A/N: Well, I figured I was being evil enough so I'm posting this chapter so you know.

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Madness and Death

"I prepared a little breakfast," Alfred said morosely, carrying a tray containing some food and Rachel Dawes' letter into the room Bruce Wayne was currently occupying. Bruce didn't answer. Pieces of his armor were lying around, discarded carelessly, and Bruce sat in a chair, half dressed in body armor, crying silently. "Very well then." Alfred set the tray of food on a table. He could completely understand Bruce's pain; Rachel and Jennifer Dawes were dead, blown to smithereens because the Joker had lied. Alfred shook his head sadly and turned to leave Bruce in peace.

"Alfred." Alfred stopped.

"Yes Master Wayne?"

"Did I bring this on them? I was meant to inspire good, not madness, not death," Bruce lamented, holding his cowl in his hands. The only reason Bruce hadn't gone after Jenna was that the Joker had assured him that Jenna was with Rachel. However, at the exact moment the bombs had gone off at Harvey and Rachel's locations, a third had gone off at another abandoned warehouse. When the GCPD was finally able to send someone over to the location, they discovered a Joker card, bearing the message: What can I say? I'm unpredictable. Though they had not yet found a body, there was no doubt in anyone's mind that Jennifer Dawes was dead. Gordon himself had hardly spoken to anyone since then and Bruce couldn't help but wonder if he blamed the Batman for Jenna's death. It made sense; Jenna was the Batman's biggest fan and despite the fact that Jenna and the Batman had kept their meetings fairly well hidden, it was possible one of the corrupt cops had found out and told the Joker about them.

"You have inspired good," Alfred assured him. "But you spat in the faces of Gotham's criminals. Did you think that there wouldn't be casualties? Things were always going to get worse before they got better."

"But Rachel and Jenna, Alfred."

"Rachel and Jenna both believed in what you stood up for. What we stand for. Gotham needs you."
"No. Gotham needs its true hero, and I let that murdering psychopath blow him half to hell."

"Which is why, for now, they going to have to do with you."

"Rachel was gonna wait for me, Alfred. Dent doesn't know. He can never know." Alfred took Rachel's letter off of the tray, knowing that Bruce didn't need any more sorrow at the moment. "What is that?"

"It can wait."

"That bandit, in the forest in Burma, did you catch him?"

"Yes."

"How?"

"We burned the forest down." The two men looked out at the view of Gotham City, wishing that things could've gone a little differently, that they could've saved one of them.

Meanwhile, in an abandoned warehouse miles away, Jenna Dawes woke up after having been rendered unconscious for a second time in twenty-four hours. She got up groaning, and realized immediately that she was not alone.

"Rise and shine, Sleeping Beauty!"