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They were in front of each other again.
Minhkhoa Khan skirted around Bruce Wayne like a moth to a flame. Bruce constantly held a steady and wary eye. Occasionally, like sun and moon in rare eclipse, they met. Brief, flickering and wavering moments they had together before fatefully leaving once again.
Today was yet another eclipse.
Bruce lifted his head, his chin dripping with the mixture of salt, rain and blood as he stared into the soulless helmet that Minhkhoa wore.
“Ghost-Maker.”
A beat passed. Rain continued pummelling down. Bruce didn’t know why they were like this. He had seen him not too long ago. They had fought, as they always did. They had made up, in a way that they never really would.
“Batman.”
They remained silent. Staring at each other, as they did. Bruce flicked his gaze over the man in front of him, a silent action to memorise the outline of Khoa. As if he hadn’t already.
It was stupid. Ridiculous, even. That they continued this pointless dance of theirs, with insults hurled and punches still pulled.
Bruce welcomed it, welcomed Khoa, anyway. He always would.
They were fighting again. Loose, harsh, almost ragged and sloppy motions as Khoa and Bruce used their fists an excuse to touch each other.
He wasn't sure of many things nowadays, but Bruce was sure of one thing: he loved it. Even at the expense of his heart.
Bruce rolled to the ground, his breath leaving him in exhausted, heaving pants as he brought himself to his feet, lurching towards Khoa, his fist connecting with the man’s jaw.
“You have to understand,” he rasps out, another punch hitting Khoa. “Gotham-”
Khoa snarled, ramming into him and pushing Bruce in the ground. “Stop. Gotham needs you. She’ll always need you,” he spat, one hand on Bruce’s throat and the other on his chest.
“We could’ve had everything,” gasps Khoa. “But, no – your fool’s errand of saving this godforsaken city is too important, too close to that soft heart of yours.”
“I’m soft?” scoffed Bruce, hurling Khoa to his back, a soft thump heard against the concrete as Bruce drove him into a wall, holding him by the throat and collar. “You’re the one who returns to Gotham every fucking time. Despite my words, despite your knowledge of what will happen, despite your hate for this place.”
“You’re wasting yourself, Bruce!” yelled Khoa, his mouth set into outrage. His helmet had long been discarded, shattered with the force of Bruce slamming his head into the wall repeatedly.
This was their language. The violence they set against each other, every time. They touched, sure, but Bruce welcomed nothing as more as he welcomed the feeling of Khoa’s fist on his skin. In his own way, he’d grown to grow tender to it. Even as far as grown to look forward to the pain and blood that spilt with the appearance of the other man. After all, how else would he truly feel Khoa’s touch on his skin? Nothing else was more them than the crunch of each other’s bones beneath their hand, blood splattered on their skin and a barely concealed smile and laugh.
“We could’ve had everything,” repeated Khoa, his eye covering barely slipping off as he glared at Bruce. He’d always looked good when he was angry. Bruce never really had the time to admire Khoa like this. “But no, your mission of saints to save this doomed city takes priority.”
Bruce stayed silent, his eyes repeatedly flicking back to the snarl of Khoa’s lips, his teeth slightly bared, blood smeared over his lips and cheek.
“Gotham needs me,” he said hoarsely, and Khoa let out another disgruntled scoff.
“No.” Khoa pushed Bruce off, wiping the blood from his face and getting to his feet, sheathing a fallen sword. “You need Gotham. It’s like scum in your blood, tainting you-”
“Shut up,” yelled Bruce, his arms outstretched as he shoved Khoa backward, his head hitting the wall.
Khoa shook his head, still talking. “We could’ve done this for the art, for the beauty of it, but this fucking city is tying you, Bruce! You’re being pulled back, restrained!”
“Shut up!”
Bruce grabbed Khoa by the collar again. He kept talking. “You’re weak! Too attached to a child’s dream of saving those dead fucking parents of yours!”
