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John wondered if it was possible to go so deep into terror that you felt calm again. He’d fought back against the men who’d grabbed him, struggled until they pressed the muzzle of a gun to his head, and even then he’d been scanning his surroundings with frantic desperation, searching for a way out as they pushed him into a warehouse, but now—now he was frozen to the spot.
Staring up at the terrorist who’d crushed Gotham’s hope under a heel and retreated to the shadows to let chaos play out on the streets.
“You were out after curfew,” Bane’s distorted voice was eerie, and sparked another flicker in the ‘oh shit oh no oh shit I’m dead I’m dead oh shit’ running in the back of his head.
“It’s the middle of winter, asshole,” John’s mouth apparently decided to abandon all common sense. “Some of us can’t finish all our business before it gets dark.” He’d made the supply run after dark for weeks, and he never thought he’d get caught. Never thought that Bane’s men actually fucking cared about the arbitrary rules they’d set up before they left the city to feast upon itself like starving dogs.
“And what business does a cop have after dark, Officer Blake?”
Ohhh fuck.
“None of your fucking—” John broke off as a gun cracked across his face, and the world went dizzy for a stretching moment. When he blinked away the stars, Bane was closer, and John instinctively pressed back against the men holding him up.
“We can be more civil than that, Officer Blake,” Bane said calmly, “What were you doing out after dark?”
Not keen to be pistol-whipped again, John kept his mouth shut.
“My men say they found you near a supply depot,” Bane continued, “Who were you smuggling supplies for, Officer Blake?”
“I wasn’t smuggling—” The stars were brighter this time, and something in his mouth was bleeding, he could taste copper on his tongue. John got his feet underneath him as Bane stared at him, trying to ignore the throbbing headache.
“This will go a lot easier if you cooperate,” Bane told him.
“Fuck you,” John snapped back.
The gun didn’t come back. No, Bane’s hand did, closing around his throat, lifting him up without a trace of effort as John jerked, first in shock and then in panic, wheezing and writhing. Black spots danced in his vision, his lungs squeezed tighter and tighter and tighter, and the need to breathe went from uncomfortable to painful to unbearable.
The world hadn’t fully blacked out when Bane let go, but John would’ve collapsed completely if it hadn’t been for the hands twisting his arms behind his back.
“Either you will tell us who you were taking supplies to, or we will find alternate ways to find them. And then we will shoot them in front of you.”
John’s blood ran cold. No.
He couldn’t bet on Bane not finding out. Hell, John went to the same supply depot every time, they knew who he was getting supplies for. John couldn’t—couldn’t watch them die, Father Reilly and all the kids, and maybe Bane was just going to drag them here and shoot them anyway, maybe John had gotten them all doomed by going out after curfew, but if he started second-guessing a madman’s motives he’d get nowhere. “St. Swithin’s,” John said, his voice cracking, “I was getting supplies for them.”
Bane turned to the lithe, almost bird-like man watching John with sharp, dark eyes, and the man answered, “It’s the orphanage. With the priest.”
John didn’t realize it was possible for his stomach to drop any lower, but it did with the revelation that they knew where it was.
“A cop getting supplies for the poor orphan children,” Bane turned back to him, and his voice was...amused? No, mocking. “What a pretty story. Who were you really getting those supplies for, Officer Blake? The commissioner? The other rats that managed to escape the sewers?”
“I was getting the supplies for St. Swithin’s,” John repeated, stronger, “Like I always do.”
“I do not,” Bane said coldly, “Appreciate liars.”
“I’m not lying—”
“If you want to drag the children into this game, Officer Blake, I’m glad to oblige,” Bane nodded at Bird Man, and John’s stomach turned over.
“No!” burst out sharply as he strained against the grips holding him in place, “No—I’m not lying—I swear I was taking the supplies there, please, don’t hurt them—”
“And now you claim altruism,” Bane turned back to him, slow and deliberate, “How sweet. A model citizen.” He stepped forward, until he was right in front of John, looming above him. “And what would you do, to keep the children safe?”
