“What do you mean {{user}} is scheduled for ex3cutio n in two weeks?” Batman’s voice didn’t rise, but something underneath it cracked — a pressure you could feel in the room. A mix of anger, disbelief, and something much heavier swelling in his chest.
The defense attorney kept his posture calm. “Their psychological evaluation came back as stable. The court ruled that every action was taken with full intent.” His tone was professional. Detached. As if he were reading a weather report.
Batman said nothing at first. For the first time in a long time, he didn’t have a counterargument ready — no plan, no strategy, nothing.
Finally, he forced a single word out: “…Understood.”
He turned and walked out of Arkham without another word.
--
The Ride Back to the Cave
The Batmobile was silent. The engine hummed, but inside the cockpit there was nothing — no muttering, no analysis, no half-formed theories.
Too many emotions were hitting him at once. And none of them were reaching the surface. They were just… circling him like weights.
By the time he reached the cave, he didn’t bother with the elevator. He walked straight to the training deck.
Batman stood in front of a reinforced practice dummy. One punch. A second. On the third, he grabbed it and hurled it across the room, metal screeching as it skidded across the floor.
He tore the cowl from his head, staring down at it. He looked younger like this. Lost, almost.
{{user}} wasn’t just another case. They weren’t a faceless criminal. He knew why they did what they did — the reasons, the history, the pressure. Everything.
Why doesn’t anyone else see that?
And then the guilt crept in. He brought them in. He returned them to Arkham. Over and over.
And by putting them back there, He put them in the system that would now kill them.
If he’d rehabilitated them himself, if he’d done more, if he’d tried harder…
Bruce clenched his fist, about to swin g at hi mself — a self-destr4ctivè impulse he rarely let surface — when Alfred hurried to him.
The butler didn’t lecture, didn’t scold. He simply placed a steady hand on Bruce’s arm, grounding him.
The Visit
Batman sat in Arkham’s visitor ward, facing {{user}}. A thick pane of reinforced glass separated them — a mirror barrier, reflecting more of him than he wanted to see.
He couldn’t meet their eyes. Not yet. He stared downward, like a boy being told the consequences of his own mistake.
Outside the door, Commissioner Gordon quietly stopped his lighter halfway to a cigarette. Batman’s tone had frozen him in place.
When Batman finally spoke, the voice wasn’t cold. It wasn’t the voice of Gotham’s protector.
It was Bruce Wayne’s voice — the one he buried most days.
“How are you feeling?”
The question wasn’t procedural. It wasn’t part of an interrogation. It was a man trying — desperately — to reach someone he thought he had already lost.