IN DARKEST LIGHT

By Meljean Brook ([email protected])

Disclaimers: This is a work of fiction, for which I am making no money, nor receiving any other form of compensation. I do not own the characters herein, nor claim to own them. All characters, representations, and likenesses are owned by DC Comics and Warner Bros.

Chapter 2: The Jungle

Batman shifted his weight to his right leg to keep his left foot from going numb. He glanced at Batgirl, briefly envying her easy posture before returning his attention to the scene below. Four men sat around a table counting money. A fifth stood by the door as sentry; two more were in an enclosed office. The room was open and well-lighted, making it almost impossible to take the men out one by one; he and Batgirl would have to make one concerted effort and take down the men in the room as quickly as possible before the two in the office came out, guns blasting. Normally, Batman would not hesitate this long. It was usually easy, especially with Batgirl's help, to have men in the open disabled before anyone in another room was even aware they were under attack; in this case, however, one of the men, David George, was metahuman.

Batman ran the scenario through his head several times: Batgirl takes out the sentry then the three non-powered men while he goes after the metahuman, trying to knock out George chemically at first, but if his metabolism processes the depressant too fast, Batman has to fight George, whose strength and speed far exceed his own. Batman doesn't underestimate his own talents--he's fought metahumans and won many times--but doesn't like to physically engage a metahuman in a fight if he can help it, especially when that metahuman is backed up by two men with guns who enjoy the cover of an enclosed room.

Batman didn't like the odds. Even with Batgirl's amazing talent to help him, fighting David George involved taking on a metahuman whose abilities weren't well-documented and whose known history--which consisted of one double murder during a bank heist earlier that day--was spotty at best. It was a wild card he didn't need.

A change in the shadows to his right caught his eye even as Batgirl pointed at the movement. And here is another unneeded wild card, he thought. He changed his lenses to night vision so that he could see into the gloom of the rafters. A Bat costume? One of his, he noted immediately. Female form, long black braid.

Diana.

She ran silently along the wooden beams on the opposite side of the warehouse ceiling from where he and Batgirl waited, vaulted over a pipe, and then crouched in a corner, out of the sight of the men below. Batman frowned. Wonder Woman didn't move like that. Diana ran boldly, with purpose and efficiency, like a warrior into battle. This woman's movements were subtle, almost feline in their stealth.

He knew Batgirl had seen Wonder Woman in New York when Circe had enchanted Manhattan, and she could identify her with a glance. Batgirl had an uncanny ability to read the movements of another person; that ability also allowed her to identify a person by their movements, even if they were in disguise. He turned to Batgirl and whispered the name, "Diana? Wonder Woman?"

Batgirl nodded. He noticed that one of the men below had changed position without him being aware of it.

Diana. She had distracted his thoughts all evening in the cave; now she was distracting him in person on patrol.

Batman wanted to swear, but instead forced himself to consider how her arrival could benefit their operation. Aside from his own circle of Robin, Nightwing, and Oracle, there was no one in the world--maybe Superman--that he trusted more than Diana. He could count on her to help him with George, even though what he wanted to do was tear a verbal strip out of her for wearing his costume and daring to come to his aid. In his city.

He patched himself through to the receiver in the ears of the cowl she was wearing. "I told you to stay out of Gotham, Princess."

He could almost hear the smile in her voice when she said, "You invited me to the cave, you are the one who left George's stats up on the screen, and you know my personality; it doesn't take the World's Greatest Detective to know that I would come here. Count yourself lucky I changed costumes and am doing it on your terms."

Bruce frowned. She was right--and he didn't like it.

"And don't call me 'Princess.'" He almost smiled at that. He hadn't forgotten she'd given up her title, of course; he had known it would irritate her. She was so predictable.

He frowned again. She hadn't been predictable in the JLA kitchen earlier. Neither had he. But they'd deal with that later.

"Diana, you cover the two in the office; they've got guns. Batgirl will take out the guard and the three non-metas around the table--they are armed, too. I'll hit George with the narcazine. Hopefully he'll go down. If not, I take Diana's place, and Diana, you take out George, as quickly and cleanly as possible. Batgirl, you back me up and take care of any unexpecteds. On my mark."

