The play had dragged on far too long, and somewhere between the overdone costumes and the hollow laughter of Gotham's elite, Bruce and Selina lost interest. Both had seen enough theatrics for a lifetime.
With a knowing glance exchanged between them, they quietly slipped out of the theater, their absence unnoticed by the guests too enraptured by the stage.
The manor's corridors were quieter now, a softer hush lingering compared to the noise behind them. Chandeliers above cast warm golden light, as their glow danced across polished floors, art works, and old portraits.
Bruce's stride was steady, with his posture relaxed in that charming billionaire disguise, though Selina could now read past the mask as she has come to know both of his persona's, intimately. "It's been quite a while," he said, his deep voice softer than usual as they headed toward the exit. "How were your travels?"
Selina's lips stretched into a grin, her eyes glimmering like a cat who had seen more of the world than most. "Wonderful. I picked up a few pieces of art from every country I visited. I'm putting them together as a collection for my gallery." She spoke with pride, her tone light, but the sincerity was indeed clear. Sharing her little trophies always made her purr.
Bruce smirked faintly, slipping his hands into his pockets as they walked side by side. "Would you mind Bruce Wayne paying a visit to that gallery sometime?" His phrasing was deliberate and respectful. He wanted to see it, but not intrude—not when her personal collection was more intimate than her nightly escapades as Catwoman.
She tilted her head with gleaming eyes. "I would love to show you my personal art," she purred, her voice dripping with flirtation as she leaned closer.
He leaned in too, and the kiss that followed was slow at first but quickly turned into something hungry, electric. Their bodies pressed together, lips locking in a rhythm that had been delayed for far too long.
Bruce's usually composed demeanor cracked, and Selina, never shy about taking what she wanted, deepened the kiss until her lipstick was smeared across his mouth.
The hall was empty, the silence theirs to play with. They slipped around a corner, half-hidden in the shadows, and Bruce pressed her back against the wall with a forceful hunger he rarely let out in public.
His lips devoured hers, hands sliding down her body, tracing curves he knew by heart. Selina moaned into his mouth as he groped her breasts through the thin fabric of her dress, his other hand moving lower, gripping her ass possessively. His body pressed tight against hers, his arousal undeniable.
Her lipstick smeared further as his kisses trailed along her jaw and down her neck. She arched into him, nails teasing at the back of his collar as if daring him to lose control.
But then Bruce froze.
His sharp eyes had caught something at the end of the hall. A shoe. Not just a shoe—a foot sticking out from the side of a half-open door. Its angle was wrong, limp, the sole visible like its owner had collapsed inside.
Selina immediately noticed his shift, her lips still parted from the kiss, her chest rising and falling. "What's wrong?" she asked, confused at why he had stopped just as things were heating up.
Bruce's gaze narrowed, the predator in him awake again. He gently pulled her hands off him and walked toward the door with cautious steps, his tuxedo shoes barely making a sound. Selina followed close, curiosity painted on her face.
Inside, the dimly lit room revealed the sprawled bodies of seven guards, each unconscious and piled haphazardly as if taken down with skilled efficiency.
"This just happened," Bruce muttered, crouching near one of the bodies. "Otherwise, the other guards would have noticed. They do regular check-ins."
Selina stood at the doorway, her lips curling in amusement. "Someone had a busy night," she whispered with a playful tone, even as her eyes darted across the carnage.
Bruce's jaw tightened as he glanced back down the hall. The guards stationed at the theater doors were still in place, and with normal expressions. Whoever had done this wasn't here anymore—they were long gone, or at least smart enough to vanish without drawing attention.
Selina's eyes flicked toward him with curiousity. "What are you going to do?" She knew that look on his face, the one where Bruce Wayne threatened to crack and Batman threatened to surface.
She was secretly hoping he would—plans for the night be damned. A detour for some rooftop sex wasn't exactly off the table.
Bruce exhaled through his nose, shaking his head. "Nothing. Judging from where this leads, someone was breaking out. Could've been a thief." He tugged lightly at the collar of his tuxedo, undoing a button to ease the tension that threatened to break his facade. "It's not my problem tonight." His tone was firm—yet calm and dismissive, but Selina could hear the edge beneath it.
