A/N: Hold onto your hats folks, cause you ain't seen nothing yet! Here's part two, hope you enjoy!

Lovecraft Pt. 2

Bruce led Selina down the streets of the Narrows, glaring icily at anyone who looked at them.

Selina apprehensively started, "So, what you said to Zee back there, about telling Detective Gordon you saw my parent's killer…"

"Don't worry, that was just an excuse," Bruce assured her. "I trust Zee, but people could've been listening and the streets talk."

"So…you did see the man's face?" Selina asked.

Bruce grunted in response. "We're here," he told her before she could ask any more questions. He felt bad for lying, but there would be no point in telling her the truth at that point.

Besides, once this was all over, he'd never see her again.

Selina looked up at the massive building in front of them. "This is the Factory?" she asked. Bruce nodded.

"Come on, let's go threaten a criminal," he said dryly.

They made their way inside pretty easily. Two security guards patted them down and Bruce told him, "There's a knife in my left coat pocket." Sure enough the guard removed a switchblade and Bruce shrugged. "It's a dangerous world," he told them.

The guard nodded for them to go in.

Bruce led Selina into the room where a chunky, red haired man was sitting behind a desk. All around the room were stacks upon stacks of boxes filled with practically anything you could think of.

The man looked up from his desk and exclaimed, "Bruce!"

"Hey, Clyde," Bruce responded coolly. He approached slowly, not wanting to set off any of the guards surrounding the Fence.

"Jack said you'd be coming by. So," he hunched forward in anticipation, "what have you got for me?" he asked.

Bruce pulled out a small paper bag and emptied it onto the table: A watch, an expensive pen, a couple pieces of jewelry, the usual stuff he'd sell to Fences, but all of this was real.

"Hey," Selina complained. She recognized almost all of it as things from her house.

Bruce shushed her and Clyde lulled out, "Wow…sweet swag. Not your usual junk, from what I've heard."

"Moving on up," Bruce told him.

Clyde picked up a particularly expensive looking watch and started swinging it back and forth. "Where'd you get this?" he asked greedily.

Bruce huffed in response. "You want a story or the stuff?" he asked.

Clyde shrugged. "How much?"

"Thousand bucks," Bruce replied.

Clyde laughed out loud at the demand. "Oh, please! Give me a break…"

"And that's rock bottom, you know it is," Bruce pushed.

Clyde leaned up on his elbows and told Bruce, "Fifty bucks."

Selina spoke up. "Fifty?" Bruce gave her a wary look, but she continued, "This pen is real gold. That's an antique jade netsuke. It's worth two thousand dollars on its own."

Clyde got a sinister, curious look in his eyes. "And who is this well-spoken little…missy?" he asked Bruce.

"Never mind who she is," Bruce told Clyde, bringing him back to the subject at hand. "Look, 500 is rock bottom. Besides, most of it is going to Maroni anyways. Why are you wasting my time?" he demanded.

Clyde stood from his chair. "Oh! Maroni sent you. In that case, I'm sure we can…" he took a long look at Selina and continued, "make a deal." Bruce picked up on the man's intentions and he shook his head.

"Nah. We'll go somewhere else," Bruce said, picking up the stuff and starting to swiftly walk away.

The two guards grabbed both of them and Clyde scolded, "Cool down, Bruce. Or, we'll poke your little girlfriend's eyes out and sell her to the highest bidder." Bruce froze. He'd heard a rumor that Clyde was in human-trafficking, but he'd brushed it off as just that: rumors. He hadn't thought twice about bringing Selina here and what the ramifications could be. He wished he hadn't told the guard about his knife. "That's it," Clyde lulled. "Relax." He put a firm hand on Bruce's shoulder and yanked him forward. "I've got some friends coming over who would just love to meet you."

Bruce's eyes darkened and in one last moment of defiance, he kicked Clyde in the groin. The Fence doubled over. Bruce threw himself backwards at the two guards, but the two grown men easily overpowered him, putting the boy on the ground and throwing a flurry of kicks and punches at him. Selina screamed for them to stop, but Bruce said nothing, giving in to the beating and allowing the guards to drag the two of them away.

They were taken into a huge storage room and the guards locked the doors behind them, trapping Bruce and Selina inside.

Bruce fell to the floor, bloody and weak, and Selina rushed up to him. He assured her, "I'm fine, Cat. Besides, I got what I was after," he said with a pain-filled grin. He pushed himself up off the ground and reached into his coat pocket, removing his switchblade. "I took it off the guard when I attacked them."

Selina shook her head. "You're crazy," she told him.

