Legendary

When I had to take a bathroom break, something occurred to me, and dreading the answer, I called the morgue. Whoever answered the phone was a little shrill. "Of course we have bodies," he snapped. "We've been overwhelmed and there's no place to put them all. All we can do is take DNA samples and a photo, do a cursory superficial exam, and have them taken off to be cremated. If you're worried, come by one of the morgues so they can take a DNA sample from you. It'll take about an hour for an analysis. We've been trying to get the word out, but the damned media are just covering heartfelt reunions." He hung up, and I got permission to take a longer break. There was a morgue about five blocks away, so I set off.

It took longer than expected to get there, but the sampling was quick, of course, and the overworked assistant was happy to send me away with sampling kits for others at the embassy and a promise to contact me if my DNA matched any of the bodies they'd processed. If there was a match in the future, I'd be notified as a matter of routine. They did both mitochondrial DNA and paternity testing, so one way or another, if I got Damian to take one too, we'd be notified if any of our descendants were processed there. On the way out, the assistant asked where I was working, and when he heard that I worked at a registration point, asked if we could start taking the samples with our incoming returnees. It was just a swab on the inside of the cheek, easy and painless, so I agreed and took a couple of cases of the kits with me.

Loki sighed when I told him about the situation in the morgues and had everyone who was processing the returned huddle with me for training. Nothing to it, really, hold the swab by the shield on the handle, swipe, insert into the vial, and the name and right thumbprint was placed on the label. We didn't even need an ink pad; just pressing the thumb on the label caused a chemical reaction with an ink and the print was visible.

Some people didn't understand the purpose of the testing and refused, but most were eager to take advantage of something that might help them find family, even if they didn't understand DNA or how it was read. We ran out of the kits by the end of the afternoon, and after I'd swabbed Damian when he came to pick me up, Serena took the kits back and arranged for a more massive delivery the next day.

On the way home, I'd received notification that seven of Damian and my descendants had been processed in the morgue, all victims of presumed random violence. We had a family tree that Daniel had made up so we could track people we were hoping to meet. It was surprisingly sparse; no individual had more than two children, with most having none or one. The women who were my descendants more often than not had no children, and I wondered if my problems had been inflicted on at least some of them. I knew that Martha hadn't had them, but she'd had two children, one had died soon after I had, and her daughter hadn't had kids. Xander had had two children, one of whom had had a son, and this general sort of pattern kept repeating. Or maybe it wasn't anything to do with difficult pregnancies and more to do with the Batman legacy.

When we got home, my folks and Bruce's were chatting on the patio. The summer was edging into fall, and I groaned as I thought about all the difficulties this change in seasons would cause for the overburdened authorities. I kept these thoughts to myself, though. Daniel came out with some drinks for them, and after greeting everybody, I went inside to change and put away my weapons. Damian came with me and it was wonderful just to keep my arms around him as we talked about our days. When we went back downstairs, Alfred was firing up the grill and my mom sat up, making room on the chaise for me. I put my arm around her and Damian sat with my dad, J, and Bucky as Thomas listened and started to integrate with the expanded family's males. The Marthas drew up chairs too, and my daughter and I caught my mom up on current events.

"Now, dear, what on earth is going on with those wings? Is that a new mutation?" Mom's practical.

"Wings?" Martha Sr asked. I got a little nervous. She hadn't seen them and I didn't know how rational she really was. A couple of returnees had caught sight of them in the beginning and that caused more problems that the fight we'd been trying to break up. Some thought we were demons, some angels. We'd been called abominations and things had been thrown at us. It had been hurtful.

"Yes. Part of the valkyrie gig, Mom. In Valhalla, we had swansfeather capes that we could put on and off, and they transformed into wings. But after Valhalla was closed to us, the wings became part of us."

"Valhalla was closed to you?" Martha Sr asked, catching the nuance.

"It's still there, Odin says, but we can't get into it anymore because we're not dead. Or maybe because Odin's not there." She looked enlightened.

"Can I see them again?" my mom asked, so I extended them. She stroked the feathers and I explained the coating that Emma had applied.

"Are they functional?" Martha Sr asked.

"Yes," I said. "During our morning practices we fly. We might be grounded soon, though. We're starting to molt." I shook my head in disgust as if on cue, one of my primaries floated to the ground.

"My word," Thomas murmured. "That's really quite extraordinary." Then men had come over when the wings appeared. Damian picked up the shed feather and smoothed it.

"So how did it happen that you ended up with real wings?" my dad asked. "Why do you need them?"

