Bruce Wainright has (onerule) wrote in doorslogs, @ 2014-01-04 01:40:00 |
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Entry tags: | batman, death, door: dc comics |
Who: Bruce and Death
What: A small chat and a promise.
Where: Batcave, Wayne Manor.
When: After Bruce brings Dami to the Batcave.
Warnings/Rating: More sads.
Death knew she didn’t have a lot to run on - her hands were still icy, even after having Eddie’s warm fingers around hers. She had given more than she’d expected to help Damian leave the world, but there were still things to do. No matter if Eddie did have worries about what might happen if she pushed herself too far. She couldn’t leave Bruce on his own in the cave, not knowing the state he was in, and more importantly, she couldn’t let Damian’s body remain out there. There was too much a risk of a well-meaning family member deciding that they knew best and “fixing” the situation with the Lazarus Pit.
She knew she wasn’t getting through this without more hatred and possibly even pain. The stretch of being herself - able to see and be all places at once - was already a strain, but she didn’t stop.
Getting from her funeral home into the Batcave would have at one point only taken a second and a flicker of thought, but when she moved herself this time, the ‘arrival’ was harder than she expected. Bare feet hit the stone of the cave floor with two sudden slaps, and she folded swiftly down to her knees, hands braced on the floor for a moment while she caught her breath. After only a few seconds, she pushed herself back to her feet and crossed to where she knew Bruce sat, still on the floor, already silent after his screaming (that she’d heard from across the city), the space in front of him darkened by the broken and bleeding skin of his hands. Damian’s body was cradled in his arms, but it was not (yet) her goal.
She slid down to the floor next to Bruce in a shift of fabric and pale arms. The dress was nearly long enough to cover her feet, but her arms were bare. Above the color, her face held onto its unnatural greywhite color, and her hair hung limper than usual, two signs of her exhaustion. She knew that Bruce wouldn’t notice, though, and that was a very good thing. This wasn’t about her.
“Bruce,” she whispered, rough like rocky coastline, trying to reach him through the shock that had settled over him. “Bruce, look at me…”
Bruce had no idea how much time had passed. An eternity, perhaps, or mere minutes. Things like that had ceased to matter. He hadn’t moved from where he sat, back against one of the rocky walls and Damian’s lifeless body cradled protectively in his arms, and he had no intention of doing so in the immediate future. His mind couldn’t process next steps, it couldn’t fathom the coming days and the funeral and what lay above his head. Somewhere, buried deep, was the knowledge that he had to get up eventually, that Damian would need to be buried. Too, he knew that there were others who’d cared for the boy as he had, but he could barely cope with his own grief; how was he supposed to so much as contemplate theirs? He couldn’t tell them. He couldn’t face them, not even Alfred. The world had shrunk to his son and silence, just that, and it was all he wanted. It was all he could manage.
When his parents had died he’d tried to cling to their bodies, not wanting to leave them, but the police had dragged him away. The last time he’d seen them aside from the funeral, which was little more than a brief glimpse of pretty corpses in coffins, was that night, sprawled over one another in an alley. Then they’d gone into the ground and he hadn’t ever seen them again. He knew the same thing would happen with Damian; they’d take him away and he’d never see him again. There wouldn’t even be a last look at the funeral because his face-- his face was too mangled, not even recognizable due to the burns. Like his parents he would be a headstone, a name carved into stone, nothing more. He didn’t want that to happen. He couldn’t let them take Damian away.
Not yet, at least. It was too soon. He had to keep him safe because he’d already let him die, hadn’t he?
He didn’t hear Death’s arrival, which in itself was an indication that something was wrong; normally he was extremely attentive. His gaze never moved from Damian even when she slid down beside him, his breathing quiet and thready. Every so often it hitched, and he struggled to regain a regular rhythm. Her voice did, at least, register, though he didn’t look at her as she asked. “I can’t leave him,” he said, voice hoarse and strained. Because that must have been why she was there, why anyone would be there. “I won’t.”
Though some people would say that Death had no heart, no feelings, that it (she) was unfeeling and didn’t care about those whose lives she took. Or those left behind. But that could not have been farther from the truth. She cared deeply, treated those she took with respect even when she didn’t have a close connection to them. When she did, which was rare, there was even more care. For those gone and those still alive. Seeing Bruce cradling Damian’s battered, lifeless body just about broke her heart. She knew his history, knew the way he’d been traumatized and then formed by his parents’ deaths. To lose them, and now a son, was the sort of thing that a person might not heal from. Less than that had felled stronger men.
