Chapter 8

There were no words for the Lazarus pit. It felt like she was on fire and being hugged at the same time. She thought she should be choking, straining for breath, but her lungs weren't burning. There was no hurry to get out. There wasn't much of anything actually.

Memories of her life swirled by. Her father and mother. The first time she saw the Batman. Her choice to become Batgirl. The first time she kissed Bruce. She was young and old simultaneously; she could feel her mind fraying under the strain. She understood how it drove one crazy now. The human mind wasn't made to hold every possibility within itself at once. Her body wasn't designed to be newly made and broken down and healing itself all at the same time.

Dick was still out there somewhere she knew, but she felt no desire to stand up.

Stand up.

Could she stand up? Why try when she was so perfectly cocooned in this warmth.

Stand up Babs.

Babs. Dick called her Babs. Bruce almost never did. It took multiple blow jobs for him to even call her Barb and that was mostly because he couldn't get her full name out. She was pretty proud of that. Why was she here?

Come on.

She wasn't sure she liked this little voice that was so insistent. Had she not earned a rest? Her body was filling with power. Soon she would be unstoppable, so full of power, able to do anything.

Stand up god dammit!

Stand. She could stand. She could feel her legs underneath her. She could feel her bowels and her groin. She could feel her toes as the liquid flowed between them. Placing her feet under her body she pushed up and burst out of the water.

The air was cold, but she was so powerful now. She looked at Dick standing next to the lip and curled her lip at him. What was he but insignificant? A little boy who dreamed of growing up. She strode toward him, gloriously naked stopping when he grabbed her shoulders.

"Come on Babs," he urged her, "snap out of it. Do not go mental on me now."

Raising her palm she executed a perfect strike to his chest knocking him back onto the sharp stone.

"What is going on here?" Bruce's voice thundered in the cave. She smiled with satisfaction as his presence. Barb wanted nothing more than to kill him.

"Barbara," Dick coughed, spitting up a little blood. "I put her in the pit."

Barb watched, amused with the little soap opera in front of her. "What are you going to do Bruce? Hit him again?"

She laughed when he flinched. Standing perfectly still as he approached her cautiously.

"We need to get you out of here and back to Gotham," he said quietly.

"Bruce," she said sweetly, reaching out tenderly for him, "what would ever make you think that I care what you want?" He blocked her strike, but missed her leg as it swung around and caught him on the side of his head.

He went down hard and Barbara wasted no time. Leaping on top of him she began pummeling every bit of exposed skin, and gap in his armor. She remembered them all; he was vulnerable in the joints, at his neck. She was so satisfied with his blood on her hands she completely forgot about Dick. He snuck up behind her, locking her arms in a full nelson and pulling her off of Bruce.

"Let me go!" she screamed madly. "I will kill you too! I will kill all of you!"

Dick's grunts as her feet occasionally connected with his shins were his only response. He held her trapped as Bruce slowly peeled himself off the floor. She watched helpless as he approached her slowly, pushing his cowl back to expose a bloody face.

"Barbara," he said in that same soft voice, "Barbara listen to me. This is the pit. This isn't you. It will fade if you let it. But you have to let it go."

"Why isn't this me?" she spit at him. "You think I don't want to hurt you? To kill you? Do you honestly think I don't feel this way?"

Reaching up carefully, Bruce cupped her face just as she had long ago on her balcony. "I'm sorry Barbara. I'm so very sorry."

She snarled wildly at him, kicking out with her legs but missing as he dodged. She couldn't get her arms free of Dick's hold and Bruce just kept stroking her face and her hair saying he was sorry over and over and over again. She screamed at him, at Dick, even at Alfred and Tim. She screamed at her father and, eventually, at the Joker. She screamed until her voice was raw and then more. She struggled against Dick's hold until she exhausted herself and Dick, but still he held on. Still Bruce kept saying he was sorry.

Finally, days or hours or minutes she didn't know, the rage faded but there was so much sorrow in its wake. She collapsed in on herself as the tears seemed to explode out of her. Her screams shifted to sobs and she dropped when Dick let go of her arms. Bruce caught her, wrapping his arms around her and rocking her as she cried. She thought it would never stop. She cried for her mother. For her father. For Bruce and herself. She cried for every person the Joker had ever destroyed. She cried because those feelings had been hers. The pit may have brought it out, but every emotion was her own.

And still Bruce held her. Dick stood quietly to the side, unsure of his place in the storm. Barb was still crying when Bruce wrapped his cape around her naked body and picked her up. The sobs had abated, but the tears still flowed as he put her in the secondary jet he'd used to follow them. Her eyes were wet as Bruce talked quietly to Dick, hugged him quickly, and finally turned back towards the jet.

Her tears didn't stop all the way back to Gotham.