#Talia was killed when she confronted her father when she found out his plans to take over her son's body | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

sixtyeightdays · 4 years

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you reap what you sow

prompt from @mialuvscats : i hope this meets your expectations ! im sorry this took so long, i tried uploading it from my phone but it glitched and i could only get my hands on the computer today

i’d like to say that i think if sabine and mari are there, damian and talia willl be relatively looser and not as uptight . mari and sabine are cold but loving and sunshiney. they keep talia and damian in check, essentially. which is why i wrote them in to be loose and free but able to be openly happy when they want to be, even if they are only happy around each other.

with sabine here i also thinkt hat talia will be slightly easier on damian, which also ties to the fact that he will not be as cold and uptight.

talia will be a good mother in this fic bc i want her to be and itll be ooc but its okay its my fic anyway

and the timeline is kinda messed up and all over the place sorry

that aside, have fun reading and i hope you enjoy!

talia and sabine are best friends, and before most of the class joins francois, marinette ruled the school after coming to paris with sabine. mari and damian are betrothed and the two are best friends. they can be icy one minute and sunshiney the next, although the sunshiney part is more mari than damian.

maybe the waynes come to paris, bc if theyre in gotham the others wont really know if the queen is back, and theyre kinda unsure why marinette is being timid and very unlike her ice queen demeanor she sometimes uses. mari is closest to jason in terms of batfam because firstly maybe she cleanses jason of the lazarus pit after helping damian using tikki's creation magic to counteract plagg's destruction one. since the waynes are here theres no point in mari hiding her queen status anymore and queue lila reveal

Talia al Ghul and Sabine Cheng were an unlikely combination, but worked perfectly well.

The two women were extremely close. Sabine was almost as deadly as Talia, but she made up for it with her devious mindset. She was the one who steered Talia away from doing anything wrong --well more wrong than usual-- and the one who was assigned to dish out punishments to usurpers.

The two could read each other like open books, and hence, when both Talia and Sabine became pregnant, Talia one month before Sabine, the two knew immediately.

They had debated whether or not to have their kids be betrothed, and eventually decided to let their children make the final call when their kids were old enough to understand.

Nine months later, Marinette and Damian were born. In the League infirmary, an hour after the two were cleaned and left there to rest while their mothers did the same, the two had already grown rather close.

Their baby cribs were next to each other, and somehow they were staring at each other through the walls of the crib, and were making small grabby hands to the other.

When Talia and Sabine were sufficiently rested and came to pick up their children, they were slightly shocked, yet gratified by their children. Sabine smiled and draped an arm around Talia’s shoulder, smiling lazily.

“I guess they’ll be as close as their mothers, non?”

Talia smirked, and the two walked forwards, lifting their respective children in their arms and walking to their quarters.

The two mothers did not regret it. Their kids were enamoured with each other, practically joined at the hip.

By the time Marinette and Damian were 5, they had a very extensive vocabulary, since they had learned to speak Arabic, French and English. They were also extremely smart and skilled with weapons.

Marinette was extremely adept at using a yoyo. It seemed weird, I know. But when the League was stormed when she was 3, she had taken out 4 men with her yoyo alone. Since then, she had been teaching herself how to use the yoyo effectively.

Damian preferred to use a katana. He looked much scarier than Marinette, even if the two were the same age. He had found a natural talent in using blades, knives, katanas and daggers included.

Marinette was the Rain to Damian’s Fire.

She was the only one who could calm Damian down when he was mad, mad.

But make no mistake, Marinette could switch personalities in a heartbeat. She was one of the League’s most skilled interrogators at the age of 5.

After all, who would suspect a pigtailed 5 year old in pink to be scary?

Damian much preferred his stoic and icy attitude. The only people he ever let loose around was Marinette, Sabine, and Talia.

Talia and Sabine loved the children to an almost deadly extent, and the four were extremely overprotective of each other.

Marinette had taken to magic as well. She had been trained by many people in the League about sensing magic. Damian did not have the patience for magic and rituals.

Marinette knew Damian was more of a ‘attack first ask questions later’ type of fighter, a stark contrast to Marinette’s ‘i will curse you and you will suffer in agonising pain for the rest of your life’ preferred type of fighting.

She’d never really liked getting her hands dirty, hence the magic. Killing people with magic was so much cleaner.

Sabine and Marinette had to leave for Paris when she was 9. For what, she wasn’t sure, but regardless of the distance, she and Damian constantly traded calls and letters. They would never go even a day without contact.

They were staying with one of Sabine’s old friends. His name was Tom Dupain, and he was an old wrestler and had worked with the League before. He and Sabine pretended to be married and Marinette’s name had hence became Marinette Dupain Cheng.

Damian and Talia stayed at the League, although all of them knew that Damian was to meet his birth father when he turned 10.

Marinette adapted her icy demeanor in Paris, never wanting anyone to get as close as she was with Damian.

A few hours in, walking around Paris, she had met an elderly man in a red Hawaiian shirt, emitting the aura of magic. She had confronted him, and eventually, he opened up to her about the Miraculous. Tikki, the Ladybug kwami, and Plagg, the Black Cat kwami had taken a liking to her.

Marinette was apparently something called a True User, a reincarnation of the first Ladybug miraculous wielder. Plagg just rather liked the aura of death and chaos she apparently gave off, from the League.

She and the other Kwamis also had a rather amicable relationship, and she’d go to the ends of the Earth for the tiny gods, and vice versa.

The elderly man, named Fu, had also started to train her into becoming the new Guardian of the Miraculous.

Before, Marinette had been planning on laying low and not drawing atention to herself, but once she had beaten up two upperclassmen for bullying her classmate and somewhat accquaintance Nino, she had been fiercely regarded by both the students and faculty.

As a result, she eventually grew close to Nino, and his friends, Kim, Alix and Chloe. She only ever let down her icy demeanour around them, showing the bright and bubbly girl persona she kept hidden. She wasn’t as close to them as she was to Damian, but they were all still quite close friends.

It wasn’t long after that Marinette became the queen of her school, at the tender age of 10, earning her title as the Ladybug. Or, as Chloe liked to put it, the Lady, because she was lucky enough to ‘get a friend like her’.

Marinette didn’t protest. She rather liked Ladybugs, and besides, it was ironic and it reminded her a little of Damian, who sometimes liked to call her his Maribug. Because she was sometimes a pest, he deadpanned. Marinette had whacked him with a pillow.

Everyone in the school feared the Ladybug. No one knew anything of her past. She was a mystery, an enigma that no one could solve. When new students came in after Marinette turned 14, everyone was slightly shocked to see their Lady change.

She was much more bubbly and approachable. Word had spread around that Marinette, the Lady, was trying a clean slate for the new kids. After all, not everyone should fear her.

Probably.

School eventually returned to what it was like before Marinette became the Lady, although she did still rule the school, she did it much more subtly, with more restraint and secrecy.

One of the new kids, Alya, had taken a liking to her. Marinette did not like her very much, she was loud and clingy and drew a lot of unwanted attention.

Marinette and her old crew, who had playfully called themselves her Consorts before the name stuck, had split up temporarily, to cover more ground and spread their branches.

Chloe was to pretend to be Marinette’s bully, Kim and Alix rivals, and Nino a shy recluse. They had had a good laugh about it beforehand, before watching Moana, because Kim wanted to compare the size of his muscles to Maui’s.

None of them had accounted for Adrien Agreste, who had tried to get the gum off Marinette’s seat like the naive, sheltered boy he was. Marinette had admittedly gotten mad at him for screwing up a perfectly good plan, before ramping up her ice persona to like, a 2/10, to get the newbies off her scent and scare Adrien away.

It hadn’t worked, because the boy was apparently as stubborn as he was naive. But besides that, Alya had been really grating on Marinette’s nerves, especially since she was convinced that Marinette had a crush on the model. It was not true, of course.

Honestly, Marinette thought dryly, as Alya dragged her all over the place to.. somewhere, she wasn’t even sure anymore. But frankly, she didn’t particularly care. Honestly, the only boy she’d probably ever have a crush on would be Damian.

Not that she’d ever admit it.

When Marinette and Damian turned 10, she and Sabine had taken a plane to Gotham to meet up with Damian.

Damian had not been having a good time. He was very much unwanted here, that was clear.

Grayson seemed to be the only one trying to interact with him. His father, had been trying his best to stay out of Damian’s way, which he reciprocated. Todd was flat out ignoring him and Drake just seemed to be busy all the time.

After all, who would want to interact with a grumpy 10 year old assassin?

He missed Marinette.

It was the day Todd finally tried to open up to Damian, that Marinette had arrived. No one had told him that she was finally meeting him again for the first time in a year. Sabine had left Marinette to figure out where Damian was on her own. She was more than capable of it.

With a quick scrying spell, she found him, and Kaalki opened a portal headed in the direction of Wayne Manor.

Meanwhile, Damian just appreciated the fact that Todd was finally extending an olive branch. He was lonely.

It hurt seeing his father care for everyone in the manor apart from him.

He had been walking along the gardens in the manor. Todd had joined him.

“Listen, I know it’s hard to feel accepted here. Sometimes, I do.” Jason gazed wistfully at the sky above him.

Damian was unsure of where the ex-Robin was getting at, so he just kept quiet. It wasn’t as if Damian didn’t know who Jason Todd was. Before he had come to the manor with Talia, he had read the Waynes’ files. In addition, Damian had known of Jason while he was affiliated with the League. They had never talked, or interacted, but he had known of the elder boy.

“I just, uh, wanted you to know that if you ever need anything, you can come to me.” He finished lamely, running a hand in his hair.

Damian opened his mouth, then closed it, hesitating. “Thank you, Ja--Todd. I will.” He settled on saying dryly.

Jason visibly relaxed and cracked a miniscule smile. There was a sudden ‘swoosh’ sound, and both Jason and Damian turned around, bodies automatically going on the defensive.

Stumbling out of Alfred’s rose bushes, trodding on a few accidentally, was Marinette.

“Angel!” Damian exclaimed, moving forwards to help her forwards.

She brushed her shoulders off, looking around before freezing, staring at something behind him.

“Jay?”

“Pixie?” He asked, sounding incredulous.

Marinette rushed forward and wrapped him in a tight embrace. Jason laughed and hugged her back, chuckling.

Damian quashed down the bubbling feeling of rage in the pit of his stomach and settled for casting a frosty glance in their direction. Not that they noticed, since they were too busy embracing each other, Damian thought scornfully.

The two pulled apart after too long in Damian’s opinion, laughing.

“Angel? How do you know Todd?” Damian asked coldly, ever so protective.

If Jason noticed the sudden reversion to his surname instead of his first, he didn’t say anything.

“Oh, he came to Paris with Lia once and I cleansed him of the Lazarus pit madness, like I did with you.” She replied.

“What are you doing here?” Jason asked. Damian had forgotten about that.

“Visiting, of course!” She winked. “Now, let’s give your old man a good scare.” She pecked Damian on the cheek before vanishing. (Thanks, Trixx.)

Jason and Damian looked to each other. “Did you know she could do that?” Jason questioned. Damian shook his head before pausing.

“Wait.. how did she get into the manor?”

The only response was the faint echo of a laugh.

It was time for dinner anyway, and only Damian, Jason, and Alfred knew of Marinette’s presence. Marinette had voluntary evelaed herself to the elderly butler after noticing his aura.

It was Miraculous tainted. If Marinette could guess, he had been either one of Duusu’s, Sass’s, or Nooroo’s.

When the butler had retired to the kitchen alone, Marinette had unraveled Trixx’s magic veiling her and waved at the butler.

To hi credit, he didn’t so much as bat an eye before his eyes widened as he took her in. Marinette cut to the chase.

“Who was your kwami?” Alfred had surveyed her for a second before seemingly trusting her.

“Duusu.” He answered.

Marinette smiled. “I’m Tikki’s.” From her perch in Marinette’s left pigtail, the red Kwami pried open the folds of her hair, waving once at Alfred before sinking back into the recesses of the bluenette’s locks.

Alfred blinked. Once. Twice. “I’m presuming you’re staying for dinner?”

Marinette beamed. “I’m gonna scare the big bat.” Alfred nodded, accepting this. Marinette clapped her hands and she disappeared again. Alfred shook his head, smiling faintly.

Conveniently, it was one of the times where everyone was there. Dick, Jason, Tim, and Damian. Rare these days, what with Dick in Bludhaven, Tim at WE, and Jason off being Jason.

Bruce was currently on his way back from WE, although it would take around half an hour. He had told everyone to start eating first. Perfect.

After Marinette’s encounter with Alfred, she had reappeared in Damian’s room, where she and Damian caught up. Just like old times.

She had disappeared again once she left the room, and Damian wasn’t entirely sure where she went.

Alfred set the the table as per normal, which Damian and Jason noticed right away. They looked to Alfred, who merely winked before stepping back into the kitchen and laying out the food.

There was a screech of a chair as Marinette, disguised as Bruce (Trixx in her right pigtail and Tikki in the left) sat down. Dick looked startled.

“I thought you wouldn’t be back till later!” Dick exclaimed.

Mari-Bruce shrugged. “Faster than I’d expected.” She answered, securing the veil of Trixx’s magic around her vocal chords, making her voice sound exactly like Bruce’s.

Jason inched away slightly from Bruce, though she pretended not to notice.

Alfred nodded at her as he reentered the room.

Everyone dug in, occasionally talking. It had been about 25 minutes before the sound of the door opening could be heard. Damian and Jason’s head shot up, thinking it was Marinette.

Mari-Bruce smirked. Showtime.

Bruce entered the room, not noticing Mari at first. Until the batboys gaped at him. He looked confused. What--?

Mari-Bruce was a pretty great actress. “Who are you?” She thundered, internally laughing.

“Who are you? I’m Bruce Wayne.” He answered, looking befuddled and frustrated.

“Impostor.” Mari-Bruce accused.

Bruce spluttered. “No! I’m the real Bruce!”

Mari-Bruce scoffed. “That’s what an impostor would say.”

Damian and Jason seemed to figure it out, although they probably weren’t sure which Bruce was the real one yet.

Tim rubbed his eyes. “Am I seeing double, or?”

Bruce said, “Ask me something the real Bruce would know.”

Dick looked torn, but did as requested. “Who murdered your parents?”

“Joe Chill.” They both said at the same time. Mari-Bruce and Bruce winced, selling the act.

“When’s my birthday?” Tim asked.

“July 17th.” Both Bruces answered.

Tim looked surprised. “You actually know my birthday?”

“No shit, Tim.” Mari-Bruce said, rolling their eyes. She rather wanted to proceed to the next part of her plan.

“Would I say that to you, Tim?” Bruce asked slightly desperately.

“Maybe?”

Bruce facepalmed. In the confusion, Mari took the chance to slink into the shadows where she rewrapped Trixx’s invisible magic around her.

Only Damian noticed. He smirked. “Where did he go?” He asked, placing a hand on the hilt of his katana for emphasis. He didn’t see Marinette smile at him.

Everyone looked panicked. “Search the manor.” Bruce ordered.

Jason still looked slightly skeptical but did as he said. Damian drew his katanas and tilted it in the direction he was going.

Amongst everyone, Bruce was the most attacked. While Jason and Damian paired off, Tim and Dick did as well, ("Don’t go alone!” Was Bruce’s admonished cry), Bruce had gone alone.

If she were being honest, Marinette had always had a grudge against the billionaire. He hadn’t saved his son, he had tried to kill his son, even though he had a no killing rule --which Marinette thought was plain stupid--, and he had left Damian to suffer at the hands of Ra’s Al Ghul.

Talia could only do so much to save her son.

Yes, Marinette was aware that Bruce hadn’t know Damian existed, but now he was still treating Damian as if he didn’t exist. Marinette knew how much Damian craved affection, even if he never admitted it.

Yes, maybe Bruce was getting better, but maybe she could.. spur the process.

So Marinette retaliated in one of the many ways she knew how.

Messing with them.

So when the Waynes regrouped in the dining room, Jason, Damian, Dick and Tim came back unharmed, and Jason had been filled in by Damian of his suspicions. But Bruce?

He came back covered in honey and feathers, drenched with water and covered in pink slime.

“Why is he going after me?” Bruce had questioned in that annoying voice of his, after looking over his spotless sons.

Jason shrugged. “Maybe he doesn’t like you. God knows he’s not the only one.”

Bruce looked slightly hurt but Jason didn’t seem to care in the slightest.

“Maybe this person is infatuated with you and is vying for your attention.” Damian deadpanned dryly. Marinette had smacked him on the back of his head, still invisible.

But the damage had been done.

Bruce snapped his fingers and ‘aha!’-ed at Damian. “That must be it!” Bruce crowed.

“Are you that narcissistic, you arrogant plebeian?” Marinette’s normally cheery voice was dry and dripping with distaste as she unwrapped her magic.

Bruce, Dick and Tim immediately went on the defensive, shifting into a battle stance. Marinette only scoffed.

“If I wanted to harm you, I would have already done so.” Marinette waved a hand in their direction dismissively.

Dick looked confused. “You’re like, ten.” He pointed out.

Damian glared. “I am ten as well, Grayson.”

Tim butted in. “Are we not going to acknowledge the fact that this tiny ten year old broke into the manor unnoticed?”

That brought everyone to their senses.

They were suddenly surprised by Marinette running at Jason, full speed. They expected him to duck or whip out a weapon, but all he did was stand still as she flipped in midair to land on his shoulders.

To their utter shock, Jason grinned, even as she fisted her hands in his hair for a better grip.

Damian only smiled fondly at his Angel. She was as short as he remembered, Damian noted.

He missed her. More than anything.

Marinette beamed, and slid off Jason’s shoulders.

“Why did you attack me?” Bruce asked. “Isn’t it obvious, fool?” Marinette revamped her icy demeanor and glared at the civilian Batman. “I despise you.”

Bruce looked very affronted. But Mariinette ignored him, even as he continued talking and made her way over to Damian.

“Damibear!” Marinette sang, as if she hadn’t seen him less than an hour ago.

The Waynes looked as if they expected Damian to attack her just for calling him that. They were not expecting him to grin and say, “Angel.”

Mari jumped on his back, and Damian merely repositioned himself accordingly, used to this from all her previous piggybacks.

“Okay so Jason and Damian helped her get into the manor.” Tim deduced, only to notice Jason and Damian shaking their heads.

“All by herself.” Damian and Jason chorused. Marinette made bunny ears on top of Damian’s head.

She kissed Damian’s forehead lovingly, replying to his ‘i am older than you’ with a ‘yeah by like a week’, and looked to his family.

She winked.

Then disappeared.

There was silence, and then, “Wait, we didn’t even get her name!” From Dick.

Damian and Jason were interrogated that night, and they refused to tell them anything related to Marinette.

Marinette smiled from where she had hidden in the shadows, and made her way back to Damian’s room. She curled up in Damian’s bed, drifting into sleep. She was almost asleep when Damian returned.

And when Damian pressed his lips to her forehead and whispered, “Goodnight, Angel”, a smile made her way onto her lips.

By the time Damian had slipped into bed with her, her head leaning comfortably on his chest, she had fallen asleep.

When the two turned 15, Talia and Sabine sat them down and told them about the betrothal. Damian had been visiting with Talia.

It had been almost two months since Lila had turned her classmates against her, not that she cared, of course. She still had her Consorts after all.

“Marinette, Damian, we’d like to tell you something. An offer? Of sorts. I’m relatively sure you will accept, however.”

Talia smiled as Marinette dragged a grumpy Damian over to them by the head, beaming brightly.

“Oh come on, Mian! Don’t be such a grumpy banana.” Marinette reprimanded the older boy who was rubbing the sleep from her eyes.

The boy only smiled lazily, and ran another hand through his best friend’s hair, the girl making a small noise of protest. “Thats what you get for calling me a noodle, Angel.” (if you didn’t know miàn means noodle in chinese)

Sabine cleared her throat but looked at the two with amusement clear in her eyes.

They straightened. “Sorry, maman,” Mari muttered.

“Now, before you two were born, Sabine and I had an agreement. We are perfectly fine with this and the implications of it, so it is up to you to whether to accept or not.” Talia got straight to the point.

The two children looked to each other curiously before turning back to their parents. Damian nodded in acknowledgment and Sabine picked up where Talia left off.

“How do you feel about each other?” Sabine asked, watching the two closely for their reactions.

“If that’s your way of asking us if we’re okay to be siblings, since you and Lia are dating, Maman--” Marinette started but was quickly interrupted by a barely noticeably flushed Talia.

“No, not that, and we aren’t dating, Nette.” Talia aimed a playful glare at the girl, who grinned and blew a raspberry at her.

“How would you and Damian like to be betrothed?” Sabine asked, smiling at her friend and daughter fondly.

Marinette spluttered and Damian coughed.

Talia and Sabine burst out into laughter.

After the adults got their laughter under control and after a few glares from their kids, Damian spoke up.

“Marinette is my best friend. If I had to be betrothed to anyone, I’m glad it’s her.” Damian looked away and Marinette coughed awkwardly into her elbow.

“You misunderstand us. You don’t have to be betrothed. The choice is yours.”

Damian felt slightly attacked. He really did like Marinette, and the betrothal was an easy excuse to ask her out (even if he was a 15 year old). He didn’t know if Marinette felt the same way, and he didn’t want to impose that on her, so he kept quiet.

Marinette, who was looking deep in thought, answered.

“Can I talk to Damian for a while, privately?”

Damian, despite his better judgement, winced. This was probably the first time in a really long time that Marinette called him by his full name. It was normally Dami, Damibear to annoy him, or some other weird nickname like Mr Grumpy Banana this morning.

Regardless, the bluenette hadn’t called him “Damian” for a very long time. Two years, maybe.

She walked out of the room, Damian trailing slightly behind, before stopping a few feet outside the room.

Marinette slid down onto the floor, her back pressed against it and head in her hands. Damian frowned. He didn’t want his best friend looking so.. dejected. He ignored the slight pang of hurt that the thought of being with him could get this kind of reaction out of her.

He sat down next to her, wrapping an arm around her shoulder like he always did when any of them felt upset. He was happy to feel her lean into his side like she always did.

She turned her head and buried it in Damian’s side, breathing in his comforting scent of paints and nature. He tightened his hold on her ever so slightly and she almost burst into tears.

It wasn’t that she was opposed to being in an engagement with Damian, it was just that she didn’t particularly want to be with anyone or love anyone, especially after her father died and Damian’s father abandoned him.

Her mother and aunt didn’t show it, but they were sad about their fathers. She had heard Talia interacting with her ‘beloved’ before, and it almost always ended up in tears or frustration. (Not that Mari blamed her, Bruce was kind of an asshole.)

She felt Damian’s chin press into her scalp and a hint of a smile grazed her lips. But this was Damian. Damian who was her best friend. Damian who supported her no matter what. Damian who comforted her and was there for her whenever she needed it.

Damian would never hurt her. And she was determined never to hurt him, ever, if she could help it.

She looked up and smiled at Damian. The smile he loved so much, the smile she always had on whenever she saw him, the smile that would unconsciously fly to her lips whenever she heard his voice.

Maybe it was then that Marinette should’ve known that she loved her best friend, but then again, she was only fifteen. She didn’t know what love was. But she would. Very soon.

“We accept.” Damian told Sabine and Talia when they reentered the room.

“We thought you would.” Talia replied.

When Marinette turned 16, her last year at Francois Dupont, six months since she’d made Lila’s time a living hell with her Ladybug (both in suit and in school), and fashion clients connections, the Waynes had visited.

Turns out, Damian and Jason got caught trying to sneak onto the Wayne private jet but instead of stopping them, they insisted they came along too, having pieced together that Damian and Jason were going to visit the mysterious tiny girl they couldn’t find the name of.

So they had no choice.

And os that leads to now, with the Waynes standing in the courtyard, elicting a growing crowd as they waited for Marinette, looking the part of scary rich people that can end your life without a problem.

Damian suddenly started running, and he hugged a girl. No one could see who the girl was because her head was buried in Damian’s chest and his body was shielding hers.

Not many people in the courtyard was surprised when they pulled away and standing there was Marinette Dupain-Cheng. After all, she was one of the most successful students in class that didn’t get fame from famous relatives. No, al her fame was hers alone.

In fact, the only people surprised were Marinette’s class, not-so-fondly referred to as the Akuma Class. Her Consorts were the only one who knew of her betrothed, Damian. Other than that, Marinette had never been willing to share.

When Marinette saw the other Waynes however, after hugging Jason, she rolled her eyes. Bruce, Dick and Tim stalked forwards, looking every inch the scary billionaires they were.

It was broken by Dick hugging the girl and gushing over how cool she was. Tim smiled at her and she had smiled back. Marinette flipped Bruce the bird.

“Why are you... so sunny? You definitely weren’t like that when you threatened us in Gotham. You were such an ice queen.” Tim mentioned, failing to keep the amusement out of his tone.

“What do you mean? Marinette’s always been like that, even if she is a bitch now. There’s no way she can be cold.” Alya remarked snidely.

Alix and Chloe stalked forward, raising thier fists threatningly. But Marinette only laughed coldly.

“You wanna see cold, Cesaire?” Marinette snarled, dropping all acts of being nice.

The Lady was back. Publicly.

The silence was interrupted by Rose, who asked, "But Lila, don't you know the Waynes?"

Said Lila had been trying to slink away unnoticed, but when her name was mentioned, all attention diverted back to her, effectively keeping her in place. Her pale face and scared eyes were enough to tell that she had indeed been lying.

Yells and screams broke out across the courtyard as the Akuma Class berated Lila for lying to them all this while. Until, Marinette interrupted, face set in a ice cold, stony position

"Okay, blame her for lying." She started. "But why did you believe her?"

The Akuma Class drew a blank and didn't respond. Partially because they didn't know what to say, and partially because Marinette's mere presence was overwhelmingly intimidating. Marinette sighed and pressed on.

"Everything the Liar has said can be found faulty by a simple internet search." It was true, and the class knew it. When no one replied, Marinette shook her head sardonically. "You reap what you sow."

She turned to her betrothed. In an instant, her icy mood was gone, replaced with the sunshiney-ness the Akuma Class had grown used to.

"C'mon, Dami!" She gave him a quick peck on the lips, hoisting herself up on Damian's back. Damian grasped her legs tightly, as she continued to be piggybacked by him.

"Onward!" She cried out dramatically, pointing to the school exit.

Damian only rolled his eyes fondly at his beloved, steering themselves out, her Consorts and his family behind them.

None of them looked back.

If they did, they would've seen the expressions of disbelief and regret etched onto every one of her old classmates' faces.

Not that they would care.

