Chapter Text
Bruce’s chest heaves, minutely shifting the bat emblazoned across his chest armor. The very same armor that razor-sharp golden claws had just raked across, thankfully unable to cut all the way through the layers of kevlar.
The child in his grasp thrashes and tries to wrench their too-thin wrists from his grasp. They’re strong, stronger than any child should be, save perhaps Clark back in his youth, and certainly much stronger than any child who appears this thin and malnourished. He’s not quite as strong the other talons Bruce has fought, but so far the child has easily made up for that weakness by being even more quick and agile than any of the others. It’s a miracle Bruce had managed to pin him like this.
Not wanted to waste his shot, despite the shock running through his system and buzzing his thoughts, he wraps one big hand around both of the boy’s small wrists and fishes out a set of meta cuffs from his belt. He slaps them around the boy’s wrist, then lunges to catch him when the child goes bonelessly limp the moment the cuffs are activated.
Bruce drops to his knees, cradling the little talon half in his lap, taking care to support his head. Talons don’t need to breathe, but the boy whimpers, and Bruce gently pulls off his mask to reveal wide golden eyes. He’s still conscious, terrified gaze flitting from Bruce’s cowl to the bat symbol to the shadows of the alley and then back to Bruce’s face again. He chomps down hard on his lower lip to swallow the next sound, black blood immediately welling up from the harsh treatment.
“Hey,” Bruce says softly, something swooping in his stomach at the sight. Telegraphing his movements and moving slow and careful, he reaches out and tugs the boy’s lip free from his teeth. “Don’t do that. You’ll hurt yourself.”
The boy stares, like he’s insane. Like he’s speaking a foreign language. Maybe he is, but clearly the child knows enough English to have hissed out “Batman, the Court of Owls has sentenced you to die,” at the start of their encounter.
Maybe it’s just the idea of another person who doesn’t want him to hurt that is so foreign to him. That thought hurts more than any of the sluggishly-bleeding cuts now littering Bruce’s body. Not that he wants to praise an assassin, but the boy is very skilled. He likely could’ve taken Bruce down if they hadn’t both been so caught off guard, if Bruce hadn’t managed to recover faster.
The boy shifts, and Bruce lets him. Trembling, either from fear or from exhaustion and pain, the talon lifts his cuffed hands to stare at his palm, now colored a deep, rich blue. Blood still trails from his claws, but the talon just wipes it away to get a clearer view. He scrubs at his palm again, as if he expects the blue to wipe away like the smear of Bruce’s blood.
Absently, Bruce reaches up to ghost his own fingers over the underside of his jaw where the talon’s claws had raked against his skin. It stings horribly, but he knows that somewhere beneath the blood, there blooms a splotch of color. He wonders what it will look like, the boy’s soulmark, what brilliant color he will leave behind on Bruce’s skin.
It shouldn’t be possible, none of this should. Bruce’s soulmark shouldn’t be blooming on a talon’s skin, but then again there shouldn’t be any talons who are this young, this small and fragile and scared.
“It’s a soulmark,” Bruce explains, letting his mouth and muscle memory take control as his mind and heart fall back in their confused panic. “It means that I’m meant to be a person who’s very important to you. And you’re meant to be a person who’s very important to me.”
He swallows the lump in his throat, suddenly imagining what must only be a fraction of the horrible things that this boy he was supposed to love dearly has been forced to endure.
“It means,” he continues, this time letting his heart decide. It hasn’t had the chance to drive in so long, but right now the burning need to help this boy is stronger than anything he’s ever fought. “It means that I’m going to take care of you. I’m going to help you find somewhere safe, where no one can ever hurt you again. I’m not going to let anyone hurt you ever again.”
The boy just keeps staring at him, confusing and disbelieve etched in the furrow between his brows and the tremble in his lips. He blinks, long eyelashes clumping together with otherwise unshed tears.
Slowly, the child shakes his head. “No,” he whispers, voice hoarse from what Bruce prays is simply disuse. “Not possible. The Court is strong and I—I am loyal. I’m good. I’m a—a talon.”
“You don’t have to be,” Bruce says, shifting to get them both into a more comfortable position. “And I can protect you from the Court. I want to keep you safe. Will you at least let me try?”
The boy’s gaze shifts to Bruce’s jaw, presumably staring at the soulmark there, then he looks back to his own palm. “If you fail,” the boy says carefully, like each new word is a chore all of its own, “they will kill you. I will be hurt. So much hurt.” He screws his eyes shut, sudden horror making him shudder, a breath he wouldn’t have to take except to speak hitching in his chest.
“I know,” Bruce admits. “That just makes me all the more determined to protect you. You don’t deserve this. You deserve to be safe and healthy and happy, not hurt or punished, not ever.”
“I’m a murderer,” the boy sobs, his eyes stare at the sky above. There is grief there, beneath the golden numbness, for all the lives he'd been forced to take.
Bruce shakes his head. “You won’t ever have to hurt anyone ever again. You could be safe.”
The child doesn’t cry, doesn’t sob, doesn’t let a single tear fall, but his clenched jaw and pressed-together lips tremble like just might, and suddenly he's nodding his head frantically, hands gripping at Bruce’s desperately, like he might turn around and take it all back now, like he might get up and leave the boy helpless and hurt in the dark and grime of the alleyway.
“Please,” he whispers. “Please, please, please. I don’t want to. I didn’t want to. Please, take me with you. Please, I don’t want—I don’t want to hurt. ” Bruce doesn’t know if he means he doesn’t want to hurt other people or if he doesn’t want to be hurt himself. Frankly, he doesn’t care. He’s not letting either option happen to this child ever again, he swears that much on his parents’ graves.
