A/N: This chapter was based on a Gotham one-shot I previously mentioned.
Haunted
No…!
She lay motionless on the bed. Blood staining her hospital gown. Her eyes staring up motionless. Bruce stood in horror. Selina Kyle. His Selina. The girl who wanted to start a new life with him was dead.
It was his fault, again. Jeremiah smiled most pleased with himself. It was the second time that psychopath shot her, but this time… she won't be able to make it….
Selina was dead!
Blind fury brought Bruce down on the clown-faced freak. He tackled him and rained punches upon him. The colorless face stained red from his splitting skin. His skull crushed under Bruce's fist. Then Bruce wrapped his hands around his throat and constricted.
"…Bruce…."
He thought he heard something calling to him but he brushed it off. He burned from his hatred of Jeremiah. The monster ruined everything. Now, Bruce had to end it. The murderer didn't deserve to live. He deserves to rot in hell. And that was what Bruce had to do. With any luck, the devil will carry out the rest of Valeska's punishment.
"…Bruce…."
Jeremiah didn't even fight back. He just smiled up at Bruce. He laughed and laughed and laughed as if he enjoyed it. Enjoyed it thoroughly up until to his stillness. Just like Jerome for he died the first time, that damn disturbing smile remained plastered to his face. Bruce watched as the freak went to the grave knowing his mission was complete.
Again that voiced called: "Bruce… wake up. Bruce! Bruce, wake up!"
He jolted up. He panted hard. The bedsheets bundled up around his waist. The girl next to him lurched back from his sudden waking. He looked at her. The curly hair he loved so much and the look of concern in her green eyes brought him back to reality.
It was just a dream. A good memory stained by his worst fear.
He found her hugging him to calm him. She rubbed soothing patterns in his back and whispering to him. "Shh, it's okay Bruce. It's just a dream. You're safe. You're home." Her beautiful voice settled his firing nerves.
Bruce wiped the sweat from his brow and looked around the bedroom. He got out of bed despite her protest. He stood in front of the window. In the distance was that oversized newspaper building with that big bronze globe on top. He was home. He was with Selina in their penthouse apartment in Metropolis. Every time he looked out at the city, he felt he was in a foreign land. The city was beautiful though. Most of its architecture was a lot less depressing than Gotham's. There was even a lot less crime. It felt weird not hearing any sirens as often as they should.
It's been several months since leaving Gotham. Despite the homesickness, they couldn't return. It wasn't a city anymore. It was a warzone. And it was best not to return for that and many other reasons.
He felt her hand slide over his uncovered back. She looked up at him with that same worrisome look.
"Nightmare?" she asked while continuing pressing patterns in his skin. He gave a low humph as his response. "About what," she asked.
For quite some time he'd been waking up in the middle of the night by bad dreams. Selina has been trying to get him to talk about them to get him past it, and hopefully both of them back to sleep. "It was," he tried to painfully retell the dream. "It was when you woke up at the hospital. Jeremiah was there disguised as a nurse… and…" it grew harder to speak.
"Go on," she urged.
"He… he killed you."
Selina studied him. Most of his nightmares usually involved her dying. Most of which by Jeremiah's hand. However, she knew there was something else that he's not telling her. "Anything else?" she asked.
The muscles in his jaw tightened as he breathed in deeply. "After he… you know," he took a sharper inhale, "I… beat him with my bare hands. Then…" it was even harder for him to say something that was far too real, "I killed him. And he just laughed!"
Selina allowed the information to sit for a moment. "Bruce, remember, Jeremiah is dead. He was killed by a bunch of cops when he tried to escape. He's gone."
"I know," he started to look more gravely. "I'm just afraid that…." He looked at his reflection. Somehow more aware of the beard he had grown. He then leaned his forearm against the glass. "I can't help feeling that he's not. Jerome came back—"
"Jerome wasn't cremated. But Jeremiah was. Besides didn't we decide to stay here to get away from it all?"
"I know, Cat. It's just—"
"And he missed! He didn't hit my spine."
"I know—"
"Then why do you keep having nightmares about him?!" She knew she was being brutal on him, but she knew he had to talk about this to get over it. The way he buried his face against his arm screamed that there was something not being said.
After a few dozen breaths, he spoke in a tone that made Selina nervous for him. "There's something I should've told you." She asked him to proceed. "While you were in surgery, I was called to the GCPD to interrogate Jeremiah. He called you such horrible things. Played with my emotions." He sniffed. "I thought, I was so sure that I was gonna lose you, it-it broke me. Then I realized that the only way to beat him… was to let him win."
Selina knitted her brow. Bruce's voice strained with each passing sentence. "'Let him win?'" she questioned further. The sound of it scared her.
"To make me kill him. To turn me into him…."
Selina paused her ministration to his back. She sensed something was off. "B-but Alfred said he was shot by the GCPD." She observed his reaction, and what happened next proved it.
"He won, Selina." He had never sounded more tormented before.
The closest she'd seen ever seen him like that was the night in the alley. It was at that exact moment that she realized what was troubling him.
He continued his story. "When I was interrogating him, I told the guards in the room to leave. And when they did, and after I punched him a few times… I strangled him with my bare hands." His breathing picked up in rate again. "I killed him, Cat."
