Archive of Our Own ^beta

He felt like a stalker. He probably looked like a stalker if he was being honest if he wasn’t completely hidden in the shadows.

Danny’s steps were practically silent as he stuck to alleys. The stench of Gotham made his nose wrinkle in disgust, but it didn’t deter his personal mission.

It was just turning evening, the shadows deepening despite the lack of sun shining through the smog.

The woman he’s been following for most of the day is strutting down the sidewalk like she owns it. Her short black hair holds no accessories accept for the useless sunglasses on top of her head. Her dark jeans are painted on and her low-cut shirt is loose. Two shopping bags are held on one elbow, not fearing the people passing by regardless of the crime rate in this particular area.

Selina Kyle.

If Danny’s research, with Tucker and Sam’s help, was accurate, this was the woman who gave birth to him. His bio-mom.

After watching her the whole day, the similarities he saw in her ID picture seem to pale in comparison to their different personalities. She was confident where he was insecure. She was strong and coy where he had lame puns. She had complete control over her emotions where Danny snaps at just a smirk from Vlad.

They were so different, it was entirely discouraging. Over the many hours since his arrival into Gotham, he’s lost almost all of his nerves to approach her. He had wanted to find the right moment to introduce himself, but the longer he watches from shadows and around corners, he can’t seem to make his feet move forward.

Selina was just so… cool, and he was just not.The kids at school still know him as the school Loser, with a capital L. Even his clone was cooler than he was. He thought Danielle would get along great with his biological mother, but couldn’t see her giving him a glance.

Geez, this trip felt like such a waste.

Although he didn’t have many expectations with meeting her, he at least expected to actually meet her. Instead he’s a coward, hiding.

“What do ya think you’re doing, kid?”

Danny squeaks and jumps at the sudden voice behind him. He twists to see a large man in a leather jacket and a red helmet. Even with his bare minimum research into Gotham’s vigilantes, he doesn’t remember this one. Was he even a vigilante? Was he just some random guy?

“Uh, nothing,” he darts his eyes to the side as he lies.

The man sighs and it comes out staticy and deep. A voice modifier?

“Right. I’m gonna have to ask ya nicely to move along. Pretty ladies don’t like being stalked even if the stalker is some two bit shrimp that aight an actual threat.”

“Hey! I’m not that small,” he denies reflectively. “And I’m not stalking her!”

“Really? So it wasn’t you following Miss Kyle for the last couple blocks ducking around corners?”

Danny opens his mouth to retort angrily, then pauses. He blinks in surprise.

“You know her?”

He knew her name, the man must know her then, right?

“That aight any of yer business, kid. I told ya to move along and I mean it.”

“No, wait, just listen. I just wanted to talk to her. I’m really not a stalker or whatever, I’m just trying to get the nerve to talk to her and it’s- it’s really hard, okay?”

The man runs a gloved hand over his red helmet impatiently.

“Look kid, yous aight even outta high school, am I right? You don’t got no business talking to Selina.”

Danny makes a face.

“Ew, gross. Not like that. You got the wrong idea, sir. Promise.”

“Then what is it like, Kitten?”

Both males turn to see Selina Kyle leaning casually against brick, hand on her hip. She wears a playful smirk, her dark lipstick stretching with the movement, with a manicured eyebrow raised.

Danny suddenly has a frog in his throat.

“Evening, Ms. Kyle,” the man states, the voice modifier taking out any humor that would be sure to be there.

“Hood,” she greets back with equal humor.

Her eyes slide back to Danny and he has the urge to squirm under that gaze.

“Well, go on then,” the man, Hood, says delightfully. He shoves Danny closer to the woman, the teen stumbling like a day old fawn. “You wanted to talk, so talk.”

“Don’t be mean to the poor boy. Just look at him. Been tailing me since noon and can’t even get a word out,” she says condescendingly.

Danny’s cheeks turn hot and he finds the ground mighty interesting. Yea, this was a big mistake.

“Sorry,” he mumbles quite pathetically.

“Are you apologizing for following me or for wasting my time?”

Danny cringes at the light tone that certainly meant otherwise.

“Both, I guess. I didn’t really think you’d spot me.”

She hums in thought. The click of heels signal her approach and a sharp nail under his chin forces his head up until their eyes meet. He notes they are just as sharp as her well manicured claws.

“You’re not the worst I’ve seen try to be sneaky, but I’m the best,” she assures with a purr and Danny suddenly feels even smaller.

He gulps and her smile flashes under the poor excuse of a street lamp.

“Come now, cat got your tongue?”