5k words yay

also uh yeah again, sorry this took so long, i kept hitting a mental block while writing this and it didnt manage to upload from my phone for no good reason :(

but anyway its up now, i hope u find this acceptable! :)

#maribat #mari is raised by the league #talia is actl a good parent in this fic bc i can #sabine is a queen as always #marinette is a godess #she is an icy queen #yes ik i spelled goddess wrong #mlb x dc #dc x mlb #ml x dc #dc x ml #betrothed #daminette #okay i think im done #i dont really know what else to tag

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kairos-polaris · 3 years

Text

Eris (demon's daughter) Chapter 3

A bunch of different perspectives. New questions and some answers.

Chapter 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

Tagglist: @liquid-luck-00 @moonlightstar64

Be aware of your own mind. Your consciousness can and will play tricks, so be careful.

Human mind is fluid. Our memories aren't set in stone but in sand. The lines and finer details blur every time we try to remember something important.

Human mind is the most curious thing. The organised chaos of it still fascinates philosophers and scientists. What is our mind if not a cabinet filled with carefully placed memories? We don't know how our mind decides what we should remember or forget, but we know that strong emotions play an important part in that decision.

Humans tend to forget bad things. They don't disappear completely, but stay in the background. This is the reason nostalgia exists and our past may seem better than present.

It didn't happen to Marinette, right? She was sure of it and her nightmares just proved her right. But she forgot the most important rule: don't take everything at the face value.

***

"You did good, my child," Marinette was still tired after avenging her death (killing them was forbidden, but injuring - not) and didn't comprehend praise in her father's words. "I can answer any question. But only one."

Marinette tilted her head in confusion. "I don't mean to be disrespectful, but why? I don't think I did anything to deserve this." Ra's lips lifts up in something akin to a smile. Her words meant his plan was working.

"You showed great strength when fighting. I've heard it took them half an hour to take you down. You are my daughter and you can't forget this," Ra's stopped to let his words sink in. "What is your question?"

"Who was my mother?" The predictability of her question almost makes him laugh out loud. He had expected something better from her. Like, "why don't my assailants have the injuries I've inflicted on them?".

"She was an assassin known as Madame Cheng. A formidable opponent and a strong spirit. She died after giving birth to you. It was a hard pregnancy," Ra's can see a flash of guilt in the girl's eyes.

"Thank you for this information, father. I will treasure it forever."

The girl slowly leaves the room and Ra's congratulates himself on completing the first part of his plan successfully.

***

Pale moonlight illuminated a bedroom. The room is completely silent save for soft sounds of breathing. Only two people are there, a man and a woman.

The woman lays on a pristine silk, white cloth barely covering her naked body. Hickies and bruises bloom everywhere like colourful flowers. Her midnight black hair barely reaching her shoulders is splattered across a pillow. Her skin seems to be glowing because of the whiteness of the bed linen. Beads of sweat on her toned arms and legs are highlighted by the moonlight.

The man is sitting near her, leaning on a headboard. His skin is several tones darker than the woman's. He also much older than her. There's white hair in his carefully groomed beard. He's physically fit and strong. He's sitting there completely lost in thoughts. New ideas, new strategies, new plans. The demon's head never rests, after all. He thinks how defenceless the woman next to him is and it makes his blood boil.

His musings are interrupted by a small feather like touch on his hip. The man doesn't look at the woman, just lets down his hand and tangles it in her hair. It doesn't satisfy her so she seductively slowly raises on her hands to meet the man's eyes. Her smile is small and teasing and it makes the man huff in annoyance.

"Was everything to your liking, oh Great One?" her voice is filled with mirth and there's a strange gleam in her eyes that the man can't identify.

After several minutes of silent stares the man sighs and decides to humour his lover. He moves his hands to her side gripping hard enough to leave bruises. But the woman doesn't seem to mind. Her small sighs hint that she even enjoys that.

"It certainly was, Madame Cheng," his voice drops slightly at the end of the sentence and it makes the woman giggle like a schoolgirl. Seeing her like that made it hard to remember she was one of the most skilled assassins in the world. Only her stature and white webs of scars reminded him of her lifestyle.

"Why wouldn't you use my name, beloved? We've been married for a year and you still use my alias," Madame Cheng is a formidable woman and she doesn't pout. No, sir, you're just seeing things.

"It's a name you've chosen and made for yourself. Your name was given to you by your parents," he stops mid sentence to change their position. Now he was on the top. "And you killed everyone who knew it to ensure nobody will ever know it. Only people you trust can use it."

"Marriage is supposed to be a sign of trust. I met you almost twelve years ago. I trust you not to kill me every night we spend together. I know you can kill me without any weapon and I know you always have a dagger with you. I… I like my name and would like you to use it. Please."

There's a dangerous gleam in the man's eyes and she needs several moments to stop shivering. That's what she gets for forgetting who her lover is but it was so easy. "I will use your name after you give birth to a boy."

His words leave a bad aftertaste in her mouth and even the man's hard kisses can't erase it. "It won't last. His gentleness won't last." Marrying the Demon's head may be her fall but she will mourn herself later. Now, she's losing herself in lust and please. She tries to not think that some parts of her won't return.

***

Talia remembers Madame Cheng clearly. She always admired the woman who became a mother figure to her.

Madame Cheng was more intelligent than most people gave her credit for and she knew Ra's al Ghul better than she let on. Talia compared her to an actress because she acted so different in front of her husband. Only in the privacy of Talia's room did she let down her walls. It made Talia feel special.

Madame Cheng was smart and she knew what kind of man Ra's al Ghul was and what he wanted from her, so she acted accordingly. She could read his mood perfectly. She gave him what he wanted because her survival and well being depended on it.

That's why Madame Cheng was preparing for the worst after she found out that she had given birth to a girl.

"But you can have more children!" Talia tried to argue. The woman laughed bitterly and shook her head. Her laugh slowly morphed into tears.

Talia didn't know what to make of her reaction. Sure, father wasn't satisfied when he heard that Madame Cheng had given birth to a girl, but he loved her. He would give her another chance, right?

"Childbirth was hard for me. I didn't get help fast enough and there were...some consequences. I can't have children anymore," she patiently explained.

"What are you preparing for?" Talia asked, feeling tears in her eyes. "He won't kill you! He loves you."

Madame Cheng sighed and took a breath to calm down. She got down on her knees and looked straight into Talia's eyes.

"Your father, my husband doesn't love me and...never did. It took me some time to understand that, ya amar. I was too naïve and blinded with his affectionate words. I thought I was special," Madame Cheng chuckled at that thought.

"Was it a marriage of convenience to him then?" Talia didn't know how to feel about this. On one hand, she knew that their union was beneficial to the League. Their child would be strong and healthy, a perfect heir. Everything would be perfect. It would be if Madame Cheng gave birth to a boy. And that was what made everything so confusing. Talia loved and adored Madame Cheng and she didn't know what she would when the woman died.

"Yes," the answer is barely a whisper but still so loud in the complete silence of the room.

"So you are just giving up?" Anger was swirling in her veins and Talia couldn't, didn't know how to get rid of it. "We can fake your death, create a false identity. There must be a way!"

Madame Cheng just shook her head and embraced the girl as tight as she could without hurting her. "Ra's will do everything to find me. He won't be satisfied until he sees my corpse," Madame Cheng noticed Talia's questioning look and continued: "He knows we're close and he doesn't want a stray element influencing his heir."

"What can I do for you?" Talia whispered brokenly.

"Talia, look at me. Talia, please, look at me," when the teen didn't move to meet her eyes Madame Cheng softly turned her head. "I know you're sad and angry but turning away from me isn't a solution. You won't get any closure if you continue avoiding confronting your feelings. They will always stay with you like invisible baggage."

"Would he really kill you because you can't give him an heir?" Talia knew she was grasping at straws but she couldn't stop.

"He refused to call me by my name until I gave birth to a boy. I should have known how little I mean to him. And I won't be useful for a very long time. And the League doesn't condone and," she explained. "Can you promise me something?"

"Everything!"

"There's no need for that, ya amar. Promise to me you will be safe. Promise to me you will protect Marinette and yourself. Promise to be a better person and mother than your father or me. Promise me you will leave one day. Promise me you will be happy. And that's all I want."

"I promise, I promise, Madame Cheng," and in that vulnerable moment for both of them Talia never felt more confident in something. It was time to make an escape plan.

Almost a year after that conversation Madame Cheng was sent to Bialiya. The mission should have been easy to a professional like Madame Cheng. And it would be if the woman were healthier.

It didn't matter how much Talia begged her father to resurrect Madame Cheng. He didn't even bother to find her body for a proper burial!

Talia wanted nothing more than to cry in her bedroom for days straight. And why wouldn't she? The only person who had genuinely cared for her was dead. Unfortunately, mourning Madame Cheng so openly wasn't on option. First of all, she would show her weakness. And secondly, she had a sixteen months old Marinette. The baby couldn't even cry to mourn her own mother. She simply didn't understand what had happened to her.

That day Talia promised to herself dhe would teach Marinette everything Madame Cheng had taught her. She would never come close Madame Cheng but the baby deserved some love. Even if only from her older sister.

***

Emilie Agreste was a strong and independent woman. She didn't need her husband to approve her choices. If she wanted to spend time with Amira, she would do exactly that, Gabriel!

"She was sent to kill me, Emilie. She's an assassin. Butterfly is the only reason I am alive. You can't let your guard down. She will use your kind heart for her own gain," Gabriel explained his point of view.

"She. Is. A. Child! A child that doesn't know anything better. It wasn't her choice. I'm sure her parents did that for her," Emilie's heart bled every time she thought about the amount of trainings the girl had to go through. "And you can't stop me. I will go to her right now!"

Emilie turned away, her dress flaring dramatically after her. She grabbed the door handle, but the doors didn't open. Emilie could feel how she was and could hear Gabriel's exasperated sigh. "Oh great, because pushing doors you have to push to open is very dramatic," Emilie softly murmured to herself.

After capturing Amira they left her in an old bedroom. Gabriel made sure she couldn't open windows without alerting them and activating security before leaving her alone.

Emilie thought that the room was beautiful but wasn't sure Amira had the same opinion on it.

When she arrived Amira was laying on the bed, completely free from bounds. The girl looked bored but Emilie could see how tense she was.

"How are you, Amira? I came here to help you," now the girl was suspicious. Her tenseness was more obvious and Emilie silently berated herself for such poor choice of words.

"I know it wasn't your choice to become an assassin. I want to give you a little bit of love, Amira."

When the silence became too much to bear Emilie decided to continue talking. Even if it meant talking to herself. She told Amira stories about her family and how much she loved them. How Gabriel could be so annoying! And how talented Adrien was.

Amira slowly leaned away and laid on the bed. "Are you tired?" asked her Emilie but the girl just nodded. "I will let you have some rest."

The girl just silently hugged her. Emilie counted it as a victory. She slowly left the room activating security once again.

"Did you check your pockets?" Gabriel's voice made her jump from surprise. Emilie nodded in denial and silently checked her pockets. Nothing was missing, except...for her phone. "Judging from your face that girl has stolen your phone."

Emilie felt so heartbroken she couldn't answer. It must have shown on her face because Gabriel softened. "I will go and take back your phone, love. After that I'll make you a cup of tea."

Emilie didn't notice anything. She didn't notice when her husband returned with her phone. She couldn't recall how they had ended up in their kitchen. Emilie couldn't remember how she had got a cup of tea.

"I don't blame her," she whispered so softly that Gabriel wasn't sure he had heard hee right. "I don't blame her for trying to escape. She doesn't know us. Why would she want to stay here?"

Gabriel just resignedly sighed. His wife was being too kind to that brat. He decided to not comment but his silence made Emilie more confident.

"Yes, I won't give up on her. I will do everything to deserve her trust," Gabriel could see fire in his wife's eyes. The very one he fell for years ago. Only now it wasn't directed at him but the brat that tried to kill him. It made him older and wearier.

"I know you will get through her shell," Gabriel didn't believe in that. He knew the girl would attack Emilie if she hadn't seen his butterfly. He knew she knew what he had wanted to say.

***

Talia knew she was a bad older sister. A good sister wouldn't sit idly and drink tea while her little sibling was suffering! And Talia couldn't even do anything to help her (she checked three times before giving up).

"Why would you do that? Why?" Talia asked herself. "Was I not…"

But then she clearly heard Madame Cheng's voice in her head: "We both want her to be happy. You have to be honest with yourself. Are you angry because she left or are you hurt because she didn't take you with her?"

No matter how much she tried Talia couldn't answer that question. If she did, it would open a can of worms. She would have to answer more questions. Who did she love more? Her father or her sister? What did she value more?

But it didn't matter right now. Talia will be there for Marinette. She will protect her baby sister.

***

Sometimes Emilie Agreste was a mystery even to her own son. Nobody explained to him why she had spent so much time in one of the bedrooms. Adrien didn't know why she was so sad after she had stopped visiting that room.

Every answer he got was too vague. "I'm mourning missed opportunities, my heart."

Adrien tried to not think that it was about a girl he had seen once in family's gardens. Her appearance blurred in his mind with time but he could remember midnight black hair and sky blue eyes. Adrien could admit she was pretty but he hated the fact that his parents refused to tell him anything about her.

After Adrien understood that his questioning wouldn't give him any answers he decided to move on. It was quite easy. His mother disappeared not so long after his decision to stop pestering them about the girl in the garden. His father closed himself in his office and Adrien had to make an appointment to see him.

Adrien didn't understand why meeting Eris had brought back memories about the garden girl.

"Why are you calling yourself Eris?" Adrien blurted out. In his defense it wasn't every day that he met superheroes.

"Eris is a greek goddess of discord. I wield the Miraculous of Destruction. I thought it was a fitting name," Eris sighed and tiredly rubbed her forehead. "One day I will make an official statement regarding my alias. Everyone asking why like they are banned from Google. Annoying."

"I'm sorry, Miss. I didn't know what to say," Adrien was really sorry. He knew how annoying it was to repeat things. He wanted to ask her about being a hero. He would ask "how does it feel to fly in the sky" and "how does it feel to be free". But Adrien is a perfect boy and perfect boys don't ask such questions. His words about freedom could be used against Gabriel.

#maribat #future dickinette #angst #i love hurting characters #referenced character death #eris (the demon's daughter)

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peppersonironi · 4 years

Text

Batfam Whumptober Day One

{Read on Ao3}

No. 1: Waking Up Restrained | Shackled | Hanging

Summary: Jason wakes up restrained in the med bay of the bat cave after a major pit-rampage. He panics and it takes Bruce rushing in to calm him down.

A/N: This is kinda soft? I just couldn't NOT put comfort at the end. It's really my first time writing anything whumpy/angsty, so bear with me. Unedited; we die like Robins.

TW: Panic attacks, referenced self harm

Jason tensed as he gained consciousness. He hadn’t remembered falling asleep, and in his business, that was bad news.

Jason sucked in a breath as he tried to raise a hand to his face. He opened his eyes and looked around. He was tied down to a medical bed in the cave’s med bay. They had used the heavy-duty restraints, the ones that were only pulled out there was a serious safety risk.

Jason’s mouth went dry as he imagined the implications. He was a security risk, so much so that no one was in the room. Not Alfred, not Dick, not Bruce, no one. Whatever happened had been serious.

Jason blinked several times and his breathing grew erratic. Why had they tied him up? Bruce promised he wouldn’t lock his son away again - PROMISED. Had Jason gone too far? Who had he hurt? Not Tim again, they were fine now. No one else had ever actually bothered him that mu - oh no.

Jason’s began to sweat, his chest clenching as he stopped straining to remember what had happened. Jason let out a choked sob as the images flashed before him.

*****

The League had come to Gotham, Ra’s leading it with Talia at his side. So of course everyone was called in.

They had taken down the agents preparing for whatever the f*** the old guy had planned, and were in the middle of a confrontation.

*****

Jason tried to calm his breathing, only to grow with panic. No, no, no, no.

*****

Ra’s had sent Talia in first, along with several of his assassins. Everyone got their turn to take down a league member, and it was going well. Then Jason had decided he wanted to take down the woman that had both saved, and ruined his life.

He ignored Bruce’s command to let him take care of Talia and attacked. They quickly disarmed each other and moved on to hand-to-hand combat. The demon’s daughter tried once or twice to pull a knife move on him, but Jasonw as lucky enough to have heard Duke’s sudden warnings.

Eventually, he pinned her to the top of the roof. Most of the fighting had stopped, and everyone was helping each other take care of the ninjas, except Bruce.

“How does it feel to lose yet again, Talia?” Jason had asked.

“Red Hood,” Bruce said as he approached the pair, “that’s enough.”

Talia smirked. “Why don’t I tell you how it feels?”

“Jason,” Bruce said in warning, “let her go.”

Jason ignored him, which turned out to be a horrific mistake. When Talia leaned up and whispered in his ear, Jason’s eyes widened beneath his helmet. He fell backwards, scooching away from the woman.

“Little Wing?”

Jason wrapped his arms around his helmet at the sound of his older brother. He shook his head, trying to shake off the emotions stabbing at his control.

No, he thought, I can’t let Talia win.

Jason couldn’t breath, and began to scratch at his helmet, clumsy fingers struggling to rip it off. But when he did, he flung it across the roof.

“Jason?” Bruce asked, ignoring the retreating Al Ghuls.

“Enjoy your fun, Beloved.” Talia called from the helicopter she had just boarded. “He’s going to tear you apart.”

“No,” Jason muttered, tearing at his hair and face. His mask came off a moment later, and his scalp screamed at him, but he couldn’t care less. He somehow found himself on his knees, and looked up to find everyone staring at him.

The crowd was too much. The noises of the city were too much. The rage was too much.

“NO!” Jason yelled, his breathing becoming ragged. He lifted his head up to look at his family, eyes wide. For a moment, he couldn’t see anything beyond sickly green. “Stay back!” But he knew it was too late.

He stood up, stumbling backwards. He couldn’t hear anything anymore, beyond the great rushing of the pit. The roar filled his ears as he tried to look away from the other bats.

He tried, oh boy did he try. But it wasn’t enough. The moment someone came into his vision, he lashed out. There were sudden yells as Jason blindly struck the person before him. The person was small, so he where he would otherwise have struck the gut, he hit the shoulder instead. Only one person was that small: Damian.

Jason could only watch in horror as his little brother spun and landed against the roof. Hard. He wanted to cry at the pool of blood forming beside the now prone body, but the pit would n’t let him. The red fuelled his rampage, causing him to lash out at the next nearest person: Bruce.

Once upon a time Jason wouldn’t have bothered to restrain himself, would've been elated at the development of events. But this time he couldn’t. This time all that filled the sliver of sanity left in Jason Todd was a cold twisting in his gut.

No, he thought pathetically as arms grabbed him, as broken fragments of conversation - it’s the pit! Hold him down! Talia! Triggered! Rage! Hold on!

No…

*****

Jason gasped and yanked on the restraints, trying to forget how everyone had crowded on him. Except for Damian. How someone had managed to tranq him.

He’d lashed out at his family.

He’d let the pit take over.

He’d let Talia get to him.

He’d killed his brother.

Jason whimpered and sunk down onto the bed, suddenly nauseous. He’d … he’d really done it. This was it. No way Bruce could ever forgive him after this. They’d already lost Damian once, and this time Jason was responsible?

“Damian,” Jason whispered softly, in between ragged breaths. He tried to swallow, but shouldn’t. It was too dry.

Jason shook, the room seeming to close in on him. He pulled on the restraints, suddenly aware of how tight they were. Almost as bad as in Arkham.

Oh no.

Arkham.

Jason blinked, trying to calm the rising panic. Bruce … Bruce had promised not to send him back. But, after he killed Damian? Proved that he has always been unstable? It was now a distinct possibility.

“No,” he muttered, “Please no. I can’t go back. Don’t send me back.” His vision blurred, and the silence of the room became stifling. “I’m sorry,” he cried, like it would do any good, “I’m so sorry. Sorry. Sorry …”

Jason shook his head and blinked away tears as he continued to mutter. He couldn’t think straight. Every spot of logical reasoning had left him. Some part of him knew this. Not that it mattered.

“Chum?”

Jason looked over his shoulder to find Bruce standing in the entrance. He wore civilian clothes - sweatpants and a t-shirt - and looked insanely tired.

“I’m sorry!” Jason began his chant again, the sight of his father renewing panic in him. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m -”

“Hey, It’s alright,” Bruce cut in, rushing forward to sit on the chair beside Jason’s bed.

Jason shook his head, unbelieving. “No, no I’m sorry!” He hunched his shoulders, trying to make himself smaller. It was what he had done when he was small, and first came to the manor. He hadn’t felt this vulnerable in years.

Bruce seemed to get this. “Jay, it’s alright. You’re safe.”

Jason shook his head vigorously. “No, you’re not. I can’t - You shouldn’t - I’ll just -” Jason let out a dry heave of a sob and squeezed his eyes shut. His hands shook in the restraints, irritating the already growing bruises. Suddenly, there was a hand in his own.

“Jason, look at me,” Bruce said calmly, patiently. Jason took a shaking breath before slowly turning to look at his father. “Hey, chum, it’s alright. No one blames you. Talia - whatever Talia said was purposeful, there to hurt you. You had no control over it.”

“But I could’ve stopped the pit, I let it get to me.” Why didn’t he get it? Jason was the problem here. He was the one who’d make the … mistake.

Bruce frowned, his eyes soft. A small part of Jason was surprised - he hadn’t seen Bruce look at him like that for a very long time. It was calming, he had to admit. “You held it off for as long as you could,” Bruce said calmly, “Besides, you did warn us. We just didn’t listen.”

Suddenly, the slowly calming emotions flared back up again. “Damian.” Jason out, eyes wide. “Oh no. no, no, no.”

“Jason,” Bruce said, grabbing his face, “breath. Damian’s alright.”

Jason blinked. “What? No, I saw -”

“He’s fine, just upstairs resting.” Bruce interjected promptly. “He was trying to draw your attention away, said that's what happened whenever his mom flared up. Just underestimated your strength.”

Jason frowned. “But I saw him-” Jason hiccuped.

Bruce smiled softly. “He just reopened some stitches on his soldier. A minor concussion from the fall, but Alfred says he’ll be alright with some bed rest.”

“He’s alright?” Jason asked, still shaking and not quite believing Bruce’s words.

“He’s alright.” Bruce confirmed.

Jason collapsed back onto the bed, the twisting in his restraints slowing down. He closed his eyes and breathed.

“The kid’s okay,” Jason whispered to himself.

A few moments later, Bruce spoke again. “Think I can take these off now?”

Jason opened his eyes and looked over to where Bruce was gesturing to the restraints. He tensed, staring up at Bruce. “I thought they were for you?” He asked, more than stated.

Bruce frowned. “No, no of course not. When we brought you in, you had started to wake up again. ‘Kept scratching yourself, and pulling out your hair.” Bruce paused to make sure Jason was looking him in the eye. “These were to protect you from yourself.”

Jason took a few moments to breathe. “Okay,” He said at last, “You can take them off.”

Bruce promptly reached forward and undid the restraints on both his wrists and ankles. He took a moment to gently rub the abused skin of his wrists before setting them down.

“Are you alright?” Bruce asked, moving back to his chair.

Jason paused to consider. “Ish?”

Bruce chuckled - honest to gosh chuckled! “I’ll take that, he said, leaning forward to press a kiss to Jason’s forehead.

Maybe it was tiredness. Maybe it had to do with released inhibitions from the pit. Maybe general emotional instability. Or maybe he just darn wanted to. Whatever the reason, Jason reached his arms up and wrapped them around Bruce. The man quickly reciprocated, keeping his son securely in the hug.

“Thanks, dad.” Jason said, and smiled.

They remained there for a while, neither really speaking. Slowly, Jason closed his eyes once more. This time, it wasn’t out of panic, or fear. He was just tired, and honestly, Bruce was a great hugger when he wanted to be.

Later, he’ll check on Damian (bring the kid Cheese Vikings or something. Maybe a new cat?), and both thank and berate him for his actions. He’ll go to Kate and Selina, Dick, Tim, and Steph, Duke and Cass, and Harper. Check on them, and apologize.

But for now?

Now, Jason thinks he’ll sleep.

Tagging: @starrystories2

#whumptober2020 #no.1 #Waking Up Restrained #shackled #batfam #dc #fic #panic attacks tw #referenced self harm tw #hurt/comfort #jason todd #batfamily members #bruce wayne #angst #batfam angst #jason whump #pit rage #lazarus pit rage

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ravenforce · 4 years

Text

Cheating Death VI

Warning/s: None

Summary: Natasha confronts you and finds out the truth.

A/N: Now, shall end it at that? Also, stay safe. Stay home. x

Parts: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

“No,” Carol yelled at Natasha, making the team wince except for the redhead.

“I’m not asking permission, Carol.” Natasha continued to disarm herself, pulling all her guns and knives out and on the table, making everyone confused.

“Okay but you’re not going alone,” Carol tried to reason. “I’m coming with you.”

Natasha turned to her girlfriend and sighed. “I can very well take care of myself.” She’s trying really hard not to be aggressive with the blonde but Carol’s keeping her from being where she wanted to be longer.

“I know -”

“Then let me do this alone.”

“But that woman is dangerous.” The rest of the team couldn’t do much more than just sit and watch the heated exchange.

“She’s not gonna hurt me.” Natasha sighed, quietly remembering the moment your eyes connected. Carol crossed her arms and scoffed, making the redhead look back at her.

“You don’t know that.”

“You don’t know her,” Natasha countered.

“And you do?”

“I do, Carol! She’s my other Clint!” Natasha yelled in frustration. Carol opened her mouth but Natasha was already storming out of the room. Carol looked at the team and they all shook their head.

“If Y/N Al Ghul is her other Clint, there’s no force on earth or beyond that could stop Natasha from going to her,” Wanda tried to explain. Carol hasn’t been earth-bound long enough to see who Clint was for Natasha. They were best friends, partners, and Wanda knows by the look you gave Natasha a few hours ago, that the two of you are even more than just that.

***

Talia and Nyssa are having a drink by the bar at home when one of their guards announced that someone wanted to see them. They looked at each other and sighed. The breakfast fiasco with the Avengers rendered them in the mood for day drinking.

“Let them in.” Talia’s smooth voice reverberated around the room.

“Hello.” Natasha greeted politely. Nyssa cocked an eyebrow at her sister and took a swig of her beer. “I wanted to see Y/N. Is she home?”

“State your business with our sister?” Nyssa spoke with her serious CEO voice.

