"I've been calling you for an hour Rachel, why haven't you- what the fuck?"

Harvey stormed out of the elevator straight into Bruce's apartment after not hearing from his girlfriend all night. She'd told him she had to abandon their dinner plans to tend to her friend last minute but after hearing nothing from her for the remainder of the evening, Harvey had started to panic.

And so while his stomach was turning with apprehensive and uncomfortable thoughts, walking in and finding Rachel stitching up a cut on Bruce's forearm while a black suit that looked remarkably like the Batman's was tossed on the floor was the last thing Harvey thought he'd find.

Bruce and Rachel both froze when their privacy was gatecrashed, neither of them knowing what to say now that Harvey had uncovered a secret they couldn't possibly recover. Bruce had fresh blood staining his skin and a split lip, his white t-shirt covered in dark red though heavy bruises could be seen through the thin cotton. His hair was damp and slicked back with sweat and rain and his knuckles were busted and bloody, tiredness haunting his dark eyes and dragging grey circles down his face.

"Harvey, don't freak out but-"

"It was you?" He interrupted Rachel's feeble attempt at handling the situation, frozen to the spot with his eyes wide and lips parted in shock, staring right at Bruce.

Rachel pulled the last stitch tight and closed the seeping wound shut on Bruce's forearm, tossing the needle and bloody gauze into the trash before washing her hands. Bruce stayed stood idly in the kitchen beneath a bright light, exhausted from a night of chasing after Bane and getting no closer than he'd done before.

Bruce said nothing, nodding once without finding the strength to say anything in response. Harvey's reaction was identical to Carla's and despite Bruce doing everything he could to not spend all of his time thinking about her, somehow, every little thing ended up reminding him of the woman he loved.

"And you," Harvey turned his gaze to Rachel with betrayal in his eyes, "You knew this whole time?"

Rachel inhaled calmly and kept herself poised, walking back over to Bruce's side, "It wasn't my secret to tell."

Harvey scoffed and shook his head, exhaling heavily and resting his hands on his hips as he collected his spiralling thoughts and tried to make sense of the truth he'd just stumbled upon.

He'd never once thought that Bruce Wayne could have been the Dark Knight and while that revelation would puzzle him till the end of time, what irritated him more was the fact that his own girlfriend had kept him in the dark about it.

"A-and Carla? Does Carla know?"

Rachel kept quiet, looking solemnly down at her feet while Bruce hauled a painful breath into his lungs, nodding once again.

"Yeah, I had to tell her."

Harvey choked out a scornful laugh and his eyes melted with anger, "So it was just me walking around like some clueless fool, huh?"

"It's not like that, Harvey."

"It's not?" He snapped at Rachel, "Then what is it like? How could you lie to my face this whole time? Him," Harvey pointed at Bruce, "Him I can understand being a coward and a liar but you? How could you, Rachel?"

"Don't talk to her like that," Bruce stepped in, walking a few paces forward ahead of his friend, "This isn't Rachel's fault, I asked her to keep my secret. Don't blame her."

"Oh I'm not blaming her," Harvey glared at Bruce and felt his blood start to boil beneath his skin, "I'm blaming you. I never really liked you all that much but now...now I know that this is what you broke Carla's heart over, I was right to never like you."

"How dare you bring Carla into this," Bruce's tone was low and quiet but that didn't reflect the fury he felt consume him as soon as Carla's name passed through Harvey's lips.

"Are you going to tell me that I'm wrong? You could've left with her and had some kind of real life but instead you chose this. That woman loved you, she went through Hell to protect you, over and over and over again and this is how you repay her? By spending your nights chasing after your own death?"

Harvey wasn't the first person to say those words to him but when Bruce looked to Rachel for some kind of defence and saw nothing but agreement in a timid frown and mellow eyes, it hurt a little bit more than it did when he'd heard it before.

He swallowed and stood his ground, "Gotham deserves a second chance, it deserves a chance altogether. My parents wanted to make a difference and so do I. I want to get rid of the guns and the crime and the death, I want to clear the streets of men like the Joker and Bane, I want to make it impossible for young kids to be swept up into gangs and end up losing their lives like Carla's brothers did and I want Gotham to be pure so that one day, if her father ever does walk free he'll have nothing to do besides give his daughter the love and attention she deserved from him years ago."

Harvey tightened his jaw and sunk his hands into the pockets of his jeans, kissing his teeth with a brow raised, "That's probably the most admirable fucking thing that's ever come out of your mouth, but it's still bullshit. You think this is what Carla wants? You think she wants you to play the hero, to die the hero?"

"It's not about me," Bruce replied with a firm shake of his head, "It's about breaking the cycle, it's about-"

"You're repeating the fucking cycle!" Harvey shouted, his cheeks turning red with anger and his eyes flashing with lightening, temper white hot and venomous, "She's lost everything to this godforsaken place and now she's going to have to lose you too, can't you see that? You can't be a hero and get the girl, that's not how these things work."

