Title: The Suit (pt 2)
Genre: fanfic (Batman Beyond)
Setting: sometime early on in the series
Rating: pretty darn G
Notes: Batman was created by Bob Kane and is now probably owned by Warner Brothers, DC Comics, and other people who do not include myself. I'm just playing, not making money, so please don't sue me.
II.
The champagne tastes flat. He has to remind himself why he's here, which hands to shake, which toast to make. He knows it's important to Bruce Wayne, but the trouble is that he doesn't always remember that he is Bruce Wayne. He may no longer wear that other suit, but he can't slough off the skin of that identity. He's spent so long wrapped in mythos he hardly knows how to be a regular man, even after years of practice.
He knows he can't get by like that anymore. He's tired of watching Powers wrest the Wayne Enterprises from him, tired of seeing his father's legacy dragged through the mud, tired of feeling like he's just taking up the perfumed space of the elite. He had been resigned, if not content, to spending the rest of his days avoiding the news and nursing his demons; then McGinnis knocked on his door.
He can't decide what really caused him to accept the boy. He's so young, so angry, so earnest. Like Bruce was. Like they all were. Determined to prove something. To find a purpose. To make things better, or die trying.
That's what will happen, you know, Bruce tells himself roughly. He'll die, or else he'll end up hating you and leaving you just like all the others. Bruce knows it isn't fair to think this way, but he's hard-pressed to be lenient when his old bones are aching from standing so long and the society columnist opposite him keeps asking for his opinion on hair gel products.
The explosion is a welcome distraction.
There is the requisite screaming, startled shouts, ducking and running. A burly man is laughing maniacally from the balcony, which is surrounded by billowing smoke. "Stinkin' fascists!" he screams. "You eat your canapes while the proletariat starves! There's only one solution – blow it all up!"
Terry is at Bruce's elbow. "Show time," he says quietly, a wicked grin on his face. Then he's gone.
Bruce has the sinking suspicion that he didn't see the shadowy figure already making its way up to the balcony.