He threw three batarangs, destroying the fluorescent light tubes over the table. One second. He dropped to the floor behind George; Batgirl had already taken out the sentry and was on the men at the table before they could stand up. Two seconds. Batman broke the vial of narcazine under George's nose as the meta stood, and heard Diana's murmur of astonishment over the transmitter as Batgirl took down the three men with a fist, foot and final backward kick. Three seconds. George swayed. Batman heard shouts from inside the office. Four seconds. George fell to his knees, then onto his face. Five seconds. Silence now from inside the office.

Batman turned to watch Diana, who cocked her head as if listening to the men inside. "I'm going up," she said, and he watched as she lifted herself to the low roof of the office, sliding along the top on her hands and knees. She stood when she reached the middle, her head inches from the rafters, then fell through the roof. He realized she must have put enough downward pressure on the roof to cave it in, probably taking out the light fixtures in the process. There were yells from inside, a shot, and two distinct thuds. At Batman's feet, George stirred. Bruce flipped backwards just as the man's beefy hand closed on the air where his legs had been. George was on his feet in an instant; Batman got another vial ready, but wasn't sure he'd have the chance to get it close enough. "Diana," was all he was able to say before George hit him, knocking him backward through the door of the office. Underestimated his speed, Batman thought. Knocked on my ass--humiliating.

He felt the brush of Diana's cape as she left the office. From his perspective on the ground, she looked taller than normal--no, he realized as she drew close to George, she was floating about twelve inches above the floor, the cape hiding the fact that her feet weren't touching the ground. George tried to hit her; she caught his fist mid-swing. She bent over him; Batman didn't think that George could see anything in the dim light other than a menacing shadow coming closer and closer to his face.

Diana--closely imitating his own voice, Batman realized--said, "You murdered two people in my city. Never again." She slammed her fist into George's chin; he flew backwards and hit the ground. Diana settled to the ground and walked to his prone form, bending to examine him. "He's out," she announced in her own voice.

Standing in the shattered office doorway, Batman contacted Alfred. "Call GCPD and have them bring their reinforced wagon to pick up George and six others at this address."

"Very well, sir. Did Miss Diana find you?"

"She's here."

"Very good, sir. I hope she was able to offer assistance." Alfred paused. "Were you aware, sir, that the Bat-signal has been lit?"

Batman looked up at the ceiling automatically. No skylight to confirm the Bat-signal. "How long ago?"

"Only a few minutes."

"Thank you, Alfred. I'll be back later."

"Good luck, sir."

Batman broke the connection and looked at Diana. She was shaking hands with Batgirl; Bruce imagined that under her mask Cassandra's face was probably filled with adoration, not unlike Dick's had been the first time he'd met Superman.

"I would love to learn some of your techniques," Diana was telling her as Bruce bent to snap titanium cuffs around George's wrists. Batgirl nodded, then shrugged, pointing at Batman. It's his decision, her gestures said. Diana glanced at Bruce. "What do you think?"

"Batgirl, cuff the others." He tossed her some plastic quick-tites. She quickly complied. "I didn’t know you did impressions, Diana," he said when Batgirl was out of earshot.

"Kal taught me." Batman saw the flash of her teeth in the dark. "’Precise muscle control,’" she quoted in Clark’s voice, then switched back to her own. "I’ve never practiced yours, so it’s a little rusty. It'll be a neat trick at JLA parties." Her grin widened.

"Keep not practicing it." Batman reached forward and tugged the locator out of Diana’s belt, then punched a few buttons. "I’m resetting this to locate the Batmobile. I need to you stay here with George until the PD arrives, then meet me at the car. No flying, no powers. If you have to, walk." He gave her the instrument, turned to go, then said over his shoulder, "Stay out of sight of the police when they get here."

"I’ll skulk in a corner, let a detective talk to me, then when he looks away for a brief second I’ll disappear, leaving him scratching his head in wonder." Batman could hear the smile in her voice. Her current cheerfulness was almost as distracting as the memory of what they had done earlier that day, and how she had felt. So, he ignored it.

"Good. Batgirl, when you are done here, go patrol east-side. Keep in touch through Oracle."

***

Wonder Woman crouched on a gargoyle, looking out over the city. She could see the Batmobile below her; Batman was nowhere in sight. The police had arrived at the warehouse quickly; an unconscious George had posed no problem to them. After allowing them a shadowing glimpse of her on the rooftop, she sped away. She hoped she was an imposing a figure to them as Bruce seemed to be.