He knew better than to linger. The other guards would notice soon enough, and the last thing he wanted was to be found standing over a pile of unconscious bodies. That wouldn't be easy to explain as Bruce Wayne.
"Let's go," he said finally, his hand resting lightly at her back as he steered her toward the exit. Selina smirked, satisfied with the answer. Her gaze lingered on his jawline, the faint trace of lipstick still smudged there.
"Good. Because I wasn't done with you yet."
And just like that, their focus shifted back to the night that was waiting for them. The city's secrets could unravel on their own. For now, the billionaire and the cat had a different kind of game to play—one that promised no masks, no interruptions, just a man and a sexy woman ready to engage in a passionate and lustful indulgence in a five-star hotel or wherever the night carried them.
Two nocturnal predators, finally giving into the hunger they had both been teasing all evening.
- - -
Commissioner Gordon moved through the shadows of an abandoned warehouse in midtown Gotham, his back now pressed against the cold brick wall beside the rusted double doors.The air inside was thick with the smell of old oil and mildew, every breath felt heavy in his lungs as his heart raced.
Dust floated through the faint shafts of moonlight bleeding in through broken roof above, and the silence around him seemed to stretch on forever.
He slid his pistol free, the familiar weight grounding him as he checked the chamber out of habit. With steady steps, he pushed deeper inside, his eyes sweeping across the long rows of stacked crates and overturned
pallets.
The vast emptiness swallowed his footsteps as his jaw was set tight, his glasses catching the faint glow of the moonlight as he cautiously poceedede into the warehouse Then—
"You actually came alone."
The voice came from behind him, close enough to send a ripple of tension up his spine. Gordon spun on instinct, swinging his pistol around, but a gloved hand moved faster. The gun was stripped from his grasp in a blur, his wrist twisted just hard enough to sting.
"Do you have such little regard for your life?" The voice was distorted by a modulator.
Red Hood.
Gordon steadied his breathing, forcing his pulse to calm as his eyes focused on the figure before him. The crimson dome reflected the moonlight refracting though the cracked glass of a window up ahead.
"Well," Gordon said, keeping a measured tone, "I figured you wouldn't reach out to me unless you needed something. And we both know you don't make yourself known unless you want to. That makes this a win-win. You get your little meeting, and I get an actual sighting of you.
Something the GCPD hasn't managed since you popped outta nowhere." He reached slowly into his coat pocket.
"That better not be a gun," Red Hood warned, the barrel of his own pistol already aimed lazily at Gordon's center mass. "Because I can assure you it'd be useless going up against me." Gordon's brow lifted, unimpressed. "Can't tell if that's pride or confidence talking."
His hand emerged with nothing more than a battered pack of cigarettes and a lighter. He tapped one out, placed it between his lips, and lit it, exhaling smoke into the stale air.
"So," he asked, the tip of his cigarette glowing faintly, "why did you reach out to me? Why here?"
"If this is how you speak with Batman, no wonder he's kept you around all these years," Red Hood replied, pacing casually around him.
"You really are one of them," Gordon noted, his eyes flicking to the faint outline of a bat crest worked into the chest armor beneath the jacket.
"Not at all." Red Hood spread his hands briefly, mocking. "This here's more of a tribute, if you want to call it that." His gloved fingers twitched exaggerated quotation marks around the word tribute.
"I see," Gordon muttered, though his expression said otherwise.
"We aren't here to chat."
"Then why did you drag me here?" Gordon asked, taking another drag. His voice had the weariness of a man with too many nights spent like this, staring into the dark corners of Gotham. "Since you showed up, it's been one thing after another. You might think you're cleaning up messes like the Bat, but your methods are causing the department trouble. My people are paying for it."
Red Hood's stance stiffened. He finally had someone—anyone—to share his thoughts. His voice came out steadier than his thoughts.
"I'm helping you do your job better than you could ever manage. I'm making the calls Batman won't, going the extra mile to make sure these vermin actually pay for their sins." He stepped closer. "If a person commits a crime and just apologizes? That's useless. The crime's still been done. Somebody has already been victimized."
