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"Love is like war: easy to begin but very hard to stop."- H. L. Mencken
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Chapter - 6(Multitasking)
"What we've gotten here, buddy? Some fancy babes are trespassing in our neighborhood."
Jumping out of shadow, a hideous looking crook with an aquiline nose twitching, taunted the two women. Advertising their broken teeth in smug smiles and crowbars in hands, his buddies ranged in all shapes and sizes.
"Men," Athena muttered.
It was less than one and a half hours since she and Aphrodite had fallen in the gloomy city. Wisdom goddess was still struggling to unblock her teleporting spell when these pests came out of the woodwork.
"If you don't mess with us right now," Athena threatened, "then I might let you live. Or I'll make sure that you pay for this, even in Tartarus."
"Boohoo!" The crook's leader, tapping a baseball bat at another palm, laughed with accompanying cackles of his group. "We really got scared, GIRLY!"
"Atty, they're not taking you seriously." Sappho remarked as she picked up the gaze of those unruly men.
"Thanks for your intellectual info, Sappho," Athena answered, biting back another retort. She didn't know which fool was irritating her more—the one who was standing in front of her. Or the one beside her. "Why don't you try something?"
"Me!" Love goddess' eyes widened at the proposal. "No! I don't deal with these types of incorrigible scums."
"Thought so," Athena mumbled. Her gray eyes calculated the goons. Most of them bore crude and inefficient weapons like their faces.
She seriously doubted they could even use them correctly. Yet, the number superiority was in their favor, not as if they knew how to use it. In fair assessment, she could nail them in less than fraction of second. But it would be waste of that second.
"Give me those gold jewelry, chick. Quick!" the goon's leader prompted, closing the gap between them. The goons circling around the two Olympian pantheons dished out their crocodiles-smiles in fake sympathy.
"Atty!" Sappho glanced at her partner. "C'mon, do something!"
"Why should I?" Athena shrugged noncommittally, eyes keeping the track of goons' movement. "What have I warned you about garbing yourself in gold, Sappho. It always attracts attention. Sometimes good—" Athena's gaze flicked through thugs, "—sometimes bad."
"Atty, this is not time of your knowledge lessons!" Sappho blurted out.
"Stop bitching, you two!" the goon's leader shouted. A pistol gleamed in his one hand, barrel pointed at both goddesses as his aim jerked hither and thither.
"Listen pal," Athena leaned against the approaching thug while Sappho spat out a series of colorful Greek curses. "You're messing wrong people. When I hit you, you'll regret the day you born. Understood?"
All goons reeled back in their steps. But with a hollering cry, the leader lunged with his pistol aiming directly at craft goddess.
Bang!
First bullet rang like a supersonic boom, shredding the silence of alley.
Athena ducked the sailing iron-armament easily, sidestepped, and focused on the grinning, but mad leader. Before the thug figure out what was happening next, craft goddess had already crossed the gap in blazing reflexes. She crunched his wrist to paste as his hand limped and pistol clattered on the street.
However, Athena was far from done.
Not missing the beat, she twisted the other free arm of goon, pinned behind his back in an agonizing move, and then banged her knee straight to his crotch as the goon's leader doubled over in ungodly pain. "My ballllsss!"
"Jeez, Atty." Sappho looked alarmed. "You killed the poor man!"
"Anyone else wants to try?" Athena craned her head to see the goons stood paralyzed in their tracks. "Anyone?"
"FREAKS!" other goons hollered, running away from the scene. "More freaks in the god forsaken city!"
0o0o0o
"Was that really needed, Atty?" Sappho asked. She peered a last time for the alley where the goon was groaning in pain. Poor man might never have children; love goddess gloomed with the thought.
Beside her, Athena flexed her shoulders, somewhat enjoying the freedom of being out of Olympus. "I remember you were the one who was shouting at me to do something."
"I never said that you've to push that hard, Atty." Sappho protested, her jaw sagged slightly.
"Hah, whatever." Athena blew out her breath in exasperation. She never grasped how she could handle those goons without few punches, not as if they were diplomatic either. Plus, punching and crunching something with her bare hands. Yes, this really, really feels good.
