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Bruce ambles behind his pack of children, slowly bringing up the rear in their little journey to the Gotham Museum of Science & History. It’s the middle of a day on a weekday, timed exactly to when the museum would be the least busy.
And yet, there are still some people milling about, floating through exhibits, and subtly avoiding his sons as they tear through centuries of humanity.
“I want to do the Egypt section next,” Dick gripes as his siblings drag him in the exact opposite direction of the Egypt section. They had already done South America, Africa, only part of Asia, and had just finished up with the “The Fight for a Better America: The Wake of the Civil War” exhibits. Now they were traveling out of the Americas more towards the European section.
“We will get to Egypt, Dickie,” Jason growled, shoving Dick with a shoulder. “But that’s on the entire other side of the museum. It’s going to be our last stop.”
“Well, it could have been done sooner if someone hadn’t wanted to look at the most depressing photos I’ve ever seen.”
Jason’s head reared back and Bruce rolled his eyes. He hoped his boys would eventually grow out of the phase where their favourite sibling bonding activity was bickering with each other and getting into near-fist fights. They were growing rapidly bigger and Bruce wasn't sure how much longer he would be able to tear them apart from each other.
(A small part of him is terrified of any time they fight with each other. They are all in a delicate balance, three points to a triangle, three forces in a chase after each other. The Speaker preys upon the Listener. The Listener preys upon the Seer. The Seer preys upon the Speaker. And the cycle repeats, careening all his children towards the mutual destruction of each other. If they ever did battle for real, he knew that he would not be able to stop it. Legends speak of mountains that were raised in clashes between Abominations. Rivers carved as one dragged the corpse of another. Forest that sprung forth from the flesh of their rotting bodies. There is evidence that shows those myths aren't exactly untrue. In the past, abominations were able to get older... bigger... turning more into monsters of legends. In modern times, they are killed so swiftly that they are rarely allowed a few years at life, let alone get to an adult size.
Bruce hopes, he hopes with his entire body, that by raising them together, they will not look to each other as enemies. That they will be able to calm their baser instincts.
He hopes that if you do not treat a creature as a monster, you can prevent it from becoming one at all.)
Dick and Jason break apart with Jason growling and Dick laughing. This are still bickering, but there's no real heat to it and Bruce feels like he can breathe a little lighter. They move further into the exhibits, finding the sign that marked their destination.
Tim freezes as they enter the next exhibit of the museum, making Dick and Jason abruptly end their argument about ‘ The Dead of Antietam ’ to avoid almost slamming into him.
“Move it, Timbo,” Jason growls, the sound harsher than was actually meant. His human form flickers for a second ( too wide a maw, too many teeth) , but Jason brings it under control with practiced ease and only a twitch of his glamored-on nose. If his puppyish ears were out, they would be flat against his skull in annoyance.
They knew that they needed to be very solidly human while they were in public places nowadays. Bruce didn’t want any threats made against them, more afraid of his boys getting hurt than saving the sanity of the general public to be honest. The man already had too many close calls with one of his boys flickering through forms and causing in some instinct-crazed person deciding they would try to be a hero by attacking his sons.
They’re called many names by many cultures– engkanto, fae, yōkai– but the scientific name of what they are in papers is H. admonition solitaria . God’s lonely rebuke.
There are several theories on how the etymology went from ‘ admonition ’ to ‘abominations’ , but that’s what they’re called colloquially nowadays. The wretched. Monsters. Abominations .
No matter what they are called, the reaction they get has always been the same, often triggering the same primal instinct to hurt, maim, kill , on humans.
These creatures drove regular people to do things they normally wouldn’t do– like maybe pull a knife on a ten-year-old’s throat as he held his father’s hand, to try to wrench his son from his grip to throw him into the path of a moving car or to make a policewoman draw her gun on a kid who had just wanted to go to the bookstore with his dad. The affected humans never quite remembered why they had attacked the child — only that there was something deeply, inherently , wrong with the boys to receive such an attack.
It was a wrong that followed them from the very start. They could never quite shake it off. It drove them to cry into comfort, to home– to Bruce’s shoulder as he held their same shaking body and tried desperately to calm away the scare.
It made public outings dangerous, but Bruce wouldn’t lock his boys up in the Manor, even if it was the safest option. All three of them had been trapped for too much time in their short lives; Bruce wasn’t willing to be another jailer.
Hence, the visit to Gotham’s Science & History Museum. But only with certain parameters, of Bruce being right by their sides, and only in the middle of the day on a Tuesday when foot traffic would be at its lowest.
Dick sighs and pushes Jason to the side so they could walk around Tim.
“Come on,” Dick tells his younger brothers gently, his eyes crinkling at the corners with his smile. “You don’t want Bruce to leave you behind, do you?”
Bruce nearly scoffs at the implication.
As if he would ever abandon any one of his children.
Jason stalks his way over to Bruce’s side, ignoring how people move away from him out of instinct. There weren’t any indications the fellow museum-goers even register he was there, just that there’s something wrong in the air and they have to scuttle outwards to the edges of the exhibit as soon as they can.
