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Chapter Text

Gotham without Batman

Batman is still 'absent' from Gotham. His whereabouts are unclear, and rumors range about what happened to him. The GCPD never issued a formal statement about Batman even after years of collaboration. Instead, positions of power exchanged hands - some less willingly than others, and a new guard was brought in. The likes of uncorrupted figures like Commissioner James Gordon were shown the door, and the new team of leadership shifted agendas to sweep Batman's existence under the rug.

For it's part, the public went through every stage of grief: denial that their hero would abandon them, anger that he could neglect his responsibility, bargaining that the communities would work harder to help put a cap on crime if he returned, depression that the ways of life before Batman would slowly creep back into Gotham, and finally, acceptance that the city was simply bound to a fate without change or a hero.

Most came to believe Batman was resigned by the lack of change in Gotham; that for all his efforts, the city chose to do the wrong thing over and over again (cue Marshawn Lynch gif). While small pockets were impacted, the city authorities and even the average citizen did little to embody the change Batman fought for. Some believed he died, but this rumor only took off briefly in tabloids. Others thought he was called away and would eventually return. It wasn't uncommon for the Dark Knight to do this, afterall; perhaps this was just an unexpectedly long mission.

Whatever the reason, one thing was very clear: In his leaving, the threat of recourse for doing bad and being held accountable all but disappeared. Corruption returned at full force and drove a spear into the heart of the city. Political officials swindled taxpayer's money, policies favored the rich, and poverty grew. For those who could afford to leave, they did, for those who couldn't, they acclimated and adapted to survive. This ushered in years of increased crime that ranged from petty pickpocketing to rampant murder sprees.

A middle class all but disappeared. In its place was an ocean between the privileged upper class and the struggling lower class. A literal line in Gotham's skyline created this distinction: at night the highrise penthouses shone brightly while dull incandescents sprinkled the street levels. In the middle? A horizontal stripe of darkness where desolate luxury apartments owned by offshore millionaire and billionaire accounts existed. A running joke was that the real estate market was only as strong as it was because the insurance payouts when buildings inevitably got demolished in some flubbed crime made the investments more profitable than the stock market.

With this came a densely populated street life. The markets kept rent high and the ability to move tiers practically impossible yet the 'pull yourself up by your bootstraps' rhetoric oozed from businessmen clad in thousand-dollar suits. Small businesses began to shutter completely or, worse, be absorbed into the crime syndicates that popped up in the various boroughs of the city. 

Battle lines were drawn as gangs fought for the upper hand in the power struggle for king of the lower class. All of the typical unsavoriness was game: drugs, blackmail, manipulation, hired guns. Recruitment was key to this war: as skilled fighters were hard to come by, quantity ruled. The drug business sponsored the arsenal that struck fear into citizens trying to abstain from sides. Out of that fear came a self-imposed curfew for most. Anyone caught out after daylight had no one to blame but himself for the trouble he found, and it was often a miracle if that trouble didn't leave him floating off some dock in Miller Harbor. In short, the streets and public sentiment were quickly flavored with the resignation and resentment from a pre-Batman era.

There was an attempt to shift public perception early on. The ideals of a vigilante striking fear into crooks was embedded in the young, ideal kids who had grown up looking out their windows toward the glowing beacon of hope and shining reminder that eyes were watching. It was in these emboldened figures that a new wave of vigilantes appeared in the streets. 

For the first year following Batman's disappearance, the GCPD was overwhelmed with tips about increased crime but also of unchecked vigilantism. The intent of the calls varied: some were worried parents calling to have their son or daughter brought in safely and some were calling to complain that they were more of a nuisance than the drug dealer posted up on the corner.

"What? No, he's not dangerous. He's a participation trophy kid, and a thankless one at that," a father once said. "One karate class and the little shit thinks he can save Gotham… Ha! He couldn't do a pull up to save his life. I'll tell you what, he's going to get himself killed is what's gonna happen. Can't ya… I don't know, can't ya just bring him in and scare the shit out of him? I give permission. Bust him and then lock him up for a bit. Give him a punch or two so he knows what gettin' beat up is like… Yea, that'll teach him a lesson."

"He just showed up and started hitting one of my customers with a rubber mallet," a shopkeep complained. "What? I don't know, he was in some stupid costume… said he was huntin' criminals, the fuckin' idiot… if stupidity is dangerous, then yea, I'd say so… yea, look, can I get an ambulance or not? This guy definitely needs some stitches."

"Yes, a purple cape and bright yellow mask… weapons? I… I don't know. Look, she's just a child - she's not dangerous. She's…   she's my baby. Please find her," a mother would plead.