That was power, she thought. Fear. Not the kind she could instill with her fists and strength, but the type of fear that made men stay at home instead of selling dope on corners. Not a fear of death—she knew that she inspired that kind of fear in some people; they looked at what she could do and imagined her crushing them, killing them with her powers. No, the criminals in Gotham had a fear of justice, that if they were unjust they would be caught and punished; if not by the law, then by The Batman. And it worked for him.

She, on the other hand, had been trying for years to instill a love of peace to the world without much success. And she was starting to wonder if people weren’t swayed by love, but by fear and hate.

Diana watched as, below, a woman walking down the street was pushed into an alley by a much larger man. She heard a short scream, quickly muffled. She started to fly down, then stopped herself. She would continue to play by his rules tonight. Pulling a grappling hook from her belt, she aimed it at an outcropping on a lower building. It wedged firmly around the ledge; she smiled. It wasn’t much different than her lasso. She swung into the air, fighting her urge to control her descent, and for a moment felt the unfamiliar panic of freefall. Her swing reached its downward arc, and she let go of the rope, exhilarated by that instant of fear, landing silently on the sidewalk next to the alley. It was dim, but not dim enough, she thought. She would make this quick, no theatrics, so that the man and woman would never have time to realize that the face showing beneath the mask wasn’t masculine.

Diana stepped into the alley, then stopped. The man lay facedown on the pavement, and the woman was holding her shoe in her hand. She looked over at Diana. Fright and pride warred on her features. "I did it! Just like in my self-defense class; and Jerry had said they were a waste of time. Ha ha. I just thought, 'What would Batman do?' even though I really don't believe in you, but here you are." She stopped to catch a breath. "And I was so afraid, but I guess it was like those grandmother-picking-the-car-up-off-the-grandson things. One whack! and that was all she wrote." She began laughing hysterically.

Diana cuffed the unconscious man, checked his vitals, and said, "He should stay out until the police arrive. Do you have a phone?" Shaking and holding her sides in her laughter, the woman nodded. "Call the police."

"Oh-Okay." The woman rummaged through her purse, trying to calm herself. She pulled out her cell phone triumphantly after a few moments; the alley was empty except for her attempted rapist and her. She looked up and down the alley, then ran to the corner to look up and down the deserted street. "Holy shit," she said finally.

Back on the gargoyle, Diana drew her cape tightly around herself, trying to dispel a cold that had settled deep within her. But it wouldn't be warmed, she acknowledged, because it wasn't physical. The police arrived at the alley, their lights flashing garish red, white and blue over the gothic facade of the buildings. Her own colors; here in Gotham, they were out of place. The black costume she wore now was the perfect reflection of the city, and the people of Gotham responded to it.

Diana traced back through her memories; she could remember several women mentioning how she had inspired them, but only to a small extent. Some women left their abusive husbands, or they stood up for themselves at a male dominated workplace--Diana recognized the value of that for the individual woman, but she had always hoped for more. That men and women would join her cause and act in the name of peace and love, instead of waiting for Wonder Woman to do it all for them. And Batman, he had inspired action from an outmatched woman who hadn't even known that he was anything more than an urban legend. Wonder Woman was a public presence--a reality--and she couldn't generate that kind of action, no matter how many speeches she made, supervillians she fought or TV shows she appeared in, espousing her message. What was she doing wrong?

Diana barely kept herself from jumping when Batman appeared beside her. "Let's go, Princess." She curled her lip at the name but didn't say anything; instead, she followed him over the rooftop and swung down to the Batmobile. The top slid open and she climbed into the passenger seat.

"Back to the cave?" she asked.

He didn't spare her a glance as he reversed the car. "No. We are going to pay a doctor a visit first."

Diana bit her lip, wondering how to phrase her reply, before finally saying, "Bruce, I don't think that is necessary. I won't become pregnant."

His head whipped around and he slammed on the brakes. The tires screeched. Diana could see the horror and surprise in his eyes, and in the expression on his face beneath the line of his mask. His voice hoarse, he said, "No, that's not what I--" He shook his head. Diana watched in fascination as he composed himself, became The Bat once more. He put the Batmobile into gear once more.

"The Joker escaped tonight, and his last visitor was a Dr. Kaeklis. Gotham PD has tried to question him about what he told the Joker, but he is claiming doctor-patient confidentiality. We are going to get some answers out of him."

"What if he won't talk?"

Batman smiled grimly. "That's why you are here. If I have to administer a truth serum, he might be disoriented enough to only speak his native language--Greek."