Most people are like that– like they could sense the ( many, so, so many ) teeth even if they could not see them.
Soon, only Bruce, his children, and the silent paintings of the exhibit remained in the room.
Jason makes his way to Bruce’s side, unconsciously bumping their sides together in a greeting that is more creature than human, but also a habit of Jason’s. Bruce found it to be wildly endearing.
Despite how human all of them looked, they always carried some bits of their creature bodies.
Dick is tactile as a bird, and even more so when he has a pair of hands. He’s constantly touching, grooming, or checking that one of his siblings is there next to him.
He always listens, too. Of course, he always listened– is listening– but that was because of his species, with their ( way too many ) ears. Dick, as a constantly talking and touching brother, is because of his personality– someone who’s unlearning touch as something that hurts, who's discovering that his voice can be what's heard. Touch can be soft and caring . He can be someone who is worth being listened to.
Jason, although he’s a wolf only in the vaguest sense, is prone to leaning up on his ‘pack’ and didn’t hesitate to show his teeth in a smirk or a ( wide, too wide set ) grin. Bruce knows that despite his comfort, the boy still fought to keep some of his more canine growls out of his throat. He definitely holds back his instinct to bite anyone who comes too close.
(Or, especially when he had been younger, to keep himself from biting visiting aristocrats who had patted his head and had complimented him on ‘developing manners despite being born in that horrid Alley’.)
Tim showed his alternative form in very different ways, unlike his brothers. He wasn’t bound to an animal ( the way teeths were wolves and ears were birds ), as his shadowy form was more fluid than form. He could be anything if he wanted to. Small or large. Solid as stone or as ever-changing as water.
He showed he was something more by his stares and that, when he looked at you, you were always sure that ( many, many more oh my god there’s too many ) eyes looked back.
A smile too wide, eyes too knowing, a face too distorted.
“Tim, what’s wrong?” The concern in Dick’s voice jolts Bruce out of his own head and makes him look toward their youngest.
Tim is still standing in the entryway, eyes wide and fixed upon the exhibit stand in the middle of the room.
For the first time, Bruce truly looks at it.
It’s a crystal ball but with some kind of dark fluid suspended in the middle. The ball was on a moving pedestal that constantly turned it, making the dark fluid swirl almost hypnotically in the sphere.
He guessed it was a display for ferrofluid, a magnetic fluid that was reacting to whatever charge was in the pedestal. A metallic ink that was constantly fleeing from the magnet underneath it.
“Tim?” He asks, looking back toward his son. Dick’s face is growing more concerned by the second and even Jason began to shuffle at Bruce’s side anxiously.
Tim shudders, eyes snapping towards Bruce. For a second, just a second, he looks scared and deeply unsettled in a way that inevitably puts Bruce on edge. Then, he schools his features and forces himself to look calmer.
Bruce doesn’t doubt that Dick could hear Tim’s quicker heartbeat and that Jason could taste the sour tang of his discomfort.
“I… It’s fine. I’m being stupid,” Tim mutters, edging into the room like he thought the exhibit was going to bite him.
It set off all the alarm bells in Bruce’s head.
It reminds him of the crying little boy in the Drake Manor who had constantly insisted that he was fine despite being blindfolded and locked alone in a room. Bruce still can’t stop the bile that rises to his throat when he thinks about the iron marks on Tim’s scarred skin.
Tim is scared. Bruce didn’t need to listen or taste to know that. Something is scaring Tim.
But what, and most importantly, why ?
His eyes went back to the crystal ball and the churning fluid within it.
Was it…
“Hi!” A bright voice interrupts and all of their attentions snaps toward the chirpy museum volunteer that bounces into the room. “I saw you were interested in the crystal ball. Do you have any questions?”
Bruce is just about to say ‘no, thank you’, but Tim cuts in before he could.
“Yes,” Tim says, walking forward toward the crystal ball. He gives her a handsome gala smile. One that said Martha’s Vineyard summers and expensive polo shirts tucked into even more expensive khakis. Bruce could see it cracking at the edges, shadows flickering at the seams of his mouth. “What is it exactly? What’s in it?”
“Of course!” She replies, merrily walking towards the exhibit. She holds her arms out like she’s presenting a show rather than some display case.
“This is a crystal ball from the 12th century and we estimate its origin to be Romania, however this type of object is known to travel around so it’s impossible to know for sure. Crystal balls, like this one, were used in gypsy fortune telling—“ Bruce catches Dick’s flinch at the words and the way he edges away from the volunteer and back towards Bruce and Jason “—and it traveled with them in their caravans so they could use them to predict the future for customers. This one, in particular, is a beautiful specimen and on loan from Rome.”
Tim nods along with the explanation, but his pinched look doesn’t waver. “And the inside?”
Her smile gets impossibly wider. “That’s the most interesting part. Nobody knows for sure and we’re hesitant to crack a ball open because they are so rare, but legend says that the black fluid is Seer blood and bone. The fortune tellers taught that it helped them see into the future and into other realms.”
