Icon from a picrew by grgikau. Call me Tir or Julian. 37. He/They. Queer. Twitter: @tirlaeyn. ao3: tirlaeyn. 18+ Only. Star Trek. Sandman. IwtV. OMFD. Definitionless in this Strict Atmosphere.
In The Batman movie, Bruce Wayne is around 30 years old. If we assume he’s 30 as of when the movie takes place (assumed to be 2021), and that his birthday is still February 19th, this means that Bruce Wayne’s parents died in 1997. In 2001, when Bruce was 12, My Chemical Romance formed. In 2004, they would release the hit album Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge, which solidified them as popular band of the day. Bruce Wayne, a 15 year old struggling with his trauma, would have at this time been the perfect candidate for an MCR fan. We can see influences of the band in him, particularly his eyeshadow. In this essay, I will-
(L O O K i know this is not even remotely a response to the prompt of ‘bruce wayne gets railed by huge demon dicks’ but also you are all terrible sinners and this is quite frankly a best-case scenario)
It was easy to follow the path of the ratty brown trenchcoat traveling through tuxedos and gowns.
“Wayne! What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”
Bruce had been watching him stomp his way up the stairs, and had made no effort to meet him, standing and sipping at his champagne. “John!” he greeted, too cheerful to ever be genuine. “Glad to see you got your invitation.”
“Yes, I know I wasn’t — what?” Constantine stopped in his tracks with a frown. “What invitation?”
“Your invitation,” Bruce said, gesturing to all assembled. “To the party. Which I assume you accepted, since you’re here. I knew you’d have to show up to one of them, eventually.”
“I don’t…”
The facts were these:
Bruce Wayne had apparently invited John Constantine to a party despite having no reason to believe it was necessary or desired.
‘One of them, eventually’ suggested that he had invited John to many such parties.
A party was often the easiest time to find and corner Bruce Wayne, when he couldn’t go handcuffing anyone to anything with ridiculous bat-shaped handcuffs.
John never expected or waited for invitations to parties.
Bruce could not possibly have been monitoring John’s activities closely enough to know when he ought to invite him to a party.
Therefore:
Bruce Wayne had been sending John Constantine invitations to every party he had thrown in the last six years, for the express purpose of ensuring that John could never have the satisfaction of crashing a posh party uninvited.
The pull at the corner of Bruce’s mouth suggested that he knew that John knew what Bruce had done, and this knowledge of his knowledge pleased him inordinately. He sipped at his champagne.
“Do you know who it is that you were just flirting with?” Constantine asked, returning to his original reason for talking to the man at all.
Bruce’s eyebrow only barely moved higher than the other. “I don’t know that I would say that I was flirting, necessarily,” Bruce said.
“Oh, I know what you look like when you’re flirting,” John reminded him, and Bruce’s eyes flitted away back over the crowd. “You were flirting.” Bruce shrugged. “Did you even catch his name?”
The corners of Bruce’s mouth turned ever-so-slightly downward, a twitch in his brow that wasn’t a furrow. His champagne flute drifted away from his mouth. “I don’t think I did,” he said, and this admission of his oversight was said with the awestruck manner that most people reserved for a glimpse of the divine.
Appropriately enough.
“You’ve been flirting with the Devil,” Constantine informed him, in as blunt of terms as he could manage.
“I don’t see what that has to do with anything,” Bruce said. “I haven’t seen Talia in months.”
John huffed, grabbing Bruce by the arm and pulling him toward the railing overlooking the ballroom. “Not the metaphorical devil,” he said. “I mean Lucifer, the Fallen, Prince of Lies, the Dark Lord Satan. You have been flirting with the King of Hell.” He gestured with both arms toward the circle of besotted partygoers surrounding the man to whom Bruce had been speaking.
Bruce scoffed. The man in question looked up from the dance floor. His eyes were all the colors of a sunset, and cherubic golden curls formed a halo around his head. He saw Bruce, and he smiled.
Bruce almost smiled back. It was the beginnings of a smile, a beginning that spoke of an ignoble end, asymmetrical and soft and small.
