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It’s 3 am in Gotham. Prime hours for acts both criminal and mischievous. While other cities may boast bustling nightlife most Gothamites know better than to wander out after dark. Those who dare are usually either up to no good, braver than they are smart, or from out of town. A lone teenager wandering down the middle of an empty street could be an indicator of all three.
Batman drops down from the low roof he’d been perching on and silently approaches the teen from behind.
"Should you be out this late?"
"Uuuuuuugghhhhhh.” His person of interest stops in their tracks and groans loudly, head tilted up to the sky. A small part of him had hoped they would jump in surprise. His robins are no fun to sneak up on anymore.
“For fuck’s sake , I know I look really young but- wait, Batman!? Seriously?? " The teen stumbles back a step after turning and realizing who was calling them out. The plastic convenience store bag in their hand swings wildly.
Batman stands stone still in front of the gawking midnight wanderer. Outwardly indifferent but internally preening.
"Of course,” the teen sighs defeatedly, hanging their head. “Of course, I'd have to deal with the Bat tonight, too. Fucking brilliant. Outstanding performance universe, I hate you so much."
The teen, who upon closer inspection, looks like a 15-year-old boy, is obviously having a bad night. A ratty blue zip-up hoodie hangs off one shoulder revealing a thin black shirt underneath. Though his pants look to be in much better condition than his top, the battered red Converse on his feet are clearly past the end of their natural life. The whole ensemble offers little defence against the cold Gotham night air. The teenager’s dark hair is tousled, sticking up in all directions. His left eye is cradled by the shadow of an old bruise. All together, it creates the image of an easy target. Regardless of his actual age, he's still prey for any unsavoury characters that have no qualms attacking younger-looking folks.
Batman speaks up, interrupting the young man’s verbal tangent against the fates.
"Forgive me for the assumption. Would you allow me to walk you home? I wouldn't want anyone else to try to take advantage of your… solitude."
The teen levels Batman with a look of immense exasperation. Perhaps even pity? A perplexing emotion to see on such a young face.
"Bats, baby, that is sweet of you, like for real, but I absolutely do not need protection around here and following me home is super creepy so thanks but no thanks byyye!"
Before Batman can open his mouth to object, the boy spins on his heel and takes off running down the street with his white plastic bag flailing haphazardly.
Batman watches in stunned silence as the youth trips on his untied shoelace at the exact moment his bag rips, sending both the runner and the bag’s contents spilling across the pavement. A nosey observer starts laughing out their window, a cigarette in hand. Good old Gotham hospitality.
Taking slow measured steps Batman creeps towards the young man lying face flat on the ground who is not making any attempt to move from where he fell. This kind of clumsy behaviour might explain the old bruising he observed earlier. For a moment Batman worries that the teenager knocked himself out. He nearly jumps when the boy suddenly pushes himself up and shouts "FUCK!" The teen rolls over and mutters angrily at the sky.
"This is my life, huh? This is really it. I should have just moved to the zone, screw it, this sucks."
His disgruntled mumbling cuts off when he notices Batman standing a few paces away.
"Oh, you're still here. Kudos for that I guess."
For all the questions Batman has he starts with the most obvious.
“Are you alright?”
The teen sits up slowly, keeping his face downcast.
“Listen, man, it’s been a long day. Long week . I just want to go home and eat stupid junk food.”
“Are you sure you don’t want company?”
“You sure are persistent, Bats. Anyone ever tell you that?”
Batman doesn’t dignify that with a reply.
“Fine, let’s compromise. Help me pick my shit up and I’ll let you stalk me home from a distance. Would that make you feel better?”
“I can work with that.”
10 minutes and 12 assorted snacks later Batman retreats to the rooftops to give the teen his requested illusion of privacy. Batman doesn’t intend on following the boy all the way home, just long enough to make sure he knows where he’s going.
A notification from Red Robin comes in through his earpiece.
“Hey Major B, there’s something weird going on downtown. Hood’s picking up some bad vibes in his part of town too. I think you might want to check it out.”
The kid disappears down a sidestreet and when Batman looks down it, he's gone. Evidently, the teen knows his way around this area better than he let on. Reassured, Batman slips into the shadows to go deal with Red Robin’s issue.