"You look happy with the incident." Sappho noted the elation. The scintillating grin on Athena's face was hard to miss.
"I think I've missed this." Athena essayed another smile.
"You mean, being in here on the Gaea?" Sappho voice echoed happily.
"Of course not," Athena gave a bewildered stare to Sappho. "I just love punching some men with my bare hands. That's all."
This time love goddess was horrified. "Mother Gaea, Atty! You're a sadist!"
Athena gave a feral grin at the gibe, stating her palms flat in a surrender gesture. "Oh, you've discovered my secret, Sappho! What am I going to do?"
Sappho glared helplessly at warrior goddess.
"That's our car," Athena spoke up and gave the high sign toward the metallic carriage standing across the road. "We're going in that, since you recklessly blocked out our teleporting spell."
"Where?" Sappho barely asked, before running after Athena.
She watched some mortals observing them as if they were some lunatics. She shrugged that. Naturally, they had never seen a living goddess among them; especially not someone like her.
"C'mon, Sappho, I don't have all night for this!" A loud voice broke Aphrodite's reverie as she finally joined Athena beside the metallic carriage.
Standing near it, Sappho realized how elegant and beautiful the metallic carriage was. Its surface was shiny gray in darkened night. The cool, smooth enamel covering everything, gave a blending beauty of its presence. In Sappho's eyes, it was simply gorgeous.
"You never told me, Atty, that you've metallic carriage in Patriarch World," Sappho said with wonder as she sat on comfortable seats and hooked up her seat belt.
Like outside of carriage, inside wasn't shiny or decorated, which disappointed Sappho greatly.
Then again, she knew Athena wasn't much a person of decorating her living space or carriage. Warrior goddess was famous for her Spartan living attitude. When this pursuit would be over, she'd teach some good work to Atty, Sappho determined.
The gray-black Mustang growled at life as Wisdom goddess revved up the engine. Sappho grinned at the thrilling sensation.
Even pleasure goddess had been a devotional watcher of these metallic inventions of Man's world. And thanks to her ex-husband Hephaestus, the smith God, the Mount Olympus now had its own television network named—MOANS.
In secret, Sappho was planning an extra channel for special audiences, when Atty interrupted everything. Always the interrupter of good things,Sappho cursed.
"Hey! Those bitches are stealing my car!"
Sappho's head whipped toward the voice. A man was shouting and running toward them, hands flailing in help gesture as if it were the judgment day. "Why's that man shouting at us, Atty?"
"There are lots of men shouting around here, Aphrodite," Athena stated as she thrusted the car into road. "Which one are you talking about?"
Some pedestrians revolted against Athena's honking, but no one dared to cross the path of metallic beast. As much as she hated the men, Athena had to praise the car designed by them. It was thrilling to drive it, in sort of a crude way.
"That one, Atty."
"He must be asking for his car," Athena responded.
Her hands maneuvered the car expertly on the road. As she throttled the acceleration, the Mustang lurched into action like a silent, dark beast awakening after the call of its mistress. A true mistress.
"Vooo!" Sappho shrilled in surprise, but her curiosity yet prevailed. "But why he's shouting at us, Atty?"
"Because this is his car, Sappho."
"WHAT!" Sappho croaked like a frog at first rains, staring agape. "We're sitting in his carriage!"
"Yea," Athena replied coolly. "And for Zeus' sake, Sappho, this is a CAR. Not a carriage."
"Mother Gaea, Atty!" Sappho yelled at the top her lungs, twisting in her seat. She struggled against the acceleration and seat belt. "We stole his carriage! We are sitting in someone else carriage! ATTY!"
Athena drew back the lips, teeth in fierce smile at love goddess' shock. "Don't worry, Sappho. GCPD will take a long while to even track our positions."
"GCPD?"
"Gotham City Police Department, the law enforcer of this city."
"Mother Gaea!" Sappho swore, totally mortified. "We're criminals in this city!"
"Just thieves," Athena offered a belligerent smile, amusement electrifying her gray eyes. "Hermes will bless us!"
