastic to him at the moment. He had given orders to Alfred, letting the butler know that he was sleeping in in the morning. He turned out the light and pulled the fresh sheets up to his neck, settling in to sleep when he heard it.

Chirp . . .

His eyes popped open.

Chirp . . .

He sat up and turned on the light.

Silence. He waited a couple of minutes but the sound didn't return. Sighing, he turned the light back off and slid back into bed with a huff this time. His eyes closed and was almost asleep when he noticed it again.

Chirp . . .

Bruce leaned over and flipped on the light again. The cricket's chirp stopped in response. Bruce waited with his hand on the lamp. When the insect didn't continue, he turned the light off once more.

The chirping began before his head hit the pillow. Growling, Bruce sat up and flicked on the light a third time. The chirping stopped. Bruce frowned as he listened.

Perhaps it was the light that made the difference. He preferred darkness but Bruce was so tired that he knew a little light wouldn't prevent him from falling asleep. He rolled over and tugged the covers up again. Quiet reigned supreme and he sighed, content at last.

Chirp . . .

With a snarl, Bruce leaned up and threw his pillow across the room. The chirping ceased for an entire sixty seconds. Frustration mixed with exhaustion put Bruce's emotions over the top as he climbed out of bed. There was only one way to fix this . . . He stood in the middle of the room and listened to the sounds of chirping, turning his head this way and that to get a bead on the infuriating insect.

There! It was coming from behind the drapes.

Bruce crossed the room and jerked the drapes aside and blinked. No cricket. The chirping continued, however, and he snapped his head to the side. The cricket was on the move. He shoved the small upholstered chair out of his way and thought he caught a glimpse of the beast moving behind his dresser.

"Oho, you are not escaping me that easily," he snarled as he lunged after him.

Bruce grunted with the effort to move the heavy dresser away from the wall. The small chest on the top of the dresser slid off and crashed to the floor, spilling out numerous tie tacks and expensive cufflinks and assorted watches.

"Damn it!" Bruce moved to pick up the spilled jewelry when the cricket chirped as if taunting him. "Come back here, you little bastard!"

Bruce stepped over the chest. He could tend to it once he had caught the cricket. He bent to scoop the insect up when it hopped at the last second, nearly overbalancing him in the process. The cricket disappeared beneath the bed.

Lying down on the floor, Bruce lifted the bed skirt and peered into the darkness. The cricket was just ahead, its back to the hunter. Bruce thrust out an arm and the cricket hopped just out of reach. But he was close to the side of the bed. Bruce crawled around, using the bed skirt to hide his movements and then he repeated the move. This time, the cricket didn't hop.

It didn't hop because it didn't have to. It sat just beyond the reach of Bruce's fingers. It didn't even flinch, as if it knew in its little, buggy brain that the man after it couldn't reach it where it rested. Bruce looked over and saw his bedroom slippers nearby. He quietly reached for one of them and taking aim, attempted to throw it at the insect. The shoe wasn't aerodynamic and wasn't made for throwing in such tight quarters, but it landed where Bruce wanted it to . . . Only to have the cricket hop towards the head of the bed milliseconds before the slipper would have squished it.

"Why, you . . ." Bruce groused and shoved himself to his feet. "You're not getting away this time."

He pulled the bedside table out from the wall to make room. The lamp toppled but Batman's lightning-fast reflexes caught it inches away from the floor. He set it down and moved back to the bed. The insect, obviously feeling safe, had started chirping again but Bruce would take care of that. He grabbed the edge of the box springs and lifted, shoving it and the mattress off of the bed's frame. Pillows went tumbling off the other side, and the blankets and linens were in a tangled mess.

The cricket was barely a foot from his left big toe. Bruce dived for it and it jumped out from the center of his hands and between his legs. He spun around as it moved off into the room and darted after it, only to have his foot catch on the lamp cord still stuck into the wall. Bruce crashed to the floor, the electrical cord yanked out of the wall and the lamp jerked off its base. The smaller crash was punctuated by the sweet, tinkling sounds of a lightbulb shattering on the Aubusson carpet.

