Now Let Us Lie

He first meets her, oddly, in a tavern, somewhere in the desolate, forgotten towns of Russia. He knows why he's in the country but doesn't quite know what possessed him to walk inside the dismally dimmed pub that catered to only one other patron other than himself, an old homeless man who'd taken his graciously given coin to the one place he should not have taken it. He was passed out against the bar now, snoring loudly as drool dribbled into his unkempt beard.

Bane lifts a brow at the old man, then pays no attention at all to the bartender who knows exactly who he is before going further into the darkened corner to sit at a table and waste time before his next meeting. The employee makes no move nor utters no word asking him to leave. His name is spreading, or more so the stories of the mask, and Bane expects no trouble lest a man want more of it. His big boots, wet from the rain puddles outside, make a loud noise that cause the sleeping drunk to twitch as Bane places them on the tabletop, leaning back in the chair and giving his aching spine a break. His heavy leather jacket squeaks, but he needs it for the dank cold right outside the door that doesn't latch like it should.

Only minutes go by before the door opens again, bringing with it that dank cold he was trying to escape. At first, from the appearance of the coat and stomping boots, Bane assumes it to be another man coming to drown his sorrows. But because he's wasting time, because even while he should be relaxing, he instead studies his surroundings hidden in the flickering shadows.

Not a man, Bane thinks, watching the new body sink into the stool at the bar. A woman, in a place like this.

It could be a mistake, is what he also thinks.

She's tall for a woman, with long legs and a long torso. Bane can't tell by her state of dress, but by her movements he can visualize a strong body, one unlike other women who were blessed with the curvature of hips and breasts and thighs, an hour glass. As she leans over the tabletop almost forlornly, he can already tell that she doesn't care about such things. Her hair is short once she pulls her collar down, cut like a pixie and the color of wheat, all perfectly natural. Her clothes are without gender and her nails are unpainted as she taps them on the bar, as is her face and whatever else Bane assumes women paint for further enhancement. She's here for a drink, for quiet. Solitude. And she seems perfectly okay with that.

Bane turns away from her, wondering again if this was a mistake on her part. Coming in here in a bad part of town.

His assumptions prove correct.

Two more men waltz into the tavern, already tipsy in the afternoon as the rain beats onto the sidewalks outside. Bane knows the shadows conceal him, but with the hood of his jacket over his bald head, his lowers his chin anyway. He would rather not cause a commotion right before his meetings on behalf of his forming mercenary company. His new band of brothers since his excommunication from the League.

He can smell the men's need for trouble from his seat across the tavern.

And he can also see their glassy eyes hone right onto the woman who only came in for peace.

They mumble something in Russian to each other. One has long dark hair and the other is buzzed to the scalp. They look like military men, but without the honor or glory, which explains their drunken, miserable states. They chuckle, approaching the woman closer who's trying her hardest to ignore them. She seems to know what they're saying but is playing ignorant. Bane picks up a few words. He knows what they plan to do.

He watches the woman from the dark shadows, and sees the way she flinches slightly when one of them says the word body.

The bartender sleazily retreats to the back room, leaving her on her own.

Bane simply waits.

"We see you here," the dark haired one says to her in English, trying the language out on her although it's heavy with an accent. "This is no place for you."

"No?" she asks, and sounds very American. She turns her head to them. Bane sees a delicate curve in her cheek that is plainly female. "I'm not worried. Thanks for the concern."

"Woman comes in here, she should expect something."

She points to her glass full of tap water. "I only expected to come in for a drink. Not really expecting anything else." The buzz cut flanks her. Now each is on either side and a little too close for her comfort.

"Do you think you can take care of yourself?" he asks, his eyes never leaving her face, although she refuses to look at them. "Are you one of those types? A man will eat you up in one big gulp."

"Until one tries, I've got no problem. Now please back away."

"You think yourself capable," he breathes, his buzz cut friend starts to giggle hoarsely at some unspoken joke. "Women think they can go wherever they please now. Coming in here, you ask me to give you attention."

She doesn't respond. Maybe she thinks they'll go away with her lack of participation.

"We know you have no job. We see you trying for work before you come in here to drink this mess." He spits at the water with disgust, then lets his eyes travel over her body. "Do you try to look like one of us? Is that how you hope to get work? Only a man can be a man. I think you forget who you are."

She's quiet, very quiet, even as they mumble to each other again in Russian, words that seem to unsettle her. Bane sees her tense up. "Leave me alone," she mutters, with a hint of warning.

"You forget that you are a female. I think my friend and I will make you remember. You have a place and that is where you belong. Women belong beneath men. Under us."

"If you try," she almost growls, remaining still and uneasy. "You'll regret it."

They laugh as they grab her and pull her from the stool. She struggles against them, unable to set herself free.

"Stop. Stop!" she shouts, and her uproar makes them heave her against the bar, making her crash into other stools. They approach her like wolves as she scrambles on the floor with the fallen chairs.

And Bane still waits. No one can see him.

"Let me see your body, woman," the man taunts, yanking the jacket from her and revealing her plain white t-shirt. He scoffs at her breasts that don't meet his expectations. Her body is too long and tall. Too strong for his tastes. "Still a female," he sighs, then grabs her booted ankle to pull her under him. "I will make you sing for me."

Bane sees it before it happens. She pulls her other leg back, and sends her heel right into his nose.

He flies back with a snarl, clutching his face. The other goes to charge her. She gets one of the wooden stools and swings it at him. It shatters upon impact. All that's left in her hand is one long, splintery leg.

And Bane sees something familiar in her. Something that reminds him of all his work now. He sees the desire for something more, something greater.

Ferocity.

The woman growls loudly and uses the leg of the stool to beat her two attackers. A vicious snarl remains on her face as blood spurts, as the two men practically beg her to stop her hits. She has power in her body unlike smaller women, has more weight and strength to put into her swings at them. She successfully keeps them down, knocks one out cold as the other cries and crawls away. She doesn't allow it. She knocks him unconscious with her wooden baton until he's still.

Once she's confident they won't bother her anymore, she pants above them. Over them. Victorious.

Then she spits on them.

"Bastards," she mutters.

And Bane… is impressed.

She jumps at the sound of a deep voice from across the tavern. Her eyes travel frantically as she scans for the source.

"The one by your foot," Bane says, waiting to continue until her eyes lock with his. They're brown, he sees. "His jaw is broken."

She's still panting as she draws her blonde brows together. "Who the hell are you? Have you been sitting there the whole time?"

"You didn't need my help," he tells her.

She's confused at the unique sound of his voice. Even more so that it sounds like his mouth is covered but also amplified. "What…" Her eyes adjust to his darkened corner. She squints. "What's on your face?"

Bane stands up and she sees that he's tall, much taller than her, who's always been equal in height to average men. He's wide too, thick with muscle if the way he swaggers is any indication of what's beneath that jacket. He pulls his hood back and she stares at the hissing mask constricting his face. She swallows with uncertainty, and grips her weapon tighter. Something in the eyes. Something in the stride.

"I know you," she says, sweat beading on her forehead beneath the pixie cut of her hair. "You're always in the newspaper."

He studies her intently, but not like the other men. He sees something other than what they saw in her. She may keep her hair short, she may keep her body strong, she may reject many rituals of the female creature. But her face, her eyes, the smooth skin of her cheeks, is all woman.

A powerful woman who took on two men, and won the fight.

"My face has never been photographed," Bane comments. "How are you so certain?"

"Not you," she corrects now. "What you do. How you work. There's a pattern and I see it. It coincides with the stories." She drops the stool leg, turns away from him and picks up her jacket. The bartender still has yet to emerge from hiding. "Unless you're going to bother me like they did, I think I'll just go home before the police show up."

"Do you have a home?"

"Yes." No, she thinks instead. They kicked me out this morning. But she doesn't tell him that.

Bane tilts his head as she shrugs on her jacket. "Can you not fight with your own two fists?"

She makes a disgusted face like he's crazy. "Any woman who thinks she can take on two men without help is stupid. If the odds are against me, then I'm going to cheat and use whatever I can find. That one's jaw is broken," she confirms with a nod. "That one's choking on his own blood. I figure those results are better than me trying my best in hand to hand. Excuse me." She goes to brush past him, turning her collar up.

"You're right."

His voice stops her. The cheerful tone of it makes her look back. She can't place his accent, and usually she's good at that.

"You're right," Bane repeats with a nod. "He's choking. It was a good job. Impressive work."

She stares at him. He really does look impressed, this man she always reads about in the paper. The mask doesn't scare her. Neither does his size or his reputation. In fact, she thinks she can almost admire him for what he's accomplished. For the fear and intimidation he creates. With a slight smile, she nods back. "Thank you."

"Would you like to work for me?"

She flinches from his question. The man from the paper, she repeats in her head. The man with the mask. The mercenary terrorist. He's standing right here, in the middle of the havoc she caused in the tavern, asking her such a question. "I'm sorry?"

"I have men," Bane tells her, moving his boot over broken pieces of wood. "I need more. And I am not discriminatory. They said you are in need of a job. I'm offering you one."

She thinks about a lot of things as she stares at him. She remembers that she has nowhere to go. She remembers that she has no prospects of work because of her background. She has no family anymore, no friends, nothing keeping her in this town or the next or the next. Everywhere she goes, she fails, strikes out. From America to Europe, there's nothing. There's only this mercenary, asking her to work for him as he stands in the blood of the men she's beaten with a stool leg.

She looks into his eyes. In her own in the mirror, she sees nothing.

In his she sees life and triumph. Something in the eyes…

"When do I start?" she asks.

Bane grins under the mask. "What is your name?"

"Kit."

He has to stop for a moment. He wasn't expecting something so... cute from a woman who looked anything but. "Kit?" he asks. He tries to make it not sound insulting but the name seems foreign on his tongue.

She doesn't seem to care. She only nods. "Kit," she simply repeats. "Kit Kelli."

Bane gives a breathy laugh and shakes his head. "Well, Kit," he begins, offering his hand out to her. "Welcome."

Kit takes his hand with no womanly delicacy and they shake. Bane can already feel the ability in her grip, the drive to work and become something else, and he approves.

It's the first time they touch.

"Follow me," he tells her, and she leaves the tavern with him.

The men behind them continue to bleed, and the drunk continues to sleep.

A couple weeks go by, and the small number of men Bane also has working for him don't seem to care that she's a woman. No one bat an eye when he brought her through the door of their safe house in Russia that first night, a structure of average size tucked into the fields where no one could find them and where the others sat and waited for his orders. Everyone is of all races, colors, shapes, and sizes. Her new boss really doesn't discriminate if the body is able and the mind sharp enough to get a job done. As of right now, Kit is the only female.

Bane expects them to stay strong and smart, she comes to find, as they wait for him to give word or begin new travels. Kit discovers that he's creating contacts where he hadn't had them before, and while he does this, they are to train, to read, to test each other until he gives a command. Bane brings with him supplies; food, clothing, weapons, and books. Bane himself mostly utilizes the books. She watches him read a lot in languages even she doesn't know.

So Kit trains. She exercises, she cooks when it's her turn, she shows others their weaknesses and she shoots the guns. Since the night they met, Bane hasn't really spoken to her unless it involves the company as a whole. The next time they speak, she's out in the fields with a rife in her hands and against her shoulder, sighting down some beer bottles a good number of feet away. The man Bane speaks to most, Barsad, told her to shoot until he sent for her. Her feet are planted firmly and her shirt is tied back at her waist in a little knot. She can't stand baggy clothes. The sky is gloomy and the air is wet. Her short hair takes on a more yellowy hue. Bane approaches her, his heavy strides a sound she's getting to know well. She doesn't even feel nervous when he stands close to observe her.

Bane finds that she knows how to handle a rifle. With both of her brown eyes open, one looking through the scope, she makes all the beer bottles shatter into sharp broken bits.

"I told Barsad to make sure you had time with our armory," Bane says, watching her hands as she fiddles with the trigger expertly. "I see now that you're just wasting my bullets."

"I do what I'm told, boss." She glances over at him, watches him make a weird expression with his brows at the nickname. "You didn't exactly ask about my qualifications."

"So you know how to beat a man with unconventional objects, and you can shoot. Is there anything else I should know before I order you to improve something you're already well advanced in?"

"I think I like it better if I just surprise you." Kit's satisfied that she hasn't damaged the rife in any way. Looking back at him, she props it against her shoulder. She looks like a warrior, an amazon of a woman. Bane only knows of one other. He thought such creatures didn't exist beyond the girl he'd saved.

"Who taught you to shoot?" he asks.

"A bunch of different people. I've been on my own for a while now, travelling here and there. I figured I needed to learn how to handle a gun, just in case I need to pull the trigger if anyone tries to hurt me."

"Yet you don't carry one of your own."

The first night he'd brought her to the safe house, of course Kit had been patted down for weapons, although Bane knew she wasn't armed. She shakes her head. "Guns are expensive. Money always went to food before bullets."

Bane smiles softly. She seems young and old at the same time. He pegs her for young in her years but old in experience, much like himself. This woman, this Kit Kelli, knows the levels of priorities. He could never work with someone who didn't. And she holds the rife as if it were something delicate and precious. Barsad does the same. Because of that, Bane reaches into the back of the wide belt around his waist. He reveals a shiny silver revolver only used for emergencies, like meeting with possible contacts or clients who can't work with him but can't let him live either. He holds it out to her by the barrel in offering.

Kit stares at the gun as if he were holding a snake.

"Take it," he orders.

Keeping the rife against her shoulder, she does. She feels the weight of it in her hand, and thinks that it looks really pretty in her palm that seems to be a good fit for it. Her brown eyes go back to his. "You're giving this to me?"

"Guns are expensive," he repeats. And it looks right with her. It looks better. "I am a man who prioritizes. If my people aren't armed appropriately, then what is the point of having you?"

Kit grins and shakes her head, staring at the revolver. "It's pretty," she murmurs, trying to remember the last time someone simply gave her something. She seems to catch her words, then erases them by adding, "Thanks."

"I never want to see you without it. That one was a difficult find."

"Not a hard order to follow," she says, then tucks it away in her pants as he had it. She readies the rife again as her eyes cast out over the fields. Kit cocks it, lifts it against her shoulder as one eye goes back into the scope. "Want to know another thing I'm good at?" she asks him.

Bane's eyes follow the path of the barrel. He sees what she sees.

She squeezes the trigger and a faint piercing sound is heard as the bullet strikes its target.

Kit smiles with triumph and hands Bane the rife before walking off to retrieve the very unlucky dead rabbit.

"Catching dinner," she answers.

If Kit was honest with herself, she would be surprised that she'd made it this long. She isn't afraid of dying, isn't afraid of being without because she's already been without the very basics. Maybe it's her own choice that she lives this way, to continuously be without, but it's better than being stuck where she doesn't want to be as an endless scream reverberates in her head until she goes insane. She distantly wonders if something's wrong with her, mentally, emotionally, whatever. She wonders if there's a chemical imbalance somewhere she isn't aware of. But she doesn't have the time or the desire to figure it out.

So she stays with Bane and the others because she wants to. She isn't afraid of dying, she reminds herself, and when she gets injured the first time something goes wrong, it hardly shakes her up.

At least she would die for a purpose. Maybe that's all she's ever wanted.

Bane and his men are hired to kill an oil tycoon. The orders and money transactions are already given to them, everything done without a face to see or a voice to talk to, but Bane suspects it's the rival. They travel to China, and even though he's already paid, Bane refuses to take the money and run. He wants to be seen a certain way, wants people to know what he's capable of, so the job gets done. They find the mogul's home sitting pretty on a mountain. There's a pool overlooking the gorgeous landscape that glows sparkling violet from lighting, and the house is surrounded by windows for a view every way you turn. Bane expects them to stay in the shadows, to use them as if they were an extension of their own bodies. Barsad is perched somewhere high up, his favored sniper close. Kit, with clothes wrapped around her body for maneuverability and a black ski cap on her head to cover her yellow hair, twists a silencer on her revolver, preparing to help take out the numerous bodyguards watching the place while Bane goes to deal with the head honcho himself.

Bane is inside and the rest of them are surrounding the fancy house now, waiting for him to do his business before they all leave. Kit keeps her eyes peeled by the gleaming pool, watching as the body of a security man floats on top of the purple water from Barsad's sharp eye. She admires the pool for a moment in the night air, thinks the whole damn place is quite nice, although she'll never be able to live in something so extravagant. There's too much to do, she thinks distantly. And she also rather likes her new band of brothers. She's come to believe in them.

She isn't afraid to die.

Good, she'll think later when she's bleeding. She needs to keep that mindset.

There's a scream from a man, a loud piercing screech from inside the house. Bane's work. And not a second goes by before the place is swarming with more men, shouts and bullets now as loud as thunder in her head. She spots one of her brothers - they call him Hart - and he has just enough time to yell at whoever can hear to retreat before the reinforcements shoot him in the face. Barsad will take out as many as he can, but the job is done, and they are to leave. Kit holsters her gun and decides to run for it. They're already successful and have no more business to see to here. Her legs are long and she can vault over rocks and bushes. She wills herself to sprint like a fucking gazelle as bullets whip around her.

One catches her in the side of the neck just as she clears the perimeter of the grounds. She goes down into the untidy foliage.

She gasps in the dirt, her breath coming out and sucking back in quickly like she can't quite catch it. She feels blood streaming down her body and places her palm over the spot where it hurts the most, to hold it all in. She hears shouts of Chinese men coming closer to her, hears the earth explode from a few bullets as they try to pinpoint where she is. She's trembling, hyperventilating. Certain parts of her are starting to feel numb and her head is going foggy. Maybe her neck is hanging by a string of skin and about to fall right from her shoulders. It certainly feels that way.

And then she hears those familiar footsteps. She hears that memorable mask hissing at her like an animal. Bane curses in another language when he nears her. He none too gently snatches at her clothing, grunts some when he lifts her up against his chest. He has to carry her awkwardly because she isn't dainty like other women and there's no time to adjust her if he doesn't want to get shot too. He's got an arm around her thighs as the front of her presses against his, the other across her shoulders. And with those long, strong legs of his, he sprints into the confines of nature as the men behind him drop from the sniper tucked in the trees.

Bane knows he can't go far carrying her as her blood soaks him, and the more of it she loses the more heavy she gets as she becomes dead weight. At some point he has to drop to the dirt when they're safe from the enemy and access the damage. If there's no chance for survival he'll have to leave her, and both of them are okay with it because they know it's what's necessary.

Kit hears him say that phrase a lot. Do what is necessary.

Her hand is still covering her bleeding wound and Bane moves it away. Her brown eyes are wide but oddly calm, and she trusts him to make the decisions from here on out with her condition. Bane lifts her head and places her neck on his thigh, bending it to the side so he can better see the injury. As he does whatever it is he's doing, Kit finds she needs something to look at instead of feeling the solidness of him against her neck and cheek, his thigh that feels like a tree trunk under her. Her eyes go to his. His brows are furrowed in either annoyance or concentration, and the expression makes the mask look feral. Like any second now it'll become teeth and he'll sink them into her bleeding neck to finish the job.

He looks… She can't describe it.

"Sorry about the slip-up, boss," she says hoarsely, but still she remains calm.

Bane looks like he flinches when she suddenly starts talking to him. He looks at her like she'd died and came right back to life, but then his eyes soften as his hands become red with her blood. "I do hope you have no diseases," he comments. He looks a little banged up too from his escape, but at some point people in this job don't really care about whose blood swaps with whom.

"Clean as a whistle," she whispers. When she swallows, fire shoots down from her neck to her fingertips. "Is it bad?"

"No," he tells her, peering down to look closer. He smells like the earth and something a little more medicated thrown in as well. "It missed your jugular. Any closer and I would've had to leave you here."

One side of her mouth turns up. Tears sting at the corners of her eyes, but she isn't embarrassed of them. It's a reaction many can't control. "You mean you wouldn't sit here with me until the end?"

"Not unless I'm dying as well."

Bane pulls her ski cap from her head and places it over the wound on her neck to stop the blood until they can get to their medical supplies. He then mutters an apology to her before ripping off some of her clothing, mostly strips of fabric around her waist that then bare her stomach. He uses the strip to wrap around her neck to keep the cap in place. They'll have to travel a ways before climbing into their vehicles, and it's best to keep her wound extra covered from infections. Kit now looks like she's wearing a makeshift neck brace or a very odd turtleneck sweater. Bane makes a knot, then peers down at her face.

He thumbs away the tears in her eyes before helping her stand. She'll have to walk the rest of the way on her own. His back won't allow him to carry her, and the quicker they start travelling, the sooner he'll get her a blood transfusion for whatever she's lost.

But Bane, and the rest of her brothers, walks just a little more slowly than usual.

It feels like days before they're back at the safe house. The job is completed and Bane is growing more successful. With completion, his mercenaries all receive their cuts of the profit, including Kit. She realizes with big eyes as she stares at her money that she doesn't really need to stay. She doesn't need to continue this hectic life lest she want more close calls with flying bullets and a constant run from the law in whatever country they happen to be in for future. She has enough money now to leave, to start a new life and possibly make something of herself respectively. She's never needed much in material possession and would be fine with this nice starting coin. She begins to weigh the options.

In the safe house, as all her brothers gather around in the main living space where they always huddle together at night, she sits at the table as the fire on the other side of the room warms them, and nurses a beer. She's been cleaned from the blood and her wound has been properly dressed. Only a few stitches were needed at the skin where neck met shoulder, courtesy of their stitching specialist Shang, but it sure had bled like a son of a bitch. A big patch of white bandage is slapped on the side of her neck as she takes a sip of her bottle.

Barsad comes to sit next to her with his own beer. Small rewards in tranquil times. "You did well. You even managed to hobble all the way back to the trucks without falling on your face."

"I can't take all the credit," she says, pointing her beer at a stocky man with a long black beard sitting by the fire. "I swayed a bit at one point and he gave me a shove."

"They call him Warden, and he is always happy to shove. Your wound will scar, little sister."

Kit gives a nod. She's maybe a little taller than Barsad, but she never mentions it to her second in command. She knows he can take her out before she could turn her head to look at him. "So far it just stings like shit. Maybe I'll look like a monster before I finally drop dead."

"Is that what you want to be? A monster?"

She runs her fingers through her pixie hair, ignoring the ache in her neck. "Nobody messes with monsters."

The front door opens and one of their comrades enters first, holding it for, surprisingly, a gorgeous black woman who saunters in and pays them no mind like she's been here before. Her body is mouth-watering, or what Kit assumes is mouth-watering to a man going by her desirable curves, and her dark brown hair is soft and pulled into a long thick braid down her back. A dark trench coat is cinched at her waist and there are rain boots on her feet that she politely wiped off on the mat by the door. Instantly, like she needs no invitation, she heads straight for the other door in the house, the one that leads to the only bedroom where Bane himself sleeps and does whatever it is Bane does by himself. Kit wonders if it has anything to do with the mask. The woman opens the door and closes it behind her. The deadbolt is turned into place and not one of her brothers seems to care.

But she finds herself curious.

"Who the hell was that?" she asks Barsad.

He smirks a little, then gives a nod to the man who apparently left to retrieve the woman. "She's the one who visits Bane."

"Visits?" Kit lifts a brow, eyeing the closed door. "Is that what we're calling it?"

Barsad shrugs and drinks more beer. "He likes her. He trusts her."

Kit mulls over this quietly. It had taken her a minute to believe that Bane even liked women, liked any gender for that matter. She could even admit that she, for a very brief moment, had thought that there was something going on between Bane and Barsad, as preposterous as the idea was now. The two were very close, and Kit would even see Bane act tenderly toward Barsad, doing such things like ruffling his shaggy hair or even bringing their foreheads together while talking quietly amongst themselves. She knew better now though. Bane and Barsad, whatever they'd been through together before merging off to do this, had history that transcended what was appropriate. She figures they've been brothers long before becoming mercenaries for hire, and have seen things she never will.

"So is Bane a 'woman in every port' kind of guy?" she asks.

Barsad gives a haughty little laugh. "No. There is only the one, this one. Whenever we come here he sends for her and she visits to help him relax, should he need it."

"Is she a whore?"

"Absolutely not. Tye is a contact. As I said, he likes her."

Kit, almost shamefully, tries not to hear the very faint knocks that are hitting the wall in the bedroom beyond. And as if on cue, the man named Grey pulls out a violin and begins to play it by the fire. No one makes jokes but no one leaves either. She knows why.

It's nice that Bane has someone to cut loose with. He does the most work of them all, takes care of them and gives them jobs. He keeps them fed and armed and clothed, keeps them wealthy and active. If not for him, she would probably have slept on a bench that first night in the tavern. Bane doesn't live the life of a normal man. He isn't social because of his status and because of the mask, and maybe the only way he can relax is to find someone he trusts enough to have sex with. Kit thinks it's a shame that he doesn't have a woman in every port, but maybe this one is enough for him.

"He calls for her whenever he is stressed out," Barsad continues, and something dulls in his eyes, like he hardly likes the thought of Bane feeling anything negative. "When we leave here, he has no choice but to hold it all in until we return."

"And there's no one else? Really?"

Barsad shakes his head. "None that he will allow. There is another, one who doesn't soothe him in bed because that is not what they share, but we won't see her for what I'm sure are years to come."

Kit doesn't really know Bane like how Barsad knows Bane. She supposes you need years under your belt before you reach that level. "And who is that?"

He's quiet before he answers, like he's reliving a lifetime in his mind. Kit sees a flurry of emotions fluttering on his face. She can't tell if they're good or if they crush him.

"Bane's love," Barsad answers.

Kit sinks into the sound of the music and not the feminine panting she can make out behind her on the other side of the wall. Grey plays something sad, something beautiful. Like only those here tonight will ever hear such wonderful tones, making them the lucky ones. For once, she's part of the lucky ones.

"Bane's girl," Barsad continues. "Talia al Ghul."

That name breezes through Kit's head, like the wings of a butterfly. Like maybe she should know it. She's never heard it before but she suspects it's very important. Just like how Barsad is important, and the woman named Tye, and Grey who plays them splendid music. Just like how she's important, now that she belongs somewhere. She's never been important before, but here, with her brothers, she feels good and free. She has money to leave, she thinks again. She can begin anew without all of them. But she's come to find that she rather likes her brothers. She likes following Bane and having purpose, albeit a violent one.

So she stays. Years and years go by, and still she remains.

The west of Africa is hot and uncomfortable. A few miles away from the Ivory Coast and they can't feel a thing from it. The night sky is clear though, which does nothing to help or deter them. It really just looks pretty over the vast lands of the giant continent where the well to do men dress as fancy as they can and the ownership of a bike puts you one rung over the guy who doesn't have one. Or maybe that's how it is in another part of Africa.

But in this part on this night, the mercenaries of the masked man will swarm and conquer.

