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Chapter Text

The wedding had been torture. It was tasteful. Rachel was staunchly against the chevron craze that was floating around. Bruce had insisted that Rachel and Harvey have the whole thing at the manor. Alfred didn’t mind hosting. He liked the hustle and bustle and having people to boss around. Alfred was, however, apprehensive. He thought that Bruce was purposely making the whole affair more painful for himself. Bruce had reasoned that he’d save the couple the stress of booking and paying for a venue. Rachel had been lamenting about the lack of them near the city. How could he not help? Also it would save the trouble of security detail. Bruce wouldn’t trust the best prosecutors in Gotham at any regular wedding venue.

It was nice to get swept up in the planning. He’d tie raspberry red ribbons on Rachel’s hand written invitations in the morning and chase down the cartels at night. There were things, of course, he didn’t consider. Watching Rachel walk down the aisle had been worse than a knife to the heart. He was glad for the League of Shadows’ teachings. He wouldn’t have been able to school his face had he not suffered their tutelage.

The ceremony was short and very private, only Rachel and Harvey’s families and a few of their friends from the office and law school were invited. Harvey had cried like a baby. Their vows were fine. Bruce gritted his teeth and made it through somehow. Rachel had talked about how Dent was an inspiration and a light in the dark. Harvey had parroted similar sentiments back to Rachel’s glowing face.

Bruce had to be the dark, so people like Dent and Rachel could shine. She just couldn’t see that, and it was too late for him to show her. Rachel had chosen the easy life with the DA. Bruce had chosen the hard life with the heavy mantle.

The wedding party consisted of mostly people they knew from law school. Bruce had escorted Rachel’s college roommate, Dinah Lance, down the aisle. It was clear that there was no love to be lost between them. This was despite the multiple attempts by both Rachel and Harvey to set them up. Neither of them seemed in the mood. This suited Bruce, he would have felt guilty if she’d wanted to pursue him. She was smart at least, had an edge to her. Bruce liked that. She glared at him over Rachel’s bouquet through most of the service, so it was clear that she knew something of his past with the bride.

The reception was reserved for what Harvey called “politicking.” It was flooded with the rich and powerful, thanks to Bruce. Dent thanked him for all his help in planning, Alfred called it unnecessary insertion. When Dent had first asked Bruce to be his best man, Bruce remembered how firm the lawyer’s handshake had been. It was a politician’s handshake. Harvey had a way of making you feel like you were the only person who could help him, like he needed you. He made 

Bruce think that he’d probably like the man more if Rachel wasn’t involved.

The happy couple was making rounds during cocktail hour. However, Bruce had lost sight of them for the past hour. This had caused him to grumble to Alfred, who just talked about how young people in love were spry. Bruce did not want to know how spry Harvey was. If he wasn’t the best man he’d have just slipped into the shadows and excused himself from the rest of the reception. He wished, not for the first time, that he was not Bruce Wayne.

Alfred had officiated the wedding at Rachel’s request. He’d run their pre-marriage counseling too. He pointedly did not tell Bruce where it was and wouldn’t tell him a single thing about it. It was infuriating. What good was any of this if he couldn’t keep tabs on Rachel?

The grip that Bruce was maintaining on his champagne glass was a little too tight. He needed to lower his blood pressure before his speech. He clung to the wall like a leech. It would do well for his playboy facade to be drunk, but he wanted Rachel to speak to him after her honeymoon. He could hardly think of why. Her life with Dent would certainly be easier without her billionaire ex-flame tailing her. She didn’t want him anymore. Rachel had cast him off for Dent . Bruce never took her to be the goody-two-shoes type, but maybe he didn’t know her as well as he thought he did.

She thought he couldn’t live without Batman, but what other option did he have now. Bruce wasn’t going to leave his life of crime fighting behind if he didn’t have something waiting for him. He wasn’t going to just be an idle citizen, that wasn’t him. Rachel just didn’t understand that it couldn’t end without her. Dent was his golden ticket and now his demise. He could live without Batman, but Gotham couldn’t. Heavy is the head that wears the crown and what not.