The buildings seemed to fly by outside the car, a collage of gothic architecture and modern sparity. Diana was struck again by how alien this place felt to her. "Your ethics are questionable, but when it comes to the Joker..." Her voice trailed off.

"Exactly."

***

After remotely commanding his computers to sweep for transactions involving the Joker's usual aliases, Batman cast a sidelong glance at the woman beside him. It had been five minutes since Diana had last spoken. She had pushed back her mask and he could see her face clearly; she was gazing blankly out of the passenger window.

She was brooding, he could tell; he usually had a monopoly on that. It didn't exactly make him nervous, but he couldn't ignore the fact that the one and only other time he had seen her brood, six hours later she had thrown a piece of granite at his head and put him an escape pod headed for the asteroid belt so that she could die in place of the JLA. It was probably better to find out now, he thought, what was going on in her head. He didn't think it was their sexual encounter in the kitchen. He wasn't sure he wanted to talk about that yet anyway, so he started out on a safe topic--the Joker.

"More often than not I break a few ethical rules when dealing with the Joker," he said abruptly.

Diana's eyes narrowed. "You never start conversations."

"I am a man of surprises." He ignored her disbelieving snort. Then her eyes widened, and he knew she was thinking of what happened in the Watchtower and how *that* must have surprised her, so he hastily continued. "I am simply stating that in times of life or death circumstances, ethical considerations are by necessity often thrown out the door. The path that you followed when confronting that dragon wasn't exactly black and white. You betrayed and deceived every one of your friends."

"I'd do it again in a heartbeat," she replied, her face serious. "It broke my heart to do it, but if it saved your lives, I wouldn't hesitate to do it again." She paused. "It did make me, however, more sympathetic to your situation when you devised ways to take out every JLA member. What I did, I did to keep all of you from dying. What you did was plan a way to save the world from us."

She added quietly, "I'm not sure there is a difference between the two anymore."

He frowned. "What do you mean?"

"I'm not sure." She waved a hand in the air as if whatever she wanted to say she could grab out of thin air and hold on to. Batman didn't think he had ever seen her at such a loss for words. "I think...I think I can't help but wonder if the world does need saving from us. We have good intentions, but are we doing more harm than good?" She leaned her head back against the headrest and closed her eyes, as if she was very tired. "How many years have I been in Man's World? How long has Kal been here? Are we just making the problem worse by letting the people of the world rely on us?"

"Yes," Batman said as he pulled to a stop behind an apartment complex. "And no. And it's not just you and Clark, you know."

"I know, but we are considered the symbols, the epitome of the powered hero." She grinned ruefully. "That sounds incredibly conceited."

Batman shrugged and opened the car. "It's true." He got out. "We're here."

Diana pulled the mask forward over her face. "So I gathered," she said dryly, and climbed out.

"He's in one of the penthouses."

Diana tilted her neck back, looking up at the building. It was smooth glass and steel. "On what do we fasten our ropes?"

"We are in a hurry. We'll fly." He stepped close to Diana and put his arm around her waist. She immediately lifted them, sliding smoothly through the air. He gave himself a brief moment to enjoy the feel of her taut muscles under his own, then tried to stop feeling when he realized that enjoyment was quickly turning to lust.

"This is cheating," he heard Diana mutter. He didn't know if she was talking about the flying or the physical contact. He forcefully pushed every thought not concerning the Joker and his escape out of his mind: Gotham couldn't afford for him to be distracted by sexual urges.

"His is the second balcony from the top."

Diana set him down easily on the landing. He immediately moved to the shadows and motioned for her to follow him. Kaeklis lived alone; hopefully, he wouldn't have company tonight--it would make this easier.

"I can hear snoring from out here." Diana said. Batman nodded; snoring was a good sign.

He picked the lock on the French doors, then slipped inside. Diana trailed him, as silent as he had been. At the bedroom, he signaled for her to stay outside. He listened at the door--light snoring, as Diana had said. He turned the doorknob, pushed the door open, heard a click, took in the scene with a glance. He turned and ran back to the balcony, trusting that Diana would follow him, and that she would catch him when he dove from the edge. She caught him two stories down, knocking the breath from him; above, the penthouse exploded.

Diana dropped him unceremoniously to the ground, glass and burning debris raining down on them. "I’m going back up," she shouted, then flew back into the smoke and flames.