They’ve never met Natasha before but you have regaled them of so many stories about how you met in Budapest, how she had the most beautiful green eyes you’ve ever seen, how you have adventured through Europe with your other friend Clint until Ra’s caught up with you. They’ve probably heard it all, even after you’ve come back to the League, Natasha was still the topic of every whispered story you shared with your sisters at dead of the night when the three of you are sure that your father has retired for the day. They’ve never met her yet they feel like they’ve known her just as long.

“I just wanted to talk. It’s been more than a decade since I -” Natasha choked back a soft sob. Thinking about how much time has passed without her knowing that you’re alive hurts her like no other.

Talia sighed, Natasha looked tired like the big revelation of the day took years out of her life. “She’s not here, Natasha.”

Natasha bowed her head and was about to apologize for disturbing their time, again, when Nyssa spoke. “But if you know our sister, you’ll know where to find her.”

She looks back at the brunette and nod. “Thank you.”

***

“We’re being followed,” Natasha whispered as the two of you continued to walk hand-in-hand after just spending your first-anniversary dinner at one of your favourite restaurants in Scotland.

It’s been over a year since you two have me in Budapest. Your friend Clint called you for help on a mission, which you easily agreed to, to be away from your father for a while. The mission should have been simple enough for two highly skilled assassins like Osiris and Ronin but no one told you that you’ll have to put down the highly dangerous KGB agent Natasha Romanova.

You didn’t know what possessed you to defect from your original orders but something about Natasha speaks to you even when she was doing her absolute best to kill you. Something in her eyes tells you she wanted the same thing you wanted most in life; freedom. You remembered it too well, the look on Clint’s face when you finally pinned down Natasha on the ground but instead of delivering the final blow, you offered her an out.

You remember the way she looked at you too like you just grew two heads. You told her about your predicament with your father, and how you wanted a life out of the league. Natasha was skeptical but she wanted nothing more but to get away from the path she’s on. That night the three of you decided you will be the masters of your own fate, and boarded the first train out of Budapest.

Currently, you were living in Scotland but you will be moving again soon as to avoid being tracked for staying in one place for too long. The three of you didn’t mind, thinking of the situation as an opportunity to see the world rather than sulk about being fugitives from your own pasts and families.

You shook your head lightly to bring yourself back to the present. You knew this day would come. You knew your time with Natasha is numbered. So you had put up a plan with Clint to ensure Nat’s gonna survive.

“Y/N, where are we going?” She asked when you pulled her in the opposite direction of your apartment. You two are almost jogging on the side of the street for five minutes when Natasha recognized the route.

“Why are we going to Clint’s?” She sounded confuse and a little bit scared. You wanted nothing more but to stop, pull her in a hug, and assure her that everything will be alright but you don’t have enough time.

You nearly kicked the front door to Clint’s building off the hinges in your haste to get inside. Clint opened his door after three frantic knocks.

“What the fuck is happening?” He asked confused after you went directly to his room without so much as a greeting.

“We were being followed,” Natasha answered while retrieving her guns that she taped under his furniture.

When you walked back inside the living room, Natasha was baffled when you handed her and Clint a backpack. Clint shouldered his immediately.

“Wait -” Natasha started to say.

“You remember the plan?” Clint nodded.

“What plan?” She yelled making you and Clint turn to her. Clint took her arm lightly and tried to manoeuvre her towards the front door.

“No!” She yelled and yanked her arm from Clint’s hold and run back to you. You easily caught her in a tight embrace. “I’m not going anywhere without you.”

You sucked in a deep breath to keep yourself from changing your mind, and backing out of your own damn plan. “It’s -” you chocked down a sob. “It’s only temporary.” You pulled back to look at your girlfriend’s face. “I will find you, I promise.”

A hollow laugh sounded behind the closed door. A laugh you’re so familiar with, you subconsciously pushed Natasha behind you. Then the door burst open, revealing your father’s smiling face.

“Y/N Al Ghul, what did I tell you about making promises you cannot keep?” He stopped at the threshold, Clint moved sideways to help shield Natasha too.

“I never broke a promise before, father.” You spat out. Ra’s just shrugged since he doesn’t really care. “Let them go.”

Ra’s laughed before pinning you with a look like he’s trying to search something within you. “Okay,” he said simply.

“Okay?” Clint whispered confuse but you didn’t pay him any mind.

“Give me your word. No harm is to come to them.”

“Give me your word that you will be the heir to my throne, and I will make sure that these two puny humans you so care about will be unharmed and even be put under the protection of the league.”

You stared at your father for a minute as you mull the situation over. You can feel Natasha tugging at the ends of your shirt from behind. “I give you my word,” you said softly. Your father grinned so hard, Clint wondered how his face hasn’t split in half.

“Very well.” You father stepped aside to let Natasha and Clint passage.

You looked at Clint before the guy was practically dragging Natasha to the door. You didn’t dare look away from your father. You know him too well to trust his words. You know that it can’t be that easy. True to his nature, you watched in slow motion as he pulled out his dagger from under his tunic, and right when Natasha has her back on your father, he made a move to stab her. You teleported yourself behind Natasha, catching your father’s dagger between your chest cavity.

Natasha gasped and yelled. Her knees buckled as she watches you bleed out. She tried to come back to you but Clint stopped her by wrapping his arms around her torso.

You caught Clint’s eyes. “Run,” you mouthed and Clint carried Natasha out of his own building.

***

Finding you wasn’t as hard as Natasha thought it would be. You’ve always had the affinity towards the altitude. So, it was no surprise to Natasha when she found you on the top floor of the Empire State Building, legs dangling on the side of the building. She didn’t announce herself, she knew you well enough to know that you know she was there. She just stood there quietly watching your back for a minute, trying to figure out what she’s feeling exactly.

She missed you. If there was a God, and if Natasha believed in Him, He would know that Natasha has missed you for the last decade that she hasn’t seen you. She misses you so much but she’s also confused. She thought you were dead for a decade but there you are, in front of her, alive and well. She’s getting frustrated and angry too.

“Hey, Tasha. Long time, no see.” She can hear the teasing in your voice but this time, she can’t think it’s cute and funny. Your smile dropped when you heard her grit her teeth.

“I thought you were dead.”

You frowned at the New York City skyline. “I was,” you answered simply. Natasha knew you weren’t exactly human by your ungodly ability in combat, and ability to heal quickly but she didn’t know you were almost immortal. She didn’t know about the Lazarus pit, as well. So, you started your brief explanation with that.

“Why didn’t you find me then?” You can hear the hurt in her voice, as clear as a summer sky. “You broke your promise.”

You gripped the ledge of the Empire State Building too tight, your knuckles turned white. “I did not.”

“Liar,” she spat out.

“I found you, multiple times.” It was your turn to grit your teeth in an attempt to reign in your rising anger. “But it wasn’t the right time.”

She was about to call you out on your bullshit but you turned around and faced her. “The first time I found you, you were with Bruce at Clint’s ranch house.” You crinkled your nose at the memory of her looking so beautiful and soft that morning, wearing a robe, and standing toe-to-toe with Bruce Banner. By the look on her face, you know that she remembers the day too.

“That’s not -” she tried to defend herself but you cut her off. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

You chuckled mirthlessly. “I had a plan. Until it was finished, it wasn’t the right time.”

“Is it done?” Natasha couldn’t hide the hope in her voice even if she tries. “Is that why you’re back now?”

You only stared at her for a minute. You wish so bad that you could cross the small distance and kiss her senseless but you had to remind yourself that she’s dating someone else. “It has been done. It took a while to be strong enough to kill my father but it is done.”

“You what?”

“I killed my father, and disbanded the league to ensure no one will ever stand in the way of us ever again.” You frowned deeper. In the end, you have lost her to Captain Marvel anyway. “I killed my father to keep you safe and imagine my anger when I found out you came to fucking space and sacrificed yourself for mankind.”

Even with only the city lights illuminating your face, Natasha knows you’re about to cry. So, she finally closed the distance and pulled you in her arms. And try as you might, your body couldn’t stop itself from melting in her arms after not being home for so long.

“I’m here now,” she tried to comfort you.

“Of course you are.”

Natasha pulled back a little to look at you closely. “You didn’t come to Vormir, did you?”

You rolled your teary eyes at her like she should know the answer to that. “I can live in a world where you’re not in love with me but not in a world without you in it.”

Natasha wiped your tear-stained face. “I was never in love with someone else.”

#drabble #mini series #avengers imagine #natasha romanoff x reader #black widow x reader #scarlett johansson x reader #natasha romanoff imagine #black widow imagine #scarlett johansson imagine #cheating death series #cheating death #raven writes

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pl-panda · 4 years

Text

Damienette arranged marriage: part 7

Credits: Miraculous Ladybug team for the elements I take from MLB show. DC for their characters, @ozmav for the AU, @maribat-archive for giving me access to so many different stories to have take inspirations from, @thyladyanput for idea for Chat Damian and me for the plot.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Part 6

Damienette arranged marriage: Part 7

NEXT!

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She was maybe the second person to learn the truth behind his name. Damian means to tame and his mother named him that because he was ultimate proof that she tamed The Bat. He expected her to laugh, but instead she pulled him into a hug to comfort him. He also revealed that he loved painting and went as far as to sketch her. She was happy to pose as long as he in turn allowed her to take measurements.

Marinette brought out what was best in him and he would be damned if he let her just suffer in silence.

Marinette was so tired that she found herself unable to sleep. This day was so full of emotions: both good and bad.

When she first met Damian, back at the temple, he was rather cold and indifferent. He struck her as selfish even. But he was also dead honest and very serious about his loyalty. He even stabbed his own brother to defend her honor. Okay, after spending the day with him she was pretty convinced he would stab him for some more meager reason, but it was still… cute in some strange way. Nobody has ever done something like this before. Even Chat Noir never stabbed anyone to defend her honor. Hit on the head with a baton? Sure. But never stab. And he threatened Lila. Marinette was unsure if he wouldn’t actually follow up on his threat.

The date she went on was great. She felt the freedom unlike ever before. She knew she could tell him anything since they already knew each others’ greatest secrets. She could freely tell him about her adventures as Ladybug. And he was also quite handsome when he smiled. Not that he wasn’t when he was not smiling, but she liked his smile. His actual smile not the malicious grin he often wore. Damian played the cold and closed mean guy, but he was actually quite soft. He loved animals and painting. He even wanted to sketch her! Damian was yet very grounded person. He had this no-nonsense aura around himself. But he was patient enough to endure with her small panic attacks. She remembered his gentle touch on her hands. His words of encouragement. And his deep green eyes. They were two whirlpools of emerald. So majestic, yet so caring. With that image imprinted on her mind she finally fell asleep. Her dreams were undisturbed by a knocking on her window.

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Next day Marinette woke up still tired, but in much better mood. She was ready for school. Well, good for her since she was almost late like usual. In panic, she quickly grabbed her purse and was about to run downstairs when Tikki flew in front of her.

“Marinette! Aren’t you forgetting something?” The girl looked around and didn’t catch what Kwami ment. “Your clothes!” Marinette looked down and saw she was still in her pijama. In record time she managed to dress up and was about to run downstairs when Tikki stopped her again. “Backpack?” Once again Marinette rushed to grab her things and get down and not get late. Her parents were already waiting for her in the bakery.

“Here is your breakfast cherie.” Her mother smiled handing her a box of pastries.

“And here is something special for you to share with your boy.” Her father smiled and handed her a box of macaroons. They both had a smile.

“And remember Mari. If he hurts you, just say a word and I will break his every bone into dozen pieces.” Her mother gave her most prominent smile ever. Somehow, it made the threat even more real.

“I will maman. Bye papa! Bye maman!” Marinette shouted and run away before they offered more ‘help’. She loved them, but after yesterday’s evening she was not sure she would allow them to meet Damian any times soon. She couldn’t protect him forever, seeing as he was technically her husband, but she could at least give them some time to get used to the idea of her dating someone. Maybe once Hawkmoth was gone. She did not want to have to escape from another thorny prison. Or maybe after the trip to gotham. They should be happy to see her back that they might not outright kill him for marrying her without their knowledge. She fully planned on telling them everything once there was no threat looming over their heads. Marinette giggled imagining Talia facing her mother. It was funny that somehow the confrontation would always go in favor of Sabine.

She barged into class almost right when the bell rang. None of her classmates cared enough to even batch an eye at her. She did notice Damian in the back and made her way to him.

“I swear… If that harlot tries telling another lie about me or my family, I will not even need the bleacher. They will never know where to look in the first place.” He growled.

“What did she say?” Marinette grasped. While Damian had a soft side, she also knew he would not hesitate to stab her, making it look like a nasty incident.

“She kept babbling about how she knows the Waynes and She and Me have an on and off ‘thing’ and probably this whole trip is because we had a fight and now I want to apologize that way.” His hand twitched dangerously close to his sword. Why did he bring the sword today?

“I can’t let you just stab her. And it’s not like you can convince any of them change their minds that way.” Marinette placed her hand over his, at the same time making sure it would make it harder for him to grab the sword if he heard something more from Lila. “Here. My parents made them for us.” She opened the box of macaroons.

“I am not a fan of sweets.” He answered, but with relief she noticed he stopped glaring daggers at Lila.

“Then try this one.” She pointed to the yellow one. “It’s made with a bit of lemon juice to add more sourness.”

Damian reluctantly picked the treat and took a bite. Suddenly, the corners of his lips went up. She proudly watched the ‘ice prince’ smile at something so common as a macaroon. “This is a very good macaroon. I am sure it could rival whatever Alfred makes.” He exclaimed, trying not to sound overly excited.

“Somehow I feel like this is better compliment than when Uncle Jagged offered to write a song about my parents’ bakery…” She giggled. Damian looked at her stumped. She only giggled again. “You should’ve seen how Tim reacted when he heard. Suddenly next day Wayne enterprises ordered catering for the whole building. Apparently the CEO wanted to celebrate some deal. I am not sure if any worker besides Tim saw the pastries though.”

“Knowing him? I have no idea. If it was Jason or Dick, they wouldn’t even make it to the building before this morons ate it all.” Then, a dark realization dawned on Damian. “Was by any chance a blonde with him when they picked up the order?”

“Uh… I don’t know. I was at school when it happened. Why?”

Damian groaned. He should have connected the dots sooner. Brown was suddenly not hanging in the mansion twenty-four/seven and she was not seen on patrols. Father said that he was aware of her location. “If Brown is here too, then I am almost sure this pastries didn’t make it. And she might be causing a sudden jump in the bakery’s revenue.”

“Huh?” Marinette wasn’t following.

“Stephanie Brown is Drake’s girlfriend. Saying she has a sweet tooth is understatement of the century. More of a sweet jaw if you ask me. She can smell sweets from mile and always get there before you. Especially when Alfred is baking. And she can rival Cass in her stealth skill when it comes to stealing them.” Damian explained to Marinette and watched her stiffen another giggle. What was it with girls and giggling? But Damian had to admit Marinette looked cute when she did. Slow down Romeo or you will crash into a stop sign.

“Well then. I will be happy to bake her something. But Tim didn’t mention her.”

“He said he is running his independent investigation, so I assume you do not see him often?”

“Yeah. He is quite busy at the office. Isn’t he missing the school though?”

“Drake is seventeen and already has three P.H.D. He goes to school either to hang out with his less intelligent friends or to argue with the underpaid teachers by pointing every mistake and inaccuracy.”

“Sounds like fun.” The mention of the teacher suddenly made Marinette aware that Madame Bustier was nowhere to be seen. “We’ve been sitting here for almost twenty minutes now. Maybe I will go check for her…” Marinette suggested more to herself than Damian. She was about to stand up when Madame Bustier walked into the class with Chloe following her. Only now anyone noticed that the blonde was gone.

“Children. Chloe wanted to say something to all of you.” The teacher started.

“Yes. I wanted to apologize for my utterly ridiculous behavior in the past and hope that you will give me chance to earn forgiveness from the better part of you.” Chloe stated nonchalantly.

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Taglist (sorry if I missed you)@pheonixashtree @sassakitty @unabashedbookworm @vixen-uchiha @maggiecc12 @actualdisasterwoman @tired-butterfly @shizukiryuu @floralfi @imanerddealwith @northernbluetongue @krispydefendorpolice @toodaloo-kangaroo @dast218 @bluesoulblueheart @theatreandcomicfreak @disneyfoxuniverse @mindfulmagics @alwaysnumberonetruth @nyaabinch @jardimazul @lenamau @rosep16 @dramatic-squirrel @sonif50 @daminett4life @lulutheawkwardess @weird-pale-blonde-person @mooshoon @jeminiikrystal @mochegato @moonlightstar64 @dragonflyswing @silverwhiteraven @shamefullove @magic-miraculous @valeks-princess @heaven428 @mlbchaosqueen @winter-gardenflower @spicybelladonna @emo-elaine13 @vetilora @karukofox21 @my-name-is-michell @sturchling @lokiifriggasonn @redscarlet95 @melicmusicmagic @interobanginyourmom @the-fusionist @razzledazzle247 @miss-mysterys-blog @darkthunder1589 @i-is-mysterious @catthhay @the-one-woman-army @zestyzealot @dahjokester @write-for-your-life2 @mermaidreject @peachedpocky

#fanfiction #fanfic #crossover #mlb #miraculous lb #miraculous ladybug #mlb x dc #maribat #maribat au #marinette x damian #arranged marriage au #damienette #maridami #order of the guardians #league of assassins #batman #guardian!marinette

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bluebellhairpin · 4 years

Text

Plague

Damian Wayne X Batmom!Reader

A/N: Heh heh, I’m following my Batmom religiously now. She’s gotten too cool. - Nemo

Warning(s): Nightmares, Zombie-like stuff (gore, blood, think Cranks from Scorch Trials)

Summary: A team-building exercise went a bit weary for you and Damian. But as time runs out, maybe he’ll be able to finally get rid of Talia’s version of a mother, and replace it with yours.

Listening to: ‘Save Your Tears’ by The Weekend (ft. Ariana Grande) - ‘Save your tears for another day, so I made you think that I would always stay.’

Series Masterlist

Masterlist

Damian never really liked (y/n).

Even after Talia broke into the cave and confronted him, Bruce and (y/n), his feelings only changed from silent loathing to slight admiration. After all, not many people could get Talia to act like she did, and it seemed (y/n) was one of them.

Eventually Damian and (y/n) were sent off one night. Bruce told Damian that it was a ‘team-building exercise’ and that it ‘would do him good to get to know the only mother-figure in the manor’ in case something happened.

What Damian didn’t expect was that something happened while they were walking back to the car from the part couple hours spent in the carnival. (Damian wouldn’t admit, but he did like her a little more after she won him one of the giant stuffed animals that no one ever won.)

It all happened so fast, and (y/n) recovered quickly enough to get to the car - luckily with Alfred waiting inside. She was quiet the whole way home, only speaking once she’d taken a look at the wound on her leg, saying something to the butler about ‘quarantine’ and ‘he’s back’.

Damian didn’t like the sound of that. He went straight to his room as Alfred helped (y/n) towards the cave.

The next day at breakfast, (y/n) wasn’t there.

Bruce was looking somber as ever, and Dick looked uncharacteristically sad. Jason was nowhere to be seen - not unusual - and he was told Tim had been awake and in the cave since 4am.

Damian thought they were just upset that (y/n) had gotten shot, and he wouldn’t lie if someone asked if he felt a bit guilty. He might’ve been able to help, and he didn’t do much more than not get in the way.

Damian ventured into the cave around lunchtime, being greeted with a new glass cage set near the computer. One closer inspection, it wasn’t a cage - more like a quarantine room with only three sides glassed off - fitted with a bed, desk, it’s own computer, and a door off to one side - presumably for a bathroom. Inside was (y/n), donned in plain clothes, and working away on a keyboard inside the box.

(y/n) noticed Damian as he approached, sending him a weary smile, and kept typing away.

“What’s this?” Damian asked, gesturing slightly with his hand before stuffing it in his pocket.

“Quarantine room.” she replied curtly, still typing away, but casting glances his way.

“Obviously, but what for?”

“Me. I’m sick.”

“What,” Damian started with a scoff, “One bullet wound and you’re out for the count?”

“It wasn’t just a bullet.” Tim said, walking back to his place at the computer. “Ma, results say it was the sulfuric and nitric acid. Mixed with that same other stuff we haven’t named yet.” Tim said, now addressing (y/n), of whom paid full attention. Treatment Damian didn’t get, and it tugged at his stomach in an unfamiliar way.

“Thanks Timmy.” She said, then went back to typing again. Damian decided he wasn’t getting answers here, so he made his way back upstairs to his father.

Bruce decided to do work at home today, and Damian now knew why. (y/n) was hurt, and it seemed Bruce wanted to be around in case something bad happened. Or more like something worse happened.

“Father,” he said, Bruce looking up from his paperwork as Damian walked in, “Why is (y/n) acting so weak?” Bruce’s eyes narrowed slightly, then he sighed and motioned for Damian to sit down.

“She’s not ‘acting weak’. She’s been quarantined for our safety.”

“Why? Sulfuric and nitric acid would only be detrimental to her health not ours.”

“You know anything about zombies, Damian?” Bruce asked, full attention on the boy in front of him. Damian tilted his head.

“I’ve seen ‘Scorch Trials’, but those were cranks not zombies.”

“Well the bullet (y/n) was shot with last night was coated in a substance that - after the incubation period - turns the host into a more agile version of themselves, stronger, smarter, and very carnivorous. Not to mention it’s contagious, it can spread as fast as the black plague.”

“(y/n)’s going to turn into a crank?” Damian said, voice less stern, and more soft. “A crank that can infect others?”

“Only if she gets out before…” Bruce trailed off, running a hand through his hair.

“Before it kills her.” Damian finished, more of a statement than a question. He was starting to realize things were more serious than he realized, but he needed all his questions answered before he could walk away from Bruce yet. “How do you know so much?”

“Because it’s happened before.” Bruce said, looking at Damian with a soft smile. “She was the first to test the cure.”

“How many were infected back then?”

“A whole town in the middle-east.” Bruce sat back in his seat, getting comfortable. He felt Damian had a good few questions left. “The League came and helped contain it to just the town. (y/n) was one that helped, and paid the price for getting too close when trying to help.”

“Why don’t you just use the cure now?”

“It’s not that easy, some of the ingredients are found on other worlds, some only Superman can get to because of his invulnerability. As you know, Clark isn’t always available. As of Jason’s Intel, only (y/n) is infected, so the urgency for a cure isn’t as great.”

“Why didn’t I know of this before?”

“It was before your time. We’d just lost Jason when it happened, we were both not thinking right. (y/n) viewed the mission as a way to get away from Gotham. And me.”

Damian fell into silence, no more questions, and he felt himself falling back into his seat to mirror Bruce’s position.

“It’s come back then. Whatever you thought you’d stopped before is back.” he said, locking eyes with his father as a few moments silence passed again. “A bullet, so someone has the plague substance. We need to stop them.”

Days passed before something happened again. The news showed police barricading streets in inner Gotham from a whole hoard of infected civilians. Since they weren’t kept in quarantine like (y/n) was, they turned faster. Jason’s red hood could be seen helping the police along with Dick in his Nightwing costume. Bruce was in the Watchtower, overseeing the making of the cure with Tim.

Damian stayed with (y/n), donned in his Robin suit in case he was needed with Dick and Jason, or his father and Tim. It seemed that even though her effects were slowed, she suffered more.

The acid made her cough and cough, her throat must be feeling raw by now by how chapped her lips were. Her eyes were sunken in and rimmed red, and normal (s/c) skin turned pasty, with black bulging veins poked out of her arms, hands and neck. She’d lost weight since she was locked up, Damian noted even though it was slight, and her hair lost its usual shine.

It made his stomach churn to see (y/n) looking so horrible. She wasn't just Bruce’s light in the dark world of Gotham, really she were light for the whole family too.

Damian moved closer, pulling the computer chair with him, and sat next to the glass wall, resting his hand on the pane. Realistically, he hadn’t been sleeping the best since his talk with Bruce about what (y/n) was going through. His sleep was filled with images of her.

One of her crawling through the floorboards of the manor, chasing him, scratching along the walls and leaving a trail of sticky black blood, skin rotted away and eyes glazed over, muttering over and over.

You could’ve saved me.

Another she was laying in bed, looking like she was sleeping, and his father came up behind him, eyes glazed over like hers were in the one before, speaking in her voice, saying the same thing.

You could’ve saved me.

The most recent, she was dangling off a cliff, holding his hand, and the harder he held on, the more he tried to pull her up - for his sake and his family - the heavier she got, the more she slipped away, and then she fell. She screamed, but he only heard one thing whispered in his ear.

You could’ve saved me.

“Damian?” she asked, having moved closer. From a distance she looked much better than she really was, even so he was sure she hid most of it well. “What’s wrong?” her voice was so soft, so caring. She was so concerned about him even though she was the one dying where she stood.

“You- you better not die before father gets back.” he said, voice breaking slightly as he fought back the start of tears. “He’ll miss you too much.” She let out a slight chuckle, sliding down the glass wall to sit. He breathing sounded easier if she wasn’t standing.

“I don’t plan on it, trust me.” she said, looking up at him, cracking a smile. “Can I tell you a secret?” He nodded. “I think it hits harder the second time round.”

They both let out half-hearted laughs, Damian wiping away at his eyes. He wasn’t going to cry. She was acting too normal to be so close to death - or something worse.

She wasn’t going anywhere, he’s sure that’s what she’s trying to say.

“I’m sorry.” he whispered, resting his arm against the glass alongside hers. If the glass wasn't there he would’ve taken her hand.

“What for Dami?” she asked, voice as quiet as his. Damian’s throat was tight. Dami.

He liked that.

“For not saving you.” he said after a while silent. “I was there. I should’ve been more vigilant.” She clenched her hand.

“You don’t need to be sorry. If it wasn't me it could’ve been you, and I wouldn’t have been able to forgive myself for that.” she said, leaning away to cough. She recovered quickly, a hand on her chest. “I don’t blame you for this Damian. There are bad people in this world, and they do bad things. Good people - like you, your father, and your brothers - they’re what stops the bad from overrunning the good.”

“Can I tell you a secret?” Damian said, mimicking her question and posture from before. She nodded with a gentle smile. “You’re a much better mother than Talia.”

To say Bruce was surprised when he got back to the cave after administering the cure to the crowd in Gotham was a good way to put it.

When Clark mentioned to Bruce over the comms that Damian was very subdued when he delivered the cure to (y/n), he just thought it meant the boy was wanting (y/n) to just go back to normal, and therefore not being a pain. He didn’t expect him to be on the floor next to the quarantine room, sleeping, with the computer chair pushed a little ways away.

