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For Whumptober, a different take on Ra's Al Ghul, his daughter Talia, and how the Pit functions. Also an embrace of fantasy elements, but hopefully with very raw emotions.

Prompt- Trust Issues: "You got away with the crime while the knife is in my back." (Charlotte Sands, "Rollercoaster")

He should have known better. His hubris, his need to be better at fighting and surviving than anyone else only human, to be unbeatable by all Gotham's criminals, had driven him here to this desert. He'd come to meet the one they said was unkillable. He'd had no idea about The Pit back then, no idea it could take life, knowledge, and skills from the living and give it to the recently dead. He'd had no idea the man who discovered and had taken advantage of this for thousands of years would become obsessed with him.

Al Ghul had decided he'd have the strength, intellect, and determination of apparently his favorite student in centuries as part of his organization one way or another. First, he'd tried to convince him to join him. Then, he'd tried to have his daughter, if not seduce him long-term, at least long enough to produce a child with her. Now, Ra's Al Ghul held a knife to Tim's throat at the edge of The Pit.

Bruce repressed a sigh. If he attacked and was killed by Ra's, Talia, or any of the members of their cult gathered to witness this, they could throw him into the Pit dead. He could then emerge with Tim's intelligence, his computer skills, even his memories … and Tim would be dead in his place.

He didn't think this was what Ra's really wanted. Despite his long list of useful attributes, he'd been a pain for even this patient villain to acquire. No, Ra's must think a younger person, as or more intelligent, but not yet fully formed mentally or physically, could be easier to mold. From what he saw in Tim's eyes and heard from his mouth, his old teacher and current enemy hadn't broken him yet.

Tim had high ideals, maybe higher than his own. He'd been afraid, though, the newest Robin's mind and body might not be ready for Ra's Al Ghul's methods. As Bruce studied the teenager's body and face, though, Robin didn't look as worse for wear as he'd feared … yet …

Tim had figured out his captor's likely plan as well. "Bruce don't! The world needs The Batman! I'm just …"

Ras dug the blade's edge in causing drops of blood to appear. Tim's eyes widened in fear as he went silent. Bruce knew, though, the fear was not for his own life.

Pride, despite the grim situation, made a corner of his mouth twitch up. Tim … Robin … his new partner … was well worthy of the position … more than he knew. He never should have all his potential, his life, cut short by the perils it brought though. Ra's had cornered them both well.

"Ra's … whichever of us comes out … you can't guarantee that person will join you … You may only get yourself one twice as capable enemy."

"Well, that would be a nice challenge for me. But I wouldn't be so sure. The Pit can be quite a transformative experience."

Bruce felt his heart sink a little lower. Tim's eyes, if not his mouth, were screaming at him. Bruce frowned back. What could he say? He could reassure Tim the world needed him too. He could say whatever the Batman had Robin did not, he might be about to have. Would that really help Tim though? Was there anything he could say that would?

"I'm proud of you."

Tim's face fell. His eyes watered. No, that hadn't helped. The teen just knew he'd lost their mostly unspoken argument …

Ra's added, "Yes, I must admit, in several ways, he was even better than I hoped, but still … I think he can be improved."

With that he sliced the blade through beginning to bleed the boy out before turning and tossing his body into the Pit. Bruce's frown became a scowl, he tilted forward and bunched his muscles to lunge after his partner. Then Talia leapt in his way. "No beloved! Please! Don't do this!"

Ra's spoke from where he'd retreated to give Bruce a clear path. "Daughter, we will not gain what they have to give us any other way."

"No! Let me try to reach him again, Father! Please! Bruce, you must listen to me!"

Bruce glared and growled at her while clenching his fists. "Get out of my way."

"No! The boy 'is' superior, but not as superior as you! And we ..!"

He tried to dodge around her. She mirrored his movements staying between him and the Pit. He tried to grab and throw her. She countered and used his own momentum even turning him away in a full circle away from the pit before releasing him onto the sandy floor.

He got up onto his hands and knees and paused thinking. Ra's spoke from nearby. "Perhaps daughter, he'd actually unworthy or The Pit 'and' you."

Bruce's hand gripped the sand. As he felt their edges dig into his skin, he began shifting the stones out of the handful he had. While doing so, he opened the door of bitterness in his heart. There might be a time limit on this. Tim needed him. Now was the time to be cruel if there ever was one. And he'd never have another chance to say this. "Once, for hours, maybe days … I actually thought I might love you Talia."

Her eyes widened behind him. He went on. "It was while and shortly after you gave birth to our son. You were more vulnerable than I had ever seen you before, and yet, as usual, strong. We loved the same thing then, the same person. I saw not only pride, but tenderness in your face as I handed him to you and you cradled and fed him. I thought 'If only I could convince you to come with me … to raise him in Gotham far from your father's influence.' But then I left to save the world for the two of you as much as anyone else. And when I returned it was to find him gone, and hear from your lips he developed a sickness you and your father decided made him too weak to be allowed to live and shame you both … You even disposed of the body in such a way I couldn't even have that, couldn't take his remains back home with me. You no longer wanted him dead or alive, but still couldn't leave me anything …"

He heard her soft voice almost sounding like a plea behind him "Beloved …"

Somehow, hearing her speak so didn't soften, but further sickened him. "I didn't think I could ever hate someone else as much as the Joker. But you have 'both' taken a son from me …"

He heard her lean toward him, imagining her eyes wide, at least her mouth he knew was open as he heard her say "No …"

He turned and threw the handful of sand. Some landed in her eyes, some in her mouth. He knew this, because he successfully dodged past her and heard her choke behind his sprinting back. Just as he sprang to a dive into the Pit, he heard her voice one more time, still strangled. "No!"