Bruce downed the rest of the champagne, handing the flute off to one of the servers. The waitress  was strikingly pretty. His carefully crafted bachelor facade failed him for a moment. Bruce winked at her. She looked at the ground, blushed, and looked back at him. Her gesture nearly had him fooled, but there was a harsh glint in her eye that told him that this had been a rouse. Bruce laughed. He wasn't the only one pretending.

Thoughts of pretty servers fled his mind as he remembered that he was going to have to talk about how happy he was for Rachel. He could stand to be a little drunk. As it was, the alcohol was just making him tense. If he had another glass maybe it would dull his senses enough he could enjoy himself. Maybe he’d make Jim do his job tonight. He smiled to himself.

A gaggle of socialites lit up when he made a show of leaving the skirts of the room to come over. Their conversation bored him and soon enough he was hoping that Rachel and Harvey would return from whatever guest room they were christening just so that he might have someone to share an intelligent thought with. Most of these people had graduated law school, it must not be hard. All they could manage to talk about was how nice the landscaping was and how the wine must have cost. The answer was a small fortune, but Bruce was a man made to give small fortunes. Tonight he wished that he could have given this to Rachel under different circumstances.

Alfred was right. Bruce needed more friends, but friends brought on weak spots. The Joker may have been thwarted in his attempt to kill Rachel or Dent, but the memory of that horrible night remained painted on Harvey’s face forever. Harvey joked about it now, but it was clear that his humor hid real fear. Dent had signed up for mob violence in the courtroom, not a psychopathic clown. It had taken its toll on Rachel too. She wouldn’t talk to Bruce about it, but she didn’t need to. He knew. 

That was part of the beauty of their relationship. They didn’t need to talk, he just knew. Rachel talked to Dent all the time. He could hear them giggling with their heads together when he entered a room, hushed words when he’d turn his head. It was all words. Rachel and Bruce didn’t need that. Their connection was formed through time, you couldn’t make that with anyone else.

The Joker was no longer his problem. He was back to helping Dent and Gordon dismantle the mob, back to ignoring his multibillion dollar company. Things could be normal again, he could be normal again. The hope of leaving Batman behind was growing dimmer and less appealing by the second. He knew that it would be hard without the hope for her, but he didn’t think that it was so intense. The monotony was settling in. This would be his life, forever.

Rachel and Harvey swung out of the doors of the manor. She was laughing into the crook of his neck, her arm strewn about his shoulder. Others must have noticed their absence too because the gathering erupted into cheers. Bruce’s expression soured.

Alfred stepped from his conversation with Rachel’s parents, curtly smiling, and made his way over to Bruce. He pretended not to notice. Bruce felt very petulant.

Alfred took a small sip of his Shirley Temple, a Mariano cherry bobbed at the end of a toothpick at the bottom of the glass. “You could do them the pleasure of at least pretending to be happy for them, Master Wayne.”

“I thought you told me not to lie.” Bruce smirked. If intentionally misinterpreting Alfred’s words were a paying job he’d be a billionaire twice over.

The older man looked out at the group of party goers, his face softening when his eyes met Rachel’s. “It wouldn’t be a lie, Master Wayne, because you told me that having the wedding here was fine because you were ‘happy that Miss Dawes was settling down with such a great man.’” Alfred turned his head to look at Bruce. “Since you seem to have such a dedication to the truth, you wouldn’t have lied to me then would you have?” Alfred raised his eyebrow, drinking from his glass again.

Bruce sighed. “It’s not easy.”

“The best things in life seldom are, I find.” Alfred smiled.

Dent’s hand was on the small of Rachel’s back as she joked with Dinah. In a small moment he reached up and tickled her. Rachel made a show of being mad at him until they both burst out laughing. Rachel had a glow about her that made Bruce want to punch the nearest felon in the face. He wouldn’t have to look far with all the corporate lawyers on his lawn.

