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And in hindsight, the scariest part was not how hard he worked, or how much he sacrificed, or how long he waited.
The scariest part was how much he wanted it.
All of the other things were the evidence of his wanting, but evidence can be faked and desire doesn’t have to run more than skin deep. And for some of them, it didn’t. Maybe not Bruce, whose self-curated sense of justice was so essential to who he was that it seemed to replace Bruce Wayne, the man, entirely. And probably not Jason, who had a bone to pick and something to prove that nobody could really fault him for even though everyone pretended like they could. And definitely not Cassandra, who’d never had a god (or a father) and so had decided to worship Bruce’s mission like it could make up for that fact.
But maybe Dick. Probably Tim. Definitely Damian.
Don’t get him wrong, they all wanted it. You had to be bat-shit insane to jump into the line of fire for something you didn’t really want… and thankfully half of them fit that description.
No. No, Duke couldn’t sit here and say that he was the only one who wanted it.
But he wanted it differently.
He wanted it like a blind man wants to see the sun, knowing that he’d never be able to comprehend light the way a seeing person could. He wanted it in the same way that men for generations had been looking to gaze upon the face of God, knowing it would be their death sentence. He wanted it like it was the only thing that mattered and, simultaneously, the most worthless form of idealism ever known to humankind.
Let’s put it this way: Duke wanted Black people to see the sun, but he knew they wouldn’t. Didn’t change the fact that he wanted it.
Back in the beginning, that’s what it was about. He thought, stupidly he thought, that if he could just climb this mountain then he could drag everyone over it with him. He was sold on that old time religion of idealism, believing that you could save anything if you tried hard enough.
And in trying to be everything, Duke realized quickly that he was actually nothing.
He can’t do the math on this one without hurting everyone’s feelings, and he’s not quite sure how he feels about that yet.
Duke had asked Bruce, back in the early days of his training before he knew better, a simple question. Maybe the worst question he ever asked the man.
“What do you do if one day nobody needs Batman?”
“Gotham will always need Batman.
“No, I mean, what will you do if the mission is finished? Like, I know this is a hypothetical, sure, but hear me out: what do you do if one day, out of nowhere, everything is perfect.”
Bruce’s answer had been predictable. “The mission never ends.”
At the time, Duke was annoyed with the man for refusing to entertain his hypothetical. He wasn’t stupid and he knew that they didn’t live in a fantasy world. He knew that crime would always exist, but Batman was constantly operating in a world of hypotheticals (evidenced by his endless supply of contingencies) so surely he could spare just a corner of that world for one where he wasn’t needed.
Later he realized that he’d asked exactly the kind of hypothetical that was antithetical to who and what Batman was. It didn’t matter. Bruce could never fathom a world where Batman wasn’t needed because he could never fathom a world where his sense of justice wasn’t the light for all humanity. And every time he went out at night, no matter how selfless he seemed, that was buried somewhere deep in him.
Bruce wanted it, but he wanted something entirely different.
Duke wanted it to work.
Bruce wanted it to last.
Somewhere along the line, he was pretty sure the man had started to pick up on that difference of opinion and looked down on him for it.
Yes, in hindsight, it was terrifying. He’d wanted it so bad some nights he hadn’t quite known how to breathe. His mind racing a million miles a millisecond, plotting out all the ways that he would fix everything. He was hopeful then.
And here’s a secret he doesn’t tell anyone: the night after his first ever patrol, the first time he ever put on the mask, he slept soundly for the first time in five years; and as he slept, he dreamed about that night that he would take off that uniform for the absolute last time.
Bruce, he was sure, had never had any such dreams.
By the time he realizes that, it’s too late and he’s too far in and he’s already sacrificed too much and it really doesn’t matter. Idealism doesn’t get you much of anywhere outside of Gotham A.M.E Baptist Church on Sunday morning, and it doesn’t pay to admit that you’ve wasted the better years of your life on a lost cause.
So he keeps trying. He keeps losing, of course, because the game was rigged and he knew that better than anyone. But Duke likes to think himself a gracious loser, so he stays seated politely at the table, knowing that all of his opponents were cheating their asses off.
Besides, in his line of work calling out the uneven odds wasn’t a worthwhile effort. Sounded like whining, really. Because what was he going to say to Batman, really?
“Our very existence perpetuates a deeply ingrained White Nationalist American ideal that ensures a racial hierarchy of which Black people absolutely must remain at the bottom of in order to uphold the foundations of American society and power.”
This wasn’t AP African American studies—Duke had submitted a less incriminating version of that thesis to his teacher and gotten back a one hundred and strongly worded recommendation that he pursue African American Disapora Studies in college. Sure it had gone over well on paper, but it was a lot harder to explain to the man who thought of himself as the paragon of justice that everything about what Batman was, was an insult to everything that Duke was.
He didn’t need the headache. It was enough trying to make sure he didn’t get shot at the convenience store picking up honey buns. Pointing fingers was all well and good, but eventually you had to put that accusatory arm down and go make some money.
His dad used to say “You can either die right and hungry, or wrong and fed. Either way you still gonna die.”
He’d been young, so of course that type of pessimism hadn’t resonated with him then. Now it did. It was only five years too late, and hadn’t saved him from making what was quite possibly the worst and most irreversible decision of his life.
Duke had wanted it more than anyone. Kind of felt like he was being punished for that now.
Finally, the cell door opens.
“Wayne posted bail, kid. You’re free to go.”
As Duke brushes past the officer on his way out the holding cell, he almost swears that he hears the man whisper under his breath: See you soon.
When he glances back at his face, he can’t tell.