Not dangerous. It was both a gift and a curse of each and every one of these pretend vigilantes. If young idealism could win fights, Gotham would have been saved overnight. Unfortunately that’s not how Gotham works. For some, sense was knocked into them before things could spiral out of control. For others… well, it wasn't pretty. Untrained, over-confident, and without the guidance of a code, the fires that lit these ambitions were quickly extinguished. Young men and women clad in well-intentioned masks were soon absorbed into the world of crime. For the less lucky, there was the hospital, and for the worst-off, the morgue. 

Twelve deaths were attributed to vigilantism that year of rebellion. The ones who got out alive were often crippled beyond recovery. 

To the rest of the world, they were all jokes. Nightly national news coverage showed the latest antics with the anchors struggling to keep a straight face through the segment. A professor of sociology out of Cambridge taught a class about the deterioration of Gotham’s social order as a cause of it. A film crew from Hollywood came out and shot footage of the ruined lives of surviving vigilantes. Most of the interviews were recorded within the walls of Arkham where sentences ranging from three to ten years were being served by the pretend-Batmans of the city. 

The documentary premiered at the Cannes Festival the following year and reaped mounds of praise. Critical acclaim was given for the raw, edgy narrative centered on the deterioration of a city bred by corruption and the foolish kids who sought to change it. The director won an award and a full-feature contract for an upcoming Marvel movie; the cinematographer was scooped up by a major broadcasting company to shoot a superhero reboot; and the film itself was picked up for international release. 

Money was made hand over fist as a nation wept and laughed at the contraction of one of its largest cities.

Not once though did a review question the context which drove a city's youth to feel compelled into action. There was no political recourse for the events that transpired. Politicians from Washington turned a blind eye. State funds were slowly diverted from the city. Even nonprofits cringed away from the depression that soaked into the heart and soul of the city. To most, Gotham had been a sore spot for years. That it regressed to its former low did little to stir sentiments from outsiders to help.

The economy was driven by real estate and top-dog corporations at the high end and drugs at the low end. Programs still existed, sure, but finding honest workers who wouldn’t sneak in their own cut was difficult. Over the years, public funds dried up and the city relied on private sponsors to repair the deteriorating streets, schools, and public infrastructure. These financiers came from old money accrued from the days Gotham was once seen as a booming city where opportunity was plentiful for all. 

At the core of this group was none other than Wayne Enterprises. The company was one of international standing and, while it carried out business all over the world, its home remained solidly in Gotham. This mere presence fueled a tiny part of the economy bringing jobs into the city. 

This isn’t to say all opportunity had dried up. Companies like Hamilton Dynamics had a strong presence both locally and nationally as a leading arms industry and defense contractor. While this too brought jobs and funding into the city, the low-level work was often outsourced to rural areas of Gotham, leaving the high-salaried positions to the headquarters located near Wayne Tower.

Batwoman

This was the city Kate Kane called home. She returned from Point Rock after being honorably discharged for ‘engaging in homosexual activity’ just as the first year of Batman’s disappearance began. For Kate, the nuances of the changes were initially lost on her. Broken-hearted, rejected for who she was by the academy and the first love of her life, she fell into a life of late night club scenes and forgetful bed-hopping to cope. This was the privilege of being a Kane.

It was during this time that a deep-seated aimlessness took root in Kate for the third time in her life. The first time came two days after her twelfth birthday. Her father, Jacob Kane, had been deployed and was out of the country on some top secret mission. Back then that’s all it was to Kate: Jacob would leave for weeks on end to save the world before returning into the loving arms of his wife and his doting twin daughters.

This left Kath and Beth, her twin sister, with just their mother, Gabi, to celebrate their birthday. After being grounded a week earlier, the twins festivities had been postponed for two whole days. For two twelve year olds, this was practically torture, and it left them mortified and begging for their mother to reconsider. She didn’t budge, instead waiting until the weekend to take them out for a special treat: chocolate waffles at their nearby favorite joint.

‘Chocolate and gauffre await!’

Unfortunately, what was meant to be a festive afternoon took a very dark, very sudden turn when they were jumped on their walk. Gotham had been under the watchful gaze of Batman for a few years at this point, but blatant crime still existed, and in this case, the Kane family was the target.

Passersby saw the ambush and rushed to call the police. Jacob Kane was notified and it was quickly established the kidnapping had been intentional and targeted. He jumped on the first flight back to Gotham and was granted military assistance to locate his family. 

It didn't take long to discover the site was an abandoned warehouse on the waterfront of the Upper East Side overlooking Bob Kane Sound, named after Jacob's great grandfather. He would spend years questioning the coincidence of this.