He wanted to throw up. “I just don’t know what to do.”

“Sir,” Alfred looked at him. “I’ll be honest you’re not very good at it.”

“What am I not good at, Alfred?” Bruce asked. Dent had noticed the two men and was vigorously urging Bruce to get off the way and join his congregation of guests. Bruce grinned, taking another sip from his champagne flute. It felt good to have his company wanted and sought out, but he could sense that Alfred wasn’t joking. Bruce’s glass suddenly felt heavier in his hand. 

Alfred took a breath. “Sitting down, smiling, and doing nothing.”

//\\//\\//\\//\\//\\

Over the next decade, Bruce did a lot of sitting down and smiling, but much to Alfred's chagrin he did not do nothing.

He sat down and smiled as Rachel told him two years into her marriage with Dent that she was pregnant. It was more of a grimace than a smile as Alfred had remarked. He offered to let them use the manor for the baby shower, but Rachel insisted that they have it at their own house, a quaint townhouse on the eastside. It had a spare room. Rachel didn’t want his help painting it for the baby.

When Charlotte Dawes-Dent was born, Bruce was stopping a bank robbery. Alfred had sent a card on his behalf. He’d been gracious enough to let Bruce sign it. He missed most of her firsts. Her first word was “dog.” Harvey had insisted that the family have a Golden Retriever, named Justice, to make the house a home, and all good politicians had dogs. Bruce didn’t need to know that she took her first steps in the DA’s office, or that her first food was peas. He did.

On Charlotte’s first day of school, Bruce tried, and failed, to bury the feelings of jealousy that welled up inside him. He decided to help more with the at risk children’s home. He could make these feelings productive. Bruce ended up spending the year breaking up child trafficking rings. He started the Wayne Scholarship to send kids to Gotham Prep. He hoped that would be enough. It wasn’t.

When Rachel announced she was pregnant again, Bruce trained until he collapsed. It was supposed to be easier the second time, but it was twenty times worse. Alfred forced him into bed. He couldn’t move from his bed for two months. He was finally doing nothing.

When Alfred Dawes-Dent came into the world, Bruce brought Rachel flowers. He felt more like a ghost from her past than her friend. She would smile at him, and there was no pain in her eyes. No remorse. She was happy. It made him feel like shit that he was upset that Rachel was happy. When he held her child in his arms he couldn’t stop crying. They called him Alfie.

He decided to take a chance on nuclear fission. The project was initially very successful. Gotham would be running on completely clean, free energy within the next ten years. His hard work would pay off. The city would benefit from the work of Bruce Wayne.

Alfie said his first word, “bye.” As Bruce was leaving a meeting with Harvey and Rachel. There were a couple legal hiccups with patenting the nuclear science that he didn’t trust anyone else to clear up. He was giving Charlotte her hug goodbye when Alfie reached out his tiny baby fist. He shook it, in a poor imitation of a wave, and said “bye.” Bruce had never been so proud and so sick at the same time. He tried not to visit the Dawes-Dent home as much as possible.

Before Bruce could launch the next stage of nuclear development to investors, a Russian nuclear physicist published his work on weaponizing nuclear energy. It looked bad, but worst of all it looked replicable. The city wasn’t ready. Bruce knew that he could do nothing in the waking hours to save Gotham. The only change he could bring was through the Batman. Rachel had been right.

He decided to go into hiding, but Batman would always have work to do. Bruce was a forge, Batman was the sword.

In the year that followed, Bruce remained locked in the East Wing. He would hear Rachel, sometimes Dent, visit with their children. Dent had come so far as to knock on the East Wing door to check on him. The children would clamber about the gardens doing what children do. Bruce would watch from his window, remembering how he used to play the same way with Rachel in his youth. He would watch Alfred and Rachel’s concern for him turn to frustration over the months. The two continued the tradition of hosting the Wayne Charity Gala. The East Wing remained locked, with him inside it. Rachel spent his money better than he did anyway.