Holy Honey Nut Cherrios, his mother is intimidating. Maddie can hold her own, but she doesn’t lead the room by the nose like this Selina Kyle.

“July twenty-third, 19XX,” he says because that was the only thing that came to mind to kick start this disaster of a conversation this was already cooking up to be.

The corner of her lips twitch and her eyes narrow into slits.

“Does- does that date mean anything to you?” he asks after she stays still. Unusually still in fact.

The nail under his chin flicks away with a small sound. She tilts her head.

“Perhaps. What does it mean to you?” she redirected.

He takes a breath.

“It’s my birthday.”

There is a flicker of recognition and suddenly she’s really looking at him. Her intelligent eyes examine the nose that matches her own, the dark hair that has the same thickness and texture as hers, the shape of his ears, and even their similar builds.

“I know this is… out of nowhere, and I probably should have approached you differently, but, um, I’m kinda looking for my birth mother… and I think you’re her. Maybe.”

Her smile is completely gone at this point and Danny is mentally regretting even bringing it up. He liked her smile, even if it was a little sharp and dangerous. It kind of reminded him of his own a bit, especially when he’s fighting ghosts and the adrenaline gets to him. His friends call the look scary, and seeing it on Selina, he’s inclined to agree.

She doesn’t say anything for a moment and Danny’s nerves come back in the form of rubbing the back of his neck. Selina notices and for some reason inhales heavily.

“Why do you think she’s your birth mother?” Hood suddenly asks, making Danny tense for a second before forcibly relaxing. Honestly forgot the man was standing there.

“I, um, found my birth certificate. Turns out I was born here, in Gotham, New Jersey to a Selina Kyle. There are other Selina Kyle’s in New Jersey of course, but none of them really fit. I know I might be wrong here. I’m usually wrong about a lot of things, so it wouldn’t be surprising… Am I wrong?”

He asks that last question in a small voice. Danny wasn’t lying. He has been wrong before and it really wouldn’t be surprising if he’s got the wrong woman. Who knows, his mother could have changed her name or moved away. There was really no telling… but he had a good feeling about her. They looked close enough to be mother and son, and she was the right age. It fit, and maybe he just wanted to find her.

Selina steps closer to cup his face gently with both hands. They aren’t as soft as he was expecting with how much it looks like she takes care of her appearance. Danny wisely remains still as she stares into his eyes with great intensity.

Without warning, she releases one of her hands to hold out to Hood. No words are exchanged as the man hands something over Danny can’t quite see.

“Open up, Kitten,” she instructs softly.

His brows furrow and he instinctively goes to ask why, but of course that leaves his mouth open for her to stick whatever it was inside to rub against his cheeks. He makes a disgruntled noise as he tries to pull away. He totally didn’t sign up for this.

It’s over quickly and he jerks away when she released him completely. He wipes his mouth as he watches her hand over a swab to the man who puts it in a slender container. Hood secures it to his belt and then nods to them both before taking out a grappling gun and making it to the rooftop before Danny had even recovered.

The teen turns bewildered eyes back to his maybe-mom. Selina has the audacity to pretend nothing weird just happened by shooting him an unbothered smile and turning on her heel.

“You got a place to stay, sweetheart?” she calls over her shoulder, picking up the bags she left on her way out of the alley.

Danny shakes his head quickly before jogging after her.

“Hold on just a minute! You can’t just change the subject after that! What the heck!”

“I would think you would have figured that out by now,” she teases.

He frowns. Okay, yea he knew she just swabbed his saliva for DNA and handed it over to the weird guy in a helmet, but that doesn’t explain literally any of his questions.

“Sorry to disappoint, but I’m a C minus student.”

“Not all smarts are book smarts,” she retorts without missing a beat.

“Not the point. Why would you give it to him? Who even was he? I get he’ll test mine against yours, does that mean he already has a sample from you? Why would he even run it-“

“Kitten, slow down before you hurt yourself. Now answer my question.”

The waiting brow was clearly a ‘mom’ expression Danny could never go against. His shoulders sag in defeat.

“My friend booked me a hotel room for while I’m here,” he grumbles.

Selina nods in acceptance.

“Good to know you have loyal friends.”

“I mean, yea, I guess,” he falters at the weird comment, but quickly shrugs it off.

“And exactly how long are you here?”

“Uh, like two more days. I fly out Sunday for school on Monday.” He pauses, then points a finger at her. “So people will come looking for me if I don’t show up.”

“I’m glad,” is her easy response, taking a turn around a corner. Danny follows behind like a lost puppy in this massive city. “I see you know my name.”