It’s a bit odd, if he tries to think about it too much. He’d set out earlier that night on patrol in hopes of uncovering a lead as to where a group of traffickers planned to hold their next exchange, only to be intercepted by a tiny masked figure with golden claws and an arsenal of deathly-sharp knives strapped to his chest. He’s fought talons before, but none that moved quite like this, none that were so clearly young, and certainly none that had taken a single swipe at his bare skin only to pull away with his soulmark now decorating them. Bruce now has eight soulmarks, even if two of them are faded and ache when it’s about to rain. That’s more soulmarks than he’d ever thought he could be worthy of, but most of them had at least made a bit of sense before now.
Except, maybe this makes sense too. Bruce has always had a soft spot for children, and an even bigger heart for the children that Gotham’s darker and nastier sides have taken and hurt and changed forever. Maybe this makes sense, because who else would have the power to help this poor child except for Batman? Who else is going to protect him, keep him safe and healthy, give him the childhood he’s been denied thus far, like the childhood of Bruce’s that got cut too short? Maybe this makes sense if he thinks about it a little bit more, or maybe the sight of the soulmark is blinding him and twisting his thoughts to make this all seem rational.
This is certainly not even close to what he’d had planned, what he’d expected tonight to be, but Bruce gathers the boy close anyway, helping him rise to his feet and balance on shaky legs.
“Can you walk?” Bruce asks gently, a hand still resting on the boy’s shoulders, keeping him close and holding him steady.
The boy takes a single fumbling step before his legs give out. Bruce catches him easily before he can faceplant into the concrete.
“I’m sorry,” he whimpers. “I’m sorry, I can walk, it’s just. Weak.” He nods at the cuffs around his wrists, sapping his powers and strength. Bruce suddenly worries about what prolonged loss of his healing factor could do to him. “I’m sorry.”
“That’s alright,” he reassures. “May I carry you then? My car isn’t far. I promise, I won’t ever do anything to hurt you.”
After a long moment in which neither of them move, Bruce waiting patiently for permission, the boy nods. “I’m sorry,” he whispers again as Bruce scoops him up into his arms.
“Shh,” Bruce hushes him gently. “There’s nothing to be sorry for. I’ll take the cuffs off soon, I promise. I’m very sorry you have to wear them for now.”
The child goes quiet after that, burying his face in Bruce’s shoulder as though he’s trying to hide away from the world and Bruce doesn’t blame him one bit, just holds him close, tough gentler and softer than its even been while in costume before. The weight in his arms is so light, so far from a burden, and it just solidifies the feeling building in his gut that this is the right thing to do.
What else is he supposed to do, leave one of soulmates behind to continue to be hurt and twisted into a deadly assassin? Not a chance in hell.
The car really isn’t too far, and it’s not long before Bruce is tucking the child into the passenger seat and away from the oppressive darkness and evil lurking outside in Gotham. The boy stares at him in bewilderment as he buckles his seatbelt.
“This won’t hold me,” he says almost coldly, merely an observation, a statement of fact. Then, he catches himself and his eyes go wide. “Not that I would try to leave. Promise. You don’t have to tie me up, I won’t run I promise. Please.”
“It’s not meant to hold you,” Bruce explains. He tugs lightly at the seatbelt, showing how it stretches and pulls away from the boy’s body. Then, he presses the button to unlatch it, taking care to ensure that the child sees how easily it is to escape before buckling him back up. “It’s meant to keep you safe, just in case there’s an accident. I told you, I don’t want anything to hurt you ever again.”
“Will you—” He cuts himself off, biting his lip and ducking his chin. “Never mind.”
“Will I what, child?” Bruce asks. “You can ask me whatever you’d like. I promise, I won’t be upset.”
But the boy just shakes his head, no other sounds escaping him. Bruce sighs inwardly.
“Alright. That’s alright, chum. I know that trust is hard to build. I won’t fault you for that.”
Then he catches sight of the way the boy shivers in the chill of the night and a sudden breeze that blows by. It’s hardly freezing out, but Bruce knows from research and past experience that talons are particularly sensitive to the cold. He curses himself for not having realized it sooner, but then again he supposes the boy hadn’t had too much time to feel cold between the quick and harsh fight and the subsequent conversation and walk wrapped up in Bruce’s arms.
“Let’s get you somewhere warm, okay? Warm and safe.”
His only response is watching the boy’s fists curl tightly together. Bruce can’t even imagine how terrifying this must be for him, to be swept away by a stranger making promises of safety and comfort that he has no way to guarantee, especially when all the young talon has ever known is pain and blood. He’s so remarkably brave, and Bruce’s heart swells and aches in equal measure. It’s a remarkable gift, even if children should never be forced to be this courageous.
Bruce reaches out and takes both of the boy’s hands in his, gently uncurling his clenched fists. Blood drips from the places where his golden claws had gauged into the flesh of his palms. The skin is already knitting itself back together, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t pain.
Bruce rubs him thumb comfortingly over the tops of the child’s fingers, careful not to touch the claws themselves. The black veins stand out starkly against pale skin. Carefully, he flips his hands, once more catching himself staring at the truly remarkable sight of his soulmark on the child’s palm.
“We’ll find a safe way to remove these, chum. I’ll find a cure for all of this. You won’t have to be a talon ever again.”
The boy’s face twists, unbelieving but so, so hopeful. Impossibly stubborn determination slots itself into Bruce’s heart at the sight. He will not let this child down. He has a new mission right now.