"So you're judge, jury, and executioner now?" Gordon asked, probing, his sharp eyes reading every twitch of body language.
"Nah." Red Hood shook his head with a small laugh. "No god complex here. I'm just doing the only thing that works. The only thing that'll actually make this city safer in the near future instead of dragging it out for another twenty years of masked theatrics and revolving doors at Arkham. One vermin at a time." Gordon's eyes narrowed behind his glasses.
There it was—the fracture line between this man and Batman. "I should arrest you right now," he said, his tone flat and testing.
"But you won't." Red Hood flicked Gordon's pistol between his fingers like it was a toy before pressing it into the commissioner's palm. "Even with a squad behind you, I wouldn't break a sweat."
"Cocky much?" Gordon deadpanned, sliding the weapon back into his holster.
"Just facts." Red Hood's helmet tilted ever so slightly, the hint of a grin in his voice.
He finally got to the point. "As for why I asked you here tonight—I rescued some kids recently. Kids that were being abused by high-ranking, well-respected pieces of shit in your city." His tone shifted venomousle as it spilled into every word.
Gordon froze, the cigarette halfway to his lips. His voice came low and heavy. "What?" His eyes narrowed, glasses catching a reflection of the moon's faint light. "Who?"
"You don't need names yet." Red Hood's voice softened with menace. "But when the truth comes out, it'll rattle Gotham to its core. Saints, heroes, men your city worships—it'll burn them to ash. I've already said too much."
Gordon exhaled smoke, fighting the urge to press harder. He'd learned when to stop pushing a man who wouldn't budge.
"So you want me to do right by those kids. Keep them safe."
"Bingo." Red Hood lifted his hand, miming a gunshot with his fingers aimed at Gordon. The gesture was mocking, yet oddly lighthearted.
"Where are they? Do they have families?"
"Trafficked in from other cities. Families might not even know they're still alive. Reuniting people isn't in my résumé." Red Hood jerked his head toward a small door at the far end of the warehouse. "They're resting back there. You'll take it from here."
Gordon studied him for a long moment, the smoke curling around his lined face. "So what, you're a hero now?"
Red Hood chuckled darkly, shaking his head. "Nah, am nothing as flashy. I'm the man who does what's needed. The one who flips the tables on monsters in their final moments before I end them. That's all."
The words hung between them as Gordon's expression hardened.
"Make sure they see a therapist for at least a year," Red Hood added, his tone flat but edged with something genuine. "Might help unfuck their minds a little."
Gordon turned toward the door, but when he looked back, the warehouse floor was empty. Red Hood was gone.
"Great," he muttered under his breath, pocketing his lighter. "Another one who does the disappearing act."
Not long outside the night had bloomed alive with sirens. Red and blue lights washed over the broken windows as GCPD cruisers swarmed the warehouse.
From a rooftop across the street, Red Hood lay prone behind a scope, his armor blending with the dark. He watched silently as the officers wrapped the kids in blankets and guided them gently into vehicles. Relief softened the tension in his chest—briefly.
"I should've gutted the mayor like a fish, prepped him for the grill," he muttered to himself, his voice low, almost conversational. "But I'll leave him for the wolves in prison once I expose him. Once I get my hands on Joker, everything falls into place."
The night wind carried his words into the dark. His fingers flexed against the rifle as his gaze stayed on the scene below. He'd warned the kids to keep quiet, to say nothing about who had abused them. Men with power and influence had ways of evading justice. Better to let him carry that burden.
Soon, he told them. In a couple weeks or months, when the shame was public, the mayor and his gang would be driven towards suicide. Until then, they had to endure and not identify them.
A sudden prickle ran across his skin. Instinct took the wheel as he rolled sideways just as a round tore through the spot he'd been laying. The bullet clanged against the steel lip of the rooftop.
He snapped his eyes up, scanning the skyline. There—on a far-off ledge, the brief, betraying flicker of muzzle flash from a high-powered rifle. Whoever was out there wasn't reckless—they were patient, precise, and had waited long enough for a clean shot.
Red Hood ducked into cover, his mind already cycling through names. Someone who preferred long distance, someone methodical enough to wait him out. He knew the type.
One name pressed itself to the front of his mind.
"Deadshot."