(y/n) smiled as Bruce approached, color already returning to her cheeks, and she raised a finger to her lips to motion for him to be quiet. The cure would kick in fully in a couple more hours, and she’d be completely free from infecting others in a little over a day.

“What’s this?” Bruce asked, voice very low so as to not wake the sleeping Damian.

“He was looking after me.” She said with a smile, having stood to stand a little away from the sleeping boy. “You should probably take him upstairs. He’ll sleep better in his own room.”

That morning, when (y/n) woke up in her hospital-like bed, Damian was back. Having obviously moved back to the cave from since Bruce carried him upstairs, and now was sleeping slumped over the computer desk.

(y/n) moved to the bathroom adjoined to the glass room, even she could tell she looked better. Color had completely returned, her eyes looked brighter, and the black veins in her neck and arms were more of a dark blue.

By the time she reemerged, Bruce was in the cave, and Damian had woken.

“Ummi.” He said, standing and walking to the glass wall, placing his hand up where (y/n)’s was. “You look so much better today.” he said, smiling.

“I thought I always looked good?” she scoffed, earning a laugh from Bruce.

“Sure, sure darling.” Bruce said smiling over at the woman and his son.

“Ah, Bruce! I’m hurt.” She said, Damian sending something that resembled a playful glare at his father, before returning his gaze to (y/n).

“Damian,” she said, looking down at the blue-eyed boy, a playful grin slipping onto her lips, “What does ‘Ummi’ mean?”

Bruce barked out a hearty laugh, the red tinted cheeks of his son over-ruling the much more serious glare he was sending his way.

#damian wayne x reader #damian wayne x batmom #damian wayne imagine #bruce wayne x reader #bruce wayne one shot #Bruce Wayne x batmom #bruce wayne imagine #batfam x batmom #Batfam x reader

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heartless-error · 4 years

Text

Broken, not perfect, but together. - Chapter 13

Fandom: DC comics, Batman

Pairings: Jonathan Kent x Damian Wayne (JonDami) & Jason Todd x Timothy Drake (JayTim)

Rating/Tags: Family feels, hurt/comfort, mental health issues, running away, brotherly love, adopted children, fatherhood

Other(s) links: AO3

Broken.

The Batfamily was broken.

It was six years ago, and they had barely stood together since then, trying to stand up despite guilt and regret.

Damian was sure there was nothing to save, not after losing something that he didn’t know he cared about. But when a new opportunity to get back what they had lost appeared, he cannot help to doubt as his past decisions haunt him again.

If you love somebody, set them free. But you don’t know what you have until it’s gone.

Chapter Summary: He knew exactly what he was doing when he helped Tim and Jason six years ago. But at the same time, he didn’t. No one was prepared to let them go the way they did, not even him. And now, after dealing with the consequences all this time, his heart was about to explode, he couldn't breathe. Because they were there, they were right there. His brothers were in front of him, and he couldn't move, couldn't do anything, because, once again, the weight of truth was about to crush him mercilessly.

Chapter 13

Now

Silence.

The batplane was completely silent.

Technically not entirely, since like the many trips and flights that had been made with it, could be heard perfectly the ambient sound of the wind brushing and surrounding the plane as it advanced on its way, also the noise of the engines accelerating to reach their destination as quickly as possible, as well of the machines and the control panel echoing at the front of the cabin, with all the breaths and movements of those inside.

However, it was they, the bats in there, who were precisely in silence, without having uttered hardly any unnecessary words since they occupied their seats on the plane and taking extreme care of each of their movements, of their postures. The tension in the place and between them was such that they had the impression that any movement or whispering would unleash a true storm among all, although this was already occurring within each of them, it was preferable to keep it hidden and sheltered for the moment, covered and hidden in nobody’s eyes while they were in a clearly confined space and knowing what was about to happen.

Bruce was at the front of the batplane, paying attention to the control panel, and gripping the steering wheel with more force than necessary. It was curious to see him like this, tense, inflexible and dressed in civilian clothes, especially when they had already been used to see the figure of The Dark Knight handling that transport with his gloves, the hood and the cloak tangled in the seat, not his father, not Bruce.

Cassandra, curled up in the passenger seat, was the only one who had deigned to sit next to him. Her gaze insistently alternated between the screen of the GPS that was indicating their current position, and in front, where she could contemplate the sky and the clouds that passed through them. But she seemed too impatient and agitated to appreciate anything.

Stephanie was right behind her, but at a safe distance from the control panel and the driver, also curled up on herself and quieter than they’d ever seen her be. Dick, on the other hand, was at the other end of the cabin, away from everyone and lost in his thoughts as he stared at nothing.

Like him, Damian was there. Farther still, almost to the end of the cabin, sitting awkwardly and with his arms crossed, thoughtful, absorbed in his head and in everything that occupied and prowled around it without stopping.

Sometimes he looked up to capture the blue of the sky and the landscape below his feet, but he couldn’t concentrate to observe it better. He settled into his seat as best he could, trying to find a comfortable position that wouldn’t bother his injuries, something difficult after everything that had happened that morning. He also met Dick’s uneasy gaze several times, Stephanie’s too, but no one said anything, no one moved, they just turned away their eyes to continue silently and in the spiral of their thoughts, allowing the tension to build and the journey to become longer, more harrowing.

Damian knew the distance from Gotham to Florida was not that much, or at least not that much compared to all the places where he assumed that Tim and Jason could be hiding. After all, it was almost eighteen hours by car, and only about three by plane, less on the batplane. Still, he had the impression that this journey was going on for days, weeks. It was endless, exhausting, and every time he glanced at the clock on the control panel, he suppressed a sigh as he realized that only a few minutes had passed when he thought it had been an hour, even longer.

The fact that the whole situation felt like a countdown against him, calculating how much was left to ruin all his life and efforts these last six years, didn’t help.

Damian knew exactly what he was doing when he helped Tim and Jason six years ago. But at the same time, he didn’t.

Contrary to what some people on the plane were thinking, the idea to run away was not Timothy’s, nor Jason’s. No. The idea was his, all his. 100% Damian’s credit. What’s more, they even doubted at first, they were very surprised when he explained the idea to them, and they partially refused. It seemed crazy when after all at that moment they were being watched strictly by a family who didn’t believe in their relationship and Jason was still recovering from an unwarranted aggression that had meant a total rupture between both sides. Although in the end they ended up agreeing, obviously, which he didn’t regret at all.

He was sure that if the others found out about this, that he had not only been an accomplice, but the leader of the entire operation, they would be much more upset than they had already been, maybe he would even receive another punch. And he would probably start to receive the same questions that had already been asked before and had tried to answer ambiguously: How? Why?

The “how” was pretty easy.

At first, a simple call to his best contact was enough: Talia. She didn’t welcome the son she now called failure with open arms, but she did like everything that would benefit her and help her obtain the power she was after. His mother was a woman very aware of her own interests and recognized something that favored them at the time, she knew how to choose her battles well. Erase Tim and Jason from the map, make them disappear, it was one that was definitely worth it, so he didn’t have to convince her to agree.

Jason was a well-known failed project of Talia, a boy who she revived in the waters of Lazarus’ pit, brainwashed, trained and commanded into battle to cause damage to Bruce and all of Gotham under the poisonous ideas that she had implanted in his damaged and resurrected mind, to later see how he not only reformed and fought again on the side of the bats, but fell in love with the one she most wanted to eliminate.

Timothy, no doubt, had always been a clear obstacle to Talia, even from his Robin days. Something she had been waiting to get rid of and get out of the way as soon as possible at any cost. She manipulated Jason and manipulated him to hate him, to break him, to kill him, because she was conscious of the obsession that his father, his grandfather, had with Timothy. Ra wanted Drake for himself, it was a fact. He wanted him, craved him, chased him, for him he was his perfect detective, the only worthy being who could challenge him, confront him. He wanted him to be his successor, his right hand, wanted him at his mercy and wanted to hand over his empire to him. Empire for which Talia had fought all her life and could lose to the third Robin.

Then, hiding the couple meant making her mistakes and her greatest threat disappear. Talia would gain respect and a big advantage with both vigilantes disappearing, she knew that, and she didn’t hesitate to take it all in immediately. Damian and the others didn’t have to wait a single full day before receiving instructions to get it all started.

After that, only the most difficult thing remained: the metas. Because no matter how much Tim and Jason changed identities, went to another continent, or avoided cameras, they had been friends of metahumans who could easily find them at any time. Any Super could identify their heartbeats wherever they were, and any Speedster could run around the world for them in seconds. They wouldn’t get very far if Superboy, Impulse, or even Starfire were involved in their search.

But he didn’t have to do much to fix that problem either because Jonathan volunteered. He didn’t even ask him, he didn’t even know that he was aware of what he was trying to do, but apparently, he was inside from the first moment, even before any plans were formulated. He simply appeared before them with a Kryptonian device sneakily pulled from the fortress of solitude and handed it over to them, assuring the red team that as long as they kept it close, it would block the metas and hide them from everyone without problem. It clearly worked, and too well seeing as how absolutely no one had been able to find them despite the many efforts made.

So, getting it all done was not as difficult as anyone might think. Especially when nobody suspected them or paid attention. Everyone was too busy focusing on all of Tim and Jason’s movements back then, and he and Jonathan were sixteen and thirteen, respectively. No one knew what was happening until it was too late, until they had been at the airport and left that damn note in the cave.

Regarding why they did it, he already explained how he was allowed that morning.

His brothers were tearing apart, little by little. Gotham were taking away a lot of things from them and continued to do so every day. Their vigilante lives began to overwhelm them more and more and the family didn’t help but make it worse with their indifference and their way of dealing with problems, including him.

Damian was sure that if they had not run away, if they had stayed in Gotham and continued with the rhythm they were taking, they would have ended up finally breaking and, with them, their relationship.

He just knows, he knows that’s what would have happened if he wouldn’t have intervened.

As much as Todd insisted over and over that he didn’t need the attention of the bats around him, that he didn’t want anything to do with the family, his actions indicated how badly he needed approval and apologies from Bruce. Like Tim, who had always depended on that kind of acceptance ever since he was a child and had driven him to seek it wherever he could obtain it. And it didn’t matter how much they both fought for each other, for themselves and their relationship, the rejection of the family, of Bruce, hurt, hurt them, made them suffer despite knowing what could happen, despite having hiding it for years to avoid the problem. They wanted to solve it, they wanted to fix it. But besides all of that, both were also rooted to Gotham and its people in a way that Damian could never empathize, sacrificing and fighting tirelessly for the city until they reached that point of no return where they were, where they sacrificed their lives and his whole being.

Their loyalty and sacrifice for the city, for the bats, was too big, it meant too much to both of them and if they didn’t let them go, if they kept tying up that way, eventually everything would have split them in two, it would have separated them, and they would have allowed it in order to keep the place standing and the bat happy. As always, they were able to consecrate their own happiness for someone else even without wanting to, without realizing it.

But Damian did it, and he couldn’t allow it. He just couldn’t, much less at that time.

Damian could lie to others and himself all he wanted, but the need for his brothers to be happy was there. The perspective of them losing what they had because the other bats couldn’t see it, sacrificing their happiness for them again, was too much for him. He thought it was too unfair.

He knew he had been an insufferable brat for years, that he had caused too much trouble, done too much hurt, and could have ruined their lives with his mere presence, but whether they wanted it or not he grew up, they all did, and his relationship with them had improved considerably over the years, too much to let what was happening happen in front of his eyes and stand with arms crossed. Damian’s appreciation for his brothers had grown in a way that he never imagined at first, feeling something that never thought what could feel towards no one, because he and Jason shared a similar past that made them lean on the other without words, and Tim… It was Tim, just like that. Both were patient and annoying until the end, but one day he realized that he loved them and couldn’t see how they were about to collapse.

They were a weakness, he knew.

But Damian knew too that he had been a participant in inflicting their suffering, and that moment was the best time to fix it, he could fix it. Because the best way to prevent Gotham, the family, and the vigilante lifestyle from destroying their brothers, was for them to leave everything behind, including everyone, including him. They couldn’t hurt them if they weren’t there. It was that simple.

And that was without doubt his best way to earn their forgiveness, to make amends with them: Give them freedom from all the chains that imprisoned them.

Jonathan felt the same, he knew it. He owed the red team nothing, not in the same way that Damian did, he didn’t need to feel deserving of their affections or forgiven for his past actions, but Jason and he were friends, and Tim practically raised him with Conner. He was also too fond of them to do anything, and most importantly: he wanted them to stay happy together.

Anyone would say that he and Jonathan, beyond the brotherly love they felt for the other two, helped them because they reflected too much their own relationship in the elders’. And they would be right.

They didn’t have the same story as them, and they weren’t the same people either, but unintentionally and without knowing they had turned in their greatest reference in terms of relationships, their support to carry theirs forward and, without a doubt, the push they needed to start dating. Their parents seemed not want to see what happened between them back then, as if it didn’t exist and everything followed its normal course, they kept doing it even today. They were both young, had not discussed their sexuality with anyone else and the indifference of their guardians stopped them from doing so. Nor did they know how to cross beyond the line of friendship with the one who was their greatest confidant and puberty is the worst time for human beings. They both felt trapped, confused, and the longest and closest healthy homosexual relationship they ever knew was Tim and Jason, who were in hiding and Damian didn’t even find out about them until the end, but they always seemed to understand and accept their situation more than their own parents.

Then, when everything exploded, both didn’t hesitate when choosing sides, and not when they helped them escape too. The rejection of Tim and Jason may have affected them as if it had been directed at them, their relationship with their parents was almost irreparable, but they turned that pain into stubbornness and courage to confess their feelings and help them to leave. Because they wanted them to stay together, they needed them to stay together, since that was their way of showing everyone, themselves, that they could be happy, that they were not in danger. Both Tim and Jason, and them.

So, yes, they did. They helped them, planned, and carried it out, being fully aware of what they were doing.

However, it was what came after that they didn’t consider.

They became so focused on helping those two to escape, that at any moment they didn’t stop to think what would become of them and their surroundings once they left.

They should have.

The nightmares, the anxiety, the secrets, and the paranoia became his new normality. The enormous guilt that came with their actions hit them too hard and fast, without giving them time to even assimilate or change it, because once it was done there was no going back.

They both thought they were ready to let Tim and Jason go, but they weren’t. Not them, not their families, not their friends, not even the hero community. No one. The huge gap that their absence left in their teams and families was too big, but they had already disappeared and all that remained was that stupid note along with the consequences it produced.

The batfamily fell apart like a house of cards in a matter of days, and it could have been in hours if they had not been focused on the search, but the fights continued without rest and the resentment along with the tension didn’t do more than increase over time. The Titans and all the metas who knew the missing ones contributed to the search, but there was no clue, making the situation worse if possible. They were all trying to find a common culprit, or a valid and less painful reason than the one they had to leave because they were unhappy, they even hoped to find them, but they weren’t going to get anything.

And as the days, the weeks, the months went by, the tension increased, everything got worse and both Damian and Jon had to get away from those whose presence could no longer bear, either due to a total loss of confidence after what happened, or because they found themselves seeing themselves as those traitors who had brought suffering to their family and friends.

Damian couldn’t trust anyone, not anymore, not his father, not Grayson either. He felt like everyone had fallen too high from the pedestal on which he had them and had to watch Bruce fall into another self-destructive spiral where no Robin was going to get him out this time. The betrayal and rejection he had felt from them didn’t allow him to have a civil conversation with none until eleven months after what happened at least, and even with Grayson he needed more time without wanting to yell at him until he was hoarse. Yet, he had to endure seeing how Brown, Batgirl, walked away increasingly because she couldn’t bear to see their faces, and how Cassandra came back from his mission in China to find her lost and broken family, how Alfred completed his tasks silently and not daring to say a word of it too, afraid to bring up the subject and cause again all those discussions both new and old that originated after the disaster.

Jonathan also felt deeply betrayed by his father and his lack of response to what happened, for his inflexible opinion in agreement with Bruce’s and his indifference to what his son felt. Damian knew they had a fight much stronger than Jon had wanted to admit, that he threw more things in his face than he said, but he decided not to pressure him on the subject and respect if at any time he wanted to give more details. Besides that, his boyfriend saw how Conner Kent crumbled at the loss of his Robin, how he looked for him without a break over and over again to the point of even neglecting his responsibilities with his team and his own health.

All that pain, all that loss, all the tears, the screams, the fights, and the problems, they caused it. All of them. Without hesitation. And the best thing is that they weren’t planning to fix it. No. They would take the secret to the grave if possible, because if there was one thing they couldn’t regret or back down, it was to make Tim and Jason happy, despite the enormous price they had to pay.

In their poor defense, they didn’t know that everything was going to fall apart like that. They didn’t come to think that the reaction would be so strong, nor the chain of disasters that followed. But it wasn’t until they saw everyone suffering and tearing apart that they realized what they had done, and that everyone would get very angry if they found out about their actions.

So, they had no choice but to keep quiet and move on, because what else could they do? They hid it all, they studied, went together to prom, moved into their apartment in Metropolis, Damian got a job, Jon is in college, and despite the difficult family situation and missing the red team a lot, they looked for their own happiness and normality where they knew they could find it, where they taught them they could get it.

And they were fine, really.

They were together and fine. The weight of guilt was not so big if you shared it, and they both learned to lie fairly well together at an early age, also to continue side by side no matter what. They didn’t even have to lie that much, just pretend, because they never had a clue where Todd and Drake were, the best was not knowing it and the moment they saw them go through the airport gate, they too disappeared for them completely.

Mostly, they couldn’t talk normally with their parents, sometimes they had to be too on guard or alert in case someone discovered something, every now and then everything became too much and they lost control of their emotions, but they always ended up overlapping. They had nightmares in which everyone surrounded them and yelled that it was their fault, in which they saw flashbacks of happy moments turned into true horrors, where they heard resentment, poison towards them and pure hatred. But despite waking up screaming, crying, begging for forgiveness, they didn’t forget the most important thing: they did it for a reason, and they weren’t responsible for everything.

If you love something you have to let it go, and that’s just what Tim and Jason chose to do. As much as they had been the ones to give them the option, it’s what they chose and they had to respect it, they had to deal with it. They couldn’t tie them to a life of misfortune, nor force them to return when they weren’t even part of the real problem there.

Damian was determined to do that for as long as possible, to protect their new lives with everything he had, during all of his if necessary, because that decision was the only selfish decision that his brothers had made in a long time, the only one they had made thinking of themselves, and he felt they deserved it, he knew they deserved it. He was going to fight to preserve that.

For that, maybe he should have tried a lot harder in Zodome to avoid this disaster.

He had to hold back himself not to curse and fall prey to his anger when Gordon revealed in the batcave that the reason they had found his brothers had been because of the explosion in which he had been involved. He had felt so helpless, because he hadn’t found out what had caused the disaster until that meeting, and it didn’t make it better.

The whole time he thought that the terrorist cell he was chasing was on the island because of its black market and its easy access, didn’t come to imagine that they were going after a hidden supercomputer of the league that they wanted to sabotage and that they would also fail in their attempt, almost killing him and uncovering his lies.

If he had been faster, if he had been more focused, if he hadn’t been regretting and missing his brothers again, if he had been better, none of this would have happened. They definitely wouldn’t be on their way to Florida.

He could have prevented so many things. And yet he had failed, failed them, again.

No matter how hard he had fought for them, how long he had resisted, in the end everything had fallen apart because he couldn’t fulfill a simple mission or control his temper.

It was very frustrating.

Damian dug his nails into his forearms, squirming in his seat. His back hurt, also the side of his face where Grayson had hit him before. His fingers itched a lot, he wanted his phone back, his comms, something. He wanted to call Jonathan and make sure he was okay, safe, at least hear his voice to be able to calm down. But they had both been isolated from each other and from everyone by the time Damian made his confession.

As they thought it would happen, just when the others learned the truth took all forms of communication and kept them under surveillance. Jon was surely under the strict and impassive gaze of Clark after a warning from his father. As if any of them could jump in at any moment and alert Tim and Jason that they had been caught and they were going for them, when in fact they didn’t know how to contact them or where they were.

He sighed, felt Grayson’s gaze on him again but completely ignored it. He was tired, angry, and resentful. He felt like an animal on the way to the slaughterhouse, his heart pounding and his mistakes hounding him, reminding him of everything he could have done to prevent this. He didn’t want to talk to anyone, he didn’t want to see anyone. All he wanted to do was scream, get mad, scream more, fight and beg for them to turn around, to stop the plane and all this madness, to go back to Gotham and forget everything they knew so they could get on with their lives like until now.

But that was already impossible, everything had changed, and they were not going to forget it, they couldn’t.

Looking straight ahead, Damian remembered Barbara Gordon’s soft grip on his arm before getting on batplane, he remembered the way she leaned, whispered an apology and with an indecipherable look said it.

“Even if you don’t know it or want to admit it, you need this Damian. You need to see it.”

He considered his answer, but he just gave her a cold look and got on the plane. He sat in his place, waited for takeoff, and hadn’t moved since, still quiet and waiting for this journey to end and see the destruction of what his life had been until now.

Everything was still silent; everyone was still quiet.

Damian didn’t care. After all, he had been six years without speaking, what mattered a little more?

~0.0~

They landed before lunchtime, outside the city, about a thirty-minute walk from the town. They were not detected, and their objective was not to attract the attention to alert the former vigilantes of the place.

Even after landing, for a few seconds, no one dared to move or say anything at all, even though some of them seemed to be about to get off the plane and begin the search immediately. They all stood still as if they could break a fragile peace that had never existed. The tension seemed to reach its peak just as Bruce got up and began to give directions of the procedure to be followed. Without having Oracle’s help this time to track them down immediately, they had to break up into groups to explore the area and check out the places they already knew Tim and Jason had been seen, hoping to meet them.

Dick and Cass would go to the local electronics store and its surroundings, where Tim might appear. It was obvious why Grayson chose to search for Drake first, and why Cass was with him, since there was no doubt that Timothy could attack him as soon as he sees him. He didn’t blame him; he would do it too.

Brown would take care of the library, where they saw Jason. She was not in much danger with him if she found him, at least not entirely. Stephanie was not so involved in the conflict and her relationship with Jason had always been neutral, they had a mutual respect that they could use to their advantage this time.

Damian was evidently forced to go with his father, who was clearly not going to leave him alone on the plane and was watching and controlling him like he was still ten years old and was planning to do something stupid. Much to his regret, he planned to check out the downtown area and where the other two had been seen crossing a pedestrian crossing that morning, having to cover a less specific and greater terrain.

Great.

Damian had assumed his complaints would not be heard at all, no matter what he felt, how angry he was or how bad what they were doing was. So, he decided to apply the total ice tactic and be silent all the way to the small town, analyzing the route, the place, thinking how easy it would be to run and alert his brothers before disaster struck. He didn’t, and he didn’t say a word as they all parted, and the search began. Just kept going next to his father, rigid, tense. He felt as if he were outside his own body, in another place, everything seemed out of focus and his nerves were on the surface. It was difficult to breathe, his chest contracted more and more, and he didn’t want to look at the streets, at the people. He feared so much meeting Drake and Todd. Standing next to Bruce looking for them, he felt like the most twisted of the traitors, again.

The traitor betraying again, what a surprise.

At least the place wasn’t too bad, for what little he deigned to see. As reported, the town was small and cozy, smelled of the sea and clean air. It was close to the beach and it was a sunny and lively place, very neat and beautiful with a close community made up of families and locals from there along with some tourists. They all seemed quite close and upper-middle class, from what could be seen.

It was very different from Gotham.

Laughter, lively conversations and happy sounds of children and adults, accompanied by the sound of the waves in the distance and life in general in the city were heard. It was refreshing, something new, different. There was no fog, no dark alleys, trash, rats, or the constant threat that a madman dressed as a clown would brutally murder you and your children for fun.

Damian had stopped for a second to look at a lady who was walking his dog -a white chihuahua very ugly, but funny and whose face of sorrow in this life alleviated his anguish a little- when his father’s voice made him turn to him in annoyance.

“I have brought your phone and comms.” He said to him as he continued walking, urging him to follow him and quite attentive to the area in case he saw any sign of those he had come looking for.

Damian didn’t answer, he just kept walking beside him.

He knew he wasn’t going to return any of this or stop watching him until he was sure he couldn’t interfere with his plans, but he was informing him of it to gain ground with him. It was always his way of trying to score points, it was a kind of punishment veiled with concern and the usual parental explanation for not looking so bad. The typical “I have punished you with this, but I’m being good, I hope you understand and forgive me because this is your fault for misbehaving, not mine.”

It won’t work.

“I’ll give them back to you as soon all of this ends.” He continued saying when seeing that he didn’t obtain an answer.

Damian rolled his eyes and continued in silence, walking briskly. It hadn’t worked, mostly because he wasn’t thirteen anymore and knew the trick, so he was still angry, a lot.

Bruce had to realize that hadn’t gone as expected, because he heard him sigh and call him again, in a slight tone of reproach.

“Damian.”

No answer.

“Damian Wayne.” He called him again in a severe tone. “Can you speak to me, please?”

He didn’t speak. What’s more, he looked at a couple that passed right by them as they walked to a black Lab, who seemed very happy to be there. Reminded him a bit of Titus, he missed him, his friend had a good life.

“You are no longer a child, and I hope you understand that in these situations you are required not to behave as such.”

He frowned. Really? The trick of maturity wasn’t going to work either right now, much less when the first to treat him like a child it was precisely him, invalidating his opinions and keeping an eye on him. He couldn’t be serious.

He snorted and kept walking, not wanting his temper to get the better of him again and crossing the crosswalk that he recognized as the one from the photo he had seen on the batcomputer. His heart clenched for a second, he lowered his head holding his breath, because he was stepping on the same ground that his brothers had passed, they had been here and now he was crossing it with his father while they were looking for them.

The chances that they were getting closer to them were more and more real, the option of being found head-on were many and his hands had started to sweat. He didn’t know what he would do if that happened, he didn’t know how he would react if it was Bruce and he who ended up finding them before anyone else.

“Giving me the silent treatment will not solve anything of this, son.” Bruce ended up saying again, crossing the street in a tired tone and ignoring the internal struggle that Damian had at that moment.

At that, the last Robin looked at him angrily, because of what had said in itself, and because he had called him “son”. He had no right to play that trick at the moment, at all. He refused, and he was too upset right now to that.

“What we’re doing either, but we’re doing it anyway, right?” He finally reproached him with coldness and aversion.

He listened to Bruce sigh again and kept walking, stepping forward to leave him a little behind and still without looking closely around. He continued going down the street after crossing the pedestrian crossing, staring at the ground and with his heart beating faster and faster. He didn’t want to walk, he didn’t want to do this, he didn’t want to continue arguing, he wanted to go home and hold Jonathan until they couldn’t make out where one began and the other ended.