What would he do? Bane was too close, John could barely think past the panic. “Anything,” spilled from his mouth, and it was the truth.
John was a dead man walking, but the children—the children should never have to suffer for his mistake.
“Anything,” Bane repeated. John didn’t like the sound of the word in his voice. Bane stepped back, and nodded at the men holding John, and they both let go.
He straightened shakily, eyeing Bane, and then Bird Man, and darting a quick glance to count the men watching from the shadows. Nine, and that wasn’t counting however many were behind him. And Bane, who was at least ten men all on his own.
If he’d been on his own, with nothing to lose, he might’ve tried it. A Hail Mary to take out Bane, take out the biggest threat, and hope that someone could find and defuse the bomb before it went off.
But Bane was threatening the children.
“Very well, Officer Blake, let us test that sentiment,” Bane said, a bite to his tone. “Kneel.”
John blinked at him for a moment before he registered that that was an order, and he collapsed so fast his knees cracked painfully against cold cement. Fuck, that had hurt.
Chuckles rang out around the warehouse, and John ignored how they burned in his ears. He stayed on his knees, looking up at Bane. He tried not to wonder about how far he would go to protect the children. What if they asked him for information on Gordon’s plans? What if they asked him to hurt people? What if they—
Something screeched behind Bane, and John couldn’t help the instinctive twitch to crane his head and see what was happening. It was a cot. Two men were dragging a cot into the center of the room.
A cold flush started as his throat closed up, and swept down his spine, coalescing into a ball of ice in the pit of his stomach. Well, John thought to himself, at least it isn’t murder.
This, he could do. This was just pain, and John was already in their power. They could take whatever they wanted from him. Agreeing to it made no difference.
Bane had seen him looking, and his expression crinkled to something resembling amusement. “Get up,” the man commanded, and after John straightened onto wavering feet, “Strip.”
More laughter. Rising louder as John did what he was told, and fumbled at his clothes with numb fingers. The coat. His gloves. His boots. His heart was pounding in his ears. His sweatshirt. His socks, just to buy some time, and he had to force himself to stop stalling. His pants. They were catcalling, and it wasn’t in English, but John didn’t have to understand the language to know that it was crude. His shirt.
They switched to English. John stopped listening.
He darted a glance at Bane, desperate for a final confirmation that he was serious, praying for some sign that this was just a cruel joke, but Bane was watching him silently, expression inscrutable.
John hooked his fingers into the waistband of his boxers, and pulled them down, trying desperately to make the motion as brief and clinical as possible. He nearly tripped trying to get his feet out of them, and the laughter only swelled.
His entire face was prickling, swollen and hot, and John blinked too fast. He wasn’t going to cry. Bane hadn’t even done anything yet. John couldn’t stop himself from gripping his elbows, needing something to keep himself from spiralling, especially when Bane swept his gaze down, slow and intent.
His brain insisted on trying to figure out Bane’s proportions. John firmly told it to shut up.
His brain then wondered what Father Reilly would think when John didn’t come back. Wondered who would be sent out to make the run in his place. God, he hoped it wasn’t one of the kids.
“Embarrassed?” Bane asked, “But the cops of Gotham have no shame, is that not correct?”
John kept his mouth shut. If he opened it, he was probably going to start begging.
“Your survival instincts impress me, however. Almost like a cockroach,” Bane mused, moving to circle John. John resisted the urge to follow his movement, and stared straight ahead, resolutely not looking at any of the dark, hungry looks as some of the men began whistling.
Bane stopped right behind him. “I will make a bargain, Officer Blake. You can walk out of this warehouse right now, and my men will not stop you. The children—well, that depends on how merciful I feel.” John didn’t move. “Or you can get on the bed, and buy their protection.”
