Insanity - Gotham Fanfic

[12] Marcus Aurelius

//Ansley's POV//

Barbara apparently was kidnapped last night at the Charity Ball by the Ogre. My uncle is tore up about it, blames himself. Says that he spent more time worrying about Lee and I than Barbara. But now Bruce and I are sitting across from each other at the manor, he spoke to Bunderslaw who knew that we were coming. Apparently I'm not as good of a thief as I once was.

Bruce and I came clean about what happened to Reggie, we couldn't help it. We were scolded about stealing the key, but everything's going okay right now. 

Bruce hangs a photo of his father on his board he has relating to his parents death. He turns to me. "We have a lot of work to do."

"That, that we do."

-
/Two weeks later/

I sat at Bruce's watching the news as he went through some old photos.

"This gang stuff is really getting out of hand." I sigh.

"How do you think your uncle and Selina are?"

I've really been hanging out with Bruce and staying the night here recently, unless I'm with Lee, despite everything. My uncle has been working his butt of and I'm pretty sure the adoption of Selina has been terminated unfortunately, so once again, I'm an only child. 

"I'm sure they're okay, I talked to Uncle Jim a couple days ago, he said he's starting to get things settled to where I could come back home full time. "

A couple of seconds later Bruce smashes a picture frame with a photo of his dad. Glass shatters everywhere and I jump. "Bruce what the-" 

Alfred interrupts me, walking into the room. "Still looking for secrets are we? Or are you just breaking stuff? Ansley I thought you were going to stop him from breaking things." Alfred partially jokes. I throw my hands up in defense. "Hey, he did this unexpectedly." 

"I was looking for secrets, Alfred." Bruce retorts, turning to look at him. Alfred's attention turns to the TV. "Oh turn that rubbish off." Without giving me the chance to grab the remote, Alfred turns it off himself. 

"There's a bloody war going on in the streets, yet you're in here worrying about your dad. Believe me, if your Dad had secrets I'd like to think I would have known them. Your dad was a diligent man, Bruce. He'd spend-"

"Hours in this room working, yes I know. No one was allowed to disturb him whilst he was working. I remember, classical music played for hours. I used to try and sneak in to see him, but the door was locked." It was as if a lightbulb had struck Bruce because he pointed towards the door that was supposedly locked during his father's work hours.

"Why lock the doors Alfred? It has to be in here, in this room. Whatever it is, it's in here." Bruce starts pacing around the room, checking and rechecking everything. He shoots me a look so I get up and start going through things as well. 

-

After what felt like hours of searching through books and anything that we could possibly find something in, Bruce decided to take a rest. After my complaining of course. 

"I hate to admit it," Alfred starts, standing in front of us, "but I'm starting to think there is nothing here."

Books lay in heaps on the floor and tables, I almost feel ashamed at the condition they're in. 

"My intuition is almost always correct." 

"Arkham's full of men whose intuition was correct Bruce. There was none so blind."

"None so blind." I mumble under my breath. Then it hits me. 

"Marcus Aurelius."

"What about him?"

"He was an emperor," Bruce jumps up and races towards the pile of books on the desk. "and he was a stoic, just like my father." 

Bruce finds the book he was searching for and pulls apart a sleeve. "Here, here it is." He grins. "I'm not exactly sure what it is, but it's here, and we're one step closer to finding out the reason my parents were murdered."  

"Don't you dare press that button." Alfred says as Bruce's thumb hovers over one of the buttons on the black mp3 player looking like thing. Bruce goes to say something but I get up and take the thing out of his hands. "If he can't, I will." 

"Miss Ansley wait, it could be a bomb."

I ignore his warning and press the square button anyway. Classical music starts to play and I look up at Alfred. "You were saying?" 

Alfred doesn't get the chance to say anything because the fireplace starts moving. It rolls back revealing what appears to be a hallway. The three of us stare wide eyed and silent, staring at the dark hallway with stairs descending into darkness, that is until Bruce speaks up.

"Hey Ans, I think you're a genius." Bruce whispers. 

"Yeah I think so too." I reply back. 

--

A/N: Hi. it's been a while

i have been procrastinating ok

high school is rough

there are a lot of stairs 

ANYWAYS

HI 

THANK YOU FOR READING

THANK YOU ALL FOR ALL YOUR SUPPORT AND EVERYTHING LIKE THERE ARE PEOPLE, ACTUAL LIVING & BREATHING PEOPLE WHO READ THIS?? 

BUT YEAH THANKS AND ILY ALL 

YOU ARE ALL GR8 FOR PUTTING UP WITH MY TERRIBLE GRAMMAR AND WRITING (i literally failed a grammar test in English yikes)

BUT YEAH

I'M PROCRASTINATING ON EVERYTHING

I HAVE A REPORT I HAVE TO WRITE FOR DRAMA AND I'VE BARELY STARTED 

ALSO MERRY LATE CHRISTMAS 

AND HAPPY EARLY NEW YEAR 

YIKES 2016 

I MEAN IT WAS A DECENT YEAR FOR MYSELF

BUT 

Y I K E S

ok enough rambling have a lovely day/night