He shrugged. "Maybe, but right now we need to get out of here." He glanced around the room and then pointed at a window on the roof. "They'll probably be locked, but if we make it look like we escaped…"

"They wouldn't expect an attack from behind," Selina finished for him. She started going to work, piling boxes and scaffolding up to the roof. Bruce eventually picked himself up off the ground and helped her, although his breathing was hitched and he was in constant pain.

Loud, deliberate footsteps were approaching the room.

Bruce jumped down and motioned for Selina to hide.

The locked clicked open and one of the assassins entered. He spotted the construction and realized what had just happened. He was about to yell that the kids had escaped when Bruce jumped from his hiding place, tackled the man, and stabbed him in the back of the leg.

The process made a commotion and Bruce and Selina had to rush out of the room before they were seen. They made it to the bottom floor where they found a hiding place under all the junk Clyde kept around.

Selina looked up to see if anyone was coming, and was just barely able to duck under cover before the woman from earlier saw her.

While they did this, gunshots started erupting from all directions. Bruce shifted so his body was in front of hers, on the off chance a stray shot were hit their hiding place.

Over the deafening noise, a familiar voice called into the warehouse, "SELINA!"

"Alfred," Bruce heard Selina whisper. Before Bruce could stop her, she went charging out from the cover, drawing several of the assassins after her.

Bruce froze as they ran past him, completely oblivious to his presence.

He knew that he should've stayed where he was until the whole ordeal was over, but he couldn't let her get hurt, either. Damn that girl, Bruce thought.

He eventually moved from his cover and found a horrifying sight.

The woman had caught Selina and was holding her at gunpoint.

Bruce heard the woman ask Selina, "Where's the boy?"

"Who?" Selina asked, trying to play dumb, although there was no real point in it.

The woman dug her gun into Selina's lower stomach, saying, "Don't make me hurt you. You aren't on the contract." A knowing look passed over her face and she said, "Oh, you like the boy. I gotta tell you honey, you could do better."

Bruce did something very stupid.

He grabbed one of the fallen assassin's guns and shot at the woman, hitting her square in the chest.

He dropped the gun and charged at the woman, who was now tumbling down the staircase.

The assassin stood up, now angrier than ever, but Bruce rammed into her and they went sprawling on the floor. He yelled at Selina, "GO!" and started punching the woman who'd been hunting him for nearly twenty-four hours. Out of his peripheral, he saw her run out of the building and he lost focus on the task at hand.

The woman hit him in the throat, causing him to gag and fall over.

She stood from the ground and held him at gunpoint, saying, "Last word of advice, kid: don't mistake bravery for good sense."

A gunshot sounded and Bruce thought he was dead.

However, it wasn't the woman's gun that had fired. Instead, she doubled over and crashed to the ground. She went still.

Bruce didn't look back to see who'd fired the bullet. He didn't care. He knew Selina was safe and that was all that mattered. He got up and ran up the steps to the room he'd been locked in.

He climbed up the makeshift tower and was able to pry open the windows on the roof. He slid through and arrived on the rooftop of the Factory.

Instead of running away from the scene like he would in any other situation, he walked over to the side and sat of the edge, watching over the police cars and ambulances that'd arrived to take care of Selina.

Bruce smiled to himself as he watched Alfred engulf her in a hug. He gingerly touched his left side where he'd been grazed by a bullet sometime during the fight; he'd been too jacked on adrenaline to notice.

Bruce's heart stopped as he saw Selina look up at the roof. He could see her face in the flashing sirens, and even from several stories above her, he could've sworn he'd seen her smile a bit.

However, he noticed her goggles were no longer on her head.

It was a shame, he liked those on her.

Bruce stood up and sat down on the middle of the roof, hidden from anyone's view.

He laid there for a couple hours, looking up at the foggy sky, just glad to be home, and he eventually fell asleep.


Selina watched him go out of sight. The entire day, all he'd seemed to care about was making sure she was safe.

When she'd heard the gunshot… A million worst-case scenarios had raced through her head.

Then she saw him sitting on the rooftops.

He looked like a phantom, with the full moon shining directly behind him. She could've sworn she'd seen him smile, which in turn made her smile.

A minute or so after Bruce had gone out of sight, Alfred told her, "Come on, Miss Wayne. Let's get you home."

Selina nodded, not really hearing him.


When Bruce woke up again, it was around midnight and all the cops had cleared out of the Factory, along with all the stolen stuff Clyde had had.

He dropped down into the storage room where he found Cat's goggles on the floor. She must've dropped them when they were trying to escape.

Bruce didn't know how he ended up at Wayne Manor, but he did.

He scaled the wall and entered Selina's study where he found her, reading through files and staring at the huge cork board covered with names and pictures and red string.

"Your security still sucks," Bruce announced, causing her to jump in surprise.

She whirled around, but smiled when she saw who it was. She told him, "No one's hunting for me. I didn't expect to see you again," she said.