The cement floor was freezing. The air was cold, and John told himself that was why he was shivering, why goosebumps rose up and down his arms and legs. The cot had definitely seen better days, and was just as cold, nothing but a bare mattress. John knelt on it, and turned back to look at Bane.
The man looked angry. John couldn’t suppress the flinch as Bane started forward, but he managed to keep himself still after that, still and shivering as a monster stalked towards him.
“On your back,” Bane ordered, and John did as he was told, his arms crossed over his chest and his knees up and pressed together. The ceiling of the warehouse was dark, but he could just about make out the impression of the rafters.
The whole cot groaned as Bane sank onto it, and he shoved between John’s knees like John hadn’t been trying to keep them together. Bane loomed over him, massive and monstrous, the light glinting off of that metal mask, and John’s breaths got faster and shallower until he couldn’t breathe at all.
Terror swallowed him whole.
Usually, cops were not worth his time. He interrogated them for information on Gordon, and either killed them or handed them over to his men. But this one, this favored protégé of Gordon’s, this friend of Bruce Wayne’s, had dared to stand in front of him and attempt to shield himself with children and that, that Bane would not stand.
Officer John Blake was a liar, and Bane would take great pleasure in destroying him. But first, he wanted to watch him admit to the lie, and it was so much more satisfying to do it like this, to press and press and press until the lie shattered and there was nothing left but pieces.
Blake said he would do anything to protect those children, and Bane was looking forward to the moment when he snapped. Even if he was being annoyingly obedient at present.
“Do you enjoy this?” Bane asked, settling more firmly between Blake’s legs, and forcing them wider. The officer was not unpleasant to look at, and maybe Bane would take pleasure from him, after Blake broke, after he stopped following and started fighting back. “You got on your back quite easily.”
“All pigs are sluts,” one of his men called out from the side, “They do enough ass-kissing.”
“Is that true?” Bane asked the officer. One hand was enough to splay across a pale thigh, and Bane admired the contrast for a moment. “Do you do this for Gordon?” Bane squeezed, and his next words were lower, quieter, “Did you do this for Wayne?”
Blake jerked, and Bane felt a thrill of satisfaction. But Blake settled again, and Bane frowned. Maybe the threat of rape would not break him. Some men got off on it. But Bane would enjoy himself, and then think of what would crack that composure.
“Or maybe you’re just cold,” Bane mused, moving one hand to Blake’s waist as he undid his pants. His cock was already hard and straining. “Desperate and greedy for anything to warm you up.” Like the rest of the filth in this city. “You—” Bane looked up, at Blake’s face, and broke off.
The man was crying. Silent tears dripped down his cheeks, glistening under the harsh, fluorescent light. His lip was bleeding where he’d bitten it, presumably to stay silent. His entire expression was a study in misery as he stared up at the ceiling, and his fingernails dug into his skin as he trembled.
Something twisted uneasily inside of him. It’s a trick, said a voice that sounded remarkably like Talia, they’re all talented actors here.
Anyone could make themselves tear up, bite their lip, feign fear. A careful act to ensure that they were seen as a protector of children. Rumors of Bane’s zero tolerance for anyone who went after children had probably already swept the city, and Blake was trying to play on that sympathy.
A furious warmth settled into Bane, burning ever brighter, and it suddenly wasn’t enough to take his time and watch the lie break. He wanted to shatter it, and John Blake along with it.
“If you’re so eager for it, prove it to me,” Bane growled, tightening his grip on Blake’s hip before letting go with a slap. “Get on your hands and knees.”
Blake’s gaze darted to him, his expression crumpling for a moment before he raised up on his elbows. He backed away from Bane to get his legs under him, and then rolled over. Braced his hands before straightening up.
Trembling all over.
Bane let a heavy hand fall on his ass. “Definitely a whore,” he said coldly, “Certainly won’t need any preparation.”
Still no reaction, even though Bane knew Blake had caught a glimpse—and blanched—at the size of him when he was turning over. The heat burned higher and hotter inside of him.
