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i.
The baby—Damian, he had a name, it was Damian, his son—was a disgruntled little thing, alternating between squealing loudly at any little discomfort and frowning at everything as if the very existence of the rest of the world caused him great displeasure.
And he liked to be held. He let out pathetic little whimpers that escalated into full-blown squealing if Bruce set him down even for a moment. He hated the crib, preferring to sleep with Bruce by his side (a terrifying ordeal because he was so small and Bruce was so massive that even with the bassinet on the bed, Bruce could hardly ever relax) and woke up wailing when Bruce inevitably went missing during the night.
Alfred approved, of course, maybe out of a misguided idea that a screaming, touch-starved child would limit Bruce’s nightly activities.
And of course Alfred was great with him. When Damian squirmed and squealed, Alfred could soothe him one-handed.
“Yes, yes,” he would remark dryly. “Your life is very difficult, I understand, but we must wait exactly 20 mins for this pie to rise…”
And Damian would eventually settle, lulled by Alfred's dry British wit. Bruce felt so woefully inadequate in comparison.
He'd never been under any illusions that he was a good man, but it was only recently that he realized he might be worse than he'd ever imagined. That he could inspire the very thing he wanted to destroy.
“It’ll be different,” he whispered to the baby, one hand resting gently on his sternum to give him the contact he so desperately craved. “I’ll be different.”
Damian only blinked blearily up at him.
ii.
Talia had called Damian a failure.
She'd said it regretfully, almost mournfully, before handing Bruce the four-month-old baby. Her father had decided there would be no use for Damian in his empire, but she'd managed to convince him not to dispose of the child and instead deliver him to her beloved. To Bruce.
A failure at four months.
Bruce watched Damian huff under his own weight, brows furrowed in concentration, trying to flip himself back over again, and felt as though his heart might burst out of his chest. Tummy time, the baby books had called it. It was apparently very important for building core muscles. By the time they reached four months, babies were meant to be rolling over onto their backs.
A failure at four months.
Deemed too unworthy to bear the weight of his grandfather's legacy, as heir to the Demon's Head.
And what about him? Bruce thought.
According to Alfred, all Thomas Wayne had wanted was to protect his family. And where had that left him? A city full of ghosts and secrets. A criminal in charge. And Bruce, all alone, reckoning with the wreckage.
His intentions had been good, Alfred had insisted. He was a complicated man. But what did intentions matter, when the consequences outlived you? Thomas had produced Falcone. Bruce had produced the Riddler. And Bruce and Talia, together, had made Damian.
Damian continued grunting in frustration, as he failed to roll himself over. By now, Bruce could recognise the signs of a temper tantrum. He leaned forward and gently, oh so gently, he flipped Damian over. It didn’t help at all. Immediately, Damian began squealing.
Were babies meant to be this upset all the time? Bruce thought helplessly. Bruce couldn't help but feel that maybe Damian should be quieter.
...No, not quieter, but happier. Less scowly. Less angry at the world around him.
He imagined rows of families in parks, nestled in strollers. The giggling babies in the videos he'd had to look up about diaper changing. He picked up Damian and rested him on the crook of Bruce’s elbow. The baby was still squealing miserably.
“Hi, Damian,” he said softly. Babies needed someone to mimic the world around them, apparently. Sounds, movement, faces. All of their time was spent learning.
He wondered what kind of world Damian had lived in before, that all he'd learnt was this.
“Hi, Damian,” he said again, trying to make his voice as soothing as possible. Damian gurgled unhappily but paused in his noise-making to look at Bruce. Bruce attempted a smile.
Damian blinked up at him, as if confused by what Bruce was trying. Then, with great effort, his son scrunched up his face.
Behind him, Bruce heard a laugh, and turned to find Alfred hovering near the doorway. “Oh, well done, lad,” Alfred told him warmly.
Bruce felt his smile spread a little.
“Well done, Damian,” he agreed.
iii.
