Title:
Rating: T
Fandom: Gotham
Disclaimer: FOX, DC Comics, and Warner Brothers own it all. I own nothing.
Alfred
Early Autumn was always quite the remarkable sight at Wayne Manor. The mild weather was very different from the bleak south London days of his youth or the inescapable heat of the desert villages he had toured in his twenties. Crisp air filled with the lingering scents of freshly started chimneys and broken pine needles drifted through the open windows and the centuries old forest that lined the property had already burst into a map of red and gold and every natural color in between. The small cold front that had swept through earlier that week had taken the permanently quilted grey sky and the last traces of Summer with it.
But the red and gold tableau against its canvas of sapphire blue skies had absolutely no effect on Alfred Pennyworth.
None. Not even a little.
He was not a man given to glamorizing or nostalgia or any of the overly sensitive sentimentality that plagued most people.
Quite the opposite actually.
If given the option, he typically tried to avoid the past. It was a concrete immovable object that he had no control over, something his mum had taught him was best to put behind you and go on.
It was inevitable that from time to time memories came to him: a worn football on the laces of a muddy boot, a cup of tea on red formica, foreign places filled with foreign tongues, and blood and heat and things he hoped to never see again. When the things he had done and the things he had had done to him swam up, he simply reached for a couple fingers of the strongest drink he could find and waited until he could push them down and move along.
Even before his service, he had been known as a hard man. He did not dwell. He did not romanticize. He was practical and efficient and had no time for flights of fancy. He had no time or inclination to entertain an artist's eye or the lyrics that were only found inside a poet's heart.
No, his mind was more often than not filled with actual important things.
Like the mental and physical health of the most valuable person in his life.
It wasn't an easy job taking care of Bruce Wayne, far from it. And today, unfortunately, through proximity alone that job happened to include discovering what could only be the nefarious motivations of a certain pale haired thief.
He could admit to himself, as he stomped along the empty main hall, that he had no proof that it had been her that he had seen on the monitor that morning. Hell, he couldn't rightly prove it was a person at all. Even with the best cameras money could buy, he had been left with only snatches of shadows and the rustling of a few bushes.
But deep in in his gut, he knew, just like he knew that girl was nothing but a world of grief wrapped in pretty paper. A bit of fluff that was anything but.
What he didn't know however, what had him moving swiftly through the manor's halls, was what she was doing at the manor.
Knowing her, she had likely gotten herself into a bind. She probably needed something. Girls like that always needed something. They were the kind that kept a pitiable palm out front and a couple of fingers crossed behind their back.
It was in their nature. Hell, it was probably in that girl's very DNA.
Well, whatever she was here for, the little nuisance would probably only bring more problems for Master Bruce when the boy found trouble easily enough on his own without the help from a girl like that. Especially one like Miss Kyle who was drawn to bad choices like a fly to honey.
Her need for the seedier side of life seemed nearly pathological as if deep down she couldn't help what she was: a liar, a thief, and with a face like that the potential to be so much worse. She was a wicked thing naturally prone to mischief, something he could usually turn a blind-eye to, but she had the uncanny ability to talk the boy into damn near anything. And that was something he just could not so easily overlook.
Simply put, Master Bruce had no business being around a girl like that. Selina Kyle had simply seen too much in her young life to be any good for him. No, he needed a girl from his own background, who understood the structure and the constraints that came with money and privilege. A safe girl, a sweet girl, a girl who didn't swear like a dock hand and knew her way around a butterfly knife.
Bruce needed a pretty bird that would drive back all the shadows that boy had in his eyes. Not a girl as broken as he was. Everyone knew two broken things couldn't fix each other.
If she had not taken a role in the boy's life, Alfred may have actually admired the girl. She reminded him of the birds back home, brutal, and hardy, and taking zero shite from anyone. But that was the problem wasn't it.
Because if it hadn't been for a hand full of half-truths and a half-dozen corrupt cops, Bruce may never have even laid eyes on the girl. Had they encountered her anywhere else, Alfred wouldn't have given the girl a second glance before he had shepherded his charge to the opposite side of the street. He had learned early in life there was little need to invite trouble when it could be easily avoided.
And trouble was what that girl was through and through. The kind of trouble he could not avoid or ignore so on the off chance she found her way to the manor, he made a point of keeping an eye on his ward.
Even without the cameras, unless he slipped inside the old servant's passages, it wasn't difficult keeping track of Bruce's movements in and around the manor's grounds. He could be typically found training or studying or doing one of his more abnormal hobbies. It was only when Miss Kyle made an appearance that Alfred suddenly had the inclination to make a few extra rounds or take his tea in front of his bank of monitors.
