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Chapter Text

The worst part of the funeral was the aftermath. Marinette's parents were buried in the ground, their shared grave covered with flowers. Strangers offered condolences to Marinette, but nothing made the ache in her heart go away. Nothing could bring her parents back from the dead. Marinette was fourteen years old and she was an orphan.

Grand-mère Gina sent a bouquet of flowers and called Marinette on the morning of the funeral. "I'm so sorry for your loss, sweetheart. I wish I could have come to Paris, but you know how much I loath air travel and it would have taken me a whole to drive to Paris from Moscow. Moscow is such a beautiful city, especially in autumn. We should both take a trip there together in a few years when you're out of high school. I've got to go, sweetheart, I have a train to catch, but I'll talk to you later. Tomorrow, maybe. Goodbye."

Marinette barely got a word in when she talked to Gina, but her scatterbrained condolences were still a better effort than Grand-père Rolland. He lived ten minutes away from the cemetery, yet still didn't show up to the funeral. Instead, he sent a store-bought card, addressed to "Marie Dupain". Marinette knew that when it came down to it, there was no way that she would be staying with any of her Dupain family.

On Sabine's side of the family, she was the only member to live outside of China and the only member to speak French or English. French and English were the two languages that Marinette spoke fluently, so a translator was employed to pass on the news. Though Marinette would have liked to stay with family, moving to China was too drastic a change for the still-grieving girl.

There was a hollowness to her heart as Marinette realized that she had no family to her name. There was no one to take her in. She felt empty and useless, like a shattered glass that would never hold a drop of water again. All she could think of was that awful, awful night when Marinette's whole world crumbled around her.

The night of the fire, a neighbor had brought Marinette a jacket. It was a few sizes too big, dwarfing Marinette’s tiny form as she shivered in the cold, watching her house burn down with her parents inside. It rubbed up against the raw burns on Marinette’s shoulders, but she refused to get in the ambulance until her parents got out of the burning building. As the sun rose, Marinette had to be dragged, screaming, into the back of the ambulance to be taken to the hospital. Her parents never came out of the burning ruins of her former home.

That heavy brown leather jacket turned out to be the only worldly possession Marinette owned. Even the clothes she wore out of the burning building were too damaged to be salvaged. Marinette was taken to the hospital and left there until further notice. She was left there until a family member could be located to take her in. But Marinette knew the truth - there was no more family to take her in.

--

Marinette felt awful, and not just because her parents had died a week ago. She had breathed in so much smoke she could swear she could taste it with every shallow breath. The inhaler helped, but every time she used it she was reminded of the fire that took her parents. The burns were the worst part. Marinette cursed herself for grabbing the cotton shawl and not the wool coat when she made the split-second decision to flee her bedroom. Wool had flame retardant properties. Cotton was easily combustible. The shawl had caught fire when she escaped her bedroom. Her shoulders had second-degree burns. The injury would take weeks to heal. The scars would last forever.

Even worse was the DNA test. Her social worker, a dour woman named Alice, seemed to think it was a good idea. Tom Dupain and Sabine Cheng weren't her biological parents, so there was a chance that the test could discover biological relatives who would be willing to house Marinette for the four years until she turned eighteen. Marinette couldn't quite pinpoint her feelings about that aspect of the situation. Was it a betrayal to her adoptive parents to want to be taken in by her family, even if it wasn't the family she was raised in? Should Marinette want to enter the foster care system for a second time, in some unnecessary tribute to her now-deceased adoptive parents?

Marinette held the letter gently, scared to wrinkle or crease it, so nervous that she illogically believed that damaging the envelope might change the nature of the results inside. This was the moment of truth. If the DNA test couldn't find her a biological relative who was willing to take her, a stranger, into their home, then Marinette would be sent into the foster care system. Marinette still didn't know which option she wanted, but really, it didn't matter what she wanted.

As Marinette tore open the DNA test results, she felt a familiar tinge of guilt, which had been present since she first filled the test kit with saliva. Tom Dupain and Sabine Cheng may not have been her biological parents, but they were her parents in every other sense of the word. They had adopted her when she was just five years old and still grieving the loss of her biological mother, a woman that Marinette now only knew through pictures. Tom and Sabine had raised Marinette, never seeming to care that Marinette wasn't their daughter by blood.

Marinette pulled the results out of the envelope. Alice grabbed the results out of her hand before Marinette even had a chance to understand what the words and figures meant.

"Give it back," protested Marinette, sitting up in the hospital bed.

Alice ignored Marinette as she skimmed the letter. "What was your birth mother's name again?"

"Julia Woods."

"Alright, then this must be your mother's side of the family on this page. We contacted them when you were an infant, the first time you were in the system, but no one volunteered to take you then. We could pursue that option again, but adoptability tends to decrease with age."

