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Hayley moves quickly and quietly into the apartment at his invitation. She stops only a few feet into the space and turns around to face him, rolling up onto the balls of her feet and back down with nervous energy. It's an uncommon gesture for her to display in any other situation. This one calls for it, especially with the anticipation of speaking to Bruce about everything.

"We need to talk," she replies immediately, nearly clipping off his words. "But you already know that."

The girl glances back around the apartment, to Bruce, and around again. "Here, or in the kitchen, or where-?"

Edited 2013-12-20 05:33 (UTC)

She's still wound up, obviously. It emphasizes her age to him, where sometimes he can nearly forget when they're speaking only by voice on the consoles. But to him it reads as young, nervous, unsure how to handle an unexpected crisis. He hasn't been like that in a long time, isn't sure he's ever really had the luxury to be antsy.

Conversely, he settles even further, seemingly unaffected by her nerves. "I have it hidden," he answers, assuming that's what she's asking for. That'd be his priority, anyway. "Let's just take a seat." Bruce walks toward the couch to do just that, gait even. "How about you start from the beginning," he says.

Hayley shakes her head immediately when he speaks. He's missing the point entirely. She's not asking about the Kryptonite, though she supposes she should at some point. Right now, her focus is on the danger at hand. For once, the green rock can wait.

"No, I-," she begins, but stops when he continues speaking and moves over towards the couch. His calm movements annoy her, because she understands exactly what it is, the effort to placate her. "I meant where we should talk."

She hates the idea of following him when he guides her like that, so she moves over near the couch but refuses to sit for the moment. "He's acting like a god, right? No one should be invincible. Especially after their powers kill people. He didn't get that. I just wanted him to understand. So I found some Kryptonite at the auction and I attacked him. Only, it didn't go exactly like I thought it would and.. here I am."

There's a pause as she considers, running through her story again, realizing she missed one important deal. "Superman. I attacked Superman."

He doesn't explicitly intend to placate her; he thinks her distress has a real and understandable source. But his instinct is ever to deescalate, to bring the tension down and return to a ruthlessly practical way of looking at potential solutions. It won't do Hayley any favors, in his mind, if he treats her crises less seriously than he treats his own.

Bruce leans against the arm of the couch rather than sit when he sees that she isn't going to, and the surprise is clear in the lines of his posture when she finally clarifies. "Superman?" he repeats, vaguely incredulous. "Why would you-- that's dangerous. Absurdly dangerous. Even if he did-- wait. What do you mean, after his powers killed people?"

Somehow he hasn't been informed of this tidbit yet, and finally, at last, some of that dark dissatisfaction, simmering anger, is visibly lurking in his bearing. Bruce is quick. He has a suspicion about who's deaths she's referring to if she was worked up enough about it to attack someone practically invincible, and he doesn't want to believe that he could've missed a piece of information so critical.

She appreciates that he doesn't sit after telling her to do so. It's both unnerving and calming that he can read her well enough to predict those kinds of behaviors. Hayley grimaces very slightly when he repeats the name, an exaggerated expression to emphasize her embarrassment over the matter. While the girl has no regrets about attacking Superman, it's not something she knows is common or particularly acceptable. Especially as a 14 or 15-year-old girl.

"It wasn't that dangerous," she grumbles in response, not entirely appreciating what feels all too similar to a lecture of sorts. Somehow, for once, it doesn't really rile her to feel chastised. It's almost too familiar to be uncomfortable.

She chooses to sound less immature as she continues. "It was a Kryptonian's powers who killed Tony and I. I didn't tell anyone because- well, because I wanted to take care of it myself, but also? It was during the whole Zatanna spell thing where people were swapping super powers and so it wasn't really his fault. And I wasn't withholding information either. Lois knows and she's part of the investigation, so they're already looking into it."

There's a pause before she continues with less sureness. "The box I gave you has a piece of green rock in it. Kryptonite? It's the only thing that can hurt Superman. I don't want anyone else to have it because I know how bad that could be if it got into the wrong hands, but it's not fair that no one has any when maybe it could have helped. I couldn't keep it because I know he'd want it back and he might have one of his friends steal it or something, but I figured you should know since you have it right now."

Normally Hayley isn't so honest about the full situation. It's easier to ask forgiveness than permission, but Bruce has earned it.

Edited (terminology) 2013-12-22 05:36 (UTC)

Bruce strongly disagrees that it's not that dangerous. Kal-El is a kind man, he'd have to be deaf and blind to have missed that, but he's incredibly powerful and Hayley is only a girl. If he'd justifiably taken offense to her holding one of his biggest weaknesses, it could've gotten messy, fast.

But he can't harp on that, because she's revealing facts about their murderer and his stomach turns over to hear it. "So someone had his powers," he says instantly. "That's how they could-- without either of you realizing who it was." It suddenly makes a lot more sense why Hayley would want to hold onto the Kryptonite, as a pivotal weakness for the set of powers that had murdered her.

The thought makes him sober, thinking over the implications. "Thank you for telling me," he says honestly, folding his arms and drumming his fingers against his bicep. "Nothing should be impervious, for reasons like this." Bruce definitely feels better having so many people around that he knows can withstand the Hulk. "I agree that holding onto it is a good idea. We don't know what might happen again. He won't be able to guess that I have it?"

