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They found themselves stucked in the desert. With few provisions and no communication to the outside world. Bruce would've been dead in a week if it weren't for Talia. The woman with all her experience in the desert saved him. Like she always tried to. Bruce felt... touched, that despite everything that occuried between them, she still protected with a fierce heart and sword.
Her brown skinned looked redder under the run, shining under the sun rays that peaked over the horizon. She called him a lobster and he snickered. But she didn't laugh, Bruce's skin was burning. He let Talia take care of his skin, pressing cold cloths against the burns. Like he said, they were stuck in the desert with no escape. The nearest village was miles away and Bruce swears he will faint and die in the sand. The only comforting throught is that he could die in Talia's arms. She would surely sweet talk him while he passes away. Talia called him weak and delusional when he expressed his concerns, already tired from walking all day. Bruce knew better than to take them to heart, knowing she's hiding her concern under layers her mask of strenght. She barely lets her true feelings be known, at least these days. He remembers her before, how she used to smile and cry in his presence, feeling safe with him. Nowdays she never smiles anymore; she doesn't feel safe anymore with Bruce and it hurts.
They hunt
They eat
They shit
And they sleep
Everytime he turned the sand would choke him, it got to a point in which Talia offered to make a little tent with blankets. She crafted them from a tree no doubt Ra's training. The little tent was done in two days. Bruce helped make it stand, feeling useless in the desert. He felt a little pride in making a stick stay straight in the sand. With his terrible luck the stick fell on Talia's leg. Breaking it and preventing her from walking. That's the moment Bruce knew he fucked everything up, they would be dead by the end of the week. Talia pinched her nose and told him to stay put. Ra's will revive her, or at least she hopes so after she pleaded with him to never use the Lazarus Pit on her. Great, so Ra's would find their bodies and prepare the funerals instead of preparing their bodies for a swim. He kicked the stick and his feet hurt from the pain, he welcomed it.
This time Talia arranged the tent. It was so small Bruce's entire body covered Talia's. It felt so deeply intimate like it used to feel. Nothing had changed... he thought that sleeping with other people would make him desire Talia less next time he saw her. He was wrong, no other person felt like Talia. So he was stucked with her frame pressed against him. In his sleep, he tighened his arms around Talia. It wasn't until the third day that she confessed this fact. When Bruce asked her why she never told him the first night, wake him, anything, I missed your tight bear hugs Beloved
Beloved, for the first time in years she called him Beloved. Bruce wonders if she feels they will die, like he feels it in his bones. Not detective like Ra's al Ghul. Bruce started hating the nickname after Talia started using it. A reminder of Ra's influnce on her, of how Bruce never won against him, of how he let Talia slip through his fingers. He knows it's wrong to make it a competition like she's some object, but she's not. Talia is a victim of brainwashing, just like their son. And Bruce couldn't save her, but here, with Talia fast asleep in his arms after confessing she still loves him, he wishes he did more. And he has hope that is tearing him inside.
By the end of the week neither could move. They stopped strugguling after it was clear they wouldn't survive. Instead they used all their strenght to keep each other warm. Talia joked about dying doing the happy. So Bruce fucked her, the sand entering their ass cracks. If any of their family found them like this, they would die of embarrasment. They found out neither cared. Not when his blood struggles to deliver glucose. Not when Talia stops speaking after they make love. I love you Beloved were her last words.
I wish I protected you both,- were his.
As monday approaches and the sun rays peak under the horizon, Ra's and Damian found them-
-their bodies cold and blue, limbs entangled in each other. Protected from the sand inside their little tent.