Chapter Text
Percy learned early that Gotham did not sound like other cities.
It was not the sirens. Every city had sirens. It was the way the noise never stopped moving. Traffic hissed like something alive. Alleyways breathed. Even silence felt crowded, like it was waiting for permission to turn violent.
He stood at the kitchen sink long after the water had gone cold, hands braced on the counter, staring down at his reflection in the dark glass of the window. His face looked wrong lately. Older than it should have been. Sharper. Like something had pulled tight inside him and refused to let go.
Sally had used this sink every morning.
The thought hit him sideways, sudden and ugly, and he gripped the edge harder, knuckles whitening. He could still picture her standing there, hair half pinned back, humming off key while the kettle screamed. She had complained about the water pressure, about how Gotham’s pipes rattled like they were haunted. She had laughed when Percy told her that maybe they were.
The pipes rattled now.
Percy shut off the tap even though it was already closed. His hands shook anyway.
She should have been here.
The apartment felt too large without her voice filling it. Too hollow. Bruce had offered to move him to the manor immediately, had said it was safer, had said a lot of things in that careful, controlled way of his. Percy had nodded and agreed and then gone back to the apartment alone, because leaving it felt too much like admitting that Sally was never coming back.
She had died three weeks ago.
Three weeks since the call. Three weeks since the police lights painted the walls red and blue and red again. Three weeks since Percy had smelled blood and smoke and wet concrete all at once and known, somehow, before anyone spoke.
Gotham crime, they had said.
Wrong place. Wrong time.
Percy hated those words more than anything else they could have chosen.
He pressed his forehead to the cool glass. Outside, the city stretched on endlessly, buildings stacked like teeth. Somewhere out there, people were dying tonight. Somewhere out there, someone would not make it home. Gotham swallowed people whole and kept walking.
He felt something twist in his chest. Hot. Dense. Like pressure building too fast.
Water dripped from the faucet again.
Percy flinched and shut it off harder this time, jaw clenched. It was nothing. Just old pipes. He told himself that over and over. The fact that it happened whenever he was angry meant nothing.
Bruce Wayne had stood in this kitchen once. Tall. Uncomfortable. Like the walls offended him by existing. He had looked at Sally’s photos, at Percy’s school papers stuck to the fridge with mismatched magnets, and something in his expression had shifted. Not pity. Guilt.
Bruce Wayne collected guilt the way Gotham collected bodies.
“I would like you to come stay with me,” Bruce had said. Not asked. Offered, like a contract. “At least for now.”
Percy had wanted to scream at him. To tell him that money did not fix everything. That Wayne Manor would not make this city less rotten. That Batman had been hunting criminals for years and his mother was still dead.
Instead, Percy had nodded. Because Bruce Wayne was trying. Because Alfred had looked at him like he already belonged somewhere else. Because Percy was tired of being alone in a city that ate lonely people alive.
Jason Todd arrived two days later.
Percy heard him before he saw him. Heavy boots on the fire escape. A curse under someone’s breath. The scrape of metal.
Percy did not panic. Gotham taught you quickly the difference between danger and noise. This was noise with attitude.
Jason dropped into the kitchen like gravity had personally offended him, helmet tucked under one arm, eyes sharp and bright in the low light.
“You gonna keep staring out the window or are you gonna say hi?” Jason said.
Percy blinked. “You broke into my apartment.”
Jason shrugged. “You left the window unlocked.”
“That does not make it better.”
“Sure it does.” Jason grinned, all teeth and bad decisions. “Means you trust the city. Or you are bad at survival.”
Percy snorted before he could stop himself. The sound surprised him. It felt strange in his chest, like stretching a muscle he had not used in weeks.
Jason’s grin softened. Just a little. “You Percy?”
“Yeah.”
“Jason. Bruce’s problem child.” He glanced around the kitchen, gaze snagging briefly on the empty chair at the table. His voice shifted. “Sorry about your mom.”