Her eyes widened and her mouth gaped. "Oh…" she murmured. "Why didn't you tell me?" she asked. He did not respond.
It's been months and he let Alfred lie for him. He kept a big secret from her. Although, she did understand his feelings for that sort of deal. Especially after what happened with that Ra's guy. And he did it for her. But his behavior at that moment made her forget those things. He just buried his face in his arm further. Hiding his eyes. That was all the answer she needed.
She then forced her tone into a slightly more casual one. "So that's why you keep dreaming about him."
Her statement seemed to brought him out of his dark thoughts. He knew her for her bluntness, but not like this. "Selina… I killed someone. I'm a killer."
"Yeah, well, that makes two of us," she acknowledged.
He then had a vivid flashback to the time she pushed Alfred's old—and treacherous—friend out of a window.
She led him back to the bed so they could sit. "Bruce, Gotham makes you do things that you'd never do anywhere else. It's toxic. It steals your soul. That's why I suggested we'd never return. Because we wanted a second chance at life." She took his hand and placed it on her belly. On a specific place for him to feel a reminder. "'Cause that's what we got."
A smile spread on his face. He suddenly felt warm. The palm of his hand pleasantly hot on her skin. The memory of his dream faded, being replaced by his happiest memory. All thanks to Selina. Wonderful and gorgeous Selina Irene Kyle.
He reached his arm around her shoulders to bring her closer to him. "What have I done to get someone like you?"
Selina nuzzled into his neck. "I don't know," she purred. Sending a tingle throughout his body. "But…" she drawled on. Climbing onto his lap straddling him. There was nothing between them anymore. Not that there was from the start. Such an interesting act from her caused Bruce's head to suffered a major loss of blood. She finished her thought, "I do know what you can do to get something."
His smile turned into a knowing smirk. "I can see that."
Before she could tell him to shut up, Bruce captured her lips. Her nails trailed his chest, shoulders, arms, anywhere she could mark. She wanted to leave a sign that he belonged to her and no one else. Bruce's hands roamed from her thighs to her back and everything he could reach. Her skin was so soft despite growing up in a rough life. He cherished the way her flesh molded to his touch. He especially adored the reaction he receive when he massaged the two dimples on her lower back.
Soon his kisses trailed to her cheeks, her jaw, and then her neck. He earned a moan as he sucked on a sensitive spot. Bruce wasn't the only one that was experiencing a reduction of blood in the brain. That erratic blood flow made her roll hips against him. With a feral growl, he hoisted her up and plopped her up the bed.
He kissed his way down her front. Soon, he found the scar on her abdomen. He lingered there. That spot was her greatest pain. Now he wanted the mark and everything underneath it to feel nothing but pleasure. That is what she deserved. And that is what she will get for the rest of her life, so help him, God.
Gotham Morgue
Several months ago
The orange glow of the furnace lit the room. The fluorescent lights have been faulty all day. The light has been rather dim and they've been flickering every now and then. There must have been something wrong with the power. The constant flashing made the mortician uneasy. It felt like something out of a horror show.
The fire in the crematory furnace didn't help. At least the corpse he shoved in there was somewhat satisfying. It was the body of an evil maniac after all. The things that monster did made the undertaker wish he was the one who croaked him. He didn't even perform an autopsy on the body. A clear sign of death by strangling, but they were releasing it as a shooting to the public. Weirder, he was given specific orders from Captain Gordon and Detective Bullock to not harvest any organs. Guess the GCPD was afraid whatever unlucky soul in need of a transplant from "J. Valeska" will turn into the same devil. Maybe it wasn't all that irrational. Whoever this Valeska guy was, he didn't look like a real human. Was he actually that white when he was alive?
Thankfully, he got what was coming to and they were cremating him. That sick bastard turned the city into a hellhole. It was because of him he was separated from his family. God, he hoped they were okay. At least he was dead now. The mortician just wished he could meet and thank the person who done him in. Whomever they were, they must've been really important for the cops to protect. Which was odd. He didn't think they would arrest anyone for killing a person worst than Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, and Jack the Ripper combined—
The man was brought out of his thoughts. He thought he heard a rattling from the furnace. The lights flickered again. Worst than before. The room even went black for a split second. And for that split second, it filled him with terrors he did not think to fantasize. But no, it couldn't be. Maybe a bone just shifted in there and the deafening silence amplified the sound in there. Not to mention the stupid power. So he just brushed it off and left to go do some paperwork.
Little did he knew, what was left of Jeremiah Valeska shifted by means of something other than natural.
A/N: Bruce and Selina seemed to be doing okay, for now at least. However, what was up at the crematorium?
If anyone did not get any reference in this, especially the one of Jeremiah disguised as a nurse, you are not fit to be DC fans.
I chose the name "Irene" as Selina's middle name because part of Bob Kane's and Bill Finger's inspiration for Catwoman is from a character called "Irena Dubrovna" from the 1942 movie Cat People. The name is also used as an alias for Selina in the comics. I changed the Irena to Irene because I thought it sounded odd. After all, that name and Selina's first name end with similar syllables.
I swear guys, the story will get better. Please leave a good, well thought out comment. Construction criticism and ideas are welcomed. They help me write.
Thanks for reading, God Bless.