Danny looks at her blankly. She has to raise a brow at him for him to understand.

“Oh! Uh, Danny. I’m Danny.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Danny.”

He rubs the back of his neck again with a cringe.

“Sorry again for the whole following you around thing. I was planning to, you know, but you’re just so… cool, and I’m just… anyway, sorry for being weird.”

She briefly frowns at him, humming in thought. Without warning she enters a run down apartment building, leaving Danny standing awkwardly not knowing whether to follow or not.

He sees her stop and look over her shoulder at him with a look that clearly said ‘are you coming’. He hesitantly follows her. Sure, stranger danger and he probably shouldn’t follow a woman he doesn’t know personally into her apartment alone, but then again, he can always go ghost to get himself out of a bad situation. Screw Batman, he was getting the hell outta dodge.

His first thought upon entering her place was oh, so that’s where he gets all his puns from. All her cat references and calling him ‘kitten’ when she lives in a feline sanctuary. She catches his wide grin easily.

Danny bends down to pet the ones that come up to him, picking up a black cat that is determined to climb into his lap. 

“Hopefully this doesn’t end up a cat-tastrophe.”

The mischievous, playful grin he gives her might actually match the one she returns.

“Make yourself comfortable. Do you like hot chocolate? I think I have a few packets left.”

He carefully maneuvers around the small bodies on the floor and gratefully sits on the cushion that hasn’t been claimed yet. He sits straight up so his head doesn’t hit the cat sprawled along the back of the couch. The black cat in his arms pushes up to butt its head against his chin. His hand automatically scratches behind its ears.

There was no way his clothes were surviving the hair hurricane this apartment is.

“Yea! Sounds good, thanks.”

Danny can watch her in the kitchen from where he sits. Selina has a practiced ease about her as she glides around the cats while getting out mugs and milk.

“So why are you looking for your biological mother anyway? Call me curious.”

“Curiosity killed the cat,” he recites. She chimes in and they finish the saying together, weirdly unplanned. “But satisfaction brought it back.”

She shoots him a smirk over her shoulder. He blushes.

“I guess same reason. Curious mostly.”

He shrugs. Even if she was his birth mom, he wouldn’t tell her the real reason. That he was thinking about telling his parents about Phantom, but needed to be prepared with a contingency plan first. His friends and sister all agreed that before he said a word to them, he needed a back up plan so he had someplace to go if it hit the fan. Sure he could hide in the Zone, but he was still half human. He wanted to stay on this side of the veil so he needed to find someone to take in a minor until he became an adult. Worst comes to worst, he could always just live on the streets until then, but if his birth parents work out, then that would probably be the easiest solution.

Selina hums.

“Did you always know you were adopted or is this a recent discovery?”

“No, my parents never hid it from me, I just never felt it was necessary to look for my birth parents before.”

“So what changed?”

Everything.

“Just you know. I’m sixteen and people are already talking about what we wanna do when we grow up and what colleges to go to and what our parents do for a living. It just got me thinking, you know?” he finishes with a shrug. He’s been doing a lot of that lately.

“Any ideas?”

“Huh?”

He has to tilt his head up so he didn’t get a mouth full of black fur.

“On what you want to do,” she elaborates. The kettle of water on the stove is taking forever to heat in his opinion.

“Oh,” he chuckles awkwardly. Mr. Lancer had been dropping hints to think about it, even going so far to drop a pamphlet for a career fair and a college fair. Both of them are stuck to the bulletin board above his desk at home. “I don’t know… I always wanted to be an astronaut when I was younger, but that’s…”

He waves a hand to dismiss it as the pipe dream it was.

“And that’s no longer an option?”

Her question is more teasing, trying to lighten the mood with playfulness, which he can appreciate.

“I hear they don’t take C average students,” he smirks back. It doesn’t really reach his eyes though.

“You never know,” Selina shrugs carelessly, “shoot for the moon, land among the stars.”

Danny chuckles at the space reference. Gosh, why did she have to be so perfect? Maybe she really was his mom- his bio-mom that is. If she was, then…

“Why did you…” he starts, his tone unsure, but too curious not to ask. “Why did you give me- I mean, your kid up?”

Her back is to him so he can’t see her expression, but her actions stop. Slender hands brace against the counter, her shoulders tense. The whistling of the kettle sparks her into movement.

“You don’t even know if I’m your mother, kid.”

She pours the steaming water into the two mugs, one of a black cat and other with some words he can’t read from his seat but can bet it’s sassy.