Leading a tactical unit, he raided the location only to discover he was too late. The first body his eyes rested on was that of his wife; lifeless, covered in her own blood, and bound to a chair. That her head was covered in a burlap bag did little to confuse Jacob Kane. He would know his wife anywhere. 

The second body was the equally lifeless form of a red-haired girl lying facedown covered in her own version of the same bloodshed, and Jacob had to suppress a sob. It was only when shouts confirming life brought him back from the edge of a breakdown: Kate was alive.

That Kate experienced the kidnapping, heard the cries for mercy, flinched at the rain of gunshots, and glimpsed the bodies of Gabi and Beth as she was ushered out of the warehouse left her traumatized through the rest of her childhood. She’d lost her mother and best friend in an instant. She closed herself off and lacked anything tangible to keep her grounded. She was aimless.

Seeing the impact this had on Kate, he pushed her to find an outlet. Whether this was through her studies, gymnastics, or training, he encouraged her to remain focused. To soldier on. Kate adhered to this to a fault; she spent her teenage years diligently honing every skill Jacob tasked her with. Her grades excelled, she won competitions, and her weekly training sessions had her holding her own against Jacob.

"You need to learn to use my weight against me."

"But you're twice as big as me," Kate would scowl, climbing up from the mat.

"So is half the country. Now, again."

Jacob would bark this point over and over without a hint, forcing her to experiment over and over until, with time, she found techniques that worked. It was this constant pushing that gave her focus. It wasn't Jacob's job to hand her the answers; it was his job to provide the obstacles.

And then Catherine Hamilton came into their lives. In the blink of an eye, he was back to travelling the world except this time it wasn't to save it; it was to be with his new beau, joining her for business trips and applying his skill and attention to things greater than Kate. That’s when the aimlessness took hold for the second time in her life. It wasn’t that she resented Jacob for moving on and finding love, it was that Kate felt left behind and alone. She couldn’t see the purpose in excelling any longer.

These were her high school years, and as a privileged member of Gotham’s upper class, it came with certain freedoms including the GCPD turning a blind eye to less than savory activities. It was during this time her aimlessness found direction in a stiff drink and a stranger’s bed. One knack she’d acquired over time was the ability to blend into a conversation. This, paired with a sardonic temperament, made her the perfect millionaire socialite. 

With Jacob jet setting around with Catherine, Kate found there was a lot she could get away with, until she arrived home one day to find a young, eager Mary Hamilton waiting for her at the kitchen table. Kate hated her the first time they met. She didn't want a sister. She'd had a sister in Beth, and she'd been taken from her. This substitute wasn't the same, would never be the same, and certainly wasn't welcome.

That’s how their relationship began; one where Mary couldn’t get enough of Kate’s attention and Kate couldn’t come up with an excuse fast enough to leave.

But Mary had a persistence about her. Initially Kate compared her to a dopey dog who didn't know its owner hated it, but that soon evolved. Kate was stubborn, but so was Mary in her own way. Just like Jacob would knock Kate down only for her to get back up, Mary would do the same. No matter how many times Kate dismissed her, Mary’s perseverance was something Kate began to respect. While she'd still regularly give Mary a hard time for the latest teenage fad or trend she was gawking over, a friendship slowly developed. It wasn't like Beth. No relationship could ever be that, but it did develop into a sisterly bond; one where Kate would put up a stink about having to help Mary but secretly also have done anything for her if push came to shove. 

Things for Kate changed at this point. Absences were noted by Mary who effectively took up residency at the Kane apartment whenever Catherine was travelling for work which seemed to be every week, and it meant Kate’s aimlessness couldn’t show itself in the same way; there was someone now holding her accountable.

As Catherine and Jacob’s relationship intensified, so did the reality of them becoming a permanent part of her life. The duo moved in shortly after the beginning of Kate’s senior year. They’d been together for three years by this point, and Kate saw wedding bells as a begrudging inevitability. While enough time had passed for her relationship with Mary became tolerable, the same couldn’t be said for Catherine. 

Catherine was sharp and business-minded. She was also frustratingly obsessed with her public image. It was a fact of life that when running a multinational company a curated lifestyle was required. This did not mesh well with Kate who couldn't care less about keeping up appearances. This put the two at obvious odds through all of Kate's high school years.

Catherine and Jacob were wed the summer before she left for college, and tensions between her and Catherine were at a breaking point. Kate played the part of a moody antagonist perfectly, and this often forced Jacob in the middle. While he tried his best to stay neutral, many arguments came out of his bias toward Kate. The timing of Kate leaving for Point Rock could not have been better.