He stopped. He turned his head away, and his face went a familiar blank shape. He glanced back toward the angelic figure out of the corner of his eye, as if to confirm the effect, before looking away again. He set his empty champagne flute down on the rail.
“That is the Devil,” he repeated for confirmation.
“Yes.”
“King of Hell.”
“Technically retired.”
“What?”
“He just sort of putters around these days,” Constantine admitted.
“He seemed nice,” said Bruce, who now seemed wary of looking toward the party.
“He does tend to.”
Bruce’s gaze drifted back toward Lucifer.
“Wayne. No.”
“Hm?”
“You’re thinking about it. I can tell you’re thinking about it. Theology or philosophy or Stones lyrics. Stop it.”
“I just wish I’d known sooner,” Bruce said. He was watching those blonde curls intently. “I might have had some questions.”
“No. No.” John took Bruce by the shoulders. “That’s how it starts, just an innocent conversation, and then what? Look. I know we’ve had this little rivalry, you and me, over who can stick their dick in the least advisable place, but that is literally, actually Satan. You cannot fuck him. I don’t just mean you shouldn’t, I mean physically, it’s not possible. And even if you could — God knows, if anyone could find a way — it’s still literal, actual Satan we’re talking about here. There are very few things in this world I’m willing to state are absolutely and categorically bad, and one of them is fucking literal, actual Satan.”
Bruce grabbed a champagne flute off the tray of a passing waiter. “Despite what you seem to think, Mr. Constantine,” he said, “I have not yet sunk so far as to need lectures on ethics from you of all people.”
“So that’s the literal, actual, Biblical Devil,” Flash asked.
“You know, I didn’t have you pegged for the slow one,” Constantine said, “but way to buck stereotypes.” He took another drag on his cigarette.
“I just mean, shouldn’t we… be fighting him?”
“You want to try fighting the Devil, you be my guest,” John said, “but I’ve met people who make that their full-time job, and I can’t say I usually get along with them.” He exhaled smoke out his nose. “‘Course, they usually aren’t real good at their jobs, either.”
“We fight bad guys,” Flash said, looking to Wonder Woman for support. “He’s the ultimate, baddest guy, right?”
“Within the Christian faith,” Wonder Woman said, “Satan is considered a personified shorthand for the philosophical concept of evil, yes?” She had a thoughtful hand on her chin.
“Yes,” Flash said.
“If you’re simple, sure,” Constantine said. Wonder Woman looked down at him. “Not that I’m saying you are,” he added. She looked pointedly at his cigarette. He put it out on the sole of his shoe.
“He seems… masculine,” Wonder Woman said.
“I’ve seen worse,” Constantine said.
“And pale.”
“Don’t tell me you’re surprised, love.”
She smiled. John smiled back. She didn’t rebuke him for the term of endearment. “I’m not,” she said. “I just wanted to be sure that everyone noticed.”
Lucifer Morningstar descended from the sky on wings of light. His suit wasn’t even rumpled. It was difficult to look directly at him; he smelled not of smoke but of heat, of lightning, of ozone.
“Consider the matter settled,” he said, his voice soft because he did not need to raise it. It was addressed to everyone, but his eyes were on Batman.
Even the Lightbringer couldn’t touch the impossible black of his cape. He was a figure of void in the light of a sun.
“Do not be so foolish as to think that you can depend on me in the future,” Lucifer added, stepping closer to the Dark Knight with feet that never touched the ground. “Your affairs are your own, and I prefer not to meddle — whatever else you may have been told.” His wings folded, dissipated. They remained as echoes, burnt into mortal vision. “This,” he said, standing too close to an unmoving and silent Batman, “was a rare exception.”
The Flash was by Superman’s side, where he had not been a half-second earlier. “Supes,” he said, speaking faster than ordinary ears could hear, “I need you to be totally honest with me right now.”
Superman had a very good poker face.
“Has Batman been a demon this whole time?”
“Thank you,” Batman said. “We appreciate it.”