Much like the locusts that tear apart the earth.

The mine is ahead of them now as they travel on silent feet across dirt and clay. The infiltrators will act first, followed by the front men who will carry the battle, and for the grand finale the guardians will arrive to finish off those barely alive, slashing their throats for sport, and of course to preserve ammo. It's the system that works for them when starting a coup. Whoever owns the land owns the rights. Whoever has the biggest guns owns the land. It's a never-ending cycle.

They have the biggest guns and the deadliest of men. Tonight, the mine full of pretty diamonds will become theirs to hand over to their newest client who wants nothing more than to excel in the world of business all the way over in America.

Slimy little weasel that John Daggett is.

The guards at the mouth of the coalface gurgle and drop as the quickest and smallest of them buzz inside like those locusts, ready to decimate the land in their wake. They'll take out as many as they can before the uproar begins and the brunt of them charge forth. The front men, those fit to push the enemy back as the strength of their entirety, will take them all by surprise like a monsoon.

Kit likes being with the front men. She likes being the force that backs the weak into a corner.

It's worked for her for years under Bane's command.

She lifts her revolver, a little dinged now from years of use and countless rounds of bullets, and fires as her brothers run ahead of her to take the mine.

Their challengers try to fight back. They give it all they've got, use up all their ammo until they have nothing to keep their precious resource save for the fists attached to their wrists or the measly blunt instruments they can find. But they are nothing against the mercenaries who are famous among the black undergrounds without ever having been seen at all. Men start to panic when their comrades drop dead from what seems like nothing at all, looking around frantically for a ghost who has sucked the life from their bodies. The ghost, Kit knows, is far away watching over them. Barsad is in charge of the guardians.

And Kit's place, her rightful place, is to flank her boss when he decides to join the fight.

Bane walks almost casually into the fray. Of course whoever leads these men who are absurdly still trying to stop them will be dealt with by his hand. Kit walks near him, a little behind to watch his back, firing the gun he gave her a thousand years ago at those who just needed to die quickly. When she's run out of bullets and has no need to reload because the battle is already won, she pulls out a curved dagger from her belt, gripping it in her fist should she need to use it. She has power over most of these men, even towering over some in height. She has strength that she's perfected in her years as a mercenary, the skill with firearm or fist. She's grown older, wiser, more willing to get the job done because this is all she can ever do now. Her hair is the same cut and color, her eyes the same brown hue, but the rest of her has changed since her beginning days. No longer does she carry a newness about her for the job. No longer is she a little naïve and brash. And no longer is she surprised by the ways of this world. She's moved up, cemented her place. Has become so important that she's nowhere near expendable.

Barsad may be second in command, but she is Bane's left hand.

Bane grips the lapels of his armor as his eyes hone in on who he knows is in charge. The man is still shouting useless orders in Swahili as he tries to fire his pistol while simultaneously trying not to trip over the excavation supplies as the black shadows move closer and closer to him. When he realizes that all his men are dead and there is no one left to yell at, he breathlessly puts the barrel of the gun against his temple and fires.

There is a dark chuckle that echoes through the mine when it clicks, empty and out.

Kit watches as Bane simply walks up to the man in charge and grabs his face in one giant hand. He eases him down gently like he's only a friend trying to help, but in Bane's grip his skull is being crushed and no longer does he need to panic. No longer does he need to keep safe the treasures of the mine.

Bane is victorious and has claimed his small fortune from John Daggett.

After the bodies have been cleared out and tossed away and the mercenaries have staked their claim, there are fires dancing inside the mine that will be used this night for shelter. Bane has already contacted Daggett from a satellite phone – the weasel likes to hear from Bane himself – and by morning he will relinquish the mine over to Daggett's men before they move out with their job completed. All that's left to do now is wait, and Bane does so by one of the fires, sitting in the dirt off to the side as his men chat quietly or find sleep. His armor is removed so that he can be comfortable in pants and a tight shirt, and the mask keeps his ailing body from falling apart.

He slants his head as the long form of Kit comes into the light of the flickering fire. Her hand rubs a cloth over her short hair that he sees is damp. He knows Kit doesn't mind being sweaty and dirty, especially for the job, but as soon as she's given the chance to clean up, she takes it greedily. She plops onto the ground next to him. Her armor, too, has been removed in favor of her breezy underclothes.

The revolver and its holster are still wrapped around her hips.

"So Daggett wants these diamonds," she comments, using the corner of the cloth to clean out her eyes. "He's practically choking on his silver spoon and he wants diamonds. We're expensive."

"The rights to this mine will give him notoriety. For him to come here himself would be suicide."

"You're damn right we're expensive," she mutters. "And Talia?"

"She is in Gotham City. We will join her shortly."

Kit eyes him, but not blatantly. She's learned what to do and say around her boss, but she inspects him nonetheless. She can feel his desire to be around Talia again, his itchiness. Talia is one of the few, if not the only one, who can calm him in ways other than sleeping with him. And, as involved as she is with her company, Kit knows Bane hasn't slept with anyone in a long while, which didn't bode well for them if the heir to the League of Shadows wasn't around often enough. Bane could become a hard ass when too stressed.

The mask, she sees, twinkles in the fire's light, as do the diamonds sparkling around them like stars in the sky.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" she asks him, and it's quietly. Some of the others don't know. They don't know what's truly going to happen to them when they make their way over to America. To Gotham and Talia. But Kit does. She knows a lot of it, and still she's loyal because what else does she have?

Bane emits no hesitation. "It is what needs to be done."

For Talia, for the League. Kit knows he's been accepted back and took that acceptance with forgiveness. He wants to do what the League needs him to do, and what the League needs is for Gotham to be destroyed. Kit doesn't ask the questions that she should and neither does Barsad. The both of them know their place.

"Then I guess our next job is to go see a doctor."

The skin at the corner of his eyes tells that he's smiling. He doesn't do that much anymore. Even at the mention of his girl. "I want you to speak to Pavel alone. There is no need to frighten him initially. Not unless he refuses us."

"Giving people the benefit of the doubt is something that gets you in trouble."

"Now, Kit, don't let your delightful negativity wander onto me. I forbid it."

She grins and spots Barsad sleeping on the ground some feet away. He's already stationed men to watch the mouth of the mine while the rest of them take a breather. "I'm allowed to be negative, but I'll keep it all to myself if that's what you want, boss."

The mercenary Kit Kelli is one of the few to remain with Bane and stay alive since those early years forming his company. She's well into her thirties and not the only woman to work for him after he signed her on, but she's definitely the only one who's lasted. Other than himself, she and Barsad and a scant handful of others are Bane's veterans. His left and right hand, Bane muses. He is a man who knows the rules, like doing things himself if he wishes for them to be done properly. But without his hands…

Barsad and Kit are not so easily replaceable like most of those who work for him. Their loyalty is boundless, and it is all for Bane.

He doesn't question their loyalty. He doesn't force them to follow him. And he's relieved that he doesn't have to because Bane is quickly discovering that he's becoming very tired.

It's a topic he can't contemplate right now, his own weariness, so he changes the subject in the middle of the diamonds.

"It occurs to me that I don't know much about you," Bane says to her while carelessly tossing more kindling into the fire.

Kit makes an unamused face. "I've been working for you for over a decade. You know me enough."

"I know how you work. I know how you move. I know that I can rely on you to get the job done and I know, at your core, who you are."

She gives a shrug, a jerk of shoulder. "What else is there?"

"I don't know where you come from," Bane answers, and it is then that he realizes that his past, one so few have heard, is something Kit does know after that very long decade under his employment. "I don't know what makes a young girl perfectly capable of beating two men by herself without shedding a tear. And I don't know why that same young girl would almost instantaneously agree to work for me."

Kit is quiet as she thinks, and does so peering up at the diamonds above her head caked into coal. Her long, strong legs stretch out in front of her and she leans back onto her hands. Conversing with Bane isn't rare, and holding the position she does, it's required. But Kit still isn't a Barsad or a Talia. Bane doesn't tell her things like she assumes he does with the other two, because he's right when he more or less says she's a perfect soldier, living only for the job because here, in the job, she's somebody. She likes being somebody and being nobody again is out of the question. So, glancing over at him, she eyes the mask. She can hear the faint whisper of gas that pumps into his lungs to soothe him.

And then her eyes go to his. Kit sees that they don't look like how they used to.

Something in the eyes…

"Trade," she offers.

He gives a quick laugh at the little game played amongst his men. Sometimes, certain things aren't given unless something is given back. An equivalent exchange. He gives a nod. "Fine."

Kit settles back on her hands, gaze returning to the diamonds. "You found me in Russia but I'm from America. Some quiet place in California, to be exact. I ran away when I was eighteen and have never been back. I survived by doing odd jobs all over, enough to keep on travelling until I ran into something good. I guess you could say I had a bad case of wanderlust."

He draws his brows together quizzically. "What child leaves her entire life and never returns home?"

"I do," Kit answers. Some of the diamonds look orange from the fire. Like the roof above them is burning. "You travel the world long enough and far enough, you pick up a few things, even as a girl. I know what it's like to be hungry and I know what it's like to sleep in a car because I don't have a bed. On a good night, I could disguise myself enough and get in on some street fights against small guys. On great nights, I could even win a few and buy some new clothes, or at least lose on purpose for cash. But in Russia, after days of looking for work and failing before I would retreat to that tavern, I would convince myself that there was more for me. That I was going to be a part of something that would change the world. And then you sat in the corner and refused to lend a hand against those drunken men." She murmurs it with a grin. When she can't make it stop, Kit rubs a hand down her pixie hair. "Wandering the streets in desperation is nothing compared to wandering the earth getting paid big money to hunt and steal and conquer. Seems to be the only thing I'm good at anyway. I like the money and I like the freedom."

Both Bane and Kit know that her words now are just a preliminary and not the main event. They know that, like the earth or the sun or even a diamond, there are layers until the core is revealed and seen. Her wanderlust isn't really wanderlust at all, more of an escape. But Bane accepts what she's given him because he isn't one to pry. The only time when he barges in where he isn't supposed to is when the League calls his name.

"It's my turn now," she says softly, watching as a flurry of bright embers fly up into the air from the fire. "Why are you going to Gotham?"

Bane can feel the pain in his body. He suffers from it, and in a way he's sure no one save for Talia can understand. There are some days he feels like he won't be able to make it much longer, days when he wonders if it is the last one he will ever live because the pain has become part of his soul and is eating him from the inside out. The stress is sometimes too much, and while he is hesitant to show it, it doesn't stop it from existing. The League has called upon him, he reminds himself. And that, he knows, is something that will destroy him.

Bane accepts that too.

"Because I want to go," he mutters, and it's the truth.

Kit turns her head away from him as she frowns because she, too, knows what he means. Going to Gotham will mean only one thing, can only result in one great outcome. For Bane to go to Gotham will mean that he will stay in Gotham. Kit lifts out her palm, keeps it still as a tiny orange ember lands on her skin. It burns for only a brief second before going black.

This is what Bane wants, she thinks, her frown remaining. He wants to become one with the fire until he's nothing but ash. But at least, for a moment, he will burn bright.

Bane turns to look at her. His eyes rest on the bullet scar on her long neck.

The stress inside him rises a little higher.

After Africa, they are back in Russia. The old small safe house from the early days is a forgotten memory after fifteen years of making a viable name for himself – especially with the League backing him now – and Bane is given proper accommodations for him and his men now that they're doing the League's work in Talia's name. They take over one of Daggett's gigantic buildings, far enough in the sky to keep a good eye on the laboratories within sight out of the windows where their new target works with his physics and his numbers and equations. Dr. Pavel, a simple man who does great work, is about to become very important. So important that he will surely die for it.

As a matter of fact, he'll even die twice.

And it has nothing to do with his refusal of them.

Kit bursts into the large room meant for board meetings as it steadily rains outside the window Bane gazes through. There is only one lone table meant to seat twelve, and she tosses a manila folder on top. The revolver in the holster bounces off her thigh covered in cargo pants and the wide belt around her waist keeps her posture as it should be. As she grows older, she discovers aches and pains she swears she didn't have a year ago. In her twenties she used to run like that gazelle she used to be. Now she wears a leg brace below the knee on the left that protects her shin and locks her ankle in place so the bones don't pop free. She'd been scaling a mountain side for a mission involving looters, and that bastard of a job had caused her to lose her footing and fall fifty feet over rocks and shards of stone, ripping up her legs until Barsad was finally able to stabilize the rope and catch her. Since then, her left leg hasn't worked quite right. She keeps it confined and chained so that she can continue to work.

She unwraps her head from a black scarf used to conceal her identity. Her wheat colored hair is something Dr. Pavel notices now that he's aware of what kind of trouble he's in.

"He's contacted the CIA," she tells Bane, giving him her report because she is the one he sends out to threaten Pavel. A small man like the doctor can fear a large and imposing enough woman. "It won't be long until they pick him up. He's also told them everything he knows about you. The agents don't know much, but whatever he's given them will add to their profile."

Bane doesn't seem to care. His identity is something they no longer try to protect, considering what awaits the world. "Barsad will make them an offer. Pavel may have refused to work with us kindly, but the CIA won't turn down a chance to have him delivered nice and quietly. I need you to prepare the flight plans."

Kit gives a nod. "Done."

"Once he's made the arrangements, Barsad will give you coordinates. He will hand Pavel over to the agents on land while I retreat to the plane. You will meet us in the sky. Daggett is getting us into Gotham straight away as he needs us for one last job. Between now and then we will build our base of operations."

She inwardly groans although her body remains still and respectful for her boss. She doesn't like working for Daggett. Something about the man rubs her the wrong way and she's pretty sure it's because he walks around with a case of a God complex. Bane seems to be the only one who can communicate with him effectively.

Standing at the table, she flips open the folder. She had another task other than bothering Pavel. Now that they've prepared for his refusal, it went without saying that she would find collateral.

She finds it in the form of Pavel's two young children. Boys, ages eight and ten. Their smiling faces are bright and happy in the picture she's nabbed of them sitting inside the folder.

"When do we pick them up?" she asks Bane, and her voice keeps steady. When it comes to her work she's lost the ability to care and relate if it doesn't have to do with her boss or her brothers or the money she earns to survive.

But Bane, surprisingly, is not as steady in this moment of time. There's something in the way he stands now, something in the vibe he gives off as he turns, the first movement he's made since her entering, to look over at the picture of Pavel's sons who will soon be taken from their beds. Their threatened lives are the only way they will get the good doctor to work for them when the time comes.

He stares at them for a long time. He studies each one as an individual before moving to the next, seeing little features in them that will soon be tarnished in the coming future. Bane can tell the younger son will grow bigger than the older when he begins to grow. And the other, the one who playfully has his brother's neck in a chokehold, has eyes that burn with a mixture of love and hate for his sibling in the manner that only siblings can share. Bane sees that they're good boys in the image. He can picture their lives today in only a photograph, but pictures are always worth a thousand words. He sees two thousand.

Bane turns away and continues to watch the rain.

Kit doesn't want to think that what she spots in Bane now is hesitation. She also will never say that it's regret either, because Bane is loyal to the League and to Talia and will do whatever is necessary. It's an unknown emotion he must be feeling, something undiscovered by human psychologists or whoever it is that studies such things. Perhaps God himself can only know what this strange feeling is, because there isn't a word for it. In her years working for his company, they haven't taken anything on that harms children directly. From the way he looked at Pavel's boys, Kit isn't too sure if that's Bane's doing or if it's just coincidence or luck. Working with Talia has them kidnapping minors now. Of course Kit will carry out her orders now that she indirectly works for the League, but it is waters they rarely travel.

And because Kit is Bane's left hand, she performs now as such.

"Any chance we could forget about the kids? They'll only cause problems."

Bane's voice is automatic, or accepting. She can't really tell the difference anymore. "Yes. They are problems that we will handle."

"Maybe we could take the wife instead. It'll be easier to knock her around some."

"We take the children. Our task demands it of us. Casualties are expected and they are unfortunate."

The lucky ones, Kit remembers now. She's a part of the lucky ones. Everyone else is unlucky. "If you're uncomfortable—"

"Uncomfortable," Bane says loudly, interrupting her. Kit closes her mouth. She thinks she's about to be reprimanded, and reprimands from Bane usually mean bodily harm. His shoulders are tense now, his hands clasped tightly behind his back like he could break his own finger bones. He looks agitated and calm at the same time. Like a cobra. "Do you think endangering children makes me uncomfortable, Kit?"

"No, sir."

"Those children are not fortunate," he tells her again, and she can hear the spitting of his voice. Much like poison. It sounds worse with the mask barring its fangs. "They will endure the sins committed by their father. They have become the wretched through their blood and will have to be punished for it. Gotham's children will withstand the same sentence and burn for breathing the same air as their ancestors and following in their ways. We will purify the air for the lungs of those who will come after. That is how it was for me in my youth, and the rest of the world should be treated no differently."

There's something in her chest and she doesn't know what it is. The same feeling is in her head, and she finds that it's painful. When Kit looks at Bane in the field, she sees the League of Shadows she's become accustomed to and is eager to follow him because he's her boss and she has nothing else. But when Kit looks at Bane when they're alone, when it's just the two of them and their work is practically pounding on the closed door for their attention, she gets that feeling in her chest and her head. She gets this itchiness in her hands and her feet, like her boots need to move closer and her hands need to touch him and take half of whatever is changing in his eyes and the way he carries himself. She's known him for over a decade, has become close to him and her brothers in a way no one else in the world can ever understand. Kit sees this disease, whatever it is, eating away at her boss, and she wants to heal it because without her brothers, without Bane, she is only a lost nomad of the earth asking others where she needs to be.

She knows the basics of what Bane endured growing up. But sometimes, very rarely, does he forget some of the details.

Kit takes a risk. She could be punished for it or could even die for her stupidity. She takes it anyway because these feelings, this pain, have taken a little part of her.

"Talia was a child," she says slowly, hesitantly. Like testing waters she knows are too hot and will scald her.

Bane remains still and doesn't say a thing. Standing at the floor to ceiling window, it looks like he's gazing out at the lands beyond, like he's monitoring life on the other side of the glass. But his eyes refuse to watch the daily happenings of the free and ignorant. Instead, he watches the glass itself, the way it's covered in rain, the way the angry clouds soak it and cause big fat drops to slide down, all the way down until it dissipates before becoming new rain for another time. He watches that instead of the people, instead of the city. Everything is connected, he thinks, still sensing Kit behind him. Everything is so connected that nothing is ever surprising.

"When I was a child," he begins, lost inside connection now, "the rain came only once a year. There are regions where people are so consumed with rain that it is now a nuisance, and they have no idea that somewhere beyond them, in another world, there are those who must ration that water until the rain comes back. Rain is free water. In my prison, in that hour after the rain stops, every man is rejoicing and lost to an illusion that life has now become better. That he is very rich. I had one jug to my name. I was hardly any younger or older than those boys in the photograph, I think. I had one jug," he murmurs again, watching as one rain drop consumes another on the glass. "Full to the brim with clean water. The other men were older and wiser, and everything they owned was used to catch as much of the rain as they could, but I looked at the jug in my arms and thought, for a moment, that I would now live like a king. I was smart to catch this water, I would tell myself, and I wouldn't have to share because everyone else now had their own, more than enough. I didn't have to squirrel this away today. I didn't have to."

The pain becomes worse now. For both of them.

"I was little then," Bane continues, the mask hissing from a quick breath of a condescending laugh. "And the other prisoners were happy. They were basking in this euphoria, as was I, and we were lost to it. One man approached me, a giant, his dark eyes above the shroud gleaming and lustful. He stared at me like the others were staring at the collected rain water. Like a prize, like a conquest. He didn't give the jug in my hands one glance because it was meaningless to him. There was already so much water." Bane turns to look at Kit, his entire body moving and his eyes piercing her. Like a knife. "Would you like to know what he wanted from me?" he asks her, almost cheerfully.

Kit finds she doesn't like hearing this story. Bane is telling her things now, for whatever reason, and she doesn't want to hear what some brute did to him when he'd been too small to fight, to run, to kill like how he could now with only a swipe of his massive arm. She has seen things and done things, terrible things because it was all just a job. But she doesn't like this story. She doesn't like seeing the effect such a past has on her very powerful boss.

Bane's eyes turn annoyed then as he stares at Kit, going back to the falling rain and dismissing her.

"I allowed him to approach me," he tells her, keeping on with his story to hopefully teach her something. To make her understand what is necessary. "I allowed him to think me submissive. I was a smart one, and with every eager step he took I came up with a solution. It would be a disheartening solution, but it was better than the alternative. When he was close enough, I shattered my precious jug of clean water over his head. With one of the wet shards, I stabbed him in the neck. Once he was dead at my feet and the other prisoners began to howl around me, my eyes were not for his body or the blood streaming from it, but for the water I had wasted. By this time, the scavengers had already claimed his belongings. All of my water, as quickly as it had come, was gone. All of my happiness, as fleeting as it was, was traded for me remaining undefiled. Children do what they must to survive, Kit. Children will become the very monsters they slay, and ruin precious resources in their wake. Until they are stopped…" he practically whispers, and the rain on the window looks like a treasure. The rain, as simple as it truly is, is something he had to sacrifice. "The League is here for the monsters. In their destruction, there is only balance. Gotham will be the setting to burn them all."

He wants to feel the rain again. He wants to be the one to carry it in his arms. He wants, more than anything, to feel peace. He wants to go home.

"Every last one of them," he adds.

The pain in her chest and head can no longer remain in the same room with him. Until she learns how to ease it, she will most definitely suffer through it. Kit looks down at her boots as a distraction, the scruff of them near her toes. Something is wrong here, she thinks forlornly. Something is wrong with her boss and she doesn't yet know how to fix it.

"How is Talia different then?" she asks, and she has a second where she regrets the question. She can't, for today, take anymore. "Why is she an exception?"

Kit doesn't hate Talia, as mad and blind as the woman has become. If not for the heir to the League, she figures Bane would have fizzled out a very long time ago. Talia gives him rest in his nightmare world. When Bane looks at Talia, Kit knows he sees everything he can't be. And he likes that. Anything for Talia than what he has himself become.

"Talia had me," he simply replies.

To Bane, it seems to make all the difference in the world.

So they continue with their work and catch their scheduled plane. Barsad hands Pavel over to the CIA, along with Bane and another who will be sacrificed, and there are many casualties. The little private aircraft is abolished and it crashes with those casualties and a false nuclear physicist. Kit waits at the cargo door of their much bigger transportation, watching as Bane and Pavel are reeled in like fish. She instantly grabs the doctor and throws him to her men who will drug and contain him before Bane is even on the plane. Reaching out, she takes his waiting hand to give her boss a pull onto steadier ground than midair. She then walks off to shout more orders.

Looking back, she spots Bane standing at the edge of the opened hatch. He's looking down, free of the harness, just waiting there like something he's waiting for will fly right through. The wind rockets through the plane, ruffling his black shirt and his pants, and she hopes it feels good on his skin.

Kit frowns at him standing there still and silent. She remembers that he wasn't the one who made the jump.

She really hopes he doesn't jump.

Kit has never been to Gotham City. California, where she grew up, is very similar in its own ways. Both places are loud and over-crowded, complete with their own madness and known by the rest of the world as famous. People dream of living in such places like California and Gotham. But unlike her original home, Gotham does not have the space, the ability to stretch your arms. California in very big and full of deserts and mountains and the ocean, wineries and lakes and valleys. In Gotham…

In Gotham there is no room at all. Everyone lives on top of each other, killing each other for even an inch of extra space. Of extra ground that becomes your own territory. In fact, there is so little room, that her and her brothers must live in the sewers.

She doesn't mind, but she does like to shower often.

Selina Kyle, Bane's own stray cat, as he calls her, is doing what they need her to do. She'll try to double cross them of course, but Bane has prepared for that since the very first moment he laid eyes on her. He even laughed when she came to him wanting work, wanting a very precise little device. Barsad tells her that their boss pegged her character instantly, and that to see the cat try constantly to land on her paws was entertainment enough for him to take her on. Kit sees that Bane's eyes don't wander when Selina Kyle comes to call, not like the other's do when she shows up in that skimpy little black suit. Bane knows her intentions and knows what kind of woman she is. Maybe that's enough for him to work with her, but not enough for him to be attracted to her in the slightest. She is useful, but only annoyingly so.

Like tonight, when she tries to trick Daggett's men with the fingerprints of one Bruce Wayne. When she sends the cops straight to Bane's door.

Or more so, the commissioner.

Bane doesn't like Gotham. It's far too loud and cramped for him, full of too many people and he's becoming agitated. The stress inside him is rising to dangerous levels now, and no one really knows what to do. It seems he can actually feel it on his skin, crawling on him like an infestation that he can't get rid of. His heart feels outside his chest and the mask is so damn tight that he thinks it'll crush his skull. Nothing helps him, nothing relieves him, and it's a fight now for Talia to calm him down. He's always in control, of course, but how far does a man like Bane need to go before he no longer has it? Kit thinks on it as she leans against one of the beams holding their sewer home up deep beneath Gotham. Her arms are crossed as she watches him stare at the ground, kneeling down after removing his shirt because that infestation is back again. It's clammy down here for all of them, even though the temperature lowers up above. Kit has resigned to a white tank top beneath her belts and cargo pants.

Her brown eyes are all for her ailing boss.

When the commissioner is brought to Bane, she doesn't make a move. She simply stands where she is and watches with her mouth set in a firm line. Something's wrong, she thinks again. For the thousandth time. Something is wrong with him, and she doesn't know how to fix it.

And now Bane is killing their men.

He doesn't pick his veterans off so carelessly like he does with the Gotham recruits. With the newcomers who strive to serve a justifiable cause, Bane holds no respect for them. They are easily expendable and he will do away with them as he sees fit. Those are the men he puts to work building his base or gathering supplies. Those are the newly free eighteens year olds he makes scamper around the city collecting intelligence and others to serve the cause. If he is angry, if he needs to reprimand, Bane will get rid of you in the only way he knows how.

He kills you. And then you're gone, like dust.

He murders two men within two minutes of each other, and now the commissioner is floating through the sewers somewhere. Bane doesn't seem to care too much about him, doesn't list him as a problem that needs immediate solving. There will be another time to take Gordon out, but now is not suitable enough for him. Barsad stares after him once the recruit falls into the waters after Bane shoots him, a tracking device planted on his body. Bane walks away to read the papers given to him, a very temporary distraction until he begins to trigger more contradictory calm and composed mayhem. Barsad doesn't like the way he flicks the recruits off like fleas or lint. The right hand knows they are needed as pawns for the job.

He heads straight for Kit, his eyes focused and demanding of her.

"You need to fix this," he says softly.

Kit sighs. "And why me?"

"You are the left hand. You are used when he desperately needs you. You linger to the side so that he knows you're there."