Fast forward nearly four years and Kate finds herself standing in Colonel Reyes’ office where she refuses to lie to keep her position. 

Fast forward another few weeks and Kate is back in Gotham, drinking her way into a tispy stupor dwelling in an existential crisis. Aimlessness has taken hold again, and she’s lost a sense of meaning and focus. As she stumbles out into the evening night, she is immediately drenched in a downpour, and she grumpily turns the corner to call a taxi when the glimpse of shadows followed by chaotic shouting catches her attention. She glances into a dark alley and sees a group of thugs beating up on… Batman?

Foolishly, she chases down the alley toward the gang of three men and interrupts their fun. The haze of alcohol leaves her with a cut lip, a future-bruised eye, and a few bruised ribs before flashes of her training at the Academy and Jacob’s voice races through her mind. She lands her first hit on the nearest guy before she falls into a familiar routine. There was also the added benefit of these three not representing Gotham’s finest in terms of fitness or skill. A few moves later, they left scurrying for drier cover, and Kate finds herself helping a masked un-Batman figure to his feet.

“Th-thanks,” he said, still shaken by the encounter

“What are you doing?” Kate said with an air of criticism.

“Saving Gotham,” the kid said before spitting out a mouthful of blood. He looked around and picked up his forgotten… staff - at least, in the darkness that’s what Kate interpreted it as.

“Save Gotham?” Kate scowled in obvious disapproval. “Is that a joke? You’re going to get yourself killed; you’re-you’re just kid.”

“Maybe, but who else is there?”

The Crows

In all of this, Jacob sees his home city being derailed by the sudden absence of Batman. An irrational part of him always carried a small resentment toward Batman for not saving his wife and Beth. It was the same irrational part of him that blamed the GCPD or the bystanders or himself for not being there. If only someone - anyone - had taken action, maybe his life wouldn’t have been torn apart. Maybe then Gabi and Beth would still be alive.

Instead of stewing in this rage, he pours his stake of the Kane fortune into founding the Crows - a private security operation that provides for the people of Gotham in a lawful, uncorrupt way that Batman or the GCPD never could. With his experience in the military and the ability to provide direct oversight of the private company, his hypothesis is that he can avoid the corruption the GCPD so regularly experiences.

While Kate was still a student at Point Rock, Jacob informed her of his plans to form the organization. For her part, Kate wanted nothing more than to join the Crows. It was the most obvious way she could see herself serving, and it would be to better her home turf in the process.

The rigor to join the Crows was intense, and Jacob only recruited the best of the best. This included some of his closest companions during his military days, and he spent the first few years scouting the best talent to keep the organization at the top of its game. Jacob made a commitment to Kate that, if she managed to graduate at the top of her class, he’d offer her a job. Anything less and she’d need to find an alternate means.

When her pride and integrity chose not to hide who she was, that shattered her dream of being a Crow. Instead, the position was offered to Sophie Moore, a fellow cadet and top of her class at Point Rock. She was also Kate’s first love.

The morning following her run-in with the thugs and pretend superhero, she tossed back an aspirin and set aside the now-thawed bag of peas on her swollen eye to hunt down Jacob. If he was surprised by her unannounced arrival at his door, it was nothing on what she asked next:

“I want to be a Crow.”

“Kate, we’ve been over this. While I don’t disapprove of what you did, I can’t give you a position here. It would be a slap in the face of every member of this team.”

“I get that, and I don’t want special treatment,” Kate explained. “So what do I need to do?”

“What do… what?”

“Tell me what to do, and I’ll do it. If I need to run into burning buildings or join an underground fighting ring or… or… tell me what it will take, and I’ll do it.”

Jacob Kane had never given his daughter an inch - not because he didn’t love her, but because he respected her, and this was no different. If a career in the military hadn’t been shot, the obvious answer would have been to serve and come back when she had the necessary experience serving, but now he needed to get more creative. He built out a rigorous, two-year training regiment that sent her around the world. If he was going to let Kate become a Crow, she needed to earn it. This was in part because he had a Crow standard, but more than that, he wanted Kate to know she’d earned it.

Two years of grueling training later, Kate returned to accept her position as a Crow but quickly realized the same corruption that flooded the GCPD had crept into the security firm. Jacob had become too far removed from the day-to-day, and Kate was surprised to see how he had become a distracted version of the focused, centered man she knew. All of this melted into a realization that this wasn’t the way she was prepared to serve Gotham.

As she left the facility having turned down Jacob’s offer, she felt a tinge of aimlessness set in again until her eyes landed on the bat signal that, even years later, remained illuminated in the sky. In that moment, the image of the untrained vigilante from years earlier appeared in her mind, and she understood there was more than one way to help Gotham.

