concernedandconfusion - Tumblr blog

concernedandconfusion · 1 year

Text

Beautiful

Canonically, Alfred Pennyworth is willing and ready to use guns and kill people if it’s necessary - he served in the SAS, and feels no obligation to change his preexisting moral code to match Bruce’s. The only other member of the Batfam unafraid to take lives is Jason. He still hasn’t killed the Joker yet despite having every right and motive to and being understandably offended Bruce won’t, and I can understand the fan opinion that he shouldn’t have to interact any more, let alone in such a traumatic way as committing murder, with the man who took everything from him and gave him a hell of a lot of PTSD. So I propose the obvious solution:

Alfred kills the Joker.

Batman vs the Joker is quite routine for everyone in Gotham, after decades of fights and plots and counterplots. Nonetheless, every time the citizens are on the edge of their seats watching the news broadcast, both because Joker always has to make it a fucking spectacle and because while Batman may not get his joke, he can get to Batman. No other villain has wrought as much emotion out of the Dark Knight. Has pushed him to such depths. Has come as close to permanently defeating him. Gothamites swear the one thing in this wretched city they can be confident in is their protector, but the Joker alone can make them wonder. All the eyes fixed on the screens are wide with fear, and only children will admit that a fragment of it is for the hero himself.

It doesn’t help that this battle is going badly. Red Hood, Red Robin, Robin and Black Bat have been called in as backup. Nightwing’s in Blüdhaven and Batgirl’s preoccupied. So with the Signal sound asleep from the day shift, this is all available hands on deck. The battle moves into one of those large, dilapidated building seemingly more shadow than concrete that Gotham is in such great supply of, beyond the news crew’s vision. Barbara can of course see and hear the whole story via the suits’ camera feed to the Batcave and the comm system. monitoring and strategizing in the Clocktower. In the Batcave, Alfred can too.

He isn’t sure what does it. Maybe the flicker of concern on Bruce’s face when Damian gets a little too close to capture. Maybe Cassandra’s grunt when an attack lands, or Barbara swearing under her breath, pinpointing the exact moment the initial game plan is rendered unviable. Maybe Joker’s latest quip in his typical exceptionally bad taste. Maybe just the laughter. On and on and on and - maybe everything at once. Whatever it is, something changes within him. Nothing cracks or breaks. No tether is snapped or cage is burst open to unleash his inner beast. It’s quite the contrary; he’s strengthened, the loadbearing walls and pillars he’s built himself on are reinforced. It’s like he’s kept a rising ocean of all his family’s blood and sweat and tears in his chest and he’s finally decided to go with the tide. He’s completely lucid, sane, controlled and morally resolute; and he’s had enough.

By the time he arrives on the scene Bruce is injured, clutching his side tightly. His breaths come slower. Alfred’s remain even. The other four heroes are positioned to cut off the exits; the Joker is covertly drawing an explosive from his pocket to make a new one. Alternatively, it’s Joker venom. Either way, he needs to act now. Nobody notices the slim figure crouched on the remnants of the floor above them. He aims his rifle.

A bullet rips through the air and likewise through the Joker’s back. He seizes up with a strangled gasp, staggers around and stares up at him uncomprehendingly. The Bats follow his gaze. Their eyes are wide and Tim is slack-jawed.

“That was for my son,” says Alfred. His voice is steel.

Batman is the Joker’s greatest enemy, but he raised Batman. Every fight; wound; ruined day; restless night; crushed hope; every loss that Bruce has suffered because of this one excuse for a man, he’s been there. And what stings most is that he knows the man is like him: too responsible. He too keeps a fathomless ocean of his loved ones’ suffering inside him. He’s witnessed Bruce barely tread its surface. He’s stood on the shore of it, helpless to prevent him drowning.

Joker sputters, “What the fuck?”

Alfred doesn’t grace him with an answer. “And these are for my grandchildren.”

Bang!

For Dick, twelve years old, unable to sleep with the sociopath’s words ringing in his head, his job no longer a wondrous adventure where the good guys always won. For his bone-white fists as he wept himself breathless at his little brother’s grave.

Bang!

For Barbara, her shriek as metal shattered bone and the future she’d planned and dreamed of in one fell swoop. For her cloudy gaze fixed on her hospital room’s ceiling, hand gripped in her father’s, an unspoken question deafening her to the world: who was she now?

Bang!