“You have to understand that this is necessary.” Bruce justified himself behind him, still in that serious and exhausted tone.

Damian felt anger wash over him once more, almost rising up his throat and burning it to start screaming and throw words sharp like knives. But they were in public, the goal was not to attract attention and nothing good would come of losing control now.

They came to an intersection with an avenue, but Damian continued without looking back, hoping to lose sight of his father for as long as possible.

“For whom?” He asked with annoyance. “Tt.”

Clearly solely for them. He, Grayson, or whoever couldn’t live with what they had done. But that wasn’t his problem, nor was it anyone’s. They didn’t have to do this, it was unnecessary, but after all Damian was the selfish one for not having said a word about what he did for years.

Of course.

He hoped to hear an answer behind him, knowing that his father would try to lecture him, scold him, or make him understand his point of view, but curiously he got nothing. When Damian took a couple of steps across the intersection, he realized that he didn’t listen either the unmistakable Bruce’s steps behind or beside him, they had disappeared.

He frowned and snorted exasperated.

“What? Now is it you who’s going to give me the silence treatment?” He complained in annoyance and stopped on his own steps to turn around and look at him, the disgust inside him urged him to start another discussion.

However, when he caught a glimpse of his father and realized that he was completely still, rigid, standing and watching in awe to his right, fixing his gaze in something, in someone, which was far down the avenue, that disgust quickly transformed into a mixture of anxiety and emotion so strong that Damian could have passed out if he hadn’t been so on guard.

Slowly, fearfully but curious, he turned his head and followed his father’s stunned gaze to where it had been frozen.

And he wanted to scream.

He wanted to scream, cry, laugh, he wanted to run there, wanted to flee, wanted to do many things but felt completely incapable of doing none because like Bruce he froze, was petrified and was unable to react, unable to decide.

Because they were right there.

Timothy Drake and Jason Todd were right there. A few meters from them.

His hands started to tremble, to sweat, he couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t, his throat was closed, his lungs could barely function well, his heart was beating so hard he couldn’t hear anything else, his head was in chaos, everything turned and stirred.

But it didn’t matter, it didn’t matter at all, because they were there, they were just there.

Damian couldn’t look away, couldn’t do anything but stare intensely, trying to assimilate that it was true, that it was them, in front of him. They were alive, they were fine, they were there, and they still hadn’t realized that they were near, observing them and about to run towards them.

They were on the sidewalk, talking lively with two women, who seemed to really enjoy their company. Their postures and smiles were relaxed, open. They were side by side and chatting with each other as if there was no other problem in the world, and if he paid enough attention, if he tuned his ears enough, he could hear Jason’s deep voice and Drake’s light laugh in the distance. And they had definitely changed, they had grown. They were more mature, more adults plus attractive if that was possible. Jason still kept his white lock in his hair and his leather jacket, but his posture was less threatening, calmer, it seemed more centered and stable than ever. Tim had cut his hair, and looked shorter if possible, but he kept that soft and genuine smile he never wore while he was in one of the expensive suits he wore at WE.

In the eyes of both there was light, there was life, a shine that he had never seen in them. They carried an aura that he never thought he would witness in them.

His eyes itched, he could cry, he didn’t know if he had already started to cry. His instincts screamed at him, screamed so much, so many different things and with such force that he didn’t know which ones to follow. One part told him to pick up his father, get away from that street, not alert others and leave in order to keep that light in them forever. But the another yelled at him to run towards them, to approach them suddenly, hug them hard and never let go, because he had missed them so much, and was glad that they were still together and so calm.

The instincts to go to them seemed to win definitively when Jason’s bigger figure leaned closer to Timothy’s to put his arm around his shoulders, causing the smaller to smile at him and intertwine their hands together without hesitation, where -for a second- an unusual shine on the fingers of both hands caught his eye.

Rings. That were rings. They wore rings. Wedding rings. Alliances.

His resolve broke, his mind went blank. Without realizing it, Damian took a step, then another, another. Tentative, automatic, unconscious steps. He still couldn’t barely breathe and now his gaze was focused on their clasped hands, on their posture, in that hug, at their smiles while they were still talking without realizing they were there.

Just as he was about to start running, a firm and powerful hand grabbed his forearm hard and pulled him back, making him complain and stumble in surprise on his steps. He hadn’t seen that coming, and he turned astonished to see how his father, surprised too, had clung to his arm, and held him in place, shaking his head.

He looked at him in startled, almost panicked, breathing hard and with a million questions going through his mind, but discarding them all quickly at the fact that he was stopping him from going to his brothers.

A shrill chime that was too familiar rang out somewhere, but that wasn’t important to him right now.

Damian shook his arm hard, flustered, grabbed Bruce’s hand, and tried to pull it away from him, shaking his head. But he couldn’t push him away, his father didn’t let him go, he tried to take a step towards his brothers and was pushed back again. He was breathing faster his heart was going to explode.

“No.” His father said, his voice also broken with nervousness. “Wait. No.”

He didn’t want to wait. He couldn’t. But the fact that it was precisely Bruce who wanted to wait now, who was stopping him right now, turned his alarms back on and in his agitation, Damian realized that something was wrong, that he was missing something.

Shaking his head hard and trying to regulate his breathing, he turned his gaze back to the ex-robins to realize that the scene in front of him had changed, that indeed, in his surprise for having them close again and his focus to watching them, he had been missing an important detail.

A very important detail.

The women his brothers were talking to were not the only ones on this street, there were more people there, it was full of adults, more groups talking to each other, men and women waiting for something in front of a building. A big one, well-kept, with traffic signs specific that he knew and with a gate of colors, childish. It was now open and from which children were coming out, who were screaming, shouting, laughing, and running to the adults who welcomed them with open arms.

Wait.

The adults were parents. This was a fucking school.

“Dad!”

“Daddy!”

Two voices, shrill and childish, repeated those words with genuine joy as they quickly approached Tim and Jason, whose smiles grew up, and they looked fondly at each other.

A boy and a girl, small, smiling, and excited, entered the scene. Holding hands and running as fast as their short legs allowed them, they finished throwing themselves towards Jason and Tim, laughing happily, with squeals of excitement and a warm welcome.

Jason caught the girl in mid-jump, hugging her tightly and not taking long to cover her face with kisses as she squirmed and laughed out loud, happy in his grip. Tim bent down to extend his arms and receive an effusive hug from the boy, separating shortly to leave the most tender and gentle kiss that Damian had never seen on his cheek while the child allowed himself to be picked up carefully to be hold. After that, they both ended up with smiling children in their arms as they talked, greeted the other and laughed with them.

“I haven’t said everything.” Barbara said. “You have to see it, Damian.” Barbara said.

Well.

Shit.

30 notes · View notes

boogiewrites · 5 years

Text

Love’s Liaison

Characters: Bane (TDKR) x Mina (OFC)

Summary: Mina has known Bane since his capture from prison. After the setback of losing in Gotham, what new changes will they both implement as they face starting over after almost losing one another?

Warnings/Tags: Violence. Sexual Content. Fluff, Angst. Medical jargon. Injury.

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As she sat next to the hospital bed where Bane lay bent and broken she couldn’t help but be reminded of the last time she’d seen him in such a way.

He had been brought to the league by Talia and her father. That was where she had first taken care of him. She spent her days and nights nursing his wounds, having far better means to heal him than they had in the prison. She watched him form back into one piece, his face losing the discoloration and swelling, scars forming as his natural shape came back to him thanks to her. He didn’t speak much, but it would’ve been detrimental to the healing of his mouth if he’d tried. He didn’t need to speak to show how deep his intelligence ran. His eyes remained bright, and she watched them formulate so many plans for their deeds.

They sat for hours in silence, her kneading out his back, working him through the painful process of his spine forming to completion.

Every time she saw the scar that ran from his thick, muscular neck down the expanse of his bulked-up back she was reminded of having her hands on him. The time spent so close and skin to skin with him at his most vulnerable.

But then Ra’s Al Ghul interfered. Mina was secretly and silently heartbroken when he was excommunicated from the league. Having had put in so much time with him, having found a way for him to function with the mask, an idea that turned out just crazy enough to work. He was becoming strong again, his body as sharp as his mind when he left. Talia was vocal about her distaste for what happened, but Mina was left to stay silent. She wasn’t a member of the league, only taken in for her healing talents and to be an indentured servant for the members. She had no real power and had to watch someone she thought she had a real connection with disappear.

Then Batman would intervene, killing Ra’s Al Ghul and bringing Talia and Bane back together. With Ra’s gone, Talia allowed Mina to learn to defend herself, finding her years of watching to be beneficial to her in the endeavor. As a plan was formed to carry out Ra’s Al Ghul’s destiny, she found herself to be among the ones named to join Bane and Talia in their work.

In the sewers, she was kept mostly hidden. Bane didn’t want just anyone knowing about Mina. He considered her an understated but vital piece of the plan. He kept her close where he went, having her in masculine tactical gear. But instead of the plethora of weapons, one would expect to be in the numerous pouches and pockets, she kept the secret to Bane’s endurance and strength with her. She supplied him with his analgesic gas to keep him functioning so highly despite his body being broken underneath that threshold of pain. She helped him heal, being the one alone with him after confrontations, using her mixtures and knowledge to further aid his body in repairing the damage he inflicted upon it. Once again she knew him at his most vulnerable. He found himself trusting Mina, confiding in her plans and theories and intently listening when she gave her feedback. He was a master of strategy but she gave a distinct point of view from being the voiceless ears and eyes of the league for so many years. She had nursed so many who thought themselves invincible back from death that she knew where every one of them went wrong. Bane knew this information was priceless, and thus it made Mina that in turn.

So when she saw Talia leave, finding Bane in a heap against the wall after being shot she knew what she had to do. She did as she had time and time again, and saved him.

After gathering a handful of other mercenaries and taking one of the stolen Bat tech flying vehicles to get Bane out of Gotham, she took him to a small isolated island in Ireland to a bunker so she could put him back together again.

And here they were now. The steady and quiet beeping of machines, the painkillers being pumped in at high levels for him at her request. She stayed by his side, not trusting anyone else to watch over him.

He came and went, the sheer force from the blast making his insides displace and rupture. Slowly those who escaped Gotham found their way to them again. She found herself the highest-ranking person left and she made decisions she’d never had to before. She was training men, reaching out to other mercenaries for support as Bane healed. Failing in Gotham had left a bad taste in a lot of their mouths but she still believed in him. She knew no man smarter than him and she fought to keep his name clear of shame while he could not.

During one of the earlier nights alone, the trauma still fresh from fleeing Gotham, she sits by his bed in her casual civilian clothes. She reaches out and holds his hand, scorch marks still visible on his skin as she lets her sadness breakthrough for the first time since he was exiled from the league.

She lets herself cry alone in the room with him, her face pressed to his big hand, the hands she’d splinted so many years ago. The hands that broke necks and the bats back and destroyed their enemies without so much as fracture thanks to her. She stroked his arm and wondered if she’d ever know his hands to be anything but fierce. He had never been unfair or forceful with her. She had long wondered, since the days before he was this beast of a man in his size and reputation. She wanted to know if there was the sort of softness he held for Talia left to be shown to her. She had only ever shown him softness. But he had never called her weak for it. Only praised the things she did for him. She wondered when it was that she let her heart get in the way of her work. And why was it a man like Bane to make her thoughts so foolish?

She leans over him, wiping the tears she sheds for him as they fall to his pale skin. Her fingers feel the indentions on his face from the mask, her fingers tracing the thin pink scars she’d helped make barely visible over his nose and mouth. In a moment of weakness, when it was still uncertain if he would ever wake, she kisses him gently. She doesn’t linger long, her lips pressed to his forehead after his lips affectionately.

“I won’t give up on you. I never have and I never will. You’re going to come back to me, Bane. The world still needs you and so do I.”

———

“What are you doing up?” Mina turns to ask Bane as she could hear his forced heavy footsteps as they came down the hall and stopped in the lab's doorway. She moves towards him, trying not to show her concern for his pain as there were others around. “Aren’t you hurting?” She asks with a quiet voice, her face showing her worry.

“Yes but...you weren’t there when I woke.” He answers with squinted eyes, his brow still furrowing under the center strap of his new and improved mask.

“I was here looking to see what progress had been made with your new braces.” She explains with a confident nod.

“And?” He demands, taking a deep breath with the analgesic gas pumping through his lungs to ease the intense pain that was currently gnawing away at him from his injuries sustained in Gotham.

“The new vials are ready, they’ve passed all the necessary testing. The braces will match your new body brace as well, not that you care about that sort of thing.” She remarks with a subtle smile, the matching of new pain-relieving arm braces to his newly formed and reinforced body brace had been a purely aesthetic choice that she had made. She thought his image was important and while he agreed to a degree, he didn’t think the production should have been slowed for such a thing.

“When will they be ready?” He asks, holding his form up against the doorframe, his still large body looking as if it may even bend the metal of the sterile looking wing of the bunker.

“By tomorrow. They need to be installed and then another round of tests. Then I would feel comfortable having you try them. Then there’s the nasty business of having you come off the gas and adjust to the injectables. But as always I have complete faith in your full recovery within 4-5 days.” She gives another nod to confirm her words.

“Good.” He nods with a curt tone. He lumbers and turns, making his way back to his room down the hall. She knew he was in pain, so she didn’t take his short words personally.

——-

“How are you doing this morning?” She inquires, with a tender voice. She was the only one left now to dare to speak to him in such a way.

He’d been angry ever since he’d woken up. But she didn’t blame him in the least. His plans had failed, he’d lost the woman he’d sworn to protect from birth and now he was injured severely. It was more than an acceptable and understandable setback. With his men now in the Gotham prison, he was left with a scattered arsenal. And though he thought Mina was worth the cost of a hundred men, it didn’t change the fact that those men he had conditioned were now oppressed by the very structures he tried to take down. His anger for the turn of events was always under the surface, and the unpleasant change from his tried and true mask was going to be something he had to adjust to. He had no doubt he could, but he knew it wouldn’t be easy.

Mina stayed by him continuously, as she had ever since she brought him there. She oversaw the connection of the new arm braces, interchangeable for damage and reloadable for medicine and thanks to her stern demands, and the technology she’d taken from their heist of the Batman’s weapons arsenal, they were practically indestructible.

Bane wasn’t a creature for wallowing in his emotions. He was a force that nothing stopped, always forward on a mission. But as he found himself now without one, without a clear and precise prerogative and plan, emotions started to surface. For even though he knew only darkness from a very young age, he was still human. There were emotions from being an abandoned child, living in fear every moment as he grew strong and resilient that he could recall. And in that youth and initial betrayal, there was softness. This is why he had protected Talia as a child. This is why he kept Mina so close to him. They represented things that seemed so out of touch for him. With Talia now gone, something he found coming back to him in anger-inducing waves, he was left with only one other person now that had ever shown him such care and tenderness. And she reminded him of this unintentionally every time he woke up and she was there next to him, every time she touched him with a look in her eyes he hadn’t seen anyone else have for him. She had always been a source of softness in his life when there was room for none. She had reminded him of the child he once was, the boy who craved warmth and affection in a world where there was no such thing for a creature like him. And unbeknownst to her, in his weakened state, in her dedication to his survival and thriving, she had made him feel more like a man and less of a war machine. She’d made him feel like this pain and failure he put upon himself in such heavy doses were something that he wouldn’t drown in. If she were there to be a lighthouse on the shore guiding him to land.

He watches her with curious eyes, delicate hands he’d seen do such violent things, now so lightly adjusting the braces on his arms which were now pumping new serum into his system. She asks him if it’s comfortable. He doesn’t recall the last time someone took this into consideration.

She then instructs him to rest, as the medicine will make him tired soon as she lowers the amount of gas the mask puts out and his mind panics, a trained response to reach for the mask and fix the problem.

She shushes him, the only one in the room to see his wide eyes and still marked hands reach up in desperation to his face. She takes his hands, and even though she was not stronger than him, he’s compelled to not fight her back as her grip is strong and certain as she takes both of them into hers.

“You will sleep soon. We don’t want too much in your system at once unless you need it. It will be okay. There will not be the pain you are accustomed to with less gas. No reason to worry.” She comforts, without a look of disdain or judgment as she runs her fingers over the taut center strap on his still shaved head. Something else she had done while he had been in his comatose state. As was her role, and what she enjoyed more than most anything else, she took care of him in every way she knew how.

His breathing slows, the lump in his throat bobbing as he accepts this instruction. Wasn’t it so strange that the only one to speak to him without bite and demands was the one a man like him listened to?

———

Mina makes adjustments to Bane’s mask, being placed on so he could address the men and fight and overpower without pain if need be. They were all expecting the man in the mask, and he wasn’t ready to be without it yet.

“You will instruct with me today Mina.” He informs with a nod, eyes avoiding her large ones that held no fear when he spoke.

“Yes, Bane.” She responds simply in a curt tone acceptable for the men to hear.

“You will show me their progress. I want to see what I have to work with. Weed out the weaklings, promote the strong.” His voice drags, he knew she knew the drill, but it made him feel back in his element to say it all out loud again. He’d been away from the only existence he knew for months now, and he was ready to make some progress.

As she was trained to do, Mina takes control of a room when she walks into it. The men at first lazily reacting, but reacting to her voice barking over the large gymnasium where they trained. When they turned and saw Bane behind her, the scurried like scared rabbits into line as he stood on a small raised platform and she, at his side.

As he always does, he fills the space he moves around. A loud booming charisma and unmistakable power shifts with his wide powerful gate. His hands matched into the new dark metal and leather panels that surrounded his torso and forearms. He looked broad and strong and she felt pride for having helped get him to this point again.

Another introductory move, something she had to do when she took command in his absence, he challenges a man who seems to be questioning his ability to do the things he claims he will if any of them go against orders. And as it always went, with a single hand and not a bead of sweat, he picks up the man by the neck and tosses him into a pile of crates by the wall. A friend of this now injured man twitches too much for Banes liking and he comes to the defense of his fallen brother. Even with a weapon in his hand, he is no match. With the braces giving theatrical sparks to the display as the edge of the sword comes down against it time and time again, Bane shifts and attacks like a glorious beast that was born with no other motive than to kill. The man finds himself on the floor next to the man he had defended. The sword now bent and broken in his hand.

As Mina stands at attention and never flinches, she watches diligently. The other men with their wide eyes and white knuckles as they watched Bane made her suppress a fleeting smile. She knew some would doubt him after Gotham, but she was happy to see that all concerns would be quickly forgotten as they always were when Bane had to defend himself in combat.

He stands tall and in control, his arms with their bulbous musculature, unmatched in strength by any adversary as they hang after a shake of his shoulders.

“This is Mina. She will be the second in command here now that I am back. If she gives you orders. You obey. It is simple. If she speaks on my behalf, you ready as if it were my voice saying the same words. She will be in charge of you. I will be moving forward with our plans for the next venture.” He speaks without looking at her and she artfully hides the shock on her face for the announcement. She’d always been kept in the shadows before. Now she was his second, a title she never expected to hold. “She will oversee your every move. We need soldiers who can listen and learn. If you cannot do that...you are free to leave.” His tone doesn’t agree with the words he says, a threat hanging in the air. “But if I hear a word of anyone speaking ill of Mina due to the nature of her gender, you will have no choice but to leave. You could only dream of being the soldier she is. She is someone for you to strive to emulate and any treatment of her, verbal or otherwise will not be tolerated. There is no room for such nonsense in my work. Is this agreed?” His words tell that there is no other option, that it isn’t really a question, merely a formality, a warning. “Now then...Mina. They are yours. We will convene later to discuss these....men.” He says with disdain in his voice, letting them know he was not impressed. Even if he had been he wouldn’t show it. It was nearly impossible to reach Bane's level of expectancy, but that ethic is what got him as far as it had.

—————

Leaving her behind he entered his quarters, his door shut and locked behind him, curtains pulled in the white and grey minimal room with only the essentials for work and rest. He slumps, hands on his desk as he takes in filling breaths of air. His body had taken just fine to fighting again, but the exhaustion from the new medicine was quick to settle in after he exerted himself. Something he was promised would cease, and yet he waited. He moves his bulky frame to sit in the simple metal chair in front of the desk of the same material. His breathing slows, the faintest of hints of the smell and taste of gas easing his mind which rushed to tell him more, that he needed more. He gathers himself, posture back to straight and commanding as he saunters towards the window, hearing shouting outside.

Below was Mina, her face contorted as she shouted commands, running the men over the obstacle course in the courtyard. She ran alongside them, sharp claps and glances to her watch kept her occupied. Bane sank back, careful to not be seen. He didn’t want his personal quarters known to any who didn’t need to know. He also needed to appear busy, and all he was doing at the moment was recovery from an inconvenient, temporary weakness, and he certainly didn’t want that sort of information getting out either.

He hoped that his promotion of Mina would show her his gratitude for all she had done for him. He knew that this particular offering was not one that didn’t come with great work, but he knew she could take it. As she was demonstrating below to him on the rubberized ground that held the metal and wood obstacles. He knew there was much to thank her for, and short of saving her life he knew of nothing he could do that would appeal to her softer side, the one that he wished he could have her show more. But thanks to him they had lost that option. Now they had to be harder than ever.

———-

Mina’s room was not without its comforts. The same simple base as Banes, as their quarters were both shared in the same wing. But hers had touches of coziness. A simple addition of a painted vase and flowers, a colorful set of pillowcases against a maroon comforter instead of the standard stark white. She had also gotten a small portable speaker, which she was currently syncing to a phone and letting the tones mellow out the white and sterile looking bathroom. She had been able to get a single scented candle, and she had used it sparingly, but it was still almost gone. Another secret import of bubble bath is poured by her tired hands into a warm bath in a stand-alone tub of white and with silver hardware like the rest of the room. A navy bath mat on the floor, something also not standard that added a small touch of softness to the otherwise uninviting space.

Dinner had passed and Bane was now being tended to by the inventors, taking a survey of what he’d experienced with his new injections and hardware today. He had seemed to take to them well and lets herself let go of the tense feelings she had held onto for so long about the introduction of the new elements.

This time alone was crucial to her. As the only woman in the bunker, she had to do these small things to keep herself from becoming something sexless and mechanic. Little things like applying a tube of cherry lip balm became ritualistic for her. Lighting a candle, soft music playing and submerging in a hot bath of salts and oils to ease her muscles from the strain she put on herself was something close to holy for her. Something that reminded her she was, in fact, a feminine and delicate creature underneath the loosely fitted uniforms and training clothes. With Bane being occupied, and previously keeping to his bed by this hour she finds time for herself. Before coming to the bunker she had more time alone with how Bane kept her out of sight, protecting her as she was crucial to his pain control during their isolation in the sewers and after the riots started breaking out. But in those conditions, she did not have the amenities or luxuries this hideaway was providing. So while she has this brief time where she was not holed away in some unreachable part of the earth, she was taking advantage.

A soft sigh escapes, head resting on the lip of the tub, her body submerged to her nose as she moves her limbs, feeling the silky water caress her skin. Soft things were so rare in her life now. She couldn’t believe she actually missed the mountainous hideaways of the League of Shadows with their hot springs. She missed the company of other women. She missed the understanding that came from another’s willing tenderness. She also misses dresses. She huffs out an amused sound at the thought. Such a silly thing to miss. Now her only indulgence was a nightgown and nothing with the sheer and feminine touches that she had cherished before. Nothing that made her feel sexual at all. Her life was painfully devoid of sexuality truthfully. Except for the rare occasions, she would let herself think about Bane. His size and dark charming nature appealed to her inner craving to feel small and coddled by a man in her personal life. A woman like her who had to be in charge in such a strict way needed an outlet, a way to let go of that performative facade she slipped into. She found that touching herself, whether thinking of Bane or not, was as good of a release as any. And certainly better than none at all.

“MINA?!” Bane’s rough voice from behind his mask interrupts her small sanctuary with a jolt as her eyes widened and her back stiffened.

“Just a moment!” She calls out and purses her lips, raising out of the tub.

“What is that smell?” He speaks slowly and moves with heavy feet towards the bathroom. Since it was an isolated room with an en suite, it had no door, and thus no protection from the barreling beast coming her way with no hesitation.

“Bane, I’m-“ she begins before his large form fills the doorway and stands at the end of the tub at her feet.

There’s a heavy moment for Mina. Her heart feeling stuck in her throat as she stands in the tub, bent at the waist to place her hands on its edge to get out. The bubbles cling to her skin in her attempt at a rushed exit.

Bane realizes his intrusion in an instant. But it doesn’t take away his surprise at the state he finds her in, the nudity was the last thing to raise questions in his mind.

Her face is more inconvenienced than scared. Although he hadn't seen her naked before, they were taught to think nothing of it if it occurred. Her eyes glare up into his from her a lowered brow. “Do I need to stand at attention at this arrival?” The words laced with sarcasm would possibly annoy him if he hadn’t seen he was, in fact, the one being troublesome.

His mouth parts and holds open as he thinks, luckily for him she can’t see it and read any pause. She blinks and her face holds steady. The bubbles only mildly distracting from her body glistening with iridescent color as the candlelight flickers against them. It had been since he first arrived at the League that he had seen her look so feminine, he realizes. When they were in the thick of plans for domination and destruction, it was easy to forget such things.

But now they were both acutely aware.

“I see I’ve interrupted your...leisure time.” He chooses his words and lowers his eyes from hers. His hands hang low off broad shoulders, wishing he had his brace on to hook them into.

“Yes.” Her voice lacks the usual bite, her face remains stoic as he doesn’t turn from her.

“You may resume.” He extends with a nod of his head as she sinks back into the water. But the moment had already shifted the dynamic between them.

He stands with wandering eyes, as she checks that her hair, piled on her head in loose falling pieces was still in place. “Did you need me for something?”

“I came to discuss strategy. After today’s events.” He begins, second-guessing his entry into her quarters now. “But I did not know you were...doing this.” He excused at a slow pace, seeing his brows shift as he takes in the unexpected scene.

“In the evenings after dinner, I like to do this when I can.” She explains.

“I was not aware.”

“That was purposeful. For the sake of keeping things... equal between us. Between everyone and myself, actually.” She informs him with eyes that don’t waver from him, trying to read his body language.

“What do...bubble baths have to do with that?” His eyes are less tense, a lilt of teasing in his voice.

“I do things like this to remind myself that I am in fact, a woman. But I work to hide and make that fact irrelevant to the others. It doesn’t serve a purpose here.” She shakes her head. “And since I am the only woman now, it has become more important to me to take time to remind myself. As it’s easier to forget.”