"Oh, Mother Gaea, save me!" Sappho prayed for umpteenth time as the gray-black Mustang tore through the road to its journey.
0o0o0o
(Somewhere else)
"Bruce, I…"
"Diana, it's fine."
"No, Bruce. It's not fine." Diana pursed her lips. Aquamarine eyes fluttered open and then shut for long moments, eyelids weighed with a weight that made her lips to struggle with words. "I mean, we've arranged this date after so many efforts and—"
"Diana." Bruce broke in, voice flat without emotions. "It happens. Emergency comes. Duty calls. You didn't even know if they call you suddenly back to the embassy at this time."
"I guess." Diana nodded; her shoulders sagged as she leaned back. Her thoughts wandered again.
After so many personal—and some global—trials, she'd scored the date with him. She knew all. Her schedule was busy with next week. Too many meetings, a score of tours lined up with various delegations around the globe and some more JL duties with new members.
"We'll reschedule sometime at Manor, Princess." Bruce said, suddenly smiling lopsidedly. "Alfred wants to show you some new dishes."
Diana shook her head. Bruce talks did nothing to her troubled mind; even the cold wind bruising against her forehead didn't ease her worries. She zoned out, thinking about the trouble that interrupted their evening.
What could be that important at this time in embassy?Last time she had checked, her next important meetings could wait for at least tomorrow. Why cannot world wait for few more moments?
Answers to these questions were nothing, but more puzzles. Perhaps, it was just her own fate conspiring with her.
"I'm sure Alfred wants to swap some hair-raising tales with you, Princess."
"Bruce!" Diana ducked her head at his poor attempted humor and snapped, seriously. "Your jokes rot, Bruce!"
"Really?" Bruce made a pro forma smile in his dumb playboy style, not affected by her snap. "Then my bad. I thought girls smiled at them."
"Bruce!"
"Don't go sulky on me, Princess." Bruce expression shifted immediately. "It doesn't suit you."
"Then?" Diana inquired as she saw Bruce talking instead of her. It was another small victory for her when his non-talking and non-brooding mood lifted off.
Generally, his speeches were just briefings in founders meetings, where the World's Greatest Detective rasped out the routine reports of interesting events. Though, Diana had her hunch that a handful of important news filtered out by him, on purpose.
"Other than sulking, you can do whatever you want."
"Really?" Diana asked, leaning closer. She could feel the warmth of his body oozing through her dress. Regardless of time spent together, his cologne still badly affected her. "Anything, Bruce?"
Bruce arched a brow, concealing any stray emotions she could detect. "Anything, until it's safe—"
Words ripped apart in a wet, sloshing "mmphf" as Diana's lips clashed to his. Her hands grappled with his shirt, sensing and enjoying the spasmodic up-and-down of his heartbeat through roughened fabrics of suit.
As her own heartbeat galloped like a wild mare in grassland, with the cool breeze outside tempering everything from hot to cold, like the steel cooling and heating in the fire of smelter, Diana crushed those boundaries that he had erected around him.
No limits, Bruce—she mulled evilly.
His lips resisted deliciously against her rosy lips, savoring the spice of his breath. And as the aftertaste of red wine in her prodding tongue hit Bruce's lips, he yielded under her assault, welcoming the invader. His guttural moans satiated her desire, but not enough to give up so early.
Diana wasn't satisfied. She pushed—hard. And the reply came back in fury.
"Mmm." She moaned, gasping for short breaths as Bruce's hand fisted in the tangle of her ravens, smashing her body closer of him, and sealing her lips. Their tongues dueled in a supremacy over the kiss while Diana's fingers ripped open few more shirt buttons into fray.
She could smell the mix of tension, arousal, and love in his breaths, even if he denied all of them. Just like she discerned that somehow he was still driving the car. Ever the multitasker.
Her mind reflected on new conspiring ideas, as Diana gave a mischievous grin.
"Mmphf…" Bruce groaned vocally and synchronized his driving. He was tempted to stop the car, when the announcement came in.