“Hmm.” Lucifer cocked his head to the side, looked Batman over, as if there was anything to see through the impenetrable cape draped over the whole of him. “You know how to reach me,” he said finally, before turning on his heel. He didn’t fly away, or disappear; just walked away, hands in his pockets, whistling.
“Supes,” Flash said, “you’re not saying he’s not a demon.”
“I told you not to ask me about his secret identity,” Superman said.
“I feel like you could tell me he wasn’t a demon without it narrowing things down that much,” Flash said.
Zatanna sidled up to Batman. “Spoops.”
“Don’t call me that.”
She rested her elbow on his arm, leaning on him. “I have to ask.”
“No you don’t.”
“I need you to be completely honest with me.”
“No you don’t.”
“Did you lay down such high-quality pipe that the Devil himself felt like he owed you one?”
“I’m not dignifying that with a response.” At the edge of where his mask ended, he was turning faintly pink.
“Did he call you daddy? Did he say ‘oh my god’? Are those like the same thing for him?”
“Why would I answer that.”
“I get that a gentleman doesn’t kiss and tell, so if you’ve had infernal dick in your mouth in the last twenty-four hours, just stand there and look stoic.”
“I’m leaving now.”
“That’s not a no!” she called after him.
“Superman,” Flash said, trying to shake him by the shoulder. “Kal. Please. If Batman has been Zee’s demonic familiar this whole time, you have to tell me.”
“Batman,” Superman said, addressing the man in question, “Flash wants to know if you’re a demon.”
Flash squeaked as Batman glowered at him, stopping in the process of storming by to lean closer. “What do you think?”
Constantine shook his head. “And that works?” he asked Wonder Woman, gesturing to the scene.
“Usually,” she said.
“What a bunch of morons. Present company excluded.”
(L O O K i know this is not even remotely a response to the prompt of ‘bruce wayne gets railed by huge demon dicks’ but also you are all terrible sinners and this is quite frankly a best-case scenario)
It was easy to follow the path of the ratty brown trenchcoat traveling through tuxedos and gowns.
“Wayne! What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”
Bruce had been watching him stomp his way up the stairs, and had made no effort to meet him, standing and sipping at his champagne. “John!” he greeted, too cheerful to ever be genuine. “Glad to see you got your invitation.”
“Yes, I know I wasn’t — what?” Constantine stopped in his tracks with a frown. “What invitation?”
“Your invitation,” Bruce said, gesturing to all assembled. “To the party. Which I assume you accepted, since you’re here. I knew you’d have to show up to one of them, eventually.”
“I don’t…”
The facts were these:
Bruce Wayne had apparently invited John Constantine to a party despite having no reason to believe it was necessary or desired.
‘One of them, eventually’ suggested that he had invited John to many such parties.
A party was often the easiest time to find and corner Bruce Wayne, when he couldn’t go handcuffing anyone to anything with ridiculous bat-shaped handcuffs.
John never expected or waited for invitations to parties.
Bruce could not possibly have been monitoring John’s activities closely enough to know when he ought to invite him to a party.
Therefore:
Bruce Wayne had been sending John Constantine invitations to every party he had thrown in the last six years, for the express purpose of ensuring that John could never have the satisfaction of crashing a posh party uninvited.
The pull at the corner of Bruce’s mouth suggested that he knew that John knew what Bruce had done, and this knowledge of his knowledge pleased him inordinately. He sipped at his champagne.
“Do you know who it is that you were just flirting with?” Constantine asked, returning to his original reason for talking to the man at all.
Bruce’s eyebrow only barely moved higher than the other. “I don’t know that I would say that I was flirting, necessarily,” Bruce said.
“Oh, I know what you look like when you’re flirting,” John reminded him, and Bruce’s eyes flitted away back over the crowd. “You were flirting.” Bruce shrugged. “Did you even catch his name?”
The corners of Bruce’s mouth turned ever-so-slightly downward, a twitch in his brow that wasn’t a furrow. His champagne flute drifted away from his mouth. “I don’t think I did,” he said, and this admission of his oversight was said with the awestruck manner that most people reserved for a glimpse of the divine.
