Flipping Through the Pages
Copyright© 2026 by Dragonpig
Chapter 31
Ultimate Bruce Wayne adjusted his cufflinks as he followed Elena up the theater steps. The Orpheum’s marquee cast ruby light across her auburn hair as she turned to smile at him.
“You’re sure about this?” she asked, her green eyes searching his face. “Last chance to back out and go to that action movie you were eyeing.”
Bruce chuckled, surprised by how natural it felt. “I think I can handle a little Shakespeare. Besides, you said this production of Hamlet was groundbreaking.”
“Revolutionary,” she corrected with mock seriousness. “The ghost of Hamlet’s father is played by a hologram, and Ophelia’s mad scene incorporates interpretive dance.”
“Well, now I’m terrified.”
Elena laughed, the sound bright against the evening air, and Bruce found himself memorizing it. When was the last time he’d made someone laugh? When was the last time he’d wanted to?
The theater was intimate, maybe two hundred seats arranged in concentric semicircles around a thrust stage. As they settled into their plush red chairs, Bruce’s eyes automatically scanned the exits, catalogued the audience, noted the security cameras. Old habits. Even here, in this different Gotham where he had decided to relax and take a small break, the reflexes remained.
Elena leaned close. “You seem tense.”
“Do I?” Bruce forced his shoulders to relax. “Just ... It’s been a while since I’ve done this.”
“What, gone to the theater?”
“Been on a date.”
The admission surprised them both. Elena’s eyebrows rose, but her smile was gentle. “Well, I’m honored to be your warm-up act.”
The lights dimmed before Bruce could respond, which was just as well. How could he explain that in his universe, Bruce Wayne was a playboy billionaire whose romantic escapades filled the gossip columns?
The multiverse was vast and strange. He’d been seeking something—redemption, perhaps, or understanding. What he’d found instead was perspective. In every world where Bruce Wayne existed, there was trauma. In most, there was rage. But in some precious few, there was healing.
On stage, the young actor playing Hamlet delivered the “To be or not to be” soliloquy with a raw intensity that made Bruce’s breath catch. The question of existence, of purpose, of whether life’s struggles were worth enduring—it resonated in ways the playwright could never have imagined.
Elena’s hand found his in the darkness, her fingers warm and steady. Bruce didn’t pull away.
The final curtain fell to thunderous applause, and Bruce found himself clapping with genuine enthusiasm. The holographic ghost had been surprisingly effective, and Ophelia’s interpretive dance had actually enhanced rather than detracted from her descent into madness.
“Not so bad after all,” Elena teased as they gathered their coats.
“I stand corrected. Though I still think the grave-digger scene went on a bit long.”
“Philistine.”
They joined the stream of theatergoers flowing toward the exits, their conversation light and easy. Bruce caught himself thinking about dessert, about maybe walking Elena home the long way, about second dates and third dates and all the normal things that normal people did.
The night air was crisp with the promise of autumn. Street lamps cast pools of warm light along the sidewalks, and couples strolled arm in arm, debating the merits of the performance.
“So,” Elena said, looping her arm through his, “verdict on your return to civilization?”
Bruce was about to answer when the scream cut through the night.
It was high, desperate, female. Every muscle in Bruce’s body went rigid. His head snapped toward the sound, and Elena felt the change in him immediately.
“Bruce?”
But he was already moving.
“Stay here,” he said, his voice carrying an authority that brooked no argument.
“What? Bruce, what’s—”
“Stay with the crowd. Call the police.”
Elena’s hand reached for him, but he was gone.
The scream had come from a narrow passageway between two aging office buildings. Bruce moved through the shadows with a silence that would have impressed even the most seasoned predator, his expensive shoes somehow making no sound on the grimy pavement.
What he saw when he rounded the corner stopped him cold.
A family—mother, father, young boy—pressed against the alley’s brick wall like cornered animals. The woman clutched her purse to her chest while shielding her son with her other arm. The man had positioned himself in front of them both, his hands raised in a gesture that was half surrender, half plea.
Standing before them, a gun trained on the father’s chest, was a figure in a black ski mask.
“Wallet,” the masked man said, his voice rough. “Now. And the watch. And whatever jewelry she’s got.”
The mugger never heard him coming.
Bruce’s hand closed over the gun barrel, wrenching it skyward just as the man’s finger tightened on the trigger. The shot went wide, shattering a window three stories up. Before the sound had finished echoing, Bruce’s hammer fist drove into the back of the mugger’s neck, doubling him over.
The gun clattered to the pavement as Bruce spun the man around. The mugger gasped, struggling against the iron grip.
“Don’t move,” Bruce said quietly, and something in his voice made the man go very still.
The family stared at him with the wide-eyed shock of people who’d just witnessed a miracle. The mother was crying, her face streaked with tears and smeared makeup. The father kept saying “Thank you, thank you,” over and over like a prayer.
But it was the boy who held Bruce’s attention.
He was eight, maybe nine, with dark hair and wide eyes that seemed to hold too much knowledge for someone so young. He stared at Bruce with an intensity that was unsettling, his small face grave with the weight of what he’d just witnessed.
Bruce felt something cold crawl up his spine. The boy’s features were sharp and intelligent, with a stubborn set to his jaw that spoke of determination that could easily become obsession. There was something familiar about him, something that made Bruce’s breath catch in his throat.
Joe Chill, a voice whispered in the back of his mind. This is what Joe Chill looked like as a boy.
“Are you hurt?” Bruce asked the family, his voice carefully controlled.
The father shook his head. “No, no we’re fine. Thanks to you. How can we ever—”
“Get out of here,” Bruce interrupted, his eyes still locked on the boy’s face. “Go home. Hold your family close.”
They didn’t need to be told twice. The father scooped up his son while the mother gathered her scattered belongings, and they hurried toward the mouth of the alley. But the boy looked back over his father’s shoulder, his gaze meeting Bruce’s one last time.
In that moment, Bruce saw it all: the trajectory of a life shaped by trauma, the way violence begets violence, the endless cycle of hurt and retribution that had defined so many versions of his own story. Was this how it started? Was this the moment that would plant the seed of resentment that would one day bloom into murder?
Or was he seeing patterns where none existed, projecting his own demons onto an innocent child?
The sound of approaching sirens snapped him back to the present. Elena must have called the police as he’d asked. Bruce reached for the ski mask.
Please, he thought, though he wasn’t sure what he was pleading for. Please let me be wrong.
He pulled off the mask.
The face that stared back at him was his own.