"That's the small payback for all surprises, Mr. Kane," Diana reminded, leaning away and retreating her lips with a faint but wet brushing. "If you stop the car, this session will end here."
For a man who didn't get surprised easily, Bruce judged, he was hiding his surprise better. Because in next moves, Diana had flexed her long toned legs—very long in Bruce's observation—across his seat, straddling him, and obscuring his driving view.
"Diana, what are you doing?"
"Sitting in the car, Bruce." Her answer was innocent along with the innocuous smile. Her aqua eyes glistened with the roll of her seductive hips, which forced Bruce to clamp down his jaws.
"Princess, I cannot even see the road. How am I supposed to drive?" he asked, trying to be threatening. Instead, his voice was more of a husky from the heavenly view of bosom, which was practically jiggling in front of his eyes.
"But you're driving, Bruce." Again, the same innocent smile.
With her hips slowly grinding against him, Bruce moaned and groaned, of course, internally without any indication to his princess. If he wasn't driving the car, Bruce might have adored the triumph grin on Diana's face too.
But Batman had a lot of blind driving experience in Bat mobile. Even if he had never driven a car with a voluptuous Amazon sitting in his lap, Bruce was determined to prove himself. Despite everything, it was just a difficult task. Certainly not impossible.
No, the toughest part was the dress. Diana's dress.
Combined with his accelerated heartbeat and the Zen meditation Bruce was using to calm down his arousing bubbles, he observed that her dress was way too short to be called a knee-length dress.
At every turn the BMW made, her dress rode higher and higher, exposing a perfect olive suntanned flesh and Bruce recognized he was in trouble. In his mind, the furious war waging between his playboy alter ego and the sensible good Wayne was in its last phase.
"Diana, this is not working!" Bruce tried a menacing warning to the mounted princess who was enjoying him as if she was sitting in a cozy fun-ride of amusement park. "This is hazardous way of driving."
"Still collecting facts, my detective," Her voice purred closer to his ear but not touching, just teasing him forward. But Bruce ignored the bait, trying his best at driving.
"I'm stating my observations, Princess." Bruce argued, putting some distance between his flushed face and the jiggling bosom in front of him.
"Hmm." Diana hummed for few seconds, rosy lips rippling with smile. She pushed her pinky finger on his lips. "Do I hear complains from the Great Batman who can do everything?"
"Princess!"
"You're not enjoying our journey, Bruce. For all your surprises this evening, I'm returning just a small favor. Besides, I've heard that the Batman is good at multitasking."
"Multitasking is banality for me," Bruce retorted. "So?"
"So," Diana leaned. Her breath ragged, evoking a promising daydream for Bruce. She asked, "You said I can do anything?"
"When it's safe to—"
"This is perfectly safe, Bruce." Diana grounded her argument with sudden shift in her hips grating moves as Bruce squirmed in the seat, jaws clenched furiously and suppressed any type vocal output.
"Diana, this is not safe."
"Hmm." Diana hummed again. Bruce sensed the closeness of her body almost burning against him; her lingering smell was blocking any other scents, when he paddled the brake at last minute.
And the BMW halted at stop. "We're here, Princess."
"Where?" Diana asked, puzzling at why the car unexpectedly stopped. She was relishing this torment of her beau as her plan was going smoothly.
"Your home, Princess." Bruce smiled crookedly, finally relaxed. His palms flattened against Diana's back as she craned her head from one side to another.
"How did we reach here so fast?" Diana demanded, amazed as her surprise was spoiled. "I thought it took one hour from Gotham to here."
"Shortcut," Bruce clipped. "Batman's special."
0o0o0o
"You wasted my surprise in middle, Bruce." Diana objected, still sitting in his lap. Bruce eased up in seat, painting another idiotic smile on his face. She looked even more beautiful in anger.
"Sorry, Princess," Bruce said without a hint of remorse. "I'm not fond of driving in this position. And I've no plans to make my afterlife journey that soon either."
"So," The gleam in her eyes evoked too many dreamy scenes for Bruce playboy alter ego, who was literally bouncing around in his mind. "We've got few minutes earlier than we planned. Don't we, Bruce?"
