[ What he doesn't tell this young man is that it's a feeling that persists. That's he's not doing enough. That he's somehow failing to keep the promise he made. It hasn't gone away just because he had to stop. It just lives vicariously through Terry now. He doesn't think it would go away for the man in front of him either. ]
Eventually. He didn't remember me at first. But by the end, I made sure he'd never forget.
( The way he turns back to face him is both slow and hopeful somehow at the same time. That to think, some day, he may actually catch the man who'd murdered his mother and father and left him with so much trauma, so much anger, so much pain and misery over the years. At least... this version of himself has. Whether or not he will is still uncertain, much as the events that may or may not happen for him and his Gotham upon his return.
But he stares to him with those blue eyes through the grease paint beneath the cowl and he's left feeling a hundred different things all in the span of a few mere seconds. )
[ He's met other Batmen before and for the most part their lives were similar enough to be near indistinguishable. Especially that singular moment that would spiral their lives into vigilantism. ]
It could be either for you. For me? He was just a man with a gun in a dark alley.
[ He wishes he had more to offer. He spent a long time trying to put more meaning behind their deaths than reality permitted. In the end, it wasn't a grand conspiracy, no matter the angle Bruce looked at it from. In the end, it was just human cruelty in its purest form. ]
( His gaze drops. All this time he thought there might be a connection and maybe there is for him... or maybe there isn't. Maybe that's simply another thing they have in common to some extent across their Gothams. Across their lives. )
I go out every night... hoping that maybe, this time, it'll be the one.
( That it will be the murderer of his parents he's throwing up against a wall or beating down into the ground. )
[ Because there's always a crisis. There's always a fire to put out. Batman is always needed. That's why Bruce finally accepted the need for a new one.
The crisis he's left behind in his own Gotham has Bruce wanting to warn him. To tell him Arkham would never contain the Joker. That his reach his long and he'd use it to warp his life maybe beyond recognition.
He wants to. But he doesn't. He just looks away instead. ]
( From the sounds of it, he never will and, despite it only being two years for him now, he canβt ever see himself stopping. All this, everything heβs doingβ¦ itβs his familyβs legacy, isnβt it? Doing what he can to help and protect Gotham. To make a difference. To change things. Thatβs all that matters. Because someone has to. Someone who isnβt corrupt.
Glancing up, he looks over to him and sees the way he looks away. )
And you haven't even met Jervis Tetch yet, have you?
[ It's only down hill from here. ]
They're all infuriating.
[ The sentence trails off. He knows he's broadcasting. That there's more. It's just whether he wants to give it words. So he'd at least have some idea of what he's getting into, even if he might not remember it back in his own Gotham. In the end, he decides to hell with it. If someone had warned him, maybe things could have been different for Tim. For all of them. ]
But none of them will be more dangerous to you than the Joker.
( Heβs heard something similar. Damian had said something about how Joker will be the one to break him time and time againβ¦ how he should just kill him and not leave him in the hands of the incompetent guards at Arkham. That he always finds a way out and makes it his purpose almost to be so involved in The Batmanβs life in the worst ways he can be.
But it doesnβt have to be like that. Whatβs happened to the Bruce Damian has for a father or this one before him now, doesn't mean it will happen for him. Thereβs no proof or guarantee it will. Still, itβs not as if he doesnβt take some things into consideration. Doesnβt listen to what heβs given. )
Itβs been a year almost since I put him in Arkham. Since we first met.
( One year since The Joker and The Batman began. )
[ It's something he couldn't tell Terry. The memories are painful and he'd rather they stay in the past where it belongs. But this man hasn't had to live it and if Bruce could prevent it from happening, even in some small way, why wouldn't he? ]
Back home, he's dead. Tim shot him, after weeks of torture. I am not saying you should kill him. Just be aware that his reach is long and the shadow he can cast over you can stretch even longer than that.
[ He's cut out some important bits of the story, but the broad strokes are there. He did not kill the Joker, but it was the closest he'd ever come to breaking his no kill rule. 40 years of that eating away at him. Is it any wonder he's been alone and bitter this whole time? ]
( He barely knows The Joker from his own Gotham and yet, already he can feel an entanglement between them happening. Almost our anniversary he'd said with a lazy grin on his lips when he'd visited him in Arkham for information. You're so much more fun he'd whined when his antics had been ignored. The way he'd been able to read him β to know how he felt about the murders deep down... it unsettled him. Had caught him off guard even. How he could read and see him when so many others can't.