Appropriately enough.
“You’ve been flirting with the Devil,” Constantine informed him, in as blunt of terms as he could manage.
“I don’t see what that has to do with anything,” Bruce said. “I haven’t seen Talia in months.”
John huffed, grabbing Bruce by the arm and pulling him toward the railing overlooking the ballroom. “Not the metaphorical devil,” he said. “I mean Lucifer, the Fallen, Prince of Lies, the Dark Lord Satan. You have been flirting with the King of Hell.” He gestured with both arms toward the circle of besotted partygoers surrounding the man to whom Bruce had been speaking.
Bruce scoffed. The man in question looked up from the dance floor. His eyes were all the colors of a sunset, and cherubic golden curls formed a halo around his head. He saw Bruce, and he smiled.
Bruce almost smiled back. It was the beginnings of a smile, a beginning that spoke of an ignoble end, asymmetrical and soft and small.
He stopped. He turned his head away, and his face went a familiar blank shape. He glanced back toward the angelic figure out of the corner of his eye, as if to confirm the effect, before looking away again. He set his empty champagne flute down on the rail.
“That is the Devil,” he repeated for confirmation.
“Yes.”
“King of Hell.”
“Technically retired.”
“What?”
“He just sort of putters around these days,” Constantine admitted.
“He seemed nice,” said Bruce, who now seemed wary of looking toward the party.
“He does tend to.”
Bruce’s gaze drifted back toward Lucifer.
“Wayne. No.”
“Hm?”
“You’re thinking about it. I can tell you’re thinking about it. Theology or philosophy or Stones lyrics. Stop it.”
“I just wish I’d known sooner,” Bruce said. He was watching those blonde curls intently. “I might have had some questions.”
“No. No.” John took Bruce by the shoulders. “That’s how it starts, just an innocent conversation, and then what? Look. I know we’ve had this little rivalry, you and me, over who can stick their dick in the least advisable place, but that is literally, actually Satan. You cannot fuck him. I don’t just mean you shouldn’t, I mean physically, it’s not possible. And even if you could — God knows, if anyone could find a way — it’s still literal, actual Satan we’re talking about here. There are very few things in this world I’m willing to state are absolutely and categorically bad, and one of them is fucking literal, actual Satan.”
Bruce grabbed a champagne flute off the tray of a passing waiter. “Despite what you seem to think, Mr. Constantine,” he said, “I have not yet sunk so far as to need lectures on ethics from you of all people.”
“So that’s the literal, actual, Biblical Devil,” Flash asked.
“You know, I didn’t have you pegged for the slow one,” Constantine said, “but way to buck stereotypes.” He took another drag on his cigarette.
“I just mean, shouldn’t we… be fighting him?”
“You want to try fighting the Devil, you be my guest,” John said, “but I’ve met people who make that their full-time job, and I can’t say I usually get along with them.” He exhaled smoke out his nose. “‘Course, they usually aren’t real good at their jobs, either.”
“We fight bad guys,” Flash said, looking to Wonder Woman for support. “He’s the ultimate, baddest guy, right?”
“Within the Christian faith,” Wonder Woman said, “Satan is considered a personified shorthand for the philosophical concept of evil, yes?” She had a thoughtful hand on her chin.
“Yes,” Flash said.
“If you’re simple, sure,” Constantine said. Wonder Woman looked down at him. “Not that I’m saying you are,” he added. She looked pointedly at his cigarette. He put it out on the sole of his shoe.
“He seems… masculine,” Wonder Woman said.
“I’ve seen worse,” Constantine said.
“And pale.”
“Don’t tell me you’re surprised, love.”
She smiled. John smiled back. She didn’t rebuke him for the term of endearment. “I’m not,” she said. “I just wanted to be sure that everyone noticed.”
Lucifer Morningstar descended from the sky on wings of light. His suit wasn’t even rumpled. It was difficult to look directly at him; he smelled not of smoke but of heat, of lightning, of ozone.