In his opinion, watching the two teenagers through the well-placed cameras was simple surveillance not spying. He was being smart, taking control, being preemptive, not being some old gossipmonger peeping over a garden wall.
This morning it had been through those cameras that he had seen something creeping along the hedge rows; a petite shadow that had the preternatural talent of knowing the exact range of every camera lens and how to avoid them.
When the shadow had slipped past a third camera, he knew its exact destination. He was proud of himself for his patience, as he had waited for more than an hour, before he had let trepidation guide him down the main hall.
He sighed as he noted the thin strip of light escaping between the double doors. He had never thought to tell Bruce to keep the doors open, he had never felt the need. Bruce had few acquaintances and even fewer friends, and when he did entertain, his behavior could be so strange that Alfred often forgot that he was a child.
Shaking his head, he reached out, gently pushing open the slightly ajar door and taking in the scene before him.
His shoes made an awful squeak as he found his usually solid step skidding across the wooden floor as he came up short just inside the double doors. Alfred would typically not have forgiven himself for such a misstep, but it was not every day that one found the Master of Wayne Manor moving around his study, a strip of wide black cloth wrapped tightly around his eyes.
Confusion kept him silent as he studied the spectacle that was his young charge. Even slightly bent, his pale hands sticking out of the nearly too short cuffs of his sport coat, he could see where the summer had granted the boy a few inches. An inevitable outcome given his late father's stature that had doubled his reach, but had unfortunately eaten away the few pounds he had finally gained over the spring.
Alfred had never had children of his own, no younger siblings either, so it was a strange thing for him to witness the youth that was draining from Bruce every week. Changes that would have probably had his mother in tears and his father looking at a mirrored reflection of his own adolescence.
The unmistakable squeak of rubber sole on floor must've have caught the young man's attention as a dark head suddenly snapped in the direction of the threshold.
"It's against the rules to leave the room," Bruce said, in that unmistakably imperious tone that belonged more on a hanging judge than a teenage boy.
"I didn't," answered a rough voice dryly.
With an audible clunk, something heavy landed on the wood floor before rolling across it. Taking another step into the room Alfred watched as Bruce's head followed the sound of the round paper weight. Despite being accustomed to Bruce's not so normal training techniques, confusion still gripped him as he quickly scanned the room searching until his gaze landed on a mop of dirty curls.
Selina Kyle was perched pretty as you please on the top of Bruce's desk, a single leather gloved finger covering her ill-concealed smirk in the universal sign for quiet.
Watching Bruce take another hesitant step forward, his dark head cocked for what he could only assume was any indication of where the girl was, Alfred decided that whatever it was the two of them were doing, it was certainly not the kind of trouble he had been getting up to at their age.
Simple curiosity kept him silent at the threshold as he prepared to witness Bruce Wayne embarrass himself, but the boy did not wave his arms about the way that Alfred would have expected someone who had been blind-folded to do. He had expected him to stumble around like a lad playing Blind Man's bluff. But Bruce navigated his way around the room as if he was in possession of all his senses, easily skirting the coffee table and the end of the button cushioned couch until he stood mere feet from the edge of his desk and the seven stones of trouble propped on it.
Alfred's gaze flicked back to the girl, but her attention was fixated on his unsuspecting ward as he took a took a step away from her. Demonstrating how she had earned her alias, she slinked from her perch. Unpredictable as ever, she took a step toward the boy, her booted feet somehow silent as she moved across the wood floor.
Soundlessly she wiggled her fingers, seemingly testing their dexterity, as she reached forward. It was at that moment that Alfred noticed the small scrap of red ribbon that was dangling from Bruce's jacket pocket. The tips of her fingers had nearly made contact with the tiny edge of red, when he heard a loud sniff and Bruce's fingers were suddenly gripped around her dainty wrist.
Surprise flitted across Miss Kyle's pale eyes, but she made no attempt to wrench her wrist back and Bruce made no move to release her. Fingers still wrapped loosely around her wrist the boy quickly used his free hand to unknot his blindfold.
From his position by the door, and Bruce's back to the room, he had little to no angle to observe the boy. His only view was the back of a dark head and the clean lines of a sport coat stretched over narrow shoulders. He could see nothing of the girl or of Bruce's expression but he could only assume he was wearing one of triumphant.
