(no subject)
Title: Equilibrium
Fandom: Batman Beyond; JLU, spoilers for "Epilogue".
Summary: Things aren't perfect.
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Wish it were.
When Terry turns nineteen, Max's face is hollow and bitter. There are deep circles under her eyes and bruises down her arms. She stays in the Cave for days at a time, working on the suit, fixing his dinner, putting up with the Old Man. She gets weaker and weaker until Terry screams and sobs at her for five hours, late into the crisp October air. He drives her home.
They make sweet, slow love in her bed. He dives into her dark, open warmth. She tears her name from his lips, over and over, over and over. They forget everything that they've ever known about anything except each other.
She leaves Gotham the next morning. He watches underwear and papers fly out of her haphazardly packed bags and promises to send the rest later. He kisses the tears off her face and watches the plane fly away, his hands clenched into fists. And he stands there for a very long time.
When Terry turns twenty, a boy comes from out of the past, the past that Terry has only dreamed of, and he is uncontrollable and obnoxious and young. Terry isn't sure what to do when he looks into the boy's - Static's - face, because there's too much of himself there. Too much of everything he knows he stood for at sixteen. So he doesn't look at Virgil for fear of seeing himself until the very end, and by then it's already too late.
When Terry turns twenty-one, Bruce throws him a gala. Ball dresses and corsages and tuxedos. This is better than anything that he's ever dreamed of, and he's content to play the playboy, to smile for the photographers with his arm around Bruce's weak back, to nod and to say all the right words at exactly the right time.
He notices a petite blonde woman in a catering outfit toward the back, who is staring at him with a face that he's sometimes seen in his dreams. He doesn't say a word.
When Terry turns twenty-four, Dana screams at him for an hour under a dirty streetlamp about how fucking selfish he is, to believe that she still doesn't know. They fuck until dawn, a harsh, brutal love. He sobs with every thrust, his fingers digging into her hips hard enough to make bruises. He curls into her like a drowning man, and it's there, right there, that he looks at her sleeping, sweat-stained face, and he knows that he'll be able to love her enough to get by.
When Terry turns twenty-seven, Bruce turns ninety, and the world celebrates. There are writers and journalists willing to pay money to write his biography, the great biography of Bruce Wayne, the generous millionaire, darling playboy, secret genius. Bruce just shakes his head and smiles and Terry smiles beside him for the photographers, and it's just like Terry remembers.
Only now Terry is a millionaire too, and he can't remember what his dreams looked like at age sixteen. He sits in the Old Man's chair, and stares at the phone, and doesn't call the number with the Midwest area code in the fading blue ink on an old piece of paper that's torn at the edges.
When Terry turns thirty, his world collapses around his head. He's always known, he always has, but now it's real, not just some story he tells himself at night. He stumbles to the old lady's house that night and he might be half-drunk on nothing else but despair. Her story only serves to crumble more of his walls. He goes home and he sits in the Old Man's chair and he looks at his phone, and calls one number and not the other.
Just wanted to ask you something.
Fandom: Batman Beyond; JLU, spoilers for "Epilogue".
Summary: Things aren't perfect.
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Wish it were.
When Terry turns nineteen, Max's face is hollow and bitter. There are deep circles under her eyes and bruises down her arms. She stays in the Cave for days at a time, working on the suit, fixing his dinner, putting up with the Old Man. She gets weaker and weaker until Terry screams and sobs at her for five hours, late into the crisp October air. He drives her home.
They make sweet, slow love in her bed. He dives into her dark, open warmth. She tears her name from his lips, over and over, over and over. They forget everything that they've ever known about anything except each other.
She leaves Gotham the next morning. He watches underwear and papers fly out of her haphazardly packed bags and promises to send the rest later. He kisses the tears off her face and watches the plane fly away, his hands clenched into fists. And he stands there for a very long time.
When Terry turns twenty, a boy comes from out of the past, the past that Terry has only dreamed of, and he is uncontrollable and obnoxious and young. Terry isn't sure what to do when he looks into the boy's - Static's - face, because there's too much of himself there. Too much of everything he knows he stood for at sixteen. So he doesn't look at Virgil for fear of seeing himself until the very end, and by then it's already too late.
When Terry turns twenty-one, Bruce throws him a gala. Ball dresses and corsages and tuxedos. This is better than anything that he's ever dreamed of, and he's content to play the playboy, to smile for the photographers with his arm around Bruce's weak back, to nod and to say all the right words at exactly the right time.
He notices a petite blonde woman in a catering outfit toward the back, who is staring at him with a face that he's sometimes seen in his dreams. He doesn't say a word.
When Terry turns twenty-four, Dana screams at him for an hour under a dirty streetlamp about how fucking selfish he is, to believe that she still doesn't know. They fuck until dawn, a harsh, brutal love. He sobs with every thrust, his fingers digging into her hips hard enough to make bruises. He curls into her like a drowning man, and it's there, right there, that he looks at her sleeping, sweat-stained face, and he knows that he'll be able to love her enough to get by.
When Terry turns twenty-seven, Bruce turns ninety, and the world celebrates. There are writers and journalists willing to pay money to write his biography, the great biography of Bruce Wayne, the generous millionaire, darling playboy, secret genius. Bruce just shakes his head and smiles and Terry smiles beside him for the photographers, and it's just like Terry remembers.
Only now Terry is a millionaire too, and he can't remember what his dreams looked like at age sixteen. He sits in the Old Man's chair, and stares at the phone, and doesn't call the number with the Midwest area code in the fading blue ink on an old piece of paper that's torn at the edges.
When Terry turns thirty, his world collapses around his head. He's always known, he always has, but now it's real, not just some story he tells himself at night. He stumbles to the old lady's house that night and he might be half-drunk on nothing else but despair. Her story only serves to crumble more of his walls. He goes home and he sits in the Old Man's chair and he looks at his phone, and calls one number and not the other.
Just wanted to ask you something.