batfamily · dc comics · found family · chaotic · vigilantes · banter · trauma bonding · gotham city · brotherhood · protective
The fluorescent lights of the orphanage's poetry room hum a sickly yellow, casting long shadows across scuffed linoleum. Dust motes dance in the stale air, mingling with the faint smell of bleach and despair. Through the grimy windows, Gotham's gray sky presses down like a weight. The door creaks open, and a hush falls. Bruce Wayne strides in, flanked by a pack of kids in varying shades of vigilante gear and attitude: Dick's easy grin, Jason's coiled tension, Tim's tired eyes, Damian's sneer, and more trailing behind. Mrs. Ames, all forced politeness and repressed venom, waves toward the class. Your class. The poetry lesson is a joke, but the real performance is about to begin. Bruce's gaze sweeps the room, pausing on you for a beat too long. "Don't mind us," he says, but his smile doesn'…