Chapter Text

The first time that Selina Kyle had cased a party at Wayne Manor she was near shitting herself. She still looked stunning and no straight man wearing his proper prescription could deny that they were staring, but for her that was standard. She’d made out just fine. By the time she had covered her tracks, paid to have jewelry reset and any tags scrubbed, she had enough to cover rent for at least the next year. Needless to say, she was eager to work more Wayne parties. Brucie seemed to have this ability to attract the fattest cats who were oh so easy to target whilst trapped in his charm. She supposed they didn’t call him the Prince of Gotham for nothing. He had this way of making multi-millionaires want to be like him, a woman on each arm and a smile that never left their silicone-pumped-faces. If one of those women happened to be a thief from the Narrows, it didn’t matter as long as she was pretty. 

Lately the Wayne Charity Galas hadn’t been hosted by Bruce Wayne. Which was a shame because it meant that someone who wasn’t Selina got to spend his money and without the titular character of the production the whole charade was far less enjoyable and profitable. Without the mascot of affluence, the other followers would not be so loose pocketed. Wayne spent his money in a way that said that he never thought he would run out of it.

There was nothing Selina could do to lure the man out of his ancestral home, no matter how much she wished there was. Things were catching up with Selina. With Dent in charge of the legal system hand jobs were going for less and less. It really did soil the fun of breaking the law. Cash bribes still worked, but innocence used to sell for much less.

In her heart she knew she was probably lucky that the Batman hadn’t gotten to her yet. Then again, she hadn’t met a man who wasn’t immediately enamored by her. From a statistical standpoint, the Batman had far bigger fish to fry than a cat burglar. So, for the moment the feds were her biggest threat.

The GCPD was closing in on her, but she had a plan. She was a great jewel thief. She knew that, but that wasn’t going to get her the life she wanted. To be frank her GED and fabulous, good looks would only get her so far. She needed a way out.

It was called the Clean Slate. She just had to get Bruce Wayne’s fingerprints, and it was hers. She could move to Europe like she’d always dreamed. She could get the hell out of Jersey. Selina romanticized espresso on the patios of quaint cafes in Florence as she drank her piss poor black coffee. All that for the price of one billionaire’s fingerprints. Whatever ransom her employers wanted, he could afford it. She didn’t even feel a little bad about it either.

Selina had offered a cut to her roommate to apply to one of the open maid positions at the Manor. She would need an in if she was going to case the closed off East Wing during this soiree. With some magnetic signatures from the floor below, she’d be able to figure out where a safe might be. If she knew that then she’d save a hell of a lot of time. Time was money and she didn’t have any of that to spare. She would use graphite to lift prints off of a safe. Plus cracking it would be a spectacular way to get the prints and some extra cash. Starting over was not going to be cheap.

The Dent Act, which had given the GCPD “teeth,” as the suits on TV always so eloquently pointed out, just gave them more guns and officers. Everywhere in the Narrows was crawling with cops. Selina usually slipped through the cracks as a conventionally attractive white woman who knew her way around the sterner sex. Others in the Narrows were not so lucky.

Selina had lost a lot of neighbors in recent years. Charlie, who always came over to fix her plumbing and didn’t hit on her to the point of discomfort, had been picked up for some work he had done as muscle at the Falcone clubs. He was doing big time in the slammer. Glaringly obvious to everyone, none of the big wigs that frequented those clubs could be touched. Just because Charlie was assigned some hack from public defense. What was that bottom of the barrel imbecile supposed to do against the celebrated Gotham DA, with his winning smile and stunning figure? Dent treated every trial like a comedy routine, he let blows glance off of him and didn’t care what people thought of him. It was the Bruce Waynes who kept Dent in office, and since everybody wanted to be like Gotham’s precious little angel, Dent sat on a stack of cases just like Charlie’s. Nice people, good people, who were just down on their luck, lives ruined. When the only way to get cash from the dirty side of the bridge was to sell your body, one way or the other, you did it. Selina just hoped that she would be able to claw her way out unscathed.