"Well, we believe that Ragnarok is approaching," I said with a sigh.

"I've heard of that, but I don't know what that is," Thomas said.

"The Norse end of the world," I said grimly. "Basically a big battle between good and bad that takes place on Asgard. We believe that it's coming because the signs have been coming true, one after the other. It's the things we haven't been expecting that are tripping us up." The faces around me were puzzled. "Like the prophesies said that three cocks would crow and different things would happen. The second cock was to crow in Valhalla and the gods were supposed to rise, the third and the dead would rise. So we thought that all the cocks would crow at the same time, which didn't happen, and the gods included the honored dead in Valhalla and Folkvangr, which is Frigga's afterlife and essentially a less-publicized version of Valhalla, and the dead didn't just include the Norse dead, but everybody. So there are things that aren't clear from the prophesies, and the Norn won't be more specific." I sighed.

"The Norn?" Martha asked.

"They're similar to the Greek Fates, but they tend the World Tree rather than spin and cut threads. Much nicer than you'd think. One of them created the valkyries."

"You met them?" my mom asked, a little stunned.

"Yeah, we needed answers, and it's not like you can't find the World Tree in Asgard," I said. "All they said, basically, is that some events are fixed and unalterable, like Ragnarok, but what we tend to call fate isn't unchangeable unless you accept it as such. So Odin is going to be killed by the great wolf Fenrir because that's in the story. Thor's supposed to be die from the Midgard serpent's venom after he kills it, but we've gotten some protective gear for him in the hopes that he won't. He's willing to try to alter his fate, Odin isn't. And Loki and Heimdall have agreed to avoid each other at all costs, so l.. I guess we'll see. "

"Sounds like a Doctor Who episode," my brother muttered, and I grinned at him.

"But if events on Asgard affected things on Earth, how do you know that this Ragnarok won't affect us too?" Thomas asked.

"I don't," I said after a moment. "All I know is what is supposed to happen on Asgard."

"What?" Damian said.

"The battle is going to happen on Vigrior. But the World Tree extends through all the Nine Realms, and one of the indicators that Ragnarok is immanent is a shaking of the World Tree that produces extreme fear. So all the realms will know that something's gong on. Who's to say that smaller conflicts won't erupt in the other realms? Loki and Thor have presented these thoughts to the authorities, but they've got their hands full as it is without having to plan for something that might not come to pass. And ultimately, the prophesy says that everything will be destroyed; this isn't a game for all the marbles, it's supposed to be a fixed conclusion, but that after time has passed, a couple of people will repopulate. But there's no indicator if this happens in one realm or all of them. It's quite specific as far as it goes, but it doesn't go very far. It's possible that despite all our preparation, nothing will change and everything literally goes up in smoke. Or maybe the destruction is confined to Asgard. We don't know."

"So you're going to go to Asgard and fight, even though you know you're probably going to die?" my mom asked, her face white.

"Yes. I personally feel we have a pretty good shot at preventing total destruction. Tony and Emma are working on a way to protect the Bifrost from destruction. And we've all been training hard. I accepted the charge of a valkyrie, which not only includes bringing the heroes to Valhalla but following Odin into battle at Ragnarok. Even if I tried, I don't think I could not do it," I said to my parents gently. And there was no way I was going to explain the unique valkyrie bond I had; since it was tied into the World Tree, I privately felt that if it died in Ragnarok as it was supposed to, I might not make it either. Nobody needed to know that, really. "So I'm trying to pack as much as I can into the time I have before the battle," I said softly. "It's more that I ever thought I would have again."

Although it cast a huge damper over the party, I was relieved that at last it was all out, cards on the table. There was silence as everybody digested this. "But if the fix is in and the conclusion is unalterable, why do you even have to fight?" J asked suddenly, and I grinned fiercely at him.

"That's just the thing, J. The Norn say that the fixed event is the battle. It will happen. But if we all got there and had a fist-fight instead, it wouldn't produce the same outcome. The battle is inevitable, the outcome is not. But not everybody believes that. Odin, who has spoken to the Norn himself, cannot be convinced that things won't happen just like in the prophesy, and a lot of the oldest beings are of his mindset. So there's going to be a pitched battle regardless. But there are those of us who feel that destruction isn't inevitable and we're going to do all we can to preserve what we can."

"Of course you would," my dad muttered, rubbing his eyes.

"We're not unprepared," I said gently. "I'm one of the finest warriors in Odin's forces, and all of us have trained hard. Additionally, I have excellent armor, including protection for the wings, and I have up to date paramedic training. We have some very fine minds working on field weapons to help tilt the advantage to our side."