She knows her place and she doesn't need him to remind her. If she knew what to do, she would've solved this issue a long time ago. "What would you have me do?"

"Whatever is necessary, little sister."

Whatever is necessary. Kit knows there's no other way to belong here. She's followed the rule since the first moment she ripped off a stool leg in front of Bane to protect herself. What other choice do they have now that their souls are too far gone, too lost in this job? So, following the rule that has directed them all, her boots click along the steel underneath as she heads for Bane.

Maybe he needs some fresh air, she thinks as she goes deeper into the construction of the sewers. It's humid down here, and perhaps that doesn't mix well with his drugs or the mask. But Gotham's air is hardly fresh and the people bother him, people Bane can't pity because, instead, he's looking at them all like he'll soon be giving them a gift. Until the time draws near to make them know him, he'll keep away from them.

And maybe, she decides, finding him off in a darkened corner where he would retreat to be alone, maybe that's the problem. Maybe Bane needs someone. Maybe he's kept himself away for too long, and it's affecting him. With Talia there is only tenderness, and with the frustrations of the job there is only pain. But where do those frustrations go for a man like him? How do you unleash them without that pain?

Where is the pleasure?

She stops as she considers her own inner question. Bane feels satisfaction for the job when he succeeds and is paid. He feels happiness when his girl is near and is reminded of innocence he has never felt or possessed. But those circumstances don't bring him pleasure that uses and empties him. There was only one who took on that job, and their trysts were very few and very far between. She needs the woman named Tye, Kit concludes. Bane needs Tye.

Bane needs relief and release.

Kit knows he senses her when she approaches him but he doesn't turn to give her any attention. He's reading the papers in his hand taken off of the commissioner. The only sound around them is the incessant drip dripping of the water falling around them, and the very faint buzz of power drills. She stands near in silence, hoping for him it's a comfortable one, the role of the left hand. When he doesn't bark at her to leave him alone, she decides to speak.

"You okay, boss?" she asks lightly.

Bane ignores her for a moment. She watches his hands move, neatly folding the papers when he's finished with them and tucking them into the large pocket of his pants. She hears a withered sound she knows is a sigh from him.

"This city doesn't know how to tell the truth," he mutters out, rubbing at his tired eyes. "They live in one lie after another. For years, Kit, and no one notices the error of their ways."

She eyes his pocket. Whatever was written on those papers is not helping her cause. "We'll take care of it."

"It must be weary," he says softly, his voice sounding smooth and silky, but beneath it are mounds of stress and anger with nowhere to go. "It must be weary to constantly live in lies. Everyone knew their place in the pit. Everyone knew what actions generated which consequences. At least there, there were no lies or deceptions. The brutality was honest and simple and… normal. I find it amusing now that the dark is where the truth is, although it is a terrible one. The light is bright enough to conceal everyone's dishonesties."

"I think you need to call for Ms. Tye," she says suddenly. With every passing moment, with every passing occurrence like the commissioner and the two dead men and those papers, Bane's stress only consumes him more. "I don't want to step on your toes, but I think it's a good idea. I'll bring her here myself."

Bane takes a deep breath. He doesn't care, has never cared, what the others thought when his old lover would be delivered to him. He isn't that kind of man and has always expected them to deal with it in the past. Her directness means nothing to him.

"Tye is dead," he tells her.

Of all things, Kit was not expecting to hear that. Over the years she would see the woman come and go, and sometimes it would be a long while before Tye would breeze through the door in her pretty clothes. She's never mentioned the woman till now because Bane obviously needs what she can give him. Her boss was the one to call his contact when he needed her, and Kit never had to deal with it. Now she discovers the reason for the lady's absence.

"Oh," Kit mumbles, scratching at the top of her hair. "How?"

Bane gives a soft laugh. It sounds like an ironic one. "Painkillers."

And there is no other option for him. Her boss could've easily replaced Tye or added to her position, but Barsad swore there was no other. Bane only trusts few and likes fewer. Go ahead of him into battle and he won't stop you. Come to him for work even if you're only a child who's escaped your orphan home and he'll take you on. But touch him intimately…

He trusts few and likes fewer.

Do what is necessary. The mantra comes back to her, singing in her head like angels, or maybe something a little more sinister. Bane has instilled it inside her, and by those few words alone she has survived the life as a woman mercenary. She has conquered her countless failures before the company and was given purpose in not submitting to a world full of unhappiness and sameness. The lucky ones, she thinks again. She's lucky to be here. She's lucky to have purpose when so many feel they have none. All because she's always done what is necessary.

It's necessary now that she, as the left hand of Bane, find a way to fix the stress inside him so that they can continue to be prosperous. The other options are gone but she has one more to try. She has never shied away from danger, from new grounds to walk upon. She's earned her place in the ranks and has proven herself to be reliable and resilient. She can't stop now because this is who she is, and if they are too succeed here in Gotham, then she may very well be on limited time.

Do what is necessary.

And Kit does.

She starts to near him slowly, casting an uninterested glance over her shoulder and making sure that no one else is around to crowd or interrupt. She squeezes her hands into fists and releases them, not in nervousness but in preparation. She's a good soldier, a strong woman. It's in her head now and she'll strive to continue to be as such. And when she places her hand on his shoulder, she's even more determined to see this through. For the plan, for the League, for her brothers. For her boss.

Only a slight movement of his head is the gesture he makes. He and Kit don't touch often if it doesn't include the outcomes of the job. In all actuality, no one touches him beyond that save for Talia and, when she was alive, Tye. Kit's hand on him now feels strange. Simple physical contacts aren't something she does often. In all the years of her working for him, he understands that Kit doesn't touch and doesn't like to be touched so casually. Bane's head turns more to look at her long slender fingers resting on his shoulder. When she herself comes into view, he eyes her carefully.

Water is rushing underneath them, drowning out any sounds made by the others and whatever they would create as well. Kit knows this when she comes to stand in front of him, his body blocking hers if anyone should happen to wander by. The air around them is humid, and her white tank sticks to her body slightly, outlining her form. She's tall, like him. He only has but a couple inches on her, and he still feels like ten times her size. The bare skin under her hand feels hot, a little weathered from years in the sun, and scarred. He's so scarred up that she wonders how on earth he's still alive. Kit moves her hand from his shoulder to underneath his collarbone. She can feel the tension in his muscles that aren't only hardened from strength. She can feel knots and tightened cords and stress that he's pent up for who knows how long. And when the tips of her fingers come to rest on his sternum, she finally moves her brown eyes up to his.

He's staring at her like he never has before. And… it doesn't look entirely good.

He almost looks like he's glaring.

"What are you doing?" he asks darkly, each word growing colder and colder.

She doesn't give in. This is a job now. She's doing what is necessary. "I'm going to help you."

"Oh? Did you hear me ask for your help?"

"You can use me."

His eyes flash at that, his unblinking gaze ordering hers to remain on his should she become nervous. She doesn't and it surprises him. Her hand is on him and her body is close. He can smell the soap from her frequent showers and a little bit of sweat from the humidity. Her eyes are expecting of him, like he needs to accept these turn of events and simply adhere to them. His anger is spiking, his hands fisting. His heart feels like it's sharp and impaling him and the mask presses on his skull. And when she opens her mouth again, when she utters those words again, he becomes furious within his stress.

"You can use me," she whispers, sliding her hand around to the back of his neck. "I'm offering. Tye is dead and if you need a woman, here I am. I want to help."

"Kit Kelli," he growls, leaning down a little closer to her in warning. "I've never known you to be so foolish."

"Stop making excuses," she counters sternly, approving of the way his eyes widen slightly from her insubordination. "I get what you need and I'm willing to give it to you. You're stressed out, boss. If anyone here needs a good fuck, it's you. So take it from me."

Bane makes a low, deadly sound in his throat, like he's about to rip her in half. He hates it that she's right. He hates her for seeing it so clearly. And he hates her for making him so aware of her body. He wants to have a woman but his lover has been long dead now. He wishes Talia were enough to ease his frustrations, but there are some she can't ease because she is still his girl. He wishes he didn't need it. He wishes that his body wasn't slowly warming and gravitating towards Kit at the mere mention of what she wanted to give him. He's only a man, but it's just another thing he hates. She is a fool, he tells himself, trying to convince his mind that the trait in her is unattractive. Trying even more so to convince his body and his desires. Simply telling her she's a fool isn't going to dissuade her. Bane knows that certain lessons are to be learned with action.

He wants, desperately now, to teach his Kit a lesson.

"You don't understand what you're saying," he hisses, keeping the anger on his face because she needs to see it. She needs to know. "Right now, you are all pretty words."

"You're talking too much. I'm a grown woman, Bane. I can make my own decisions and I understand completely what I'm saying to you. I'm not a young girl and I'm not inexperienced. I want you to let me help."

His eyes suddenly change then. She wonders, fleetingly, if he's laughing at her. But what he says next washes those wonders away.

"Go on, then."

Kit feels bold now. She feels that purpose she's been given and it's always been the best feeling to her. She's right when she tells him that she isn't inexperienced, that this right here isn't something she's never done before. Of course she's never been in a relationship because she's a citizen of the world and constantly living out her last days if the next job decides to be difficult enough, but she's slept with men over the years and knows sex. She's content enough to go to whatever tavern is available in whatever town they happen to be in for their next client and allow a man to pick her up. She's fine with the occasional one night stand because that's what her life allows her. She knows sex and she likes it. She's casual enough that she can stand here now, her boss of all people waiting for her to touch him because she's offered herself. She can do it. She can do what is necessary.

She wonders what kind of effect she's had on him and decides not to waste time. Kit slides her hand down his chest, feeling again all the tension that hopefully she'll help ease. Her fingertips graze the edges of the wide brace around his waist, but that isn't where she wants to be. She wants to feel something else, wants to discover if she's worthy of becoming what Tye had once been to him. Kit moves her hand further down and now she can feel the zipper of his pants. She casts a quick look up at him, keeps her face secure when she sees that he's very intently watching her eyes. He looks smug and almost confident that she'll fail at this. That she'll back out at the last minute for some inane reason he isn't telling her. But Kit is strong and she is courageous. She gets the job done because she is the left hand. She presses her fingers in, right over his zipper.

The smug confidence falters slightly beneath the mask. His eyes – involuntarily? – begin to lower from hers and trail down her body. Her neck is long and uncovered by hair because she keeps it short, scarred on the side from a bullet, and he likes it. Her shoulders are broad but strong, powerful. Shoulders she uses to beat their enemies or steady a rifle. Her breasts are small but still there beneath her white tank top, her body seeming to stretch out like a rubber band instead of retaining voluptuous curves. He's looking closely now, allowed to look because she wants him to, and he can faintly see the flimsy bra underneath the tank that supports her breasts. Her waist curves in slightly, her abs toned and her hips flexible. All this leads up to very long legs, endless legs.

Kit feels more boldness from his staring and tries to probe the outside of his pants for a sign of an erection. She struggles a little, refuses to let him see her difficulty, but he's wearing so much. There're so many layers for protection, although his top half is bare, so much armor, so much to soothe the pain in him. Kit's gaze has to leave his wandering eyes to focus on the task. She uses both hands now to try to get his pants opened. She holds fabric taut to get to the zipper, pulls it down and the sound is like lightning in her head. Her determination is everything, she must continue on. Kit reaches in to feel him…

She discovers just how endowed her boss really is. Past all the armor is a man hung like a war horse, completely proportionate to the already great mass of him. She rests her hand on his cock over one last layer and keeps it there to give herself a minute. He's only half hard but he seems to be growing harder the closer she gets to skin, and the thought of him being fully erect is making her feel like she's bitten off more than she can chew. Like maybe he's only ever slept with the one woman because perhaps that woman was the only one who could take him.

Do what is necessary.

Kit stills when Bane slowly leans a little more forward, bringing the grate of the mask right over her shoulder as his pelvis pushes against her hand. He's suddenly become even bigger, so consuming around her that she feels like she'll be swallowed up. But his response makes her move automatically. She rubs him through the thin layer, from the thick base of him all the way down to the swelling head. He growls deeply against her shoulder, brings his hand up and onto the back of her neck. There's no hair to get tangled in, her skin is completely free. His fingertips sink in as the tubing of the mask bites her now, and it only grows heavier the more he gives in. Kit sets her jaw and keeps her hand steady. She can't see his face so she can't tell what he wants or how she's doing or if he needs it a certain way. She's casual with sex but she's never been this adventurous, like giving a guy a hand job right where they stand. It's mostly basic positions with her, do the business and be done. Something feels different with this, with Bane. Something feels… like maybe she doesn't know…

Her heart is hammering.

But her pride eggs her on. Her fingers crawl up to the band of the layer, slips inside slowly. She can feel the hard skin of his lower stomach, coarse hair of a man growing there unlike the rest of his visible body. He's breathing heavier now, his muscles jutting out like he'll soon become feral. Kit feels pressure in her bones, something she's never felt as her teeth sink into her lower lip. She forces her hand deeper, finally comes into contact with his cock. Her back is against a railing now because he's pushed her there, her tank spotty with sweat and a deep line between her brows. She's used to being in control but now she has none. She thought he would let her do what she wanted, simply stand there while she got him off. That doesn't seem to be the case, after all. She feels like she can't breathe.

Kit's grip instinctively constricts around his erection, gives one good jerk with her wrist.

Bane's hand wraps itself around her neck. He squeezes.

And… she flinches as a small, weak sound falls out of her mouth.

Bane scoffs at her and instantly pushes her away, yanking her hand out of his pants like she's useless. The mask hisses at her. Apparently that wasn't the sound he wanted to hear from her, or the exact sound he wanted to hear to prove his point.

"You don't understand what you're saying," he tells her again, and Kit feels like she's been played. By his tone of voice, she has been. "You don't know what it is you offer me. Don't be so quick to make certain deals when you don't possess the ability to see them through."

She controls her breathing although she wishes it were softer, standing there dumbly as she watches him right his pants. The action should have been embarrassing for him, but Bane does it without care or concern. He isn't a man who feels mortification or stupidity. Not like Kit, but she's pretty sure she's never been shameful until this very moment in time.

She isn't even sure what exactly just happened.

"You didn't give me a chance," she says softly. "You didn't have to push at me."

"Didn't I?" he asks her sharply, his brows furrowed in annoyance. "You have no idea what giving your body to me entails, Kit. You don't know what you offer and you most certainly aren't ready for it."

That offends her. She isn't some twenty year old virgin, naïve and small. She's lived half of a life and he doesn't seem to care. "You didn't give me enough time. You ended it too soon, so how the hell do you know?"

"I know because of your hesitation as soon as I pressed on your neck," he says matter-of-factly, tilting his head for good measure. Like she's truly just a child. In this area, he seems to think that she is. "I decided to give you a little sample of what it would be like, and how do you respond? You squeak. You grew still and you lost your nerve. How will you be able to satisfy me while squeaking, Kit? How will you be able to endure it? You can't."

Kit can't remember a time she's been furious with him. Sure she's been agitated and annoyed, tired and snippy during the job, but everything he's ever done has been agreeable to her. Except for this. She can't stand this. This simple disregard just because she isn't Tye, who apparently could endure it. Her eyes go heated and her stance defensive against him. "You have no right to say that. You have no right to judge me after three minutes of my hand on your cock."

"Hush," he hisses, his glare turning into a blazing fire. "Don't try to demean me with such words. You will be wasting your time as I don't care about them. You aren't ready for me and what I would do to you." When he studies her, when he's still not convinced she understands, he takes a step forward and snarls lowly at her. "Are you prepared for me to choke you? Are you prepared for me to hurt you? Are you so desperate, Kit, for me to mark you up and tie you down? You can't handle one little squeeze."

She hates that she's actually trying to defend herself. "I've just never done that before."

"Then all the more reason you shouldn't allow me to touch you," he simply replies, shaking his head. "There is a difference between what is done for the work and what is done in bed. I find it best to keep you undamaged for the field." He sees the defeat in her. Or, more so, the defeat she's desperately trying to hide along with a little bit of hurt she's certainly not used to feeling. But Bane doesn't care about her shame or her wounded emotions. He'd rather have her as his left hand in her prime than crippled by his needs as his lover. If he can't squeeze her neck without her flinching, then how could she take the rest of him? Women don't understand that there was a reason he only had the one. And if the League is to succeed, then he only needs to hold out for a little longer before the fire. He can last. Looking back at her, he finds he needs to end this with a warning. "Don't speak of this to me again. Next time I might not be so self-sacrificing."

It sounds like a threat. With his upset voice and the mask and his tensed body language, it sounds like he wants her to run away from him and never touch him again. But she has touched him, so how can she run? How can she forget? Bane begins to walk away from her, the air as uncomfortable now as it is humid and wet. She was supposed to do what is necessary. She failed and Kit doesn't like to fail. She's done it far too much in her youth and doesn't want her remaining years with any trace of it.

"Bane," she calls out suddenly, shocking herself and maybe him as well when he stops and turns to look back at her. His eyes are still angry and the air of him is still stressed. He looks like if he were to make an audible sound at her now, it would be an annoyed groan.

Kit is just as annoyed with herself when she finds she doesn't know what to say.

"Bane," says another voice.

Barsad called his name but all eyes instantly look to the smiling face approaching their boss. Talia al Ghul is here now, dressed in a tight dove gray dress that clings to her curvy figure with pumps on her feet, as if she left her role of businesswoman for the depths of the sewers. Barsad is waiting some feet away behind Bane, giving the two their space. Kit watches as Talia goes to Bane without hesitation, her delicate hands reaching up to take his face and murmur something to him in a language she doesn't know. Only at her presence do Bane's eyes remove from Kit, going from distraught and upset to tender as he leans down closer to Talia, watching her face intently as she coos to him. Talia pecks the grate of the mask where his mouth would be, and Bane's shoulders relax a little. His hands unclench and his tensed brows soften. With Talia here now, he doesn't seem as close to dropping dead from strained pressure as he did a moment ago.

The two could be soul mates, Kit muses, if only there was sexual attraction, which there wasn't. Bane and Talia are closer than anyone she's ever known and she thinks it the biggest shame in the world that she is only Bane's love and not Bane's lover. If things had been different, if both of them had grown up in different circumstances, they most definitely would be the lovers to rival all lovers.

But Bane and Talia's love is everything but sexual. He is always what she needs him to be, and she is for him as well. In fact, their own lives aren't even too big a sacrifice.

And still… even Talia isn't enough.

Talia whispers more tender words to Bane, saying whatever it is she knows she needs to say to soothe him. She nuzzles against him while lovingly rubbing his head and masked cheek, acting almost like the very medicine that is pumped into his lungs.

And as Talia does this, Bane's eyes move and land on Kit again. They heat just for her.

Kit's gaze narrows as she wonders if the heat is good or bad.

Talia leads Bane away, no doubt bringing him somewhere the two can be alone. The closer and closer the heir infiltrates her colleague's trust, the less time she has to give to her protector. Barsad, arms folded, comes to stand next to Kit.

"Did you call her?" Kit asks, her eyes on Bane until she can't see him anymore.

"I did. I thought it an appropriate secondary plan in case you failed. Which, it seems, you did."

"Thanks for sending me over here for nothing then," she mutters, irritated.

"If Talia could change the course of the plan and stay with him, she would. We must use her as often as we can. In her absence, we will have to get creative. The others mustn't know the strain he feels."

Kit's heart finally calms down. With Bane out of sight and no longer yelling at her, she can assess what happened between them. Bane says she isn't ready for what he would do to her in bed. She can only imagine what the man is into, but if it's anything like every other aspect of him, it's powerful and brutal and unforgiving. It suddenly feels hotter in the sewers than it had before. The more she remembers his cock in her hand and his grip on her throat, it becomes hotter still, and she's left with a clenched stomach and a feeling she doesn't quite know how to place. She lifts her hand, places it on her throat. When Barsad walks away, she wraps her fingers around her neck and squeezes. Her own grip doesn't feel like how Bane's did.

And she's left… disappointed.

Maybe it's only that chemical imbalance flaring up again.

It's days later and she's made her choice. Kit does what she has to do and if that means losing something inside herself, than she doesn't blink twice. She prides herself on being a good woman mercenary, on getting the job done in whatever way she knows how for its success. She's gotten injured and almost died one too many times not to see this company remain as the powerhouse her boss has created it to be. Her job is her purpose, and she wants to keep her purpose more than anything. She doesn't want to go back to feeling lost and alone and incapable.

It's the night of Miranda Tate's masquerade, and Kit has been chosen to attend and keep an eye on Talia. Talia al Ghul doesn't need protection but Ms. Tate does, as that is the character the heir will be playing as she socializes and laughs and partakes in food and drink that has come from her own endless League funds. The role will consume Bane's love for authenticity, and having extra eyes on her is deemed a good idea. Kit is the only one in the company who doesn't look too weathered and beaten down, someone who won't cast a suspicious eye among the elite of Gotham City. Her appearance is easily changeable.

Kit is going to a fancy party, so she needs to dress for the occasion.

A dress is delivered for her. Kit can count on one hand the number of times she's worn a dress, but it doesn't feel too bad. It's a long gown that flows to her feet, resting delicately on her tall body. Her breasts aren't terribly big so the front can dip low for elegance, the straps on her shoulders the only thing keeping her from being completely naked. It's made of satin so she has to forgo underwear. Kit is an adaptable woman so knowing there's nothing underneath doesn't bother her. The only thing that could bother her if she allowed it would be the color of the dress.

It's pink. Soft, pretty, blushing pink, like a carnation flower.

It's such an odd color on her that her brothers know not to make any kind of comment about it.

Her pixie hair is styled and light makeup is applied. She swipes on some gloss for shine and slides her feet into heels the same petal pink as her dress. The sticky cups holding her breasts feel strange at first, but she ignores it along with the bareness between her legs. She decides to fix that as her last addition.

Before she leaves for the party, she has one thing left to do.

She finds Bane sitting on the sad excuse for a bed where he sometimes sleeps. His medical equipment can't be jostled too far throughout the sewers, so finding an isolated area within the underground wasn't an option so long as they're here. One sleeve is rolled up and a needle is in his arm, the tube sending nutrients and other supplements into his veins. He looks deep in thought before the sound of her heels clicking knocks him out of it, putting some kind of life back into his deadening eyes.

Kit allows him to drink in her appearance. At first he flinches, his eyes squinting as if she disgusts him. But she knows it's a disgust he doesn't want to feel. It looks, almost, like she's torturing him now.

She lets emotion wash off her face as she approaches him briskly. His eyes can't decide what they want to look at; her expression or her body.

Now she's standing over him. He doesn't seem to like it.

"I know what I'm offering you and I'm not going to let you scare me off," she tells him lowly, keeping an edge to her voice without totally disrespecting him. "You don't decide what's too much for me. I do. So if you want me, if you want to relax, you can have me. Going to bed with you can't be the harrowing experience you think it is. If you want to go hard," she whispers then, holding his gaze, "then go as hard as you like."

Heat seeps into his eyes again and his face scrunches up like he's silently growling at her. His body goes a little straighter as he squares off against her. "Suddenly you don't follow orders very well," he mutters darkly.

"I follow my orders just fine, or else I wouldn't be wearing this pretty dress. Would you like proof of how obedient I am to you?"

Before he can answer Kit takes his hand. His eyes slowly droop down to her skirt as she begins to tug it up in front of him, knowing everyone else is either not around or too busy to notice what they're up to. Bane allows her to continue whatever it is she's doing, waiting to see if she squeaks again. But she doesn't. She doesn't even pull her skirt all the way up. She slides his hand underneath, right to her upper thigh. Instead of skin, he feels rough fabric and metal.

The revolver he once gave her in strapped between her legs.

I never want to see you without it.

His eyes zip back up to hers.

And Kit is confident, cocky. Oh, how he wishes she wasn't.

It infuriates him as well as arouses him instantly.

"I can be a good girl," she murmurs to him, then makes his hand slide from the gun and onto the soft skin of her inner thigh. He doesn't pull away. In fact, his fingers involuntarily spread to feel more. "And I can be a bad one, too."

Kit removes his hand from underneath her skirt. It falls back to her heels with a pretty swish. She turns, ready to catch her car for the party, but before she's out of sight, she stops.

"Next move's yours, boss," she calls over her shoulder.

Bane watches her saunter off in her dress, his eyes slowly going down her body until they land on her pert ass as she walks away. He can't really tell if the sway of her hips has always been there, or if she's put it into his mind, like a witch casting a spell. He wants to punish her. He wants to let her know that she isn't allowed to say such things and think she knows what she's talking about. His little lesson from before obviously wasn't enough.

She needs a firmer hand.

The masquerade party goes well… Kit supposes.

She mostly stands off to the side by the dance floor near a big bouquet of roses because she likes how they smell. She doesn't get to be around pretty things very often, and maybe the rich red of the flowers is clashing with her blush pink dress, but she hardly cares because she likes them and they're something beautiful in her very unbeautiful world. She also likes looking at the different style of dresses the other women are wearing and how unique everyone's tastes are. Talia – Miranda – looks ravishing in bright red with her brown locks bouncy on her shoulders and her mask in her hand, lifting it to conceal her face occasionally for amusement among her guests. She laughs elegantly with them.

But the joke is on them. Talia's mask is truly her real face everyone can see.

Kit holds a flute of champagne by the roses. She constantly knows where Talia is at all times, but after working for Bane for so long she knows how to multitask with the masters. Talia is chatting with the unexpected Bruce Wayne – And isn't that funny? – so Kit takes the time to study Selina Kyle, who's somehow acquired an invite. She probably stole it.

Her little black cat ears are adorable, Kit thinks, lifting her flute for a sip. And also quite fitting. The old man she's dancing with probably has something she wants, and Selina isn't the kind of woman to turn even the most disgusting of men away if it means something shiny. Kit finds that she can envy such a trait in Bane's stray cat. It's always been that if she didn't like you, she had nothing to do with you. There are hundreds of people walking the earth who are dead to Kit, and she finds it's a simpler way to live.

She proves her inability to give anyone she doesn't want to talk to the time of day as some debonair men – all married – approach her for a dance. She's a tad taller than most of them but it doesn't seem to dissuade them from wanting her attention. When she even refuses to give some eye contact, she can tell they're lingering on her body. They must take a fancy to the length of her, the strength. She may not have many luscious curves, but they like her long neck, her broad shoulders, and her unending legs. But they don't know that the scar in that neck is from a bullet. They don't know that her shoulders can cut off their windpipes with a good enough ram. And they certainly don't know that her left leg is killing her without its brace because she refuses to give these people any suspicious kind of body language.

One calls her a bitch under his breath as he walks away, spurned. Kit takes the time to grin a little.

If only he knew she had a gun between her legs.