Bruce has no idea what Superman knows of his relationship with Hayley, whether he'd think to guess that she'd have passed the Kryptonite onto him.

Hayley watches and listens in silence as Bruce begins to piece it together. It's dangerous, him knowing so much. In this situation, though, she's aware enough to recognize that she may need help to find the killer and she knows Bruce's words will have more sway with Tony than her own. That means she needs Bruce on her side and to understand that she's not entirely innocent and definitely not content to idle around until the man is found.

She feels a weight lift from her shoulders, one she didn't realize she had been carrying, when he agrees to hold onto the Kryptonite. The girl really didn't want to test that theory about the Hulk protecting her to get time to retrieve the rock from him if he wanted to give it away. With most of her anxiety settling to a more manageable level, exhaustion floods in to fill the gap and she finally moves over to take a seat on the edge of a chair near him.

"I don't know. I think I told him I stayed with you, but I don't think he knows how-" '..how close we are,' 'how much I trust you?' It's the last thing Hayley's willing to admit aloud without absolute necessity. "..often we talk."

"Don't invite him in and maybe.. I think we'll be okay." She begins a different thought than she ends with. Hayley knows Stark Industries would be a safer place for the rock to be, but she doesn't trust Tony with it. The more people they tell, the more risks there are of the wrong person knowing and trying to kill Clark. That's really not what she wants right now.

This is a serious situation, no doubt, but it's nowhere near close to alarming enough to provoke a major reaction out of Bruce. He's fully in damage control mode, unperturbed by the suddenness. It's just his long held, simmering anger at their murderer that's affecting him.

How often we talk is a good euphemism for their actual relationship, one Bruce accepts in lieu of anything about trust. Trust is such a precarious thing; he doesn't expect Hayley to do more than trust that she can depend on him in certain situations. Such as this one.

"I won't invite him here," he promises, somewhat speculative, like he's thinking. There has to be more to this situation than just what Hayley's telling him, and Bruce, like her, isn't the type to sit idly when he has answers that he wants. "Do you think he knows any more than we do about... what happened?"

Hayley accepts the thinking aloud for what it is. She tucks her hands besides her thighs and stretches her legs out in front of her, trying to relax, watching Bruce. Although she does her best to follow his line of thinking, all she can do is wildly speculate and wait for his actual thoughts to come in the form of words. It isn't until his question that she speaks again.

"No," she replies confidently and almost immediately. "He knows it was his powers, but that's it. He's trying to find whoever it was too."

Her hands clench up with that thought. Lois and Clark rushing to find her killer in order to put him away in jail until he can get lose and kill again. She hates that they might find him before she and Tony do, that their murderer might not get true justice.

Bruce isn't even thinking of jail. It's so not a viable option to him that, like Hayley, he finds the entire idea pointless. Even Fury wouldn't be able to contain him in prison forever, whatever cage he thinks he has, and in a place like this where death is frequently impermanent, it seems fruitless to try. That doesn't mean Bruce is going to give up on the idea that murderers should face consequences; no, it just says to him that he needs to be more... inventive.

But he's spent the past decade going to extreme lengths to prevent others from being harmed. One person who got lucky with a power swap, and notably isn't the Hulk? He's not phased at all.

All that races through his head in another moment of obvious thought, before it breaks and he scrapes his hand through his hair. "Okay. So. Whoever this is... we can't use the method he killed with as an effective identifier. That's not what he's normally capable of. Actually that's, that's promising."

Looking more through her than at her, Bruce is rapidly getting lost in a whirl of ideas about things he could make, likely with Tony's help. He'd never think of leaving him out of this.

"If that was a rare opportunity for him," which is supported by the fact that there hasn't been a huge string of murders afterwards, "then he's not as hard to restrain as Superman. Maybe we could make something, build something, I don't know. But we need a plan for what we're doing with him after we find him, before we do it."

Again, Hayley allows a silence to give Bruce time to think. She knows that half the time he isn't exactly listening and suspects he's the type who has spent so much time alone that he thinks aloud regardless of another presence. It doesn't bother her in the slightest, cuing her in on his train of thought without requiring her to ask questions or interfere. It's almost preferred.

It isn't until he again crosses a topic that needs addressing until she reestablishes her presence. When she does speak, it's not angry or threatened, but very confident and factual. "I don't think it's your decision."

She waits a beat, ensuring that she has his attention before she elaborates. "He killed Tony and he killed me. I think the two of us should get to decide what to do with him. That's why I don't want Lois or Clark or those guys to find him first."

Her voice turns cold as she continues, distancing herself from the subject and unconsciously dehumanizing the perpetrator. "He deserves consequences and I don't think anyone else needs to know what Tony or I need to do to feel okay again, you know? I don't want to kill him, but.. he needs more than to be put in jail."

Torture. Isolation, starvation, suicide. He deserves physical and psychological agony for what he caused to others. It's the only viable method of prevention she can come up with really.