The words landed heavier than Percy expected. Not because they were cruel. Because they were simple. Honest. Jason did not dress them up or lower his voice or look away.
“Thanks,” Percy said quietly.
Jason nodded once. “You ready to get out of this place?”
Percy looked around the apartment again. The magnets. The sink. The ghost of his mother everywhere.
“No,” he said. Then, after a moment, “Yeah.”
Wayne Manor was too clean.
That was Percy’s first thought as Alfred led him through halls that echoed softly with each step. Everything smelled polished. Controlled. Like nothing bad had ever happened here, or if it had, it had been scrubbed away.
Jason walked beside him, boots loud against the marble. He did not lower his voice. Did not treat the place like a shrine.
“Boring, right?” Jason muttered. “Give it time. You start seeing the cracks.”
Percy glanced at him. “You live here?”
“On and off. Depends on how mad Bruce is.” Jason smirked. “You get used to it. Or you don’t.”
Bruce waited in the study, standing instead of sitting, hands clasped behind his back. Batman habits, Percy thought distantly. Always ready. Always braced.
“Percy,” Bruce said. “I’m glad you came.”
Percy nodded again. He was doing that a lot lately. Agreeing. Letting things happen.
Bruce talked. About school. About counselors. About rules. Percy heard only pieces of it. His attention kept drifting to the massive windows, to the fountains outside. The water there looked wrong. Too still.
Jason leaned against the wall, watching him. Watching the way Percy’s gaze kept pulling back to the water.
That night, Percy lay awake in a bed that was too soft, staring at a ceiling he did not recognize.
He thought about his mother. About Gotham. About the way something inside him kept pushing, like it wanted out.
He wondered how long people like him lasted in cities like this.
Down in the gardens, the fountains surged suddenly, water sloshing over their edges before settling again.
Percy did not see it.
Jason did.
He frowned, just slightly, and made a mental note.
The city outside kept breathing.
And somewhere deep beneath it, something old listened.
Percy dreamed of water.
Not the clean kind. Not beaches or pools or the lazy roll of waves under a summer sun. This water was dark and pressing and endless. It wrapped around his ribs and squeezed, not enough to hurt but enough to remind him that it could. He sank without moving, without fear, watching light fracture and disappear above him.
He did not drown.
That was the strangest part.
He woke before dawn, lungs full and steady, heart beating slow and heavy like it had decided panic was optional. For a few seconds he did not know where he was. The ceiling was unfamiliar. The room smelled faintly of old wood and something metallic. Not blood. Something sharper. Oil, maybe.
Wayne Manor.
The word settled in his mind with a dull thud.
Percy sat up, running a hand through his hair. It was damp with sweat, but he did not feel overheated. If anything, he felt cold, like he had been pulled out of deep water too fast.
He swung his legs over the side of the bed and stood. The floor was cool under his feet. He welcomed it. Grounding helped. His mother had taught him that after nightmares. Name five things you can see. Four you can feel. Three you can hear.
He could hear the house breathing.
That was the only way he could describe it. A low, constant presence beneath the silence, like the walls themselves were alive and keeping secrets. Gotham did that to buildings. Filled them with ghosts.
Percy left his room quietly, drawn by something he could not name. He followed the hallway until it opened into a balcony overlooking the gardens. Dawn painted everything gray and blue. Mist curled low over the fountains.
The water moved.
Not splashing. Not spilling. Just shifting, slow and deliberate, like it was aware of being watched.
Percy swallowed.
This is stupid, he told himself. You are tired. You are grieving. Your brain is making patterns where there are none.
The water stilled.
Percy froze.
For a long moment, nothing happened. Then one of the fountains surged upward, higher than the others, before settling back into place as if embarrassed.
Percy’s breath came shallow. His pulse kicked hard, loud in his ears.
That did not just happen, he thought.
Behind him, a floorboard creaked.
“Yeah,” Jason said, voice rough with sleep. “That’s about the reaction I had too.”