Bane knows, she thinks suddenly, sipping more of her drink and breathing in deeply for the scent of the roses. If only he was forgettable enough to attend the party as well. She would catch his eye and hold her ground against this new inner battle between them, maybe even dance with him so that she could press herself against his body so he could feel the weapon on her. She imagines it, warms to it. He can snarl and huff and snip at her like an animal, but he would still reach inside her dress again like she had his pants and…

Kit blinks and regains sight on Talia.

It's been a long time since she's had sex. Kit can only think that's her problem now, her lack of it because there hasn't been any time since they began this Gotham job. What is probably their last job. Sleeping with Bane will be nothing more than relaxing him as he continues to lead them effectively without burning out. She's doing what is necessary.

That's all.

Kit goes back to work, downs her drink, and watches Selina carefully as the woman leans into her new dancing partner Bruce Wayne, whispering to him.

She files that away for when she gives her report of the night.

Kit doesn't have to go back to the sewers tonight. Instead, after the staff has cleaned and the caterers have taken away all the food, she ends her task by claiming a room in Talia's big penthouse. There are plenty to choose from and her leg is aching, as well as her back from standing all evening. Inside the simple guest bedroom, she slips off her dress and cleans her face, runs a hand through her short hair and climbs into bed in nothing but a sleep tank and panties. Her revolver is resting in its holster draped carefully over a chair. Before the sun rises she'll go back to the sewers, back to her orders. There's plenty more to do before the siege of Gotham.

Kit opens her eyes when she hears footsteps outside her door. She knows those footsteps like she knows her own, which is the only reason why she doesn't reach for her gun.

Bane pushes the door open. It swings slowly as he eyes her in the bed, looking at little uncertain like he can't tell whether she's friend or foe.

But his presence now tells her he wants her.

"You want to know what it is like," he says gravely, remaining in the doorway. The penthouse is dim behind him.

Kit sits up slowly. The blankets fall to her hips. "I want to help you relax."

"You want to help me," he parrots firmly, and he isn't wearing a jacket. She thinks he's too hot to the touch to fight the cold outside. "You want to give me… what Talia cannot. What I won't take from her."

"Yes," Kit tells him. For his sake, she'll give him whatever he needs. "Yes, I want you to have me."

"I warned you," he utters, stepping forward and closing the door. The room is darker but there's a little nightlight on in the bathroom. She can still see him. "You have one last chance to decline before I put my hands on you."

Kit respects him enough to take one moment to assess her situation. Bane said that he wanted to hurt her, to mark her up and tie her down. She believes him because she felt his hand on her neck, felt the power in his body when he allowed her to touch him. And she believes him because she's heard the sounds during her time with him, heard the loud banging of the beds and Tye's harsh panting when he would take her during her visits. Tye was able to sate him and endure his desires. But she isn't Tye, she's Kit, and he's giving her a choice. One last chance before he pounces.

She wants him to stay because she's his left hand. Because maybe she needs a good fuck, too.

So Kit takes her flimsy blanket and casts it off her thighs. Her legs are there to welcome him closer.

Bane growls at her and accepts her choice. Instantly he's peeling off his shirt and ripping away the braces, kicking off his boots. He climbs onto the bed on his knees, causing her to rise up a little from his weight, and his hands move as quick as they can to unfasten his belts and pants. All the while his eyes are on her, all the while she's burning from the heat radiating off of him. He hasn't told her what he wants so Kit reaches for her tank, ready to pull it over her head.

"No," he hisses, his eyes hot and dilated, his body contorted into something feral again. "No, you will not remove anything until I tell you to. Your body is mine tonight and you will not touch yourself."

Kit goes quiet. She leans back on her elbows instead.

"Tell me you understand," he says, and maybe there's a hint of desperation. Like he really needs her to.

She nods. "I do. I understand."

"Grab the metal bars above your head."

She does, her long fingers wrapping around the black metal bedframe. Bane's body is magnificent and she's always thought so. Before, it was simple respect she had for his formidable size and superior strength. She's watched him take on multiple men at once and crush bones with his hands. But now, as he comes to kneel between her opened legs, she discovers the lines and angles and sheer mass of him is arousing her. The more naked he becomes, the more hot she feels.

She looks so submissive and it's been so long for him that Bane thinks this might not take long at all. If she's so desperate for him, so desperate to help, then he'll take her exactly how he wants it. Sex for him is in the only way he knows how to go about life. Hard and rough and dirty, with him in complete control because never does he want to feel out of it again. His is the boss, the master. He controls sex like how he controls his company, how he will control Gotham. There is order but there is a price for disobedience and a lingering threat of pain. Submit to him, and you will be given pleasure.

And Kit has submitted. She lies there, the thighs of her long, toned legs spread and ready to wrap around him should he have a need to feel their grip. Her breasts look a little more swollen against her tank and her nipples are hard against the fabric. Bane tugs at her panties, yanking her around as he fights them off. He stares at her center like a hungry man. She's pretty between her legs, he finds, spotting her shiny arousal that he swears makes his cock twitch, as does the very thin strip of blonde hair that's been left while everything else is gone. The rest of her isn't dainty and delicate, but here, right here in this lovely spot, is she exquisite. And as she submits, so does he to his primal desires.

"Don't release your grip," he demands of her, always one to watch the face as he gives his orders in bed. "Keep your hands right where they are."

Kit doesn't want to, but she swallows anyway when he takes a thigh in his hand and lifts it up, placing her leg over his shoulder. It's a diagonal placement; her right leg over his left shoulder, and only when his eyes travel down does she realize his intentions. Her ass cheek is bare for him now. He's already reeling his hand back to spank her.

Only a small hitch of breath escapes her when his hand connects. It stings, but she won't dare to make any weak sounds this time. He does it again, his eyes practically glittering from the act. He's so hard now that she can see the sizeable bulge underneath his underwear through the opening of his pants. The next time he spanks her, her body jerking from the hit, she lets out a very small whimper.

"Tell me to stop," he tells her, approving of the way her hands are remaining where he ordered them to. "If you can't handle it, Kit, then ask me to leave."

"I don't want you to leave," she whispers.

Smack.

That last one was harder and she feels that she might actually lose her nerve on this one, that soon she won't be as wet as when he was fiddling with his pants and growling at her. But how can she retain her arousal when he's constantly wanting her to push him away? How can she keep it with him smacking her like this?

Kit then feels an intrusion, a thickness sliding inside her although it can't be his cock. She looks at him with her leg still over his shoulder, his hand at her crotch. Bane has his middle finger inside her, curling and pumping and fascinated by… By how wet she really is.

Suddenly she wants nothing more than for him to fuck her.

"Oh, Kit," he murmurs, coos more like. Her ass cheek stings but his finger feels good, prepping her for what's to come. "You truly are an obedient one, aren't you? A good girl," he whispers, moving her leg and grabbing her ass in one hand underneath, pulling her closer and stretching out her arms above her head like he's tied them there and she can't move. Her hands are still tight around the bars. He removes his finger from her and uses the tip to rub on her sweet spot, the pad able to fit over it and cause a soft moan to ease from her lips. He hums at the sound, makes her do it again when he pinches her, but it's a painful one now. He thrills at the back and forth between the two distinct noises. "The obedient are always rewarded. This first time, I will reward you quickly."

Bane reaches between his legs to pull his cock out of his opened pants. Kit sees that he looks exactly as she imagined him to be when her hand had been on him, and once again it overwhelms her a little. Her ass hurts and her arms are starting to ache from their placement, but her mind screams at her not to move a muscle. She won't like it if she does something he didn't ask of her. Maybe, she thinks, watching him pull her by her hips to bring her closer to him instead of him leaning to her, maybe he won't let her come if she's bad.

The stretch on her arms is worse now and he knows it. He likes it. Seeing her discomfort makes him utter another silken threat.

"If your hands release," he begins, his voice soft and calm and almost loving because this is how he is in bed. Politely brutal. "Then I will take my pleasure from your head and not between your legs. I will leave you throbbing." He waits for her to respond. When she doesn't, he swats her on the thigh and says louder, "Kit?"

"Yes," she breathes, her voice weary.

"Yes what?"

"Yes, I understand."

Bane believes her, and without wasting any more time, he uses his grip on her hips to make her align with him, and surges inside.

And she feels…

She feels like instantly her body has sucked half the strain right from him.

It's a storm of feeling and Kit doesn't really know how to respond. The sound she makes when he enters her is like a startled gasp and a lusting moan all in one, like pleasure and pain are colliding to create one almost unbearable sensation. Bane is breathing heavily above her, already pumping inside with hard, unforgiving rolls of his hips. Her hands grip the bars to tightly that they begin to ache, pairing with the pain in her shoulders and the sting on one side of her ass. Bane's hands hurt her hips, digging in roughly, but not too far away where they are joined is a living pulse of pleasure, making her shiver. She doesn't know what to think, she just doesn't know. She isn't used to this.

But he feels…

Bane's hands crawl up her waist, pushing the fabric of her tank up at the same time until he settles for the shirt bunched on her collarbone. Her back is arched as she tries to retain her grip on the bars while also keeping her pelvis still as he fucks her, and because of that arch, her breasts are offered sweetly to him. He grabs them brusquely in his hands and pushes her spine down onto the mattress with force, his hands large enough and her breasts small enough that they're covered completely by his grip. He takes her that way for a while, making her entire body bounce on the bed from his thrusts, the bedframe crashing into the wall each time he bottoms out inside her. He grunts and his eyes clench tightly shut. His orgasm is there, right there, and all he wants to do is come inside her and feel it. He wants to wrap his hands around her neck and choke her and force her to come as well, make her scream underneath him. Something tells Bane, far away inside him where rationale is losing the battle against desire, that maybe he shouldn't choke her tonight, that maybe he'll save it if he should be given another opportunity with Kit's body. He listens to it, even as his hands inch up for her neck, desperate to feel her pounding pulse under his fingers as the moans build in her throat.

Not tonight, not this first time, he tells himself, and moves past her neck for her wrists high above her head. With his legs spread underneath her thighs, Bane leans forward for the grip, draping his body over hers and allowing some of his weight to press on her. She's mewing under him, giving moans of pleasure and discomfort, but still she hasn't told him to stop, although he's given her multiple chances to kick him out. He makes his lower stomach scrape against her wet sweet spot to counter against the pain he's giving her wrists and the sting of the mask as he digs it into the side of her sweaty face.

She's coming now and he relishes in the sensation, a grip he isn't used to like how he was with Tye's. He growls harshly, pounds into her so hard that the fabric of his pants is rubbing her raw. And when he comes he feels a hundred pounds lighter, thrusting into her sporadically now to get rid of more and more of it. He fills her up and collapses on her, his breaths big and loud as their heartbeats knock against one another. He stays that way for a moment, basking in the feeling of another body under his, another woman tight around him and pulsating. Bane opens his eyes when he feels her shift slightly. He looks up and still sees his hands around her wrists, keeping them locked on the bars. Obedient, he thinks again, and pries her fingers away, almost having to fight their grip because of how stiff they are. His hands roam down her arms, squeezing her muscles every now and then to soothe. Her breasts feel soft against his chest but he doesn't dare touch them.

Bane knows that if he needs to treat his bedmate's body a particular way, then a certain amount of comfort is to be given in return.

He rolls off of her to rest at her side. His cock is softening and shiny from her orgasm, and it means so much, because now he can actually breathe. Now he doesn't feel the world collapsing on top of him as much as he did before. Bane remembers that comfort again. He isn't a man who soothes anyone save for Talia al Ghul, but rough treatment demands aftercare. He's a man who understands that equivalent exchange.

"Kit," he calls softly, his voice deep and husky and finally sated. He breathes the drugs steadily. "Are you all right?"

When she feels like she can move, one hand goes over her eyes as the other stretches downward, easing the aching muscles in her arm. So much hurts; her arms, her wrists, her breasts, her ass, her hips, between her legs. And so much feels like the after effects of sex. She's never been treated that way before so it takes her a moment or two to recuperate. But when she does, when she feels like her voice will work, she utters hoarsely, "Yeah."

It's quiet then between them. Talia's penthouse settles into place and the air softly hums. The nightlight is still on in the bathroom and the sheets are warm beneath her. Bane's shoulder is touching hers, but he doesn't move. If he wants to continue lying in the bed, there isn't any room to spare. Kit just tries to relax.

"I neglected to bring protection," he murmurs, his unique voice with the mask filling the room with a hint of regret and damned forgetfulness he hates.

"Oh," she simply replies, grunting ever so softly when she finally closes her legs. "That wasn't very responsible of you."

He makes a low sound, not unlike a threatening growl, but he can't really argue with her either. He's never been irresponsible, and the fact that he got to a certain point where he had been irritates him tremendously.

Kit takes a deep breath, places her hand behind her head. She wonders if he's freaking out a little, if he's overanalyzing that there's a chance he could've gotten her pregnant. Once again, she eases him. "I'm on the pill."

It does ease him. Kit works for him and spends her life travelling. Of course she would be on birth control if there was a chance she could have sex on the road if she wanted it. Bane has never considered Kit's sex life, until now. Until he was suddenly a part of it.

Until he showed her how he likes it.

"I told you the truth," he tells her, staring up at the ceiling. "I told you so you would expect it."

Kit doesn't really know what to say to that. She doesn't really even know what she thought of it yet. But she did allow him release and relaxation. Wasn't that what was necessary?

"I encouraged you," she says, maneuvering a little to get comfy. She's never slept with her boss before. "Everything that happened was consensual."

"Yes," he agrees softly, reaching down to tuck himself away and zip up his pants. "It was good."

If it was another time and another circumstance, maybe Kit would've laughed a little at that. Instead, she remains quiet and still when he sits up and stares down at her. His eyes look sleepy now, but not like how they did before. They seem a little brighter, a little calmer. He's not carrying himself with tension and she doesn't have this lingering feeling that maybe she needs to worry for him. Barsad will know for sure, she accepts. The right hand can tell when their boss isn't doing so well, much better than she can. This time, she thinks, she helped. Bane is fine.

But what about her now? Why does she feel… so strange?

Why does she feel like something has changed for her?

Because it has, she tells herself, annoyed now. Kit comes to the conclusion that she feels strange because she's slept with her boss and now how can he order her around in the field when he's ordered her around in bed? It might be a conclusion done in haste, but for now it satisfies her. Tonight, spent and used up and hurting, she dismisses it all.

It's done easily because Bane is still looking at her with those eyes.

If he wants to say something, he doesn't. All he does is reach for her bunched tank and pulls it back down over her breasts, covering them. He lifts the blanket and hides her bare lower half she'd forgotten about, and the bed creaks like it might be a little broken now when he climbs out of it. Kit rolls to her side instantly, ignores the aches and the pains and the stings. She forces herself to think about nothing as Bane quietly washes up in the bathroom. It might be that even though he's never cared when people know he's had sex, it doesn't mean they have to smell it on him too.

He dresses just as quietly in the bedroom, pulling on his shirt and boots and braces. Before he leaves, with the door in his hand and a dark house beyond him, he gives her another look. She thinks he does it just to be polite.

"Thank you," he mutters, then closes the door softly.

Kit clears her mind before it can start up again, and passes right out. She's thankful that she does.

Bane doesn't leave the penthouse right away. It could be wrong on some level when he creeps into Talia's room after he's just slept with another woman, but he doesn't care. She knows it's him because only Bane is allowed past security and the other alarms. He's never slept in Talia's bed but he has a desperate need to see her before he leaves her home, before he goes back to the dark dank sewers of Gotham. He knows he can stay here, but it would be too risky to the plan. This hard, final plan with his men and with Talia and everything he's ever known. Bane sits on the edge of her bed, leans down to her when she opens her arms and caresses him.

There are very fleeting moments when he regrets this plan to burn Gotham. Like when he physically sees Talia and when she is his girl instead of Ra's al Ghul's daughter. When he thinks of an entire half-life that neither of them will get to live. And when he feels such pleasures like a woman's soft, giving body under his. Only in those moments does he think of the fire with remorse. They are very few and far between, but he still feels them in that rarity.

The rest of the time, he waits patiently for it.

Talia holds him and the silk of her nighty is soft against his hot skin. She smells good, like lavender for soothing sleep, and her tender hands remind him of the innocence she once carried as a child. It's long gone now, but Bane can still experience it when she's like this. Soon she will make a deal with their devil. Soon, she will give her body to him. To Bruce Wayne.

The innocence is gone, but Bane holds a little piece of it in his memory.

Kit won't say that things are tense and weird and different between them now. She won't mention the fact that she sometimes catches Bane staring at her when he thinks she doesn't realize, especially in places below her chin, and she definitely won't admit that she's been staring at him too when she knows she's supposed to be doing anything else. She won't say that she's been losing sleep, that she just lies there with that strange feeling in her chest and a disappointment settling in her stomach when Barsad inquires about the dark shadows under her eyes and the occasional yawn she emits. And when she's walking a little funny the next couple days after Bane left her bed, she tells her brothers who ask about it that her ankle is acting up.

It's not that she wants to keep the one night a secret from them. It's that it's none of their damn business.

Bane has hurt her. Her ass was a little bruised from his smacks and her thighs had some red fabric burns from his pants. The pull on her arms caused a crick in her neck and of course she was sore between her legs after he'd pounded away like a madman. There was so much pain that came with his pleasure that Kit wondered if it had been worth it. Her body was part of an army, and if she couldn't perform because of the marks and soreness, then it was a mistake that could get her killed, especially now that the police had visuals of Bane. She knew it was her own fault after consenting to it when he told her what to expect, but had the pain, and now this knowing air between them, truly been what was necessary?

Kit tries to ignore it. She tries to ignore her boss's lingering eyes on her body, tries not to feel an air of pain and punishment when he walks by her. She delves into the work, finding it's easier now with Bane not so stressed, and strives to do what her company needs her to do. She waits for Bane in the sewers when he hits the stock exchange for Daggett, her and Barsad remaining behind because Bane tells them there's a chance who he brings with him will be taken by the police, and he won't risk his right and left hand. They watch on as the police chase the Batman instead.

Little things about Bane are more cheerful than before. He pats her brothers on the shoulder when they please him, studies the Batman's flying vehicle with sparkling interest when he escapes with Selina Kyle instead of annoyed disdain. He's happy to kill John Daggett and even happier when he gets to rough up the stray cat, telling her nicely that if she doesn't have anything of use for him, then her days burgling as well as breathing are finished.

Selina pleases him greatly when she offers him the Batman. Just as he knew she would.

Bane seems to be doing fine now. Kit's done her job. She's helped.

But now she is the one who feels stressed and unable to relax.

The weeks go by and Kit feels a dissatisfaction like she's never felt before. It's worse now than it had been in her youth, and not even holding a gun to Dr. Pavel's head as he prepares their bomb can ease it. She still has her purpose with the company and with the League, but she's slowly starting to feel like she's nothing but useless and feels sick over the fact that she constantly feels like she's missing something. She wonders if this is finally her mid-life crisis. She feels unfulfilled and tense and wanting because she's peaked, and no longer does she have anything else to look forward to besides success in Gotham. She flanks Bane in her belts and her armor with her revolver in her hand as they head out onto the football field, and she finds that she carries a hate for this place. Not just for Gotham, but for the entire world because the world is nothing but a colossal disappointment. Even little stars like the Batman meet their match and die, become nothing but a broken jagged piece of what they once were. It only takes a man like Bane and a woman like Talia al Ghul to crush those who try their hardest to create light in darkness.

The Batman is no more, and with the push of a button as the world watches on, the clock begins to tick.

So much for borrowed time.

There is one little shred of excitement for Kit. Bruce Wayne's fancy armory makes her feel like a girl on Christmas morning, or at least what she thinks a little girl feels like when she flees for the lit tree. She herself has never cared for such things, even at the age, but on TV normal little girls squeal and laugh and gasp. She wasn't a normal little girl and she doesn't squeal, laugh, or gasp when she finally gets to drive one of the Tumbler's, but she does feel a zing that temporarily fades the strain and confusion she's experiencing.

The zing is then replaced with something she doesn't like when she realizes that she is the one who will drive Bane to Blackgate Prison and man the controls to set free those who were wrongfully oppressed.

He's too close to her inside the Tumbler, too big, with his massive size and the brown coat that makes him seem thicker. With the right plan of attack and tools, she's never felt weak or incapable around some men, or hasn't in a few years. But now, sitting next to him even though she's armed to the teeth and can take out traffic in her vehicle with a push of a button, she feels like how she did when she was in bed with him. She feels like he's in control and she is nothing but powerless.

And maybe she only feels like that because… she's allowing it.

Kit pulls up to the gates of the prison, eyeing the group of reporters not too far away. They're going to make them wait a little, let them grow antsy after the trauma they've caused at the stadium. Gotham needs to know that Bane is in charge, that they're on his time. That he will set them free. As they wait, as Bane settles into the quiet before he addresses the world, Kit runs her hand through her hair.

It's hard, at her age, to discover that she's still learning things about herself. It's hard to go through half of a life knowing who you are and what you like and how you take things, only for one incidence to change everything. She's a woman mercenary constantly seeing the world and constantly staring death in the face, so what else does she need to learn? But the truth is simple and Kit has finally come to terms with it because she has no other choice.

The bomb is already ticking. As of right now, she's on limited time.

Her revolver digs into her hip and her leg brace squeezes her ankle. The weathered gray military jacket around her torso is hopefully not too sweaty, and her boot rests against the gas pedal because it makes her feel more in control, like she could take this monster car and just drive away without consequence. She dresses for her work and to appear intimidating, because enemies discovering her as female will always be quick to write her off. But even in these clothes, even with her body strong and toned and a gun on her hip, she feels feeble next to her boss.

It's a truth she accepts because she's sick of fighting it. At her age, she doesn't want to and possibly doesn't have the time for it.

"I think we need to talk," she murmurs, taking a deep breath and suddenly thankful that it's only her and Bane in the Tumbler. She stares out the window at the gathering reporters for distraction. "About what happened. Between us."

Bane draws his brows together and looks over at her. "Kit."

"I was just trying to help. I was trying to give you a little relief, you know? No one's ever done that to me before. Handled me that way. Shit," she sighs, covering her eyes with her hand. Her mouth is suddenly dry. "It's bothering me. The whole damned thing is eating me up, and I don't like it. I know I have the worst timing, but if I don't speak up now then it's over. I need to start some kind of conversation so it isn't forgotten."

"It was one time," he tells her, and his voice is hard. She doesn't dare look at him. She can already tell she's pissing him off. "You told me you could handle it. You assured me that you knew what you were offering and you wouldn't allow it to affect you negatively."

"I know I said all that," she hisses softly.

"This is why I warned you. This is why I pushed you away initially. You convinced me that you knew what you were doing and still I gave you multiple chances to tell me to stop." The helicopters arrive then, flying over the prison because they know Bane is here, the sound of their loud blades audible even inside the tank they're in. There isn't much time for him to converse. His eyes are smoldering as he stares her down, even though she still isn't looking at him. He wants to strangle her, and not in the good way. "This is the last thing I expected from you, Kit. I gave you your chance and you acted like I'd done nothing wrong. That you were perfectly inside your head." In his frustration, Bane jabs some buttons and opens the roof himself, readying to climb out. "I must attend to you another time but we will finish this."

"You didn't do anything wrong. I enjoyed it."

He scoffs at her, giving her a glare before he goes to pull himself out through the hatch. "Lie to me again and I will knock you down in the ranks. I don't appreciate it, and now I feel as if I've been drawn into childish games."

"No, Bane, stop. That's the problem." When he ignores her, she grabs his arm before he exits. She grips the coat as well and now she's wondering when it suddenly became okay for her to reach out and touch him. "I'm trying, and not in a very good way, to make you understand. I enjoyed it," she says again, looking at him now and feeling more of the truth with every second that goes by with her hands on him. "I didn't know what to make of it, after. But… I liked it."

And she had liked it. She liked every second he'd manhandled her, every smack and hard swat he'd given her body. She liked the way he marked her up and left her sore, sorer than she'd ever been with a lover. She liked the way he dominated her, made her do things with a cold threat that always held the promise of pleasure that somehow felt more intense. She liked it so much that she was disappointed with everything else because it wasn't Bane holding her down. She's discovered something new about herself, and now Kit feels like she's ruined for any other man she could have, any other pleasure she could feel. She wants to feel again what he made her feel because one time had not been enough.

If she can't feel those things, if she can't submit after a lifetime of doing, doing, doing, then Kit believes that she will never be satisfied ever again.

Bane eyes her carefully. He's trying to decipher whether or not this is another of her attempts to help relax him, or if she's being truthful. If it was only part of her call of duty – and since when did he need his own soldier to sleep with him? – then Bane knew he would refuse her. He couldn't damage Kit and wear her out when she truly didn't want him to, even though she would consent to it, just because she felt he needed the relief that sex could give. But if she's being honest, if she's willing because now she wants it…

Well then it changes everything.

Bane knows when someone is lying. He's trained in the ways of body language, the shift of the eyes, and the beating of the heart. He's known this woman for a long time and even saved her life once when her blood began to leak from her neck. He'd seen something in her, in a dark tavern when she'd defended herself against those who would harm her. Kit Kelli, his left hand, approves of the way he'd had her body.

And it looks like she needs more.

Bane's expression eases into something a little less terrifying and/or interrogating. He notices the revolver strapped to her hip, her foot on the gas of the tank and her hands ready to control his armory. He looks into her brown eyes, and sees the amazon she's always been.

He gives a soft laugh, and doesn't remove her hands from him. "Perhaps, now that I'm looking at you, I shouldn't be surprised."

His arrogance, something she hasn't seen much in a long time from him, causes her to bristle even as it reminds her of a time before the League of Shadows came to call on him. Kit pulls her hands off, sits stiffly in the seat. Just moments ago he needed to do his work, and now he's just looking at her, making her feel dumb. Kit has used men for sex sparingly, but she's never asked to be used before. And perhaps she can't be the one to ask because she already is the one who offered.

The mask hisses, the gas flow a soft, faint sound inside the tank. "Do you need more?" he asks her then.

Does she need more? Kit can admit she has a need. In the middle of all this, after a city has been hijacked, of course she does. They both need more, in different ways. "Yes," she answers. "I want to try it again."

He's about to become the most infamous man in the entire world. He will be named multiple things as soon as he makes his speech; dictator, conqueror, revolutionist, redeemer, among many others. He will hold a city and keep millions of people hostage, and mostly by their own will because they don't wish to burn. But before he does it all, before he gives liberation, Bane takes Kit's jaw into his hand and turns her face to his.

His eyes are shining with pride.

"Then, Kit Kelli, I shall give you more."

