Authors note: Very sorry about the long wait, it was a rough semester but on the plus side it was my last semester so I hope to post much more regularly from now . Thank you to all those who are still reading as well as reviewing. As always I don't own anything from the Dark Knight, and I make no finical gain from this.

"Breath deep Lena girl, slow and steady. Nothing else in the world matters it's just you and your target." Lena listened to her father's quiet yet resonating voice as he instructed her on the finer points of shooting. She remembered those weekend trips with her father so vividly that Lena could still smell the earthy crispness of the bed of pine needles she'd lay prone on for hours at a time in the forests northwest of the city. Almost every weekend of her childhood Lena and her father would escape Gotham and head north to the seclusion of the woods.

The rumbling of her stomach pulled Lena back to her current predicament. She had returned to the apartment several hours ago after Bane had come and collected her from the gym. When Lena had entered the penthouse she'd paused for a moment to see what her captor would do next. Bane had taken up his usual position on the sofa and Lena had made a beeline for her bedroom.

"Oh great I've been here a week and I'm already thinking of it as my room. I have got to get out of here."

Lena berated herself as she shuffled around the space. Her stomach gave another grumbling protest and Lena looked down at it reproachfully. She had no desire to confront the terrorist at the moment but she also needed food. Lena stepped quietly to the door inwardly assuring herself that there was no way Bane would still be sitting in the living room after all this time. None the less she moved as quietly as she could manage out the door and down the hall. Lena stealthily poked her head around the corner for a quick look into the living room. Bane sat in the same position as imposing and immoveable as a mountain.

"Shit, Crap, Shit."

Lena thought frantically before she got control of herself.

"Jeez get a hold of yourself. Stop acting like a scared like kid and go out there."

After her mental pep talk Lena took a deep breath and strode confidently into the living room, past Bane and in to the kitchen, without a glance in his direction. She was busily scrounging for food in the kitchen feeling self-satisfied by her bravery when she heard that bone chilling mechanical hiss from close behind her. The hair on the back of Lena's neck stood straight up as she froze in surprise. She regained her composure and retracted her head from the fridge.

"Very cute, but you're little sidekick already pulled that one on me earlier."

Lena stated with false confidence as she turned around to face her captor. Any other snarky remarks she was about to make died in her throat. Bane was leaning against the opposing counter with just two feet of open space between them.

"I don't think Barsad would like being referred to as my little sidekick."

Bane said in a low almost playful tone. The air was thick between the pair as they stared each other down once again. Lena couldn't understand what her captor was playing at. She had watched the destruction of the stadium and all the violence that had occurred since the bridges went down. She was fully capable of comprehending the radical viciousness of Bane and his men. What she could not reconcile in her mind was this terrorist seeming to find more enjoyment in unnerving her than causing her any serious physical harm. Before she'd even taken her first shot at Bane, Lena had accepted the fact that her actions against him would more than likely end in disaster, that the best case scenario she could have hoped for was a quick death. But ever since her kidnapping, Lena was starting to get the distinct impression that Bane was the type of predator that liked to play with his food before he ate it and if that was the case her ass needed to fly this coup as soon as possible.

Bane's commanding voice snapped Lena back to reality. "Follow me," was all he said as he moved easily from the kitchen toward the couch.

She skulked reluctantly after him into the living room. Lena started toward the solitary arm chair but was blocked by Bane's hulking form as he silently gestured for her to sit on the large sofa. She had absolutely no desire to be in the same room as this man let alone share a piece of furniture with him but seeing that she didn't have any other options Lena sat down tensely determined not to allow Bane to get the better of her. She watched as her captor took a seat next to her much closer than was necessary on such and ample sofa.

"Tell me little one how long have you lived in the city?"

Bane questioned in a casual tone. As he asked this Bane turned his torso toward her and leaned in slightly, further invading Lena's space. Her heart jumped at his actions adding more tension to Lena's already frayed nerves. She almost panicked, almost lost control ready to blurt out an answer but something clicked at that moment in Lena's thoughts. Bane was taking her personal space making it impossible for her to get comfortable and he was asking a benign question about her life.

"His interrogating you, you idiot and you were about to play right into it."

Lena took a deep breath collecting herself before she replied.

"Oh I don't know for awhile now I suppose," s

he said evasively. Lena saw a flicker of something in Bane's eyes at her comment and she thought ruefully to herself,

"That's right buddy this game of 'who can pump the most information out of the other' isn't going to be as easy as you thought, and it sure as hell won't be one sided."