She knew that he hadn’t heard her, and after calling softly to him, she simply sat quietly until he replied. She knew not to pull him too far too fast. He needed to come back on his own. She knew what needed to be done, but she didn’t want to force him. When he finally spoke, though he didn’t look at her, she was at least slightly heartened.
“You’re not leaving him, Bruce. I’m not asking you to.” Her own voice was still rough but quiet as she kept herself folded up next to him. The gruesome sight of Damian’s body didn’t bother her; she was more focused on the living at the moment, knowing that the boy was no longer connected to his former body. Her voice was softer with the next words. “But he’s not here any longer.” After a moment, she took a chance to reach out one pale-fingered hand to rest on his arm.
He drew in a deep, deep breath when she assured him that he wasn’t leaving Damian. Had she asked, or insisted, he would have fought with every bit of strength he possessed but, at present, grief had sapped most of his energy. He was so, so tired, and he didn’t want to fight if he didn’t have to. The very thought of moving was exhausting. Relief was tangible in his exhale, the tension in his shoulders which had manifested as a fear of having his son taking from him easing away, slowly, into a weary slope. “I’m not leaving him,” he repeated, barely a whisper. It was more a movement of lips than sound, for himself rather than for her.
But his calm, if it could be called as much, was short-lived. Her gentle reminder that Damian was gone dredged forth a reality he couldn’t bear to face, and no, no, he didn’t want it. He didn’t want to think. Bruce tried to speak, to deny her words, but all that escaped was a choked sob. He shook his head, eyes closing as though he could shut out the truth that way instead. He’d had his moment of lucidity, when he’d screamed himself raw because he acknowledged that his son was dead, but that moment had passed, and he’d returned to clinging to what was left with pitiful desperation. “I was-- I was there. I was right there,” he said, once he’d managed to regain his voice. “I tried-- I couldn’t--” Another sob, and his expression became twisted into something pained. “He can’t be gone. He can’t be.” There were a million reasons why, why this was so wrong, but he couldn’t find words for any of them. They were just there, swirling round and round in his head.
Her touch to his arm solidified more, still gentle, but very present, trying to anchor him as best she could. Though she cared for both the dead and the living, she was not usually the one to provide the first grief triage for those left behind. Her voice stayed soft, even when his shocky calm disappeared again. She didn’t shush his sobs, knowing that the emotion needed to come out, like poison from a wound that would fester and kill if it wasn’t allowed to heal. The only question was how many people this wound would take with it, if allowed. The healing had to start with Bruce, if possible. She hoped the rest of the family would follow if he could begin.
“I know,” she murmured. “I know you were there.” She tread carefully with what she said, knowing that something too-wrong would set him against her before she handled what needed her care and attention. “I was with Damian.” Careful steps - ‘with’ Damian, not ‘taking’ Damian.
The blip alert of technology cut through the cave, and with a glance down, Death saw the message for Bruce on his own equipment. He was still clinging to Damian, though, so she pressed fingers to keys to reply to Alfred. And after only a moment was left with a new, much shorter, more desperate deadline. Five minutes. She looked at the time as it started to tick away.
“I need you to still be there for him, Bruce. Can you do it for me? For him? He wanted something. Something very important to him.”
It took a few seconds for her words to sink in. “You were with…?” Bruce still didn’t look at her, but a thread of understanding wound around the jagged mess within his mind. With him. Death was with him. He could be angry, and he might be, later, but not just then. No, just then he blamed himself wholly and entirely. Death wouldn’t have had to be ‘with him’ if he hadn’t failed, if he’d saved Damian like he should have. “I was supposed to save him,” he whispered, a shameful thing, like he could barely stand to give voice to his shortcomings. “I was-- I was so close, I don’t understand why-- why--” He broke off again with another sob, shaking his head. He could, and likely would, drive himself crazy with whys and what ifs and should haves. It shouldn’t have happened, Damian shouldn’t be dead, and he didn’t know how to let go.
He was oblivious to his phone, oblivious to who was trying to contact him or that Death was typing in his place. It wasn’t until she she said that Damian had wanted something that he actually paid attention; he looked at her, eyes red-rimmed and weary. “What did he want?” Whatever it was, he’d give it to him. Somehow. Anything for his boy.