“Maybe I will give you to my men when I’m done,” Bane said, shifting up to press against Blake’s ass, leaning down on Blake’s hips to observe how small the man looked under him. “Maybe if you satisfy them all, I will leave St. Swithin’s alone.” A soft, choked sound. “How does that sound, Officer Blake? Are you still willing to do anything?”
Blake’s trembling arms gave out with a shudder, and Bane waited. Waited for the no. Waited for Blake to start begging or pleading or ordering him to stop.
Kept waiting.
Tiny, hitched sounds grew louder, sharper. They were muffled, Blake had shoved his face against the mattress, but the warehouse had gone silent, and each one echoed clearly. Sobs. Wrenching, strangled sobs.
Each one shuddered through Blake’s shaking body, Blake’s fingers curled into claws against the mattress as he half-smothered himself. He either took no notice of Bane shifting back, or simply didn’t care, his ass still sticking up as he sobbed against the cot.
He sounded terrified. He sounded broken. And yet he hadn’t told Bane to stop.
Bane looked up, uncertain of what he was hearing, and Barsad was staring at Blake with a half-suspicious, half-pained expression. Some of his men were still looking eager, but most were his inner circle, and they were looking equally uncomfortable in the face of Blake’s silence. The man wasn’t even breathing properly, and when Bane reached out to nudge him to his side so he didn’t accidentally suffocate, Blake moved with the barest press of his fingers, utterly pliant.
His face was streaked with tears, and he brought a hand up to conceal it, but it could do nothing against the choked whimpers. This couldn’t be an act. It was too—fractured to be an act, too many tears, too much panic. These were the cries of a man who lost everything and couldn’t hold himself together.
Bane again looked at Barsad. Barsad stared back at him, and gave a tiny little shrug. This was your decision, the expression told.
It was. The cop couldn’t actually have been getting supplies for the orphans at St. Swithin’s. Not the young man both Jim Gordon and Bruce Wayne had unofficially designated as an heir, not the symbol of everything that was wrong with this city, with the gilt that hid the darkness from view, with the facade of righteousness that had to be ripped away.
Only Bane had ripped it away, and there was a man sobbing on the cot because he’d offered himself up to protect children. Children that Bane had threatened.
He was abruptly unsure of who was feigning righteousness here.
Bane got off the bed, and the thing creaked, but Blake didn’t move. Only shook with muffled sobs, clearly terrified out of his mind. Bane ran through all the threats he’d made. Quite reasonably terrified at that.
Bane looked at Barsad again, and Barsad’s expression shifted to half-annoyance, half-acceptance. Fine, I’ll take care of your mess, the pinched lines foretold, but Bane couldn’t stay. Not after—
He’d threatened children. He hadn’t meant it, but Blake clearly didn’t know that. Gordon and Wayne were both hypocrites, their fresh-faced young heir definitely the same, but—but he said anything.
Bane had asked him what he’d do to protect the children, and Blake had knelt, and stripped, and presented himself to be raped.
The memories of the Pit were pressing a little too close. Of watching Talia climb up the wall, surefooted on the ledges, as he was torn apart by a baying mob.
Bane hadn’t cared. The pain had been secondary to the sheer relief that Talia had gotten out, that she was safe, that Bane had succeeded.
He wondered if that was what Blake was feeling.
Bane headed for the door. Barsad could watch Blake. Bane needed to bleed out his restless energy.
And check if the officer had been telling the truth.
“Get a blanket,” Barsad sighed at the group of anxious and uselessly fluttering men, “And some water.” Officer Blake was certainly crying hard enough to need it. Goddamn Bane. Barsad didn’t know how this had become his problem.
“He’s still a cop,” Jean-Louis muttered, and Akira, who was closest, slapped the back of his head.
“You know how Bane feels about children,” he said.