"So what's the signal?" J asked.

"There will be an earthquake that brings down mountains, but nobody knows where in the Nine Realms this will happen, so it's not the best indicator. The one that everybody will feel is the shaking of the World Tree, which will produce heavy fear in all beings. Once that comes, I'll get my arms and armor and leave. So in case that doesn't happen when we're all together, know that being able to spend time with you all again has been the greatest experience of my existence."

The silence that followed was absolute and lasting. It was broken by the arrival of Bruce, Emma, Tony, and Steve, who'd been working at Wayne in the labs. Emma, Bruce Banner, and Tony had established a routine of inventing and prototyping and handing off the inventions to Steve and my father-in-law for testing. Bucky too, when he was there. He'd come home early to greet my folks and J.

"You've had the Ragnarok conversation," Tony said, sipping his bourbon as he observed us. "There's nothing that will squash the conversation and spirits as completely." I smiled at him a little. But this wasn't his first rodeo with the topic and it wasn't long before he lightened people's moods. Tony is a complex man and sometimes an aggravating one, but he does have his gifts. By the time dinner was ready, conversations had recovered.

It wasn't until later that Thomas pounced on me. I was doing my evening check on my weapons and armor (yeah, yeah, a little OCD), finding a place on one of the shield straps that I'd need to watch, when he sidled into the cloakroom.

"Bruce explained this... Batman concept he started," he said to me, and I looked at him with interest. He stopped and started a few times, as if he didn't quite know how to put what he wanted to say. Maybe he didn't know what he wanted to say. I waited patiently for him to articulate. "How could Alfred let him do this? How could he let his son? How could any of you? Did you know before you married Damian?" The words burst out of him like a flood.

"I don't think Alfred's consent was sought," I said, trying to blend the facts that I knew with what I suspected lay behind the questions. "Bruce had to depend on Alfred when he was growing up and their relationship is very close, but I have always felt that Bruce would have done this no matter what Alfred said, and I am quite certain that Alfred tried to talk him out of it. But failing to do so, he made sure that it was as safe for Bruce as possible. Damian... I don't know what you've been told about Damian's mother, but most likely it was soft-pedalled. I know I considerably understated the matter when I said that she wasn't going to win Mother of the Year awards. She and her father abused Damian terribly. By the time he was dumped on his father's doorstep, he'd been trained as an assassin. His fighting skills, with and without weapons, are extraordinary. And he had no social skills. I thought he was a boor when I met him, and that was after seven years of improvement. Damian viewed Batman as a family trust, and one that he was proud to assume as a public service. I knew about it almost from the beginning." Thomas's mouth had fallen open. "We'd managed a friendship after I started working at Wayne Enterprises, and one night we went out to dinner after work. It was fall semester, I remember, because we were both studying Hamlet and discussing it on the way to the car. That's where we were jumped by a group of assassins that Damian's grandfather had sent for him. We managed to defeat them, but Damian was severely injured." I could still see him on the concrete floor of that parking garage. "He'd been knifed in the gut, beaten... it was really horrible. But he had me drive him back here, which is when I found out that there's a surgical suite downstairs, that Alfred is a medic, and that there's a resident batman. Later, after we started dating, I took over patching up Damian when he came home. If I'd pushed him to choose between me and crime-fighting, I'd have lost." I regarded Thomas soberly. "Damian and I did agree to hold off on introducing our children to the whole thing until they were in their mid-teens, I think. Martha wouldn't have anything to do with it because of how Bruce had died, but Xander weighed his options and gave it a try. He could have quit if he'd wanted and neither Damian nor I would have held it against him. It was their choice to make. I'm not saying it was easy to see them go out and not know what condition they'd return in, but... that was the way it was. As a parent, there's only so much that you can protect your children from. And they did make a difference."

It took Thomas awhile to sort through all of this. "After that fight in the garage, why didn't you tell Damian to stay away? I think most girls would."

"By that time I'd been learning hand-to-hand from my uncle for awhile. In the basement of Avenger tower, so I overheard plenty about fights and why the heroes do what they do. I have mutations myself; they're enough to make me more than human but less than superhero material. It was a lab accident; some boys were horsing around and I got drenched in chemicals and solvents and zapped with live current. I'd started practice because there was a boy in school who was making my life miserable and assaulted me on the sidewalk one day. Being able to defend myself makes me feel good about myself and decreases the chance that I'll be a victim. Doesn't eliminate it," I sighed, remembering the Joker, "but it does decrease it, or at least enables me to get my revenge." I smiled at him a little sadly. "After helping him, I felt kind of a bond."