The issue turns into a city-wide all-hands-on-deck situation. Or as Hood so eloquently put it: A Clusterfuck. Several of the Bat Family’s worst rogues decided to team up and cause massive damage in different parts of the city to draw out all the Bats. The Family prevailed but at a great cost. There have been nearly a dozen civilian casualties so far. An hour into the attack Signal and Red Robin were separated from their backup and severely injured. Thankfully Orphan was able to get them out and back to the cave safely. After personally handling Two-Face, Batman joined Nightwing and Spoiler to help them take down the last rogue, Riddler. The brains behind their coordinated attack.
After the final battle, Batman received confirmation that all his birds and bats were accounted for and in stable condition. With their encouragement, he stays to look for injured and trapped civilians.
A rough cough guides Batman's attention to an unassuming alley. Blood at the mouth of the alley leads him further into the dark. Wary as the night has left him of traps, the laboured breathing he hears echoing off cold brick walls is enough to temper his paranoia. His intuition is rewarded. At the end of the blood trail, he finds none other than the teenage boy from earlier sitting next to a destroyed wall. Batman wouldn't have recognized him if it weren't for his plastic bag of snacks and classic red Converse.
Dust and grime camouflage the original colours of his clothes and hair. Under the dirt the teen's jeans are bloody and his left leg sits at a wrong angle. Blood seeps through the left side of his hoodie and his arm hangs limp. He must have been caught up in the action and managed to escape whatever did that to his leg. Probably taking cover in the alley thinking a spot so out of the way would keep him safe.
The boy coughs again. He's still alive, but in rough condition.
He doesn't look up when Batman crouches down beside his slumped body. Doesn't flinch when Batman’s gloved fingers take his pulse. In fact, his eyes remain closed. Unconscious. His skin is cold and clammy, his pulse too slow and irregular. He barely breathes at all.
Blood dribbles past his slack lips and stains his chin. In the dark alley, it almost looks black against his pale skin. His chest shudders and seizes when he tries to take a deep breath. The air rattles wetly in his lungs and up close Batman can see why. Two inches of steel rebar protrude from the teen's chest just under his right clavicle, almost hidden by the hood of his sweater. With gentle hands, Batman finds the other end of it protruding between the boy's 7th and 8th ribs on his left side. At least one, if not both of his lungs have been skewered. And considering the odd angle, it’s amazing his heart wasn’t pierced too. The piece of metal is still attached to a large slab of cement.
Batman withdraws his hands and pulls out first aid supplies from his belt. He taps his comms to alert Barbra. The boy wheezes.
Maybe a near-instantaneous death would’ve been a kinder end. Instead, the boy has been trapped here for who knows how long, bleeding out from his other injuries unable to move or call for help.
“Oracle, can you send fire and paramedics to my location as fast as possible? I have a severely injured civilian. Male, between 15 and 18 years old. Penetrating chest trauma. Crush injuries to his left leg, arm, and torso. I can’t move him and he’s lost a lot of blood.”
“Sending priority aid your way, B, but… things are pretty backed up...” Oracle trails off. Her unspoken concern sits heavily between them. ‘With injuries like that, help might not find you fast enough’ . He knows. They both know. But it won’t stop him from trying.
“I’ll do what I can in the meantime.”
Batman quickly ties a tourniquet around the teen’s upper thigh to stop further blood loss from his mangled leg. Tightening it finally draws a reaction from the injured teen. He tries to suck in a sharp breath and sends himself into a ragged coughing fit. Unfocused eyes blink blearily. He tries to move and winces.
“Easy, easy. Breathe slowly.” Batman instructs calmly. Regaining consciousness is a good sign but it could also easily make things take a turn for the worst. Every breath is slowly shredding his lungs. Panicking and exacerbating his injuries will lead to nothing but a quick and painful death drowning in his own blood as it fills his chest cavity.
The boy’s head lolls to the side. He opens his mouth to speak but Batman cuts him off.
“Don’t speak. Just take it easy.” Batman leans forward to stabilize the boy’s head with his hands. Pale eyes peer back at him. The alley’s dimness leaves them looking grey and devoid of colour. Eerie. It feels like they can see straight through the lenses of Batman’s cowl and into his very soul.
“I need to ask you some questions but you need to stay as still as possible. Blink once for yes and twice for no, can you do that?” The teen blinks once, slow and exaggerated.
"Good. Can you feel your toes?” One blink and a wince.