“So what? He didn’t even do anything—”
“And would you spread your legs for Bane to protect a child?” Rafa raised an eyebrow. Jean-Louis’ face made a complicated expression that was very clearly a no.
That had been the moment Barsad’s stomach had twisted. When Blake had turned over at Bane’s order, Barsad had caught a glimpse of his face—expression terrified and broken—and knew that the man wasn’t lying.
He’d seen the regrets play out over Bane’s face. John Blake was one of the names on the list of people they were to watch out for, and Bane was clearly having a hard time reconciling that with the very visible reality of a man that had been prepared to go quite far to protect an orphanage.
The blanket was passed to Barsad, and he sighed again. Bunch of useless fuckers. Barsad didn’t understand how they could be so skittish of a man curled up and sobbing. He briskly snapped the blanket out and covered Blake.
Blake’s hitched breaths stuttered, and he warily glanced up. When he saw Barsad standing over him, and the others ringing the cot, his expression went completely blank.
Shit.
“He stopped crying,” Jean-Louis peered forward, “That was fast.”
Barsad crouched in front of the cot and resisted the urge to groan. “He’s dissociating, you idiot,” he said flatly, and reached out a hand to wave in front of Blake’s face. Those dark eyes remained unfocused.
Blake’s breathing was slow but shallow as Barsad hauled him upright—carefully tucking the blanket around him—and pressed the water bottle to his lips. Blake swallowed the small sips, but he didn’t look like he planned on returning to reality any time soon, and this was hardly an ideal place to bring someone out of a dissociative episode. The warehouse was freezing, the men were grumbling, and Barsad had no idea when Bane would return or where he even went.
“Get his clothes,” Barsad called out, and then turned his attention to the man he was bracing upright, “Blake. Can you get dressed? Blake.”
The man made zero indication that he could hear.
Barsad growled, and shoved him fully upright before dumping the remainder of the water bottle onto the man’s face. Blake inhaled sharply and blinked, his gaze focusing on Barsad.
“Blake,” Barsad snapped, “Can you hear me?” Blake made a minute twitch that might’ve been a nod, eyes too wide to be entirely tracking what was going on. “Get dressed,” he said, shoving the collected clothes into Blake’s arms.
Blake looked down, and for a moment Barsad thought he’d gone back into the haze, but he slowly began peeling the pile apart.
The men were hovering like mother hens. Barsad gave them a sharp look and they retreated a step. Blake didn’t even seem to notice. He was pulling his clothes back on, but his movements were slow and his eyes had gone unfocused again.
“Are we heading back to base?”
“Are we bringing a cop back to our base?” Irfan wrinkled his nose.
“We can either go back to the base that has heat and a fireplace,” Barsad said, stretching to his feet, “Or we can freeze our balls off while we wait for Bane here.”
The argument swayed most of them. “But he’ll know where it is,” Jean-Louis protested, “Even if he’s out of it now, he’ll wake up at some point. Bane won’t be pleased.”
“Then Bane can come back and shoot him in the head,” Barsad shrugged. Blake didn’t even twitch, slowly rolling his socks on. “Either way, I’m not staying here, it’s freezing.”
Blake stood when they pulled on his hands, and walked if they pushed or pulled him, and made absolutely no sound, his skin clammy and pale and his mind far, far away.
Barsad hoped he was at least somewhere sunny. This city was far too dreary to be the stuff of daydreams.
John wasn’t quite sure where he was. Or what he was doing. Or what was happening around him, colors and sounds and textures all blending together in one vivid swirl.
Anything. He remembered promising that. He remembered surrendering. He remembered pain. Or expecting pain? He was floating, and no pain touched him here, but he didn’t know what was going on out there.
Bane.
Oh right.
He felt strangely discordant, as though he was a step removed from his body, and enough of his mind was coherent to know that that was probably a good thing. He did not want to step back into his body. He didn’t even know if he had a body to step back into.
The children. That was all he could cling to. That the children and Father Reilly were safe.