"You don't know that, you underestimate me."

"Look at yourself, Bruce. You're one hit away from the cops finding you cold in the Narrows when the sun comes up."

"That won't happen."

It pained Rachel to have her childhood best friend look back at her with defeated eyes and a surge of hopefulness directed at only her, knowing that she couldn't give him any. Harvey was right, Alfred had been right and Carla had too, though it seemed like nobody could get through to Bruce enough to make him change his mind.

Harvey shook his head in disgust and steadied his breathing, looking Bruce up and down and feeling nothing but resentment towards him. He'd done his duty alongside Rachel to check on the billionaire after Carla had asked him to before she left, but any shred of respect Harvey had left for him had diminished in that moment.

Silence lingered as tension settled amongst the three of them, rain hammering down on the windows of the penthouse while harsh winds whipped around the tall buildings piercing the black sky. It had been barely a month since Bruce had left Sicily and although remnants of summer clung onto the last days of September recently, it seemed like fall had stormed the gates all at once.

"You never deserved her," Harvey spoke up again, the first to break the silence.

"Harvey that's enough," Rachel said, shooting him a warning glance from a few feet away that he ignored.

The words cut Bruce open all over again, invalidating his heart's will and the pain he'd felt, the love he'd felt and everything else in between that had captured him and bound him in raptures since the moment he set eyes on Carlotta Falcone in the rain.

Yet part of him agreed.

"You didn't. I watched her stand up in court and lie to protect you, I watched her ignore the comments and the stares in the courthouse. I watched her get pushed from that roof, be hung over a ledge, have a blade to her throat all to save you. I picked her up when you left her alone, tried to make her feel better, dried tears that you made her cry. You didn't deserve her, and you know it."

Bruce's eyes stung and he felt his heart seize up inside his chest, a harsh truth coming from Harvey that he wasn't used to hearing. Sure, Gotham had their opinions on Bruce Wayne and he was used to the taunts and the digs from newspapers but never had anyone's depiction of him hurt more than Harvey's.

"Maybe you're right," Bruce shrugged with shake of his head, lips pursed as he stepped towards Harvey, "But you can't tell me I don't love her. I caught her before she hit the ground every time, I pulled her away from the edge of that blade, I held her when she was a broken mess on the bathroom floor after Doctor Crane's death. So maybe I don't deserve her, but I love her with every inch of my body and soul and there isn't anything I wouldn't do for her."

Harvey just blinked, exhaling with a short, sharp laugh, "Except the one thing she wants you to do, right?"

"You don't understand...y-you..."

Bruce was lost for words as he stared at Harvey and the adrenaline was forcing him to try and fight back, to argue his case and to speak his god's honest truth but the reality was, he had nothing to offer.

He loved Carla, he'd loved her for as long as he could remember and she was part of the catalyst that drove him forwards when it came to protecting Gotham and standing up for what he and his parents had once believed in. He wanted to make the city a better place, a safer place, a place that he wouldn't feel guilty about leaving, about abandoning when he decided to start his own life with her.

Bruce thought he could have both and he still believed that he could. The Joker was tough and Bane was something else entirely but Bruce was convince he'd just fight harder, the same way that he always had. He didn't see an end that wasn't him boarding his jet out of Gotham after he gifted the city peace and while he knew nothing was ever one hundred percent certain, he was as close to that figure as he could possibly get inside his mind.

"You're right," Harvey nodded, "I don't understand. Carla would've died for you, would you have ever forgiven her for making that choice? For accepting that consequence?"

Bruce's throat burned and water shredded his vision in his eyes as he shook his head, "No."

"Then why would you expect her to forgive you for doing the same thing?" Harvey had calmed down and his tone was indifferent, though there was a harshness in his blue eyes and a steel structure holding up his expression that still remained.

"She won't have to."

Harvey had grown to tolerate Bruce Wayne the more they were forced into spending time together and for a while, he was comfortable with being able to call Bruce his friend. When he picked Carla up from Wayne Manor and saw an empty look in her already painfully hollow eyes however, his stance immediately changed.

Carla was his friend and Bruce came second to that, even if he was someone Rachel loved very dearly. Carla was always higher than Bruce on Harvey's list and she would continue to be, even after everything that had happened. She was a good woman, a strong, fierce and loyal woman who deserved to be loved the way that she loved in return. It just felt like a shame that the only love she wanted was from someone like Bruce.

"I don't give a fuck about your happiness," Harvey looked him up and down once more, "But I do care about Carla. She loves you, and you make her happy, the happiest I've ever seen her. So please, Bruce, listen to me when I say this: go back to her. Go and love her before you lose the chance to completely."