So the thought of him being dead is one that gets him to look over to the other man β to stare in silence before he's dropping his gaze again momentarily. He can't claim to know Tim in the way he knows Damian or even Dick here. But he knows he's the third Robin and that he wouldn't train him to murder anyone they ever came up against. But to have been tortured at the hands of The Joker for weeks... )
[ Once again he's forced to confront the notion that in all these years, Bruce had not once reached out to ask if Tim was okay. At any other time, he could put it away. Lock it up with all of the other years of unaddressed issues. But he cannot here. Because whenever he sees them - any of them - it drags all of it up again.
The honest answer is I don't know. ]
I refused to let him continue as Robin so he left. As far as I know, he's fine.
( He left. He hasn't dealt with any of them leaving yet β hasn't even been through the things the other man has and yet, he knows, deep down, that neither of them handle a loss of any kind well. The thought of losing Damian here bothers him in ways he tries not to dwell on. Where if Damian's actual father from his Gotham appeared here and he would have to let him go, he... doesn't know what to think or feel about that. Tries not to, for the most part, but. Doesn't always work.
Staring to the other man, he's quiet again β gaze dropping for only a moment in thought before he's looking back up to him. )
[ The difference - Bruce has learned - is that they come back. All of them, even after Bruce pushed them away. They did not for him. And maybe it makes a little jealous. Maybe it makes him wonder what he did to so drastically change his outcome.
The other Bruce's question lands heavily. Because in the end? Bruce couldn't protect them. Not back then and especially not now. He couldn't even protect himself. Not really. Not like he could when he was 40 years younger.
He wants to say no. But that feels hopeless and Bruce is...not completely devoid of that. Not yet. ]
( Keep them close. Something that, for any Bruce Wayne, can be difficult to do at times, simply because of how they are.
His gaze drops, silence to follow as always is typical of both Bruce Wayne and The Batman. He can't say he tries his best to keep them close, but he also doesn't go out of his way to avoid them either. Not like he first did when he found himself here anyways. Were it not for Damian's relentlessness in seeing to it that he wasn't left alone, he doesn't know where he'd be with the young Wayne, let alone the others. But he still finds himself, every now and then, leaning back into his reclusive tendencies, especially after Clark had disappeared. Someone he had thought of as a friend. )
They're curious about you. Like they were me. We're not the man they've known throughout their lives, but they still feel drawn to us. I guess because we're familiar.
( Even if they're different in their own ways. )
So try to do the same. ( Keep them close. ) Even when you don't want to.
[ That's something that separates them. Bruce doesn't want to see them. Because it means a confrontation he's not ready for yet. He was alone for 20 years; he could endure more of it here if it meant keeping these people at arm's length.
He takes what this younger Bruce is saying - it sounds idealistic. It sounds foolish. Bruce isn't going to do it - and puts it away. ]
( A look over to him, he remains quiet for a moment longer, still finding it strange to be here, face to face, with some possible older version of himself that he may or may not come to be in the future. He still can't claim to be an expert on all of this... on multiple versions of selves and worlds, but. It's not as entirely jarring as it had been when he first found himself here. )
Yeah.
( The word comes soft and simple, a turn made to take his leave before he stops. )
Be careful with this place. It has a way of twisting things as a means to break you.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
so it's unclear whether or not he gets caught so im going with a bit of headcanon
Eventually. He didn't remember me at first. But by the end, I made sure he'd never forget.
π
But he stares to him with those blue eyes through the grease paint beneath the cowl and he's left feeling a hundred different things all in the span of a few mere seconds. )
Then there's a possibility.
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[ He's met other Batmen before and for the most part their lives were similar enough to be near indistinguishable. Especially that singular moment that would spiral their lives into vigilantism. ]
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I won't remember if I leave here.
( But.. )
Who?
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[ Regardless. If the roles were reversed, Bruce would want to know too. ]
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( Given the things he's heard concerning the two mob bosses, he needs to know. )
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[ He wishes he had more to offer. He spent a long time trying to put more meaning behind their deaths than reality permitted. In the end, it wasn't a grand conspiracy, no matter the angle Bruce looked at it from. In the end, it was just human cruelty in its purest form. ]
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I go out every night... hoping that maybe, this time, it'll be the one.
( That it will be the murderer of his parents he's throwing up against a wall or beating down into the ground. )
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[ No body armor. No gadgets. No cape or cowl. Just a young man with too much and too much anger. When he was still learning how to be Batman. ]
If you catch him? It won't be enough. You won't stop.