Kit stays put as she watches him climb from the Tumbler. She doesn't need to turn on the monitor and watch the broadcast because she can simply look up and see the back of him, hear his voice that booms like thunder as he declares Gotham a corrupt city full of liars. She feels a sense of thankfulness that she's on this side instead of the other, the one that cowers and flees as the League destroys those unworthy of structure and life. And she feels that pain in her head and her chest when she activates the controls of the tank, turning the canons on the gates of Blackgate to blow it to hell and release the wrongfully imprisoned. Barsad gives a quarter of their armory to the wretch of Gotham so that they may join them, enforcing the martial law and serving the true justice.

She remembers the bomb in the truck. She remembers the dying ember in her palm deep within a diamond mine in Africa. She wonders if she was given a glimpse into the future, or a consequence if something were to go wrong.

What have they become? she asks herself. What have mercenaries for hire evolved into and where on earth do they go beyond this? Are they truly doing what is necessary, or are they snatching something that doesn't belong to them simply because a woman has asked them to?

Kit doesn't know if they're redeemers or tyrants. But really, what's the difference? All she wants is to keep her purpose and her position.

Bane, as soon as all is set into place, then declares Gotham a great city.

They patrol the city after the prisoners are free and armed and the citizens are falling into justifiable chaos. The bomb is tucked away safely and will remain in a constant state of motion, and soon things will ebb and flow smoothly as Gotham remains a world separate from the one it used to be a part of. Bane orders the tanks to scatter throughout the city, making sure all is well and secure, that the American army is kept just behind the line of acceptable lest they want to cross it and kill millions. He tells Kit to drive, to watch. To witness.

He wants to witness the beginnings of a new era, as well.

It's like they're separate from the chaos, from the new world. It's like a film is playing around them and of course they aren't part of it because they're simply spectators. Inside the Tumbler, safe behind steel and big bullets, Kit watches the very start of their victory. Once again, she's thankful.

"So how is this going to work?" she asks, breaking the silence, her foot barely resting on the gas as they wander through the streets while Gotham becomes something new.

"I assume you're not talking about what is happening around you."

"No. No, I'm not. I'm prepared for this. I'm just not too sure… how you want this to move forward."

There is so much that Bane will need to do. The city has been given to the people but the people aren't capable like they think they are, or even like he's led them to believe. Behind every freedom is a force keeping it that way, holding the invisible strings of puppets who don't even realize they're puppets. That burden of putting on a show will fall to him. But for now, he will allow his puppets to dance by themselves. Or at least try to.

He's not answering her, so she continues. "Look, you need someone to be a replacement for Tye, and I need someone… I just need someone. It works out for both of us, but going by how hesitant you were at first, I'm assuming you have some rules." Still he's quiet. She drives a whole block before he decides to open his mouth behind the mask.

"A replacement for Tye," he repeats softly, almost under his breath.

"If you were so inclined to generously sleep with whoever was willing, then she wouldn't have been the only one, obviously. And you wouldn't have fought me at first."

"Tye and I had a beneficial relationship. We both began our various forms of business nearly at the same time and worked together to create suitable connections. The other aspect of our relationship happened quickly after we decided to trust each other. She noticed my appeals and was eager to take them on. You are not a replacement for Tye. It isn't a job opening that needs to be filled."

He doesn't sound angry when he says it, but that last sentence sounds like she insulted him. "Sorry," she mutters, turning a corner. "Didn't mean it quite like that."

"Of course you did. You see this as a beneficial relationship as well, but also as a business arrangement. You think you're doing me a service by helping me relax, and your payment is that I will slake this newly discovered lust inside you."

Kit sighs, shaking her head. She admires her boss and respects him. She's followed him all over the world and has killed and destroyed and tortured in his name. But sometimes she wishes he didn't speak so cut and dried. "Isn't that what we're going to do?"

"Yes," Bane answers simply. "But you aren't a replacement. I will take you to bed because I will allow you there. Tye was my only because that is what I wanted. I refuse to share myself so carelessly to anyone I neither like nor trust in some fashion. And yes," he adds. "There are rules."

Not only were they witnessing Gotham's new birth, but they are also to find a base camp of some sorts. Bane will need a place to sleep, as will their core group, and now that hiding is no longer a necessity, there is only the task of finding such a place. Their eyes scout Gotham as it changes around them. Kit gestures for him to continue.

"Outside of my bed you will act as if nothing has changed. I am still your superior and you are to follow my orders, as you always have. Once you enter my room or I yours, well..." He looks over at her, needing that eye contact again so she understands. "That same rule roughly applies. I'm in charge. You do as I command. Which, it seems, is something you enjoy."

"Is that all?" she asks tersely.

Bane laughs softly. "No. You must understand once again that I will desire to push you to your limits, but I will never do anything without your permission. Whatever the world thinks of me, I will not have an unwilling partner. You can hastily agree to that, Kit, but there may come a time when you want me to stop without fully realizing why. I will give you a way out. If utilized, I will cease my actions immediately and end it."

And isn't that what she wants? Isn't that where her disappointment is coming from? The fact that she's not experiencing those things? She supposes she'll find out. "Do you think I'll be afraid of you?"

She feels when his demeanor changes. She feels it as if it suddenly went from freezing to scorching hot in a matter of one great second. Speaking to her, he was how he acted around others, finalizing business or collecting his earnings after victory. Now, as soon as that one small question leaves her lips, he becomes the giant she flanks in the field. The body she is the left hand to. Eyes focused on his target, hands itching to dominate and destroy, spirit fit to consume, and arrogance ready to enjoy his spoils. He's like a dragon of a man, full of fire and rage and raw power. And he's also untamed, a little lost sometimes, a little agitated, but when he sees prey, he wants nothing more than to devour it.

Right now, sitting next to him, she feels like she's prey. She feels like she's the foolish one who has come to fight the dragon.

He seems to like it.

"Do you want to be afraid?" he asks her darkly.

Kit wonders if he's her boss now or if he's whatever he will soon become to her. She accepts that they're pretty much the same position. The only difference is that in the field, when they do the work, she has some kind of power. She has her strength and her gun and the ability to protect herself, her drive to see the job done and her anticipation of payment. Her purpose. If she submits to him, then she has no power at all.

But she'll try to hold onto it until he takes it from her because she wants to see if he can.

"It'll take quite a big man to scare me," she says softly, letting a hint of suggestion flutter through her voice.

Bane holds her gaze carefully. She's surprised him once by not backing down before. He's learning not to let her surprise him again because he sees a streak of defiance in her that he will be more than happy to break. It's want she wants, he remembers. She wants to feel what he can make her feel again. He stares into her challenging brown eyes and feels this immense desire to take her right now, if only for the purpose of having her because her skin looks soft and her body underneath the armor is delectable. He wants, desperately, to control her, in the best of ways.

For a man who has all control, sometimes he feels like he has none. And maybe that is the simple reason for his tastes.

"More pretty words from you, Kit," he says, his voice husky. He wants to draw her in. He sees she's expecting it. Instead, he backs off and leaves her wanting because he has control. "I will enjoy you."

They find their base camp in the form of one of Bruce Wayne's elaborate hotels. The place is ransacked and turned into a fortress of sorts, close by City Hall where soon the guilty will be sentenced. Kit and her brothers look like misfits among the glamorous structure, but it's only just a shell. There are no employees, no attendants, hardly any frilly supplies now that looting is common and allowed. But the hotel gives them space and security and privacy. It smells good and the power is kept on and the accommodations they need are available. Everyone is given a bed and a shower, should they want it.

No more sewers.

As Kit rests her head on the white pillow of the room she's declared is hers, her hair damp from a bath, the words tyrant and redeemer flitter through her dreams.

Bane doesn't sleep at all.

The young children today don't know of the Gotham that was once run by organized crime. They don't remember the days you couldn't go out after eight in the evening because they would be out prowling the streets. They don't know of a time when nightclubs were used for the gangsters and drug dealers instead of the young adults newly legal. And they hardly know of the Batman who once flew through the night, chasing clowns and crazy politicians and mental patients. The police were at their wits end and the officials were no help at all. The legal system was their enemy, and only worked in their favor with the help of a damning lie. Gotham was bad back then.

What those children will remember is that Gotham is much worse today.

People are fighting to stay alive. People are fighting so hard that they will stone anyone from the outside world if they so much as step one pinky toe onto their land in fear that the triggerman will send them to the fire. People are going insane in their fight. All they want is another day, another hour. All they want is to continue the fight because it is so much better than the threat of burning. There are some people who don't think so. There are those who will willingly cross the lines and kill them all so that they don't have to return to freedom. Because of that, people are killing each other.

Jonathan Crane says Bane has no power here. What Gotham doesn't know is that he does.

He's liberated them and placed shackles around their hands and feet. He's told them to shed the blood of their enemies while simultaneously numbering their days. He's given Gotham to the people, but in reality, it is his girl who holds the trigger. The rich and famous are thrown onto the streets, but everyone lives in the desolate land of Gotham, susceptible to all dangers. Bane has raised his army and sent them out. They live to serve.

The fire is calling his name.

And because he can practically hear it, he sends for Kit.

Bane doesn't choose the extravagant suites of the hotel to sleep in. What does he need with state of the art kitchens and mini bars and televisions that make him uncomfortable? But he does take one of the larger rooms that face a certain area of the city. Out on the balcony as the cold bites at him, he can easily see the building where Talia is kept safe by her peers in their pathetic attempts to protect her. Of course Bane knows where all those in hiding are gathered because she tells him, but he gives them their time thinking they've outsmarted him. Having the upper hand is something he enjoys and is prone to, and with this view he can feel somehow connected to his love in some way. They try to protect her, he thinks with a sneer. They truly have no idea what protecting that girl is like. Soon, when their lives are changed and their spirits are crushed, they will know the sacrifice Talia will demand of them.

The rest of his home is suitable enough for him. He has a sizeable bed and a couch nearby that is covered in papers and blueprints and pieces of his armor. The washroom is a little much for him with all its top of the line functions, but it serves the purpose. The air is clean here, as is the water, and he is given plenty of food and medications. Not like in prison, where the air was unbreathable, food was scarce, medication was abused and the water…

Water is wasted.

He's come a long way since prison. He's even come a long way since he first started the company. No more shelter that was much too small for him and his men. No more guns that had to be scavenged and no more contacts to be made because now they came to him. He will die in victory, as the terrorist who conquered Gotham and the force that broke the Batman.

He will die. Bane knew his fate when he agreed to come here.

The thought is almost comforting. The frightening part of death is that no one knows when it will happen to them. The possible pain experienced, the sacrifice, the regrets… Those facts of death are nothing compared to the uncertainty of it. The big guess where you ask yourself when does it all end?

But Bane knows. His time is yet to come, but at least he's aware of the very day.

There is suddenly a light knock on the door, followed by the soft click as it opens. Kit saunters through, gun on her hip. She looks, as she always does, ready for battle. Her cargo pants are tight on her hips for mobility, and the brown long-sleeved shirt on her chest is partly covered by a small bullet proof vest. She has more armor but she has yet to put it on, considering she remains behind friendly lines. Her short blonde hair, as usual, looks combed and clean.

Kit likes to be clean, he remembers.

Her brown eyes are the ones of his left hand and not of the woman he's seeing more of, her mouth set in a firm, no-nonsense line. She's never worn any jewelry and he's pretty sure he's never seen a stitch of makeup on her face save for the night of Talia's party, but she still has a beauty about her that is unconventional. Bane thinks back to her body in that blushing pink dress as she wanders farther into the room. The image seems to be of an entirely different woman.

"It's cold as shit in here, boss," she comments, eyeing the open balcony doors.

Bane hardly feels excessive cold or excessive heat anymore. He's suffered in both despairingly and has learned to ignore them. Closing off sight of Talia's location, he closes the doors and locks them.

"Barsad says the army's going to retaliate. He says you told him to prepare. He also seems to think they're a few cops running around that didn't make it into the tunnels as planned."

A verbal report. He should never expect anything else from his left hand. "He's right," Bane answers, nodding some. "Not all cops wear the uniform, and some didn't fall victim to laziness over the last eight years. Any suspicious behavior that threatens the liberation is to be seen as a crime, and will call for a trial."

"We're still looking for the commissioner. I have Warden and a few others following a trail. They like having something else to do besides waiting around for someone to screw up." Kit crosses her arms casually, her vest digging into her chest. She glances around Bane's room. It's just as nice as everything else in the hotel. Fancy architecture, although the perks are not used. "They aren't calling this thing liberation, you know. They say it's revolution."

Bane gives a shrug. "It hardly matters to me what they say. The intelligent ones have already accepted that the two words are one in the same. The ignorant are still deciding."

Kit runs the tip of her finger over the table. The dark brown of the wood shines like a star. "What do you call it?"

He looks over at her with a lift of his brow. "Does it matter?"

"Just curious, boss."

He doesn't call it either of those things. It's all just a show, puppets and strings and his hands that hold them and Talia's smile as she sits and watches the performance before dropping the curtain on them all. But more than a show, it's something else, he knows. "It is only a reckoning," he says.

Kit looks down at the wood. She can see her reflection in it. She looks at herself as if it's her own face she's talking to. "And what accounts are you settling? The dysfunctional mess between Talia and her father, or you and the League of Shadows?" It's only when there's nothing but silence does Kit realize what she just said. Her head snaps up to Bane with slight alarm. He's staring at her like she just dared to do something foolish like slap him. "That was uncalled for."

"Very much so," Bane agrees.

Kit doesn't question Talia and the League. If she's honest with herself, she doesn't really care what they decide as long as she gets paid or doesn't feel pressured into anything. She's never spoken about Talia and Bane's relationship out loud, or their own respective roles and past with the League. And she most definitely utters not one word about the deceased Ra's al Ghul. Whatever Talia feels for her father, whatever Bane feels for his old mentor, is none of her business because she's only here to do her job. It's always been that way. She's never had a problem with insubordination before.

She chalks it up to being overworked. She was, after all, the one who orchestrated the design and placement of the explosives that imprisoned Gotham. Kit bows her head in a silent apology to her boss.

"Do you have anything more to say, Kit?" Bane asks, his voice stern. Hard. And he's suddenly much closer than he was before.

"No, sir."

"Give me your gun."

Kit blinks at his outstretched hand. A giant hand that, for now, is patiently waiting for his order to be fulfilled. She snaps back to attention and immediately unclips the holster around her hips, raveling up the straps before she places her revolver still inside the confine into his hand. She feels naked with it, empty. Like he's asked her to give him an organ and now she's standing there as a person not totally complete. He gave her that gun. He's never asked for it back before.

She doesn't know what to think when his other hand reaches out, palm up. Waiting once again.

"The rest," he orders softly.

Something is different here but Kit doesn't want to jump to conclusions. Ever since their talk in the Tumbler days ago, he hasn't made any attempts to take her body and never spoke a single word about it. She didn't mention it because she's aware that even a man can change his mind about intimacy at any moment, and gave him his space as the both of them worked night and day to keep everyone in line with the new laws. But because the air between them seems a little off, like she isn't too sure how exactly he's seeing her now, Kit obliges him. She reaches into her vest and gives him her extra bullets. In her belt she pulls out the two sets of brass knuckles in case a big man thinks he can outmatch her, and gives those to him as well. Finally, she leans down and digs into both boots, slides out the retractable daggers and places them neatly, and almost delicately, into his full hand.

Now she has nothing.

Bane isn't in his armor, only a simple dark shirt and pants, but it doesn't make him look any less dangerous. He doesn't know what it feels like to her, surviving in a man's world without a family bloodline behind her like Talia or the preference of living with hardly any purpose like Selina Kyle. Without her weapons she feels small and powerless. Of course she will always improvise to protect herself, but her weapons, especially that gun, have been her own personal security. Little tells that remind her she may still be a woman - albeit a rather mighty one – but she is a woman who will attempt to take you out in more ways than one if she needs to. Bane doesn't have to worry about such things like gender or greater strength or heavier weight. He doesn't understand.

Or maybe… he does.

Looking up into his eyes when she's completely disarmed, Kit realizes he knows exactly what he's doing.

His gaze is dark and knowing and expectant. Hot all over her and exterminating the cold she felt before.

He's willingly taken her weapons because he's telling her that she is submissive.

One of his hands holds her revolver in its holster, the other is filled with her other measures of security and enforcement. Pieces of her, she thinks. And yet he is still waiting.

"Your vest as well," he tells her, his voice just as dark as his eyes. Both traits of him are weapons all on their own. "Place it in my hands."

Kit longs for her things, and he knows she does. But still she reaches for the big clips that secure the vest against her and unlatch them, pulling it off her chest. She opens her mouth to speak.

"Ah, ah," he interrupts, correcting her. "I've not asked you a question, Kit, or made any inclination that I want to hear your voice. You will speak only then. Unless of course you wish to stop."

She's new to this and still trying to figure out if it's good or bad. All she knows right now is that she hates feeling this wanting, this lingering disappointment and emptiness that she's pretty certain came after Bane left her bed that first night in Talia's penthouse. She wants more. It's what she told him in the tank. And because she can feel the buzz in her body, a sexual anticipation, she closes her mouth and sets her bullet proof vest on top of all her weapons in his hands.

Bane seems to approve. He brushes past her and sets her things on the table, putting them there because he's taken them from her. And when he turns back to look at her…

His eyes are different. They've changed from the hungry beast he'd been just a few moments before when she was disarming herself, his multicolored hues growing brighter the more harmless she became. Now they look like how they do when she worries for him, when she looks at her boss and sees someone she thinks she doesn't know. She sees the man as the ember in her hand and not the liberator of Gotham City. He walks up to her with those eyes on hers, wandering away only fleetingly to look down at her body like he's unsure about something.

And when he speaks now, softly to her like he's telling her a secret, he sounds like the strained man who stood in the doorway before he pounced on her. Like he needs her to know all that he is.

"I need you to say something if you want me to stop," he murmurs. "Can you do that?"

Kit swallows to wet her dry throat. She assumes things have halted for this quick conversation. "Like… a word? A safe word?"

"Yes."

The way out he'd spoken of before. This was it. "Yeah, no problem." Her consent reassures him, she notices. "What word do you want me to say?"

He's quiet but he doesn't look like he's rifling through his mind to find the best word for her to say. He instead looks like he's preparing himself to potentially hear it.

"Monster," he says.

Kit doesn't know what she's doing. She doesn't know what's an acceptable safe word and maybe there isn't one, only what you want it to be that will always keep you safe. But she has somewhat of an idea of where this one came from. She nods. "Okay."

"Say it back to me."

"Monster."

Hearing her greatly reassures him now. He knows Kit isn't stupid and grasps the concept that this particular word has nothing to do with the rules. Seven letters, and it instantly stops his movements. Tye was smart too.

But now he wants Kit.

And just like that, in literally a blink of an eye, he turns into the man who will break her into submission.

Bane grabs her upper arms so suddenly it makes her gasp – and the feeling in her chest is thrilling – before he walks, charges more life, pushing her back and closer to his bed.

"Do you feel powerless without your weapons?" he asks her, and it's almost mockingly. "I've taken them all from you. I know where you hide your deadly surprises. Not one single bullet to shoot, not one sharp object to stab me with." Bane spins her around so she's staring at the bed, her heart already galloping at the hard fastness of it. He holds her in place standing. "Do you feel naked without your toys?"

She doesn't answer right away. The little shake he gives her reminds her he asked a question. "I do," she says. It's not a game, it's all the truth. It only stops when she wants it to. "I feel powerless and naked."

"Not yet," he mutters, then slides his hands onto the sides of her ribs. "Place your hands on top of your head."

She does as he says, the heat of his body warming her back.

Bane likes that Kit is tall. It's always been a plus for their work, and now it's just as pleasant in the bedroom. He doesn't have to bend down like how he had to with Tye, or how he does with Talia when he gives her affection. Kit's size is fitting for his own and it pleases him. With her arms out of the way and her body completely compliant, Bane begins the exploration of her body that he couldn't enjoy that first night.

His hands instantly slide onto her breasts from behind, gripping her small mounds of flesh and squeezing. He can feel her bra underneath her shirt, but he already likes it better when she's not wearing one, like before. He wants them to hang free so they bounce when he takes her, a mesmerizing sight. From there he runs his hands down to her stomach, feeling her tight abs and the strength of her core. He watches the back of her head as it bows a little once he goes further, onto the bones of her hips before settling on the zipper of her pants. He thinks she's watching intently the path he's taking, wanting to keep her eye on everything he does. That first night, Kit was a good girl. He wonders if this time she can continue to be good.

He hears a small intake of breath from her when he starts unbuttoning and unzipping her pants. So she is watching, he discovers. Pressing himself against her back, he tugs her pants down some, wraps one arm around her waist before probing the front of her panties. Her arms shudder a little but he ignores it and looks over her shoulder through them. He rubs her there, right where she wants him to. Right where she's growing hotter. Just two fingers on top of her, pressing, pressing harder still.

Her arms slowly begin to drop.

Bane presses the grate of the mask right against her ear. "Don't disobey me, Kit," he warns.

Instantly her hands return to the top of her head, but now her breath is shaky when he continues to rub her. Bane is watching her intently and pleasuring her maddeningly. Just the image of his hand between her legs is driving her crazy, making her legs feel funny as she holds herself up. Kit's ass arches back a little when he starts to slide that hand into her panties. The tips of his fingers touch her, dipping inside, and he rumbles at her wetness. He uses it as lubricant.

And her arms, involuntarily, fall slowly to her sides as she forgets herself in sensation.

Bane punishes her by pulling his hand from her panties and smacking her on the ass cheek.

A sudden squeal falls out of her mouth as she jerks from the hit. At least it's just one this time.

"Disobedience begets punishment," he tells her simply. Turning her around to face him, he makes no move to continue his rubbing. She's lost that from her neglect to listen. He watches her inspect the mask before meeting his eyes. Her anticipation pleases him. "Open your mouth."

She listens perfectly this time, her jaw dropping so he can see her tongue. He places his two fingers on the soft wetness so she can taste herself. She looks a little lost, like she's never been asked to suck a couple of fingers before, but he shows her the way. Bane takes her cheeks in one hand and he makes her close her mouth, almost tenderly holding her face as he slowly pumps his fingers through her lips. The sight of her like this, the grip of her lips around his fingers, makes him hard in his pants, causing discomfort against his zipper. Bane has half a mind to tell her to go to her knees, to unzip him like she had in the sewers and lean forward, taking him in her mouth instead of her hand.

But her eyes are too big looking at him now as she sucks off the wetness he desperately wants to sink into.

Bane rubs his thump over her cheekbone. "Will you behave now?"

Her rear end stings from his smack. As soon as he removes his fingers from her mouth, she whispers, "Yes."

He pats her cheek. Tap tap tap. "Give me your back and start undressing yourself."

Kit really wants to touch him. Instead of pulling at her own clothes, she wants to tug at his until he's bare. Until she can see that body again she's always admired. Somehow she was under the impression, now that she wants him this way even with his tastes, that he would order her to do things for him, that he would be rough with her, but ultimately sit back and enjoy as she pleasured him like a king. The fact that she feels like this is all for her, that he wants to reward her if she complies and submits to his demands, makes her feel lightheaded with want even as she realizes that she doesn't know much about what she's agreed to. She turns back around without touching him, waits for the irk that now she can't see him.

It doesn't come, so the only thing left to do is to give him her skin.

Bane watches from behind as she kicks off her boots, as she shimmies out of her pants, and isn't that a sight all on its own? Kit's lovely full body wriggling as her pants fall down those strong, endless legs. Legs he wouldn't mind biting if the mask didn't cover his mouth. Her bottom is perky from remaining fit all these years in their work, and with his eyes on that toned flesh, the most prominent curve of her body, he gets rid of his own boots, his hands opening his own pants, mirroring her. His erection isn't as uncomfortable when he tosses his pants along with hers, but at least there's more freedom. Kit pulls her shirt over her head, the entire back of her bare because her hair is short. The muscles on her broad shoulders move underneath her skin, skin that is no stranger to the sun and other harsh elements and weapons along the way. The bullet scar on her neck is practically begging for him to scrape the tubes of the mask along the raised flesh. As she reaches to remove the simple cotton bra, Bane pulls his shirt off as well behind her, his desire humming from the sensual act of copying her without her knowing.

"I like your body," he tells her, pinching at the panty line on her bottom and pulling it back some so he can see the red mark on her ass cheek he's created. "I can appreciate the determined force in you, Kit. You aren't so delicate, so easily breakable. It makes it very satisfying when you do as I say. When I can easily manipulate you… and you love me for it."

His left arm comes back around her, taking her right breast in hand. He keeps a firm grip and pulls her against him. She shivers at the meeting of nakedness. Skin on skin, muscle on muscle. Need for need. Kit closes her eyes and breathes deeply, wishing he would use his hand between her legs again. She really wants him to fuck her, but being rubbed felt just as good. The mask is a threatening buzz in her ear as it nuzzles against her hair, taking in her scent and staking his claim.

"If your hair was longer I would use it to direct you. It could be irritating that you keep that desire from me with hardly any locks to grip. I don't like to be irritated," he breathes against her, onto her neck now. "But," he continues, his voice sending vibrations into her spine, "now I am given the opportunity to use the rest of you as a leash."

She can feel his erection nestled in the cleft of her ass. Bane rubs his hand into her breast, the other probing at the side of her thigh while the mask scratches her neck and the top of her shoulder, as if he would kiss her in those places if he could. His hand squeezes her soft flesh hard, bruising her breast, but what could be uncomfortable feels nothing but exhilarating to her, discomfort becoming so very gratifying because it's pain she's allowing instead of only enduring. She presses her bottom against his pelvis and very slightly moves her hips from side to side to rub him. He seems too invested in touching her to notice, a low pleasurable groan vibrating into her skin from the digging mask. He smells like snow and gunpowder, feels like a man with an entire city under his boot. The thought is thrilling.

So thrilling that Kit lets her hanging hand finally move between her legs so that she can continue what Bane had started. He bucks into her and she gasps, pleasure from the front and the back making her knees knock. She can finish like this. As he squeezes her breast and ruts against her ass with her hand working herself, she can come with such force.

"That," Bane says suddenly, his much bigger hand grabbing hers between her thighs and yanking it away, "was an order I did not give you."

She shivers from the denial, letting out one big breath.

He takes her arms and places her hands back on top of her head. "For stepping out of line, your hands will remain here while I take you. If they move, I won't allow you to come." He reaches in front of her, pulls her by her jaw against him so she's looking up into his eyes. "Do you understand?"

"Yes, Bane," she croons, her tongue sliding out against her bottom lip as she stares at him. She really wants to taste him.

"I want you to come, Kit," he tells her gently, his eyes on that tongue. "I want to feel it."

She wonders how long she can stand this way, especially when he starts to fuck her and especially since her ankle is bothering her without its brace. She tries not to worry about it when she hears foil being unwrapped behind her. Kit assumes he's slicking a condom he's dislodged from somewhere over himself. Oral contraceptives are a plan B type of protection, and this time he's prepared. It isn't long until she feels him pulling the crotch of her panties aside, holding it away and probing her entrance with the confined tip of his cock. His massive arm comes around her yet again to keep her in place, the other taking her thigh to spread her legs a little more. He bends her some, her hands remaining on her head like he's about to frisk her.