“That is understandable.” He agreed. “Is this...crucial for you? This feminine focused time?” His words lack his usual demanding tone, one of a genuinely curious man is heard instead.

“I do not wish to always be an emotionless machine. I was once made for tenderness, not violence. I like to entertain the idea I could be without this violence in my life someday. To keep that hope alive... it is crucial yes.”

“That is where you and I differ.” His head nods, a heavier breath heard through his mask.

“I’m aware.” She responds quietly.

“Since you are of the utmost importance to me and my work, is there anything that can be done to help you with this, feminization?” He offers, seeing a possible means to help her, to repay her for her work and her loyalty.

“I must remain a soldier. A leader to the others. I do not wish to be treated differently.”

“I agree. Remaining sexless is important. Especially with these newer inductees. They have much to learn.”

She nods in agreement. “Is it not their place to remind me I am a woman. It is not something our work allows.” Her eyes finally move from his and to the water. He could see sadness, reluctance in them. Things he was not accustomed to witnessing with Mina.

“They should not remind you, no.” He pauses, choosing his next words carefully as she sits in the bath. He puts on a hard brow and knows his next movement is crucial. He sees her face, can read her body language, hear her voice, knows by the book what he could do or say next and its chances of being accepted or rejected. He decides to show the softness he admires so much in her. As he approaches the side of the tub, standing with a relaxed posture as he waits for her to meet his eyes, “But would you like for me to?” He boldly suggests.

A blush rises to her cheeks, the pink noticeable in the white surroundings as the steam framed her soft-looking features. “You?” She finally responds, only her eyes shifting up to meet his gaze which held strong as always.

“Yes.” He answers curtly. “Do you see me as someone who could have that kind of role? Not in a...professional manner but a personal one.” He still spoke as if in a meeting, and she found his approach endearing. His voice was gentle, his palms showing as he inquires further with his hands speaking to engage her.

But she still couldn’t believe what he was suggesting. After all this time. Making her feel like a woman? In a personal way? She only knew one way to interpret his words and she audibly swallows. “You would… like to… remind me that I am a woman?” Her voice is quieter, he could hear the disbelief in it. “This would require such softness, Bane. A degree of tenderness that you are not accustomed to. Both emotionally and physically.” She warns him but does not tell him no.

“I am accustomed to receiving it from you. You have shown it to me, Mina.” He says with a slight tilt of his head before kneeling by the tub to connect with her, to prove that he could. “With your care, I know it intimately do I not?” He asks with a more stern tone, only proving her point as he tries to defend his abilities. “I have the capacity for such things. But as you said, it does not have its place in our work.”

“But we aren’t talking about work. Are we?”

“No. We are not.”

She blinks slowly, eyes moving across the bubbles. “Have you… do you wish to know me with tenderness Bane? To treat me like a woman and not a soldier? As a friend, a companion?” He can so clearly see the want and fear now within her. He knew only honesty would prove his long-time suppressed interest.

“Our time spent alone has led me to consider it. You have always touched me with care and consideration. Our time here now, after Gotham, has made me consider touching you in the same way. A creature with such depth deserves to know it the same. I do not wish you to hide what you are. It does not serve either myself or you to do so.”

“I did not know.” Is all she manages, and he sees she truly did not. Perhaps he had been harder on her than he realized.

“That is how I intended it to appear. There are sacrifices to be made for our work. The same as you, yes?”

“Yes.” She admits.

“So I ask you again. Knowing now of my intention. Would you like me to remind you that you are a woman? I would not allow any other man to do it.”

“Why is it that you feel this way? Why tell me now?” Her narrowed eyes are sharp as he smiles behind his mask, she was always inquisitive. Never trusting at a glance. Something he always admired about her.

“Because we’ve always belonged to one another in our way haven’t we? You mended me. Twice now. We trained together. Planned together, fought together. Always as a team. A cohesive unit. One of the best partnerships I’ve had. And that does go beyond the professional. You are not only skilled and irreplaceable to me, but you are also loyal and a friend. I never interacted with anyone in such a casual way as I have you. You allowed a few moments of informal behavior and conversation. You reminded me that I was also a man, not only this machine the world has created. It is only right I’m the one to make you feel like a woman. As you’re the only one to make me feel like a man.” His head nods softly her way in confession. He sees her shoulders lose their tension. She was truly touched by his words and the sentiment behind them. She had no idea of the depth that he was capable of. She could see her error now. He was only hard for protection, for himself and those around him. Same as her. Who was she to tell him what he was capable of? A man like him who did such great things. She believes every word he says as she always does.

“You have always made me feel like a woman.” She admits with a small voice. “With our work, I’ve never had the luxury to explore feelings like the ones you have awakened in me. It has never been a part of our plans. “ she shakes her head, her eyes far away for a moment.”But when I thought I had lost you… when I had to take control and protect you… ever since I have had a harder time separating our work and the inconvenient emotions that this turn of events has caused me to have. “

“It has caused the same in me little Mina.”He replies, moving his forearm to rest on the tub edge, his large hand somehow light as it touches her hair, causing visible bumps to bloom across her skin. “Let us find the answers together. For we have been suffering in silence separately. In the interest of showing you more, would it not make sense for us to work together on these emotions neither of us are accustomed to? I trust no one else in this way.”

“We do make a very good team.” A small smile appears on her face. “One would think the compatibility might translate to pleasure from the professional.”

“We do know each other most... intimately.” He chooses his words to reflect something softer and more personable.

“We do.” She nods subtly. “And I have thought of what you and I would be like together. Intimately. Although I admit I pictured more of a frenzied unraveling than a discussion.” She chuckles. “But this does leave no room for misinterpretation. Which for people like us, in positions we find ourselves in, is more valuable than any quick tryst.”

“You know I prefer a deep discussion of important matters.” His shoulders move slightly as a small huff of amusement escapes him.

“And do you prefer other things deep Bane?” She asks, a less sweet smile appearing on her face. One he had not seen before.

“With you Mina, I have always wished to know what depths I could reach.” His voice has an inkling of that charm he uses to get his way. Almost cheeky and boyish that makes you second guess yourself. But she was past that, and she only found the confidence he held to be arousing as his knuckles grazed her cheek.

“We have been so very close all these years. And I have often wondered who the man was behind the mask. If the depth in your eyes was past mere intellect. And I have wanted to know if your brutality had an opposite side to it. If you had the power that lies in gentle and tenderness and not just violence” she puts her hand over his on her face and touches his face lightly, fingers tracing the tubes of his mask.

“I once knew it. But it was taken away and made into a weakness, a luxury someone like me couldn’t afford. So I tried to show it to Talia. And now I wear the mask. But when I was taken from the prison, when I was given to you, I was reminded that it existed again in others besides myself. And you have shown it to me without the expectancy of repayment all these years.” He stands, a hand outstretched to her that she doesn’t hesitate to take into her own now. “Let me repay it to you starting tonight.” He remarks, pulling her up and keeping his eyes soft as he lifted her from the tub and onto the mat by her waist. The water ran audibly down her body, plinking into the tub and tapping into the floor. With a steady hand he takes a towel and dries her off, limb by limb, one hand gently to her skin to move her as he needed and the other gliding the towel. Finishing with a soft once over of her face, hands to her cheeks as he looks over her gracious face. “You are as soft and lovely inside as you are outside Mina. As I imagined.” A soft hiss through the mask as his hands travel down her jaw, over the curves of her breasts and hips, his bare hands taking in every bit of her. Every scar and divot he touched lightly and with care, as she had when he was healing. He’s never run from anything that could be interpreted as a physical imperfection. He only wanted to make her feel as he believed a woman who was loved and cared for should as if she was perfect and the only woman in his eyes.

His thumbs circled and traced her raised nipples, a slight rise in pulse and rate of her breathing as he cupped and pinched. A soft sigh escapes her, eyes shut and hands reaching out for his arms to feel him. His hands roam, from her hair to her back and hips he touched her softly. Against his chest, she could hear his heart, the decompression of the mask she’d helped design to keep him with her in the hopes she’d know him like this one day. With her chin up to see his face, he presses his forehead to hers before dipping down and lifting her up.

She felt small but not weak in his arms. Her nose nuzzles his head and kissed his temples before he placed her in front of the bed. “I want to see you.” She softly asks of him, her hands at the hem of his basic black shirt.

A nod and a shedding of his layers commenced on her suggestion as she gets to see the breadth of him for what felt like the first time. The first time her body could react how it wished. He could see her hips twitch, her nipples harden at the sight of him. He was not a shy man and stood at attention for her to trace her fingers along his masculine lines as he held her.

“My god look at you.” She whispers, kissing his barrel chest. Hands feeling greedy as they explored the breadth of his shoulders, the musculature of his ass and thighs. She felt the need to please him, falling into a role she hadn’t expected and one she never got to play. She wanted to serve him. Moving to her knees he doesn’t stop her, letting her do as she pleased. He wasn’t one to judge how she wanted to feel like a woman. As she explored below his hips with a nuzzling of her face into his hair and skin the last thing he wanted was for her to stop.

As she always had, she touched him with care. Gentle hands stroked his length and cupped his balls, a hiss of pleasure from the mask as she took him into her mouth. Her soft lips and tongue worked against him hungrily. Small sounds escaping her as she sucked and licked him into her mouth and throat that told him she needed him there. He didn’t feel any need to be harsh with her, his hands only pushing back her hair to see her face, meet her eyes when they opened as she caught her breath. The steady audible breathing from the mask all the while. She could’ve stayed and worshipped him on her knees to completion but she withheld. She rose and with a gentle stroke of her hand still on him, she leaves messy kisses with trails of saliva behind them across his chest. “I’ve had my fun, now have yours.” She smiles, chin up to face the dark eyes that bore into her.

His hands lift and toss her to the bed gently as she smiles with soft waves of hair surrounding her face. A blush of happiness in color across her cheeks as he lay by her and teased her with fingers down her stomach.

She put her arm around his thick neck, bringing him close, temple to temple as he began exploring her body. Those strong hands, ones that snapped bones and took lives were gentle against her. She was the exception.

His fingers were large just like the rest of him and proved it as they parted her lips and legs with ease. She wasted no time giving herself over to it. Feeling the cold metal of his mask pressed to her throat where she wished his lips to be. But she had the heat of his skin, that handsome face pressed to her and it was enough to pretend the hiss was simply his breath tickling across her bare skin. With an arching back and open mouth she sighs and calls out his name. He pulled her to him, chest to chest as she grasps at his shoulders, leg over his hip as he kept pressing forward, stretching and stroking and making her feel how she needed, what she could never make herself feel.

“Bane, please. I want you. Let me feel you inside me when I come.” She whines, a tone he never thought he’d heard from her, but keeping her on the edge of orgasm she lets her needful nature show through. Her hands stroke him, already hard from feeling her hot and writhing against him. The call of his name so sweet makes him groan. Had his name ever been moaned in such a way?

With a lift of leg, he enters her fully sheathed and being pulled on top of her by her strong arms around his neck. Forehead to forehead he fucks her. Two column sized arms she clenches onto, his traps and shoulders daunting, she could reach around him and every bit of that muscle giving her the pressure and push she needed. With every call of his name, every arch of back and squeeze around him he felt closer to coming. Sex was something he did alone and only for the purpose of killing distraction. This was different, this was a connection being made. Something he hadn’t done with anyone else but her. Sex was performative, functional with anyone else. This was something different.

She sang his praises, “Bane, you feel so good. Better than I imagined. And oh how I imagined all these years.” She confesses into his red ears, flushed with effort. His own sounds, wordless carry into her sternum where his mask presses, holding her hips up and using the leverage of his knees to work her body against his. She circled her hips, hands back on the bed to push back onto him. His head hung down and hers back, both more animalistic now, growing only more so.

With clenched teeth and sweat dripping they locked eyes, holding an intensity they both knew the other held, and now it was for each other. She reaches for him and he scoops her up to ride him on his knees and arms around his neck. He lifts her hips and pounds her into him, both gasping the other's name, her's a light and delicate call and his a groaned and desperate warning.

“Bane, please love just… I’m going to come, finish. I want you inside me.” She mewls out with her lips latched to his neck.

He hadn’t expected it, and that was a rare event. Which is why it caught him deep in his gut and forced him to feel every breath she gave him as she came around him. Shaking and trembling, tears squeezed from clenched shut eyes as she felt it all so intensely overtake her. He follows suit, giving her what she asked, as he had always done within reason, and her plea of him was more than reasonable at the moment.

A mix of the two of them, cum, sweat, tears, and friction lay with them in the heap they created on the bed. Now with clear minds and relaxed muscles, they lay together, her kissing his chest and tracing her fingers across old scars. “Would you stay? Can you stay without arousing suspicion?”

“Those that would notice know better than to say anything.”

“Anyone who did would have to answer to my blade.” She chuckles and he feels her snuggle into him. “We are the leaders. They do as we say.” She adds with a tone that tells him she means it.

“Good to see you’re still the Mina I need in battle.”

“I can be the Mina you need in bed as well.” A smile crosses her lips and he pushes back her hair affectionately.

“You are many things to me, Mina. And all are important.” He nods in approval. “Now we rest. We have training in the morning.”

“Yes, sir.” She said playfully, wrapping herself around him and feeling him bare against her as she fell asleep, something she’d never really thought possible.

—————————————————

Time passes and it’s business as usual. He treats her no different around anyone else. He calls her to his room one night and gives her the report on his vitals for the new injections. Everything had stabilized and he no longer needed the mask.

She can see his reserved body language as he sits on the edge of the bed. She places the paper down, moving towards him slowly like a frightened animal. She kneels in front of him and puts her hands over his that clasp together between his knees.

“Are you ready to take it off?” She asks with no demand.

“I was no one before it. Will I still hold the same power and fear without it?” He asks her.

She’s touched by his honesty for the concern of how he presented himself, he did have a point. “I believe no matter what you look like or wear you are powerful and worthy to be feared.” He senses no lie in her sweet words. She truly believed in him. “Is it your appearance without it that bothers you?”

“No.” He swings his head. “Such things are of no consequence to me.” He explains. “The mask is a symbol. A character head for a movement, a belief that goes beyond myself. I am not the movement, it will go on after I am gone. But without the mask, I am only a man to them. With it, I am more. It will not be the same without it.”

“No, it will not. But you do not require it any longer for pain.” She shakes her head as she stares into his eyes that had so many thoughts running behind them. ”I do have a proposition.”

“Yes?”

“You can wear it out there... for them. You are Bane and the mask has been as big a part of you as any since your inception. But you are not only who they know. You are who I know as well. Perhaps you can be without it in private? Have it serve as only a mask now. No longer an aid.”

“Is this something you would prefer? As you would be the only one to witness it.”

“I will admit I want to see all of you. In every way. Every incarnation. I have dreamed of kissing your lips and feeling them on my skin.” He feels her words brush against him in a caress as tender as her own.

He nods and furrows his brow, finding her advice to be as solid as it always had been. “I have wondered what you taste like. What the soft flesh of your breasts would feel like under my tongue, between my teeth.” He begins and exhales with a hiss. His hand raises her chin, speaks of her lips as his thumb runs across them, knuckles grazing down her chest to her hardening nipples, her body reacting to him with words alone.

“I want you to know what it feels like too. I want to taste your lips and feel the tongue that commands army’s against mine. I want your breath and sounds unfiltered against my skin. I want us to devour each other with nothing between us.”

Her words of lust encourage them both, a solid thrumming through their veins as their eyes meet and hold boldly, her face set with a confident expression and wanting eyes, lips parted just slightly, begging to be known by his.

“Then I’ll make it so.” He decides, standing and letting his hand trail through her hair as he moves to a mirror on the wall. His strong fingers pull the straps, release the holds and a whisper of air escapes. He suppressed the learned panic from not having it on his face. Usually a sign of immediate and intense pain to follow, but Mina's ingenuity had led him to be able to exist as he was before the mask, something he never thought possible.

He stares at himself, the mask now sat on the tabletop growing cold. His eyes were curious and unafraid. His face as he recalled beneath it, having been shaved recently as the existence of facial hair was cumbersome to him. The same scars were there, the same snare in his lip that split the top one unevenly. White lines around his mouth, his nose still strong and a bit crooked. She waits on the bed for him, letting him have his moment of reflection.

“There’s the face I remember from so many years ago.” She beams as he moves towards her. “The mark of a true warrior. Scars and proof of survival as a man such as you should be.” She raises her hand to touch his face. He simply closes his eyes and doesn’t recoil at the feeling. Never flinching as she touches the unexpected softness, “I cherish mending every scar.” She whispers moving closer. “You’ve only grown more wise, depth in your eyes where fear lay then.”

Her words make him feel secure. He wasn’t a person who needed others to stroke his ego but having the approval of another person he admired as much as Mina felt good.

He opens his eyes again and she hums with content for what she finds there. “And hunger now.” She gives a broad and confident smile to his almost expressionless face. His eyes were always the way to understand him and she was fluent in it. “Tell me, Bane.” Her voice was low and full of clear intent to tempt. “What are you hungry for?” She asks as she removes her top, leaving her uncovered. “What do those lips want now that I’ve given them their freedom?” She challenges as she takes off each article of clothing, confronting him with an unwavering stare. “They can take anything they wish, just like you… your hands… your cock has before.” She touches his body before undressing him as he stands with a devilish glare to meet her precocious one. Stroking him now in her hands, she bites her lip and moans for the hardness she feels. “Let the flesh bleed between your teeth, my love. Take it how you wish. Know what this pussy tastes of as it starves for your touch. Only yours.” She taunts.

Bane has never let a worthy taunt go unanswered, and Mina was the most worthy person to receive his hunger. So he gave it to her. In full.

It’d been so long since she’d sparred with him she’d almost forgotten the speed that accompanied his strength. He had her mouth to his in an instant, hand in her hair to yank back her chin as he licked at her throat, drawing a moan from her. “Mina you minx I’ll eat you alive.” He threatens as they groan into the others mouth, hands fierce on each other as the kisses skip affection and go straight for desperation. Tongues outside of mouths, teeth drawing blood from lips and gnashing continues through the rolling they do on the bed. Nails leave marks on their bodies and they lap away at each other like beasts. He kisses her throat, teeth biting at her shoulders. His eyes rolled back, panting after the sound she emits when he takes her nipple into his mouth with a hard and biting suck. She only pleads for more, pressing his head into her chest.

He leaves a trail of marks down her body, on her thighs before he proves his appetite and takes her into his mouth. She’s left breathless, a starving man between her thighs he is as he laps and sucks and bites. He fucks her with his tongue first, tasting as deeply inside her as he can, a messy display of need as he slurps and grunts into her. His fingers follow, his lips attached to around her clit as they nursed and his tongue worked the sensitive and swollen bud between his teeth and lips. He earned every sound of pain and pleasure he wanted to hear. His enthusiasm is contagious and causes her to cum. He drinks her in, licking her clean before nipping and kissing his way up her body to meet their mouths again.

Only for a second a tender kiss is shared as he aligns himself and begins a brutish pace that her body eagerly welcomes. She was louder than he’d ever heard her as he engulfed her nipples, kissed her mouth and neck and couldn’t decide where he wanted to touch and taste next. The need was relentless, her hot and wet around him, both around his cock and his mouth now as she cried against him. He needed it harder, he needed her conquered and his jaws on her in new places.

He moves her without effort as she’d always fantasized. Turning her over and taking her from behind which made her roar out for him. Holding onto the headboard she braces herself, head knocking from the power and every breath a moan as he pounded into her full strength. His hand held her tightly, feeling her skin began to darken under his fingertips from the force. His mouth moved along her shoulders, as she cried for more from him. Always more.

He bites into her shoulder. She growls out approval and tries to push back onto him but he’s controlling her hips and the sounds were surely echoing around the base of their bodies hitting together. But who gave a fuck?

He yanks her up by her neck, one hand encasing it entirely as he holds her tightly by the hip with the other and pounds into her with his lips at her ears. She heard every breath and felt ever drop of spit on her skin as he groaned her name. He fucked her relentlessly as she came around him, giving it no mind as she yelped and shouted. He kept going, her legs spreading until she was flat on the bed, him with his heavy hands on her back, knees planted to hit into her impossibly deep. She moaned like a banshee for him, deep and guttural as she came again, him hitting and stretching every spot she craved.

He comes with a roar. The weight of him on her back and pressing her into the bed in the most comforting way. She was safe, he had her, she was his. She feels the heat and wet from his mouth in her hair, the lion-like roars now purrs against her skin. He had let out the beast in himself that had felt caged from the mask. He gave her a piece of himself, no one else had ever had, something that would frighten anyone else, and she took it as hungrily and desperately as he gave it. She was his match.

He rises and dips her over, her face with hair plastered with sweat, mouth open and arms already reaching for him. “You are… delicious.” He sighs as he leans in to kiss her again, this time taking his time, lips and tongue soothing and affectionate against one another.

“You are a beast.” She giggles against him. “You are as much of an animal as a man should be, Bane. You are… a force to be reckoned with.” She honors, hands on his cheeks to feel him even as he kissed her neck.

“Do you wish to tame it, Mina? Me?”

“Never.” She sways her head and he kisses up to her temples.

“That is why you are the only one to know him in this way. You’re the only one to ever know him, see him and accept it as it is. A part of me.”

“All parts of you are the ones I want. I’ve known them all. And I fear none because I know them. I know you.”

“You do. You see me now. As I am. As a man. No mask, no Bane, only a man.”

“And it is such a man that makes me feel like a woman.” She whispers against him. “Every part of me, woman and soldier are yours, my love. The only man to earn my heart.”

“And I’ll fight to keep it. I’ll bleed for you and our vision.”

“May the gods have mercy on our enemies, Bane. Because we never will.”

Click on my icon then go to my Mobile Masterlist in my bio for my other works! Please like, comment and reblog if you enjoyed it! It helps out us writers A LOT!

#Bane #TDKR #bane fanfic #bane fic #bane fan fiction #Bane x ofc #BAne x reader #Bane fluff #Bane Angst #the dark knight rises #The Dark Knight Rises fic #The Dark Knight Rises fan fiction #tom hardy #Bane Tom Hardy #Bane Smut

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queenrhenpendragon · 4 years

Text

You know whose arc gets me every time?

Dameon’s. Dameon Maurva's arc is so beautiful and significant and affects not only himself but multiple other characters and also the entire heckin plot of the game and it moves me Every. Single. Time.

So I’m going to rant about it, welcome to the post I’ve been waiting to make for fourteen years.

First of all, this precious sun, this dear one, this absolute angel, was most likely raised mainly by an Ahriman sympathizer-- like, c'mon, am I supposed to believe Talia kept a child in the dream realm? Even without the nightmares it's dangerous, and very isolated. If something were to happen there would be nowhere she could send Dameon while she dealt with it. It’s one thing in fanfiction, but when I actually consider the logistics, either she was a truly terrible, irresponsible parent, or Dameon lived in Aveyond with his father. I've played Ahriman’s Prophecy; responsibility is Talia's middle name. Dameon was raised in Aveyond.

He has to have been a lonely child. He most likely had no human friends, and definitely none his age. Maybe the binis or fairies or sometimes Vata babysat him when Mr. Maurva was unavailable. Maybe not. Either way, such contact couldn’t replace his need for love and validation from his incredibly busy and important parents.

He probably constantly sought his parents' approval and was constantly falling short because how do you impress an immortal sun priest, millenia old and the last of his kind? Especially one who is apparently becoming disenchanted with the ideals he once fought for, the ideals his fellow priests died for. How do you impress a half-fairy who saved the world at the tender age of 17, who then became the Guardian of Dreams and is responsible for the safety and well being of every mortal creature? Especially! When! You only see them when they’re not busy keeping the universe running smoothly!

Furthermore.

Please understand that I love Talia and do not wish to vilify her in any way. I point out her flaws because I love her, because her shortcomings are so human and tragic and are part of what make the story as impactful as it is. And Talia... does not easily express affection. She is not likely to have cuddled Dameon during the times his father took him to the Dreamworld-- which just can't have been often, I just can't imagine a parent who even kind of cared about their child taking them to such a place frequently. She is not likely to have praised him or spent any notable amount of time showing interest in his interests. I do not say this to condemn her. She had a lot of responsibilities. She had never been a mother before-- and yes, she had a great example of motherhood in her Grandmama, but her own mother also left her in the care of others, abandoned her to pursue a louder call. Is it any wonder that she ultimately did the same to her own child?

She has no real relationship with Dameon. Even without all the evidence I have already laid out, this much is obvious in the way they speak to and about each other. Talia doesn't even mention Dameon is her son when she first tells Rhen about him. She gives him no more than an epithet, "Dameon, the sun priest." She does not express particular concern over his safety, even though she knows the druids are in danger and she herself was almost killed.

And Dameon calls her “mother,” and it is not because of the dialogue style of the game. Talia calls her parental figure “Grandmama.” Rhen calls Tailor “Pa” and “Daddy,” and Ma is known only as “Ma.” But Dameon calls Talia “Mother,” and his father “Father,” because that is the level of familiarity between them. The Maurvas live a strict, solitary life. Is it any wonder that Dameon is stiff and formal at the beginning? Is it any wonder he struggles to connect with others beyond a thoughtful compliment or an antiquated form of greeting? He doesn’t like himself, let alone trust himself. No one has ever taught him how to. He is so isolated, and lonely, and touch-starved, and unloved, and if that was the end of his character it would still move me. But there is more.

Talia literally killed his father, her own husband. It had to have happened when Dameon was still very young. If you take into account Devin’s apparent age, and the fact that a barely-aged Jack in av2 remembers Alicia as queen of Thais when we know that you can only ascend to the throne of Thais if you are married, and a few other details which I would be happy to pull up if anyone is interested, you will realize that Dameon can’t possibly be more than a year older than Rhen. More likely, he is younger, and this would be in line with the other canon ships we see throughout the Aveyond series.

And we found out in Rhen’s Quest that his father was murdered “many years ago.” MANY! YEARS! He was still a child, maybe 11 years old, at my best guess. He most likely hadn’t even attended a magic school yet. It’s possible he wasn’t even thinking about it. And then he had to take the position as Druid of Light. When he was a child, still mourning the death of the person most precious to him, at the hands of the only other person he could have had any semblance of a relationship with in all of Aia.

The people who were supposed to be teaching Dameon how to be gentle, loyal, and upright instead taught him how to hurt, and betray, and murder those closest to him. Even without Ahriman's influence, how is a child raised in that environment supposed to turn out healthy and good?

