I managed an hour nap in my car and a large fast food coffee, and then I was back at work. Thank God for locker room showers, but it wasn't quite enough to get the glue off my face from my mask and I spent most of first period surreptitiously picking it off. I kept glancing at my phone, but there was no word from Dick. I had a moment of regret for throwing him out the night before, not least because I was still on the bullet train to nun-land and wanted off. Badly. I broke my own rules and took a smoke break behind the cafeteria at lunchtime, hating myself every minute of it. A couple of my students were out there, and I bummed a light off the second string quarterback. Your tax dollars at work.
The day dragged, and I was so tired that I actually dozed off while standing at the board, trailing a long chalk line halfway down the board to my student's laughter as I snapped back up. Tonight I had a date with my bathrobe and the fuzzy slippers Dick always made fun of me for, and I was staying OFF the streets.
When I pulled up, I knew immediately that someone had been in my apartment. My bedroom window was wide open, the curtains shoved violently aside and hanging crookedly from a broken rod. Dick. It had to be. Who else would come in that window when the one in the living room was wider and not visible from the street?
Slipping my crossbow into my purse and holding it at the ready, I carefully unlocked my door and pushed it open, keeping my body to the side of the doorframe until I could gauge the situation. The living room was clear. I listened intently. No sound. I was at a real disadvantage - I couldn't see into the kitchen or the bedroom from here. I kicked off my heels and set down my gear bag, padding in the door silently. Keeping my back to the wall, I inched around the corner and checked the kitchen. Clear. No sign of disturbance. The bedroom then.
I took a chance. I drew the crossbow and held it steadily on the bedroom door. "HELLO?" I called, trying to sound nervous and weak, like any schoolteacher who's just discovered her apartment has been broken into. "Is- is anyone there?"
I was entirely unprepared for who showed up. He staggered to the bedroom door, a trail of crimson dripping from a dozen bloody gashes in his forearm, sweat pouring out of his cowl and streaking his chestplate, and leaned heavily on the doorframe. His gravelly voice was almost unrecognizable, distorted with pain and a barely-contained madness. "Huntress..."
I froze. A dozen thoughts raced through my mind in a split second. If I shot him, right now, no one would blame me. I could blame the puppetmistress. I could free myself and Dick, now and forever. I could be the one who finally took down the Bat, and that had to count for something. Was he about to kill me?
He went to one knee, barely holding himself up. I could see the tightness in his jaw and the muscles of his neck. He was shaking with the effort of... what? Not eating me?
He didn't make a move. I waited, watching him warily. "Huntress..." he whispered again, his eyes fixed on my face even through the film of the cowl's lenses. Knowing I'd regret it, I lowered the crossbow and made my way to his side, kneeling in front of him. "Batman? What happened?"
He choked out something that sounded like "Primal" and reached out for me. I jerked back, raising my weapon. He didn't stop. I kept the quarrel fixed on him but there was something in his face that glued me into place. Besides, what were chances anything short of a grenade would penetrate the kevlar and ceramic that I knew the suit was made from anyway? What was I really going to do, beat at him with my tiny fists until he didn't want to kill me anymore?
A large gloved hand, uncomfortably warm even through the thick fabric, slid across my cheek to lock in my hair, and he pulled me closer. I bit my lip, and I let it happen. The motion put the crossbow quarrel under his chin where there was no armor. This was good. This was okay. I could kill him if I needed to. Where the fuck was Dick?
He was saying something. I tuned back in just in time to hear "-removes inhibitions. Can... be channeled... not resisted." I stared at him, not sure what he was getting at. "Channeled into what?" I asked.
"Sex..." As the word left his lips, entirely foreign on the heroic tongue, I got it. Me? Really? REALLY?
"Seriously?" I stared at him, my mouth gone dry. He leaned in to kiss me, and it was brutal. He seemed completely unaware of the imminent danger to life and limb, or of the fact that we were in the middle of my bedroom doorway, or that he was still completely suited up. His lips were dry and cracking, and the kiss was rough, bruising, desperate... I put a hand on his chest and tried to shove him away, but his grip on the back of my head was like iron and all I did was sprain my neck.
I managed to brace a foot against his chest and kicked him in the solar plexus full force, propelling me back across the living room floor and breaking his grip at the expense of a nasty rug burn. "No WAY!" I spat. He didn't pursue me, picking himself back up to a sitting position and holding his head in his trembling hands. I could see him fighting it, pulling out every reserve of willpower he'd learned over the decades he'd hidden behind the cowl and cape..