Bane pushes inside her, one quick thrust and suddenly she's completely full.

He growls deeply in delight, dropping her thigh so she's impossibly tight around him. He doesn't need a moment to bask in it, but rather starts pumping immediately. There's no support on Kit's body save for her feet planted firmly on the floor. It feels like he's fucking her into the air and she has no choice but to keep falling, nothing holding on to her except for him; his arm, his hand, his cock inside her. It's all the anchor she has.

Kit feels overwhelmed and delirious and aroused all at the same time. As Bane takes her from behind, as her own hands grip into her pixie hair to keep them where he wants them, she reminds herself absently that this man is her boss, and how had they not bedded each other in all these years? They feel like wasted years now. In the last era of the League of Shadows, the last months of Bane's life, she desperately wishes that she could've felt this a long time ago.

This very painful and perfect pleasure.

Bane grunts as he bucks her body, making her pant and groan from sensation. He doesn't mind it. In fact, it encourages him on. He needs to thrust into her harder and deeper because of the condom, his pelvis slamming into her lower body with everything he has, but she says nothing concerning it.

He has yet to hear that word on her lips.

Kit moans and hisses and breathes heavily, but yet she remains obedient this time with the placement of her hands. Even when he grabs at the pits of her arms, his fingers curling until they wrap around her shoulder, she fights the urge to drop her hands onto the bed right in front of her. She wants to; her arms ache again and her bad leg feels shaky and weak. But she dares not because she really, really wants him to end her.

He snarls and ruts so hard she bends practically in half with a loud yelp of pain and force. Her fingers are pulling out the short strands of her hair and her thighs are trembling tremendously, but his cock sliding in and out of her with such ferocity is a feeling that overpowers, and then conquers her completely when his hand moves between her legs to rub her again. She must look ridiculous but she doesn't care. Bane is hunched over her and quenching her thirst, as she quenches his. As the bodily and emotional release save him from breakdown. The strain inside him is in abundance, but she is the one who gives him escape.

Kit gasps as she comes. Bane follows her shortly, yanking her onto him to finish himself off as the mask hisses sharply. After he's done, after he catches his breath and starts to assess her, he eases her hands off her head and rubs at her sweaty hair.

He then allows her to fall face first right onto the bed.

The condom is full and he is going flaccid. But knowing his duties, Bane first leans and straddles over her some, digging the tips of his fingers into her back and shoulders to soothe the aching muscles.

His touch is gentle and the strain, once again, seems less.

Gotham has become a cold wasteland, of sorts. The people are feral or scared, but they are surviving because of their obedience. Some find it better to shack up with their families in a dark forgettable apartment, and others are living it up on the snowy streets, participating in a life the laws of their country deemed illegal. So much is legal now. So many are free.

Liberation, to some, is everything they've ever wanted.

And so it continues on as the people listen to martial law, as the rest of the world watches helplessly, and the newly free live in silent fear of the triggerman.

That unsung hero they all secretly despise.

Gotham remains great and continues to live on for months.

As it does, the new relationship between Bane and Kit doesn't blossom as much as it festers. It lingers like a desperate need no one else speaks of, something that loiters around until the approaching day it will be gone for good with the dreaded – and in some cases anticipated – day of reckoning that Bane fights day in and day out for. A blossoming would entail something lovely to emerge as the end result of a small and humble beginning. Neither Bane nor Kit can or will call it that considering that it is only a benefit one is taking from the other, or also in Kit's case, a task she's taken upon herself to soothe her and her brother's boss.

But even knowing what it is, this relationship that could be seen as degrading or preposterous and not a relationship at all, neither wish to stop.

The dark months go by. Kit never sleeps in his bed and neither he hers, not for true sleep or the potential for intimacy. She doesn't move into his larger room or keeps extra clothes on hand when he rips hers apart, and instead bundles up in whatever she has left when she leaves his room, ignoring her brothers who don't make a sound or give any derisive glances. She doesn't give him soft knowing smiles or tender caresses of her hand outside of the closed door, and he most certainly doesn't enable anything of the kind. They stick with the rules because it works for them, because it's the only way they can fuck and still do their jobs. Outside of the bedroom Bane is the boss and Kit is his hired left hand. It's a rule that is never disregarded. Inside the bedroom…

When the door is closed and the army and Gotham and even Talia are kept behind it, Kit becomes the compliant plaything Bane needs her to be for his peace, and Bane is the dominant hand that scratches the ever powerful itch she never knew she had.

Bane is hard on her. His tastes stress her limits and push her to new territories, and her body is used and abused. It's all done amazingly so and she regrets nothing, even when her limbs are sore and her skin is bruised, or when she distantly hears the word monster in the lost spaces of her mind, but never does she hear it come from her mouth. It feels like sunshine, like literal sunshine in her body when Bane punishes her, when he rewards her after she's made the better choice. Kit doesn't think she's felt sunshine quite in this capacity. She knows the sun well, but never has she felt such a satisfying heat. An encompassing warmth.

She is a woman who has worked and strived and searched for purpose. She is a lost girl who once had no talent, and only did it come in a not so admirable and socially acceptable way. With her brothers, with the company, she is threatening and capable and has earned her place in the ranks. She is a soldier who does, as the left hand to her superior, Gotham's liberator.

But with Bane, when he ties her up or holds her down, she doesn't have to be those things. She can let go and feel, as she gives him the same in return, and allow someone to dominate her without having to remain ever dominant.

With Bane, she gives up for just a little while. She finds she doesn't hate the world so much then. Her purpose in the army is her greatest possession, but even possessions takes pieces of you, especially the ones that will kill you if ever lost. But when she enters his room, when she hears that baritone voice or feels those demanding hands, she experiences nothing but mind numbing decadence. It is her one and only guilty pleasure, and to him she submits.

His trysts with Kit, to Bane, mean so much more than guiltless hours spent free of the demands of the League of Shadows. Even in his area of expertise, he is a man who has boundless amounts of anger and hate and a sense of no control because he is the one who comes from nothing. He is the forgotten prisoner left to rot when it was only innocence that condemned him in the first place. He is the little boy in a hole in the earth who would waste precious water for the shedding of blood. Only Talia has ever been his true mark on the world, and even after years of being the necessary evil, nothing can destroy his ever present self-loathing. There is a hatred in him.

It grows with every step he takes.

Being with a woman in the way he wants to be and accepting his preferences in bed has made it possible for him to continue taking those steps. He wants control and power and the need to be relevant. He gets those things for a little while when he dominates his willing submissive. When he is able to unleash the stress and lash out in a way that gives him and his bedmate pleasure, even though an entire city rests in the palm of his hand.

Kit lets him do those things to her. He likes that she does.

And she has quickly adjusted to this new world. It took her a few tries, but soon she became well practiced in the rough bouts of sex Bane prefers. In bed, she knows that she is only ever to speak if he initiates conversation. She is only ever allowed to look into his eyes during if he softly calls her name or moves her vision for her. And the one that was the hardest for her to overcome was the rule that she can only touch him if he gives her permission to do so.

She supposes he likes that part the best. The ability of giving permission simply because he can. Because he knows she'll want something and ask sweetly for it.

He does something a little different with her every time she visits him, because now she is the one who visits him, and not Tye. Kit's compliance pleases him greatly, and until he hears that one word, he ceases to back off from seeing all that he can do to her.

Tonight he has tied her up. As snow falls nastily outside the gray skies of a now quiet Gotham, Bane has taken rope and locked her arms behind her back, one hand made to grasp the opposite elbow. Strain is put on her arms and shoulders, especially when he makes her lie on her back on the bed, but the exhilarating sensation that pairs with the strain is worth it all. Her heart pounds in her chest and her body warms with arousal. Even when he wraps the blindfold over her eyes does she not make a peep of distress. This way, she is like a gift, like a decorated present all for him and he will play with her until he tires. Her back is arched on the bed to ease some of the pressure off her arms and her mouth is slightly open, feigning obliviousness because her eyes can see nothing.

That is a thrill all on its own, that she can't see him. The control comes to him in droves and it makes him want her dreadfully.

Naked, bound, and blindfolded is how he takes her this day. Kit's body convulses with his thrusts, her breasts bouncing along her chest that is stretched tight from the rope. He hasn't allowed her to wrap her legs around him even though he stands naked on the floor before her, so her feet stay planted firmly on the mattress, her waist red from his grip. The mask is loud and obscene as he fucks her frantically, as he squeezes her breasts hard and watches her muscles tense from the binding. He wants to forget and escape and sink into the source of his pleasure and she wants to give him that, to become the one who doesn't need treasures like purpose or the ability to be stronger than her enemies if it means soothing her boss and keeping them whole. She doesn't need to think, doesn't need to do when she's with him like this.

And Bane doesn't need to wish or regret.

Whatever it is between them, whatever is festering instead of blossoming, both of them like it just fine.

It is times like these, when Bane is feral and as needy as he is testing, that Kit feels that word whispering along her lips. She likes this treatment, endures it both for him and for her, but sometimes, against her own desires, does monster almost echo in the bedroom. And perhaps it's only another thing she enjoys about the whole ordeal. When her mouth almost says it, the promise of feeling and duty makes her remain silent.

And when she is silent, when she allows him to do these things to her, the pleasure feels like… sunshine.

A bright, warm burst of glorious sunshine.

Bane growls at her as he pumps away, sweat beading on his body even as snow falls right outside the balcony doors and frosts the glass. He looks down at her while standing between her legs, at her naked bound form and her lovely obedient nature, and feels the serene calm that flees from him far too often. This mighty woman, this amazon who has earned her place by his side for her ferocity and capability, is tied by his hand and subservient to his wishes when all is behind that closed door. And because she is, because she pleases him and gives him his relief, he strives to give her all that her body begs of him.

His hands leave her breasts to wrap both around her slender neck.

He squeezes ever so slightly, his hips snapping against her and it produces a small strangled grunt from her that almost makes him come. He holds it back by sending the resistance to his hands that can feel the beat of her pulse. Bane stares at her covered eyes, at her gasping mouth, but it doesn't speak the safe word he's given her. He makes her repeat it before they begin anything and knows she is competent enough to shout it should she need to, but it remains a word unspoken. Whereas she would've squealed it out when he first placed his hand around her neck in the sewers so long ago, she takes it now. Takes it because she's good.

Kit is breathing those frantic little breaths, easing out those sweet little moans under his hands, and Bane knows she's about to end. He keeps a firm hold on her neck and lets her finish. It isn't much longer before his orgasm takes him, and he grunts hard as he violently draws it out like he's beating her, the thwak of his hips smacking on her ass a consuming noise. When he's done, when his own release is hot on his cock inside the rubber, Bane lets out rushing pants as the mask is set on the middle of Kit's chest.

Once again, there was no word to stop him. There is no monster.

Nobody messes with monsters, Kit remembers.

Bane lets the after effects of satisfying sex sink into his bones before he begins to tend to her. He leaves the inside of her body and tosses the condom, reaching underneath her immediately after to untie the rope holding her arms in place. She feels the red chafing on her skin, but if he notices it he doesn't say anything or soothe the area. He only removes the binds and adjusts her arms for her. The blindfold is then pulled from her eyes with a flourish, and suddenly there is the large mass of her boss looming over her.

Kit has never met anyone who gives her as many conflicting feelings as Bane does. She once thought herself hollow, unable to feel because nobody has ever made an impact on her, and of course there was no time to feel in her journeys across the world searching for her place. But this man forces her to feel a flurry of emotions, both good and bad. Both as lover and leader. She doesn't love Bane, and it's really the only emotion she think she's incapable of feeling because of her life as a woman mercenary. If she did love him, at least she could admit to it, just like how she knows that along with everything else he makes her feel, she also experiences a sense of dread, of concern for him that accompanies that pain in her chest and her head when she looks at him.

She doesn't love Bane, she thinks again, because she can't. For a billion reasons.

But he is the man who has given her purpose.

She figures it makes him pretty important.

The world outside Gotham continues to submit to Bane's demands until suddenly… they stop doing it.

He wonders absently if they thought they could get away with it. If they sat around whatever table the conference took place at and said, "Yes. Yes, this could work. It will work." He pictures the brave agents that raised their hands for the job, thinking themselves worthy and downright confident when they volunteered to weasel their way into his city and try to rendezvous with the sneaky cops left outside the tunnels. As an afterthought, he finds it curious as to what their entire plan consisted of. Once they scouted out their intelligence, information that would come directly from Miranda Tate because of course it would, then what would they have done? Would they have gathered the pathetic numbers available to them and storm the reactor? Bane knows how they think. There is no longer a Batman silently listening to their problems to assist them as they try to handle the job themselves. They don't even think that maybe it would be a better idea to advance on Bane himself before looking for the bomb and disabling it.

It is an adorable mistake, he thinks later. If you don't take Bane out first, then he will come looking for you.

It is a mistake that fails the agents and leads to their deaths.

Disobedience begets punishment.

"Captain in sight," Kit murmurs softly to her comrade standing next to her, who immediately radios it in to the rest who will ambush the agents, and to Bane. She watches from the shadows on the street, her clothes matching the gray and ruined roads of Gotham, a strand of the silver scarf around her neck pulled over her yellow hair to conceal it. She crosses her arms and taps a gloved finger on her side. As soon as the agents enter the building where many other refugees of sorts, including Talia and Lucius Fox, are hiding away, she purposely gives them a few minutes to chat before she breaks things up.

She looks to the right out of instinct. About a block away, in this area where there is hardly no one because of the fear her brothers provoke, is what appears to be a woman, slender with dark hair, who is hastily pushing along a child. A little boy whose feet are scrambling to keep up with his mother. Anxiety consumes her face and the way she grips the boy's arm tells Kit that she is fleeing from something. Or trying to flee, she discovers, when large men who are a part of their cause hunt them down and stop their useless attempts. They are revolutionaries, Kit sees, observing them grabbing the now shouting woman who tries to keep her child with her. Radical men who support Bane by bringing the guilty to court, knowing her boss frequents there, hoping that their valiant efforts will catch his eye and Bane will allow them to join his inner circle. Whatever this woman has done, and by extension the child, was deserving of judgement.

The boy is ripped from his mother's arms, kicking boldly at his attackers and trying to sink his little teeth into available flesh. The woman starts to cry hysterically when the revolutionaries decide to spilt them up, one half taking the mother in one direction as the other sprints off with the son somewhere else. They'll probably try to brainwash him, make him one of them and supporting of the liberation. His mother will go to trial. No one survives trial. Kit's man at her side says nothing, does nothing. He is a good soldier who knows his place, and gives no awareness to her watching of the scene before they are left alone on the street again.

Redeemer. Tyrant.

Monster.

The word, once again, flutters through her mind like a whisper. The word that makes everything stop if she wants it to.

But she can't stop. This is her purpose. Her life. Her brothers and Bane and this liberation.

Enough chit chat, she thinks, giving the signal that the men are to move on the agents inside the building. She's looking for a fight now, her blood warming for it. She can't wait to fire her gun.

"Move on target," she mutters, knowing her orders will be transferred. "Enter quietly. On my signal. Leave none alive."

Bane's men are trained to have to most silent of feet lest they wish to die in the field. Her boots, heavy when she doesn't care to be spotted, make no sound now as those behind her swarm the building. The air is colder in here than it is outside, but Kit smells the very faint stink of smoke that seems to be drifting from the floor above them. Must be people up there, she thinks, picturing blankets and fires, and exactly the image of how she and brothers look on jobs in the past. Her back presses against a pillar. She turns her head only slightly to assess the surroundings. The one she knows is the captain is speaking with another young cop, along with Fox and Talia. The skilled damsel, Talia looks fragile and weary and frightened, but only faintly so, which makes the men strive harder to protect her. They make a plan, it seems, and Kit knows it's time to squander it. The captain moves with his men.

Bane told her he wants them all dead. He's allowed them their fun but fun only lasts so long here in desolation.

Kit gives her signal, and shots are fired.

She yanks the scarf down from her hair, pivots and raises her arm with cocked revolver in hand, taking out one of the agents as the rest scramble for cover. Her blood is still warm and she moves forward, doing her job. It's all she wants to do. She doesn't want to give the safe word, doesn't want to stop. She can't stop because this is all she has. She wants to stay with her brothers and Bane and even Talia if it means that she can live. In the only way she knows how.

Redeemer. Tyrant.

Nobody messes with monsters.

The captain's tragic attempts to help Gotham give him one small triumph. The last squeeze of his trigger hits some flesh on Kit's arm, grazes it enough to immediately shed blood that runs hot down her heavy sleeve. Kit is incredibly used to blood and bullets after years in the army and wavers not, her strong body able to take a hit and still aim and shoot the captain until he falls to the floor, defeated.

He tries to look proud when he glares up at Bane moments later. Kit is at his side as she always is, watching carefully if the poor captain tries to take her boss out as one last brave try at freeing the already free city. But behind his pride is a small sadness that Kit can see. He's failed. He's done.

He's dead.

Bane goes to his knee and the bones in the captain's neck pop.

Before he leaves the building that is already full of screams as hidden men and women are snatched from their haven, Bane glances down at Kit's bleeding arm. He makes no move to inspect it, no shift of the eyes that could grace the gaze of a lover concerned or even mildly so. He only watches the blood seep down her arm until one fat drop falls from her fingertip. He immediately turns away.

She'll see to her arm later. Right now, she only wants to work.

Kit volunteers to be part of the team that will hang the agents. She bends to reach for the captain, ready to heave him with help.

Her past life in California before she left is a time Kit doesn't think of very often. She lived eighteen years in one house with one family who owned one dog that was not allowed in her one room for as long as she could remember, and it seemed that was all she had. Mundane possessions that only came one at a time. But as soon as she stepped out of that one door she would never enter through again, suddenly she was ready to have more. She wanted the world. If not to own, then most definitely to see.

In the cold air of Gotham Kit studies her work, this mark she will leave in the name of her job. The agents on hung from the bridge, like ornaments on a Christmas tree. Decorations that signify a new season.

She left her one home to see the world, and now the world sees her.

Wisps of her short hair blow as the loud roar of copter blades hover above her, broadcasting for the world to witness. She can spot the camera crew from this distance, people from outside the lines who graciously remain behind them with the US army, who all look mad from fury and this close to sending a bullet into her brain for committing such an act against humanity. The news people are taping her, along with the bodies that freeze. She stares blankly at them, uncaring inside her armor with blood on her clothes.

She remembers her childhood in the warmth of California then. She remembers how everything came in ones. Unsatisfying, useless ones. The world is watching her now from their homes, watching the horror taking place in a city not too far away. Her parents must be watching too, she thinks, and the sister she's forgotten. It will be the first time they'll lay eyes on her in about twenty years.

Kit gathers her men and heads back to base. She'll take Gotham before the measly ones the other world has to offer her.

They reach the hotel just as the sun is about to set. The temperature has dropped and everyone can see their own breath. The sharp wind bites at her wound, freezing her blood, and Kit's first stop is the infirmary so that she can get the gash tended to. It's nothing but a graze. A bullet kiss that bled a lot and stings like a bitch. Barsad passes her on his way out the door, ready to take night patrols with a sniper on his back.

"He's asking for you, little sister," he tells her softly, not meeting her eyes. Barsad isn't dumb and knows what she and Bane are doing. He doesn't curse it or bless it. The most important thing to him is seeing Bane less tense, and the right hand doesn't care who his brother takes his pleasure from as long as he takes it.

It is a strange relationship, Bane and Barsad's. Kit has long since grown used to it.

With her arm tingling from topical meds, Kit heads for Bane's room, taking the stairs because her legs must remain fit. She clicks the safety on her revolver before tapping on the door and entering, closing it behind her.

Bane is in his underclothes, baggy sweat pants and a men's black tank. Only his eyes shift slightly in her direction to see that it's her before his attention goes back to the syringe he's got against his upper arm. The needle is deep in his flesh as he injects himself with medication. The mask isn't all he requires. Bane is highly deficient in many things because of his covered mouth and complex body.

He is a deadly weapon all on his own, a one man army. And still he is somewhat fragile.

"You looking for me, boss?" she says casually, wandering in further and unstrapping her holster.

His eyes remain on the needle. "You were on the news."

So they really were recording her. And it was live. She tosses her military jacket on the table next to her gun. "I hope they got my good side. The other side was bleeding like a son of a bitch. Damn agents."

"Your gender was a shock to them. They focused on you multiple times after discovering you were female."

Kit wonders where he watched the news. Bane isn't one for television, but now that the country is making threats towards him, maybe he finds it best to learn their motives. "What does it matter to them?"

"They are obviously aware of the position you hold, having studied the workings of our group from the miniscule footage they're able to gather. The armed forces were confident enough to send infiltrators across the lines with that intelligence. But the others, the ordinary people who are doing the little that they can, see a woman among hostile men and it leaves them scratching their heads." Bane pulls the needle from his arm and tosses it in a nearby trash can. He flexes his hand some. "This world is quick to judge you, as a woman. You have proven yourself well-practiced and capable, just as hostile. It sparks fear when they witness this new era."

"Hmm." Kit knows her place in the ranks. She is Bane's left hand and knows what she needs to do to keep the position. She's lasted a long time and as a soldier in their company, she's trustworthy and respected. These are things she knows. Hearing them is different, especially from Bane. "Those attitudes are exactly the kind I wanted to get far away from."

"And you did," he agrees. "But it is discrimination you continue to fight, even to this day. Those who wish to change the world, extremist men, still don't realize the power of a skillful woman."

Skillful women, Kit thinks, like the triggerman. Hardly a man at all.

"But I am not an extremist man in that regard," Bane continues with a hollow voice, finally turning to look at her. His eyes are glazed with something she can't place, and it has nothing to do with injections. "I have already changed the world. I know what a woman can do. I know that if it is necessary, there are no bounds to how far she will go for success. Talia is such a woman. My girl…"

His deep voice trails off and she doesn't press him. Something must have happened with Talia, and until he briefs her on it, Kit decides it's none of her business. She doesn't get in the middle of the two because it is a place where no one can fit. Forgetting he said anything, she continues to peel off her armor, not in an intimate way, but because her arm aches and she wants to feel some kind of comfort before going back out into the cold. Neither of them has asked for intimacy.

Bane's eyes sweep over her. There is a white bandage wrapped around her arm below the short sleeve of her gray t-shirt. The neckline rests against her collarbone and the hem is tucked into her cargo pants for efficiency purposes against her fit torso. The length of her, especially those long legs under fabric, always make him see the woman, the female that has nothing to do with the mercenary she is. He knows the power of a woman, he muses again. He's always appreciated it immensely, and silently.

His eyes linger on the bandage. Kit notices. When it goes on for longer than it should, she glances coolly at it and says, "It's not a big deal. I've been shot before."

Of course they both know that. He's plucked her from the ground from the force of a bullet. The scar on her neck shows what he's done. Kit isn't nearly as scarred as Bane is, but their raised flesh are medals of survival. He begins approaching her then, his steps slow but big because his legs are long as well. Kit stays where she is but feels a wall behind her, room diminishing. Her eyes involuntarily brush over him, and she determines that the more skin Bane shows, the bigger he looks. His arms are bare, long limbs like his legs, and so deadly that she's seen him kill a man with a simple but powerful backhand. Bane is close now, and very gently he makes her press her back against the wall.

She can't tell what he's thinking, but she didn't realize he wanted this from her. Usually she knows when he needs to unwind. Now…

She doesn't know what he's up to in the slightest.

Kit knows she has only to say the word, and he'll leave her alone. He doesn't do anything to her that she ultimately doesn't want, and maybe she should say it, she thinks, as Bane does nothing but stare at her so closely. She's been shot today and she's tired. Since joining up with the company she feels like she hasn't slept much, but it was a trade she was glad for. What was sleep compared to purpose and a place? And there's so much to do still, she tells herself, her own voice in her head sounding like a breathy submission all on its own as the heat and the smell of him lock her in place. He's warm and he smells like a man. It makes her head fog a little.

Any chance that she might say the word is squashed when Bane lifts his hand to touch her.

Before he can officially make contact, Kit's body and mind sink into the woman she becomes when she's with him this way, remembering the rules. Her eyes drift to the middle of his robust chest, away from his own.

"Kit."

Her name behind the mask, the soft wheezing growl of it, makes her look back up. She doesn't need to crane her head the way other women would need to when standing right in front of him, but he's still taller than her.

Bane seems to contemplate something. His eyes are lost in whatever it is, but finally he tells her what he wants.

"Right now there are no rules," he tells her, then softly presses one fingertip to her cheek. "They are suspended temporarily, although the word is still in play."

She blinks at him, her brown eyes confused. She's never not had rules with him before, not since the sewers, and that had ended disastrously, with both of them frustrated and unsatisfied. She doesn't feel like reliving that unpleasant moment of her life. He might just be unintentionally setting her up for failure again.

But Bane only tilts his head a little as he studies her face, his body so close to hers as the wall presses into her back. His fingertip runs down her cheek and over her chin, lifting for only a moment to place it onto the bridge of her nose and trailing it down ever so slowly. Her light eyebrows are next, followed by the shadows above her cheekbones. She doesn't know what's going on, but she'll call herself a fool if she tells him to stop. Finally, and what feels the most overwhelming, Bane uses that fingertip to trace her lips.

His eyes become a little brighter.

Kit feels like she's lost all mobility and stands there dumbly as Bane reaches for the latches of his mask. Very rarely has she seen him without it, and it had more to do with his pain than his reservations about showing his face. Barsad sees it the most, she knows, and with him Bane seems to be the most comfortable when he's bare. But he's taking it off now and Kit can't think very well. When it's gone and he's standing there with no hissing mask, she feels a zing, like a sudden graze of a bullet that she can't seem to feel in her arm anymore. There isn't any pain but the shock it entails is the same, a sudden elevation of… something. Bane is considered a good looking guy when you look past all the injuries. When you don't notice things like the scaring along his nose and mouth or the painful looking burn marks from the mask constantly chafing his face. He doesn't seem to care about how he looks and feels no shame. Not many things shame him on the outside.

The truth is it's all on the inside.

She doesn't know what to do with her hands so they hang lifeless at her sides. But when he moves just a little closer, she tenses and they fist up.

Bane catches her eyes and holds up a hand to still her. "Don't move," he murmurs, and his voice sounds a little different without the mask. More human. He leans in, tilting his head again.

"I want to taste you," he whispers, right against her lips.

She could say it. She could say monster, and he'll back off.

But she doesn't.

