I do not own Martian Manhunter/J'ohn J'ones, Alfred Pennyworth, Leslie Thompkins, or Batman/Bruce Wayne. I did create Evelyn Ainsley, Madge Robertson, Alice, and Thomas.

Wayne Manor Eleven Years After Waynes' Deaths

Bruce's body slumped as he marched down the hallway and then leaned against the wall near a certain door. He rapped his knuckles reluctantly against it. Mr. Fox opened it and squinted out at him. "Bruce?"

"Considering how this second 'exploration' of Mars went … I think it's time we both let and call her in on this."

Despite their initial glassiness of interrupted sleep, Lucius' eyes immediately took on a gleam of interest. "You mean …"

"And she may take it better from you than me, since she already thinks I'm on the brink of insanity."

Lucius nodded. "I see. I'll get on it this morning. Go to sleep Bruce."

Wayne Manor Kitchen Eleven Years After Waynes' Deaths

John walked into the kitchen where Alfred was making tea. "I've finished my letters. I have realized though, that I do not know the current addresses of those I wish to send them to."

Alfred began to pour steaming water in a cup and asked, "Are any of those for Dr. Thompkins?"

"Yes, actually, one is."

"Good, because we decided that sending a sudden flood of letters from this house would be suspicious, especially since Master Bruce is not meant to appear to be living here. Sending them from Ainsley manor, however, would seem less suspicious. She has quite an active social life. Dr. Thompkin's is staying there now. You can drop the others off and give her hers directly at her sister's home."

The Martian raised an eyebrow ridge. "Would you like me to walk?"

"You can drive one of the vehicles in the garage if you wish. One of the less expensive ones if you please."

The Martian stared at the butler another moment before saying, "I do not need my mind-reading abilities to know being sent directly to a shrink is a trap."

The Englishman dropped a few cubes of sugar into his cup. "If you do not wish to be thus entrapped, perhaps you should not do things like disappearing without a trace. Now, would you like a meal before you go? Before they fell asleep, Master Bruce and Mr. Fox were both most insistent you not be allowed to go hungry. I also do not wish to send a guest of ours hungry to another household."

"And, if I don't step into the trap, Mr. Pennyworth?"

Alfred raised the cup to his lips. Before taking a sip, he said, "Then perhaps your letters won't ever be mailed." He blew on the tea and sipped it.

Ainsley Manor Eleven Years After Waynes' Deaths

John pressed the button on the gate into Ainsley manor. It opened. Evelyn Ainsley opened the front door as he approached it. He gave her a long stare. The last time he'd seen her had been when Bruce was young. Her face and form had always resembled those of Dr. Thompkins to him. The emotions her personality caused to waft off her, though, usually did not. She gave him a cheeky smile now. "Hello, I was told to take those." She pulled the letters from his hand and gestured down the hall, "And to take you to see my sister in the parlor. One of my guests should be in her room drawing and the other is outside with Thomas and my dogs exercising them. That's why I'm letting you in and escorting you around. Normally Thomas does this, but despite all the rumors, I recall you being a pretty harmless seeming man. At least, you don't remind me at all of my first husband."

"Glad to know that."

She opened a door in the hallway and called in, "Leslie, here's your guest."

Leslie sat on a posh sofa with a straight face, bellying the turmoil of emotions he felt coming off her. She nodded to Evelyn. "Thank you, sister. Could you leave us?"

"If he'll step inside." John did. The woman who was just slightly younger than the one before him shut the door on them both.

The Doctor swept her gaze up and down him. "Alright. Lucius said some very odd things about you. Either I'm going to have to put him on some medication for hallucinations after a blood test, to make certain he's not been poisoned, or you're going to have to show me he's sane."

John sighed. "What do you want to see first?"

"I believe he called your 'actual biological form' fascinating, and that the ... easiest ... of your special abilities to perform ... is reverting to it."

"Seeing 'what' I really am is ... startling."

"I have a fairly healthy heart. Lucius did his best to prepare me."

John shrugged. He took a few steps forward into the light coming through a window and its brightly colored curtain. There, he let the human form of John Jones she knew, fall away and remold into the Martian one she didn't.

To her credit, though Leslie's eyes widened, her face paled, and she drew slightly back, she didn't have a health emergency. Instead, after he was fully in his Martian form, she rose from the couch and approached. "Your skin 'is' not only differently colored, but textured as well ..."

"Healthy Martian skin is moist if we aren't hibernating. You don't have as consistent humidity as Mars caverns did during the "wakeful-living" times, here on earth, so human skin is often more practical for me."

"What is this … shape-shifting used for, by Martains, normally?"

"Mimicking animals our prey and predators wouldn't find frightening or worth eating."

"So, you did a lot of hunting to meet your needs?"

"Hunting, gathering, and we brought back much young life to raise at home in what you might call gardening or raising livestock."

"Interesting. Lucius said your people were attacked?"

The Martian flinched and grimaced. The human went on. "That you crashed here in an attacker's ship, and you've had to do a lot of lying, stealing, and impersonating to survive here."

"Yes."

"This all explains the freezer episode somewhat."

"Yes."

She looked up into his face gently. "You saved my godson's life in there didn't you?"

He answered in a lower, softer voice looking down at the carpet under his Martian feet. "Yes ..."

The woman tilted her head staring up at him more softly as well. "Then, why are they so concerned about you and the guilt you carry that they sent you to me?"

"Perhaps … because even though I have helped many, I have also hurt many."

"And why would you say then you 'have' helped many? There are others besides my godson?"

He grimaced, "Dr. Thomkins ..."

"Yes, though you can call me Leslie."