Bruce raised an eyebrow. "We never said goodbye."

"No, we didn't," Selina replied.

"Well, I didn't want to be rude," Bruce joked.

"I-it's good to see you," Selina told him.

Bruce held out a paper bag full of stuff for her to take. "Here," he said.

Selina came closer and took it. She opened it and found all the stuff that they'd left at the Factory inside. She smiled lightly, saying, "Thank you, but you could keep this. You need it more than I do."

Bruce shook his head. "Nah, let's keep things honest between us. Besides, I needed to bring you these," he said, pulling out the welding goggles from his jacket pocket.

She came closer to look at them.

He'd probably walked all the way from Gotham just to give her these. The whole thing made her feel all warm and fuzzy inside. But she felt something else when she looked back up at him.

Selina acted on impulse.

She stood up on her tippy toes and kissed Bruce straight on the lips, catching both of them by surprise.

However, Bruce quickly overcame the shock and kissed her back, resting his hand lightly on her back as she cupped his face in hers hands.

The entire kiss probably only lasted a few seconds, and it was complete bliss for the pair of them. But Bruce knew he couldn't get close to her. He knew he had to stop all of this.

For her sake.

He pulled away and smiled at her. He whispered, "See you around, Cat," and walked back out of the balcony window.

Selina kept her eyes closed for a couple seconds after he'd gone, savoring the feeling of him kissing her.

She was jarred from her thoughts by Alfred entering the room. He asked, "Having a little chat, are we, Miss Wayne?" There was a knowing smirk on his face.

She smiled. "Thinking out loud," she told him.

"Right," he responded. "Right. Of course you are." He closed the balcony doors and turned back to her. "Shall I take that for you?" he asked, gesturing to the package she was holding behind her back.

She nodded, handing him the package in her left hand. However, she kept her other hand firmly planted behind her, still hiding the welding goggles.

Alfred sighed. "The old house seems very quiet without him, doesn't it?"

Selina nodded. "Yes, it does."

"Shame, really. I was just starting to like that boy," Alfred said with a chuckle.

Selina raised her eyebrows. "No you weren't. You hated him."

He smiled. "Well, best be off to bed, Miss Wayne. Goodnight."

"Goodnight, Alfred," Selina replied.

She went back to her room and entered her closet where she'd hung up her street clothes. Alfred had wanted to throw them out, but Selina forbid him from doing so. She took the hanger down and hung the goggles around the hook, completing the outfit.

She sighed wistfully. Something about the streets had drawn her in, and she laid in bed, restless, wishing she could be back in the Narrows with Bruce.


Bruce scaled down the wall and waited until he heard the balcony doors slam shut. He shook his head, scolding himself for kissing that girl, but also reminiscing in the feeling of it.

Sure, it wasn't his first kiss, but it was still more special than anything he'd had before with anyone else.

Stop it! he told himself. If you get close, you'll only get hurt.

To be honest, he was more worried about Selina getting hurt than him. The thought of what Clyde had almost done, what he could've done…the Narrows wasn't a place for her. She was too good for the people there.

He started walking back towards Gotham, driven by the thought of getting as far away from Selina Wayne as physically possible.

As he walked, he realized the real gravity of the situation he'd put her in. He'd never been worried about getting sold into child trafficking. He'd never thought about it as a kid, and now he was too old-looking to just be taken by someone.

But it could've happened to Selina. He could've sentenced her to that fate and there would've been nothing he could do about it.

Bruce shook his head. Never again would he put her in harm's way, and if that meant never seeing her again, so be it.

A firm hand on his shoulder jarred him from his thoughts.

He turned back and saw that a dark van had stopped and several men in masks were approaching him.

Bruce reacted immediately, grabbing for his knife and slicing the arm of the man who'd already reached him.

The others surged forward, and Bruce was quickly overrun, although he liked to think that he did quite some damage prior to getting pinned to the ground. He felt the prick of a needle in his neck, and everything started to go fuzzy.

Before he was completely blacked out, however, a man without a mask came and stood over him.

It was dark, and everything was blurry, but Bruce got the gist of what he looked like.

The man said in a foreign accent, "Calm, my heir. It is time to rest. Rest," he insisted.

Bruce knew didn't want to pass out, but the man's words were so powerful that he did as he was told and quickly fell into a deep sleep.

A/N: *Cue dramatic music* "Oh, no, what's gonna happen to Bruce?" You'll just have to wait and see :)

But in all seriousness, thank you all for your continued support on this series. I'm finally in summer, so updates will be coming out very frequently, if a bit randomly. Yeah, that thing about only updating on Tuesdays and Fridays isn't gonna happen, cause I can't physically stop working on this project even if I wanted to (which I don't). Review if you enjoyed or have any critiques/questions, and thanks for reading!