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❛  leave me alone.  ❜ w/ bats?

;   PROMISED HAVEN — THE BATMAN / READER

summary: you move into selena kyle's old apartment. bruce has taken to watching you.

pairing: batman x f!reader, set five months after the events of the batman (2022)

rating: t+ for canon typical violence

a/n: wow, me writing the beginning what will probably be a series of drabbles? amazing, iconic, unique, awesome, etc, etc. anyways, have a little morsel >:)

Gotham City will eat you alive.

Limb from limb, ashes to ashes.

It will pick your bones with a gnashing bite, true to the force of its reality — and while you lay there, gasping and writhing and lost, the grit will wear you down, seep into the cracks.

You think, on the third month, you can shake it... That indomitable itch to run from the slightest shadow that breathes too deep. In the dark, things come alive in Gotham.

You move into a second floor apartment in Old Gotham come winter. It's a little place that has neighbors who stare through peepholes and whisper the names of girls who are dead or missing or both. There are cats who howl at your fire escape like the heralds of a new dawn. There is a pervasive feeling of being watched.

Tonight is no different.

You agreed to take the late shift.

Pauli's Diner is a staple of Old Gotham — the sort that has become as immovable as Wayne Tower. A doting fixture along the scarred and brutal map of the city. Glittering in neon, the diner stands for more than a twenty-four hour spot for the best fries in the city. It stands for neutrality. No violence.

In Pauli's, you're family.

Sometimes, your uniform can promise safety. The pale jade shirt and skirt combination has shielded you from two muggings in the last month alone.

Other nights, like tonight, there's no such thing as promise.

The shadows inhale, and they exhale, and as you wait on the Steeple Street platform you see that very promise slip away. The subway rattles in, and faces flicker into focus. A murder of men. The lights above swing, blink, and the dark around you becomes more and more alive.

They step off the train, and you grip your keys tightly.

You've learned that placidity is a survival instinct in moment's like this. But, a flinch is earned when they leer, jeer, and the games begin.

Surviving, you think, was something Gotham has taught you well in the last few months. Cover your head, don't look at their faces too closely, and remember to only pick fights you can finish. Politeness will kill you just as quickly as boldness. Find the middle. Survive.

Someone yanks your bag from your arm, and you're swung roughly to the ground. You palms his the cold concrete and your knees sting. Day old snow bites at your skin.

Get up.

If you're quick about it, you could run.

You ignore the hair creeping into your peripherals, ignore the disheveled heave of your chest as you snap your eyes around the scene.

The faces of five men on a haunt surround you like the hours on a clock — and you realize that there's a sound. Like the ticking of seconds. One, two, three, four, five.

Boots on pavement.

...It's quiet.

Their voices have faded. The rummaging through your tote bag has stopped.

It strikes you suddenly, as you stare beyond the men into the living dark, that you've never seen The Batman.

You've heard the stories chattered over hot cups of coffee, clutched in the hands of jabbering GCPD boys. You've heard the eclectic tales of his uncanny ability to see what even their best detectives can't. You've heard whispers of praise, promised threats, and footage of last year's incident with The Riddler.

The Bat steps into the light, you realize you were right.

The shadows are alive in Gotham.

It's he who lives within them; towering and broad, intimidation dripping in kevlar.

...Bruce doesn't know why he's here.

If he's being honest with himself — something he tries not to make a habit — then he knows it's because he's been watching you for the last three months. After all, you'd moved into Selena's old apartment only a handful of weeks after she fled for Blüdhaven.

It stung.

He's spent too many nights up on the opposite fire-escape, watching, waiting. He isn't sure for what. Maybe for Selena to return, maybe for Falcone's remaining boys to come knocking. Either way, he supposes you've grown on him.

You don't see Gotham the way he does.

Or, at the start you didn't.

Your unwavering smile had become tired in recent weeks. Your hope in a new start was beginning to dwindle. The city was getting to you.

A late shift was out of character for you.

"C'mon, man, we're just helpin' her get to the train..."

One of them reaches to touch you, to placate the approaching vigilante — and you snap fast like a viper.

"Leave me alone."

It's tipped with venom.

Bruce's eyes flick about. The Bat narrows his eyes. Beneath his gloves, a tense fist cracks his knuckles awake.

You're not prepared for a fist to connect with your cheek in retaliation to your words. You're not prepared to lose your footing, to slip in the snow, and for your temple to hit the concrete hard as you try to brace yourself.

You tell yourself to get up, get up. Roll over and push up.

But, the shadows are breathing again — and it's getting darker, and you try to open your eyes to see him.

He's Gotham.

He'll eat them alive, swallow them whole with violence so resounding.

But, the shadows are here now, beckoning you with warm hands.

So, you lay there, gasping and writhing and lost as your blood seeps into the cracks.

It's quiet for a long time.

When you come to, you're home.

Home.

Quiet.

Home?

Light.

No shadows.

The door is locked.

You sit up straight on the couch.

The room tilts, and you wince.

Home?

Yes.

Yes, there is a cat meowing. The grey one, out on the fire escape — it's morning. He's expecting you to put the food out. You usually do.

You reach, touch your hairline, and furrow your brow when you realize there's gauze there.

Your socks land on the carpet. You stare at the kitchen.

Home.

That's when you see the note on the fridge.

NO MORE NIGHT SHIFTS.