The cricket was inches from Bruce's face. He went to slap at it but with its usual efficiency, Jiminy hopped an impressive height over Bruce's head. He felt it on his pajama top. The beastie had landed on him! Bruce yelled and rolled over but the insect continued to elude him. It headed back into the other direction, using the mattresses and bedlinen to cover its tracks.

Scrambling up, Bruce leapt for it again, yelping loudly when his toe slammed into the dresser. Annoyed, Bruce shoved the piece of furniture out of his way, ignoring it when a couple of drawers fell out, dumping its contents on the floor next to the pile of watches. He could pick all this stuff up and put it away before Alfred came in to wake him.

Right now, the most important thing was getting that cricket!

Climbing over the mattress and the mound of blankets, Bruce stumbled and slammed into the wall but his eyes found the little bugger as he crawled into the relative safety of the closet.

"Oh no! You made this personal," Bruce was warning him when his bedroom door eased open a bit.

The door caught on the back edge of the dresser with a thud as Damian stuck his head through the opening. The boy's room sat on the other side of the hall from Dick's and was just on the other side of Jason's. Despite the distance, the sounds of battle emanating from his father's bedroom had woken him.

"Father?" Damian asked. His eyes surveyed the disaster with growing concern. "I heard noises."

"Fine, fine, Damian. Everything is fine," Bruce answered gruffly. The cricket was going to get away. "Go back to bed. I have this covered."

Damian tried to step further into the room but couldn't quite squeeze past the dresser. Bruce barged into his closet like a man on a mission. The boy tilted his head to see what was in there that had the most stoic person he knew acting so erratically. Suddenly, a pair of slacks flew out of the closet and past his head.

"Uh, Father?" A pair of shoes thumped against the dresser and bounced off of the mattress. "Do you need any help?"

Bruce stuck his head out of the door from where he was kneeling on the floor. What the hell . . .? The man's hair was mussed and there was a wild look to his eyes. Damian bit his lip fretfully.

"It's him or me, Damian! He will learn that I am the master of this house," Bruce snapped and dove back out of sight.

"I'll be right back. Call me if you need help," Damian squirmed out of the tight spot until he was back out in the hall.

Damian considered briefly rousing Grayson but his eldest brother had moved all the way to the other side of the house and Damian wasn't especially excited to interrupt anymore of their nighttime calisthenics, or whatever the couple wanted to call it, not even for this. Although, another loud bang against the wall made him want to reconsider.

Alfred, Damian thought suddenly. Pennyworth would know what to do! He ran down the stairs toward the old man's quarters.

"Good heavens, Damian," Alfred muttered as the boy dragged him towards the master suite. "Is there blood? I'm certain that if blood is not involved that this could have waited until morning."

He pushed his hair into some semblance of neatness. The youngest sir had not given him time to do more than find his slippers and grab his robe before he hustled the older man out of his room and up the stairs.

"I've never seen father like this before, Pennyworth," Damian told him for the fifth time. "I might have expected something like this if it were Joker or Scarecrow but we were only dealing with the riffraff last night."

A loud thump caught Alfred off guard. It did indeed appear to be coming from Master Bruce's room. He tied the sash of his robe snugly and followed the boy more quickly.

"Of course, there were likely an assortment of drugs during the rumble," Damian theorized, "but Father's suit should have prevented him from being inadvertently stabbed with one of those lowlife's hypodermic needle . . . Unless, that is, the cretin managed to wound him by stabbing in one of the seams but the likelihood of that event taking place during the battle last night are slim to none. But Father made no mention of such an injury . . ."

"I'm certain, Damian, that we will find a completely rational explanation once we have the opportunity to talk with your father. He is an extremely logical man . . ." A crash resounded, cutting him off. "Er, in most situations, at least."

Alfred tried to open the door only to have it bump against the dresser as it had for Damian earlier. The older man braced himself against the door frame and gave a mighty shove. The dresser inched over a little farther, enabling Alfred to slip into the room, Damian moving in right behind him.

