Hindsight
A Justice League fanfic by Aisling Yinyr Ngaio

He was watching him again. This was the third time he'd caught him watching. He didn't look quite so often at him when she was around – his attentions were on her then. But after she'd vanished into thin air, after that first heartbreaking moment, it was he the old man kept track of, as if afraid that he'd disappear as well.

He watched as the other man pondered, debated, then finally, about ten minutes after they'd finished their "interrogation", approached him. But his opening line perplexed him. "Seems really silly now, aren't they?"

"Excuse me?"

The old man smiled, a sad regretful smile with a wealth of bitterness behind it.

"Number one, Green Arrow and Black Canary, Question and Huntress, and now as you see, Green Lantern and Hawkgirl."

"What about them? I thought you of all people should know not to cause a time paradox."

The old man smirked instead. "No paradox, as it is happening during your time. We're intelligent. Figure it out. Number two..."

Batman's brain finally caught up with what his older self was trying to say, and only barely caught his mouth from hanging open. "This is no time to-"

"NUMBER TWO!" Old Bruce thundered back. "Because we never have the time until there's nothing but time on our side!" The last statement was delivered with a Batglare only Alfred could've topped. Uncharacteristically, Batman fell silent.

Bruce softened a little, but continued. "Number two, it turns out she didn't outlive me, but I outlived her. Ironic, isn't it, that knowing what was done to her everytime someone like Mongul, or one of Toyman's machines, appear on the scene, we still think that eventually she will be the one to outlive us? When we are just mere mortals and more expendable, and on top of that so very self-sacrificing?"

His lips thinned. "That could just be due to Chronos. How would you know that in the unpolluted timeline, she'd..."

"That was just my point. She won't live forever, not in the way we imagined. It could be today, or tomorrow. Even if we set the timestream to right, who is to say that she won't die during our lifetime? You know her as well as I do. She's an Amazon through and through. Fighting is the only way she knows how to achieve peace. She's not immortal, Batman. We were all wrong about that. She's perpetually youthful, but it does means that she can be killed."

There was a moment of silence between the two, as the older looked meaningfully at the younger, while he pondered on all the older man had said. "And my – our – issues? If we'd let her in, we'd risk losing ourselves. What about Gotham?"

Bruce chuckled cynically. "What about it? Fifty years into the future and Gotham still needs a Batman. Doesn't mean what we did was nothing, but it doesn't have to take over your entire life, because despite the sacrifice Gotham will still be..." He waved to encompass the surroundings. "Besides, she's the only one who would understand. She never did fully embrace the precepts of Man's World, including the family way. She is a warrior born, Batman. All her family on Themyscira are. She is the only one who would understand this way of life. And as for number three..."

Here, Bruce lapsed into silence, averting his gaze to his successor for a moment, then turned back to Batman, paused, and continued, this time with a wary undertone. "I do not know if I should say this, so it's best I do not give any specifics. But I truly believe she would be a match against our rogue gallery. Do not forget she's endowed with the wisdom of Athena, along with the strength of Demeter, and though she does have a temper hotter than Hades," they shared a brief smirk, "there will come a time where you will be glad to have her by your side. Along with the many who are there already. Or are you saying our enemies will only try to get to us through her?"

Batman considered the unsolicited advice, but he couldn't resist jabbing, "You've gone soft, old man. If I didn't see you do the timestream analysis with my own eyes, I wouldn't believe that you were me. I haven't been like this since-"

"Indeed." The bitterness was back. "That, I suppose, is the benefit of hindsight. We always spent so much time filing post-patrol reports that we'd forgotten to do the same to ourselves. It's easier not to think about it so we didn't." Here he leaned in meaningfully to Batman. "Perhaps we should have."

Turning away, signalling the end of the conversation, Bruce limped away slowly. When he was almost reaching John's group, Batman said softly to his retreating back, "Time paradox, Bruce? Meddling with the most dangerous concept in the universe? Is she really worth it?"

Without missing a step, the older man answered, "I've had twenty years to do nothing but think, Batman, and all I know is that if you don't try to forge a new path like we did when our parents died, things will remain the same as before, we'll fight until we can't fight any longer, and what then?"

He stopped, took a deep breath, and needing to make his younger self understand, faced him and demanded, "Tell the truth, Bruce. Did you feel any less when she disappeared, merely because you refused to let her in?" When Batman maintained his stony, stoic slience, Bruce nodded wearily. "Feelings aren't like logic gates. You can't just flip them on and off to suit yourself. You are just doing you both a disservice by ignoring something which is already there. After all, you never told her you weren't interested, did you?"

Continuing on his way after his last salvo, he considered, then threw over his shoulder without being asked, "She was faithful. To us. Even after I... eventually... left for good. Even when we never began. To my knowledge, she did not..." The knuckles holding his cane were almost white as he paused on hs way to control his emotions before looking at Batman once again. But there were no words left to say. He'd done his part. He only hope...

Time to deal with Chronos.

- Finis -