Bruce’s breath catches in his chest and he watches Tim’s face pale.
“Seer? Like an– like an abomination?” His voice trips up on the last word. The volunteer’s voice only gets more excited.
“Yes, the gypsies were quite adept in hunting down the seeing abominations. They were well known across Europe for their prowess and the little villages would hire them to take care of a seeing Abomination if they had one lurking about. The people were said to train owls to hunt them.”
“Owls?” It was Dick who asks this time.
“Yeah, owls! Although, it’s just a legend because scientists don’t know how they possibly could have trained any birds given their technology. Any modern attempts have failed to replicate any of them and it’s not like they were prioritizing making manuals when they had monsters to hunt.
The hunting owls of the gypsies are common figures in European myths, though. They are said to have been great listeners and able to follow any of their trainers’ commands. They were used primarily to hunt Seeing abominations, but could also be used to bring down deer and boars. The gypsies treasured them and were said to sleep with them in their caravans, treating them almost like they were their children. Many European kings tried to steal the owls from them, but… well let’s just say it never ended up good for the kings.”
Her smile turns a little dark, but then suddenly, it brightens.
“Do you have any more questions?”
Bruce picks up his son, Tim’s shaking so softly that Bruce wouldn’t be able to tell the full extent of it without this full-body contact. “No more. Thank you.”
The woman nods and walks back to the door she’s meant to be standing by, her smile never faltering.
They need to leave, right now.
The crystal ball spins slowly, idly, with no real destination or direction. The liquid inside of it sloshes around with soft gentle movements of a hidden riptide.
Bruce hopes that the person inside is long dead. Mummified due to the lack of air, the lack of food, and water, sitting inside its final prison.
Tim tucks his face harder into Bruce’s chest– this doesn’t stop him from seeing–
Seeing everything .
Dick’s also frozen, eyes wide, mouth agape, fingers twitching out to reach Tim but afraid that Tim might not be receptive to the affection right now.
Affection specifically from Dick.
Jason, however, can’t keep the low grisly sound of his growl to himself. A deep sort of irritated grating rumble.
“Let’s go check out the dinosaurs again,” Bruce announces to the empty room. “You guys liked dinosaurs.”
“Don’t leave it,” Tim whispers, right into Bruce’s ear. His breath puffs against Bruce’s cheek. And even though they were so close, chest to chest, with Tim’s delicate heart beating a rapid-beat pattern into Bruce’s shirt, Bruce hardly heard the words. “I can see it… It’s—“
Tim’s voice hitches with an aborted sob and he shakes his head like he was trying to saying ‘no’ to seeing anymore. But he always could see even if he didn’t want to.
“It’s crying.”
Bruce freezes as the horror hit him.
The liquid in the crystal ball, what Bruce had thought were the remnants of an abomination long-dead, was still alive.
He stares at the ball and the liquid, no, the person caught within it.
“It’s begging,” Tim says, fingers tightening in Bruce’s shirt. He could feel the echo of (additional, there are so many) arms, hidden from view but still grasping his shadow. “Not with words, but I can see it in their eyes.”
Tim turns so that he could meet Bruce’s gaze through one eye with half his face still pressed into his chest. And suddenly, it's not one eye. It's many. Dozens kaleidoscoping out from each other. Different colours. Different pupils. It makes his son look so much more alien, though it's his most natural state. A being more than a human. Something that can peer between realms, even in this small room, a see the horrors hidden between the layers. “It knows I’m here. It knows what I am, what we are. It’s scared of Dick.”
Dick flinches because of course he heard ( he always hears, he’s always listening). Bruce could imagine his feathers ruffling in shame, puffing up, and getting messy with his distress. Wings, the number of them unknown, shuffling around each other, making the delicate ears littered around his body rustle like leaves. He would remember this. He has heard the words and the implications hidden inside of them. Nuance and deeper meanings are never lost on him.
Bruce’s son, always so eager to take on burdens, will be haunted by ancestors he hadn’t realized he had.
“It wants to be killed. It’s begging for it.”
Bruce curls his son tighter to himself, tighter into his protective embrace. Tim could be so much bigger than him, he could be half the size of a house, and yet he always perfectly fit into Bruce’s arms. Tim squeezed his eyes closed, all of them, and molded himself into Bruce. The body Bruce is holding is so strange and yet he is sure that the squeeze around his heart is the same for every parent holding their frightened child close.
“It wants it to end.”
Bruce brushes his hand through Tim’s inky black hair, as dark as the fluid that swirls inside the ball, and leans down to kiss his boy on the forehead. He thinks of Tim, in his form when he’s more shadow than bone, trapped and twirling. Twisting. Circulating. Never free. Always searching for some way out. Tortured by the panic of his own mind.
The implications of that person being alive, being aware, and not as long dead as somebody should possibly be–
Bruce tucks his children closer to him, teeth by the hip, ears by his elbow, and eyes closed against his chest–
He…
He needs to call an old friend.