"It had all started off so well",

Bane contemplated as he looked into his little captive's hard brown eyes. He could feel her anxiety as they sat down together. Leaning toward her had all but pushed her over the edge. He had started with a simple question about her life in Gotham and that simplicity mixed with her tension would compel her to answer finding comfort in the normalcy of conversation. Bane could see the whole discussion laid out in front of him with her answering any little question he posed to her. He figured once he unraveled what little mystery she had he could finally be rid of the electric pull she seemed to exert over him.

But those soft brown eyes that had been fulled with so much befuddlement only moments ago had turned so quickly against him. He felt an odd mixture of frustration and pleasure in that moment, something Bane was beginning to associate with his little bird. Bane maintained eye with her and took deep slow breaths his mask admitting methodical puffs of air aiming to lull her senses somewhat . It appeared to be working because he could see her chest began to keep pace with his own until Bane saw the corner of her lips twitch upward for the briefest second.

He chuckled inwardly as he realized she'd been outmaneuvering him this whole time using her own quiescence to make him think he'd won. Bane could see that he wouldn't get any useful information from her today. It would take more time than he'd anticipated to break her but he would accomplish the task. Bane decided one last counterstrike was necessary to let her know that she did not have the upper hand in their game.

He reached up and gentle grasped a lock of his captive's hair that had come lose from her ponytail. Bane slowly tucked the protruding strand behind Lena's ear. As he did this he let the tips of his well callused fingers run across the smooth skin of her face and the soft shell of her ear. The hitch of Lena's breath and the tremor Bane could feel under is finger tips caused him to smile behind the mask.

"Tell me your secrets little one." He said in a low tone. She hesitated for a moment before breathlessly replying " You tell me yours and I'll tell you mine." Bane's eyes danced with amusement as he dropped his hand and slowly got to his feet. "Another time perhaps my little bird."

Lena watched as Bane walked from the room down the hall and through the double doors. She got shakily to her feet and managed to make it to her room before she started to hyperventilate.

"What the fuck, what the fuck, what the fuck was that?!"

She screamed over and over in her head as she paced around the room. Lena felt flushed so she stormed into the bathroom and repeatedly splashed water on her face. Lena ran her hands through her hair as she stared at the reflection in the mirror. She saw a scared girl with two deep splotches of red on her checks. Lena was in over her head, she knew it, Bane knew it, hell even his sidekick sniper knew it. She felt a rush of emotions threaten to over take her as she continued to stare at herself.

"Push it away girl, push it way down deep where no one will find it, not even you."

Lena heard the voice of her father cutting through the chaos in her mind. She saw him staring back at her through the mirror her features so much like his, most of all their eyes. Lena swallowed the bile that had been rising in her throat and she shoved all those tumultuous and useless emotions she was feeling deep down where they'd never see the light of day.

"Yes denial is definitely the best course of action right now,"

Lena thought mustering a small determined grimace. She turned away from the sink her mind finally clearing enough for her to remember her escape plan. She opened the small closet in the bathroom and found it stocked with several sets of linen sheets. She grabbed one set and headed back into the bedroom. Lena produced a small knife from the waist band of her shorts that she'd managed to snag from the kitchen.

She began to cut the sheets into one inch wide strips which wasn't an easy process considering the sheets were made for a California King sized bed. Before she'd realized it the room had dimmed to twilight. Lena was about halfway done with the first sheet and had a thick stack of long lien ribbons next to her on the bed. Her eyes were feeling heavy and she decided it'd be better to quit for the night than risk stabbing herself in the low light. Lena folded up what remained of the sheet and grabbed the shredded linen at the top.

Using a loop pull-through method Lena created a daisy chain out of the ribbons which would keep them from tangling up and make them easier to hide. She tucked both the sheet and the daisy chain back in the linen cabinet and flopped down on the bed. Lena sighed as she laid still on the bed noticing for the first time the tight knots is her back that had formed as she hunched over her work. She rolled her shoulders and took calming breaths in an attempt to release some of the tension that had built up over the day.

Thinking about that tension caused a vision of Bane to flash in her mind and she felt his fingers on her skin all over again. Lena bit down on the inside of her cheek in an attempt to distract herself from that dangerous and strange course of thinking. She tried to fill her head up with the woods again as she started to drift away. Just before she entered fully into sleeping Lena swore she could hear the gentle wind that would rustle the pine needles in that beautiful forest of her memory or was it a hiss?

Well well, Lena and Bane seem to keep tripping each other up, and the daring escape plan is starting to take shape. Sorry it was on the short side this time, trying to get back in the swing of things.