“Try not to move. Do you have any allergies?" Two blinks.
“Are you on any medication?” Two blinks. His eyes unfocus and drift to the side a little.
"Hey now, stay with me. Do you have any medical conditions or history the paramedics should know about?" No blinks. His brows furrow and he squints. They’ll have to circle back to that one.
“Do you have any family?” His eyes come back into focus on Batman’s face. One blink.
“Are they in Gotham?” Two slow blinks. His gaze drifts again. His eyelids are drooping. Batman gently nudges the teen’s cheeks with his thumbs to get his attention.
“Come on, stay with me. You can’t go to sleep.”
The boy blinks rapidly, fighting to keep them open but he’s starting to fade. The burst of adrenalin that woke him up is starting to wear off. Chances are if he passes out now he won’t be waking up again. Sirens echo and wail through the dark city but none come near. Batman can’t do anything for the boy’s internal injuries or the blood he’s already lost. The teen has a family. If all else fails, Batman has to bring him home to them.
“What’s your name?” The boy closes his eyes. He inhales slowly and manages a single word.
“Da- nny.”
“Danny?” Batman confirms. One blink.
The teen’s head- Danny’s head, lists further to the right and presses against Batman’s hand. His eyes stay closed.
“Warm… s’nice.” His breathing falters between words.
“It’s okay Danny, you don’t have to talk anymore.”
Danny’s eyelids briefly flutter when Batman sits down next to him on the cold cement ground. He carefully presses himself against the boy’s uninjured side and drapes as much of his cape as he can around the teen to help preserve what little heat he has left. He lets Danny’s head rest on his shoulder, careful not to jostle him. Countless times his Robins have done the same on chilly nights when he couldn’t convince them to stay inside. Seeking out comfort in subtle and not-so-subtle ways.
Batman tries to swallow down the lump forming in his throat. Death is never easy to face, especially when victims are young. As Gotham’s protector and as Bruce Wayne, he’s come face to face with far more death and tragedy than he’d like. It never gets any easier. Certainly not now when Danny looks so much like his own boys. He knows his danger-prone brood of children are safe at home with Alfred but what about Danny’s family? If they’re outside of Gotham how long will it take for them to realise something’s wrong?
“This part, s-sucks,” Danny whispers. Batman has to agree. This part does suck.
The comm in his ear beeps once and crackles to life. Batman taps it, praying for good news and while preparing himself for the worst.
“Oracle, any news on those paramedics?”
“I’m sorry, B… There’s too much debris on the streets in your area. The ambulances can’t get through. The only way help can get to you is on foot or by taking the long way ‘round and come at you from the east side.”
That would be too late.
“Is he still…?”
“We’ll wait here until help arrives.” Batman held Danny’s uninjured hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze. The teen managed to twitch his fingers weakly in reply. He knew they were out of time. They both knew it. The worst kind of death is the one that creeps slowly yet takes no care in trying to hide itself. An inexorable march forward towards a single inevitable destination.
Together they sat in the cold dark. Danny fought valiantly to hang on for another 7 minutes and 45 seconds before his broken breathing finally petered out and his body went limp. Batman placed a protective arm around the boy’s shoulder knowing that it couldn’t hurt him anymore. He kept holding Danny's cold hand until sirens and flashing lights bled into the alley.
Batman failed to save the teen from the alley. He failed to save a grandfather from inside a rolled car. He failed to save a teacher from falling debris. He failed to save a lot of people that day. Bruce Wayne pledged to cover the funeral and burial costs of any unclaimed souls and Batman vowed to put names on their graves. Amongst them, he vowed to find Danny’s family and send him home.
From his cowl’s footage and the blood on his suit, he was able to create a DNA profile and visual reference for Danny. He knew the approximate area the teen was living in. Nothing popped up right away with facial recognition. His DNA isn’t in any local or federal systems either. Not that Batman suspected it would be.
As of two days after the incident, no missing persons reports have been filed matching the late teen's description. Not in Gotham or the surrounding states. He calls the hospital morgue where Danny’s corpse was taken to see if anyone has claimed him yet… and the most curious thing happened. The morgue staff claim they don’t have any freshly deceased from the incident matching that name and description. They haven't had
any
teenagers lately.
Mental alarm bells go off.