And yet he is still good! He is gentle and thoughtful towards not just Rhen but everyone he meets on the quest. That includes heckin MAD MARGE if you forgot. That includes an actual ogre. That includes people who are spiteful and dismissive towards him. He treats Rhen like she outranks him, the Guardian of the Sun, when she is still a peasant with a practice sword. He is kind to literally everyone except Talia, and he is at least respectful even to her. He never raises his voice at her. He never calls her anything except Mother. Never traitor, never murderer, never any of the curses we know Amanda had no qualms about using because she used them plenty in AP. Just Mother.

In fact he appears to be the reason Ahriman decided against killing Talia. Yes, Dameon wants justice for his murdered father. I think anyone who is being honest with themselves can admit they would, too. But he doesn’t want to kill her. He doesn’t want her to die. He just wants her to understand what she did, to understand the hurt she caused. He is apparently so against killing her that Ahriman has to change his carefully laid plans before he can convince Dameon to change sides.

And consider. During all of this, Dameon is literally possessed by Ahriman, or under his demonic influence, or however you want to phrase it. This influence likely began even before the game, but even if you ignore that, it is no small thing. Remember how quickly Mel became corrupted under this influence? Remember how quickly Galahad, who resisted the urge to drink blood for actual centuries, became corrupted? The fact that Dameon has any shred of goodness at all, after years of exposure to such darkness, even if you ONLY take into account the actual duration of the game, is evidence that Rhen is right; Dameon has a genuinely good, incredibly strong heart.

And speaking of that conversation. Please allow me to share some of my favorite screenshots in the entirety of the series.

My precious sun really went from this:

To having this very level-headed and respectful conversation, of which I have shared only two tiny snippets:

To THIS:

This. Is tangible, real difference, at a rate which makes sense, and I am so proud of him. I have seen people try to dismiss it, and his other development, by saying he is just pretending in order to make Rhen trust him. That literally. Does not make any sense. First of all, if this was part of his efforts to persuade Rhen to join Ahriman he would have done absolutely anything except agree that perhaps Talia was right. He would have tried to convince Rhen that Ahriman was right, not admitted he may have been wrong. And second, even if you ignore that incredibly obvious discrepancy, he either would have forgotten about the conversation with Rhen by the time they returned to the sun shrine and his mother asked him the question again, or he would have pretended to have forgiven her completely. Instead, he acts as though he is uncertain, because he is uncertain.

And his actions in the dream realm, confronting and fighting Agas for attacking his mother and desecrating her shrine, prove that he is sincere. Of course it takes him some time. Of course he hesitates. Forgiving someone for taking your parent from you is an enormous act. Forgiving someone you trusted for causing you that much pain is unfathomable. His progress is profound and inspiring and does not deserve to be treated like any less.

And he makes this progress while still under Ahriman’s influence! Can you even imagine! Aasgakadgjlkjklj. He tries to do what he believes is right even at the cost of those things most precious to him, his beliefs and ideals and the sacred memory of the person who raised him. ONE conversation prompts him to question everything. While Ahriman still has possession of him. I cannot even begin to comprehend being that brave. And this is just one small example.

I have seen many negative, unfair evaluations of the fairy dust scene. It is deeply tragic to me that such an important, eloquent, beautiful symbol could be so widely misunderstood. I have tried to explain it before. Allow me to indulge myself once again.

Fairy dust always reveals the truth. This effect is well established, not just in Rhen’s Quest but even in Ahriman’s Prophecy. It heals physical wounds (aka HP) and reveals the truth, and that’s all. There is never any indication that it can change hearts or magically “goodify” anyone or anything. It is not a deus ex machina. It was included specifically to exclude the possibility of that interpretation. It only reveals the truth, and if Dameon had already been aware of the truth, or if he truly honestly wanted the same things Ahriman wanted, it would have changed exactly nothing. That’s why Rhen’s choice to use it is so significant. It shows that she trusts him, as he is. She knows that he has a good heart and will do what is right when he knows what that is; she has been saying so for the whole game. In the final battle she gets the chance to prove she believes that.

And she does.

And she’s right.

When the truth is revealed to Dameon, he follows it, at the cost of his chance for justice, at the cost of living forever, safely, with the one person who has ever shown him any significant amount of affection, at the cost of everything he ever dared to want in his short, lonely, miserable life. While still under Ahriman’s demonic influence! Ahriman is still in his head! And he chooses to resist even though it means he will lose everything.

Now, this whole plot could have worked without the fairy dust. Previous cutscenes in the game have already proven that Dameon listens to Rhen. The screenshots I included are just a few examples of this; trust me, I could go on for a while. Dameon believes her and believes in her and trusts her, where he doesn’t trust himself. Amanda could have had Rhen just tell him what to do. Rhen could have had another conversation, told Dameon to switch back, and that would be that. It would be consistent and believable with what had happened in the game thus far.

Except then Dameon still wouldn’t trust himself, or like himself. He would still be lonely and self-loathing and miserable, or even if he wasn’t, there would be plenty of room for that interpretation.

But instead Rhen gives him a choice. Instead Amanda makes it clear that his redemption is not Rhen’s responsibility, or her decision, or her doing at all. All Rhen does is throw the fairy dust, and then lets Dameon realize what is right, and choose for himself what action he will take. She gives him the opportunity to trust himself, to believe in himself, for perhaps the first time in his life. She makes it clear that she believes in him. She gives him the support he’s been starving for his entire existence, and then she steps back, and let’s him choose.

This part is so significant for her arc, too. I have ranted about it elsewhere but allow me to sum up: Rhen has spent the game feeling like she doesn’t have a choice, and questioning her own judgement and her own significance. Dameon is the first to give her a choice, one which she seriously considers. She realizes she’s always had a choice. And she finally acts on her own judgement, without prompting from anyone else (in fact, without prompting even from the player, because as you might recall the choice the player is offered has always been “fight Dameon,” and yet Rhen never lifts a finger against him). She trusts her own heart and invites Dameon to trust his. She has always been a hero but this is the moment she really steps fully into the role. She saves herself. And then she gives Dameon the choice to do the same.

And they fight Ahriman, at staggering personal costs. Dameon fights while, again, still under Ahriman’s influence. He has to fight Ahriman physically and mentally, or spiritually, or all of them, most likely. He is not free until Rhen plunges the Sword of Shadows through Ahriman’s heart.

This part. I cry every time and I am crying thinking about it. Dameon has been a prisoner for likely as long as he can remember. His father supported Ahriman. He likely let that influence into the sun shrine. He let it affect Dameon. Dameon has likely never known a life without that darkness. Or if he did, he was too young to remember it. And now, finally, he is free. There is light for the first time. And because Rhen gave him a choice, he has the confidence and experience to stay free, to make himself and be proud of himself and not be just what he thought his parents wanted.

His gratitude to Rhen is profound. He has always been respectful and supportive of her, he has always listened to her and trusted her, as demonstrated during their first conversation when she meets him in Aveyond, and their conversations in the manor in Sedona, and every other tiny interaction they have. He looks up to her immensely.

And I think that is part of why he is so resolute about continuing in his role as the Druid of Light. Rhen has spent the game shouldering responsibilities that no one else could or would. Being the Guardian of the Sun is his responsibility, and he is determined to follow her example.

It is also the only thing he has ever known.

In the midst of his own uncertainty, still reeling from his own losses, resigned to a lonely eternity in his childhood prison, he still offers Rhen his support and devotion. This is before she ever makes her choice. He listens to her, sympathizes with her, and encourages her. He loves her, explicitly, out loud in canon dialogue, in literally. Every ending. No matter what she chooses. Nobody ever taught him how to love and yet he does it so scrupulously.

And in the canon ending, the True Ending as many of us like to call it, he finally, finally gets a chance to grow beyond his family’s legacy. To love someone and be there for her. To be adored by her. To be happy. To make a difference. To live a good life and die of old age and be buried beside his best friend and true love, and to face the shadowy unknowns of the afterlife together. And he accepts it, in an instant.

This is redemption not only for himself but for Talia, and Nino. All the Maurvas with their good intentions, who never got to see their happy ending because another call was too strong. Talia gets a second chance to watch her son grow, this time in a kinder world. And she gets a second chance with one of her dearest friends. Nino's legacy of absence and broken trust is finally set right. They all get a second chance to become who they intended to be, before they heard the calls they could not ignore. All because Dameon chose truth and love over every other voice, at every cost.

It was a very fairy-like thing to do. In overcoming his families' legacy, he steps into their true heritage. Aian Fairies value truth and love most of all.

There is an inscription on the statue that guards the fairies in AP. It has always resonated with me and I think it will help describe what I mean here:

Heart of gold thy secret guards

Love, felicity, light

Gaia's precious children

I am moved. I do not know a better way to say it. Dameon Maurva inspires me, and comforts me. His example has made me a better person. He has made me a happier person. I am so grateful to Amanda for being brave enough to tell the story she did, and being brave enough to stick by it. Her story changed my life and I honestly, truly do not believe I would be here without it. Her story saved my life, and I can never praise it enough.

#aveyond #dameon maurva #aveyond rhen's quest #aveyond 1 #talia maurva #rant

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littleeyesofpallas · 4 years

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Batman shenanigans...

So, I’m the type of would-be writer that gets easily bogged down in plotting and planning and researching minutia more than writing actual moment to moment scenes and dialog, and the rabbit hole I’ve found myself tumbling down most recently has been this…

I wanted to rewrite Jason’s Red Hood origin story; from his death and resurrection, up until his big return. Under the Hood has a great finale and a memorable confrontation scene between Jason and Bruce, but in all honesty, the plot surrounding it is pretty blase. And granted, that’s mostly because there were no real long term plans for Jason as Red Hood beyond the big twist, so the initial story wasn’t really written with any solid themes, overarching direction, or character integrity in mind. But then on top of that things attempting to elaborate on the intervening years (Lost Days, and that weird thing they did in the first Red Hood & The Outlaws) also just aren’t especially well handled. They tend to be narrow in scope, isolated within continuity, and not especially thematically substantive.

But here we are, at a point in Jason’s character and publication history, where I think there’s just a lot that can be done with revisiting the idea of his Red Hood debut, as well as the events leading up to it, that could better incorporate his character’s themes and personal history. Something that until somewhat recently had all just felt a little too fresh, still, to really warrant any kind of rewrite and retcon.

The first big question I had to ask myself was, “How long was Jason dead/gone?” because to have gone from a somewhat under accomplished Robin to a credible threat to Batman himself, needs time, even with remarkable circumstances surrounding his training. So, I needed to figure out how long I really needed/had available to work with for his training, as well as what that training would entail; and part of figuring that out also meant taking stock of all the Batfam events Jason missed while gone. Basically, I had to figure out what Batfam events I wanted to keep in my new continuity, and draw up a timeline to keep track of them all…

So, taking a cue from the old Superman & Batman: Generations elseworlds comic —in which John Byrne re-envisions the World’s Finest’s superhero careers as if they had debuted in the year of their first issues, and aged in sync with the real world ever since— I anchored my timeline around Jason’s death in 1988 and just started working out fixed measurements from there…

For example, When Jason becomes Robin, Dick had recently retired the costume and gone to college, putting something of a finite age range on Dick, which helps orient his and Jason’s relative ages, and in turn lets me pinpoint their years of birth, and by proxy nail down Bruce’s age if we consider he adopts Dick in Year Two as Batman. And going off Batman: Year One’s premise of Bruce starting his vigilante career at age 25, it gives me a solid grasp of his age as well.

One problem of course came from the early days of The Dynamic Duo; namely Robin’s time between the ages of 8 and ~17(leaving for college) which lasted the awkward 40-odd years of publication. My solution was to scale the years in publication to his two confirmable ages at the time of The Flying Graysons’ deaths(8yo) and his leave for college(age 17); resulting in a ratio of 1 in-world year:~4.44 publication years.

Applying this to the years before 1980(when Dick leaves for college) in turn pinpoints Babs’ debut as Batgirl, which ironically ends up scaling down to the same year Jason first appears as part of The Flying Todds. (I kept the date of his appearance, but opted to keep his later origin story)

Anyway, while this process was fun and all (and hopefully leads to something a little more productive in the future) the bottom line here is that I just wanted to share the timeline I’ve constructed, because it paints a somewhat jarring picture of everyone’s ages, relative to one another and at the time of certain major events.

Now! Enjoy this harrowing examination of the relative ages of all your favorite Batfam characters, if they didn’t all just hover around the ages of 18-30!

1970: YEAR ONE

Bruce Wayne is 25 - becomes Batman (parents died 17y ago)

Barbara Gordon is 15 (just entering High school

Jean-Paul Valley is 1

In 1 year…

8yo Dick Grayson will watch his parents will die

1976: BATMAN & ROBIN - THE DYNAMIC DUO

Bruce is 31, Barbara is 21 (graduating with her Bachelors)

Dick is 13 - becomes Robin

Helena Bertinelli is 8 - watches her parents die

1979: BATGIRL

Bruce is 34, Dick is 16 (has been Robin for 3 years)

Babs is 24 - becomes Batgirl

already completed a PhD in Library Science

Jason Todd is 8 - watches parents die

in 1 year…

35yo Bruce will have been Batman for 10 years

17yo Dick will be shot, fake death, & go to college

join the New Teen Titans(?)

1983: JUST ANOTHER KID ON CRIME ALLEY

Bruce is 38, Dick is 20, Babs is 28

Jason is 12 - becomes the 2nd Robin

Stephanie Brown & Cassandra Cain are both 1yo

In 1 year…

21yo Dick becomes Nightwing

1988: DEATH IN THE FAMILY & KILLING JOKE

Bruce is 43, Dick is 25

Jason is 17 - murdered

Babs is 33 - shot and paralyzed

Lucas Fox is born

In 1 year…

Babs becomes Oracle

21yo Helena becomes Huntress

12yo Kate Kane watches her mother and sister die

1990: A LONELY PLACE OF DYING

Bruce is 45, Dick is 27, Babs is 35

Tim Drake is 13yo - becomes the 3rd Robin

Tim Drake & Kate Kane are the same age

Cassandra Cain is 8yo - just killed her first man

1992: KNIGHT FALL

Bruce is 47, Dick is 29, Babs is 37, Tim & Kate are 15

Stephanie Brown is 10 - becomes Spoiler

Jean-Paul Valley is 23 - becomes Azrael

Renee Montoya is 21 - joins GCPD, partnered with Harvey Bullock

In 1 year…

48yo Bruce will have back broken by Bane

24yo Jean-Paul will become Batman

1995: LOST DAYS

Bruce is 50, Dick is 32, Helena is 27, Kate is 18, Cass is 13

Babs is 40 - forms Birds of Prey

Tim is 18 - retires as Robin, goes to college

based on Unmasked happening while Tim is in high school, but pushing to senior year to accommodate Spoiler’s age

Steph is 13 - becomes the 4th Robin

keeping War Games in ‘04, Steph gets more time as Robin

Calvin Rose is 8 - locked in kennel by his father

In 1 year…

Jason will rise from the dead (with the body of a 17yo)

33yo Dick will relocate to Bludhaven

51 yo Bruce and ??yo Talia will conceive Damian

1999: NO MAN’S LAND

Bruce is 54, Dick is 36, Babs is 44, Jason is “20,” Kate is 22

Tim is 22 - returns as Robin

Steph is 17 - pregnant

Helena is 31, Cass is 17 - sequence of Batgirls

Duke Thomas and Harper Row are 1

Steph being 10 when she starts as Spoiler is also a little hard to believe, I know. And her having a thing with Tim 5 years her senior is pretty squicky. (It’s not a big age gap for adults, but the fact that Tim would be 20 when she’s 15 is pretty, bleugh!)

But the problem is that I anchored her to her teen pregnancy in 1999, and a pregnancy scare at 18 or 19 doesn’t really feel like a big deal, (I mean, it is as a personal thing, but not so much as a publication thing*, if that makes sense?) which made 17 about as old as I could make her at that time.

*Pregnant at 18 or 19 is just, “wow, you’re young, and this was probably a bad idea, and you’re not ready… but you’re also a legal consenting adult and this isn’t some kind of cause for moral panic, just kinda trashy…” territory, and not like a big controversial, 90s-dark-age, comic-selling gimmick, you know?

2001: JOKER’S LAST LAUGH

Joker dies of cancer (not featured on this timeline)

2003: UNDER THE RED HOOD, & WAR GAMES

Bruce is 58, Dick is 40, Babs is 48, Tim is 26

Helena is 35, Steph & Cass are 21

Jason is “24″ - returns in Hush plot

Jean-Paul is 34 - “dies”

Ra’s al Ghul killed by Nyssa ah Ghul (not featured on this timeline)

In 1 year…

22yo Steph will be “murdered”

25yo Jason will return as Red Hood

2006: ROBIN: WANTED

Cass is 24 - begins long process of beating up her family

kills Nyssa al Ghul (not featured on this timeline)

In 1 year...

Cass will take over the League of Assassins

2007: BATMAN AND SON

Bruce is 62, Dick is 44, Babs is 52, Jason is “28,″ Tim & Kate are 30

Damian is 11 - becomes the 5th Robin

Renee is 37 - becomes The Question

In 1 year…

63yo Bruce Wayne will “die”

29yo Jason will don the Red Robin mantle w/Challengers

Kind of like in Arkham Knight, I LOVE the idea of Jason returning to a Gotham where the Joker has been confirmed dead. So, instead of just going to Arkham and asking Joker what’s up with the new copycat Red Hood, everyone has to legit wonder: Did he just fake his death?/Was he resurrected? Is Joker back?

I made Jason’s return at age 25 because it mirrored Bruce’s start as Batman. There wasn’t really a good anchor otherwise, but I might nudge that date around, if only because resurrected Jason being “younger” than Tim is super weird. My other angle here was to determine how long Jason was training for his return, and determine his resurrection that way. (Comics have made it that he was resurrected within the same year he died, but that feels frivolous to me, so whatever my final version, I’ve opted to let Jason stay dead for at least a full year.)

There’s also the whole 2010s decade, but that’s less relevant to my Jason story’s timeline. But, yeah... this has highlighted some interesting points for me to play with! Like that fact that Jason…

…is almost the same age as the Dynamic Duo itself

He’s never known a world without Batman & Robin in it

…is the version of Robin Tim, Kate, Steph & Cass all think of first, since he was Robin when they were kids, not Dick.

And in fact they all would only ever know of Dick as Nightwing.

…got captured and killed by Joker right after Barbara got shot

He DEFINITELY should’ve been motivated to kill Joker by that, instead of the random biological mom smuggling drugs in Iran plot

…was resurrected right around the same time that Damian was conceived, and that Calvin began training as a Talon prospect

makes interesting parallels about different plans to replace Batman all forming right around the same time; with Bruce entering his 50s and having just lost to Bane

…showed back up in the same year that Azrael died

I think it’d be cool if those were more closely linked, instead of Azrael just being shot by a couple of C-listers

…comes back to start a gang war with Blackmask and yell at Bruce about dead Robin issues at the same time Steph gets killed by Blackmask while trying to execute Bruce’s plan to take over the mob.

How can I not take advantage of that for more drama?

Also, not part of my fic, but how cool that Duke and Harper were born in the middle of the Gotham earthquake in Cataclysm? And with Damian having lost a year to being dead, he’s the same age as Duke, which kinda makes Duke not wanting the Robin mantle a little more interesting.

I find it funny that kids in Gotham are really consistently traumatized at the age of 8 for some reason: Bruce, Dick, Jason, Helena, Cassandra, Calvin...

Half the Batgirls were in fact grown ass women and not “girls,” when they started in on the vigilante racket and I’m tempted to just combine them with the Batwoman legacy a ditch the weird nubile/infantilism fixation comic creators have on forcing them to hover around 18-20 while all the guys hover closer to 30.

And I’m trying will all my might to fight the compulsion to do a timeline for the Teen Titans, because knowing the Robins’ ages puts a pretty narrow frame on the other Teen Titans’ ages at any given time, but by god the fact that they keep reusing the New Teen Titans roster but for EVERY new Robin is a maddening paradox...

Don’t even get me started on that fact that now I get to go map all the Gotham Rogues and figure out just how long they’ve each been up to their bullshit, and who’s still rolling around Gotham in, like, a wheelchair at age 80, menacing the Bat...

#batman #redhood #bruce wayne #jason todd #nightwing #oracle #batgirl #robin

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thecomicsnexus · 5 years

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Son of the Demon

BATMAN: SON OF THE DEMON SEPTEMBER 1987 BY MIKE W. BARR AND JERRY BINGHAM

SYNOPSIS (FROM DC WIKIA)

When a group of criminals take hostages on a chemical plant in Gotham City, the GCPD summon Batman to assist them and the Dark Knight manages to stop the criminals, saving the hostages, but he ends up badly wounded after the confrontation. On his way back home, Batman falls unconscious due to his wounds and he is found by Talia, who takes him back to the Batcave.

When Batman recovers, he and Talia speak to Commissioner Gordon, who informs them that the crooks who Batman stopped were trying to steal chemicals used in pluviculture for a terrorist only known as Qayin. In order to learn more about this technology, Batman visits his old friend, Dr. Blaine, but finds out that the man has been recently murdered. Following the only clues left behind, Batman deduces that the person responsible for killing Blaine is his long time enemy, Ra's al Ghul.

Batman and Talia travel to Ra's base of operations, where they learn that Ra's had in fact survived his previous encounter with Batman and is currently working to restore one of his Lazarus Pits. During their meeting, Ra's explains that he had nothing to do with Blaine's death, and when Batman asks him about Qayin, he learns that the terrorist had once worked for Ra's, but is responsible for the death of Melisande, Ra's' former wife and Talia's mother. Knowing that Qayin is their common enemy, Ra's asks Batman to join forces with him, but upon agreeing, Batman must also take Talia's hand. Since the two of them were previously wed by Ra's, Talia and Bruce simply embrace each other and have their first sexual encounter, after which Batman becomes an official member of Ra's family and starts acting as a leader for Ra's men.

Meanwhile, Qayin continues his plan of stealing a satellite from the United States Government, which is designed to control weather conditions. Joining forces with the rogue General Yossid, Qayin's hold of the satellite is secured, even though he has a few weeks to live, due to a strange illness.

The night of the sabotage, Qayin infiltrates the US military base, from where the satellite will be launched into space. At that same time, Batman, Talia and a selected group of Ra's men also infiltrates the base in order to place a bomb in the satellite. Batman and his team are discovered and they are attacked by the US forces, who also alert Qayin of their presence. The terrorist confronts Batman and manages to disable the bomb they placed on the satellite, just as it is launched towards space. Having failed their mission, Batman and Talia retreat back to Ra's base of operations, unaware that Qayin managed to get capture one of Ra's men.

Upon returning to Ra's base, Batman is informed that Talia is pregnant with his child, who becomes his only concern in the world. Unfortunately, the man who was captured by Qayin is tortured to reveal the secret location of Ra's base and with this information, Qayin organizes a large scale attack on Ra's, taking dozens of his men to the place. Qayin and his army break into Ra's fortress and Batman's only concern is to protect Talia, which renders him innefective against the enemy. Qayin and his forces break into the core of Ra's base, where he finally finds the Lazarus Pit which will help him survive his disease. However, Ra's was prepared for such emergency and he destroys the pit with explosives he had placed prior to the attack. With Qayin seriously wounded, his forces retreat and he only manages to escape the place with great effort.

Back in his base, Qayin learns that the satellite is in orbit and with help from his rogue scientists, he takes control of the satellite, creating chaos and destruction near the Soviet Union. This actions would eventually create a war between Russia and the US, which is Qayin's ultimate goal. After killing General Yossid, Qayin gets full control of the operation and he speeds up the destruction.

Meanwhile, Ra's is planning his next move against Qayin and he wants Batman to take the lead, but the Dark Knight wants out of any plans until Talia is taken to a safe place. At that very moment, Talia falls unconscious and after taking her to the doctor, she reveals to Batman that she had lost their child as a result of the strain. Reinvigorated by the loss of his unborn child, Batman joins Ra's on his attack to Qayin's base.

In the ensuing confrontation, Batman and Ra's manage to infiltrate Qayin's base along with several of Ra's men, killing every opponent along the way. When Ra's and Batman reach the main chamber, where Qayin is operating the satellite, Batman commands Ra's to deactivate the satellite, while he confronts Qayin. The terrorist however, only wants to kill Ra's and gives little attention to Batman. This distraction gives Batman the edge he needs to defeat Qayin, giving Ra's enough time to destroy the machines that control the satellite and giving full control of the machine back to the US. Once the US have the satellite under their control, they decide to destoy it for good. In a desperate attempt, Qayin tries to electrocute Ra's, but Batman stops him and Qayin is electrocuted himself, ending his life.

With the threat of Qayin ended, Bruce returns to Talia, who tells him to leave her alone, as their relationship can no longer remain the same. Batman complies and he returns to Gotham and locates Blaine's killer, who was one of his co-workers, paid by Qayin. Having solved the case, Batman returns to the shadows and his grim attitude gives Gordon the hint that something is wrong with the Dark Knight, who spends the night in isolation on top of a building, wondering how different things would've been if his child had not died.

Nine months later, a newborn baby is given away on an orphanage and the baby is soon adopted by a couple, who promise to take care of him. The baby has the necklace that Batman gave to Talia after he learned about her pregnancy, giving away the fact that Talia didn't lose the baby, but she lied in order to have Batman help Ra's against Qayin.

REVIEW

Scott Snyder once said that Batman’s story is a tragedy. And he is mostly right. When you read this novel, there is a clear theme about kids growing up without their parents or seeing their parents die. It seems to be a never-ending cycle. It is true for Talia, it’s true for Batman, it’s true for Dr. Blain’s son. So it would make sense that Batman would make all the decisions he made here, as every single questionable action, is linked to the premise of “children need their parents”. It is nor surprise then, than his reaction when he finds out he is going to be a father is that one of making sure that kid is the happiest child on earth. However, had he been successful, I am pretty sure that kid would have entered that cycle as well. By being given into adoption you would think at least he has been spared. So it is a sour ending (as the kid is not growing up with his parents) but we see him being adopted.

Now, there are a few things in this novel that could be considered first appearances or not. The most obvious one is Damian Wayne. It was never Morrison’s idea to put this story into continuity (in fact, it doesn’t match the different versions of Damian’s origin). But there are too many similarities to say it isn’t the same character. It’s just not canon.

The other thing I cannot believe is not mentioned, is Qayn, who has too many similarities with David Caine. Technically, this character died in the novel, so I guess it was just one of those situations where two people create the same character (with some obvious differences).

There was a period in time when this novel was considered canon (between 1987 and 1994). It’s amazing no one tried to use the plot again during that period (says a lot about Batman editor, Denny O’Neil).