The rules may be suspended but she still hands the control over to him. Her mouth opens against his, thinking he's going to kiss her. To taste her like how he wants. But he doesn't move in to seal their mouths together. Their breath mingles and there's not an inch of room to spare between them. Kit's chest feels like it's heaving against his from the pounding beat of her heart, and when he moves next, it feels like an earthquake, ready to demolish her insides.

Like that first night in the sewers, Bane's hand wraps around her throat.

Unlike that first night, Kit is used to his touch now and knows she enjoys it.

Bane takes her neck in a firm hold, but not enough to hurt her or cut off her air. He wants her to be able to breathe and move if she wants to. Her throat in his hand has always thrilled him, and nothing changes now, especially when she allows him his desires. Bane keeps his eyes open, locking them with hers. Squeezing just a tad, he makes her mouth open a little wider.

The rules are suspended, but what arouses him stays the same.

Using her neck, Bane adjusts her… and slides his tongue into her mouth.

She sighs, just a little, and her shoulders drop from the tension. Kit is aroused and confused and fascinated all at the same time, but she holds still when his tongue seeks out hers and tastes. The grip on her neck, the way he holds her in place is so exhilarating, even more so since he refuses to kiss her properly and is perfectly satisfied leaving his tongue in her open mouth. Trying not to shiver, she swipes her tongue along his, encouraging him. A low groan falls out of his mouth and right into hers, and she thinks he's rewarding her when only his teeth sink into her bottom lip and bite down. He licks her there after, and the air of him is one she knows. She's pleasing him. She's being good.

But right now, there are no rules.

Unlike other women, she has an advantage of being tall. Kit has only to move her chin up slightly until she can fuse her open mouth against his, and this time her tongue is the one to invade.

The squeeze on her neck tells her he likes it.

She demands the taste of his mouth, an enlivening taste she never thought she would experience. The flavor of her boss is delectable and Kit moves her head for more. Her tongue brushes over his own, his teeth, his lips. Anything and everything. When their mouths part, when their lips smack, it's the first time a kiss is felt between them.

Maybe it's wrong, but the rules are suspended.

Bane takes her mouth again as she reaches up and pulls him closer, their eyes finally closing. She can touch him without permission now, and while she likes being submissive to him, she enjoys this temporary sanction. The kiss is wet and sloppy, a dirty kiss that is perfect for them and what they share. Hardly lovers, but people who occasionally fuck. He as her boss, in and out of bed. Bane's hand drops from her neck when her arms wrap around his, and falls down her chest to cup one of her small breasts, squeezing the modest flesh. He's content with leaving his hand there as he kisses her, and a low growl escapes him when she moves her head a certain way, making the angle better and the kiss sweeter.

It was rare that he would kiss Tye and taste the deliciousness of her dark skin, and he's also felt the loving peck of Talia's lips on his. But where Tye was soft and feminine with her mouth, Kit is mighty and bold, demanding of him as he is of her. When she submits, she is just as demanding and he is quick to heed her desires. To make it good, Bane knows that the line between dominant and submissive is a fine one.

The kiss is turned into something deeper, and neither of them understands how. It is also more forceful, more violent, as they remain equals for this and without a role to play. They pant against each other, sharing breath, sharing taste. Bane lets her touch him freely, the bandage around her arm scraping against his skin and her breast a wonderful thing to hold, so he doesn't let go. He hangs on. His other arm is around her waist, locking her against him, giving him contact. Bane will kiss her until his pain drives him away, back to his separation of the normal. But for now, he hangs on.

It feels nice to be normal. It feels peaceful not to be a monster.

All he wants is peace.

When the mask is back on, their equality ends. Bane pushes Kit to her knees so that she can take him into her mouth, and he stands there, staring at nothing as she gets him off with her wet mouth, her probing tongue, and her teeth that make him groan. The mask feels tight but her mouth is tighter. It feels good. It feels normal.

When he comes in her mouth, he can pretend like he's home. After she moves away, he can pretend like he feels peace.

There isn't much time left and it seems to be moving much too fast. The lights on the bomb are hardly there at all anymore as it silently ticks away, and yet the people continue to suffer in their hope that if they just continue to do what Bane wants, if they keep pleasing the triggerman with their obedience, then surely they will live to see another day.

Bane feels dread. In these last days, his last moments that will go down in history, there is a small dread inside him and he can't quite place where it's coming from. Kit asks Barsad if it's Talia. Bane's love isn't able to see him as much as she used to, before all of this, and Kit can feel his need for his girl that unfortunately makes him push Kit harder when he gets her into bed. Kit is his last avenue for relief before the end. Barsad says his dread isn't coming from Talia, but Talia isn't helping, whatever that means. Kit, like with so many other things, doesn't think it's her place to ask, so she doesn't.

Wherever this dread is coming from, she doesn't know how to handle it, to fix it for him as his left hand. Even Bane doesn't know, and yet he feels it. He feels like something is wrong with the city, but everywhere he looks, there is only what he's created.

But… something is wrong. Like a shadow has covered him, and he doesn't know what it is that blocks the sun.

Bane uses Kit to distract himself.

There are only a few days left, and it seems like they will be leaving so much. A few days left to breathe, to see, to move. To touch someone and be touched by them. To taste something on your tongue or feel any kind of pleasure. A few days left, and it will all be over. There will be peace and there will be balance. A new age will be created and something pure will take Gotham's diseased place so that something else can shine. This will be the League's last great triumph. This will be the end of the company Kit has pledged herself to. And this here, as Gotham burns, will be Bane's great redemption.

Redeemers. Tyrants.

They will give the world another chance by doing what is necessary.

In these last few days, Bane is with Kit more than usual.

He needs the relief more than ever.

There is a band around her eyes again, but today there is one around her mouth as well. Bane wants to hear the rushes of breath from her nose when he disrobes her, when he forces her to undress him even without the sense of sight. Only touch is what guides her. He watches her intently as he stands, waiting patiently for her because he likes to observe her carrying out his demands with the obedience that gets her rewarded. She has permission to touch him, but only for the act of removing his clothes, and when he's naked, when her job is done, her hands must be lifted from his body and returned only when he commands it. Bane likes to touch her rather than her touching him, but tonight is a different story.

Today he wishes to forget about the dread. Forget… a lot of what's happened.

Leaving her to stand awkwardly in the middle of his hotel room, Bane wanders over to the bed and climbs in, resting his back against the headboard until he's comfortable and sitting like a king on his throne. Kit doesn't move from her spot because she hasn't been told to. She doesn't even touch herself, even though he knows she's aching for contact and wet enough to slick three of him. After a few moments of making her wait, prolonging her desire and only enticing more out of her by doing so, he calls for her.

"Come, Kit."

She's a soldier, his own, and knows where he is just by the sound of his voice. Graceful like a warrior, Kit turns and heads for him, knowing the layout of the room in her mind. Bane's eyes travel her body as he waits for her. He prefers her naked, but tonight he didn't bother removing the strip of fabric across her chest, sheer lace an ivory color that still gives him a lovely view of her bare breasts behind it. The band wraps around her breasts to her back, and because her skin is tanned and weathered from harsh elements of their work, the white color of it looks pure, pretty against her skin. With only a strip of lace that still gives him her naked body, Bane feels the ache of his erection.

She stands at the side of the bed, waiting. Only her yellow hair and her nose are visible on her head.

"Get on the bed," he tells her.

Kit does, on all fours now. The sight of her in such a position makes a low growl rumble in his chest. But he doesn't want her that way tonight, although the thought is very appealing.

"Sit in my lap," he says, and she's already moving to comply. "Spread your legs around me."

With his arms resting coolly on the mattress, not moving to assist her, Bane commends her silently when she keeps her hands off him, struggling a little by not touching him as she tries to straddle his wide hips. They hang in the air as she uses nothing but balance to situate herself on top of him.

"Good girl," he breathes with praise, lifting his hands to pet her almost lovingly around her neck. There's still a yellowed bruise on her shoulder from the other night, and Bane admires it on her skin. He put it there, after all. He makes her shiver with his petting, her chin tilting up just a little for more of his touch. He can feel the heat between her legs on his cock. Before his next command, Bane swiftly removes the band around her eyes so she can see him, but keeps her mouth silenced with the other.

Her brown hues are heavy with arousal.

Kit is attractive to Bane. She would have to be for him to continue this mindless fucking between them, but it is not a typical loveliness. Her eyes are big and brown and her hair the cut of a pixie, but her tenderness ends there. Kit is strong and gets things done in the way they need to be done. She keeps her body toned and fit, keeps her eye sharp for targets and her mind steady for the field. With this body she can beat men bigger than her. With those intense eyes and that perceptive wit, she can interrogate with the best. Her beauty comes from the strength of her, her versatile nature and her need to do what is necessary. She doesn't have traditional beauty, a soft femininity about her like Talia, but she is an amazon woman.

Because of all that, Bane thinks her beautiful.

And this right here, as he looks at her, is one of those very infrequent moments when he wishes the bomb would never go off.

But it passes quickly.

"You will ride me, Kit," he says to her, pushing all feeling down to his waiting cock. "Touch me as you please, but make it good."

Kit wastes no time. She's too wet, too wanting not to sink down on his hardness as soon as he gives the order. With permission now she takes his strong shoulders as she takes his cock inside her, finding relief and giving it back to him in abundance.

And it's all she wants, she knows. Her need for this treatment, for contact, is nowhere near as important as sating her boss.

Bane watches her face as she rides him, as her hands clutch at him and her hips bounce on his lap, long rolls in between that ease the tension from his body like the loosening of a vice. His eyes are almost sleepy with desire, his cock being treated and his lover doing all the work like the obedient girl she is. When she starts to go faster, when her breath is panting raggedly against the band around her mouth, Bane takes her hips and encourages her.

"Keep going," he says to her, grunting some from the pleasure of the tight constriction and her bobbing body. "It's good, Kit, don't stop."

He holds her ass cheeks now, already red from his earlier time spanking her. Bane almost tells her to reach down and touch herself, but she seems content with holding on and fucking him. Her small breasts under the band bounce with her body. When he feels close, when he feels the relief tingling at the base of his spine, Bane pulls the band from her breasts and crushes her against him, the mask scratching at the skin of her jaw.

Kit wants to come. She loves this feeling of riding him, loves the hard press of his hands as he paws at her. He cups her breasts, slaps her ass, moans deeply as she does the same for him, although her sounds are muffled by the fabric gag. She's coming, she's coming now and her hips move faster to draw it out, to fill herself with him over and over and over again.

Bane snarls at her and flips her onto her back with great speed, pummeling away with ferocity.

The sweat on his body feels like the water he once wasted.

They didn't care for a condom tonight. Each was confident that her birth control would do its job this one time, giving Bane the indulgence of coming inside her. He grunts on top of her when he finishes, his body tensing with immense pleasure than the stress he is more used to. He ruts inside her, lost in euphoria as all the levels balance in him with satisfaction. Kit's arms are still around his wide shoulders, her abs constricting against his own and convulsing heavily with her breath. She doesn't ride him often – he prefers to have all control – but the rare times she has leaves her winded.

Bane takes longer than usual to pull out and roll off of her. Immediately he begins the task of tending to her, as he always does, after. Maybe he doesn't do it as well as some other men would, but he acts in the only way he's comfortable with. Bane pulls the band from her mouth softly, tilting her chin up a little so she can take in big unobstructed breaths not barred by a gag. He runs his hands over her swiftly, listening for any hiss or looking for any wince in her that would tell him he caused an injury somewhere. When he's satisfied that she's all right, he lounges on his bed to rest.

Kit rolls onto her side, her back to him. She pulls the sheets up some, only to cover her naked lower half instead of the upper. She's never been uncomfortable in her own skin when it came to intimacy, and Bane isn't too shy either. She knows she needs to get up and get her clothes back on. Time is winding down and she has much to do. But for now she takes these few moments to lie in bed. She expects them to be comfortable ones.

When she hears the regular wheezing of Bane's mask behind her, she gets that pain again. Her head and her chest ache, a pain that has only flared around her boss at certain moments.

When Bane is breaking her spirit because he himself is so broken. And he's feeling it.

"Bane," she begins softly, using his name instead of the title she calls him. She doesn't turn to look at him so he feels like he has space. "What's going on between you and Talia?"

She usually minds her own business when it comes to the two. But she can feel his pain inside her own body and right now, as they lie in bed together, she takes a halfhearted risk.

The clock is almost done ticking, after all.

He huffs. Maybe he doesn't realize the sound is louder because of the mask. "Is that what you want to talk about?"

She gives a small shrug with one bare shoulder. "I guess not."

"Having come this far with me, Kit, you should just say what is on your mind."

What's on her mind, Kit repeats in her head. So much that has everything to do with the mercenary she is, and so little with the woman underneath. The woman has fewer thoughts. Mostly just two words, redeemer and tyrant. She can't seem to get them out of her head.

"Bane," she whispers, saying his name again because she feels like she needs to. "Do you regret any of this?"

He's quiet then. She doesn't even hear him move. And she doesn't know how to feel when he actually answers her in what she assumes is the truth. A quiet truth.

"There are very fleeting moments when I do," he says softly, his eyes staring up at the ceiling above the rumpled bed. "They come rarely. Like… evanescent whispers. There aren't many reasons for me to regret, and they usually just get swallowed up by the drive to create the fire. But I cannot pretend that these whispers don't exist. I try not to lie to myself."

Fleeting moments. Evanescent whispers. Things that exist. "What do you regret?"

Bane turns his head. All he sees is her toned back and her pixie hair, the sheet draped delicately over the slight curve of her hip and the smaller bandage around her upper arm. "Why are you asking me this?"

"Because I'm not sure if I'm full of regret or regretting absolutely nothing."

That answer surprises him. A puzzle, she is. "What troubles you?"

"I keep thinking about what we are. Are we tyrants or are we redeemers? Those two words won't leave my mind. I know it shouldn't matter. We're only here to do a job. To do… what is necessary," she murmurs automatically. "One is better than the other, for humanity's sake. But would I hate being a redeemer more than being a tyrant? Is there even a difference? I don't think there is, and yet those words ring in my head like a bell."

"You are a soldier, Kit. Mercenary and missionary both. A legionnaire." She isn't like him. They aren't the same and he can tell her these things. With Kit, there can be hope. "You are a special speck of dust. Agonizing over those musings will only give you insanity."

Insanity. What exactly is insanity? "You're special too," she says, and it's so quietly it's almost one of those whispers he speaks of.

And because he thinks of it as such, he sucks in a breath that causes more pain in him than he thinks is possible. He knows pain, knows it like he's made a deal with it years ago and never can it leave his side. And isn't that exactly what he did? Did he not trade his comfort for pain, all for his girl's survival? Thinking of Talia, feeling Kit next to him, being crushed and burned by this city…

They're whispers that speak just a little bit louder.

Conquerors. Liberators.

Kit remains still as she feels Bane turn onto his side as well, facing her. She can feel the heat he emits, heat that warms her in this frozen city of liberation. He's close to her, close enough that she can feel the rough texture of his leg as it slides against hers. She doesn't know if he wants something. Maybe talk of all of this has hyped him up and he needs the release from it again. Kit knows she'll give it to him. She'll turn onto her stomach or her back and let him have his way for peace.

All he does is place his hand on her naked waist, right under her ribs.

"Kit," he whispers, his hand feeling not like the dominant he is when touching her, but the sated man who tends to her after he's done. After she's been a good girl. Somehow, to her, it feels scarier, especially when his voice continues in a whisper. "I control this city in a way I never controlled prison. I know Gotham better than I knew the hole where I was left to rot. There are places most of you are unaware of. I created the blockades, and not even Talia knows about them from her position." His hand squeezes her waist, his leg runs down hers. The tubes of the mask sink into her hair as if he could smell something other than bitter drugs. "There are places that not even you and Barsad were shown for a hundred reasons."

All the touches he's giving her, all this intimacy, feels like an icy hand squeezing her esophagus. Not in the way she's used to, but a grip that will leave an everlasting mark. "Why are you telling me this?" she asks, whispering as well only because he is.

"You've always known what waits at the end of this job. Never once have you spoken to me about it."

"It's not my place to question you."

"Don't talk like you feel no emotion. Barsad came to me one night, what feels like years ago now. There is no life for him beyond me, he said, and that is the only reason why he remains here. After Gotham, there is nothing. There is only the end of who we all are. You've said not a word to me about it. You only strap that gun on your body and go out onto the streets in my name. It makes me wonder if you truly haven't accepted that if you stay here… you will die."

It's then that Kit realizes he's very right. She knew the plan, knew every step because as the left hand, she was a part of the finalizing of it. She and Barsad, behind Bane as he led them, paved the way to where they all are now. But when it comes to the end, when the very last step is Talia's finger over the trigger… It's the part she refuses to think about. She does her job like the competent mercenary she is, and never held any reservations for the possibility that she was not getting out of this mission alive. She ignored it. Why did she ignore it?

Because she wanted to be here. Because she only wanted to keep her purpose.

She is nothing without her purpose.

"You will die," Bane whispers again against her hair.

She feels better hearing it. She feels like she's no longer half of a person only doing what is necessary without coming to terms with what exactly that means. She likes being whole.

"I'm still here, aren't I?" she mutters, and doesn't yet move away from his touch. His warmth.

One of Bane's fingers lifts and trails down two of her ribs past the hardness of muscle. "But if there was a chance that you could leave, that you could escape," he begins, closing his eyes for a moment before continuing. His voice is heavy, still soft and quiet. "Would you take it?"

Kit's eyes widen slightly. Is this what they are now? What have they become that his left hand is now so important that he would ask her this question? With his words, she is given the world. She is given life. Her boss has opened his hands, and in them is everything everyone else in this desolate city wants more than anything. He's offering it to her, like a flower or a jewel.

Like another life she will get to live.

"There are places that are kept a secret," he continues, and now he sounds sad. She doesn't know why. "Blockades that, in truth, are easy to escape. If you wish to escape, Kit. If you wish to live… I could tell you where they are."

She swallows and her eyes are moving so much that she can't focus on one thing to stare at. She can leave. Bane will allow her to leave and flee from the fire. "Why are you offering me this?" She can't help it that her question sounds like a desperate one.

"Because you offered me your body. Because you have given me relief when you didn't have to. You work for me, as my left hand, watching out for me as I do what I need to do. What I've done to you in bed, what I've forced you to become… You may have enjoyed it but it still was not in your nature. You changed so that I could feel an ounce of peace in this frenetic time. For that… I offer you the chance of freedom from the fire."

Freedom, she muses. As soon as he spoke to her in the tavern she was given true freedom. Bane will take her to a road to safety if she accepts. She could start fresh. With her newfound experience, she could start her own company in honor of those who fell. She could continue on.

She could live while Bane and her brothers remain here to burn.

Or… she could rest right alongside them.

"I choose to stay," she says.

Once again Bane is quiet. He doesn't have it in him to convince her otherwise, and knows that it isn't his place to do so. If he had his way, Talia, Barsad, and Kit would be kicked out of the city if only so that he died knowing they were still breathing. He isn't the sentimental type, but he thinks it would be a nice thought as the fire consumes him. Maybe the three of them are too hard for this life now. Maybe, like him, they just want to feel solace. To sleep without a crestfallen soul. Bane accepts her choice because he has to, because that is the kind of leader he is. If Kit wishes to die in the blaze of balanced glory, then he won't keep her from it.

His hand falls from her waist, and rests on her stomach. His hand flat and secure on her skin.

"Talia is pregnant," he says.

Kit looks down, past her naked breasts and to her stomach that is covered with his hand. Like his statement is paired with a weighty touch. She doesn't know what to say other than, "Oh."

Bane clutches Kit's stomach, caresses her there as if he can create some kind of connection with his love's condition. "It's Bruce Wayne's child," he breathes, and it's here Kit discovers how unhelpful Talia has been to Bane's stress. "I begged her to leave the city, but she refused. She feels nothing for it. The rare moments I have with her, she ignores me completely when I bring it up."

She wonders if this is the dread he feels. It can't be, because the dread comes when Bane goes about in the city. Going by the hollowness of his voice, he isn't taking Talia's news very well. "I thought children were dispensable for the success of the League."

"Not Talia's child," Bane answers. If Kit wasn't lying naked in his bed, maybe he would've taken offense. He touches her stomach a few moments more. Once it starts to feel a little uncomfortable for her, he removes it. Neither of them wants to admit it was done regrettably. "She was only a child herself in trying times such as this one. She can't see past her goal to understand. Talia has never cared for a baby and doesn't plan to. She's pregnant, and yet she doesn't understand." Bane huffs out a breath and turns onto his back, staring at the ceiling again. "I look at her, I look at her stomach, and all I see is the child she once was. Like I could open her up, peer in, and there's my girl, inside her now as a different baby. She would look like her," he murmurs, picturing another girl in his mind's eye. Another little love, without simmering hatred. "She would have Talia's eyes and coloring. A pretty thing. But Talia could still have a boy. Yes, a little boy. One who would grow to be… just like him." It's another thing Bane can see. The son of Bruce Wayne, doing everything he couldn't. As the Batman failed, his son would prosper and he would be better than either Bruce or Bane ever could. "The heir to the League of Shadows. No matter what it is, it will still burn before I can see. Before I can hold it in my hands."

Kit sits up drastically then. The sheet has fallen to her thighs but she doesn't care. All she cares about is looking at him over her shoulder, meeting his eyes.

Bane stares up at her. Her body is still sated from sex and her pixie blonde hair is tufted up in the back, a rumpled appearance that pleases him. He likes Kit. He trusts Kit. It's the criteria that he needs to take a woman to bed. And she is very worthy.

Kit lifts her hand and places it over his beating heart. She doesn't know the words that will soothe him and most certainly doesn't know how to go about fixing this Talia business. But she can do the only thing she's been doing for months. Be here for him, offer him relaxation with her touch. It's worked this long. With her hand on his chest, she leans down, doing so slowly in case he doesn't want what she has to give. He remains ever still, and she pecks the mask with her lips, a simple kiss. A sweet gesture she isn't accustomed to.

Easing away, she gives him a sad grin. "No regrets, boss."

She doesn't know if he's smiling back. She likes to think he is.

Bane gives a brief nod. "No regrets."

No more fleeting moments. No more evanescent whispers. No regret for Gotham, for whatever this is that has changed between them. Not for any of it, since the first moment in the tavern. If this is to be their last night as lovers, if they are to be together every waking moment until the fire takes them both, then it will be time worth living. A great purpose, indeed.

With the taste of metal still on her lips, Kit sits on the edge of the bed and pulls up her clothes. She finds the ivory band of lace that will have to suffice as a bra and yanks that on along with a white tank top. The underclothes don't do much to conceal her breasts, but that's what her armor is for. Before she finds her pants and boots that are somewhere in Bane's room, tossed or even ripped in some corner, she fingers her hair to work out the small knots. A quick brush-through has always served well.

Bane watches as she pulls her panties on. He slides her pillow over and tucks it on top of his own under his head for more support. "If you're dying for me, I think I should know more about you."

She lets out a quick laugh. "What a thing to say after months of fucking."

"How eloquent you are, Kit Kelli," he says dryly. "If you truly don't want to tell your story, then I understand. But perhaps one person should know you best, if only to miss you. Even if that person is me."

Her careless grin falls away. One person to know her best. She realizes that no one really knows her at all. To die as a stranger would be pretty lonely. And, Kit, discovers, maybe she really does want someone to miss her after the fire. Miss her wherever they're all going. She looks at him over her shoulder again and says, "Trade."

Another trade. A story for whatever answer she wants. With such limited time, Bane thinks it doable. He gives a nod.

"I don't know what else I can tell you," she says.

Bane's eyes run over her body as he thinks. "Why did you leave your family?"

Kit takes a deep breath as her hands grip the mattress underneath her. She's never talked about her family to anyone since she left. She's always been a loner and was perfectly content until she joined up with Bane and her brothers. They didn't need to know her history for her to tag along. But she remembers them now, as she briefly remembered them on the bridge with cameras zooming in on her. Her family she left behind and has never thought of until now.

"I grew up in a pretty average home," she begins, shrugging a little at the normalcy of it. "I had a mother and a father who had a decent marriage, and a younger sister. Much better upbringing than most of the guys who run with us. Hearing their stories, it's almost shameful where I come from. Nothing bad ever happened to us. Nothing traumatizing happened to me to make me run away. Everything was so normal and we were well off. We always had food and a nice house, two cars. A dog," she adds with a lift of her brows. She wasn't one for the dog and its confusing unconditional love. She gives Bane another glance behind her with a face that holds somewhat of a warning. "I don't tell people this bullshit because it's ridiculous."

"And what is ridiculous about the truth?"

"It's ridiculous because there was nothing wrong with my family," she says snappily, growing annoyed with her own words. "My parents and my sister were good people. They didn't pay all that much attention to me because I didn't want it from them. They respected me enough to give me space and I…" She stops and takes another breath, looking away from him again so she can finish. "I looked at them, at my parents who both had mundane jobs and an average bank account, at my sister who led an ordinary teenage life with her friends and boyfriends… and I couldn't stand to be around them. They drove me crazy, how they could fester in this meaningless typical life and not want more out of it. I was angry, for as long as I can remember I had this anger that ate at me, this disgust that I would end up just like them. That I would die as a nobody, as an old woman full of desire for everything I never attempted to see. I was bad. I was frustrated. And they would just pat me on the head and tell me that it would all pass."

Not wanderlust, she thinks again. It was never wanderlust that drove her away. It was the simple wish of living. Of not becoming someone she would grow to hate or resent.

"I just felt… like I didn't belong with them. They tried to include me for a while, but everyone gets to a point where they're done trying. Even my sister. She's probably married by now," Kit mutters distantly, trying to imagine her family, and failing. "When I turned eighteen I wasted no time packing a bag and getting the hell out of that dull abyss that was slowly sucking the life out of me. I didn't care if I had to sleep on the street some nights or barter my way onto a boat overseas. It was all worth it. No regrets," she says again, smiling a little at her triumph. "I was wandering the world for a little while until you found me. I was running out of luck, but still failure was so much better than going back home. When you came up to me, when you offered me a job…"

No regrets. Her life is ending, her time is up. Just a few days more, and then she's done. No regrets.

"I finally found my purpose," she murmurs, and for that alone, dying so soon was a small price to pay. "My only skills thrive in this world. All I'm good for is what I am right now. The times are hard and the path is pretty dark some days, but I wouldn't change a thing."

And Bane realizes that he can understand her. Kit was given the life most of them should have led, especially Talia, but even in such luxury, there still comes a feeling of being lost. Of not belonging in the worst way. After a while, all that remains is a shell, and the soul of who you were has long since died. Talia's father refused to accept him and put him through hell for only breathing in his wife's gravesite. Bane took care of his child and lost his ability to function like a normal man, and still he was told to leave. Kit wasn't forced to abandon her life like he was, but whether forced or chosen, the path beyond all they knew was still one they had to create all alone. Bane belongs nowhere except for exactly where he is. The same goes for Kit.