"Did Damian or anybody go after the man who killed Bruce? Or Damian, for that matter?"

"Nobody went after the Joker; Bruce was very much against killing and for the most part everybody tried to live up to that. I didn't go after him, although I should have. I told him once that if he disturbed me or anyone I cared about again, I'd really do some damage. But the kids were hysterical and Damian and Alfred needed support too. So that opportunity slipped away. I did kill the Riddler, though."

"Why do you think you should have gone after the Joker?"

"Well, the Joker and I have a history ourselves, and it's pretty brutal. He pulled a stunt at a New Years Eve party. Damian and I had been set up by our friends, and we'd been having a good time. But the Joker came in, took a bunch of people hostage, but he was particularly excited to get his mitts on Damian, and apparently I intrigued him. We escaped, though, and after that, Damian said that he was going to keep his distance from me to protect me. Didn't work. The Joker tracked me down after high school graduation and kidnapped me one night. I got away eventually and beat the hell out of him. He kept his distance for awhile--had to, actually, he was locked up--but he broke out again and came after me again. He had his thugs abduct my brother, and after that... the gloves were off. After that, I encountered him once more and I really hurt him. But after that, he left me alone. So I left him alone."

"How did you get away from him?"

"The first time, I headbutted him. He ordered his goons to put me back in the cell with Damian, but I got the key and we made our escape. The second time... the paralyzing agent wore off faster than he'd expected."

Thomas blinked. "The paralyzing agent?" I nodded.

"So Damian and I had been through thick and thin by the time we even started dating with intent, not blind dates. We both knew everything of substance about each other and I think now that we were sizing each other up for a serious relationship from the start. We got serious pretty quickly. But he wanted to spend some time balancing out the bad with the good."

"And what was the good?" Thomas asked, beginning to smile.

"Flowers,"I said dreamily. "He used to use the language of flowers when he sent me bouquets. And ice cream." I smiled back.

"I'm surprised that he wasn't more extravagant," he said, offering me his arm

"He mostly waited until we were married," I shook my head. "Then it was jewelry." Thomas started to laugh. "I'm not even that fond of it. It beat all the animals he wanted to adopt, though; he's kind of a hoarder and there are only so many pets that you should have. But if you're interested in how he spoiled me, most of it's in the Smithsonian." Thomas stopped laughing.

"That sounds excessive," he said. I nodded.

"Excessively excessive. He didn't go into high gear until his mother died, though; he inherited all her assets. He broke down the businesses, wiped out the criminal aspect, but he had a lot of money that he didn't want. He donated most of it to charities, but then he thought about the jewelry. His mother really didn't like me." Thomas started to laugh.

"Why did he do it if he knew you didn't really care about the jewelry?"

"Well, it's all pretty and sparkly, so it wasn't like I was completely indifferent, and it was a very tangible way for him to show his love. It allowed him an outlet for his magpie tendencies, and... well, he was sometimes the victim of racist behavior because he's partly Middle Eastern. Aside from a few fights as a kid, he pretty much swallowed it in public, but it hurt. Later, he got revenge in other ways. There was one guy who'd created a lot of trouble for him, called the feds on him. He hired away all that guy's best people and the business tanked. To be fair, though, he mainly did that because the guy put his hands on me. Otherwise, he took pleasure in generous contributions to charity; he was often in the paper at ribbon cuttings or groundbreakings for various public enterprises, and I think it made him feel better to have a wife who was well turned out by his side, that he could afford to be so remarkably extravagant. For my part, I cultivated relationships with designers, especially those with roots in the Middle East, so that when we were out I could look the part."

"You didn't mind?"

"It would have been nicer to have more evenings at home," I acknowledged, "but he did enjoy going out there, expanding his knowledge and acquaintance of the right kind of people, pursuing business interests." I laughed fondly. "And with him I had fun too."

"Who were the right kind of people, then?"

"Business people, the ones who worked in innovative ways or made forward-thinking projects. Potential business partners. Smart people, inventors, people who wanted to make a difference in the world." I smiled at him. "But he also listened to those who were older and more experienced."

"What did you do after he died?"