Kate manages to sneak into the Crows facility over a series of days under the guise of visiting her father and steals equipment to aid in her vigilantism. This works for a few weeks (insert a montage of successes and failures and close calls and lessons) until an event begins to unfold that forces more drastic measures: Sophie Moore is kidnapped.

Chapter Text

It shouldn't have surprised Kate when Jacob found out. She'd been cautious, but even that was never enough to let things slip past her father. He had finally pieced it together in the aftermath of Sophie being taken. His focus had been hijacked by months as the Crows collected whispers of a new organization setting up shop in Gotham. It was a result of this obsession that Sophie became a victim of a botched search.

Jacob was beside himself with grief when he learned she'd been nabbed. Memories of a warehouse years earlier flooded his mind, and he made a commitment to see this one end differently.

He'd come to see Sophie as a surrogate daughter of sorts. While she'd never replace Kate or Beth, he felt a paternal bond to her as she moved through the Crows. There was also the factor of being Kate's ex that made him keep a watchful eye on her. She'd joined the Crows immediately out of Point Rock, and carried the heartache into her first few months as a Crow. That she even joined straight out of school was an exception intended for Kate, and, when she'd left the Academy, Jacob had no intention of making an offer to anyone else. That was, until he ran into her on campus when he returned to help Kate move out. They'd interacted only a few times, but he already held her in high regard: if Kate approved, and she had managed to put up with his daughter for three years, that deserved consideration.

She was sharp, detail oriented, and had the dry humor reminiscent of Kate that appeared without fail to call Jacob out when he was being particularly bullish and irrational. This no-nonsense approach to leadership was a quality that quickly lifted her to his second in command. It was an unprecedented move, but she was an atypical hire. His strategy for years had been to surround himself with brawn and leave decision-making to him, but he quickly discovered that the two balanced each other out: he was often quick to draw from his years in the field while she preferred a more diplomatic approach. That they respected each other helped with the worst of confrontations which were often met with raised voices of disagreement, but never once had they not been able to find common ground.

Until recently. They'd had spats before but had never not met compromise. That had changed with the discovery of a new crime syndicate making Gotham its new home months earlier. This underground group became known as the Religion of Crime, and it sent Jacob on a warpath to uncover anything and everything about them. The vetting process to hire new Crows had been sidelined to bulk up 'for war' as Jacob put it. The timing was noteworthy as many from the task force had begun to retire. Even for the hired gun, there was only so much of Gotham a Crow could take before being drained and stepping down.

The task force hadn't been this slim since its creation, and Jacob took the threat of the Religion of Crime to forgo traditional training and background checks. It was the first time he and Sophie left the table at complete odds, and the impact of the decision swept through the force in no time. Unproven and questionable hires introduced the flavor of corruption that the GCPD had spent years fighting to detain. This made Sophie's job all the harder as Jacob took the increased quantity as a reason to pursue each and every lead.

Chaos ensued. The Crows were no longer focusing on everyday Gotham needs and instead spent nights leaping from one abandoned warehouse to another. At one point Sophie and a squadron spent three nights navigating the sewers to check on a tip. It turned up empty, much like every other piece of intel that had been found.

Finally Sophie demanded a split in the task force.

"We can't keep this up; we can't exist only for this. We haven't made a single arrest in weeks."

"Don't you understand? This could be the downfall of Gotham."

"You sound mad, sir," Sophie scowled. Jacob had taken to expressing these ambiguous claims that, to Sophie, sounded like nothing more than a conspiracy theory. "We keep chasing these leads that end up nowhere. We need to reorganize and refocus our energy on verifying intel. The task force is burning out, and we have nothing to show for it."

"I'm not giving up on this."

"I'm not saying we should," Sophie said. She didn't believe this, but after weeks she knew logic didn't apply when discussing this topic with Jacob. It would remain a thorn in the Crows side for as long as this obsession remained. "But there needs to be progress. The city is getting nervous. Last month's numbers aren't good."

The introduction of doubts from the city and performance numbers persuaded Jacob to reassign part of the task force to regular. It wasn't nearly as many as Sophie wanted, but it was better than nothing.

That's when the seeds of corruption from dodgy hires began to sprout. Arrests were botched, missions went sideways, and a feeling of distrust took root in association with the name 'Crows'. In a matter of weeks, the good the agency had brought to Gotham took a complete one-eighty back to business as usual.