Apart form its theme, I think the story doesn’t really feel that strong. It’s hard to relate to the characters (I always have problems relating to Batman and Talia’s romance). And even if Batman can feel his actions justified... he is still allying himself with Ra’s Al Ghul, who is killing people at his side.

Also, how much time happens during this story? It feels like months.

The art is pretty standard for a graphic novel, but somehow it is easy to forget the it. There is only one page I always remember and it’s the “conception” page. But I tend to forget it was done by Jerry Bingham.

I give this novel a score of 8

#batman80 #dc comics #modern age #batman #batman son of the demon #damian wayne #comics #review #1987 #ra's al ghul #talia al ghul

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celestialvoid-fanfiction · 6 years

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Sterek Crazy Rich Asians AU - Stiles is an economic professor in New York who is in love with his long-time boyfriend, Derek. Everything seems to be going well for them, until the day Derek asks Stiles to accompany him to Beacon Hills for his best friend’s wedding. Stiles agree, soon discovering that Derek is the only son of the Hale family, the richest family in California, and one of the most eligible bachelors.

Stiles meets Derek’s best friend, Boyd, who’s getting married to his high school sweetheart, Erica, and who asked Derek to be his best man. The pre-wedding celebrations start in two days and Boyd offers for Stiles to join them at the bachelor party, but Erica begs Stiles to join her at her party. Unable to say no, Stiles agrees to join Erica and her friends on her family’s island for the weekend.

But first, Stiles has been needing to catch up with his best friend, Scott, and gets to meet Stiles’ family: his mother, Melissa, and his step-brother, Isaac. Stiles tells Scott that he’s going to meet Derek’s family that night. Scott takes one look at his best friend and asks, “Is that what you’re wearing?” Stiles looks down at himself nervously and says, “Yes? What’s wrong with it?” Scott drags him into the massive closet, rifling through the clothes and piecing together an outfit as he explains that Derek’s family is the richest family and Boyd and Erica’s wedding is the wedding of the century - the next Kate and William or Meghan and Harry.

Stiles starts to feel nervous, changing into the outfit that Scott has laid out for him. His anxiety begins to spike as Scott drives him to the Hale manor, a gorgeous building in the middle of the forest. Stiles begins to feel out of place, but all his worries wash away as he pulls up at the door to see Derek waiting for him. He steps out of the car and lets Derek pull him into his arms, kissing him sweetly.

Derek invites Scott inside and takes Stiles to meet his mother. Instantly, Stiles knows that Derek’s mother, Talia, does not like him. She comes from a wealthy family that values honour and prestige, and it is very clear that she does not approve of Stiles.

[SPOILERS BELOW THE CUT]

Stiles also meets Derek’s older sister, Laura, whose beauty is well-known all across Asia. Although she maintains a positive image to her family and society, her marriage is suffering. Jordan Parrish, her husband, is a self-made man who is looked down upon by the Hale family because he does not come from money. At the party, Laura discovers that he might be having an affair.

Among others, Stiles also meets Derek’s little sister, Cora, and his close friend, Lydia, who keeps Stiles company when Derek is dragged aside. Lydia seems to be the most normal person there, and she quickly become friends with Scott and Stiles.

The next morning, the parties begin. Stiles goes with Erica and her friends to her father’s island and Jackson Wittemore - one of the groom’s men who Boyd was forced to invite becasue of his family’s connections - flied Boyd, Derek, and the others out to a barge in the middle of the ocean, where he has planned a party fuelled by booze and debauchery. Others at the part begin to talk about how Stiles doesn’t fit in and Derek is about ready to pick a fight with each and every one of them when Boyd pulls him aside - taking one of the helicopters and flying somewhere quiet. While there, Boyd has to be serious, asking Derek whether he thinks Stiles is a fighter, whether he can stand up to the wolves that are the Hale family. Derek honestly doesn’t know, but he hopes so, becasue there’s a ring in his pocket and he so badly want to give it to Stiles.

Meanwhile, at Erica’s party, Stiles meets up with a woman named Kate, who begins to make Stiles panic about his relationship with Derek--making it clear that Talia would never accept him, after all, Kate is the daughter of a rich family, but Talia still didn’t approve of her and Derek. Stiles goes back to his room, bumping into Laura - who reluctantly got pulled into the party and tried her best to arrive as late as she could. They go back to his cabin to find a fish gutted on his bed with the words ‘CATCH THIS YOU GOLD DIGGING WHORE’ written on the wall. Laura is furious, ready to pick a fight with the others, but Stiles stops her, refusing to make a scene.

He and Laura stay away from the party for the rest of the weekend and Laura tells him about Jordan having an affair.

They both survive the weekend and make it back to Beacon Hills, where things only get worse. Derek’s grandmother adores Stiles - much to Talia’s dismay - and invites him and Derek over to teach him how to cook traditional meals. As they’re cooking, Stiles makes a remark about how beautiful Talia’s wedding ring is and she explains that her husband made it for her when he proposed. Later, when Talia catches Stiles on his own, she corrects herself and explains that her husband made the ring because his family refused to give him the family ring because they did not approve of Talia. Talia corners Stiles, looking straight through him as she makes it perfectly clear that he will never be enough for Derek.

Stiles goes to see Scott, not sure what to do. Scott relays what’s happening to one of Stiles’ economic lectures on loss aversion - where you don’t play to win, you play to not lose. Scott calls in Lydia, and they go about making Stiles look amazing for Boyd and Erica’s wedding that afternoon.

Meanwhile, Laura confronts Jordan about the affair as he walks out on her. Laura is heartbroken but shows a brave face for the wedding, catching the eye of an old friend, Chris Argent.

Stiles arrives at the wedding and makes his way inside, knowing he will not be allowed to sit with Derek’s family. But he spies Boyd’s mother sitting on her own (becasue shes had reserved an entire row to herself in order to stop people pestering her), recognising her from one of her economic papers. Stiles approaches and introduces himself, telling her that he had read her paper and believes the critics to be wrong and her paper to be immensely insightful.

Boyd peers around one of the pillars, waiting aside until the ceremony begins, and tells Derek that Stiles is there. Derek says he’ll probably be sitting towards the back. Boyd calls him over and points out Stiles, sitting in the front row with Boyd’s mother, smiling and chatting. Boyd gently pats Derek’s shoulder and says, “Look like you’ve got a fighter.”

Derek begins to feel hopeful, excited by the thought of Stiles fighting through all of this and staying with him. But it all comes crashing down when Talia pulls him and Stiles aside at the reception. She tells them that she had a private investigator look into Stiles and accuses Stiles of lying. Stiles finds out that his mother was married before and he was born from an affair she had with his father, John. Derek’s grandmother looks at Stiles and tells him that he is a nice man, but they must preserve their family’s honour and he cannot be part of their family.

Stiles, enraged and heartbroken, tells them that he wants nothing to do with their family, running away with tears streaming down his face. Talia grabs Derek’s arm, refusing to let her son chase after Stiles, but Derek pulls free, telling his mother that he loves Stiles and he’s not going to let him go. He chases after Stiles, but it’s too late; he’s gone.

Stiles drags his feet as, hours later, he makes his way down Scott’s driveway. Scott runs out, letting him come inside and giving him a place to stay for the next few days before his flight back to New York. The next day, Stiles’ phone rings, he picks it up to see Derek’s number and lets it ring until it stops.

The day after that, Scott comes in to say there’s a visitor for him and Stiles’ dad comes in. He explains everything, how Claudia had been married to a man who would abuse her, how she had turned to John and wanted to marry him but her husband refused to divorce her, and when they found out Claudia was pregnant, they ran away becasue they were scared that her husband would try to kill her and the baby.

John tells his son that Derek called him and explained everything that happened; it was Derek who bought him the plane ticket so he could come to Beacon Hills becasue Stiles needed him. He tells Stiles that he wants him to talk to Derek at least once before they leave for New York. Stiles reluctantly agrees and messages Derek to meet up.

Derek meets him by the edge of the lake. Derek tries to convince Stiles to stay with him, telling Stiles that he’ll give up all the money and his family legacy -- he’ll walk away from all of it if it meant that he would be with Stiles. He gets on one knee and proposes to Stiles, but Stiles says that he can’t marry Derek.

Stiles makes one last call, meeting Talia at a seniors game centre. They sit down to play and Stiles tells Talia that Derek proposed to him, that he turned down the proposal, and tells Talia that she gets what she wants, but she hasn’t won. He says that he couldn’t marry Derek and be the thing that tears the family apart, but he also says that if Talia doesn’t make amends, Derek will resent her forever. Stiles gets the perfect hand, but surrenders on his last turn. As he does, he tells Talia that in the years to come when Derek marries someone she approves of and she sits watching her grandchildren play, she’ll remember that it was because Stiles stood down. Talia reveals her hand, winning the game, but as Stiles stands up, he turns over his cards to reveal the perfect hand; what would have been his victory. He walks away, leaving Talia staring at the cards.

Stiles and his dad get on the plan back to New York when Stiles hears a familiar voice call out to him. He turns to see Derek rushing down the aisle, trying to catch up with him. He starts talking about how he had planned to propose to Stiles: about how he’d take Stiles down the trail behind the manor, the one that led through the reserve to the lookout where he’d stand with Stiles and, as the sun sets, he’d get down on one knee and propose. Stiles begs him to stop, saying that it’s hard enough to walk away as is, and he doesn’t need Derek making it harder. But Derek leaps across the seats and stands in front of Stiles, and continues, “I wanted to take you to the most amazing place I know becasue you are the most amazing man I know. But I realised that I don’t need that, I just need you. So I’m asking one last time...” He gets down on one knee and pulls out a ring. “ Stiles Stilinski, will you please marry me?”

Stiles is about to refuse him again, tears rolling down his cheeks, when he notices the ring in his hands is strikingly familiar: it’s Talia’s ring. Realisation dawns on him and he’s lost for words.

“Yes,” his father says behind him, spurring his son on.

“Yes,” Stiles repeats.

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Text

► Selina Kyle

Selina Kyle is Catwoman, a costumed adventurer who's been both a super-hero and super-villain. Beginning her career as a thief and enemy to Batman, she later turned to crime-fighting and became part of the Batman Family. Despite her villainous nature, she works hard to protect the East End of Gotham City.

Selina Kyle's early life was defined by tragedy. When she was just a girl, her brutalized mother Maria committed suicide and her violent father Brian drank himself to death soon after. Selina was separated from her younger sister Maggie when remanded to the Sprang Hall Juvenile Detention Center, an abusive state home for orphaned or delinquent girls. Eventually, she escaped the Center and tried pickpocketing the crowd at a carnival outside Gotham City but failed. She was caught by the man who ran the place and he offered her to join the carnival. Selina agreed and soon she learned the art of contortionism, gymnastics, magic and trickery. Using her new learned skills, Selina also improved her pickpocketing skills. When the owner of the carnival died in a tragic accident, Selina decided to take her chances on the streets of Gotham.

Selina started out as a prostitute working in the East End. She watched over an underage girl named Holly Robinson while working for their abusive pimp Stan. Detective George Flannery sent her to Ted Grant, who taught her how to fight after Stan beat her up. When she saw Batman in action for the first time, he inspired her to become Catwoman. Selina returned the beating Stan gave her and took Holly with her. To distinguish herself, she would claw the faces of her victims starting with Carmine Falcone. Stan kidnapped her sister Maggie Kyle which led to his death when fighting Catwoman. Batman confronted her about this, but she simply kissed him before wounding his chest, allowing her to flee. Holly was left with the nun Maggie to be raised in a convent. Following a distortion of the time stream, Selina's history as a prostitute was erased. She survived on the streets as a petty thief.

Catwoman's status as hero or villain was always fluid. She had her own moral code and had occasionally teamed up with Batman and other heroes against greater threats, even saving the lives of the entire Justice League on one occasion. She represented a gray area in Batman's otherwise black and white life where the line between good and evil blurred, and his attraction to her stemmed from the perception that, in her own way, she's a female version of himself: another dark creature that prowls the night.

Selina met an acquaintance, Bruce Wayne, at the wedding of Johnny Viti, a member of the Falcone Crime Family. The pair instantly hit it off, though Selina was unaware of Bruce's identity as Batman. Catwoman attempted to rob the home of mob boss Carmine Falcone that night, but was interrupted by Batman and the two were forced to flee. Falcone placed a bounty on both the Bat and the Cat, offering one million dollars to whoever could kill either one of them. When the Holiday Killer first struck in Gotham, Catwoman began her own investigation but was soon discovered by Batman. She offered her assistance in resolving the case, which Batman reluctantly accepted.

Catwoman followed Batman from a distance as he unraveled the mystery, while in their civilian identities Selina grew closer with Bruce - until he fell under the mind control of Poison Ivy. Catwoman realized Ivy was responsible and rescued Bruce from her clutches. She later jumped in to assist Batman while he was fighting Scarecrow and the Mad Hatter. Catwoman joined the other 'costumed freaks', led by a newly-turned Two-Face, in confronting Falcone for control of Gotham City. This led Batman to question where her allegiances truly lied, to which Catwoman responded that she was on the same side as always: her own.

The disturbed Mister Handsome targeted Catwoman, as he had dedicated his life to destroying beauty. When she was caught, he caged her with a monster as a sick allegory to Beauty and the Beast. However, he was unable to crush her spirit, and she gracefully defeated him.

Selina's neighborhood in Brideshead was taken over by a crimelord named Bracuda. Catwoman investigated his operation, as he had forced all of the legitimate shop-owners out. The corrupt cops on Bracuda's payroll got involved, and it turned into a riot. Catwoman fought Bracuda and forced him to flee, allowing her to take his valuable assets.

After Bane broke Batman's back, he started taking over the Gotham underworld. His henchmen tried to recruit Catwoman and have her work for Bane, but she refused the offer. Bane tried to learn Catwoman's identity, but she had hidden her birth name "Selina Kyle" behind dozens of aliases. Leopold sold her out. Catwoman's apartment was blown up by an assassin targeting Bane. The assassin fled to Santa Prisca, and she followed by hitching a ride on Bruce Wayne's private plane. Leopold told Catwoman that Bane had been defeated by a new Batman. Arizona was taken home by her parents, suffering from amnesia. Catwoman took out the assassin, inadvertently saving Santa Prisca's dictator. The dictator offered her protection, and she made a huge payload saving him from an attempted coup. When she returned to Gotham, she had Leopold killed for betraying her.

After this, Catwoman became involved with a group of activists called The "Friends of the Earth Nature Magic Alliance". Working with them to prevent a terrorist attack, Catwoman stole a deadly toxic agent, which attracted the new Batman's attention. Catwoman realized that this was a different Batman and she tried to get away with the stolen chemicals, but the new Batman followed her all the way to a building in the middle of Gotham, where the police surrounded them, and Catwoman was left to confront them alone. Catwoman managed to escape and tipped off the location of the chemical agent to the police, after which she used Batman to distract the terrorists and claim a victory for her own agenda.

When the Apocalypse Virus broke out in Gotham, Catwoman was hired by the Penguin to track down a survivor named Kendall Stuart. She was forced to team up with Azrael and Robin against a bounty hunter named Tracker. They finally grabbed Stuart, but he was assassinated by the Order of St. Dumas. The group teamed up to find another survivor named Fong, but he killed himself when he met them. Catwoman tracked down the last survivor alone, a student named Leanore We in Miami, and draggged her back to Gotham. It was discovered that survivor blood was useless, but Leanore wanted to help anyway. Catwoman was inspired by this, and stayed to help until a cure is found.

Catwoman was stealing from a mall when the 7.6 earthquake hit. Despite her selfish inclinations, she worked hard to bring everyone to safety. While patrolling the city to stop looters, she met Poison Ivy. Ivy tried to control the vulnerable city with plants, and Catwoman barely managed to stop her.

Catwoman crossed paths with Batman once again after she made off with a briefcase containing ten million dollars which had been paid as ransom money to Killer Croc. While Batman was fighting him, Catwoman escaped with the briefcase, prompting Batman to chase after her. During the chase, Batman's wire was cut, causing him to fall to the ground and allowing Selina to return to the hideout of Poison Ivy, who had mind controlled her into stealing the money.

When Catwoman regained her senses, she met Batman again and offered her assistance in tracking down Ivy, who had relocated to Metropolis. She flirted with Batman and, for once, he gave into his attraction towards her and the two shared a passionate kiss.[52] Batman and Catwoman both found the whereabouts of Poison Ivy. Catwoman confronted her first, but called for Batman's assistance using a button he had given her. Together, the duo fought Ivy, until she revealed her own secret weapon: a mind-controlled Superman.[53] The two managed to escape, and quickly hatched up a plan to restore Superman's mind. Batman stalled Superman and lured him to the street, while Catwoman kidnapped Lois Lane and dropped her from the roof of the Daily Planet. In that moment, Superman was able to resist Ivy's mind control and rushed to save Lois. Batman, Catwoman and Superman tracked down Poison Ivy and had her arrested.

Following a conversation with Nightwing, Bruce was inspired to let Selina closer into his life and tell her about his true identity as Batman. Batman met with Catwoman at the Gotham Zoo and took off his mask. Bruce entrusted Selina to watch over Talia al Ghul while he confronted her father Ra's, who he believed to be behind his misfortunes as of late. The assassin Lady Shiva came to retrieve Talia on behalf of the League of Assassins, prompting Catwoman to fight Shiva. She was no match for the master assassin and was almost killed, had it not been for Talia's intervention. Catwoman returned to the Batcave with Batman and was attacked by Robin who was seemingly furious at her being let into Bruce's life; Selina was unaware that this was a ruse. She was later attacked by Huntress, who had been exposed to Scarecrow's Fear Toxin, and rescued Robin from Clayface, who had disguised himself as a revived Jason Todd. After Batman's defeat of Hush and the Riddler, who had orchestrated the entire ordeal, Catwoman met Batman as he mourned the death of Harold Allnut. Bruce began to doubt his mental clarity after a suggestion from Scarecrow that his mind had been manipulated, and questioned Selina's true intentions. Selina replied that until he learned to truly trust her they could never be together, and left Bruce alone.

Catwoman further proved herself as an ally of Batman when she fought alongside him and the League against the old Secret Society, of which she had once briefly been a member. Wounded, she was taken to the Batcave to recover. When Despero and a faction of brainwashed League members infiltrated the cave and succeeded in brainwashing Batman, Catwoman was able to send a distress call out to the unaffected League members. After a fierce struggle, Despero was subdued. However, this was something of a hollow victory, since all recognized that Despero was able to pit the JLA members against one another by drawing upon pre-existing animosities and distrust. In response to Batman's inquiry about her wounds, Selina departed the Batcave after curtly informing Batman that he had already "done enough."

Catwoman appeared to be completely reformed for a time and her love for Batman true (although brash and unpredictable). However, it became unclear if her reformation was of her own volition or the result of a mindwipe by Zatanna, a procedure known to deeply affect and, in at least one case, physically incapacitate its victims. Selina had no inkling that any villains had been mindwiped until Batman informed her otherwise, worried that her reformation may be due to mental manipulation.

An influx of supervillains seized control of the East End, leaving Selina with no choice but to join the new incarnation of the Secret Society. While her initial intentions were unclear, Selina shared her plans to infiltrate and destroy the cadre of East End villains with Batman.

Selina made a deal with a former criminal who had powers similar to Clayface that had promised to help her in exchange for his freedom. The man impersonated her, and allowed several villains to shoot and dismember him, giving the impression to the underworld that Catwoman was really dead (like Clayface, the man was able to survive what would otherwise be fatal wounds). Capitalizing upon the advantage which her "resurrection" provided her (the villains believing she had somehow managed to cheat death), Catwoman dismantled the new East End cadre of criminals, one villain at time. After she was done, Zatanna appeared at her side, informing her that she had some "bad news".

Selina Kyle was no longer Catwoman. She left the East End, and gave birth to a daughter named Helena. Holly Robinson took over as the new Catwoman while Selina, living under the alias Irena Dubrovna, turned her attention to caring for her daughter.

Though she took her role as a new mother quite seriously, Selina donned the costume for a run through the East End some days after Helena's birth. Having understandably gained a few pounds, Selina found that her costume is now a tighter fit. In addition, she was easily distracted by a common criminal. Although the situation was defused through Holly's opportune arrival, the fact that there were two Catwomen active in the city was caught on video. Selina returned home from her adventure to find that the mysterious movie aficionado Film Freak had deduced her alias. Joined by Angle Man, they grabbed Helena.

After rescuing her daughter, Selina convinced Zatanna to mind-wipe Film Freak and Angle Man in order to preserve her secret identity. Following the procedure, Angle Man turned himself in to the authorities; Film Freak, however, embarked upon a murderous rampage. Ted Grant informed Selina that Holly had been arrested for the murder of Black Mask; Selina infiltrated the police station and freed Holly. Finally defeating Film Freak, Selina returned home to find that Slam Bradley had deduced that Helena was Sam Bradley's child, and therefore his granddaughter.

Batman asked Catwoman to infiltrate the violent tribe of Bana Amazons during their attack. Posing as a criminal, Selina gained the Bana's trust and thwarted a terror attack aimed at causing mass casualties in Gotham City. Shortly afterwards, Selina invited herself to become the newest member of Batman's Outsiders. Catwoman and Batman also had a romantic relationship which they both tried to hide.

Selina, fearing the many dangers of a post-Batman Gotham, proposed that she, Ivy, and Harley Quinn team up, living together at a single base. Ivy agreed under one condition: using home-grown drugs to weaken Selina's resistance, Ivy demanded to know the identity of the true Batman. Time spent with Talia three years ago in Tibet had prepared Selina so would not relinquish the true ID of Batman under any circumstances. After the interrogation, Selina saw Harley with Bruce Wayne on TV. Catwoman told Poison Ivy she knew it was Hush in disguise.

After stealing the contents of a safe belonging to the Falcone crime family, Selina returned home to find Kitrina, a teenaged escape artist and Carmine Falcone's long lost daughter, breaking into her room. She attacked and subdued Kitrina, who told Selina that she had unknowingly stolen a map that detailed the location of the new Black Mask's underground bunker. Realizing that she could use the map to capture Black Mask and claim the 50 million dollar bounty on his head, Selina left Kitrina bound in a locked room so that she could keep the map for herself. She later called Batman to her house in order to turn the would-be thief over to the police, but discovers that Kitrina had managed to free herself and steal back the map. This impresses Selina, who mentioned that she had tied up the child using an "inescapable" knot that Bruce had shown her years earlier. Following a massive battle with Black Mask and his henchmen (which ended with neither woman being able to claim the bounty), Selina agreed to take on Kitrina as her new sidekick, Catgirl.

Selina was soon contacted by the mysterious Insider, who asked her to follow Vicki Vale and discover how much she knew about Batman and his allies' secret identities. With some help from Harley and Ivy, Selina finally got the evidence to prove that Vale was right about to discover the truth not only about Batman, but of the Gotham underground as well. After giving the required information to Insider, he subtlety revealed his true identity and Selina realized that Bruce Wayne had returned.

Once Bruce Wayne reclaimed the mantle of the bat, he established Batman Incorporated, a global team of Batmen. Selina accompanied him on a mission to break into Doctor Sivana's armory, and later traveled with him to Tokyo in order to recruit a Japanese representative for Batman Inc. Catwoman teamed up with Batman to stop Harley Quinn from breaking the Joker out of Arkham Asylum. After defeating Harley and the Joker, Catwoman told Poison Ivy that they were no longer friends, this after Ivy drugged her in an attempt to uncover Batman's identity. Shortly after, Poison Ivy and Harley Quinn escaped and set off to pursue revenge on Catwoman for leaving them behind. The two of them found Catwoman and fought her. While they were fighting, Catwoman said that she saw good in them and only wanted to help. Batman was about to arrest them, but Catwoman helped the two of them escape.

Powers

Acrobatics: Selina is a gifted and accomplished athlete, with heightened acrobatic prowess. Her feats have been so amazing, one could argue that her athletic ability is somewhat superhuman.

Martial Arts: She was trained by the Armless Master in martial arts and by Wildcat in boxing and street-fighting. She is a dangerous, clever and resourceful fighter, known for precise, agile attacks and speedy getaways. Her formidable hand-to-hand combat skills are augmented by her cat-like speed, reflexes, balance, and flexibility. Catwoman has mastered the following martial arts styles:

Boxing

Capoeira

Hapkido

Jujutsu

Dragon Style Kung Fu

Karate

Stealth: Selina is as stealthy as any large cat. She has easily been able to sneak up on large groups of people and even other vigilantes on patrol. She shows marked prowess in this ability while she's on the prowl for her next job.

Thievery: Selina is a master thief, known throughout Gotham City for her burglary of cat-themed objects and/or gems and jewels of the highest quality. Hardly one to knock over a bank, Catwoman would rather break into the chairman's office and take his personal documents.

Disguise: To pull off her many capers, Catwoman resorts to disguises and aliases. She once posed as an old lady in order to steal a valuable piece of jewelry while on a cruise ship. Later, she posed as a night club goer in order to get acquainted with it's owners and return later to rob them.

Feline Empathy: Catwoman has a strong affinity for cats. Feline species tend to flock to her, accepting her almost immediately, recognizing somehow that she is not an enemy but a friend. This allows her to calm injured cats, train them, befriend them, and form strong bonds with them. These animals will even sometimes come to her defense when she is attacked. This has proved most beneficial, especially when it has involved big cats.

Catwoman has had many nicknames in the past, some of them include: The Cat, Plundering Kitten, Princess of Plunder and Madame Moderne.

Selina's alias, Irena Dubrovna, was inspired by the name of the main character in the 1942 film Cat People.

Verses

Selina Kyle v. Early Tragedy

This verse focus on teen Selina while still working as a prostitute and beginning her life of crime.

Selina Kyle v. Brideshead owner

After becoming the famous Catwoman, Selina takes over her old neighborhood from criminals.

Selina Kyle v. Friends of the Earth Nature Magic Alliance

Selina joins a group against terrorist working with them to prevent a terrorist attack, Catwoman stole a deadly toxic agent.

Selina Kyle v. Behind the Cowl

Selina Kyle has a life as a socialite where she donates quite a lot of money to zoo and others in need.

Selina Kyle v. The Dream Life

It has finally happen, Bruce Wayne has finally asked Selina the big question and now they are married!

Selina Kyle v. No Longer a Street Cat

Selina decides to stop being Catwoman passing the mantra to Helena and start a vigilante life of her own.

Selina Kyle v. Irena Dubrovna

After giving birth to Helena, Selina decides to leave her old life and adopts a new name.

Selina Kyle v. Sirens of Gotham

tba

#Batman #Batman [Selina Kyle]#Female Character #non mutuals #face claim: Emeraude Toubia

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