"What about my father's side of the family?"

Alice shuffled the papers, searching for the right one. "Here it is. It looks like you're in luck, Marinette. The DNA test was able to identify your father. I'll get in contact with him as soon as possible to ask if he would like to take custody of you."

"What's his name?" asked Marinette, wide-eyed and in shock.

"Bruce Wayne."

--

The flight was miserable. Marinette was lucky to have a window seat. She pressed her forehead against the glass and pressed the sleeve of her borrowed jacket against her eyes so it would soak up the tears before they had a chance to fall. Marinette had nothing left, no luggage to check at the airport, nothing in her carry-on to amuse her during the seven-hour flight. None of the clothes she wore were hers - a tragedy, considering fashion was Marinette's biggest passion. The shoes weren't hers, scuffed boots that had been worn in by different feet and left blisters on her heels. The jeans and sweater were ill-fitting, but Marinette sucked it up and thanked Alice for delivering the clothes. She might be picky about her clothes, but she wasn't going to be ungrateful.

All of her designs, her clothes, her fabric, her sketchbooks, were lost to the fire. Marinette would have to start from scratch, and that was only if her biological Father, Bruce Wayne, approved of fashion as a hobby. Marinette didn't know much about him. She had only done the surface level of research - skimming his Wikipedia article on Alice's phone while she and Alice waited for the plane to start boarding. Bruce Wayne was inhumanly rich. His company was known globally as a leader in technology. Marinette figured that he would want her to join the business club at her new private school and major in business and never touch a bolt of fabric again in her life. Imagining the loss of her greatest passion disheartened her.

Marinette stumbled off of the plane, legs shaking like a newborn fawn. She felt cold and nervous, almost sick with anxiety. She couldn't quite remember how to walk, let alone introduce herself to the biological father she had never met before. As she walked into the terminal, her eyes scanned for her father, landing upon the man himself, Bruce Wayne. He held a piece of posterboard, reading Marinette Dupain-Cheng in black calligraphy.

Marinette felt her brain freeze up as she walked towards her father. It was all so real, now that he was right in front of her. What was she supposed to say? What was she supposed to do? Who would her father want her to be? Marinette was fourteen years old, old enough that she was her own person, with her own hopes and dreams. She didn't think that she could pretend to be happy pretending to be a stranger's daughter.

"Hi, I'm Marinette." The words came out of her mouth, but Marinette heard them like it was someone else speaking, as her mouth seemed to take over for her when her brain failed.

He looked at her with something akin to amazement, as if he couldn't believe his eyes that she was standing in front of him. Discovering that you had sole custody of your fourteen-year-old daughter who you had never met before was probably a shock, so Marinette didn't blame for the disbelief in his expression. "Hello, Marinette. I'm Bruce, your father."

Marinette figured that she was probably supposed to hug him. Instead, she scuffed the toe of her shoes against the ground and told him, "I didn't check a suitcase so we don't have to wait for baggage."

Bruce's face softened into pity. "I'll have the girls take you out shopping sometime soon. Or if you aren't up for a shopping trip, I can send them out to pick you up some clothes."

"Okay." Marinette didn't know who 'the girls' were, but from what she had read from the Wikipedia page, Bruce Wayne had a habit of mentoring, fostering, and adopting children. Marinette now had siblings - and quite a few of them. She always wanted siblings when she was younger, but this wasn't how she wanted it to happen. She would give up the dream of siblings dream in a heartbeat to get her parents backs.

"This is for you." Bruce handed Marinette the sign he was holding. "My youngest son, Damian - your half-brother by blood - did the calligraphy. He hasn't always taken to new people, so I think this is his idea of a peace-offering."

"Oh, thank you?" Marinette took the sign and looked a little closer at it. The calligraphy was beautifully done, so flawless that it looked professional. Marinette was beginning to regret her lack of research. She hadn't even known that any of Bruce's children were biologically related to him.

They walked to the car, Marinette keeping a few feet of distance between her and her father. It was difficult standing next to him, knowing that of the four parents she stumbled across in her short fourteen years on this Earth, he was the only one she had left.

"It's a half-hour drive from the airport to the Manor. I can put on some music if you'd like?"

Marinette nodded. She didn't particularly want to listen to music - in fact, she would have preferred the silence - but she had a feeling that Bruce would try to fill any silence with small talk, which sounded unbearable. She could barely keep her eyes open, let alone be sociable. The jetlag seemed to kick in as soon as the music started, soft and calming, and Marinette was out like a light.