Bane reaches over and places his fingers on the bullet scar on her neck. He's heard Kit say things like how she would rather be a monster, if only for the protection of being one. A special speck of dust she most certainly is.

"It will be a shame for the fire to eat you, Kit," he tells her.

It's not so much a regret. It's more like praise that she'll still die for him and what he needs to do. Because at the end of the day, Kit isn't giving her life for Talia or the League of Shadows or the hope for a balanced world. She's doing it because after Bane and her brothers die, then her purpose dies with them. She'd rather they all go together. Kit leans her face down a little to his hand, and rubs her cheek on it.

"I have to know something," she says, calling upon the trade. "I need you to tell me the truth."

Her skin is soft, the skin of the last woman he'll ever touch. "Go on," he replies.

"The Batman thought you were dying for the League of Shadows. You make Talia believe you're dying for her. But… I don't think it's either of those things. Not really." She sees Bane's true form, as does Barsad. The right hand isn't as accepting of it as she is.

"What is your question?" Bane asks.

And because she is a dead woman walking, Kit doesn't think of the appropriate words to say.

"Did you agree to all of this because you want to die?"

Automatically Bane thinks of his once precious jug of water as a child. He likes to remember it full and heavy in his small arms, but the image that always takes his mind is the picture of the wasted water drying up on the ground. He thinks that's when the boy in him died and was replaced by what he is now. Looking down at a wet stain at his feet, Bane's hope for himself vanished. The sensation of soothing rain on his skin was something he would never feel again. All this time, only the life of Bane's girl has kept him going. But even the life inside her will be lost. Bane tells Kit that he has no regrets, but it seems the death of Talia's child is one he will continue to feel.

Death will come with an abundance of rain, he tells himself. Convinces himself. Hope is something he wants to feel again, without despair.

Kit once asked him why he wanted to go to Gotham because she knew what going to Gotham meant. It meant that he wouldn't leave it. He's answered this question before, but now it comes with clarity. Does he want to die? Was Talia's desire for revenge used only as an excuse so that he could feel the rain again?

"Yes," he tells Kit, tells himself. And Bane knows he's telling the truth.

Kit looks at him, lying down on the bed still naked under the sheets. She takes his hand from her neck and gives it a squeeze. "Why?" she whispers.

The brief light she can bring to his eyes with sex usually dims about now. But they both see that it's still there. Maybe the end of the job is the only thing Bane can look forward to now.

"I'm tired, Kit," he tells her softly, basking in the squeeze of her hand, although he doesn't return the gesture. "I can no longer live with this pain."

And pain means so much more than the state of his body or the mask on his face. It means wanting to be a fiery ember, bright and hot one moment before going dark and unseen in the next. It means staring down from the opened hatch of a plane and knowing that with one step, he can jump right into the sky. She can't fault him for it. She never would.

"It'll be a shame for the fire to eat you, boss," she says.

This time, she can most definitely tell he's smiling.

She grins as well. Taking a deep breath, she hopes she doesn't sound like a sappy fool to him. She takes another risk. "I don't really know what's after all this. I don't know where either of us is going. But if we have a choice, if we can go anywhere, then I think you should meet me in the tavern."

He laughs. The sound keeps her grin in place. "You would want to spend this questionable afterlife with me in a tavern?"

She doesn't love Bane. She doesn't love him because she can't. For a billion reasons.

"Yeah," she whispers.

He shakes his head at her, his eyes amused. "I'll be waiting, then."

Kit rises from the bed to finish dressing. She pulls on her pants, her armor, her gun. The gun he never wants to see her without, and it's a rule she's obeyed all this time. Bane remains in bed, taking only a few moments more before Gotham will call his name in its last leg of life. Before she leaves, he has one last request.

"Come back tonight, Kit," he says to her.

It is the end times. It is the last days. She knows where she wants to be, and nods.

Of course she returns to his bed hours later, not just for him, but for herself as well. She wants to be with him and now she can almost fear the end because she doesn't know where they'll end up. But at least she can hold on to the tavern, and it keeps her steady when he eases her onto her back and tells her to touch him. It keeps her from lashing out in rage when he settles between her legs, taking her body in a way he's never done before and the rules are obsolete. It keeps her from screaming at him to run when the mask gently presses into the crook of her neck as the sheets cover his thrusting lower half. She can't do any of those things because it isn't what he wants. What he wants now, what she wants too, is to find the tavern and meet there, where water will never be wasted and the constant fight for a purpose will finally be done.

It is their last night now. The last stars they will ever see, the last moon they will ever marvel at. The bomb and the triggerman are waiting.

And Bane's dread is revealed.

Kit doesn't go to him. She's in the field and she's only the left hand, but she stares at what has been unknowingly bothering her boss, like a leech he can't find on his skin.

Bane gives his orders, and simply stands there staring at the giant bat made of flames.

Kit is the one who has to relay the bad news. The three of them, Bane, Barsad, and Kit, each take a team and scout the entire city, looking for a familiar face. It can be masked or unmasked, but it is a face Bane and his inner circle knows well and will rid from their streets. Barsad tells the men to find the Bat before he can do something drastic, but Bane is silent in his musings. He knows Bruce Wayne, and has already concluded that his ex-brother has done something to turn the tables on him. Kit is the one, with her team, to find those turned tables. She blankly inspects the hole that the police were able to wiggle through.

Bane listens quietly to her report as he stands inside the dark City Hall, staring up at the wide window of the story above where Talia – Miranda – is being held hostage and watched in case the Batman makes an attempt for her tonight. The trigger is in her pocket and Bane trusts her with it, but he doesn't trust Bruce and the measures he will take to rescue the woman he doesn't know is pregnant with his child.

But Bane knows. He also knows that the little baby inside Talia has already been given a death sentence.

His only regret he will never speak of.

"He used a missile of some kind with his tank for the sky. It cut right through the concrete and now they've all scattered like ants."

Bane keeps his eyes on the window as he answers Kit. "And whose assignment was it to locate all of Bruce's weaponry not stored at Wayne Enterprises?"

Kit can't tell if he's majorly pissed off or just can't care at this point. Only hours remain now. Soon the sun will rise for the last time in Gotham. "I assumed we found each item. We stopped searching when we thought there was nothing left to find. I went through the lists and there are two machines unaccounted for."

He shakes his head some. How clever Mr. Wayne is. "Which are?"

"The flying tank, and we are also no longer in possession of the motorcycle."

"Did you know that Bruce Wayne began honing his skills with the art of thievery?"

Bane doesn't talk about his life with the League if it doesn't concern Talia. Kit has no way of knowing what he knows about Bruce and what he doesn't. Obviously he knows quite a bit. "I didn't, no."

"These turn of events aren't surprising, and the shock of his very existence in my city mere hours before the day of reckoning will not weaken me or those who serve under me. What is most important now is protecting the triggerman. I need you here."

"I'll take the blame for the miscalculations."

Bane smiles softly under the mask. "Oh, Kit," is all he murmurs to that, finally turning to look at her with the smile now erased. "Call off the search. I need every hand at the door. Whatever he is planning, I won't allow him to stop the bomb. Keep the trucks circulating. They stop for nothing."

"Yes, sir."

His eyes wander down to her hip, where the revolver is nestled tight in its holster. His obedient left hand. "Keep it loaded," he tells her.

All night they wait. All night, the triggerman is guarded but not one shadow of a bat comes for her. Bane has all his men on the steps of City Hall. It begins to snow on their jackets and the firearms in their hands, and some of them don't know that it's their last day alive. Morning arrives in the flurries of white and an unsuspecting city. They are within their last hour.

Bane, with Barsad and Kit at both his sides, his two vital hands, steps out into the cold air of a dead Gotham and sees the troops marching into battle. The police force he's locked away for months is standing at his door, ready to reclaim the lives he's taken from them. They are all armed and fit for war in their blue uniforms that once gave them authority. Bane studies them closely as they move forward, his hands on the lapels of his coat to retain his dominance.

Kit tries to estimate their numbers. It's far too many for her to guess, but with their armory they stand no chance. The spirit inside her, what she's always thought was her chemical imbalance, rises to life inside the drive she possesses to fulfill her purpose. To complete her job.

To do whatever is necessary.

Gray pants cover her legs with matching gray trooper boots that hide her daggers, the black holster for her revolver strapped to her thigh, locked and loaded. Her brace is tight around her shin and ankle, keeping her foot in place, and the belts that give her appropriate posture are buckled securely. She has extra ammo strapped to her upper arms, a small bullet proof vest over her dark long sleeved shirt. Short tufts of blonde hair flap in the biting wind, and her mouth is set firm and grim. She is ready for war. She is ready to go out in the line of duty.

It's been a long life but one she doesn't hate or resent. Here with her brothers, at Bane's side where she's been for years, is where she wants to die. Here in this city of lies.

No regrets.

Bane seems to scoff at the police. He can't even be so annoyed with them that he thinks their efforts are adorable. Without wasting their last moments with such nonsense, he tells Barsad to open fire.

And then the city of lies comes back to life.

Kit doesn't think as the police charge and the Batman zooms off in his flying tank. With a firm determined line between her brows, she rushes right for them with her brothers surrounding her. Usually her place is flanking her boss, but drastic times call for drastic measures and Kit will carry out the orders of seeing this last hour through to the end. The frontlines are already destroyed by the time she gets to the fray and cops and mercenaries and revolutionists are brawling it out on the streets. With brass knuckles on both hands, Kit uses her size and power as advantage against the smaller men. The opposite sex is still given superior strength, so she will use all the tricks up her sleeves.

She takes them out methodically, jabbing them twice with brute force of brass, watching the blood from their broken teeth spray before using the dagger in her hand to slash their throats. The cold feels like nothing but adrenaline now, for both sides. Kit takes some hits, particularly to the face and the gut by a larger cop. But her time as a woman mercenary has made her ruthless, and she jabs her dagger with an uppercut right between his legs. She spits blood on him before turning for the next one.

Bane and the Batman are staring each other down. She thinks to go assist him, to weaken Wayne in some way in that pathetic armor, but her plan is halted when she's grabbed from behind and thrown to the ground. It's a lady cop glaring down at her, one who has caught her off guard. She thinks her uniform and her training will give her the necessary strength to take Kit out. One less crook to blow her city up.

But Kit knows this woman has no idea what it takes to do what is necessary.

Using one leg, Kit sends her foot crashing into the cop's shin, vaulting it up immediately after to her chin and cracking her jaw with steel toed boots. The woman stumbles back, stars in her eyes and hands grasping at snowy air.

With her brown eyes clear and focused, Kit whips her revolver out and shoots her right in the head.

No more games with children.

She fires her gun until the cylinder is empty. The dead lay at her feet and victory is so close, but Kit remembers her place. She may have charged forward with her brothers, but Bane is always to be in her sight at all times during battle. She glances around for him as hell ensues, can find him and the Bat nowhere. As she searches, as she jogs and her eyes scan, she simultaneously reloads her gun with the bullets attached to her arm. She has to find Bane. She has to watch his back. She's the left hand and will die as such. Her purpose.

Her eyes snap right onto him as if they are a detector and he is exactly what she wants to find. They widen seconds after as soon as the Batman rears his arm back and shatters the tubes of Bane's mask.

Now she runs. Gun in her hand and sight set to kill.

She forsakes all those around her. She lifts a hand or gun to no one as she keeps Bane in her vision, but she doesn't have a clear shot at the Bat. Thinking a little too frantically, she neglects to mind her surroundings.

Another thing she once heard Bane say a lot. Mind your surroundings.

A cop crashes right into her with a war cry, sending them both to the pavement covered in blood and snow. Kit snarls as she tries to kick him off, but his weight and armor are consuming her. She feels him trying to grab her gun to disarm her before he makes to apprehend her, but she can't allow that. The mask is damaged and Bane has no replacement. Her boss is left unprotected.

No matter the dwindling time, Bane is still her lover. The firm hand she needs. The one she's supposed to meet in the tavern and the only one who doesn't leave her disappointed.

It feels like forever, squabbling with a Gotham cop. Kit tries to shoot him but he stops her. She tries to stab him, but now her daggers are missing, as are her brass knuckles from the hit. She bites him, punches him, reaches down to rip his crotch right out of his body in an all-consuming desperation to get out from underneath him and get to her boss. She doesn't want to die like this. She wants to die as either the redeemer or the tyrant, not held down by a man as she tries to claw her way to the one she wants the most.

She doesn't love Bane. She doesn't love Bane.

Kit shrieks in frustration.

A loud shot is heard and suddenly the weight holding her down is blown off and away. Kit pants as she kicks him further away from her, already bringing herself to her boots. Barsad points the barrel of his rifle to the sky.

"Don't die until your time is up, little sister," he tells her.

Both of them then run to the building they know Bane is inside.

These are Bane's last moments on earth. But should he have expected anything else? Was he supposed to assume that the last breaths he takes would be through a contented smile or pride swelling in his chest? Of course he didn't expect that and of course his last moments would bring him only more pain. These are the last words he hears, the last gestures he's given for all he's done.

He has to stand here, watching Talia, his girl, his love, attack Bruce Wayne and condemn his entire existence. He has to listen to her tell their shared enemy their history together, one that used to be private and sacred. He has to see the demon that she's become pulsate in her eyes even as life grows inside her, and the man she's killing with her slow knife doesn't know that his line could have lived on with the child in her belly. He has to relive his past and stare at her stomach as he holds Bruce in place, knowing that for all of them there is no future. All those emotions, terrible, terrible emotions, had overwhelmed him for a moment.

Bane knows that Talia purposely seduced Wayne although the pregnancy is an inconvenience, and the entire thing causes rage to bubble inside him like fiery lava. He can't harm Talia for doing this to him and never would. So Bruce will have to suffice.

Even if Talia orders him not to kill her baby's father so that he instead may burn. For making these his last moments, this once Bane will intentionally go against her.

I pledge my life to you, my girl, and this is what you do to me. Torture.

But Bane loves her anyway. Maybe that is the worst kind of torture.

Barsad and Kit rush in. The left hand is more banged up than the right, blood smearing down her chin with some dirt in her yellow hair, but each seems fine and Bane feels a small semblance of relief he knows is foolish. Barsad tells Talia that they're under attack and that she needs to keep moving, to protect the bomb even with the spared eleven minutes. She looks annoyed, no trace of pregnancy in her expression and Bane finds that strange. No one else can see it yet when he looks at her, it's all he can see. But even through her annoyance, she still retains an air of success. Before she stands, she tells the Batman that he's failed.

She then turns those eyes on him, and Bane is blasted by every last pain he's ever felt in his entire lifetime. The hardships of prison, the wasted jug of water, the beatings, the rejection of ex-brothers like the one he holds in a vice now. The little baby he will never get to see. It swamps him, overtakes him when Talia touches his mask. These are his last moments. This is what he gets for all he's done for her. Talia was everything and so was he to her, and she can't even touch his skin as her final goodbye.

Tyrant, he thinks, staring deeply at her. Kit was right. Tyrant.

Monster.

The bomb is barely needed, for he will surely die in this pain.

Talia saunters off from him without a glance back. Bane can't even take one last second to see her face or her stomach, to internally say goodbye to the little barely nothing of a baby that only Bane seems to care for out of all of them. In a flash she is gone. Both of them. He holds Bruce tight by the rope, anticipating the chance to murder him, his last great performance in this cold world full of liars.

But someone else is still in the building. Bane looks up, and sees that it's Kit.

She needs to go with Talia and Barsad. She needs to protect the bomb and its triggerman at all costs and the cops are closing in. Bane doesn't need her anymore, but there she is. They stare at each other, and it seems like the last minutes ticking down have stopped so they can be given this last shred of association.

Kit needs to go. Her body seems like it's itching to continue to do her job, but her almost desperate face is all for him and wants to stay with him more than anything. Talia has left but Kit is still here.

They promised each other no regrets but she would regret nothing more in her entire life if she couldn't connect with him one last time. Kit never belonged to Bane body, heart, and soul, and neither did he to her. Bane pushed on for Talia and Kit only wanted to live with purpose and fulfillment. But in this moment right now, she is incredibly thankful to him. He picked her up in a shady tavern and gave her a job when the rest of the world didn't want her. He equipped her, trained her, made her better and honed the only skills she possessed. He gave her brothers and a sense of duty, a place to belong. He gave her a gun.

She doesn't love Bane. She doesn't love Bane.

Except… she does.

She wants to touch him. She wants to kiss him. She wants to sleep with him and talk to him and travel with him and watch his back for him. She can't do any of those things anymore, but she can give him what Talia didn't. A last sendoff full of complete acknowledgement.

Kit doesn't care that the Batman is right there, bleeding and crushed. Her brown eyes are all for her boss, and she smiles. She doesn't make it a sad smile or a regretful one. She won't torture him with those evanescent whispers. She smiles because she's grateful to him, for him. She smiles to let him know that in his last moments, someone will miss him.

Even if it's her.

Oh, Kit, he thinks, for the thousandth time. His obedient, hard-working, powerful amazon Kit Kelli who never once spoke her safe word. Who left her home away from care to fight for something different. Who seemed to lift her hands, and in them was a full sparkling jug of clean water. That's what he sees when he looks at her now. Finally, he is that much closer to feeling the rain that has eluded him. Bane gives her a nod.

His simple gesture to her feels like… sunshine.

The last thing she does before continuing on with her job is nod back. Their actions are full of unspoken words.

You know where to find me.

Those last eleven minutes pick up again, and war is still raging.

Kit leaves Bane and the Batman behind, jogs up to Talia and Barsad who are making to get in one of the Tumbler's. The two hands of Bane will protect his love so that she can protect the bomb. Barsad helps lift Talia up and into the tank…

Kit's throat hitches and she can't even scream when her brother goes down from the force of one deadly bullet.

She runs, drags Barsad's body behind the tank and assesses him. Blood is everywhere, leaking from the hollow of his throat and already covering her hands. His body convulses a few times and he halfheartedly places his hands onto the wound to stop the flow, but it isn't long until those hands drop lifeless. Kit's breath rushes out, mournful breaths for Barsad who only ever wanted to remain at Bane's side. Other than Talia and later Kit, the right hand was the only one who strived to take care of Bane. To love him for exactly who he is. Kit honors him in only seconds, pulling his already cold head up and kissing his forehead. She hopes he can find Bane, as well. Barsad was never okay without him.

Kit's eyes fly up through the sounds of war as the tank suddenly drives off. And being the dutiful soldier she is, it is the only time she curses the name of Talia al Ghul.

The leader of the League of Shadows has revealed her to their fighting enemies, taking away Kit's shelter behind the steel Tumbler. Kit is now out in the open with the dead body of her fallen brother. Bullets suddenly explode on the ground around her, sparking on the cement. There's so many of them and she does what she can to retaliate. She lifts her revolver, her precious gift, and fires it for all she's worth. Talia takes some out from the tank, but not all. Her misguided help is useless.

What is truly Kit's undoing is the explosion she hears behind her where Bane is. Her head spins at the sound at the same time the revolver clicks empty in her hand.

A rain of angry bullets cut into her body and sends her crashing to the concrete steps.

Oh no.

Her armor could only protect so much. Kit is suddenly gasping for breath lying on her back, pushed several feet back from the multiple guns of the cops that were turned onto her. Instantly she sees the blood pooling around her, and the pain is so great that it feels like she's been thrown into a pit of fire and left to burn there. Her entire front is covered in slimy blood and bullet holes, shards of metal lodged deep inside skin and muscle. Her teeth clench together as she growls in agony, her heart beating so fast that she thinks it'll rip itself in half. The cops don't bother with her now. She's already a corpse to them.

Her hand is still clenching the empty revolver.

It's so cold and so hot at the same time. Kit feels like she can't move her legs, but she doesn't want to die next to Barsad, although she still mourns his loss. The explosion behind her killed her, and if she has a choice, she would rather die next to someone else. With her last remnants of strength, her last trek of life, and pulls her bleeding body back into the building, moaning and groaning the whole way, leaving a trail of blood.

Kit pants as she hears the sounds of a smooth vehicle. She cranes her head and watches Selina Kyle zoom off on the Bat's motorcycle, the barrels of the attached canons smoking.

Bane was right. Double crossing cat bitch.

Her eyes are leaking frustrated tears and her hands are shaking as she fears the worst. She knows what she's going to find, but still she heads straight for it. She doesn't want him to die alone. She doesn't want to be without him when she can no longer endure the bullets wedged inside her body. Kit crawls and crawls until she finds him, until she finds Bane.

His chest is in ruin and the mask is making obscure sounds. He lies on his back, what remains of his torso still panting up and down frantically as he suffers through his injuries like she is. Like her, he smells of blood, but unlike her he also smells of burning flesh. She has to be next to him. She has to remind him that he's not alone. Kit pulls herself until she's lying on her back right next to him, as if they could be resting next to each other in bed. She pretends that's what they're doing now, although they lie in a bed of their blood. It still feels nice to imagine it, naked and sated and panting from slaked pleasure instead of impending death. Soon they won't have to suffer anymore. Soon the fire will eat them and they will have succeeded.

Her right hand clutches the gun he gave her, and her left wanders down until it can grab his. She hangs on tight.

This time, Bane squeezes it back.

It will be… the last time they touch.

She isn't afraid to die.

She doesn't know the time and can barely think as she feels herself slipping away, blood in her throat now and choking her some. The eleven minutes will be up any second and the pain will be gone. Maybe the fire will be something pretty. Maybe it'll feel like the sunshine she felt for a little while or the rain she knows he desperately wants to feel. Kit decides to wait. She's done her job and she most certainly has done what is necessary. For that, she will wait with all her might for the fire they fought and died for. And as she waits, as she strives to remain on this world, one single memory comes back to her. Not a life flashing before her eyes, but a time similar to right now.

Bane holding her as she bled, as he inspected her neck for approaching death. One of her very first jobs with him a million years ago.

You mean you wouldn't sit here with me until the end? is what she playfully asked.

Not unless I'm dying as well is how he answered her.

How fitting. Kit chokes, tries to cough, a very small grin spreading on her pallor face for one brief second before everything goes slack and the revolver falls out of her grip.

Death feels like going to sleep. It feels… like sunshine in her open eyes.

Kit is gone and Bane is right behind her. How he's surviving longer than her will forever remain a mystery, but maybe it's only one last cruel jab life will give him. He keeps his grasp on Kit's hand even though she's dead, and misses her like he said he would. Even as the rest of him breaks, as he suffers through Talia's death because of course he can feel it, he holds on to Kit Kelli as he has been for a long time now. She couldn't wait for the fire but he will witness it for them both. He will tell her, later, what it was like.

But the fire never comes. And when Bane feels a tremor under his back even through his convulsions, when he distantly hears the cheers of the cops from outside, he knows that they've failed.

There will be no fire. There will be no great victory for the League of Shadows. Everything they worked for, everything that was necessary, is all for nothing.

And Bane… finally feels an encompassing peace.

He closes his eyes then and he waits for it to come. He breathes his last breath and suddenly he can feel the rain. It sprinkles on him like liquid gold, like an everlasting thirst inside him is finally being quenched. It is the best thing he's ever felt in his entire lifetime. There is no more agony as the rain soothes his soul. There is nothing left to fight for and the hope he's kept from himself finally returns without despair. He doesn't need to be a monster anymore because Bane can now go home. It feels so good to be home. Only in death does the strain of carrying on leave him, as he knew it would.

In the League's failure, Bane is given a divine tranquility.

Death, he discovers, is without endless pain.

If she has a choice, she knows where she wants to go. If she is given the chance, she knows what path she will take. Sometimes, people are forgiven and placed exactly where they want to be.

There's only one place she wants to be.

Kit, with her gun tucked safely away against her thigh and armor securely in place, opens the door and walks onto the wooden floor with her boots. The light is dim and the air is comfortable, the smell of people and the music soft. The door closes behind her and she glances around in what could be a scary, shady hole in the wall.

She knows everyone here. She looks at all the faces of her brothers as they chat and laugh and drink. They all cast their eyes over at her and nod, almost relieved that she's finally made it.

There's an abundance of rain right outside the door. Endless streams of clean water.

Kit walks further into the tavern and it's as if nothing has changed, this place their only reality. Barsad is sitting at the bar close to the only one he's ever cared about. He looks to be brooding, but she knows he isn't by the way he holds himself up. He looks good. He looks easy and rested and Kit is happy he's here. Happy he's found his way. Their eyes meet and he gives her that sleepy grin before turning back to his beer, his eyes continually glancing over to the one he must always have in sight. In the corner, hardly shadowed now from the flickering candles that smell like another world, is a table. Only this time, she knows he's there.

Bane's eyes are bright and here he is without the mask. Here he is without scars and pain and stress that once pulled him down by claws punctured into his shoulders that are now relaxed and at ease. Inside, she flips at the presence of him. Her heart sings so loud that she wonders if he can hear it. Going by the slight smile on his face, she can tell that he does. His eyes are bright but still dark for her, still wanting and satisfied with the woman she's become to him. He shakes his head at her happiness. Yes, he says with the gesture. Here I am, as I told you I would be.

Waiting here, for you.

Kit can only stare at him. Here, in this tavern.

The smile on his naked face remains, but when he turns away from her, when he looks down to the chair next to him, they soften in such a way that once was only given to one other person. It is a different look than how he looks at her. He looks knowingly proud, overly protective, and insanely grateful that someone else is here with them all.

It isn't Talia. Talia isn't here in the tavern. But sitting next to Bane is Talia's son.

The little boy is beautiful and she can tell Bane knows it to be true. He colors a picture on the wooden table and pays no mind to Bane when his large hand ruffles his unkempt brown hair. The child of the Batman looks exactly like Bruce Wayne, but Bane doesn't fault him for it. When Bane looks at this boy, he sees everything, this innocent child who wasn't given the chance to live because of his lost mother. He is everything, but most importantly, he is Bane's true redemption. His ticket to the tavern.

Kit approaches Bane, watching the way he's left his hand on the boy's hair. There's a third chair at the table. She can practically see her name on it. Meet me in the tavern, she once said. Meet me so that we can be together.

Bane's eyes turn back to her as she takes a seat. He saved the chair for her.

Kit smiles and takes his other hand underneath the table.

"Hey, boss."

The End

A/N: Different… well, everything for this one. I hoped you all enjoyed it, and enjoyed a little bit of BDSM Bane. This whole one-shot was inspired by the Iron Bull romance in the game Dragon Age: Inquisition. Please come visit me on Tumblr, where I take drabble requests with Bane and any of my OC's and have even written some more Bane/Camille stuff. A big three part drabble is coming out with those two, so drop by if you're interested. Thank you so much for reading, my darlings! And please review! : / / poisonous - angel . tumblr