The night in Blüdhaven was thick with fog — streetlights flickering like dying stars, shadows stretching long and thin across the alleyways. The city had its monsters, and tonight, they’d found her.

She ran until her lungs burned, until her feet stumbled on broken pavement. But they were faster — three of them — laughing behind her like they already knew how the night would end.

She hadn’t meant to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. But that’s how it always started. A shortcut through a shadowed alley, a glance back, the feeling of being followed. Then the voices. The chase. And the pain.

Now she was on the ground, her hand pressed to her side, warm blood seeping between her fingers. Panic was starting to outweigh the sting.

One of the men reached for her again, and before she could scream, the sky fell.

Or that’s what it felt like.

Nightwing hit the ground like a strike of lightning, and chaos erupted. His batons cracked against bone with precision, his movements fluid, fast, practiced. The first man was out cold in seconds. The others didn’t last much longer.

Then it was quiet.

He turned to her. His chest heaving beneath the black suit, his eyes sharper than the night. After of those stories tossing around the city, you never once thought you would actually be rescued by him.

He dropped to one knee beside her, and when his eyes found the blood soaking through her shirt, something in his expression cracked. His hands hovered for a beat before they moved — not rushed, but careful, trained.

“I’ve got you,” he murmured, voice low and steady. “You’re safe now. I’m going to help you.”

He didn’t ask if she could walk. He didn’t need to.

He swept one arm under her legs and the other around her back, lifting her gently as if afraid to make it worse. She winced against the pain in her side, and his grip adjusted immediately — supportive, controlled, but desperate in its own quiet way.

The rooftops blurred past them. She barely registered the way he moved — silent, swift — as if the city knew to clear a path.

He didn’t stop until they reached the safe house — an old, unmarked building above a locked garage. He kicked the door open and stepped inside, the faint hum of electricity greeting them in the low-lit room.

She was still bleeding. He would fix that. But first, he needed her to know she wasn’t alone anymore.