Flashback: The End of Spoiler

[lesliethompkins]

There isn't any time for tears in the middle of an operation. The brain is focused entirely on the hands. The hands are occupied with the patient. This patient, Leslie knows somewhere in the back of her brain, doesn't have a chance. She's too stubborn though to admit it.

Hours pass. The bleeding is stopped. The slugs are removed. The wounds are stitched. There's nothing else she can do. Leslie looks sideways at the readouts. Blood pressure is low. Pulse is weak. Her professional judgment battles with her stubbornness.

Stephanie doesn't have that long to live.

Leslie's eyes move to the assisting nurse. "Don't move her."

The nurse glances up in surprise but Leslie is already moving away. Towards the sink. To strip the blood covered gloves from her hands. They hit the biohazard bin with force. She doesn't even bother to wash before she leans heavily against the wall. Fingers tighten involuntarily. She strains her neck, trying to wipe her face on the sleeve of her scrubs.

She wants nothing better than to collapse. There's one last duty she has to perform before the tears can come though. She has to find a phone.

Comments

[http://users.livejournal.com/_darkknight_/]

"Bruce Wayne." Sounds like he's in the car somewhere.

[lesliethompkins.livejournal.com]

Her voice betrays her exhaustion. "I need you at the clinic, Bruce."

[http://users.livejournal.com/_darkknight_/]

Leslie never calls him unless it's important. "What's wrong?" he asks immediately.

[lesliethompkins.livejournal.com]

There's a pause on the other end of the line. "Stephanie is here."

[http://users.livejournal.com/_darkknight_/]

The squeal of tires is immediate. "I'll be there in ten minutes."

[lesliethompkins.livejournal.com]

A click and the line goes dead. She stands with the phone in hand, numb. The tears are supposed to come now. But they don't. She doesn't have the energy left to produce them.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_darkknight_/]

In point of fact, he is there in four minutes. The Ferrari can break all sorts of traffic laws when Bruce is so inclined...and its owner can break all sorts of clinic rules. He bursts into the building, past those who know and would stop him. "Where's Dr. Thompkins?" is all he asks.

[lesliethompkins.livejournal.com]

The staff informs him she's just left surgery. Other than that, they have no other information on her whereabouts. The next logical place to look is her office. That's where Bruce finds her.

She hasn't had time to change. Her scrubs still bear Stephanie's blood. The expression on her face is not one Bruce has seen in a very long time. It's a mix of fear, anger, and heartache.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_darkknight_/]

Bruce hasn't been the Batman for years without being one of the smartest men on the planet. He looks at her expression, at the blood on her scrubs, and then he pivots on his heel and strides purposefully toward the emergency surgical ward.

[lesliethompkins.livejournal.com]

A heavy sigh escapes her. She follows a few moments later. On her way into the surgical ward, she dismisses the attending nurse.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_darkknight_/]

His last conversations with Stephanie come to mind, black thoughts jackhammerring in his consciousness. And quite suddenly, he feels so sick to his stomach he has to pause in the doorway to the ward, where the sight awaiting him is, in a word, ghastly.

[lesliethompkins.livejournal.com]

The young woman's body is a mass of bandages, blood, and bruises. The beeps and miscellaneous sounds of machines working around her offer little assurance. Her blood pressure is slowly but surely continuing to drop.

Leslie maneuvers behind the stalled figure. "I've done everything that I can," she whispers.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_darkknight_/]

Which means everything that can be done has been done. Bruce has utter faith in Leslie's abilities. Taking a few tenative steps toward the table, he takes a position from which he can see Stephanie's face...and she his, if she is at all conscious.

[lesliethompkins.livejournal.com]

Leslie watches mournfully from the doorway as Bruce advances.

His movement seems to spark some shred of life into Stephanie. Eyelids flutter and with unfocused eyes, she glances up at him. She parts her lips as if to say something but no sound is made.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_darkknight_/]

God. It's like a kick to the solar plexus via his heart. Bruce puts a hand on Stephanie's face, trying just to see her eyes and not the mass of bruises and abrasions that have defiled her features. The other hand wraps around her slack fingers. "I'm here," he murmurs. Unvoiced meaning? You're not alone.

[lesliethompkins.livejournal.com]

Despite the morphine running into Stephanie's system, tears well forth from her eyes. A tremor runs the length of her body. Slack fingers curl around his grip but the pressure is delicate and devoid of strength.

"I'm... sorry." It's a pathetic cry, packed with deepest of emotions.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_darkknight_/]

"Shhh," is his only answer as he brushes her face tenderly. Inside, his soul is screaming in pain and rage. The one way to wound the Batman, who is rumored to have no heart, is to harm those close to him. Someone has dealt a mortal blow. That someone will suffer. But not now.

[lesliethompkins.livejournal.com]

The tears are coming in waves. They roll away, right into his hand as it moves over her face. "... better," she mumbles. She should have done better.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_darkknight_/]

Bruce leans down and kisses Stephanie's forehead as he breathes, "You did great. I couldn't be prouder."

[lesliethompkins.livejournal.com]

Those are the words she needs to hear. She seems to settle under the kiss. For a second, Stephanie closes her eyes against the tears. Pain is a strange companion to this brief moment of peace.

"Tim." Communicating with Bruce is taking everything she has left. "Does ... hate me?"

[http://users.livejournal.com/_darkknight_/]

"Stephanie...." The twist in his gut tightens. "No. No one could."

He's helpless to save her, but he won't let her die feeling anything bad. He won't.

[lesliethompkins.livejournal.com]

"...sorry." The single utterance encompasses a breadth of regrets. Heavy laden is the word with sorrow. It escapes on the barest of breaths as once again her eyelids slide shut. Damaged lungs take in air two more times before her chest fails to rise. In sharp contract to her explosive life, Stephanie Brown passes silently from the world.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_darkknight_/]

Bruce's eyes close tightly as he rests his forehead against Stephanie's, jaw trembling, hand shaking, until he raises his head long enough to make a long, loud growl of anguish.

Then all is still for five seconds. Ten. Twenty.

By the time thirty seconds have passed, Bruce has burst through the surgery's doors and is heading for his car. For the Cave. For the cape and cowl.

For payback.

He won't let Stephanie's body grow cold before he has visited vengeance on whoever is responsible for mauling her.

[lesliethompkins.livejournal.com]

The tears finally erupt.