Percy spun. Jason stood a few feet away, arms crossed, eyes sharp despite the hour.
“You saw that,” Percy said.
Jason nodded. “Couple times now. Always when you are around.” He tilted his head. “You wanna explain or should I start guessing?”
Percy laughed, short and humorless. “I have no idea what that was.”
Jason studied him for a long moment, gaze dropping briefly to Percy’s hands. “Huh,” he said. “Usually when people lie, they look guiltier.”
“I am not lying.”
“Yeah. I know.” Jason straightened. “Relax. Gotham’s weird. You fit right in.”
Percy did not relax.
Breakfast was quiet. Alfred moved with practiced grace, placing plates and cups like he was restoring balance rather than serving food. Bruce read something on a tablet, eyes flicking up occasionally to track Percy’s posture, his expression, the shadows under his eyes.
Jason kicked Percy under the table once, lightly.
“Eat,” he muttered. “You look like a ghost.”
Percy pushed eggs around his plate. Food tasted wrong lately. Too solid. Like it expected him to commit to being alive.
Bruce cleared his throat. “Jason tells me you had trouble sleeping.”
Percy glanced at Jason. “He does not talk much, does he.”
Jason smirked. “Selective honesty.”
“I am fine,” Percy said.
Bruce nodded, but his eyes sharpened. “You do not have to be.”
That almost did it. The words scraped too close to something raw. Percy clenched his jaw, focusing on the clink of silverware, on the weight of the chair beneath him.
“I know,” he said quietly.
Training started that afternoon.
Bruce framed it as self defense. Exercise. Routine. Percy saw it for what it was. A way to bleed off anger without letting it spill where it could not be controlled.
The cave beneath the manor felt different from the rest of the house. It hummed with purpose. Screens glowed softly. Vehicles slept like predators at rest.
Jason watched from the sidelines as Bruce showed Percy basic forms. Percy copied them easily. Too easily.
“You trained before?” Bruce asked.
Percy shrugged. “School fights. Nothing fancy.”
Jason snorted. “Yeah, no. Kid moves like he means it.”
Percy felt something coil in his chest at that. Approval did that to him now. Made him want more.
They sparred lightly. Bruce held back. Percy did not.
The first time Percy knocked Bruce off balance, the cave went quiet.
Jason’s grin was sharp. “Oh, I like him.”
Bruce straightened slowly, studying Percy with something like surprise. Something like concern.
“Again,” Bruce said.
They went again. And again. Percy felt alive in a way that scared him. Each movement felt intuitive, like his body already knew how to hurt someone and was relieved to finally be allowed to try.
When it was over, his hands trembled.
“Good work,” Bruce said carefully.
Percy nodded. Always nodding.
That night, Jason knocked on his door without waiting for permission.
“You angry?” Jason asked.
Percy lay on his back, staring at the ceiling. “Is that a trick question.”
Jason sat on the edge of the bed. “You are allowed to be.”
Percy turned his head. Jason’s expression was open. Honest. No judgment.
“They say it was random,” Percy said. “They say it just happens.”
Jason’s jaw tightened. “Yeah. They say a lot of things.”
“If Batman had killed the Joker,” Percy said, the words tumbling out before he could stop them, “my mom would still be alive.”
Jason went very still.
“Careful,” he said softly. “That road does not end where you want it to.”
Percy laughed again, bitter. “Where did it end for you?”
Jason did not answer.
Outside, the fountains surged, water slapping stone hard enough to echo faintly through the manor.
Percy closed his eyes.
Somewhere deep inside him, something answered the call.
Percy was ten years old, and everyone kept forgetting that.
Not in obvious ways. No one asked him to cook or drive or make decisions that mattered. It was smaller than that. The way adults spoke around him instead of to him. The way they looked surprised when he remembered things. The way Bruce’s voice went careful, like Percy was something fragile that might crack if handled wrong.
Percy hated that most of all.