"I win," he stated, releasing her wrist
"Did you though?" the girl asked, her question closer to an observation as she hopped back up, settling herself on the desk and bringing the two of them nearly eye to eye.
"You said that I wouldn't catch you," he said, almost smugly and from the movement of the boy's elbows Alfred assumed the boy was idly wrapping his now useless blindfold around his hand like he did when he taped his knuckles. "And I proved you wrong."
From the girl's scoff, Alfred could only imagine the look she was training on the boy. "Those're some pretty bold words coming from you," she teased, her voice equal parts challenging and amused.
"I can be rather bold when the occasion calls for it," Bruce said lazily, and if he had not known the lad so well, he would have said his words were practically… Flirtatious.
Alfred almost shook his head at the notion. He would have found the entire situation humorous if the secondhand embarrassment wasn't making him internally cringe.
"Oh, B," Miss Kyle nearly crooned, humor laced through her tone as she reached for the tail end of the scarf in his hand, "You've got the potential to be a lot of things, when the occasion calls for it."
Suddenly, she tugged the loose end of the long black fabric and like a dog on a leash, Bruce allowed himself to be pulled forward. His thighs nearly brushing the girl's knees-
Unable to watch this too awkward flirtatious moment any longer, Alfred locked his hands behind his back and cleared his throat.
In the blink of an eye, Miss Kyle brought her feet up and using Bruce's chest almost like a spring board propelled herself backward, gracefully rolling off the opposite side of the desk somehow managing not to disturb a single sheet of paper from one of the numerous stacks.
Almost in tandem with the girl, all the lingering tan from Bruce's summer holidays leached from his face as he jumped and spun away from the desk as if the girl's very wake had been on fire.
"Al-fred," he exclaimed, his words springing forth as fast as he had jumped away from the trouble makers lingering presence. "How long have you been standing there?"
"Long enough," the girl replied for him.
Alfred glared in her direction before narrowing his eyes back on the boy before him.
"We were just," he stammered, as if they had been caught in the backseat of an auto and not doing whatever the hell it was they were doing. "It's sensory deprivation training," he explained, gesturing to the black scarf still in his hand and extracting the shiny red ribbon from his pocket.
Alfred had a cutting rejoinder, but kept the words to himself.
"Of course," he drawled, stealing a glance at Selina Kyle as she propped a hip lazily against the desk beside her. "Perfectly normal adolescent activities."
An uncharacteristic snort escaped the girl standing behind Bruce, "The Old Man's got jokes," she chuckled as she moved from the desk to the back of the couch, grabbing up the worn leather jacket she had tossed there so carelessly.
Alfred felt the pounding in his ears as his blood-pressure rose at the little thief's arrogance and casual dismissal.
No, she was definitely not the kind of girl Bruce needed in his life.
As if she could sense his disdain, Miss Kyle merely smirked at him as she pulled on her jacket. "I'd love to stick around," she said, sarcastically, "but I've got places to be."
Judging from Bruce's narrowed grey eyes and obstinate expression, her sudden departure was a complete shock to him.
"I thought you said-" he started, taking a step in her direction.
"Yeah, I forgot about this thing," she said, and for the first time, Alfred could see the slight tinge of pink that had started running along the girl's sharp cheek bones as she jerked open one half of the veranda doors and the crisp smell of burning leaves and autumn cold invaded the library.
"But I won the game," he replied, his tone mere notes away from being down right childish.
His words seemed to slow her. "Yeah," she drawled, indifferently, "I'm gonna have to hit you back later, B," she said, before disappearing into the midday sun.
It should have been a casual farewell, but the tension the departure left behind was much too strong to ignore.
"Well, what was that about then," Alfred felt forced to ask as he tried to keep his tone casual.
Frowning, Bruce slumped onto the couch. "Nothing," he answered. "Just a wager."
From the deep furrow in his dark brow that had slowly evolved into a mulish attitude the boy had had for the next few days, Alfred assumed it had been much more than 'just a wager' between two friends. Looking back, he had never taken the time to find out what the terms of that bet had entailed or if the young girl had backed out on her end, but more important he had never found the inclination to finally have that 'talk' with the boy, to finally lay down any rules.
At the time, he hadn't seen the point in dragging them both down that road. He had been too careful, too new, too inexperienced in his parental role. His own father had made an embarrassing muck of the birds and bees and Alfred had just assumed the boy would find out the way he had through telly and mates, and magazines you kept hidden between your mattresses.