“Consider the matter settled,” he said, his voice soft because he did not need to raise it. It was addressed to everyone, but his eyes were on Batman.
Even the Lightbringer couldn’t touch the impossible black of his cape. He was a figure of void in the light of a sun.
“Do not be so foolish as to think that you can depend on me in the future,” Lucifer added, stepping closer to the Dark Knight with feet that never touched the ground. “Your affairs are your own, and I prefer not to meddle — whatever else you may have been told.” His wings folded, dissipated. They remained as echoes, burnt into mortal vision. “This,” he said, standing too close to an unmoving and silent Batman, “was a rare exception.”
The Flash was by Superman’s side, where he had not been a half-second earlier. “Supes,” he said, speaking faster than ordinary ears could hear, “I need you to be totally honest with me right now.”
Superman had a very good poker face.
“Has Batman been a demon this whole time?”
“Thank you,” Batman said. “We appreciate it.”
“Hmm.” Lucifer cocked his head to the side, looked Batman over, as if there was anything to see through the impenetrable cape draped over the whole of him. “You know how to reach me,” he said finally, before turning on his heel. He didn’t fly away, or disappear; just walked away, hands in his pockets, whistling.
“Supes,” Flash said, “you’re not saying he’s not a demon.”
“I told you not to ask me about his secret identity,” Superman said.
“I feel like you could tell me he wasn’t a demon without it narrowing things down that much,” Flash said.
Zatanna sidled up to Batman. “Spoops.”
“Don’t call me that.”
She rested her elbow on his arm, leaning on him. “I have to ask.”
“No you don’t.”
“I need you to be completely honest with me.”
“No you don’t.”
“Did you lay down such high-quality pipe that the Devil himself felt like he owed you one?”
“I’m not dignifying that with a response.” At the edge of where his mask ended, he was turning faintly pink.
“Did he call you daddy? Did he say ‘oh my god’? Are those like the same thing for him?”
“Why would I answer that.”
“I get that a gentleman doesn’t kiss and tell, so if you’ve had infernal dick in your mouth in the last twenty-four hours, just stand there and look stoic.”
“I’m leaving now.”
“That’s not a no!” she called after him.
“Superman,” Flash said, trying to shake him by the shoulder. “Kal. Please. If Batman has been Zee’s demonic familiar this whole time, you have to tell me.”
“Batman,” Superman said, addressing the man in question, “Flash wants to know if you’re a demon.”
Flash squeaked as Batman glowered at him, stopping in the process of storming by to lean closer. “What do you think?”
Constantine shook his head. “And that works?” he asked Wonder Woman, gesturing to the scene.
“Usually,” she said.
“What a bunch of morons. Present company excluded.”
ok but if bruce wayne somehow came upon zuko fresh out of banishment he would lose his mind.
black hair? check. bad parent(s)? check. trauma? double check.
bruce: how’d you get your scar?
zuko: my dad got mad at me for saying that killing people is wrong so he lit my face on fire and banished me.
bruce, vibrating with excitement, already pulling adoption papers from his utilility: that’s terrible. how do you feel about capes.
Zuko: Do you mind if I wear this blue demon mask?
Bruce: *sniff, tear in his eye* Not at all.
*Zuko fighting the Joker*
J: “wan na kno w h ow i go t thes e sc ar s”
Z: *rips off mask* i don’t give a fuck
I’m still stuck at the “batman has adoption papers in his utility belt”.
“Quick, it’s time to use the Bat-adoption papers!”
Bat-option papers
Okay, but you’re missing the best part of this.
Alfred and Iroh complimenting each other on tea while they discuss their overly dramatic children.
iroh: once, i told zuko that he needs to work on his inter turmoil. he screamed at me that he had no such inner turmoil, and then proceeded to go to a cliff during a thunderstorm to scream at God to strike him with lightning
alfred: master bruce and i have that interaction at least three times per week.