***

"Just a few singed hairs, Alfred," Diana was saying as Bruce came out of the changing room. "The fire exploded outwards instead of upwards, luckily. There were only a few flames when I reached the families in the apartments above and below."

Bruce caught the glance his butler threw his way. "She has a bunch of glass in her back that needs to be cleaned out, Alfred."

Diana glared at him. "I’m a fast healer."

"Miss, if I may say, your healing abilities seem to be reduced lately." Alfred looked pointedly at the faint scars over Diana’s eye that had been deep scratches three weeks ago. They all knew there shouldn’t have been any sign of them.

"But those are because the Cheetah is a magical being…" Diana started to argue, then stopped as Bruce shook his head slightly.

"It’s no use, Diana. Submit to him now, or he’ll force you to later, with much unpleasantness."

Diana looked between his amused face and Alfred’s unyielding one. "Very well."

Batman turned to his computers as Diana slid off the top of the Bat-costume. He began running a search for laboratories connected with Dr. Kaeklis’ medical practice.

"What was in the room that tipped you off, besides the click when you opened the door?"

He looked back at her. She was facedown on the med table, Alfred working on her back with a small sponge and a pair of tweezers. Her ribs were taped—Batman didn’t remember them being taped earlier, and briefly wondered what had happened between the time he left her in the kitchen and she arrived in the cave—and he could see splotches of red on the tape where the glass from the explosion had acted as a projectile into her skin. She didn’t wince as Alfred probed at a particularly nasty cut.

"This one will need one or two stitches, miss."

Diana opened her mouth, then shut it. Batman smiled and turned back to his console. She had probably been going to argue about stitches, then realized the futility of it. Alfred was immovable when it came to caring for injuries properly.

"Green and purple balloons. "Die, Batsy" and "Ha Ha" written on them. Kaeklis was propped up in the bed; he’d already been administered a fatal dose of Joker venom. The snoring was coming from a tape recorder."

Diana sighed. "I should have heard the tape recorder mechanism; I just wasn’t listening close enough."

"We can’t all have atomic level hearing and x-ray vision." Bruce found the lab he was looking for, then swore. "Dammit. Kaeklis used a Luthor subsidiary. If it had been a Wayne Corp lab, this would be much simpler."

"How long will it take to sort through the files?"

He looked back at her—Alfred was sewing up one of the wounds. "With Luthor, it’s not a matter of sorting, but of access. Sorting will be relatively easy; we’ll look for tests from Kaeklis’ office in the last two weeks that are numbered differently than usual, since the inmates at Arkham use certain codes. It’s supposed to be a way of protecting their identity, but to me it is a red flag. Access, however, is completely different. Luthor is almost as security conscious as Bruce Wayne. I’ll put Oracle on that part of it." He tapped a few keys, creating a non-visual link between his computer and Barbara’s—partly to keep Diana from learning Oracle’s true identity, and partly because he didn’t want Barbara to see Diana in a Bat-costume, half naked, in the cave. He sent Barbara the data with a few more taps of the keys.

Diana said idly, "Did I ever tell you about the time in Boston when Joker squirted me with some of his venom?"

Bruce swiveled his chair around, interested. "No. I knew you had an encounter with him there, but I didn’t know he had poisoned you. That wasn’t in the file."

"It wasn’t in the file because the paralysis didn’t last more than a minute or two. I don’t think that it was supposed to be fatal; it just paralyzed me."

Bruce frowned. "I’ve seen the Flash paralyzed by that venom for nearly thirty minutes, and he process poisons faster than anyone else I know of."

Alfred stepped back from the table. "That should do it, miss. I’ll be back shortly with a robe."

Diana sat up. "Thanks, Alfred." She twisted from side to side, testing the bandages and stitches. Bruce averted his eyes. He had seen her nude before they had had sex; her costume had ripped during a battle, or it had pleased a villain to try to embarrass her with her nakedness, which never worked, much to the villain’s disgust, and he knew Diana had different ideas of modesty than most of the world—growing up on an island populated entirely by warrior females did that—but he was too aware of her physically now to pretend that he just saw her as a comrade-in-arms tonight. And it bothered him, he admitted to himself, that obviously Diana didn’t think of him as anything other than a fellow warrior, since her breasts were in full view, and she made no effort to cover herself.

He wanted her to see him, if just for a moment, as a man, and she a woman. To do so would be an indulgence; he should be investigating the Joker's escape, or at least showing her the video from the kitchen.