And if he was being honest with himself, maybe a small part of him had been in no rush to have Bruce acknowledge what was clearly happening between him and Miss Kyle. If they were happy to play they were platonic, he was happy to let sleeping dogs lie.
In hindsight, as he glared down at the two teenagers tangled together on the study floor, fire light and shadows dancing along their lines, letting sleeping dogs lie had turned out to be a terrible idea.
Alfred Pennyworth had always been a light sleeper so the sound of muffled voices drifting down the main hall had easily roused him from sleep. Initially he had felt no alarm at the sound, it was not unusual to find Bruce, restless and sleep deprived, watching television, or reading a book, or possibly doing any number of things that would alarm any normal parent.
Still shaking off slumber, he hadn't bothered to check the time on his watch as he had slid it on or looked down at his feet as he slipped into his house shoes. He had been in the middle of pulling on his dressing gown when a feminine shriek had cut through the night air. Instinct had had him reaching for his gun and before he had taken a moment to think about what he was doing he had found himself racing to the study.
Had adrenaline not been pumping so swiftly through his veins, his outburst at discovering the pair may have never happened. Given the opportunity again, he would like to think he would have gone about it more tactfully. A nice heavy footfall down the hall, an audible coughing fit outside the doors, or had he been feeling very generous he may have even chosen to not make his presence known at all and trusted the boy to use some common sense.
The two teenagers wrapped in each other certainly would not have noticed had he chosen to silently walk away. Hell, they probably wouldn't have noticed if a marching band had come parading through.
No, his sudden outburst, his flare of anger, had been born from a combination of relief, surprise, and disappointment. Relief at finding both children in his care alive and well. Surprise to find them the cause of the pre-dawn racket. And disappointment that, despite their fully clothed bodies, they had clearly crossed some invisible line.
From their very telling positions on the floor he wasn't sure what he had expected them to do in response. Maybe some scrambling, some stuttered explanations, even some jumping away from each other as if they both had contracted the plague. He had expected at least something in the catalog of responses he would have had had he been caught with a bird at that age. But they did none of those.
He would like to chuck it up to a just 'kids these days,' but Bruce Wayne and Selina Kyle were far from your average teenagers.
Even fully dressed in her baggy jumper, a girl, any girl, of Bruce's acquaintance should have been mortified, or at the very least slightly embarrassed to be caught in such a position. Of course, that little piece just sat there, like the cat that had gotten the canary.
Suddenly, the gun in his hand felt entirely too heavy and like a glaring overreaction. Taking a deep breath, he rested his back against the opened door as he reigned in his temper.
Regardless of their behavior and what may or may not have transpired had he not barged in, he felt an overwhelming sense of relief at the all too normal position he found himself in. These were the kind of things guardians dealt with, not kidnappings and assassins, and psycho clowns. Normal folks just had to deal with lads with too many hormones and girls too pretty for their own good.
And for now, he was one of those people, charged with navigating a teenage boy with hearts in his naïve eyes for a girl well outside of anything he would ever be able to handle.
That thought killed all the humor that had slithered in, and he looked back at the pair. Somehow, dealing with assassins and psychos wasn't looking so bad.
Exhaling, he looked down at his watch before he made a noncommittal gesture with his free hand. "Are either of you aware it's four in the bloody morning," he asked, for lack of a better kickoff and nodding his head in the same general direction.
Silence answered him as Bruce stayed crouched over the girl as if he was shielding her from prying eyes. For one moment, he and the boy merely stared at one another, the air pulling tighter with tension as the seconds passed until with a very un-lady like snort, Miss Kyle burst into a short laugh.
Head falling back to the floor, she quickly blew an errant curl from her face before releasing another laugh. The sudden humor had Bruce's head tilting back in her direction and Alfred felt like he was intruding when she suddenly smiled up at the boy. It was an oddly sweet smile. Suspiciously sweet, actually. But it was all the warning she gave Bruce, before she delivered a playful smack to his chest. Her touch proved all the prodding the boy needed to climb from her.
Moving as if he was recovering from some invasive surgery, Bruce rose to his feet. Standing, he quickly wrapped his robe around himself, knotting the belt efficiently before he offered Miss Kyle his hand. To Alfred's surprise, the girl accepted it as she sprang gracefully to her feet like the little woodland sprite she was.
Turning his head to give them the illusion of privacy, he ignored Bruce's glare and watched as Miss Kyle slowly relinquished Bruce's hand to right her jumper and wipe away specks of nonexistent dirt. Always alert, her gaze quickly moved from Bruce to him and back again.