@absentlyabbie
I see your “Alfred and Iroh as tea bros” and raise you “Alfred and Iroh as tea rivals”
Consider
Iroh: you too must learn patience. Boiling the water ruins the delicate flavor of the white jade
Alfred: oh I’m dreadfully sorry - for some reason I expected this tea to have TEA in it
(later)
Alfred: *aggressively laying out full tea service with milk, lemon, sugar, and, just to drive his point in, jam*
Iroh: *dying inside*
excellent addition
hey bruce spent a lot of his bat-study abroad in the far east and has kind of a weeb weapon collection so proposal, what if Bruce appreciates Iroh’s tea
while Zuko is enthusiastic about cream and sugar
further fueling their dad-figures’ passive-aggressive rivalry?
You had me at Zuko vs. Joker, I was crying by the Eastern vs. Western tea service
Wait a minute. Batman and Zuko have the same arch-nemesis.
Mark Hamill
Saw the last comment and my brain would not rest until it happened
this post has everything
this was an enjoyable ride. i liked the scenery very much. smooth suspension, nice height, several fascinating loops. 10/10 would go again.
I don’t know if this is a hot take? But there’s something that bugs me about a lot of Batman performances: the dichotomy of his Bruce and Batman voices.
Now, hear me out. Batman absolutely should have a completely different voice from Bruce. Bruce is neurotic enough to develop two completely different idiolects for his identities. Anything to throw people off the scent, right?
However! Actors usually make the choice for Bruce to be the “natural” voice and Batman to be some sort of growling affectation. I personally think it would be better for Bruce to be the fake sounding voice and Batman to be his more natural speaking voice.
Imagine, Batman with a naturally deep and resonant voice that carries a lot of authority but very little emotion. Meanwhile, Bruce’s voice is very Mid-Atlantic old money playboy with an almost breathy, ditzy quality. It’s all emotion! No thoughts! Just enthusiasm and good natured smiles!
This is absolutely coming straight out of my “Bruce is neurodivergent” HC. A lot of us have a natural speaking voice that sounds off to others and a performative “public” voice that we’ve learned to use with people we don’t know very well to put them more at ease. So, it’s completely possible for Bruce’s natural speaking voice to be a bit more flat and his words to be more fact based in a way that would make neurotypical people nervous. And, being Bruce, he would have absolutely studied other people’s voice and behavior so that he could mimic it in public.
However, masking like that is very brain resource intensive, so it would have been an easy choice to drop that for Batman. This would also mean that in private, when it’s just him and the family, he also uses the “Batman” voice because that’s just what he sounds like when he’s not trying.
This would also lead to hilarity when Bruce does crack jokes or tease people by intentionally using his Brucie voice when they’re not expecting it. Like, imagine Batman, looking Flash straight in the eye as he shows up late to a team meeting FUCKING AGAIN, and saying, “You know, old chap, for The Fastest Man Alive, you certainly know how to take your dear sweet time.” IMAGINE!
TLDR: Batman is the real voice and Bruce is fake and it kind of bugs me when actors do the opposite.
thinking about today. Batman having to take an injured teammate who doesn’t know his secret identity to the Batcave and they just assume it is his House. like oh yeah Batman lives in a big, spooky underground cave, full of literal bats? yeah that checks out.
looking at the cot where Bruce crashes when he’s working through the night like ‘ah that must be where he sleeps… that is his sad little bedroom :(’
‘aw there’s no clothes in this closet except more batsuits. guess that must be all he ever wears. :(’
You mean the Batcot and the Bat-minifridge
Everything is covered in Bat Symbols. Everyone who visits assumes he can’t afford a better Bat Bed or Bat House because he spends all his Bat Money on Bat Symbols
yeah they think it’s a dril candles tweet situation. he’s terrible at budgeting just spends all his money on custom made bat-branded equipment.
They look in the mini-fridge and it’s just two (2) plain unseasoned chicken breasts, half a thing of Sunny D (via one of the robins), an unopened bottle of ketchup, and a mostly-eaten bag of shredded cheese.
‘they’re like huh does Batman just sit at his batcomputer eating handfuls of shredded cheese out the bag’, and they’re right, he does.