Bruce reacts to his solitude by closing up, withdrawing even further; he hardly ever speaks to himself. No, what he's doing here is awkwardly trying to draw another in to his thought processes, a rusty memory of doing that with Betty guiding him. Bruce is bad at explaining himself but sees the necessity of it here, and as always, finds it far easier to focus on the practical than on the human element.

His focus abruptly sharpens to a fine point on that human element at what she says, though. There's a few seconds of tense silence, awaiting his response, as his thoughts align themselves. Bruce can't gainsay anyone's desire for revenge or justice or whatever they want to call it-- it's their attempt to regain power, basically, and his whole life has been one long attempt at regaining power. He knows it. But he also instinctively disapproves of watching someone he cares about, for whatever misguided reason that is, break themselves down with violence.

He's not sure that's what she's saying here. Hayley's been vague, likely deliberately so.

"It's not my decision," he agrees neutrally, the bland composure that returns to him a more dangerous sign than any apparent display of feeling. "It's yours and Tony's and whoever else was killed. I'm willing to help if I agree with it." Carefully not committing himself to anything unilateral, trying to draw her out into revealing her hand before he reveals his. Bruce doesn't think this conversation is trivial; not at all. It's a foreshadowing to an inevitability-- they will catch him eventually, and what happens afterward needs to be addressed now.

Without a change in tone but deliberate, weighted, he asks, "What do you intend to do?"

Edited 2013-12-29 07:58 (UTC)

She watches him. Some deep part of her anxiously awaits his response and there's even some small corner in the back of her mind that seeks some form of approval. Much more prevalent, however, is her firm and unwavering knowledge that she has made the right decision and that, regardless of what he thinks and whether or not he approves, she'll do what she thinks is right. It's the same mindset that tells her that everyone really does approve of torture in terms of the results that it brings. It's only that no one wants to be faced with the moral conundrum and the chance of being deemed cruel that makes them shy away from the sometimes necessary choices. For some people, there is no other method.

Hayley can't - and won't - say that her killer can only be educated by that method. Not yet. She has to find out who it is and evaluate him independently first. But she's prepared to do whatever is necessary. That much she knows.

"I don't know," she replies evenly. The girl can't handle surprises worth a damn, but Bruce is rarely a surprise anymore. Even if everything he says is unexpected, his disconnect and measured words prevent the sort of spontaneity than can fluster her.

He might know about her attacking Superman and, through that, be able to anticipate some level of what she's capable of. He might know some of her past and the darkness that bring. He might even know how deeply manipulative and deceitful she can be. But he doesn't know her. Not entirely. "Maybe we'll have to wait and see who it is."

Edited 2013-12-29 08:05 (UTC)

Although unknown to Bruce, Hayley takes on a very similar mindset to one that he has about his own problems-- which is being incredibly stubborn. He's as resistant to external influence as she is, and denies any hidden desire for approval just as well.

It's this similarity that makes him convinced immediately that she's lying when she says she doesn't know. Of course she knows. She's been thinking about it, she has to have been. Bruce as a teenager had been consumed with thoughts of angry revenge, if not against his father (that seemed impossible to him even then to attempt) then against all those others who had hurt him. And there were many.

He also knows from that experience that personal capabilities can be overcome in pursuit of retribution. Hayley might be just a girl, but he's not about to discount her. He was just a boy when he'd built a bomb in his school basement.

"Let's try that again," he says, gentler. "What would you like to do?" He's not unsympathetic, he really isn't. But he does want the truth about what he's aiding and abetting.

Hayley lifts her chin to meet his gaze dead on, the way she did with Jason Todd, insinuating a darkness rarely shown. Unlike Jason, it's not empathy and understanding that she sees in him, not in the same way. While Jason is subtly encouraging her to kill, she's fairly confident that Bruce will pull her back from that. He might allow it from Tony, but she's a girl and a kid and she's sure that he can't ignore those things.

After a moment, she drops her eyes to her lap and pulls her legs back in towards her, looking down to her shoes. When she returns her gaze to Bruce, the hint of menace beneath her features has lessened and her tone is flippant and weary. "It really depends on who it is. It's not about anger or revenge or whatever, Bruce. It's about making sure it doesn't happen again. The only way to do that is to make sure he knows it's not worth it."

Whatever his own feelings on the subject of taking back power, Hayley is right that he wouldn’t want her engaging in it. He doesn’t want to see the violence perpetuated in her like it has been in him. He knows of no truer way to phrase that in the privacy of his own thoughts.

The demure act doesn’t fool him in the least, not after that glimpse he’d gotten. His lips tighten, Bruce recognizing far too much of himself in her already. The hiding, the pretending, the attempt to reason away her intended actions. It’s all too familiar, and it scares him faintly, to think that she might be falling into the path his own life had taken. He wouldn’t wish that on anyone.

“That’s a logical fallacy,” he says curtly, giving up on gentility. “If it was about making sure it didn’t happen again, you wouldn’t care what he thought or knew. You can’t change someone like that. Tony and I could come up with something once we have more information, something that would—restrain or monitor him, something. Just don’t tell me you’re not angry.” His gaze sharpens, knowing. “You are. You should be. I know what it looks like.”