He wished they would kill him before he had to go back. He was already slipping forward, warmth curling into him, pressure around him, grounding him. Something was crackling, orange and yellow. A fire. Someone was talking and John couldn’t understand the words. Multiple someones.
He automatically strained harder, bleeding back faster and faster, taking a breath and feeling the scratchiness of whatever was wrapped tight around him, feeling almost smothered in the heat as gravity resettled.
The language wasn’t English. That was a fireplace. He was covered in a gray blanket.
“—already have the supplies. If he’s awake we can drop him off.”
That. That was Bane.
“If he’s awake,” someone snorted, low and snide, “He’s spent the last couple hours so out of it I had to stop Jean-Louis from trying to balance books on his head.”
Bane was here.
“He is truly that far gone?”
Bane was right here. Right here.
“Are you surprised?” the snide voice drawled.
John tried to grab at the haze, tried to detach from his body again, tried to retreat—but it was useless. He’d started to panic, and he was firmly stuck in his own body.
“Well,” the snide voice remarked, sounding slightly surprised, “Maybe he is waking up.”
John’s view of the fireplace was blocked by a hulking, massive figure, and he forgot how to breathe.
No. Not again. Please not again. How—how many times—he didn’t feel anything, any echo of pain in his body and he didn’t know why and please, please, he just wanted it to stop, please, he was sorry for breaking curfew, he was so, so sorry, please make it stop—
“You need to breathe, Officer Blake,” Bane’s voice rumbled like a warning of thunder. John was distantly aware that he was gasping, shaking in place.
He couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t move. Bane was looming over him, and there was nothing inside him but panic and terror.
There was a sharp sound. “Move,” the snide voice grumbled, “You’re not helping.” Bane’s massive frame shifted out of view, and was replaced with a scowling Bird Man. “You,” Bird Man snapped his fingers in John’s face, “Blake. Breathe, before I’m forced to give you CPR.”
The threat was discordant enough to jar him out of the all-consuming panic, and John took a shaky breath.
“Rafa,” Bird Man called over his shoulder, “What happened to the tea you were supposed to make?”
“It got cold!” a distant voice answered.
“Well, warm it up,” Bird Man snapped back, before turning back to Blake, “Dissociate again, and I won’t be pleased.”
Oh. They wanted him to be present. John could try, but it wasn’t exactly something he could control. “I—I can’t—” his voice kept cracking, “I can’t—can’t stop it—I’m sorry—”
Bane moved, and John’s attention immediately snapped to him. “No, Officer Blake, our bargain is no longer at play.” He continued speaking, but John had stopped listening.
Our bargain is no longer at play.
No. Fuck no. Please no. Was this also John’s fault? Was it because he’d retreated into his head at the sight of everyone watching him, his mind’s last-ditch defense at the overwhelming agony that was going to follow? Because he couldn’t just suck it up and deal with the pain?
“Please,” he was trembling again, ice shivering through his veins, “Please, I’m sorry, don’t—don’t hurt them, please, I—I can do better—”
Bird Man made an irritated clicking noise and shoved at Bane. “I told you that you were not helping.” Bane retreated a step, and Bird Man shifted back to face him. John darted his glance between the two, and then around the room, unable to help counting all the faces that stood between him and an escape.
He was wrapped tightly in a blanket, his face pulsing with throbbing bruises, sitting on the floor against a couch in a room he didn’t recognize, and every single person here was a threat.
“Look at me, and listen carefully,” Bird Man said. He looked distinctly annoyed. “Bane doesn’t hurt children. He nearly got torn apart standing up to a mob to save a little girl. And it was a bold claim, Blake, to cast yourself as a man of similar character.” John glanced up at Bane. Bane did not look like a man that could’ve been overwhelmed by any odds, and certainly not to protect children.