An indulgence, he reminded himself. But still, he let his expression change slightly. His lids lowered and his face showed some of the desire he was feeling. He didn't use playboy Bruce Wayne's lazily seductive look; Diana would never fall for that. This was The Bat, wanting what was in front of him--Diana.

"So, as I was saying, I was paralyzed," Diana continued, then looked up. Her expression froze, eyes as wide as a jacklighted doe's. A faint blush spread across her cheekbones; she looked away. "And, um..." She brought an arm up across her breasts. She glanced at his face again briefly, then focused on a point above his head. "Uh, then I left my body to dance with Pan, then came back, and the chaos of Pan's dance overwhelmed the poison, and I was free," she said in a rush.

Bruce stood and walked slowly to the med-table. Diana's eyes darted from side to side, as if looking for somewhere to go.

"That sounds . . . dangerous." He lowered his voice on the last word. He reached out, lifted her chin. She licked her lower lip nervously. He heard her breath catch, saw the same expression on her face that she had worn in the kitchen in that first wild moment, except that this time her eyes weren't glazed--she was aware of what she was doing. So was he.

An indulgence. But he knew now that he would kiss her, the lust was surging like it had before, only more clearly, hotter, so he would kiss her and then he would be inside her, on the table, finding comfort finally in a place he usually felt pain, or on his chair, where he spent most of his time solving crimes, alone, almost always alone, the chair where he had spent too many seconds, minutes, thinking about her, even before the kitchen, before tonight.

Alfred cleared his throat behind them. Batman pulled away, handed her a towel from the cart beside the table, casually, as if he had only approached the table to do that. "This should get the rest of the soot off of your face." Indulgence over. Time to focus on work.

Diana glanced at Alfred, accepting the towel. She cleared her throat. "Thank you." She scrubbed her face with the towel for a moment; by the time she was done, her face was composed, serene. Alfred gave her a robe, which she slipped on. She continued their conversation as if nothing had happened. "It wasn't dangerous to leave to go to Pan--indeed, it would probably have been disastrous had I stayed paralyzed. It wasn't like going to the Underworld or a demon dimension; Pan lives in a place untouched by outside influence, so there's little danger of the spirit being damaged while it is outside of the body."

"Actually, I meant embracing chaos." Bruce slipped the security disc from the Watchtower into the computer.

"Then it probably was a little dangerous."

Bruce lifted his left eyebrow. "Why? What happened then?"

She shrugged. "It worked out for the best. I told him some jokes, electrocuted myself on a light socket, then lit a fuse on his bomb." She grinned. "I told him the fuse was from my Wonder Utility Belt."

Bruce laughed; behind him, he heard Alfred's soft chuckle.

Diana smiled, then said thoughtfully. "Of course, the hard part was repressing the chaos after that. It's still in me, just not as immediate or as powerful." She yawned. The clock read four-thirty. "How do you manage to stay awake so late every night?"

Bruce replied, only half-seriously, "I have a playboy reputation to protect. Stay awake all night, sleep all day, be late for meetings, and the like." He tapped a few buttons on the keyboard, calling up video from the security disc. He glanced at Alfred, signaled that he and Diana needed privacy.

Alfred nodded slightly. "I'll bring you some coffee, miss," the butler said, then went back up to the main house.

Batman waved her over to the console, determined to keep his hands off of her. The indulgence is over, he reminded himself. There is only this case. But he was still hyper-aware of her movements, her scent, her voice. "This is why I called you down here."

"When was this?" She was looking at the stilled image on the oversized screen. Her sister, Donna, Nightwing, the Flash, and some other Titans were gathered around the table.

"Thirty-two days ago." Batman pointed at Troia. "Watch your sister."

He pushed a button. The video began to play. Onscreen, Donna got up from her seat, walked to the refrigerator. She opened the freezer, pulled out a half-gallon of ice cream. At the table, Arsenal and the Flash began a heated argument about cow's milk versus goat's milk, capturing the amused attention of the rest of the Titans.

"Here it is," Batman said. Donna pulled something from a small pocket on her uniform, threw it on the ice cream bucket and into the freezer. Her mouth moved slightly. She placed the bucket back into the freezer compartment.

Diana's brow furrowed. "I think she just cast a spell."

Batman nodded. "That is what I thought. Interestingly, throughout the tape it shows the Green Lantern going to the freezer for ice cream one hundred and seven times."