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( Words that are soft and tired, yet still hold such conviction behind them. )
Jokerβs in Arkham. Penguin is around. The Riddler is who Iβm dealing with now when itβs not corrupt cops and the mob.
( Another day in Gotham, in other words. )
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You never will.
[ Because there's always a crisis. There's always a fire to put out. Batman is always needed. That's why Bruce finally accepted the need for a new one.
The crisis he's left behind in his own Gotham has Bruce wanting to warn him. To tell him Arkham would never contain the Joker. That his reach his long and he'd use it to warp his life maybe beyond recognition.
He wants to. But he doesn't. He just looks away instead. ]
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Glancing up, he looks over to him and sees the way he looks away. )
What is it?
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[ Not what he wanted to say. ]
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He's more infuriating than anything if you ask me.
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[ It's only down hill from here. ]
They're all infuriating.
[ The sentence trails off. He knows he's broadcasting. That there's more. It's just whether he wants to give it words. So he'd at least have some idea of what he's getting into, even if he might not remember it back in his own Gotham. In the end, he decides to hell with it. If someone had warned him, maybe things could have been different for Tim. For all of them. ]
But none of them will be more dangerous to you than the Joker.
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But it doesnβt have to be like that. Whatβs happened to the Bruce Damian has for a father or this one before him now, doesn't mean it will happen for him. Thereβs no proof or guarantee it will. Still, itβs not as if he doesnβt take some things into consideration. Doesnβt listen to what heβs given. )
Itβs been a year almost since I put him in Arkham. Since we first met.
( One year since The Joker and The Batman began. )
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[ It's something he couldn't tell Terry. The memories are painful and he'd rather they stay in the past where it belongs. But this man hasn't had to live it and if Bruce could prevent it from happening, even in some small way, why wouldn't he? ]
Back home, he's dead. Tim shot him, after weeks of torture. I am not saying you should kill him. Just be aware that his reach is long and the shadow he can cast over you can stretch even longer than that.
[ He's cut out some important bits of the story, but the broad strokes are there. He did not kill the Joker, but it was the closest he'd ever come to breaking his no kill rule. 40 years of that eating away at him. Is it any wonder he's been alone and bitter this whole time? ]
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So the thought of him being dead is one that gets him to look over to the other man β to stare in silence before he's dropping his gaze again momentarily. He can't claim to know Tim in the way he knows Damian or even Dick here. But he knows he's the third Robin and that he wouldn't train him to murder anyone they ever came up against. But to have been tortured at the hands of The Joker for weeks... )
Is he alright?
( A beat. )
Tim.
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The honest answer is I don't know. ]
I refused to let him continue as Robin so he left. As far as I know, he's fine.
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Staring to the other man, he's quiet again β gaze dropping for only a moment in thought before he's looking back up to him. )
Are we ever able to protect them?
( Dick, Jason, Tim, Damian. )
Or is nothing we do ever enough?
( Because it's beginning to make him wonder. )
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The other Bruce's question lands heavily. Because in the end? Bruce couldn't protect them. Not back then and especially not now. He couldn't even protect himself. Not really. Not like he could when he was 40 years younger.
He wants to say no. But that feels hopeless and Bruce is...not completely devoid of that. Not yet. ]
Don't do that to yourself. Just keep them close.
[ Don't be like him is what he's saying. ]
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His gaze drops, silence to follow as always is typical of both Bruce Wayne and The Batman. He can't say he tries his best to keep them close, but he also doesn't go out of his way to avoid them either. Not like he first did when he found himself here anyways. Were it not for Damian's relentlessness in seeing to it that he wasn't left alone, he doesn't know where he'd be with the young Wayne, let alone the others. But he still finds himself, every now and then, leaning back into his reclusive tendencies, especially after Clark had disappeared. Someone he had thought of as a friend. )
They're curious about you. Like they were me. We're not the man they've known throughout their lives, but they still feel drawn to us. I guess because we're familiar.
( Even if they're different in their own ways. )
So try to do the same. ( Keep them close. ) Even when you don't want to.
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He takes what this younger Bruce is saying - it sounds idealistic. It sounds foolish. Bruce isn't going to do it - and puts it away. ]
Is that all you wanted?
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Yeah.
( The word comes soft and simple, a turn made to take his leave before he stops. )
Be careful with this place. It has a way of twisting things as a means to break you.
( Like the image of their mother. )
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[ Bruce doesn't sound dismissive or flippant. Just tired. ]
But I take your warning. Take care of yourself, Bruce.