These concerns fell on deaf ears as Jacob removed himself entirely from day-to-day operations, instead leading the charge of the Religion of Crime task force. It was in this obsessed state that Jacob misjudged the intel that would send the entire Crow operation out into Gotham and put Sophie in the hands of the crime organization.

It was only in this moment that Jacob snapped out of his haze. He understood, perhaps too late, that his actions had jeopardized lives, and he fought off the grief simmering at the edges of his mind to coordinate a search and rescue.

The next twelve hours were a blur. One lead after another was proven a fabrication, and the Crows were struggling to pick up any scent. Blinded by fear, he directed the entire task force into the field, leaning heavily on his intel team to discern fact from fiction. Seconds turned to minutes turned into hours, and a reality of Sophie not returning safely gripped at him. He imagined with horror the thought of telling her parents; the shattered worlds that would follow if they didn't find her in time.

Then suddenly it was over. A radio call over the coms announced she'd been found. She was bound and beaten but conscious and responsive. Jacob breathed for the first time in hours. Sophie was safe. She was safe and not one iota of that fact could be attributed to Jacob. He'd messed up, and it had almost cost him dearly.

Sophie was debriefed, and she described what she remembered which wasn't much. A sack had blindfolded her, so she couldn't identify her kidnappers. She was perplexed by the entire experience: she didn't understand what they wanted, and she certainly didn't understand why she was alive. They didn't interrogate her, and there was no violence beyond the beating she took when initially fighting off the kidnappers. She'd remained bound and isolated for hours until a hurried moment when shouts in the hall of wherever she was being held broke into her room and dragged her out. She fought the hands that gripped her and after a few moments she felt the cool breeze of the outdoors hit her. The sound of a car engine was the backdrop to the hurried breathing and grunts from her kidnappers. She was pushed down onto a surface that she concluded was the floor of a van. She kicked wildly, fighting to delay their ability to close the door when a cry of pain distracted everyone.

Suddenly there were no hands on her and the shouts had migrated toward the cry. A rattle of bullets peppered the air, and Sophie instinctively curled into the van. She couldn't determine the source, but she hoped it was enough to dodge getting hit. The rain of gunfire ended just as quickly as it started, and shouts followed:

"-leave her-"

"- but the High Priestess said-"

"- can't be taken-"

"- no casualties-"

"-run!"

The voices diminished, fleeing toward some unknown distance, and for a brief moment Sophie relaxed. This quickly disappeared at the sounds of footsteps running toward her. She twisted and, with perfect timing, launched her legs into the torso of her assailant.

The gasp, curse, and cough of surprise that followed confused her. The voice wasn't a male.

"I deserved that," the voice gasped. "Probably should've…" coughs "...announced myself first."

"Who's there?"

"Relax, you're safe," the voice choked out.

"Who are you?"

"Are you injured?" it asked in concern.

"Wh-no," Sophie scowled in frustration. "But I can't see either."

"Uh, right," the voice hesitated. Why did the voice hesitate? Why did it also feel so familiar? "Your guys will be here shortly. Hold tight till then."

And then the footsteps fled. It didn't take long for Crows, Jacob and Sophie included, to speculate that the voice was the new vigilante in town. Unfortunately the lack of CCTV in the area couldn't help them verify this.

Sophie and Jacob both took the week that followed to reset. For Sophie, the shock and memories of her kidnapping fuelled sleepless nights, and for Jacob, the fear of losing Sophie drove him to his own form of the same. He spent those nights pouring over intel surrounding this vigilante. There were rumors of two, but proof of one.

He hadn't been so closed off not to have heard about the vigilante making Gotham her home, but he'd previously waved it off as another idealist playing superhero. He hadn't paid the stories much attention… until now.

Kate returned home from a night of rooftop-hopping to find him sitting in the dark. It had been a week since the incident with Sophie, and things were slowly returning to normal. Even before she saw him she knew something was amiss in her flat. Her eyes scanned the darkened room and found him sitting on the sofa. Part of her was anxious, but part of her wondered why it had taken him so long to figure it out.

"Two years of training is enough to make you a Crow. It isn't enough to make you Batman, Kate."

"I'm not trying to be Batman."

"Tell that to Gotham's mob bosses, because I don't think they see a difference."

"I don't care what they see."

"You're putting an end to this."

"No."

"That is an order, Kate. You're in over your head, and it's getting too dangerous."

"I am not, and, with all due respect, you aren't my commanding officer, sir."

"Enough. You've stolen from me, you've endangered your own life, and you're giving Gotham false hope that things will change."

"Can't they?"

"What?"

"Why can't they change? The GCPD isn't doing it, and meanwhile you're fighting off corruption in your own ranks. This is my way to serve."