"I'm beginning to see where your godson learned some of his tactics from …"

"Well, I did recommend some psychology courses to him."

"I imagine he also learned a great deal from observation as well …"

"Did you only write letters to those you hurt, or did you write any to those you did mysterious good deeds for as well?"

Feeling like cornered prey himself, the Martian sighed, but also felt a corner of his mouth turning up into a smile.

Grounds Behind Ainsley Manor Eleven Years After Waynes' Deaths

Thomas watched Alice play fetch with the younger dogs. She tried to throw the ball in such a manner each individual dog would get to catch the toy once. Inevitably, though, the best jumpers got more than their fair share of catches. Thomas glanced away from her and the dobermanns and shepherds to watch Juniper sniff around the trees.

The old St. Bernard was more of a house dog. The ladies of the house thought it best he get out and enjoy some fresh air, sunshine, and the company of other dogs once and a while. Thomas didn't disagree. However, he saw that usually the dog managed to, if not avoid fresh air, then find shade and avoid running with the other younger, fitter dogs more often than not.

The bodyguard and dog trainer felt discomfort niggling at him for far more than that reason. His once co-agent, Alfred Pennyworth, had clearly had suspicions of the guest now inside the house, while he was out here. He didn't disagree that Miss Alice needed protection and guarding, but there "were" five dogs with her and a sixth sniffing at the tree line while no trained man or beast was inside with Miss Evelyn or Dr. Thompkins. So, he wondered where the need for him truly was. Perhaps if he just went in and checked, especially if Miss Alice were in a safer place.

He walked over to her blowing on a whistle hanging around his neck. Alice turned toward him. Her mouth was open in confusion. He pointed toward the kennels and then to her. She pointed to herself. "You want me to put them up?"

Alice thought it early, but it wasn't in her current nature to argue especially with intimidating men. Thomas hadn't hurt her yet, but he was pretty much the definition of intimidating. At 6 ft 3 inches, he had a lean and fit build always held ramrod straight, and piercing eyes, one of which seemed to have narrowly avoided permanent damage from whatever had caused the scar across his face.

When he nodded, Alice turned to the dogs that had all run up to them. She then began leading them after her, nearer the house, toward the kennels. There, she'd give them their meal and fresh water rations.

Thomas glanced down at the St. Bernard still exploring the treeline. Unlike the others, he hadn't been trained to answer to the whistle. He'd come from a different household. The dog should be fine left alone there, though.

Thomas turned and marched toward the house wanting to at least pass soundlessly by the room, where his employer's one and only sister was having a "private session" with the man his fellow agent had never trusted. It may not be good medical ethics for him to overhear something, but after having stolen so many secrets in his younger days, or helping those who had, it didn't bother him much. He was far more concerned with alleviating his fears for Dr. Thomkins' safety.

Parlor of Ainsley Manor Eleven Years After Waynes' Deaths

"So, you have found missing people, been a father to orphan children, and stopped Samson from perhaps doing me and my guests harm … as well as saving Bruce from dying of asphyxiation with some hyperthermia effects thrown in … Yet, you don't think earth needs you?"

"I am an extraterrestrial, literally an invasive species, on your planet."

"Oh please … The very face you can call yourself that means you aren't like any other said invasive species. You can't say the rabbits let loose in Australia know or care about any damage they do there. Nor are you exactly starving us native species. You're more intelligent than this. What is really bothering you?"

"There are many who think me far more dangerous than other invasive species …"

"Other people's assumptions about you based on only partial information is going to dictate how you see yourself?"

"Now, I definitely see Bruce in you."

"We're getting off subject, but since you bring him up, why don't you want to take Bruce' offer to send you somewhere other than Mars? In fact, if you can go somewhere else, where the technology works as well, and then go straight from that planet to Mars later. What is your excuse for passing that up?"

"I'm not comfortable using my Martian abilities as a performance …"

"And your other plan is less self-punishing than that? Have those you would be leaving with even 'said' you must repay them in that way?"

"We have not discussed it."

"And what is the harm in having that conversation?"

"As someone who's been hunted by dogs, I'm trying to decide if you remind me more of a bloodhound or bulldog."

"I'm whatever breed isn't easily sidetracked by such comments."

"Did I agree to be a patient?"

"Interventions usually take place, when those who need them have shown they are incapable of admitting something is destroying them or have come to think their own destruction matters less than it does."

The Martian leaned back. His body tightened briefly, before it sagged. His head fell forward. Leslie continued, "You may see yourself as a net-harm to earth … but, among those you've spent the most time with, you seem to be alone in that opinion."

"There is the opinion of my twin, who does know me best besides myself … if he is still alive."

"Trust me. In my experience, human family members are not in less need of therapy, when their last encounters with family members went poorly. In fact, it's the opposite. You think, if your brother is alive, and learns something happened to you, he will 'heal' better in any way for that being his last memory of you?"

The Martian remained silent.

Treeline Behind Ainsley Manor Eleven Years After Waynes' Deaths

Samson let out a breath he'd been more or less holding for some time. That stupid butler, bodyguard, dog trainer or whatever he was that worked at this place had frustrated him by hanging around his girl every single time she stepped outside. Finally, he'd gone inside while Alice stayed out.

Samson stiffened again. That old dog that slobbered so much approached. As it opened its mouth and began making a racket on seeing him, Samson took a bag out of his pocket and threw some raw meat with something extra in it at the mutt. There, that ought to take care of it for a while. Now, when Alice came down here looking for this monster, he and his girl were finally going to have some alone time.

What do you think now?

Whumptober Prompts therapy, making amends, "I'm alive, I'm just not well," (Elliot Lee "Alive, Not Well)

What do you think

God bless

ScribeofHeroes