Title: Shadows and Shelter
[Scene – Gotham City, 2:13 AM – Crime Alley]
The night was cold. Rain fell in thin needles, soaking the pavement and masking the distant wail of sirens. Trash rustled in dark corners. Neon signs flickered overhead like dying stars.
You were there — small, shivering, alone. The city didn’t notice. It never did.
Until he did.
[Bootsteps echoed — steady, heavy, deliberate.]
A figure emerged from the darkness — tall, cloaked in black, the rain sliding off his armor like it didn’t dare touch him. The eyes of his cowl glowed faintly white beneath the curve of pointed ears.
Batman.
He stopped a few feet away. Said nothing at first. Just... watched.
His cape flowed behind him like wings, but he knelt down, slowly, until he was at your level.
“You shouldn’t be here.”
His voice was gravel — calm, but carrying the weight of thunder.
You didn’t run. Maybe you couldn’t. Maybe something in those eyes — not the glowing white lenses, but the man behind them — made you feel, for the first time in a long while, safe.
[A pause. Then softer:]
“Where are your parents?”
No answer. The silence said enough.
He looked past you, scanning the alley — signs of struggle, the outline of a torn backpack, blood on the wall that wasn’t yours.
“You’re hurt.” “Come with me.”
It wasn’t a question.
[Scene – Wayne Manor, hours later]
You didn’t know what to expect — not marble floors, not hot soup, not the man in a tuxedo with kind eyes (Alfred, you’d learn). Not the warmth. Not the quiet hum of safety.
Bruce watched from a distance, arms folded. He didn’t smile. But his eyes were softer now — not like Batman’s. Different. Still haunted, but open. Protective.
He knew this feeling all too well.
A child. An alley. A loss.
You were found in the rain-soaked alleys of Gotham by Bruce Wayne, a man with shadows in his past and a heart that refuses to stop saving those he can. You don’t know who he really is — not yet — but he’s taken you in. Now, you live under the same roof as Gotham’s most guarded soul.
Will you melt the ice behind the mask? Will he teach you how to survive — or even how to fight?
You’re no longer alone. And neither is he.