Ships Adrift in a Strong Tide

Raze

The Manor stretches before them, the walls graffitied and the doors slashed with knives. Damian looks on impassively, but Mar'i can hardly stomach it.

Who knows who did this? It wouldn't have been the big-name criminals. They wouldn't have spent time on this. Their main goal would have been the batcave.

Damian wrenches the door open. Inside, the Manor is even worse. Everything is smashed. Picture frames are broken on the ground, and a few that couldn't be yanked from the wall have had the canvas inside slashed.

"It's awful," Mar'i says, her voice small.

Damian grunts and wades through the broken vases, glass crunching like snow under booted feet. Sunlight filtering through the broken windows reflects off glass powder littered over the carpet. It's beautiful, in a horrible way.

The whole house has been damaged. Doors have been broken, some ripped from their hinges. Knives have been dragged over the carpet. Some stairs are even missing—most likely, a couple of thugs got overexcited with an axe—and Mar'i flies Damian up them.

She grabs some of the things that remain from her room. It disturbs her to find that some of her undergarments appear to be missing, and all of her drawers are turned upside down. She grabs as many outfits as she can put together, then she takes some photos from the frames, picking through shards of glass to get them.

Her bed's been disturbed and Damian tells her not to go near it, and she doesn't want to know what she'll find in it. She follows him to his room, which is in way worse shape than hers. His dresser has been tipped, and she has to help him right it before he can rummage through the clothes on the floor. His mattress has been scored with knives, springs showing, and the insides of his pillows have been spread over it like blood. There's nothing left of his desk and his computer's been taken, although Proxy took care of that remotely.

He walks over to his closet and kneels, rummaging. If he's looking for something specific, Mar'i can't help but think that he's never going to find it. He stands and tosses her a small object. A tiny box.

"I was planning on giving that to you soon," he tells her, the first words he's said since they arrived. "It's not very appropriate anymore, but you should have it."

A diamond ring glitters at her, the gold band sunk deep into velvet lining the box.

The sight of it brings tears to her eyes. The future they could have had plays in her mind, a life at the Manor, a wedding full of their friends and family, children.

She stows the box down her shirt. No fitting words come to her mind, and even if she could think of something, Damian isn't paying attention.

"Do you think the cave's been broken into?"

"Of course," he says bitterly.

He's not in the mood to comfort her, and she shouldn't have expected anything else. This has to be much harder on him than on her.

Word that Batman is actually Damian Wayne got out a few days ago. The results were catastrophic. Damian pulled as much money as possible out of his bank accounts. He arranged for Lucius Fox and his two daughters to take over Wayne Enterprises. It seemed like a huge loss, but Damian reminded her that he had another foundation under his ownership. The League of Shadows. Mar'i didn't like the idea of living off money made by assassins, but it didn't really matter anymore.

She follows him down to the grandfather clock which hides the entrance to the batcave. It had been knocked away, the hidden staircase gaping at them Damian kicks it angrily, but it doesn't budge.

The small fries must have done that. They wedged the clock this way, off the tracks so it wasn't able to move but enough that they knew where the entrance was. They'd probably be coming back with explosives.

"Here, move." She puts a hand on his shoulder to gently push him aside, and she pushes the clock herself, though with great effort.

This would be their last time here. Ever. Damian set to work, tapping at the computer. Eerily, several vehicles—motorbikes, the batmobile, extra cars for use in a civilian identity—turn themselves on and drive themselves.

"That should be at least one per bunker," he mutters.

He takes the uniforms out of the glass cases, shoving them into a large bag which he gives to Mar'i. He also takes vials of different immunizations and samples of different chemical weapons—fear gas samples, joker gas, Ivy's poison injections.

He taps on the computer again and his motorcycle turns on in the distance. It pulls up next to Mar'i obediently.

"Say goodbye to the batcave, Mar'i," he says grimly.

She doesn't say anything. She clenches her hands into tight fists, but she tries to keep her nerve, like Damian.

He taps at the keyboard again and drags his fingers across the holo-touchscreen. When he finishes, harsh red light fills the cave and a timer shows on every monitor available, including the one on the body of Damian's bike.

As one last measure, he takes a handful of explosives and throws them at the stone stairs leading down from the clock. It won't do much, but it should stop anyone who's wandering around because they're just curious or stupid.

The explosion sounds and Mar'i turns from it, shielding her eyes from dust and debris but also unable to look at it.

Damian takes Mar'i's bag and the one he filled and attaches them to the bike on either side of the seat.

She thinks that he's about to leave, just like that, but without saying a word to her he stalks over to the wall where he hung his collection of weapons. He slings two swords around his shoulders, crisscrossing around his back, and he pockets a few daggers.

Then he goes ballistic. He takes a longsword and he slashes at the practice droid he was in the middle of repairing before any of this started.

Red light glints off the sword and brackish oil spills out as the droid's head flies off its body, rolling close to Mar'i's feet. Damian stabs the sword through its body, spraying more oil on the floor and on himself.

Mar'i turns away, giving him a small amount of privacy. She pulls on a leather jacket and a pair of gloves she keeps for motorcycle runs, and she grabs Damian's jacket, too.

She turns when a clattering sound rings out, and she finds that Damian threw his sword away and started punching the metal husk of the practice droid.

She flies to him and she catches his wrists in a firm grip. He struggles against her, curling his lip back and baring gritted teeth, but he realizes what he was doing and he goes somewhat limp, his head turned to the ground.

She lets him go and he doesn't move. He looks defeated.

"Damian," she breathes. "Come on." She lifts her hand to wipe oil off his cheek, but he catches her as she leans forward and crushes his mouth against hers.

It's a rough kiss, not really all that pleasant and his fingers tug at her too hard, but she goes soft against him and lets him do it because he needs something to work with him instead of against him.

He pulls back and leans his forehead against hers, panting too roughly for a kiss that wasn't very romantic.

"Damian," she soothes, stroking her fingers down his shirt soothingly. "We have to go."

His eyes snap to the monitor counting down the seconds to the cave self-destruct. She can see the numbers reflected in his eyes.

"Yes," he agrees. "We're off to bunker j-13, in case something goes wrong and we get separated."

He pulls on the jacket she got for him and straddles the bike, tapping on the screen on its body. She gets on behind him, noticing the blood on his knuckles. She'll wrap his hands when they get to the bunker.

She wants to say something, anything, to assure him that things will get better. But there's nothing to say, and she isn't even sure that's true. He revs the engine and she wraps her arms around him, wrapping her her fingers around her wrist for an anchor, and they leave the batcave for the last time.