[ he asks, and her first instinct is to laugh. batman requesting information from her, seriously? as if she's the bold and the broody with years of experience -- oh, and eyes everywhere. bruce doesn't tend to ask her broad questions like that unless he's testing her. maybe training her, on their good days. at least that's how it was. back when they interacted on a regular basis. pre-firing.

pre-dying. on both their parts.

suppressing her suspicious instincts, she halts her response. that was the old steph and the older bruce. now, in this trash compacter, she knows she has come so far. thinks that he agrees, at least partly. that he allows himself to like her openly, instead of genuinely distrusting her or pushing her away.

and that she'll be fine if he doesn't like her, anyway. ]

[ after a pause, her tone shifts slightly, more steady than before. a shade less jovial. ] Did you hear that voice earlier? Calling this a "level," like in a video game? [ the clarification because she's honestly not sure if he ever played video games (simulations don't count). she speaks with minimal room for a reply, assuming he noticed. he always notices. ] I think we've gone full on Matrix and been dragged into the digital world by one of the usual suspects. Maybe the Calculator didn't stay dead, or the Electrocutioner branched out. Computer science is where the jobs are at, after all.

[ ha ha ha said the undeclared major who kind of enjoys psychology but mostly wishes she was fighting crime ]