"Yes," Bruce replied cautiously.
Keep the lid on your dreams, Bruce—he chastised to himself. His mind was crayoning too many scenes—like a child left in a room with lots of crayons and a perfect white wall.
"Then," Diana closed the small distance.
"I thought you never want to get late on your meetings, Princess."
"Ah, my meeting." Diana pulled back, as swiftly as she had leaned, and climbed out with her flying ability. "You're distracting me, Bruce."
"Right," Bruce grunted, feeling like an idiot who himself knocked out his golden chance. "Good to know, I'm good at something."
Climbing out of the car, Bruce eyes inevitably ran over his date.
Her ruffled black ravens, the snugly black dress slightly crumpled here and there. She looked so viable option to him. She was the woman.
The woman he'd searched for his whole life. How easy it looked now. Only if he could go on his knee and pop up the question that would seal their lives together—Bruce and Diana. Together and forever.
Silly.
But he knew how silly that dream was. Even in fantasy, he didn't deserve her—he absorbed that fact a long time ago.
He was only a lowly life man with lots of coins and nothing else. Even if she wore a simple dress with only her bracelets, she was still the Wonder Woman: the paragon of virtue, the epitome of love, the heart of Justice League.
How could he be that selfish to want her for only himself? No. It wasn't the style of Gotham's protector. Neither the son of Martha and Thomas Wayne could sleep with that idea.
To contrary, she was an unattainable conquest. Forever and ever.
"Bruce, you're brooding again," Diana stared at Bruce while he drove away his cobwebs.
"No. I'm thinking there is little surprise left in our evening," Bruce said, approaching her, eyes scanning her from toes to head. "Ready?"
Her brows furrowed, but in challenge. "I thought your surprises ended long ago, Bruce."
"Not yet, Princess. But for this, you've to close your eyes."
Diana gave a crook smile. "Another man's world custom for date-evenings?"
"You can say that." Bruce kept his expression neutral. "And since we're acting as "Normal couple", we need to do this."
"Okay, I'm ready then," Diana replied, closing her eyes. "But—"
"No more questions, Princess." Bruce used his stern voice as he admired the woman-standing front of him like a Greek statue of some goddess.
Tall, lean, but somehow still willowy; how her mother did mold such beauty with clay, Bruce couldn't comprehend.
"WH…Bruce, what are you doing?" Diana asked as she felt herself airborne, but in a warm envelope of strong arms.
"Taking you to your home," Bruce replied, carrying her bridal style. "Thought, you'd like this custom."
"Not one percent, Mr. Kane." Diana rejected, opening her eyes, peering at him. Although she sensed homely in his arms, she didn't have any plans to tell him. "This is just another custom in which men show off their grandeur to their brides, nothing else."
"Well, I'm glad you've such open view on this," Bruce paused for some effects, "because you're kind of heavy also, Princess."
"WHAT?"
"The door, Diana." Bruce deftly switched the topics as he finally reached the door of her embassy apartment. "Will you open the door for me?"
"Don't change the topic, Bruce," Diana snapped while Bruce held her bridal style. "I'm heavy!"
"The key to the door, Princess." Bruce overlooked the whining princess in her arms. "You've the keys?"
"Bruce, you called me heavy."
"Did I?" Bruce asked, clueless as ever. "When?"
"Just now, Bruce!"
"Slip of tongue, Diana." Bruce answered amiably as he contemplated of unlocking her door. Would she mind if he cracked open the lock? She could easily afford a new lock system.
"Slip of tongue with my boots! Bruce Wayne, I'll—"
Diana's curse cut off as the apartment's door swung open from inside and a known voice called. "My sun and stars, you're home!"
As Diana's aqua eyes widened in surprise, more surprised than Bruce had ever seen, he tore his gaze away from princess in his arms and looked up. His own face almost contorted in same gesture.
He needed his contingency plan. Because in front of him stood the Queen of Themyscira herself, the Royal Highness Hippolyta.
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A/n: As always, feedback is graciously accepted. Until then. Keep reading.