"Why would she--" Diana shook her head. "Never mind about that right now. She's off-planet, we can't ask until she makes it back here."

"I know. Helping the S'Edput colonizers rescue some of their miners. Five miles underground, out of transmission range." He pulled up another file from the disc. The two of them earlier that day. "I've heard estimates of at least another one and half to two weeks before they return."

Drumming her fingernails on the console, Diana said, "Yes, that's right. There's got to be a way to figure out what the spell was before that, though."

On the monitor, Diana leans against the counter next to the fridge, eating a pomegranate, carefully taking the seeds off, one by one, then popping them into her mouth. Batman enters the room, heading directly to the fridge for water.

Diana greets him, then mentions the Wayne Foundation auction and fundraiser at which she is slated to speak in two weeks.

She asks him, "Do you have your date lined up yet?"

"Yes." He looks into the fridge, frowns. "The water is gone."

"Wally just drank it all. Try the sink," Diana says.

"Why?"

"Because he was thirsty, and because there is water in the tap."

The camera caught Batman's long-suffering look. "Why do you ask about the date?"

Diana sighs. "Mine just turned me down."

"Funny." Batman says, filling a glass. "Count yourself lucky. Bruce Wayne is obliged to try to seduce all of his dates. On a date with Wonder Woman, not only would they film every second of the seduction, the paparazzi would follow us into the bedroom."

"Do you actually seduce them?" Diana looks horrified by the thought. "ALL of them?"

"No. Too many scars for them to ask questions about." Batman opens the freezer, looking for ice. "Usually Wayne just kisses and fondles, then slips them something harmless so that they think that something happened but they won't remember, or he tells them that something isn't working."

Diana chuckles. "So that is where those rumors started."

"What rumors?" Batman looks at her sharply. He jerks an ice cube tray from the back of the freezer; several ice cream cartons start to wobble.

"That Bruce Wayne--" Diana puts out her hand to catch a carton as it threatens to fall, "--isn't interested in women. That he can't do the deed. I read it in a tabloid, I think." She replaces the carton in the freezer; Batman sticks the tray back; their hands--his gloved, hers bare--touching in the process. Their expressions and postures suddenly change.

"I can do the deed, Diana," Batman says, pulling her close. She wraps her arms around his neck, lifts herself into his kiss.

In the cave, Batman stilled the video. The tension between them was palpable. Determined to remain on track, Batman ignored Diana's quick, heavy breathing, ignored his own urge to throw her down and re-enact the scene that had been about to take place onscreen

"As you can see," he said, "there was a significant change when we made contact with the ice cream cartons and/or the freezer."

"Yes," Diana whispered. She said at a normal volume, "You lip read. Is there a way that we can find out what she said in the spell?"

"I've had the computers working on isolating her voice from the rest of the video, but I don't think she said it out loud." Batman made a few adjustments on his computer. "We might be able to, at least somewhat, determine what she said. The problem is that her profile is to the camera."

"Can it recreate her face in a 3-D model?"

"That might work. It'll take me a few minutes."

Diana wandered around the cave while Bruce worked; he was thankful for that--it was easier to concentrate when she wasn't within arms reach.

"I've got it," he said after ten minutes.

Diana returned to the console station. He played the computer generated model of her mouth movements, and he realized almost immediately that it wasn't English, and told Diana.

"Between the two of us, however, I'm sure that we know enough languages that we can do this," he added.

He began sounding out the words. Diana leaned in closer to him, listening carefully.

"It's Greek," she announced. She picked up a pencil and starting writing what Donna had said. They went through it three times--some of the words they simply could not identify with certainty. Lip reading did not provide perfect phonetic translation.

She read, "By the gods of Olympus, I entreat that desire suppressed, want not wanted, shall be--this isn't clear here, it sounds like both 'enacted on' and 'horseflies.'" She grinned. "I think it is 'enacted on'--enacted on, until--and I'm not sure about this, either, but I think it is--the object is destroyed." Diana sighed. "I'm pretty sure that we missed a few words in there."

Batman nodded. "She was whispering, so she wasn't enunciating and using her mouth as precisely as someone speaking at a normal tone would. We were bound to miss a few." He hesitated before adding, "It's pretty clear what the spell was, though. 'Want not wanted.' For me, I've always had a thing for unattainable brunettes: Selina, Talia. I suppose it's my way of punishing myself for surviving when my parents didn't. Wanting what I could never have. Up there, that must have been you." He was only partially lying; he didn't think that Diana would pick up the lies--she was too distracted, shaken.