He sat on the floor of his room with his back against the bed, knees pulled to his chest, counting the pattern in the carpet. Alfred had brought him tea earlier. Not coffee. Tea with honey, like Percy was still sick.
He was not sick. He was angry.
Anger felt too big for his body. Like wearing clothes that did not fit yet. It bunched up inside him with nowhere to go.
Jason knocked again later, softer this time.
“You awake?” Jason asked through the door.
Percy hesitated, then nodded even though Jason could not see him. “Yeah.”
Jason came in anyway.
He did not sit on the bed this time. He dropped to the floor across from Percy, back against the opposite wall. Same level. Percy noticed that. It mattered.
“You wanna tell me what you were thinking earlier,” Jason said, “or you wanna just sit here.”
Percy picked at a loose thread in the carpet. “I did not mean it.”
Jason tilted his head. “Mean what.”
“What I said about the Joker.” Percy’s throat felt tight. “Bruce looked mad.”
Jason exhaled slowly. “Bruce looks mad when he is thinking.”
Percy frowned. “He thinks a lot.”
“Yeah. Too much.” Jason glanced sideways at him. “You still feel it though.”
Percy nodded. The feeling had not gone away. It never did. Every time he thought about his mom on the sidewalk, about the red lights and the rain and the way someone had covered his eyes too late, the anger rushed back like water breaking through a wall.
“I do not get it,” Percy said. His voice cracked, and he hated that. “If someone hurts people and keeps hurting people, why does Batman let them keep doing it.”
Jason did not answer right away.
“Because he thinks stopping is better than ending,” Jason said finally. “Because once you cross that line, you cannot go back.”
Percy hugged his knees tighter. “My mom cannot come back either.”
Jason closed his eyes.
That night, Percy dreamed again.
This time the water was louder.
It roared in his ears, rushing past him so fast it blurred everything else. He was small in it. Tiny. He spun helplessly, arms flailing, but the water never let him hit anything. It held him, even as it dragged him deeper.
You are safe, something seemed to say. Or maybe he wanted it to.
When he woke, his bed was damp.
Not soaked. Just enough to notice. Like morning dew.
Percy stared at the dark patch on the sheets, heart hammering.
“I did not do that,” he whispered.
The water glass on his bedside table trembled.
Percy slapped his hand over it, breath coming fast. The glass steadied immediately, water smoothing as if embarrassed again.
His chest hurt.
The next few weeks blurred together.
Schoolwork came in neat stacks. Tutors spoke kindly and slowly. Bruce checked in every night, asking the same careful questions. Are you sleeping. Are you eating. Do you feel safe.
Percy answered yes because it was easier.
Jason was the only one who did not treat him like he might disappear if handled wrong. Jason let him be mad. Let him sit in silence. Let him throw rocks into the pond behind the manor and curse when they skipped wrong.
“You throw like you are fighting the water,” Jason said once.
Percy scowled. “I am winning.”
Jason laughed. “Sure you are, kid.”
The pond rippled harder than it should have.
Jason stopped laughing.
“You see that too,” Percy said quietly.
Jason stared at the water, then back at Percy. “Yeah.”
They did not tell Bruce.
Some things felt safer as secrets.
The first time Percy saw Batman come back hurt, it was raining.
Bruce limped through the cave, blood dark against black armor. Alfred moved fast. Jason clenched his fists.
Percy stood frozen at the edge of the stairs.
Batman did not look like a hero up close. He looked tired. Human. Breakable.
Something ugly twisted in Percy’s chest.
All this, and people still died.
That night, Percy pressed his hands against the bathroom sink and stared at his reflection. His eyes looked too dark. Too old.
“If you are strong,” he whispered to himself, “you should stop bad things.”
The pipes groaned.
Water surged up, splashing over the rim, soaking his sleeves.
Percy yelped and jumped back, heart racing.
The water drained immediately, innocent again.
Percy stared at the sink, breathing hard.
He was ten years old.
And something inside him was already answering Gotham’s violence with its own.