Chapter Text

An interesting phenomenon that Bruce never expected to learn: the shock of learning that you have a secret child, concealed from you for the majority of their childhood, does not lessen the second time around. Instead, that shock only grows the second time you are informed of your nearly-adult biological child, whose existence you had no prior knowledge of (and Bruce could not stress this enough, that five years ago he lived his life with complete certainty that he would never biologically reproduce - yet apparently at the same time he had biological children in two different continents).

When Bruce found out that the ten-year-old child assassin sitting in the passenger seat of the Batmobile was his biological child, he was stunned. When Bruce found out that there was an orphaned fourteen-year-old French civilian who happened to have the misfortune of containing half of his DNA, he was horrified.

"I have a daughter?"

"Yes, Mister Wayne." the woman on the other end of the telephone patiently explained, "Her name is Marinette and she's fourteen years old. Her adoptive parents recently passed away in a household fire. When we tested her DNA for living relatives, you came up as her biological father."

"Who's her mother?"

Bruce could hear the sounds of the woman typing. "Julia Woods, if you recognize that name?"

Bruce did not recognize the name, but a quick google search jogged his memory. She was a model, one of the many models that Bruce slept with in his efforts to keep up his womanizing charade (now, with five children to reasonably occupy his time, Bruce had long since ended that charade). Bruce noted that her Wikipedia page listed her as deceased, having passed on before Marinette was even a year old. "Ah, yes, Julia. I remember her."

"Given your close biological relation to Marinette, if you are interested, I could transfer custody to you. Otherwise, she'll be going into the Parisian foster care system where she will receive quality care for the next four years."

On one hand, Bruce sincerely doubted the quality of care that the Parisian foster care system could give for a grieving girl. Marinette deserved a longing (and permanent) home. On the other hand, his household wasn't the best for a child who needed a calm and stable environment. The fact that the family business was dressing up in costume and fighting crime was not to be overlooked. How could Bruce morally allow Marinette to get mixed up in his dangerous business?

There were many mistakes that Bruce had made in his life. Abandoning a child in need would never be one of them. Without hesitation, Bruce opened up his home to his (technically not orphaned, but functionally she had no caregivers left, except for him) daughter "Of course I'm interested. Marinette is my daughter. I would do anything for her."

Bruce's brain went into autopilot mode as he sorted out the details of Marinette's arrival. The one detail he couldn't seem to get off of the forefront of his mind: how in the world was he going to tell his kids that they're getting a new sister?

--

"What's her name?"

"Seriously B, another one!?"

"Is she an assassin? A hero?"

Bruce spoke evenly as he addressed his children's questions, not allowing the hurricane of emotions he was feeling to get past his mask. Suppressing emotions was one of his most well-honed skills. "Her name is Marinette. She's French, recently orphaned by her adoptive family. As far as I can tell, she has no business in the hero world. She's a civilian through-and-through."

"Yeah, a civilian for now. Let's see how that lasts for you."

"How old is she? Is she my older sister or my younger sister?"

"She had better not be older than me. I will not tolerate some civilian becoming your heir."

The last comment was made by a very disgruntled Damian. Bruce felt his heart sink. After four years of raising Damian, Bruce thought that he had broken Damian's belief in his own 'blood son' superiority over the rest of his kids. Now, it seemed that Damian was falling back on old habits.

"Marinette just lost her parents and I'm sure she's feeling an incredible amount of grief and survivor's guilt so I need you all to be kind to her." Bruce aimed that last comment towards Damian, whose face softened slightly. "She's fourteen - six months younger than you, Damian. That ought not to change the way you treat her. She is my daughter and you all are my children, no matter how you came into my life."

Damian nodded, his face downturned in what Bruce noted to be a rare show of embarrassment from his son. "I'm sorry Father. I was simply... surprised."

"Now, Marinette will be here in two days. Treat her delicately, but treat her like family."

Cass placed her hand on top of Bruce's and stated with conviction, "Little sister."

Bruce exhaled, relief washing over him. Of course, his kids would be fine. While there were plenty of obstacles that had faced them, no matter how traumatized the children entered the Manor, they left as family. Even Damian, prickly, abrasive, and entitled as he was when he first arrived, was now sensitive, thoughtful, and loyal.

Yet a lingering doubt wouldn't leave him alone, that despite the progress all five of his children had made, Bruce always seemed to make things worse. He pushed his kids too far, pushed them away, never knew the right time for serious advice and the right time for comfort. He pushed Dick out of the house. Jason was killed because of him. Tim lost his spleen saving him. Damian and Cass were the only two kids Bruce actually improved, and that wasn't saying much, considering they were both raised by assassins.

Bruce sighed, ending his overthinking in the middle of his train of thought. He had to be better, for Marinette's sake.

--

"Did I do a good job of raising you?"