"Same thing, mostly, just by myself. It wasn't much fun without him, but I had connections of my own that I used for the benefit of Martha's stewardship of the company, and partly to keep a little of Damian alive. There's a Damian Wayne Memorial Garden in Central Park and an elementary school named after him in the Bronx. The Damian Wayne Memorial Trust still takes applications from public schools and after school programs for funding and supplies. Damian had done something similar in Bruce's memory; that trust provides funds to send inner city kids to summer camps and funds youth sports programs."

We stopped by the stairs. "Look, I know that you and Martha would have had plans for Bruce that included virtually none of what happened after your deaths. But Bruce used his loss in a manner that kept him from being just a rich guy with a sob story and turned him into a hero. And I'm not talking about the costume. He made a very real difference, saving lives, making the city safer at the risk to his own self. And that made him a hero to me. Rehabilitating Damian is something else that he doesn't get enough credit for. Most people probably would have thrown up their hands and sent him to a succession of boarding schools, but he did the hard work himself, with the result being the best husband and father I could imagine. Bruce had a wonderful guardian and he accomplished some really extraordinary things, whether the public knew it or not."

"So you're saying he ended up better than he would have if Martha and I had been there."

"No. He would have been different, but I don't doubt that he still would have been an outstanding man and a fine civic leader. The main difference in outcome is that there wouldn't have been a Batman and there wouldn't be Damian." We parted, Thomas quite thoughtful.

The next morning, I remembered to do something I'd been meaning to do but forgetting. When I went down to breakfast, I handed Martha a box. She took the cover off and picked up one of the boxes inside. She smiled when she saw her pearls. I smiled too.

"It was nice of you to give Grandma her jewelry back," Damian said on the ride in.

"They were hers, she should have them. Besides, I still have the pearls you gave me. And no, I don't want you to start in on another jewelry collection, Damian," I said anxiously, and he laughed.

"I think we're done with that for the most part," he said affectionately. "Besides, your beauty requires no ornamentation. I should have seen that to begin with." Martha rolled her eyes.

"I'd gag, but that was actually sweet, dad." Bruce laughed.

When I got to work, Serena's mother had turned up, great news. We popped to Asgard for our training and she told me more as we warmed up. Space was at a premium in the city, but Loki had authorized the purchase of cots and air mattresses, blankets and pillows for close family members, and the ballroom and most of the large public rooms were set up as refugee shelter. "That's such terrific news," I said. Serena had perked right up and she was trying to find out information on the rest of her family in Georgia. Unfortunately, not every city had a database like ours, and some had rejected Daniel's offer of free software on the grounds that it would take too much time and money and personnel who weren't available to replicate their records. They did have a searchable database in Great Britain, but it didn't work with ours and I'd had to submit a formal request for information on my grandma along with documentation since I was a foreign national.

Afterward, we winked back to the city, changed into street clothes, and went out to help. I was waylaid by Peter. "I wanted to apologize for May's behavior the other night," he said. "I'm so sorry. I had no idea what she'd done. We--MJ and I--tried to do our best with her. We were overly indulgent, she was so bright and personable."

I nodded. Martha had had the same qualities, but she'd turned out differently. I didn't want to rub Peter's nose in that, though. "At some point, you have to accept that your influence as a parent only goes so far," I said quietly. "She was an adult when she made her choices. My personal feeling is that she let it all go to her head. She's got such a strong personality that it would have been difficult for even you to set her straight. We all do the best we can as parents, and hope that our kids have absorbed our lessons well enough." He didn't say anything, just stared at the floor.

"Martha turned out all right," he said.

"Martha and May are two different people. May has to accept the consequences of her own actions. Nobody made her do the things she did. Once we were in a disagreement and I said "your father never would have done that," I'm sorry to say. It wasn't fair of me. But she said that that was why she wanted to do it. She wanted to differentiate herself from the comparison, although you really were a good example to follow." Peter just shook his head. What do you say to a parent whose kid had turned out badly? "She's got a second chance, though. If she wants to redeem herself, there are a lot of options out there for somebody who's driven to make a difference." It was all I could think of to offer.

"You think so?" He finally looked up.

"I do." I nodded. "She can't undo what's been done, but she's got another opportunity to show her character. If she wants to, she can change opinions about her by the good that she can do now." Serena was going to kill me if she found out, but-- "Look, Peter. There are opportunities out there now that have never existed. If she comes up with a good idea that isn't an ego trip, let me know. I'd put down a small stake." I had to do something for him. He was ashamed of his daughter and this might be a way to help her get on track. "If you don't tell her." This time a hint of a smile lifted the corners of his mouth. He knew that this was something offered on his behalf, not May, but he wasn't going to turn it down.