“Shut up!” snarled Bruce as he slammed Khoa into the ground, his knee at Khoa’s neck. It was silent again, the rain quiet and Khoa’s breathing erratic. “You keep coming back to Gotham because you’re too fucking scared to be alone, Khoa.”
“And you’re still that stupid child in an alley.”
They were quiet again. Holed up in the bedroom of Bruce’s brownstone, the sheets a disarray from their previous activities. Bruce laid comfortably against the smooth plane of Minhkhoa’s bare chest, with one of his brown arms slung around his left shoulder and absentmindedly tracing small circles on Bruce’s skin.
“That’s a new one,” observed Khoa as he traced a healing scar on Bruce’s shoulder.
Bruce grunted, looking at his bruised and red torso. Open cuts from their fight before, and red marks where Khoa’s nails had pressed into his biceps an hour ago. Bite marks on his shoulders and neck, trailing down to his hips, lazily covered by the sheets. “Blame Cassandra for that one.”
“Ah. I like her,” shrugged Khoa, the movement short and fluid. He always moved like that, like smooth water on a still surface.
Bruce angled his head to look at Khoa better, to look at his uncovered face, to look at him. The slope of his cheekbones, the flutter of his eyelashes against his skin and the slight smirk to his lips that never really left. The scars on his skin, the few but large bite marks on his shoulder, the more numerous ones on his hands. The red scratch marks peeking over his shoulder and down his back, which was propped up against Bruce’s headboard.
“Why are you back in Gotham?” He’d meant to ask earlier, but they had gotten too enraptured in the adrenaline of it all.
Khoa shrugged again, his own eyes sweeping over Bruce. “Wanted to check up on the shit job you’re doing. Ended up with a broken rib and you.”
“Don’t you always?”
“Yeah.” The admission was soft, like the way that Khoa’s hand lightly curled through Bruce’s hair. Like the steady breathing behind him, like the gentle way that Bruce would’ve held him if things were different.
Bruce sighed, leaning back against Khoa’s chest. “You’re being gentle tonight.”
Khoa raised an eyebrow. “I was literally just inside you while you were clawing at my back, while I continued ruthlessly. That doesn’t sound too gentle to me,” he said, the smirk practically heard.
“You know what I mean. Not like that.” Bruce rolled his eyes, looking at Khoa, his big brown eyes and that shit-eating grin of his. “You were pulling your punches. I haven’t bruised as heavily or as quickly as I normally do.”
Khoa let out a small hum. “Maybe I’m saving all the rough, pent up energy for round… five? Six? I didn’t keep count of how many times I had you screaming my name.”
“Khoa,” chided Bruce, though there was no malice behind it. It’s not like the man was wrong.
He was weary, he realised. But comfortable. It was a rare feeling in Gotham. It wasn’t a rare feeling with Khoa, a fact that Bruce hardly recognised or acknowledged.
“You’re growing soft,” murmured Khoa, like he wasn’t the one currently pressing kisses up the slope of Bruce’s neck, his free hand brushing over the red and tender skin over Bruce’s knuckles, injuries that Khoa caused.
Bruce’s lips cracked as he smiled slightly, shaking his head. “You’re growing soft.”
“I might have to fuck it back into you later,” said Khoa, almost solemnly, ignoring his words. “Such a pity, that Bruce Wayne needs to be beaten up and then fucked like an animal to regain some sense of normalcy.”
Bruce laughed, then, a deep hearty laugh that reverberated in the small room. They laid like that for a while, content, in each other’s arms as the sun rose over Gotham’s landscape.
They were alone again. Bruce in the Batcave, holed up in some new case. Khoa was probably in the Haunt, listening to Icon yammer on about stupid health risks.
Bruce sighed. The eclipse was over. Until the next time, he echoed to himself, to the cave. Until the next time they met.
All he had left for now, as remains of Khoa, were bruised knuckles and a tender heart.