By six months, Damian could put some weight on his legs when Bruce held him up by the armpits. He could sit if Bruce positioned him correctly (the tripod sit, the books called it). He still, somehow, could not turn himself over during tummy time and was incredibly infuriated by this fact.
Bruce couldn’t help it. He was fretting.
“You might consider taking him to a paediatrician.” Alfred would roll his eyes at him.
And Bruce had. He had gone to the best, and most discreet paediatricians money could buy for Damian’s everything— his vaccines, his diet, his nutrition, his toys. All they had said was that these things took time. None of that prevented Bruce from fretting.
They didn’t know, of course, where Damian had come from. The things he had seen or not seen, heard or not heard, felt or not felt. The only people who could give Bruce this information were Talia, who would not tell him, and Damian himself, who could not.
How could Bruce not fret?
Currently he was sitting in the armchair in what used to be the family room in Bruce’s childhood. Now it was Damian’s baby room. Together, Alfred and Bruce had fenced off and baby-proofed a section for Damian’s use. The Manor was so full of sharp corners and edges that it would have been impossible to proof them all. Bruce had considered asking Alfred what they had done when Bruce himself had been a baby. He had considered it. Then re-considered.
Damian was on his stomach again, grunting furiously. Babies could get frustrated, the baby book had said. It was important to let them sit with frustration. You couldn’t hand them all the answers. So Bruce sat, newspaper in hand, while Damian remained frustrated.
There had been a break-in at Gotham Central. Some goons wearing clown make-up had allegedly walked in right before closing, badly brutalized the guards on duty, and made off with less than sixty-thousand dollars in cash. A paltry amount for the violence they caused.
They were getting to be a problem. Multiple hits—sometimes senselessly violent, sometimes with clear financial motivations—and no clues, but a mastermind that left Joker calling cards. Another Riddler copycat, Bruce suspected, and felt the guilt curdle in his stomach. Gordon had supplied Bruce the calling cards and Bruce had discovered that they were all from the same printing factory in Burnley. It was a long shot but Bruce had already marked every licensed distributor on a city map, trying to find the overlap between the robberies and the shops selling Monarch-brand decks. Patterns usually began somewhere ordinary.
There was a sharp squeal.
Bruce peered up over the newspaper and then almost dropped it in shock.
Damian was lying on his back.
He threw the paper aside and dropped to his knees. Damian squirmed and then shrieked, demanding attention as always.
“Damian,” Bruce said, awed, hands hovering uncertainly over his stomach. What was he meant to do now that rolling over had been successfully achieved?
“Damian,” he called again helplessly, as if the baby could provide an answer. Instead, Damian squealed again, mouth stretching wide enough to reveal the beginnings of the three tiny incisors his body was trying to grow.
Smiling, Bruce realized. His son was smiling. Giddy, what else was there to do but smile back?
iv.
Damian also barely spoke. Well, babies did not really speak, but Damian barely even babbled. Instead, he would only quietly observe, frowning intensely. Bruce was inspired to worry a little less about this by Alfred, who revealed that Bruce himself had apparently been an alarmingly quiet baby.
“Like father, like son, I suppose,” Alfred had sighed and Bruce had tried to stifle the squirming in his gut.
The baby books said that books helped stimulate speech. It was useful to start reading to children even as newborns. Bruce read, but to no avail, it seemed. Damian only looked at the animals with intense concentration, thinking things only his baby brain could fathom.
“It would probably help to also do the voices,” Alfred offered, and launched into an elaborate snorting performance on behalf of the pig in the picture book. Bruce had spent the better part of last week chasing a man who wore a pig mask and enjoyed butchering people. And yet, Bruce had to admit, Alfred made an unexpectedly convincing pig. Damian, however, seemed to disagree, regarding Alfred with profound skepticism. Bruce laughed slightly, unexpectedly fond of his son’s old soul.
