Disclaimer: I do not own any part or characters associated with DC comics.

Thanks to MGD for betaing as always makes my story leaps and bounds better.

Once again questions concerns comments feel free to hit me up love the reviews so far.

Enjoy!

Chapter Four: Introductions

After an hour or so of mingling with Gotham's elite, Diana realized a few things: she liked champagne, these the men were pigs, no one fit the profile of Batman thus far, and, most frustratingly, she had yet to corner Bruce Wayne into a conversation. Diana had seen him within the first five minutes of arriving and had kept half an eye on him ever since. Annoyingly enough, whenever she tried to maneuver closer to him, he seemed to move further away as if he was anticipating her movements. By Hera, it was getting on her nerves. She talked to everyone else on the list of possible suspects and had already summarily dismissed them as potential candidates. Most, she found, either mentally incompetent or physically unfit to fill the role of the Dark Knight. Bruce Wayne was her last suspect, even though, she knew other members had disregarded him due to Superman's insistence that he could not possibly be Batman.

Diana found it amusing how her fellow League members were treated. Superman was looked upon in awe, and people crowded around him like fans to a celebrity just to be in his presence. Flash darted around to everybody making jokes that received laughs from all cliques, and he had quite a number of young girls giggling in his direction trying to get his attention. John was treated as just another person until people noticed his unnaturally green eyes, which seemed to frighten them into abruptly ending their conversation with him. Regardless, he still had a steady group of military and law enforcement men and women, who had probably seen too much to care about a person's eye color. Shayera was the most annoyed of the Leaguers, which was probably due to the large group of young men that were trying to flirt with her drawn by her exotic wings. Diana had to stifle a laugh at the look of impending violence on her face as another young man reached his hand out to attempt to touch her wings. Out of all the League members, Diana felt the worst for J'onn, who people seemed to avoid like he carried the plague. She assumed people were afraid to talk to an alien that looked so much different from them. The one bright spot of hope with the matter was that an attractive Asian woman did not seem to share the fears of her peers and had struck up what seemed to be an engaging conversation with J'onn.

Diana wondered why people approached her infrequently. Unless she walked up to a group, everyone tended to leave her alone. Her isolation left her feeling slightly uncomfortable, and no one seemed to want to clue her in as to why. She had not even been asked to dance yet, not that she wanted to necessarily since she could not comprehend why the women would allow the men to lead them around the floor like a trophy on their arm. For the most part, her night was turning out to be very boring with no one wanting to engage her in any meaningful conversation. Insofar, almost all of her interactions had solely been of an investigatory nature to ferret out the identity of Batman. Speaking of Batman, she suddenly realized her last remaining target, Mr. Wayne, was no longer in sight. Diana quickly scanned his customary spot on the direct opposite side of the room to no avail. Could he have left? It appeared so, and she never got a chance to even talk to him.

"Stupid, stupid coward, Diana," she berated herself aloud.

"I don't know what you did, your Majesty, but I get the feeling stupid and cowardly could not be farther from the truth," a deep, melodic voice said from behind her. Smiling at the fact that someone actually approached her while simultaneously blushing in embarrassment at being overheard, she turned around looking into the handsome smiling face of none other than Mr. Bruce Wayne.

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Throughout the night, Bruce was quite surprised that he had to seek out and talk to the League members instead of the other way around. He watched while they all approached other possible candidates of Batman, but he was left surprisingly alone. He had no trouble disguising himself as the playboy to the League members. He even introduced the Flash to some girls knowing that no one would suspect the Batman of being able to play matchmaker. He knew that the Martian was the only one he could not approach for fear of detection, so he harmlessly suggested to a friendly how fascinating it would be to get the story of Martian origins from a native. Now, they both seemed to be deeply enjoying their conversation. One person he had yet to approach, however, was Wonder Woman.

He realized that she was trying to corner him within the first five minutes of her arrival, so he had kept on his toes ever since. Thankfully, the bonus of playing the part of a rich airhead playboy was that you get a lot of practice mingling and roaming around the room without it looking intentional. Twenty minutes after her arrival, he caught on to her knowingly sneaking glances his way making sure that she knew his whereabouts. It's not that he was nervous-that was certainly not the case because Bruce Wayne does not get nervous-but he did not want to be her primary target from the very beginning. So he sat back and watched her approach some of the other candidates for Batman, all the while knowing that he would have to talk to her before the night ended. He just wanted to do it on his terms.

After almost an hour, he saw her shoulders slightly slump and heard her sigh as she scanned the room looking at the other League members. Then, it hit him. She was feeling alienated and alone. He had not seen her dance with a single dignitary, not that an Amazon would let a man lead her around he thought. No one really had approached her to engage in a conversation. This was good. This meant she was off-guard, and her attention was elsewhere instead of on finding out about his alter ego. Also, this would give him a good opportunity to talk to her and learn what he needed.

Choosing a moment of lapse in her observation of him, he walked to the bar and ordered two champagnes since he noticed that she was enjoying hers throughout the evening. Taking the drinks, he began to walk up behind her thinking of a way to introduce himself in a non-insulting manner but at the same time seem very un-Batman like. As he got closer, he noticed her head turning frantically looking around the room, probably wondering where he went, before slumping towards her chest.

"Stupid, stupid coward, Diana," he heard her silently say to herself. Perfect.

"I don't know what you did, your majesty, but I get the feeling stupid and cowardly could not be farther from the truth," she turned around at hearing this with a smile on her face and a blush in her cheeks being happy and embarrassed all-in-one.

Having that smile turned on him was like looking into the sun. Before he could help himself, he returned the smile with a genuine one of his own instead of the fake playboy one that he had plastered on his face all night. It didn't help that she had possibly the most gorgeous features he had ever seen being what he could only describe as absolutely perfect. O yeah, he was in deep alright. Taking a breath, he opened his mouth praying that he didn't stumble over his words and said…

Authors Note: Going to be a bit more time before the next chapter since its a bit bigger until than enjoy!