Dick raised one eyebrow, an amused smile on his face as he teased Bruce, "Well I think I turned out okay. Are you insinuating that you don't."

Bruce shook his head. He loved how lighthearted his first son could be, but this wasn't the time for jokes, not when Marinette would arrive in less than two days. "That wasn't what I meant. I just want to know, was there anything I could have done differently - especially in the earlier days, when you were still grieving?"

Dick shrugged. "You did the best that you could. I was so angry at first, so hellbent on getting my revenge against Tony Zucco, and you helped me see past my anger. Without you, I probably would have murdered him. I can't imagine what that would have done to me."

"I'm concerned about how to handle Marinette," Bruce admitted. "I looked into her parent's death. The fire was caused by the wiring - although the fire department isn't sure exactly how, since as far as they can tell, everything was installed perfectly. The official report calls it a freak accident."

"I can't imagine how Marinette feels. Her parents are gone and she has nothing to blame except for dumb luck."

"It was a senseless tragedy," Bruce agreed. "While I'm sure that grief counseling will help her, I know from experience that she'll need help from inside the house."

Bruce wished that Dick had more substantial advice to give him. Fortunately, Bruce knew exactly which of his children to go to for real advice. Unfortunately, given the sheer quantity of tragedy that his childhood contained, Jason wouldn't be happy when Bruce asked him for advice in fixing a childhood.

--

"Am I a bad father?"

Jason gave Bruce a look of sharp annoyance. "Don't ask me that. Ask Dick, ask Tim, ask anyone besides me because I'm not going to tell you what you want to hear."

Bruce expected this reaction. Jason didn't like to talk about the past, neither the bad parts nor the good. He gently stopped Jason from storming out of the kitchen with a hand on his son's shoulder. "That's why I'm asking you. I want to be better. I need to be better."

Jason sighed. "I'm going to assume that this is about Marinette."

Bruce nodded. "I can't fail another one of my children."

"Look, you weren't a bad father in the beginning. You turned my life around when you adopted me. But I never should have been Robin, no matter how much I wanted it. Balancing the relationship between Batman and Robin and the relationship between father and son - it just didn't work. Your expectations for Robin were so high, and I understand that those expectations kept us safe, but they also crushed me. You expected perfection from Robin and those expectations dug so deep into our relationship that I started to think you expected perfection from Jason Todd as well. That's what drove Dick away and that's what drove me away too. And then I died and..."

Jason took a deep breath. "Just promise me you won't let Marinette become a bat. Promise me that she won't turn out like the rest of us."

"I swear to you, I'll keep Marinette safe. If I can help it, she'll never learn about our family's secret."

Jason breathed out a sigh of relief. "Thank you, B."

--

Bruce could barely stand to look straight at her. She appeared so breakable that he was afraid that if he looked too closely she would crack right in front of him. Marinette Dupain-Cheng - his daughter - was a tiny slip of a girl, dwarfed by the big brown leather coat she was wearing. He could see the bandages poking out from the collar of her shirt. He had read the medical report - second-degree burns on her shoulders and back and damage to her lungs from the smoke.

Yet Bruce couldn't keep his eyes off of her as she slept in the passenger seat of his car. He wanted to pull off to the side of the road and just watch her, the daughter he never knew he had, the way that parents watch their newborn children sleep. Instead, Bruce forced himself to keep his eyes on the road and keep driving. He wanted to get Marinette home, to the safety of the Manor, somewhere she could heal, both physically and mentally.

He had expected to feel sympathy for the girl. What he hadn't expected was the rush of emotion he got when he first laid eyes on her - protective, anger, sadness, anxiety, pride, hope. It was like all the feelings of raising a child for fourteen years had been stuffed into one moment. Bruce could still feel the aftershocks every time he glanced over at her sleeping face.

That poor girl, she deserved so much better than the hand that life dealt her. Marinette should have lived with her adoptive parents in their quaint little bakery. She should have lived her teenage years with the greatest worry being a crush on one of her friends at school. She never should have lost her parents, not so young that she wasn't even out of the house.

It seemed that proximity to Bruce Wayne directly correlated to a ruined childhood, even with an ocean between poor Marinette and himself. Perhaps terrible misfortune was a genetic trait.

Bruce shook his head to clear his thoughts. He couldn't allow himself to spiral, not with his grieving daughter curled up in the passenger seat. For Marinette's sake, he had to be strong, to guide her through the devastation she was undoubtedly feeling. He would be perfect for Marinette. He would give her the idyllic childhood that the rest of his kids never got. He would protect her and he would keep her safe.

Bruce gripped the steering wheel with determination as he pulled into the driveway of Wayne Manor. One final promise rang through his head: he would not fail another one of his children.