"Become a Crow if you want to serve."

She misread Jacob's tone as a commander ordering a subordinate. What she didn't hear was the fear concealed by the years of experience in hiding it. Kate shook her head in frustration. Part of it was her pride, unwilling to take command from a superior again, but part of it was the change she was seeing her night's out made. She wasn't taking down the likes of the Joker or the Riddler, but she was making a difference. She was interrupting muggings and burglaries.

One thing she hadn't accounted for was nabbing the bad guys to get booked by the GCPD or Crows. That track record for catching wasn't great, but she was learning. In that learning, she discovered not all GCPD was thrilled by her prowling the night. A handful were indifferent, a few actively pursued her, but a couple fell into the category of allies. She was building a rapport with these few GCPD duos who had stayed on from the Batman years. If they were out on patrol, it made booking the thugs easier, but if they weren't, well, the best Kate could hope was that she taught them a hard-learned lesson.

Her methods were unsavory; training in Serbia had assured that flavor in her fighting took hold. She hoped this was enough to make criminals think twice before stepping out into the shadows again, but if there's one thing growing up in the city had taught her, it was that pride and stubbornness was bred into every Gothamite.

"You're less forgiving than the other guy."

"Other guy?" Kate asked, squatting from the fire escape overlooking the alley. While she was beginning to trust this Harvey Bullock and Renee Montoya GCPD duo, she wasn't ready to offer up anything to them.

"At least I think he's a guy. Montoya?" Bullock said, zipping a set of cuffs in place of the zip ties Kate had applied on one of the three burglars. They'd attempted to break into a hardware store. The storefront glass was demolished, but beyond that mess, nothing was out of place. The shopkeep had been called and more GCPD were on their way to help board it up which meant Kate didn't have much time to linger and chat.

"I've never seen a woman with shoulders that broad," Montoya growled. Kate had been prowling for nearly four months at this point, but this was the first she was hearing of the possibility that there were more vigilantes scouring the same turf for baddies.

"We thought it was you for a while," Bullock continued. He was clearly the more friendly of the two, and Kate wondered if the good cop-bad cop was real or these two just happened to fit the stereotype. "But he looks…" he trailed off, trying to find the words to articulate his thoughts.

"Cooler," Montoya finished for Bullock.

"Cooler?" Kate scowled, her voice betraying the surprise hit at her ego.

"He has a suit. You have… a ski mask," Bullock explained. "He doesn't stick around to chit-chat like you though, and most of the force doesn't believe he's even real. We've only seen him what… twice?"

"He's not Batman," Montoya said unprompted. Kate noted that Harvey Bullock's face fell slightly, and she couldn't help but wonder how many times the partners had gotten lost in the speculation of this 'cool' mystery man being the OG of vigilantes.

Before she could ask anymore questions, the sirens of incoming back-up was her cue to leave. Kate wasn't sure how to take this news. A part of her was excited to know another shadow was lurking in Gotham and fighting for the same thing she was, but another part of her was nervous. There was a schoolyard worry about whether they'd end up friends, indifferent to each other's existence, or at odds.

As luck would have it, it didn't take long for Kate to have her first run-in with this other vigilante. She had been chasing after a mugger when she turned a corner and found the broad-shouldered form taking down her target. After the first second of shock passed, she couldn't help but agree: he did look cooler.

Three quick and successive strikes had the mugger on the ground. He quickly adjusted his stance into a defensive position at the sight of Kate, and she noted it was reminiscent of a boxer. She stowed this nugget away and quickly spoke to clarify the situation.

"I'm not with him."

The figure didn't say anything, and her words only caused his stance to relax slightly.

"You're that woman the cops talk about," he said. His voice was surprisingly soft spoken for the presence his form had. He only had an inch or two on Kate's height, but he had the fitness of a well-tuned machine. The added bulk of the suit only enhanced this.

"And you're that shadow in the cool suit."

"Batwing."

"What?"

"The name's Batwing."

"You gave yourself a name?" Kate asked in disbelief. A groan from the mugger at Batwing's feet brought their attention back to the task at hand. She watched Batwing reach toward his waist where a utility belt blended seamlessly with the black suit.

Renee was right, he wasn't Batman, but the suit could have fooled anyone. With the exception of a cape, it was reminiscent of the full-bodied armor adorning Batman in the final years. She remained a few feet back, but even from that distance and in the shadows, she couldn't help but notice the bat emblem branded on the chest. A million questions raced through her head, and she had half a mind to ask them when Batwing looked up at her.

"You going to just stand there?" he scowled, using the zip tie he withdrew from his belt to quickly bind the mugger.