“But you did give up a kid,” he points out. There’s no other reason she thought it could be a possibility.

She turns with a tight smile, hardly looking at him as she passes him the mug with words. Danny takes it.

Selina sighs as she shoos a white and black cat out of a chair and takes the seat.

“I was young. I knew I couldn’t take care of a baby, but some other family could. I wasn’t mother material,” she says simply.

Danny takes a sip and fiddles with the mug in his hands. He shoots her an awkward grin.

“At least you’re self aware.”

“I suppose you could say that.”

“I guess that means you don’t really want me here, huh?”

She hums, “I didn’t say that.”

It was a vague reply he didn’t really know what to do with. She takes pity on him.

“Did you grow up with a family?”

He blinks and looks down at the dark color in his mug. Oh, this was the goodstuff.

“Yea. Mom and Dad can be a bit eccentric, but they love me lots. My big sister Jazz is annoying, but I know it’s just her way of showing she cares. We might be a bit… different, the rest of the town seems to think so. I always tried to fit in with the cool kids, the A-listers, but after a while I got the hint that it just wasn’t me. It’s alright, I’ve got my two best friends. Sam and Tucker. We’ve been through a lot together.”

“Yea?”

He nods quickly.

“Yea. Me and Tuck have been buds since like third grade. Sam moved to Amity in middle school I think. It all blurs together.”

“Oh? Where do you live?”

“Right, I’m in Amity Park, Minnesota. We’re only really like two hours from Lake Superior.”

She blinks at him.

“Danny, honey. Just in an hour you willingly gave a stranger your name, date of birth, and where you live. Not to mention followed me into my home.”

Danny thinks about that and tilts his head.

“Yea?”

The following thing was rude and he probably shouldn’t have followed her into her place, but he wasn’t really worried about anything bad happening.

“Didn’t your parents teach you stranger danger? Or at least self-preservation?”

He stalls like an old manual car.

“Uh, not really. Have never really needed it. My town is pretty safe from other people. Mom taught me some karate moves if I ever got into a sticky situation, but that’s about it,” he shrugs.

Her sigh sounds strangled. She clears her throat.

“Sweetheart, I’m going to remind you this is Gotham. Crime is everywhere and you always need to be aware of your surroundings and on your guard, otherwise every man with a knife and his brother are going to mug you. You can’t be giving your information out to strangers because they willuse it to their advantage.”

Like, yea he heard it was bad, but he didn’t know it was that bad.

“Oh.”

“You have to be careful, kitten.”

“Okay,…”

He didn’t know what to call her.

“Just Selina is fine for now,” she answers the unspoken question.

Selina. Right. Man, this was so awkward.

They talked for a bit more before she snuck a peek at her phone while she thought he wasn’t looking. From her reaction when he glanced over his shoulder while washing the two mugs he knew it was the results, but couldn’t discern whether her closed eyes meant a positive or negative outcome. She doesn’t say anything so he doesn’t bring it up.

Instead, she offers to walk him to his hotel. It takes him several reassurances he’ll be fine and he didn’t want her walking around the city at night when she didn’t have to and his hotel was ‘just around the corner, promise!’ before she finally let him walk out on his own.

Of course, that led to a knife in his face after seven minutes of walking.

“Whoa, dude! You should be careful with that. Could really cut yourself on accident holding it like that.”

“Shut up, kid, just give me your money.”

The guy calls him a kid, but he doesn’t look out of his teen years either. Dude must really be in a tight spot if he’s mugging someone this early in life. Not particularly vicious either. The knife was even a bit tarnished. Bet he picking it up off the street or something.

“You’re holding it wrong.”

“What?” the guy snaps reflexively.

“I said you’re holding the knife wrong.”

He pauses and just gives him a look like Danny’s the one who’s insane.

“Look- like this,” Danny demonstrates with an empty fist. The guy hesitantly maneuvers the knife self-consciously. “Flip it around. Yea, like that. Now you’ve got it.”

The guy gets back into position with his new holding on his old pocketknife. Danny frowns.

“Dude, widen your stance. A gust of wind could knock you over.”

“Would you stop criticizing me!” the guy snaps. “I’m trying to mug you!”

Danny raises his hands calmly.

“Alright, sorry, geez. I was just trying to help.”

“You want to help me mug you?” he asks incredulously.

“Just forget it then,” Danny rolls his eyes while flopping his hands down. “You know a place to eat around here that’s still open this time of night?”

“With what money? I am currently robbing you right now,” he seems to feel the need to remind with a motion of his knife.