When the pregnant silence only stretched on, Alfred felt himself clearing his throat, "As I said Miss Kyle, it's very late."
She simply shrugged her shoulders in response, stepping around Bruce as if he was nothing more than a footstool. Alfred would have found her seeming nonchalance impressive, if he hadn't seen the color growing along her cheeks.
As she paused beside him Alfred realized he must have run out of favors, because it was clearly too much to ask for her to just silently quit the room.
"Great timing their Jeeves," she said, and looked as if she wanted to cheekily pat his arm, but something she read in his face must've lead her to reconsider.
Resisting the urge to add his own off-color reply. He turned back to Bruce, only to find the boys pale eyes running over her quickly and the slightest tick in his lips.
"Catch you later B," she called over her shoulder, a conspiratorial note in her voice as she finally stepped from the room.
"Not tonight you won't, Miss Kyle," he barked after her retreating form.
She merely burst into another fit of laughter.
Insolent girl.
Alfred closed his eyes for a moment as he listened to her swagger down the hall. Her usually whisper-soft tread was replaced with a heavy near skipping-step as if the girl wanted him to hear how casually she felt about his interruption and his dismissal of her. The arrogance behind the sound would have been annoying if he couldn't see it for the blatant deflection that it was…
Deflection.
Alfred shook his head at the thought.
A conman's favorite tool.
How could he have been so blind? It was his job, his sworn duty, to protect Bruce from all sorts of danger. Including those that came with a halo of curls on their head and a pair of devils on their slim shoulders.
Over these last few weeks, having her here, seeing her every day, it had been so easy to overlook certain aspects of her personality. Hell, he had almost started enjoying her clever cheek and the way she could so easily coax a smile from his surly ward. Seeing them together, he had almost forgotten what that little girl really was.
A liar, and a thief, and too pretty by half. She was a girl who had seen and done things, no child that age should have even known about.
But it was not just about where she had come from or where she was going. She had floated in and out of Bruce's life like a sailor, feeding him lies from the first moment they met.
Bloody hell, the girl had abandoned him to the mercies of an assassin the first chance she got at freedom; had lied to him about the worst moment of his life, had gone missing and shown up at their door starved and beaten and half-frozen to death and still refused to give them even a hint as to who had done it.
She would never be any good for the boy, but Bruce refused to see that. He probably never would.
Alfred's first reaction to a threat was to grab the boy and run. Unfortunately, he had a feeling he would never be able to run fast or far enough to get away from this threat. There would never be any protecting him from her.
Turning back to face the study, he glanced at Bruce's averted profile before gazing down at his watch. Despite the urgency he was feeling, he would allow the boy a few more moments to gather himself. He had been in that position a time or two or four himself in his youth, but after that there would be no more stalling. It might be late in coming, but it was beyond time he talked to the boy.
To Be Continued…
Author's Notes: This un-BETA'd so constructive criticism is always welcome.
I'm not sure if anyone is still reading this, but if you are: I am SO sorry for not updating sooner. Between school, work, and trying to write and rewrite from Alfred's point-of-view, I unfortunately got caught in this chapter for a very long time. I promise that I am working very hard on the next few chapters and they are going to be pretty big and will once again be from Selina and Bruce's POVs.
Again, I am so sorry for not having updated in forever.
Big Thanks to: R3wind101, Bubbasaur, claire-loves-music, Darkener, byzinha, DarkElements10, Zerephel
Guest 2/8 – Awww, thank you. I loved S1 BabyBatcat. Guest 2/9 – Thank you. Batcat-Hahaha, Alfred certainly has terrible timing doesn't he. Thank you so much for your kind words, and I'm so glad you enjoyed the kiss, I was very nervous about writing it. Guest 2/9 – I hope you're doing better now. ; ) Guest 2/13 – Yeah, during S2, that was definitely a slap heard round the fandom and I'll admit I'm still pretty sore about it too. Thank you so much, I seriously cherished your review. Winnie – Thank you for the encouragement, it really means a lot and I'm still working on it bit by bit. Guest 3/28 – Thank you, I'm glad you've enjoyed it. Guest 3/31 – Thank you. Guest 4/16 Oh, wow, thank you so much. I know it's been a while but I'm finally able to start writing on a regular basis again so I hope to have a number of chapters up soon. Winnie- Your reviews are so sweet and encouraging, thank you so much. Batcat 8/30 – As always, thank you so much for the encouragement, it really gives me the push I need. Guest 9/25 – thank you. I'll hopefully have more chapters up soon.