It’s been exactly fifteen years, two days, 4 minutes, and 33.5 seconds since the Wayne murder. Bruce can feel time crawling under his skin, like filth under fingernail, like it’s a breathing, screaming thing.
It’s an endless, infinite supply. And yet, he feels like he’s running out of it.
The details are carved deep; Alfred’s cologne lingering on both his mother’s Stefano Cabbana fur coat, Snow White and fluffy, and his father’s sharp-looking leather jacket.
The gunsmoke. The pearls bleeding on the pavement.
“Your mother wore Armani, actually.”
The Waynes are known to cheat Death, but this is getting ridiculous.
“You’re not here.”
The Riddler, — Edward. His name is Edward Nashton, 29-years-old, forsenic accountant, Bruce’s former classmate at Gotham University.
He’s just a man, not a monster, — gasps, wide eyes confused, “Who are you talking to?”
Thomas watches Bruce’s, — Batman’s hands tighten around the swamp green jacket with mildly tamed amusement. Almost like Bruce is an infant again, shaking on his first steps.
“Pretty sure I am, chum. Also, you might wanna move Eddie here to a coffee table. That shit looks sturdy. YOU were made on one, I think,—“
He cringes, but does as he’s told. Edward’s coffee screeches when Batman slams him across it like loose change, “I’d rather not think about that.”
“Honey, it’s a very romantic story, and I resent Alfred for not talking to you about it. Now go grab a drill and some duct tape. Oh, don’t make that face, — His adrenaline levels are higher than a fucking drop head.”
Bruce doesn’t want to do it. Something just compels him to. Thomas scoffs but Bruce is too focused on the drill biting through bone to notice. Edward doesn’t feel any pain. He’s just under the illusion of it, which seems much crueler.
“You would’ve KNOWN that if you stayed in school. “
“Why are you here?”
“Now that,” His father’s smile is a serpentine, alluring and full thoothed and stained with Maverick cigarettes. His hair is slicked, crowned by red lensed sunglasses.
He looked for a dead man. “Is a smart guy question.”
—
He doesn’t sleep. He can’t.
“Your father was a hundred different things, “ Alfred sighs at him, stitching up his wounds in a tight, secure pattern. Thomas’. The ghost of the hour. “And I never understood any of them.”
Bruce is about to ask more, expand a stream of curiosity, when footsteps bang against the cave’s massive interior.
He knows each child by foot, by volume, by rhythm.
He’d know Jason dead or alive.
He’s about to greet him, choosing to ignore his father’s ghost flirting with an unsuspecting Alfred, when his baby bird beats him to it.
“Why the fuck is your dead mom following me?”
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Someone is having a big ass Halloween party in Hawkins and since Robin is back in town from college she demands Steve goes there with her. She has got them matching costumes and all too! So Steve agrees to go because of course he does.
So when she shows up to Steve’s house with two sets of sailor uniforms he gives her a look that’s way more expressive than any words could be.
“Oh come on, it’s funny!” She insists. Steve just sighs, rolls his eyes and takes the outfit Robin is offering for him. And yeah it’s little funny, but he doesn’t want to admit that.
But the menacing grin Robin was giving him should have told him something was up, something other than reminiscing about summer at Scoops. But Steve pays it no mind and starts pulling the stupid sailor outfit on while mumbling curses. It’s not identical to the Scoops Ahoy uniform but close enough. The shade is slightly different and there’s no red details, only blue and white, and the shorts.. Well somehow they are even shorter and tighter. Which seems little odd since the shirt fits just fine. Has he put on a little weight? Steve doesn’t think so but maybe he just hasn’t realised it. Maybe he’ll ask Robin, she’ll give her honest answer for sure.
It’s only when he sees Robin he realises that yeah he probably has not gained weight. Someone has just switched up the bottoms of the outfits. Possibly someone that is now standing in front of Steve, snickering, while wearing her full length pressed trousers as part of her own costume.
“Seriously?” Steve asks and just shakes his head when Robin bursts out laughing. It’s too good to see and hear her laugh like this and not just via phone so Steve doesn’t fight it when Robin starts ushering her out with an excuse of them being late. (How could they be late? It’s an early evening and it’s a party?). And really, sure the shorts are little tight and short but it’s Halloween, who cares. What’s the worst that could happen?
It just so happens that the now graduated ex-Hellfire club leader has convinced his little sheeps, who also wanted to attend said party, to go as a group of pirates, him as their captain of course. So when Steve and Robin arrive, and Eddie sees what Steve is wearing, the pirate captain Eddie Munson is definitely hunting for booty.
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