I had a sudden, suicidal moment, and crawling back to him on all fours, I took his face in my hands and I kissed him, the hard polymer of the cowl cool to the touch but his skin burned where it touched mine. He let out a strangled groan and yanked at my shirt, buttons skittering everywhere across the floor. Oh he was going to pay for that one. I loved this shirt. He buried his face in my breasts, the stubble on his chin dragging across them like fine grit sandpaper.
Trailing my lips across his jaw, I murmured "How do I get the suit off?" Obligingly, he released the complicated series of latches, catches, hooks and zippers without ever once lifting his head. I couldn't begin to tell you how it all worked, and I couldn't have reproduced it even at that moment. I did find the catches for the cowl with my fingertips, but as I went to release them, he caught my wrists in his hand and growled "No!"
He jerked my hands over my head, crushing my wrists in one powerful hand, and pushed me backwards onto the carpet. I bit back a yelp as he stretched the barely healed wound on my shoulder and the sound seemed to drive him mad. He had me naked in record time. Even though I wasn't sure he was going to remember any of this, or admit it if he did, part of me was still glad I hadn't worn the bunny underwear today, and had instead settled for a plain, basic black thong. I know what you're thinking, and yes, they're entirely impractical. But talk to me about that after you've had some gangbanger make fun of YOUR panty lines under your spandex, huh?
He tore the thong from my body, the elastic snapping under the ferocious assault, and he mounted me the way I imagined one would mount a horse - all business. His mind was so focused on the act that at that moment I could have been a blow up Chinese sex doll for all he cared. Note to self. Buy blow up Chinese sex doll for next such occurrence.
I remembered the condoms too late, but I could never have gotten to them anyway. He drove into me so hard it drew a cry of pain. That got through to him and he stopped for a moment, finally seeming to see me. He was big. I wasn't surprised. Everything about him was larger than life, why shouldn't his cock follow suit?
"Huntress..." the harsh whisper dripped from his lips. I could almost hear the battle between his head and his libido, that deeply entrenched morality fighting not to go ahead with this if it wasn't wanted.
"Yeah?" I whispered back, holding perfectly still beneath him.
"Need this..."
"I know." I bit my lip. "Can I have my hands back?"
He released my wrists, reluctantly. I could feel bruises blossoming there against the tiny bones and I rubbed them gingerly before sliding my hands over his shoulders. I remembered the gentleness he had shown patching me up, the dozens of times he could have turned me in and didn't, the times he'd saved my life, and Dick's, and Dinah's, and everyone else who mattered in my world. Fuck it, I had been ready to do this a week ago. I was ready to do this now.
I dug my nails into his back, whimpering softly. "Please," I begged him. "Shut up and fuck me."
He did. If you've never been with a hero... you are missing OUT. All the training, all the weight lifting, the martial arts and the gymnastics, that all comes through. And we never get tired. I had a moment's respite to wonder who was under that cowl before he was inside me again and all coherent thought fled.
The muscles in his back flexed like steel cords under my hands as he pounded into me, blurring the line between pain and pleasure, and when he came, he let out a long, deep groan, the forehead of the cowl dropping to my chest and resting there. It was heavy. What was in that thing, lead? I sighed, disappointed and unsatisfied. So much for the man, the myth, the legend.
As he recovered, he slowly lifted his head, looking at me through the expressionless mask. Then, he kissed me long and hard, and I tasted blood - I wasn't sure if it was his, or mine, or both. I was ready to wriggle free and try to make my escape when he wrapped his arms around my waist and lifted me effortlessly, carrying me to the bed and throwing me down onto the rumpled sheets. I felt him hardening again in moments, his body half-covering mine. If that couple minutes was all the break he needed, I had most definitely been spending my drunken evenings with the wrong cape. His hand, uncomfortably warm and clammy with sweat, slid between my legs to tease my clit and a tiny moan escaped my lips. A probing finger slipped into me, then another, to find I was still open and wet. Although it hurt, I wasn't about to try and stop this before I got at least one good orgasm out of it. I arched my back, opening my legs, and kissed him. The salt on his skin stung against my split lip, and in a matter of seconds nothing hurt at all anymore.