As he sliced through the liquid, The Pit's contents did burn. It was like he was being dissolved. He forced himself to swim down and reach. Far too long later, it felt, when he thought he might pass out from the pain, he felt something.

He grabbed and pulled. More body followed. By touch alone, he recognized it. He'd had to carry it when it was limp through pitch darkness before, had had to examine it by touch alone for breaks and blood in the same.

He wrapped himself around the lithe, limp body. Tim … I've got you. I'm sorry. But I will not lose another son here. And the world does need your heart and brilliance for years to come. I hope whatever you gain from me by this is later more help and comfort to you than a burden and you escape my foe even more fully than I did in life.

Talia couldn't stop coughing, nor her eyes from watering, as she stared at where her beloved had disappeared. The surface of the green liquid was still moving from his dive into it. She overheard a murmur from her father and turned to see him staring at the same place. "Was I not right, my followers, to want his skills and cunning with us? Now it shall be passed on into a mind and body hopefully more willing to receive my tutelage and accept my authority as all of you have."

Now, she had the perfect excuse for crying, Talia didn't want to hide it. Her throat was swelling with the irritation of the sand along with emotion, so she didn't speak. But she wanted to yell.

She'd done everything he asked of her for years, even lied to the man she loved, breaking his heart, making him believe she did something she had not. She even hid their child from him … Now, even as he also admired the courage, ingenuity, and determination of her beloved, her father didn't mourn him with her, only awaited his gifts to be put to use for him. He wouldn't mourn with her for the man … her beloved … the father of their living son. She hadn't managed to admit this before he disappeared.

She could not even blame Bruce for his actions. He'd acted as the man she'd come to love, so determined to save those "he" loved and brilliant as he did so always. She would never forget or stop loving him. She bowed her head, not caring at that moment who noticed. What would she tell Damion?

Then in a flash everything changed.

Light and fine sand filled the air. It was as if lightning had struck deep inside the rock formation where not even sunlight should reach. She could not see anything for a moment. When she did reopen her eyes and see flecks of sand like diamonds drifting in the air. They seemed to be slowly falling like snowflakes to the floor, which should have been impossible.

Curiosity or hope drove her through them to the edge of the Pit. It was no longer glowing green or filled with liquid. It was simply an empty pit.

She peered down inside it. Two faces, not one, looked back up at her. They seemed almost as equally shocked looking as she was sure she, her father, and their people's faces must look.

Tim looked unharmed. That was actually expected, but her beloved looked back too, seemingly sound. She glanced at her father.

His face was pale, eyes wide. She'd seen him with painful and deadly wounds looking more collected. She looked back down and saw her beloved and his protege searching for handholds on the pit wall, but it was smooth.

She went to the rope two possible survivors or sacrifices sometimes fought on as it hung over the pit to decide who would enter and exit it dead or alive. She tossed it down to them. Bruce looked up at her over it with skeptical eyes. Tim jumped at and began climbing up fast as a monkey. This goaded her beloved to follow at his "son's" heels. After they scrambled over the lip of the Pit, they turned to study the onlookers causing Talia to do the same.

Some of her father's followers still stared down into the pit with similar expressions as her father's. Others were now staring at her father who finally turned his face toward her beloved. His expression and voice made him finally seem … old. "How?"

Her beloved turned a level cool gaze back at him. "Has anyone entered it before to save another?"

She spoke for her father, believing she knew the answer. "Never. It has always been a struggle or a sacrifice of one who lost to another or fell in my father's favor."

Without turning toward her Bruce replied, "That might be your answer."

Bruce turned and began to walk toward the entrance of the tunnel that led outside, where he might summon a plane or perhaps a fellow member of the Justice League to pick Tim and himself up. She turned and watched. She almost called after him.

As she remained silent though, he didn't look back. His body tense as if expecting an attack. Even Tim, moved in a more relaxed way and glanced back at her and her father instead. Bruce put his hand on the teen's shoulder and pushed him slightly further before him, moving to block her and her people's view of the younger outsider's back. Talia's shoulders and hope fell. She looked to her father now staring back into the depths of the pit again. Again, his voice actually wavered, almost cracked. "How?"

He looked and sounded like she had felt just minutes ago: betrayed. And why wouldn't he? He had loved and trusted this Pit, for power, for immortality, for god-like status in the eyes of many for thousands of years. She felt numb too, yet … not entirely unhappy. Her beloved and father of her child still lived. But, even if she told him the truth, he would never love or trust her.

Her father though, might soon love and cherish her more than ever, would need her. She would stay, where she'd still be loved, cherished, and needed. She's already betrayed her beloved. She would stay with even the one who'd asked her to do it, her father, for whatever time he had left. As she studied certain stares from those once loyal to him, she knew it wouldn't be long.

What do you think?

God bless

ScribeofHeroes