The time continued to tick in her head, a stopwatch started by Alfred, yet she still didn’t want to push Bruce. He would never be ready to accept things, but she didn’t want to cause even more harm than had already been done. She saw the understanding as it washed across his expression, and she knew in that moment that once he had recovered enough to really think about it, that he would hate her - possibly even more than he hated himself for the loss of his son.
She didn’t try to answer any of his whys, any of the questions that any parent asked when they lost a child so young. There were no answers that would be acceptable. And so she followed the thread that he had grasped onto, the thought that there was yet something he could do for his son. “He wanted to be kept from the Pit.” It was a simple statement, and could have stood on its own. But she continued. “I gave him the choice, Bruce. I don’t…” She paused. She didn’t usually give a choice. “He said no. And I promised him that I would keep him from it. ...I need your help with that.”
In all honesty, Bruce hadn’t even considered using the Pit. The loss had left him broken, pieces scattered about that he couldn’t collect, and his mind wasn’t working as it usually did. For a moment he thought, maybe, that was how he could fix it, that he could bring Damian back and everything would be fine… but deep down he knew it wouldn’t work like that. Even if Death hadn’t given him a reason why, he knew there was no magical solution. “He said no?” Repetition, again, as he mulled it over. Or, at least, he tried. Damian hadn’t wanted the Pit. He’d had the choice and he’d said no. It would be supremely selfish to go against his wishes, and while losing his son was unfathomable, wasn’t bringing him back against his will as something else even worse?
But those things didn’t matter, not really. All he needed to know was that Damian didn’t want to be Pitted. And so he wouldn’t be. He’d failed him, failed so very much in so many things, but this he could do. “I won’t let anyone Pit him,” he said, after a long, long moment. He looked back down at the boy, marred face and all, feeling a sudden surge of protectiveness beneath the ache of loss. “He should-- he should be able to choose. I-- I can do that much for him.”
Death watched the struggle, back and forth. A father wanting his son back, having the capability to do so, and choosing not to. She nodded when he agreed, and sighed in relief. “Thank you,” she murmured softly before another glance at Bruce’s phone showed that her time was nearly up. Her fingers tightened on his arm for just a moment (chilly even through the material of his suit), hoping that the pressure would get through to him and he would remember, pay attention, agree.
“I can help you with the funeral. When you’re ready. I have a place where I help people with that.” She paused, sighing. “Let me help you. Let people help you.” Another look at the clock. “Alfred will be down soon. Please, Bruce. Let him help.” She held still for another moment, hoping any of her words would be remembered, and then finally pushed herself to her feet. She used the wall as support and did her best to ignore the threat of her knees giving out. There was more, so much more, that she wanted to say, but she only whispered “I’m sorry”.
And then she was gone in the softest flutter of feathers, a stretch across the city until she pulled herself back together in the basement of the funeral home, falling from several feet off the floor and hitting it hard when she landed. And staying there. No need, for the moment, for her to move.
Why she was thanking him didn’t quite register. He wasn’t doing this for her, he was doing it for Damian. He was honoring his wishes. But Bruce didn’t say as much, now lost in the new, albeit temporary, sense of purpose he had to cling to. He’d make sure no one tried to put Damian in the Pit. He’d keep him safe. The feel of her fingers on his arm was pressure and chill, but he was already cold down to his very bones so it didn’t bother him. He doubted he would ever feel warm or whole again.
When she offered her help he flinched, as though the thought of a funeral physically pained him. Logically it would have to happen, but he didn’t want to think about it, didn’t want to think about the coffin being lowered into the ground or the headstone or all those people in black gathered to mourn. “I’m not ready yet,” he whispered, hoarsely, but it wasn’t a refusal. He didn’t agree to let people help, to let Alfred help, but he didn’t refuse either. It was better than nothing. And then there was that whispered apology and she was gone, he was alone again, his dead son in his arms and silence filling the Cave once again.
“Sorry won’t bring him back.” The words went unheard, but maybe he didn’t need them to be. Maybe he just needed them said. His breath caught in his throat, hitched, and he looked down. “Don’t worry,” he whispered, tenderly, as though Damian could somehow hear him. “You won’t go anywhere near the Pit. I promise. I’ll keep you safe.” Bruce held his son a little tighter, then, as he waited, waited for Alfred’s inevitable arrival and whatever came after.