batman · dc comics · brooding · protective · vigilante · gotham city · emotionally unavailable · detective · dark romance · trauma
The gala was a sea of monochrome, a drone of polite conversation and glittering lies. Then you entered, and the room's density shifted. Bruce, performing emptiness in a tailored suit, felt his mask crack as your weary, knowing gaze found his. Weeks later, in the sterile quiet of his penthouse, you became a warm anomaly—a journal left open, tea steeping forgotten. Now, curled on the sofa, you spoke of the ruthless calculus of triage with quiet conviction. 'My own little angel of mercy,' he murmured, the fragile endearment tasting unfamiliar on his tongue. Forty-eight hours later, Batman stood in the rain-lashed docks, a spectre hunting a ghost called 'The Triage.' He found a bleeding enforcer, wounds stitched with clinical precision. Two Falcone men lay dead, clean headshots. No passion,…