Percy learned quickly that Wayne Manor had rules even when no one said them out loud.
Do not run in the halls. Do not touch things that look expensive. Do not ask questions that make adults go quiet.
He broke the first rule sometimes. Never the second. The third haunted him.
He sat on the steps outside the manor with Jason one afternoon, knees scraped from tripping on the gravel path. He had not meant to fall. His foot had slipped like the ground decided to move without him.
Jason crouched in front of him, inspecting the scrape. “You bleeding?”
Percy shook his head. It stung, but not bad. What bothered him was the way the puddle beside the steps had rippled when he hit the ground. There had been no wind. No reason.
“It moved,” Percy said before he could stop himself.
Jason followed his gaze. The water was still now, reflecting the gray sky.
“Yeah,” Jason said slowly. “Sometimes water does that.”
“That is not true.”
Jason snorted. “Kid, a lot of things are not true and still happen.”
Percy frowned. “That does not make sense.”
“Welcome to Gotham.”
Jason handed him a bandage anyway. He did not ask more questions. Percy was grateful and unsettled at the same time.
That night, Bruce called Percy into the study.
The room felt too big for him. Too tall. Books lined the walls like they were watching. Bruce sat behind the desk, hands folded, expression calm in a way that made Percy nervous.
“Alfred tells me you had another incident with water,” Bruce said.
Percy’s stomach dropped. “I did not mean to.”
“I am not accusing you,” Bruce said quickly. “I just want to understand.”
Percy stared at the rug. The patterns swirled when he looked too long. “I do not know why it happens.”
Bruce was quiet for a moment. Percy could feel the weight of his attention like a spotlight.
“Sometimes trauma expresses itself physically,” Bruce said. “Especially in children.”
Percy bristled at the word children but did not argue. He wanted to say that it did not feel like trauma. It felt like something else. Like the world listening too closely.
Bruce stood and walked to the window, looking out over the gardens. The fountains were low tonight, barely murmuring.
“We will keep an eye on it,” Bruce said. “You are safe here.”
Percy nodded. He was very good at nodding.
Safe did not mean quiet.
The first real incident happened two weeks later.
Jason had snuck Percy out onto the roof, swearing Alfred would not notice. Gotham spread beneath them in a mess of lights and shadows. Percy hugged his jacket tight, wind tugging at his hair.
“Why do you like it up here,” Percy asked.
Jason shrugged. “You can see things coming.”
Percy liked that answer.
They sat near the edge, legs dangling. Percy watched rain clouds gather in the distance, dark and heavy. His chest tightened. He hated storms now. The sound of rain on pavement was too close to the night his mom died.
A crack of thunder rolled closer than expected.
Percy flinched.
“You good,” Jason asked.
“I do not like rain,” Percy said quietly.
“That is fine,” Jason said. “You do not have to like it.”
The storm hit hard. Wind howled. Rain lashed sideways, slicking the rooftop in seconds.
Jason cursed. “Okay, maybe this was a bad idea.”
Percy stood too fast. His foot slid. For one horrible second, there was nothing under him.
He screamed.
Water surged.
Not rain. Something thicker. Heavier. It rose from the gutters in a rushing wall, slamming against the edge of the roof just as Percy tipped forward. It caught him like arms, wet and cold, shoving him back onto solid ground.
Percy hit the roof hard, gasping.
Jason stared at the edge, then at Percy, eyes wide.
The water fell away immediately, draining back where it came from like it had never existed.
Rain continued to pour.
Jason did not say anything for a long time.
“You saw that,” Percy whispered.
Jason swallowed. “Yeah.”
“I almost fell,” Percy said. His voice shook. “I did not want to.”
“I know.”
They went back inside soaked and silent.
Bruce noticed the wet footprints. Alfred noticed Percy’s shaking hands. No one noticed the way the gutters overflowed for a split second too long.
That night, Percy could not sleep.
He lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, replaying the moment over and over. The water had moved fast. On purpose. It had known where he was.