“But you’ve proven that you are,” Bird Man said, and something flickered in his expression. It was almost respect. “We’re not going to hurt you.” That sounded too good to be true. “The children are safe, and we will let you go,” he said, “Do you understand?”
John understood. He just didn’t believe it. He glanced again at Bane.
“Barsad is my right hand,” Bane said, “He speaks with my authority.”
John mentally tucked that piece of information away, and turned back to Barsad, who was waiting expectantly. “Do you understand, Blake?” Barsad repeated, “Or do I need to use smaller words?”
“I understand,” John croaked out.
“Fantastic,” Barsad straightened to his feet in a fluid motion and John tried harder to melt back into the couch. “Rafa! How long does it take to heat up tea?”
John was not any less confused when he was sitting on the couch with a mug of tea in his hands, still dressed, still covered in a blanket, watching Bane’s men joke around with the kind of playfulness John had not expected from terrorists.
Or when they blindfolded him and led him out and John thought ‘this is it’ and they shoved him into a car and drove around Gotham for so long that even his hypervigilance couldn’t keep him from dozing off, and he was rudely shaken awake by Barsad, blindfold off, to realize he was in front of the church.
“Here,” Barsad said, dumping a very heavy box in John’s arms as John stood at the gates, dazed, “Stop going out after curfew.”
It was full of supplies. Food and medicine and toiletries and winter gear. Nothing looked poisoned, or sabotaged, or like it was concealing a bomb.
John managed to close the door of the orphanage behind him before he sank down and gave into the choked, fluttering gasps.
John had chosen to stay at the church for a couple of days. He kept having flashes of panic and needing to check on the kids, and Father Reilly had taken one look at his shaken expression and refused to let him return to his empty apartment.
He had nightmares about a heavy weight pressing him down. Locked in dread of the pain that was to come. The trepidation as he waited and waited and woke up, still waiting.
Well, he’d had nightmares ever since the football field had blown up, so this was really nothing new.
It did, however, mean he liked to sleep in when he got the chance, which was unfortunately not possible in a house full of children, and John groaned as he was jostled by small hands.
“John! John! You have to wake up!” Chloe chirped into his ear, “Father Reilly is calling for you!”
John muttered something probably inappropriate this close to a church.
“Come on, John!” Mary was on his other side, “Up, up, up! The sun is already up!”
John groaned and raised his head. It was pitch black outside, and the kids were all liars. He glowered at them, and they grinned back.
“What does Father Reilly want?” John asked, wondering if he could distract them long enough to get in a quick cat nap.
“I don’t know,” Mary shrugged, “Some men came to the door and he told us to get you.”
John was wide awake now.
“Some men?” John asked, not bothering to change out of his sweatpants and sweatshirt, and inwardly mourning that his gun was back in his apartment. “What men? How many men?”
“I don’t know,” Chloe said as he strode out of his room and headed for the stairs, “We went to get you.” Her voice got smaller, clearly picking up on his jitters, “Is it trouble?”
“I don’t know,” John said—the voices he could hear were in a conversational tone, and no one was screaming. “Keep an eye on the other kids, please.” He took the stairs as fast as he could without making too much noise, and emerged into the hallway to the sound of Father Reilly’s voice.
“—very generous,” Father Reilly was saying, his voice tight, “But I’m afraid we have no money, and very little to trade for.”
“Do not worry, Father—” and Blake was running now—“It has already been paid for.” Bane’s gaze landed on him the moment he burst into the foyer, and John took in the scene at a glance as he kept moving forward, inserting himself between Father Reilly and Bane.
A stack of pallets near the front door. Barsad, hovering in the entryway. Kids, peering in from both sides, still in pajamas, some holding bowls of breakfast, watching with half-curiosity, half-suspicion.
Bane, a giant in the middle of the foyer, expression inscrutable as he stared down at him. Father Reilly, faintly trembling behind John, taking sharp breaths. And John, his chest squeezing tight and his mind blurring to static as he looked up at Bane.