Damian's eyes flicked immediately toward the sound. He didn't laugh back. Bruce supposed laughing was a bit too much to ask for a baby who had only just learnt to smile. Still, he stared at Bruce with that same impossible concentration, as though committing the noise to memory. Then, turning to Alfred, he slapped the book.
“Oh?” Alfred asked, excited.
Impatient, Damian slapped the book again, his chubby palm landing somewhere near the pig’s nose. The message was clear. Again.
“I think it’s your turn now,” Alfred said.
“You’re joking.”
Smack, smack, smack went Damian’s palm. He was getting frustrated. And a frustrated Damian meant a screaming Damian, and Bruce would do anything to prevent that.
He launched into a pig routine.
v.
By nine months, things had been going well. Damian made noises, not a lot but they were there. He could grab things if they were light enough. He could even lift himself up using the armchair. He had developed a particular fascination with Bruce’s watch, which Bruce had eventually surrendered after Damian had nearly succeeded in pulling it off his wrist three times. He was doing so well. So of course Gotham would fuck it all up.
On Halloween that year, the first Holiday murder happened.
Bruce had been expecting trouble. Gotham always had trouble on Halloween. Last time it had been Don Mitchell. This time it was Carmine Falcone’s nephew, a pistol and a baby bottle’s nipple the only clues left behind.
And Bruce couldn’t figure it out. By next month, Gotham was on fire with a mob war and there was another murder on Thanksgiving. And on New Year’s Eve, Bruce came home with a gash on his thigh from stopping Joker from releasing a chemical agent onto a square full of people counting down to midnight. But Holiday had still struck again. Failure after failure.
At home, Damian was screaming.
“He has been inconsolable,” Alfred declared, giving Bruce his usual look of grim disapproval. “He hasn’t slept well in six days.”
Bruce sighed, exhausted. Damian’s face was scrunched up as if in agony, and he had to wonder how such a tiny body could hold so much furious energy. “I don’t know where he gets the energy from,” Bruce mumbled. “I probably would have taken a nap by now.”
Alfred gave Bruce a dirty look, and Bruce felt like throwing his hands up in frustration. He would have, if that didn’t mean removing pressure from his wounds. “I don’t know why he’s like this, Alfred,” he admitted. “I don’t know what he wants from me.”
Alfred gave him a long, disappointed look. “Isn’t it obvious? What he wants, Bruce, is his father.”
And so saying, Alfred gently placed Damian on the floor. Bruce lurched forward in a panic. Damian hadn’t—he didn’t know yet how to stand without support—
Except apparently, he did.
Damian lumbered forward, awkward and blubbering, but walking until he reached Bruce and wrapped his tiny arms around his knee.
Nine months. No, twelve months now. And somehow, between one holiday and the next, Damian had learnt to walk. Bruce held his breath, as though afraid that Damian would suddenly lose this ability if Bruce scrutinized him too hard…but Damian only continued sniffling, face pressed against Bruce’s knee.
Carefully, Bruce removed his bloody gloves, and then picked up his son. Damian immediately tucked his face under Bruce’s chin, as naturally as breathing. Bruce ran a hand down Damian’s back and listened as his hitched sobs tapered off, and then quietened into even, snotty breaths against Bruce’s chin.
Alfred raised an eyebrow at him, as if to say, ‘you see?’
He didn’t, though, and for that, Bruce was grateful. Instead, all he said was, “I’ll just get the first aid kit then, shall I?” and bustled off.
That night Damian slept on Bruce’s chest. Bruce could feel the small, rabbit-like flutter of Damian’s heartbeat in contrast to his own slower, heavier one. He was almost as tall as Bruce’s torso now. When had that happened?
Bruce lay awake through the night and into the New Year, listening to those beats.
“Sorry,” he whispered into his son’s hair as daybreak broke. Damian smelled like the talcum-free cornstarch-based baby powder Bruce had bought for him. “Sorry, Damian. Let’s do something together, yeah? Just you and me.”
They could go to the zoo or the aquarium. Or maybe a children’s museum. He’d even read something about the circus coming to town. Children loved those, right?