Kate quickly phoned in the location as Batwing located the discarded handbag that had been tightly clutched in the mugger's hands until moments earlier. He tossed it next to the barely conscious figure before stepping back and reaching once again toward his belt. He extracted a gun-like shape and pointed it toward the sky.

"You aren't going to stay?" Kate asked. "What if he gets away-"

"Of course not," he said simply. "But unlike you, I don't need to make myself seen."

So it was going to be like that, Kate thought with a scowl as he pulled the trigger and, in an instant, flew up toward the nearest rooftop.

She'd never sought him out, and, as far as she knew, he'd never sought her out, yet they managed to run into each other frequently. A handful of these interactions over the next few weeks gave Kate enough to go off. Batwing worked alone; this suited her just fine - she'd have rejected a cross-over appearance if offered anyway. Their run-ins were cordial enough, and in these moments Kate was beginning to distinguish obvious differences between the two: Batwing, for one, had the Batman's toolbox at his fingertips while she was limited to whatever she'd 'borrowed' from the Crows and managed to purchase second hand. Kate knew better than to ask, and he didn't volunteer any particulars, but there was an obvious connection between him and the dark knight.

One other key difference was their fighting styles: she was better, and this pleased her. Yes, he was bigger and could throw a harder punch, but his wheelhouse was limited. She chalked this up to her training; Batwing clearly leaned into a preference for boxing while Kate had an arsenal of moves and techniques she'd acquired over the years. The boxing and takedown techniques reminded her of days at Point Rock, and she couldn't help but wonder if he had a military background.

Weeks went by like this until an occasion came up that couldn't

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Oh drop the act. I know you have connections to Batman. Does he have any other forms of city surveillance you can tap into?"

Batwing paused for a moment in thought. "What would you need something like that for?"

"Someone's been kidnapped."

"It's Gotham. Someone's always being kidnapped."

"This is different. This is… this is personal."

"No."

"What? Why?"

"That's not what the symbol is for. It's not for personal gain."

"What? First, it shouldn't matter the relation: it's a human being. Second, it's not for personal… " Kate asked, a flare of urgency in her voice. "If this was your… your mother or your dad would you just stand by and let it happen?"

"That's different."

"No, that's this. This is that kind of personal. We have a chance of saving someone's life."

Numbers were exchanged, and within an hour she heard a chime notifying her that Batwing had found something. They met on a rooftop, confirmed the information, and in less than five minutes, had silently made a pact to raid the warehouse.

The fight that ensued wasn't really a fight at all. By the time they had snuck into the space, they had little time to execute an attack before the gang fleed. They pursued from opposite directions and converged at the exit, attempting an offensive strategy to catch who they could. Unfortunately, it was clear that their goons' orders were to avoid just that: they scampered in every direction, abandoning Sophie for the sewers.

Batwing pursued two while Kate stayed back to check on Sophie. Much like Jacob mere blocks away in the back of a Crows armored truck, she let out a breath she'd been holding ever since she'd heard of Sophie's capture over the radios.

It was three days before Kate caught sight of Batwing's silhouette leaping across an alley. She followed and found him waiting for her on the parapet.

"Did you take the fire escape?" his voice called.

"Only because wall crawling is for Spiderman," she joked.

"Spiderman?"

"Different universe," Kate waved away.

Silence fell between them as Kate climbed onto the parapet next to Batwing. Together they stared out onto the city.

"Thanks," Kate said after a minute. "For, you know…"

"You don't do this very often, do you?"

"Fight bad guys?"

"Say 'thank you'."

"Is it that obvious?" Kate admitted.

"It's definitely hard to miss."

"A little bit like a dozen bad guys fleeing from a warehouse."

"Are you accusing me of being sloppy?"

"I'm just saying maybe next time you can catch one of them," Kate smirked.

"And maybe next time you'll pick the mission over your girlfriend," Batwing replied coolly.

"She was my mission."

Batwing considered her words for a moment. "How was she?"

"Rattled, but fine."

"Good," he said, hopping down onto the roof. "Did she see you?"

"No."

"Good," he repeated. "You need a better mask."

"Yea? Maybe I'll swap a ski mask for a bat cowl."

"No. But here," he said, extending his hand to her, and she realized he was holding out a grappling hook. "Best to practice before you try it in the field though."

"Really?" Kate asked in surprise, taking the gun into her hands.

"Yea, if you do it wrong you'll dislocate your arm."

"No, I just meant… thanks."

"Not bad, you're getting better already," Batwing replied dryly. "Get good enough and maybe next time I won't have to wait twenty minutes for your ass to get up here."