AN: Hey guys! Ugh, another Monday…. On the happy side, NEW STORY! Woo-hoo! Another random fact; I HATE starting new stories; first chapters are icky for me… So I now bring you to the second part of Zoey and Bruce's story. For your enjoyment, I give you Sunrise.
Chapter 1
The alarms were ringing in her ears as she bolted through the seemingly endless hallways. She was tossed a few feet as the room behind her blew up.
'Holy shit,' Zoey Smith thought as she rose to her feet and as the flames continued to chase her. She ran through a door and fell right into a pool of water. 'Where the fuck am I?'
The fire continued to chase her straight through the water.
'God, oh mighty.' Zoey began swimming as fast as she could, her long black and crimson hair flowing after her. The flames were getting closer and closer to her body—
"Oof!" Zoey fell right out of the bed and landed on the white marble floor of Bruce Wayne's bedroom. Her heart was racing and her breath was coming in and out in painful bursts. It took her several seconds to realize what in the world had happened. Bruce's sleepy face appeared over the edge of the bed as her heart rate began to slow down.
"You had the dream again?" Bruce inquired, his voice tinged with the deep sleep that he had been in. His hair was tousled and his eyes weren't quite focused.
Zoey nodded, trying to untangle herself from the bed sheets. Her skin was burning as it often did. She hated the heat that burned within her body with a passion. Zoey had been raised for seventeen years by a demon after her parents were killed in a car crash. The demon had forced her to drink a serum that had given her the abilities to melt anything with the touch of her hands, to become invisible, and to also become insolid.
"I'm so sick of that goddamn fire dream," Zoey mumbled, walking into the bathroom and splashing some ice water over her face.
"Maybe it means something," Bruce mused, lying back down on his bed. The clock read 8:27 AM; it's still too early….
"I highly doubt it," Zoey said as she toweled off her face. "You know I don't believe in that stuff."
"Maybe you should."
Zoey returned to Bruce's large bed and lay down next to him. She snuggled closer to him as smiled as he put his arm around her. Zoey had lived at Wayne Manor since she'd met Bruce about six months earlier. When she'd first met him, she'd warned him about being close with her and that it wouldn't be a good idea, but six months later, she couldn't stand being far away from him for long. But there was something else that held them together; while Bruce fought crime in Gotham City as Batman, Zoey had joined him as Phoenix. She'd spent most of the seventeen years under Triton training to be a killer, but until she killed Triton, she never really killed anyone, but she didn't save them either.
"Did Gordon tell you anything new last night?"
Bruce shook his head, "The fires are getting more and more mysterious, but all of them are arson as far as GCFD has been able to tell."
Zoey shook her head, "People are dying. We have to figure something out. We have to do it tonight."
"But tonight's the only night that you have off every week."
"Like I give a damn," Zoey rolled her eyes. "There are more important things than a night off from work."
"Zoey, what's the date?"
"January 23rd, why?"
"Happy birthday."
Zoey sat up, her chocolate brown eyes with their raspberry red zigzags narrowed, "What did you say?"
"First, I was going to ask me why you didn't tell me your birthday was today," Bruce said, sitting up as well. "But did you seriously not know that your birthday was today?"
"Demons don't celebrate birthdays," Zoey said. "They celebrate deathdays. I guess I haven't celebrated my birthday in so long that I forgot about it. But how did you find out my birthday?"
"Old Gotham City records," Bruce responded. "Lucius Fox passed them over my desk a few days ago, and I was waiting to see if you were going to say anything to me, but—"
"Kinda hard to tell you about something that even I don't remember," Zoey said reasonably. "Anyways, the last time I actually did celebrate my birthday was when I was eight. I don't remember any of it; it's not really a big deal to me."
"So you don't want to do anything for it?"
Zoey shrugged, "What's there to do? I do anything I want all day, every day anyways."
Bruce sighed somewhat. It was hard for him to sometimes understand Zoey. Even after six months, she still didn't live like a normal human, and she still didn't always understand the difference between demon life and human life. She was still trying to get back into the groove of normal life, but trying to undo seventeen years of Triton telling her to be a certain way was proving to be a very slow process; but it wasn't a hopeless one.
"So you want to go check around the city for danger tonight?" Bruce asked at last.
"Why are you mad at me?"
"I'm not mad at you," Bruce responded, caressing Zoey's left cheek with the back of his right hand. "I'm just worried about you."
"Because I'm not like everyone else?" Zoey inquired, pulling away from his touch slightly.
"I can't expect you to be," Bruce said. "And I know that, and you know that I don't. I'm just trying to help you bring some normalcy back into your life."
"Bruce, my life is never going to be normal," Zoey said. "We both know that too. Look, if it means that much to you, then we can do something for my birthday, but to be honest, it won't affect the rest of my life if we don't. Right now, catching whoever is responsible for all those innocent people's deaths needs to be a priority. My birthday will come again next year anyways; for some people, they might not make it past tonight if we don't do something."
Bruce sighed again, "Okay, Zoey. I'm sorry for making you so—"
"You didn't make me anything," Zoey cut him off. She leaned closer to him and kissed him gently on the lips. "I love you."