“Well I’d buy you a meal obviously. Come on, nobody likes eating alone.”

The guy ponders that for a second.

“There’s… well, there’s Jerry’s just a block over. Best subs in the Alley.”

“Yea? Let’s go then, and put that away for Ancient’s sake, you will actually hurt yourself and I can’t fix tetanus.”

“Hey! It’s not that bad,” the guy examines the knife critically in the bad lighting, flipping it this way and that to try and see any rust while he walks with Danny down the street, “and stop telling me what to do!”

“Says the guy who didn’t know how to handle it right. Who taught you anyway because I’ve seen better YouTube tutorials?”

“Shut up,” he snaps, pointing the ‘weapon’ in Danny’s direction. Danny raises an eyebrow and the dude flips the thing closed and stuffs it in his pocket with a grownup pout.

Turns out the guy’s name is Malcolm and he needs money for his Grandfather’s medical bills. He’d opted out of college to help with the family finances and has only been able to get some jobs here and there. The last one got blown up by one of the many rogues polluting the city.

Danny could relate to many things going on in Malcolm’s life. They only stable income they had was from the government (Danny’s parents getting grants and Malcolm’s mom getting food stamps), money mostly went to things that weren’t necessary (Danny’s parent’s inventions that never see the light of day and Malcolm’s dad’s drinking problem), and there was never enough edible food in the house (no explanation needed).

“What about food banks or something like that? Over by me there’s a church that gives out food every month. My sister and I signed up so we could at least have something to hold us over,” Danny suggests.

Malcolm shakes his head.

“We don’t do charity.”

“I mean, sure I don’t like charity either or anyone’s pity, but how I look at it is sometimes I need an extra hand, just a little help, and when I’m finally not drowning I can give it back later on. It’s not charity if you pay it back.”

Malcolm ruminates on that for a while.

“I don’t like owing people either.”

“I’m not talking about loan sharks or whatnot, Malcolm. I’m talking about… you know, like centers and people and programs that are literally there to help people down on their luck or in a bad place. Gotham has got to have something like that, right?”

“…I don’t actually have a clue. Wouldn’t even know where to look for somethin’ like that.”

Danny hums as he thinks for a moment. He had devoured his sub and was now taking his time with his chips.

“My sister is almost always at the public library and they always have posters and brochures and crap on the bulletin board or at the front desk. Bet you five bucks they’d at least know where to point you.”

They talk a little more and by the time it was super late and time to go, Danny gives Malcolm all his cash except for ten dollars for the next day. Sam had loaded him up in case something happened and he needed to buy a train ticket home instead of the plane ticket he already had. He easily hands over at least two hundred dollars. He does it by a dark alley and Malcolm pockets it, not even looking at it. Everyone knows not to count your money out in the open.

“You’re a real chill dude, you know that?”

Danny smirks.

His parting words are, “Sometimes life sucks, but at least we aren’t dead. Take it easy, man.”

He makes it back to his hotel without any additional muggings.

**

“Selina, your son either has balls of steel or he’s a moron.”

“You made sure he got back okay?”

Hood gives her a cliff notes of what happened and Danny’s absolutely insane course of action and demeanor.

She gives a sharp smile.

“Looks like you can take the boy out of Gotham…”

“No. See, no. That doesn’t even count! He wasn’t raised here!”

“But he was born here. It counts.”

Jason sighs long and hard.

“He’s definitely yours though. Didn’t see it at first, but that whole encounter I witnessed just reminded me of you. And his smirk. It’s honestly creepy.”

“So happy you agree with the test results.”

“Yea, B is having a cow as we speak. Had to use his tech.”

“I wasn’t hiding it anyway. Just as long as he doesn’t interfere.”

“Did you tell him?”

They both knew he wasn’t talking about Bruce any longer.

“Tomorrow. It’s his last day here and now it seems I have a reason to treat him to lunch.”

Hood shifts, but doesn’t voice his thoughts. He didn’t have to. Selina is well aware of the explosion that ended with Jason finding his birth mother.

“I just don’t know,” she admits quietly. “He has a family. I can’t drag him into this.”

‘This’ being their nightlife. Their crazy double life that no sane person attempts.

“But…” Jason prompts because he will always be internally a middle-aged woman stirring the pot.

“There was something there, something he wasn’t saying, something off.I need to make sure…”

“Right. And the fact that you actually want to get to know your literal son has nothing to do with it.”

“I never said that.”

“No, you’re just dancing around it.”

She huffs in mock irritation and promptly shoos him out of her apartment. She needed to figure out what she’s wearing tomorrow.