For Jason, battered and bleeding, his certainty Batman will save him turning to hope turning to ash. For the rage in his masked eyes, broken pieces sharpened into blades as he pointed a gun at his father over the idea that his pain (his love) didn’t outweigh any morals.

Bang!

For Tim, choking having given way to that terrible laughter, his hands clawing the antidote away, lost to reality. For his self-reprimands when he slapped himself awake while he poured over data, trying in vain to plot the bane of strategy’s next move.

Bang!

For Cass, hunched and haunted in the corner after her first encounter with him. For the slightest tremble in her hands as she raised them to sign, then faltered, struggling to think of a word that could convey that much pure, undiluted evil.

Bang!

For Stephanie, pale and still and utterly unlike herself on the operating table, her pulse and breathing so faint that when he’d first seen her he’d feared the worst. For how her constant smile failed to reach her eyes the next day, and he knew she also had.

Bang!

For Damian, who acted cold and fearless, who’d boasted such a ridiculous villain would give him no trouble, and suddenly found himself to be ten and horrifyingly human. For Bruce’s sullen frown far too old on him, a look of disappointment that he had innocence left to lose.

Bang!

For Duke, begging his parents through his sobs to recognize him, to even acknowledge him - he’d searched so hard, and this was how he found them? For the glistening tracks on his cheeks as he slept in the chair next to their beds, exhausted after hours of no results.

For Alfred’s family, and for Gotham, the Joker falls. He’s dead before he hits the floor. His jacket is more red than purple. Afred notes with satisfaction his dire frown, his most prized possession destroyed forever. He blows the smoke off the tip of his gun, places it gently on the ground and looks to the heroes in greeting.

“Apologies for the interruption. I thought it was time someone did away with him,” he explains calmly, “and I didn’t want it to be any of you.”

The silence lingers a moment more. Well, besides Barbara’s long, deep exhale in the comms. Jason’s helmet clunks to the floor, revealing a face like the dawning sun. Damian moves first, to stand directly in front of Alfred. His mouth twitches into a crescent of approval.

“You are now officially my favourite member of this household,” he declares.

“Much appreciated, Master Damian.”

Before he can even look away from the youngest Wayne, there’s a heavy thump on the floor next to him and his frame is enveloped in a tight hug.

Jason mutters a wet but warm, “Seconded.” When Alfred returns the hug, the young man leans deeply into it, shuddering with sobs, shedding every tear he’s kept bottled up inside since he had to live with being murdered. Good. He’s earned it. They could really all stand to let out their feelings in a non-violent manner more, Jason especially.

Jason pulls away at last, eyes indeed brimming. His arm still on his grandfather’s shoulder, they go back down the stairs. The kids have congregated around the doorway.

Alfred clears his throat. “I brought refreshments in the Batmobile.”

“Your special chocolate cookies?” Cass asks. Her form, though tired, is buoyed by relief and she wears a cautious smile. She gains no pleasure from death; quite the opposite. But their safety means everything to her.

“Why Miss Cassandra, I’m insulted you feel the need to ask.”

Bruce hasn’t moved. He is a statue, expressionless and limp with blank eyes. Alfred gently squeezes his hand. “It’s okay, Bruce. It’s over,” he says softly.

That melts him out of his numbness, but doesn’t quell the storm that froze him.

“This is Gotham. It’s never over.”

(He’s right. Villains will swarm to fill the power vacuum. The streets will soon be no less dangerous. Perhaps without the Joker’s threat to provide a common enemy and his iron grip on his lion’s share of territory, criminal activity will even get worse in the immediate aftermath. Gotham is still rotten and fragmented. Its people will still be forced to live in fear.

Yet… a monster is dead. One reign of terror has ended. His family’s darkest demon can hurt them no more. And they all deserve a celebration, not to mention a rest.)

“True. But he’s gone and we’re here. So let’s go home.”

Bruce’s brooding face softens. He sighs and nods, and for now that is enough.

The death will be a mystery eternally unsolved, an act of providence. Well, that or Jason could take the credit. Every criminal will certainly be clamouring to. Bruce leads the way with brisk strides; then Jason, practically with a skip in his step; Damian, who takes care to kick the corpse hard on his way past; Cass and Tim hand in hand; and Alfred bringing up the rear, not sparing the body another glance. The kids banter and bicker like normal the whole drive home.

It’s over. By Gotham standards, it’s okay.

751 notes · View notes