It had saved him.
That thought scared him more than falling.
If it could save him, it could hurt someone else.
Percy buried his face in his pillow, breathing hard.
“I do not want this,” he whispered to the dark.
The glass of water on his bedside table stayed perfectly still.
Percy decided the water was his fault.
That was the only explanation that made sense.
If it was Gotham, then it would happen to everyone. If it was the house, then Bruce would have noticed something wrong long before Percy arrived. If it was magic, that was stupid. Magic was for movies and kids who still believed the world had rules that bent instead of snapped.
So it had to be him.
He stopped drinking water unless someone reminded him. He took baths as fast as possible, counting tiles and keeping his hands clenched in fists so nothing could slip. He avoided the gardens. He avoided the fountains. He avoided rain whenever he could.
It did not stop it.
Sometimes the water reacted when he was not even touching it. A glass sweating too fast. A puddle shivering when he walked past. The sink sputtering when his chest felt too tight.
Every time it happened, shame crawled up his spine.
Jason noticed.
“You doing okay, kid,” Jason asked one evening as Percy pushed his dinner around his plate.
Percy nodded automatically, then shook his head. “I do not like water.”
Jason blinked. “You live on a planet that is mostly water.”
“I mean like this,” Percy snapped, then froze. His hands had clenched so hard the water in his cup sloshed, nearly spilling.
Jason slowly reached out and moved the cup farther away. He did not tease him. He did not ask why.
“Okay,” Jason said. “We work around it.”
That made something loosen in Percy’s chest. Just a little.
Bruce noticed the changes too.
Percy flinched more. Jumped at sudden sounds. Watched exits. He slept curled tight like he was trying to take up less space in the world.
Bruce tried to help in the only way he knew how.
Structure.
Schedules. Exercises. Rules. Safe, predictable things.
Percy followed them all perfectly.
That scared Bruce more than rebellion would have.
One night, Bruce sat with Percy in the study again, both of them silent except for the soft ticking of a clock.
“You do not have to be perfect,” Bruce said eventually.
Percy stared at his hands. They looked normal. They did not feel normal. “I am not trying to be.”
Bruce studied him, gaze sharp but careful. “If something is happening that frightens you, you can tell me.”
Percy almost did.
The words pressed against his teeth. The memory of the water catching him. The way it had felt like being held by something that did not care if he wanted it to.
“I make messes,” Percy said instead. “On accident.”
Bruce exhaled. “That is not a crime.”
Percy nodded. There it was again.
Later, in the cave, Bruce reviewed security footage.
He watched rain pour off the roof. Watched Percy slip. Watched the gutter swell strangely before the camera glitched.
Bruce frowned.
The file corrupted itself when he tried to rewind.
Jason found Percy in the library the next day, tucked into a chair that was too big for him, book open but unread.
“You wanna get out of here,” Jason asked.
Percy hesitated. “If it rains.”
“It will,” Jason said honestly. “This is Gotham.”
Percy swallowed. “Then I do not want to go.”
Jason considered that. “Okay. Then we do something else.”
They built a pillow fort in Jason’s room instead. It was stupid and cramped and perfect. Percy laughed once, surprised by the sound. Jason froze, then smiled like he had won something.
Outside, rain hammered the windows.
Inside, Percy felt almost normal.
That night, the rain found him anyway.
He woke to the sound of rushing water. For one terrible second, he thought the room was flooding. His heart slammed against his ribs.
But it was only the pipes.
Only the pipes shaking so hard the walls vibrated.
Percy sat up, breath coming fast. “Stop,” he whispered, unsure who he was talking to.
The shaking eased.
Tears burned his eyes. He scrubbed at them angrily.
“I do not want to hurt anyone,” he whispered.
The water was quiet.
In the days that followed, Percy made a decision without realizing it was one.
If Gotham made people like this, then Gotham was the problem.
And problems could be stopped.
Even if you were only ten years old.