It could be a pure fluke. The ambulance most likely ended up going to a different hospital for whatever reason. Abiding by this line of logic Batman follows through and proceeds to call every hospital, private morgue, clinic and funeral home in Gotham. Every single one of them gives him the same answer.
"There’s no one here like that."
But that can’t be right. He felt Danny die. He remembers the exact moment he could no longer find a pulse or hear the boy’s breath. Death can be questionable when magic and superpowers fall into the mix but normal civilian corpses don’t just get up and walk away. They simply don't vanish into thin air.
Batman searches for leads that might reveal the fate of Danny's body with no luck. Dark theories suggesting foul play is to blame creep into his mind but he can't find any evidence to support them yet.
With no body and no death certificate, Danny isn't counted among the victims of Riddler's attack on the official death toll. It bothers Bruce to no end because he was
there.
He saw Danny, talked to him and held him. The sheer disrespect, the
dehumanisation
, that the boy he accompanied during his last moments on earth could be denied his very
existence
because someone botched the paperwork by accident. Or worse.
Since no missing person reports have been filed matching Danny's name or description it's possible he ran away or was kicked out of a troubled home. Someone who wouldn't be missed. Drug addicts, sex workers, foster kids, runaways and the homeless. All people with little protection from the law who suffer disproportionately from trafficking. Not even death prevents their bodies from being stolen and violated. A poor man's nameless grave is better than having their organs, skin and blood harvested and sold and their bones dissolved in acid and flushed down a sewer. They deserve dignity in both life and death. The fact some only receive the latter…
If nothing else it's a lead worth looking into. And fortunately or unfortunately, his search for human trafficking in the shadows of Gotham's medical-industrial complex bears fruit. Rotten and disgusting fruit. Another cancer among many to be cut out of the city's heart.
What he finds is as troubling as it is heartbreaking. Fresh cadavers of the unknown broken down for parts right there on the morgue table. Living patients without insurance or contacts "transferred" to a "private care facility" never to be seen or heard from again. People waiting on transplant lists while viable organs change hands under their feet to line a nurse's pockets. Though the number of culprits actively operating in Gotham's hospitals and their individual crimes were few, the damage they wrought over time was damming.
Most arrests were kept quiet in exchange for information. It served justice for the victims whose bodies were taken by this group. One branching root of a bigger weed that never seems to die.
In the end, however, no trace of Danny’s body was ever recovered. Once again Batman failed to find him in time, but it was his disappearance that led to the discovery of dozens of others just like him. It's a victory with a bitter aftertaste. If Batman hadn't found him and sat with him that day, who knows how many more people and bodies would've gone missing without a trace. With hope, that fact alone will be enough to let his spirit rest easy. His life, his death, and his memory would not be in vain.
Time passes and Batman moves on from what he and his family dubbed
'The Danny Case.'
The city and its people heal and move on too. Buildings and roads return to their perpetual state of being under construction for repairs. Rain and sanitation crews wash away old bloodstains leaving rusty, faded afterimages that will eventually become part of the scenery. Each one a subtle addition to the ever growing collage of tragedy. Never forgotten, but less painful with time. In a city whose gargoyles and grotesques see more blood than rain it's difficult to imagine any inch of it devoid of ghosts.
It's in those following months that Batman finds himself above a familiar street during a solo patrol. Many, if not most, of Gotham's streets hold sorrows, some more poignant than others. This one houses a fresh regret. It's where he first met the mystery teen he failed to protect in both life and death. Not for the first time, he wonders what he could have done differently that night. What would've happened if he'd stayed to ensure the teen got home? Would things have turned out differently if he hadn't interfered at all? If the boy hadn't felt pressured to deviate from his normal path to shake Batman would he have still ended up in harm's way?
Many times depressing doubts and malicious 'what if?' scenarios like these invade his thoughts. Company keeps them at bay. Staying busy leaves him with little time to dwell. Reassurance makes them weaker. But they never truly go away.
The subtle crinkle of plastic draws him from his thoughts. It's 3 am. A lone shadow wanders down the middle of an empty street, a white convenience store bag in hand. Battered red Converse don't make a sound when they touch the asphalt.
Batman drops down from the low roof he’d been perching on and approaches the silent apparition from behind. He hesitates.
"Should you be out this late?" He wills his voice not to shake.
Dead grey eyes meet his gaze-
...and-
Batman is alone in the street.