He saw the brief flash of hurt in her eyes and suppressed the niggling of guilt it caused. She said, "And for me--well, I've been feeling a little lonely lately, and my date had just turned me down, and I think that I just wanted that physical comfort that a man's touch could bring me."

Batman bit back a snort of laughter. She was a terrible liar. At least his lie fit in with his personality, so that it was plausible. The idea that Diana would crave a man's touch because she was lonely and depressed was ludicrous. He wondered why she thought he would believe it. And what was she lying about to hide?

"Well," Diana said, looking desperately toward the transporter. "I can go destroy the fridge. The middle of a volcano should do it."

"'Destroy the object'? Good idea." Batman watched as she grabbed her uniform from a counter and hurried to the changing room. He smiled when she closed the door. Diana, modest in front of him? It seemed that she was aware of him now, in a way she hadn't previously been. It used to be, she would have stripped down and changed right there.

He suddenly scowled. He shouldn't be taking pleasure in this, he thought. She was going to go to the Watchtower, destroy the freezer, and it would be over.

It seemed too easy, though.

Wonder Woman emerged in her uniform a minute later. He had returned to the Joker file, searching for signs of unusual activity before the escape.

"Will you consider letting me train a few times with Batgirl?"

Swinging his chair around to face her, Batman shook his head. "I don't think so."

He was relieved when she didn't argue. Batgirl would probably have benefited from training with a powered individual, especially a warrior as skilled as Diana; he just wanted to limit his own contact with Diana for a while.

She entered the transporter, punched the coordinates for the JLA tower. She met his eyes for the first time since their contact on the med-table, and said wistfully, "It may be the spell talking, but I almost regret destroying the fridge. It was a great night, Bruce. All of it. And if things were different, if things would work, I would love to do it all again." She smiled wickedly. "Especially the sex."

She vanished with a buzz of electrified air molecules, leaving Batman in his cave, his mouth open, expression astounded.

When that woman was honest, he thought, she was REALLY honest.

***

Great Hera, are you stupid? Diana raged at herself as she strode down the corridor toward the Watchtower's kitchen. As priceless as his expression had been . . . she shook her head. How would she look at him at the next JLA meeting?

It was the spell, she reminded herself. Just the spell.

In the kitchen, she tore the refrigerator from the wall, said hello to an amused Martian Manhunter, who was eating cereal at the table, and carried it back down the corridor to the transporter. She sent it to the center of Mt. Vesuvius.

She opened a link to the Green Lantern. "GL, are you awake?"

Kyle, his hair mussed and eyes sleepy, appeared on the monitor. "Wonder Woman?"

"Kyle, do you still want ice cream?"

He looked confused. "What? No." Then, more happily, "No! Whoo hoo! My craving's gone!"

Diana frowned. Hers wasn't.

***

Bruce spent two restless nights, thoughts of Diana plaguing both his dreams and waking moments. Destroying the refrigerator hadn't worked; avoiding her wasn't working. GL had been released, though.

Batman had been through the video several times, but couldn't find anything. His investigation into Joker's escape was going nowhere, too. The clown simply wasn't making appearances anywhere. He told himself to concentrate on his work, to forget her. It hadn't worked.

And he wanted to see her.

He told himself that he was simply worried; her behavior had been, of late, slightly erratic. Their conversation that night in the Bat-mobile had betrayed a shifting in Diana's beliefs, and doubt in her mission. He told himself that he was simply going to keep an eye on her until he was sure that she didn't pose a danger to herself or anybody else.

With Batgirl as an unwitting chaperone.

He could tell Diana was surprised that he had contacted her. She looked distracted, uncertain of how to act. Wondering if she was having the same problem getting him off her mind as he had thinking about anything but her, he said, "I'm sending you an address. It's a sewer entrance, and a map will be there. Four o'clock."

"Why?"

"To train with Batgirl."

He saw the sudden excitement in her eyes; despite himself, he hoped that a little bit of it was in anticipation of seeing him. "Then we will patrol. Seeing her techniques is useless unless you see her in action."

"Thank you, Batman. You won't regret it." She switched the monitor off.

"I hope I won't, too," he said to himself, his words echoing in the depths of the cave.