"Oh, my! You did not exaggerate the amount of destruction to the room, did you?"

Alfred cleared the large piece of furniture but was forced to step through the bed frame in order to reach the closet door. He still fumbled trying to clear the mattress and box springs that lay between him and his goal. Damian took a different route by hopping over the drawers and their spilled contents before he dropped to his knees and crawled beneath mattress where it was propped up at an angle on one corner by the edge of the bed and dresser. The two made it to the open door of the closet at the same time.

Damian edged in first as he didn't want the butler blocking his view, and Alfred stepped in right behind him.

"My word, sir! Have you gone mad? What is it that you are trying to do in here?"

The closet looked as though a bomb had gone off. Clothes were off the racks and strewn throughout the small room. More than half of the shoes were scattered amidst the carnage. Only a few items were left still hanging. Drawers had been pulled out completely from the built-in dresser, leaving a gaping black hole beneath the furniture. Master Bruce, himself, was kneeling in the middle of it all, digging with one hand while the other held a black leather loafer upraised like a weapon.

"Sh!" Bruce looked up at him, quite frazzled. Dark circles lay beneath his eyes, attesting that he had been at this all bloody night. "Can you hear it?"

The two sane inhabitants froze and listened. Silence answered them.

"I'm afraid I hear nothing . . ."

"Quiet," Bruce growled, "and listen!" He raised the shoe in a threatening manner but his attention was not on them. Instead his eyes searched the room for some unseen intruder.

After several long, unnerving moments, they heard it as well.

Chirp . . .

"Alfred! It mocks me," Bruce wailed.

It took quite a bit of effort until Alfred could close his mouth but, then, he placed his palms on his hips.

"All of this in search of a cricket? Really, Master Bruce . . ."

Bruce dropped the shoe and ran his hands through his hair, making the ends stick out in every direction. "I can't sleep with that incessant noise! It won't stop!"

Unimpressed, Alfred raised an eyebrow. "And you chose to destroy your belongings rather than remove yourself to another bedchamber? You have seventy-eight from which to choose at last count. Surely, out of all of those, you might have discovered at least one that remained cricketless."

Bruce blinked at him and slowly sank back onto his heels. "I could have done that, yes," he admitted slowly but then his jaw firmed, "but then it would have won!"

Alfred looked around the room at the chore that lay before him come the morning and sighed. "Hm . . . Well, indeed, we couldn't have that now, could we?" He looked down at Damian's gaping expression and gave him a nudge. "Come along, lad. There are still more hours in which to sleep before we must get up."

Alfred gazed at the utter catastrophe of the bedroom and shook his head. He called back over his shoulder as he and young Damian made their way back through the clutter, "I will call in for you tomorrow and tell them you will be taking the day off."

"Good. After I catch this cricket, I'll want to sleep in," Master Bruce answered.

"Actually, you will be spending some time with me in here, straightening up this mess," Alfred told him in a no-nonsense tone.

"What was that?"

"You heard me, young man. You make the mess, you can clean it. I'll be back in four hours to assist," Alfred declared. "In the meantime, I strongly suggest you leave the cricket to its business and move into Jason's room for what is left of the night."

As the two exited into the hallway, Damian looked back over his shoulder, worriedly.

"So . . . Father's not drugged?" he asked.

"I'm afraid not, young sir," Alfred sighed. "Merely sleep deprived. You should get yours before you begin acting in a similar manner."

He watched Damian scamper quickly into his room before heading back to his own bed. He would need the rest before the sun roused him to his duties. He would need to rethink the manor's cricket problem again. This could certainly not continue.

REACTIONS? Please . . .

I thought long and hard about who would win this battle, Batman or the Cricket, but a couple of opinions swayed me to the cricket's side. Sleep deprivation can make you act in strange ways, trust me . . . And having had a cricket in the house before, I can tell you from experience that there is little that is more frustrating and antagonistic that those tiny varmints, particularly when you want to sleep. I figured "Why should Bruce be any different?"