“What are you doing?” John’s voice asked, much calmer than the screaming inside his head.
“Supplies,” Bane said casually, “More than what the depots offer.” He was studying John, and John had never felt so helpless in his life.
“And what would you do, to keep the children safe?”
John had said anything and standing here, unarmed, in a house with fourteen children, staring up at a monster, John knew he meant it. Information on Gordon. Information on Batman. They could put a gun in his hand and tell him to shoot and he would do it to keep these children safe.
“Please,” John took a shaky breath. The whole thing had been a game. Maybe they were going to fuck him here. Maybe they were just going to kill the kids and make him watch. “Please don’t.” His voice was hoarse, and cracking worse with every word. “Please—I’m sorry for breaking curfew. Don’t—don’t punish them for it.” John would leave and never again visit the kids if that was what it took. “Please—”
“No one will be hurting the children,” Bane’s voice dropped, “I told you I would protect them.”
John felt alternatively hot and cold. Sparks of helpless fury too weak to burn through all-encompassing fear. His mouth was dry. His chest tight. His vision blurry. “Please,” he heard himself say, “Stop playing games.”
If they were going to kill him, just let them kill him.
“It is no game,” Bane rumbled, “I have already told you that I do not harm children—”
“They’re going to die,” John interrupted hoarsely, “In a couple of months, they’re all going to die.” It was a yawning pit of misery inside of him. No Batman, and no matter what the resistance plotted, the despair swelled higher every day. “Just please stop taunting us.”
Bane looked almost surprised. John waited for him to do something. Say something. Someone was crying, he could hear stifled sniffles. Bane’s expression darkened, and John knew exactly what it felt like when those large hands wrapped around his throat.
But Bane didn’t try to strangle him. Bane merely inclined his head, eyes shadowed. “Very well, Officer Blake,” he said, turning to leave, “We will leave you be.”
John didn’t breathe until the door clicked behind Bane. Father Reilly strode forward to lock it with shaking fingers, as though that would stop them, and several bodies plowed into John.
“Are we going to die?”
“Who was that?”
“I saw him on TV! I remember the masked man with a funny voice! He’s the one that blew everything up!”
“I don’t want to die!”
John more crumpled to his knees than crouched, but he tried to wrap as many of the kids into a hug as possible. “No one’s going to die,” he exhaled, “Remember the talk we had on sometimes saying things we don’t mean to make people go away?”
Chloe wriggled forward until she was sitting in John’s lap. “I don’t want to die,” she whispered, quiet and teary.
John met Father Reilly’s gaze over the heads of the children, and the helplessness there matched his own.
“You’re not going to die,” John rested his chin on her head, “I promise.”
“Brother,” Bane said, and Barsad looked up from his book to see Bane standing at the window, staring out into Gotham, his expression vaguely unfocused. “What do you think of letting the children leave Gotham?”
Well. Barsad could not say that he didn’t see this coming.
“I think it’ll start a riot,” Barsad said in as unconcerned a tone as possible, “I think we will never find all the children in Gotham, no matter how hard we search. There will be children that don’t want to leave their parents, and parents that won’t want to leave their children. There will be people trying to take advantage to smuggle themselves out. Someone will definitely end up shooting, and in the end, there will be a lot of dead kids.”
Bane’s expression grew harder and harder.
“Besides,” Barsad said, slow and idle, “She would never let you do it.” Barsad would follow his brother into any hell he led them to, but that didn’t mean he enjoyed watching Talia al Ghul lead him around by the nose. The woman wanted to turn the whole city into a funeral pyre for her father, and was covering it up with a pretty story about corruption.
People fought each other all the time. That was just what nature was. What it would always revert to, if you gave it half a chance. It was nothing new, or special, the chaos that Gotham had disintegrated into.
“I see,” Bane said quietly, still staring out the window. Barsad turned back to his book. It was not his place to pass judgement on his brother’s plans. It was only his job to execute them.