Shallow
YANDERE BATFAM Ć MERFOLK READER ćROMANTICć
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Dickās fingers curled weakly against the concrete. His lungs burned. Every breath felt like dragging broken glass across his chest.
Tim was saying something.
Jason too.
Their voices sounded distant. Muffled. Lost somewhere behind the frantic pounding of blood in his ears.
All that Dick could think about was the water.
His head twisted despite the protests of his body. Searching.
The river remained empty.
No flash of violet. No glimpse of scales. No glowing eyes staring back from beneath the surface.
Nothing.
It should have relieved him.
Instead, an unfamiliar disappointment settled heavily in his chest.
āDick.ā Tim grabbed his shoulder so hard that the older boy nearly pushed him away on instinct.
His voice finally cutting through the fog. āYou with us?ā
Dick blinked slowly.
The bridge came back into focus.
Jason crouched beside him.
Tim looked pale. Worried.
The water continued rushing beneath them.
The creature was gone.
And for some reason, Dick couldnāt stop looking for it.
Sleep never came.
The manor had long since fallen silent. Every light extinguished. Every hallway empty.
Grandfather clocks echoed softly through the estate, their distant chimes marking the slow crawl of the night.
Dick remained awake through all of them.
Flat on his back. Then on his side. Then sprawled across tangled sheets that had long since surrendered to his restlessness.
The pillows were a disaster. One trapped beneath his chest, the other abandoned somewhere on the floor after another frustrated turn.
Still awake. Still thinking.
Moonlight poured through the towering windows of his room, washing everything in silver.
The pale glow traced every line of his body with merciless precision.
Dick Grayson had always been unfairly beautiful.
Not handsome. Not merely attractive. Beautiful.
The kind of beauty that stole attention without trying. The kind that lingered in people's minds long after he'd left the room.
Years of training had sculpted him into something that seemed almost impossible. Lean muscle flowed beneath smooth skin, every movement graceful even in exhaustion. His shoulders were broad without heaviness. His waist tapered naturally. Every line of him seemed designed for motion, for flight, for impossible leaps through Gotham's skyline.
Even injured, he looked like something carved rather than born.
Moonlight caught along the elegant curve of his throat. The sharp line of his jaw. The faint hollow beneath it.
His dark hair was still damp from his shower, falling in soft, unruly curls across his forehead. Strands brushed against lashes so ridiculously long they looked almost unfair on him.
The same lashes countless Gotham socialites had spent years shamelessly swooning over.
Not that Dick ever noticed.
Or cared.
The same bright blue eyes that somehow managed to look warm even when he was exhausted.
Right now those eyes stared endlessly toward the ceiling.
Restless. Haunted. Beautiful and completely miserable.
A sigh escaped him. His hand dragged down his face before disappearing beneath the hem of his shirt.
His fingers settled over the place where the wound should have been.
The knife.
The blood.
The agony.
The sensation of his life slipping through his fingers.
He remembered all of it.
Yet when his fingertips brushed over the skin there was nothing but smooth flesh.
Faintly pink and freshly healed. It should have been impossible.
Dick frowned, lifting the shirt higher. Moonlight slid across his chest as he examined the spot again.
Nothing.
No stitches. No scar. No explanation. Just skin. As if the injury belonged to another life. As though the injury had happened weeks ago instead of mere hours.
Down in the cave, Tim was still running tests.
Still analysing whatever strange substance had been packed into the wound.
Dick barely cared.
Because every time he closed his eyes, he saw you.
Not the wound. Not the blood. You.
A flash of violet beneath black water. Bioluminescent markings glowing softly through the darkness.
Wide, terrified eyes.
Not frightened of him. Frightened for him.
The memory settled deep inside his chest and stayed there. Warm. Frustratingly persistent.
Dick groaned and rolled onto his side, pulling the nearest pillow against him.
His fingers tightened unconsciously around the fabric. As though he could somehow hold onto a memory. Hold onto you.
"This is ridiculous," he muttered.
The room remained silent.
You were a stranger. A mystery. Something that shouldn't even exist.
Yet somehow every thought circled back to you.
To webbed fingers gripping his shoulders. To your voice. To the panic in your eyes when you thought he wasn't breathing.
To the way you'd looked at him.
Outside, Gotham glittered beneath the night sky. Far beyond the city. Far beyond Wayne Manor. Beneath miles of cold, dark water.. You existed.
And somewhere between his racing thoughts and another sleepless hour, Dick found himself wishing he could see you again.
It wasn't just plain curiosity anymore. And judging by the fact sleep still refused to come,
You weren't leaving his thoughts anytime soon.
The cave was quiet save for the endless hum of machinery.
Tim hadnāt moved from his chair in hours.
Several monitors illuminated his face in varying shades of blue and white. Empty coffee cups occupied every available inch of desk space, abandoned as quickly as they had been consumed.
Hours in front of the computer had left shadows beneath his eyes, dark against the sharp planes of his face. Exhaustion lingered there, but it hadn't dulled the intensity in his gaze. If anything, it made it sharper.
Normally Bruce wouldāve ordered him upstairs hours ago.
Tonight he didnāt.
Because Bruce himself hadnāt left either.
The bridge footage continued to play across the largest monitor.
Again.
And again.
And again.
The grainy recording showed little more than dark water and fractured moonlight. Occasionally a flash of movement appeared beneath the riverās surface before disappearing entirely.
Nothing that could be useful.
Nothing that should have warranted this much attention.
Yet neither of them looked away.
āIt doesnāt make sense.ā Timās voice broke the silence.
His fingers moved across the keyboard again. Reaching for it, he pushed his sleeves farther up his forearms without seeming to notice. The motion tightened the muscles beneath pale skin, subtle veins tracing along his wrists before disappearing beneath the rolled fabric.
Bruce glanced toward him.
The younger vigilante was frowning at a collection of scans displayed across three separate screens.
Chemical analyses.
Biological breakdowns.
Tissue comparisons.
Every test they possessed had been run against the strange substance recovered from Dickās injury.
Every single one had failed to identify it.
āIt accelerated tissue regeneration,ā Tim continued, scrolling through another report. āNot theoretically. Not potentially. It actually did.ā
Bruceās gaze shifted toward the medical file currently displayed beside it.
Nightwing.
Severe abdominal trauma. Expected recovery time: weeks.
Physical recovery time: hours.
His jaw tightened. Because Tim was right. It didnāt make sense. Nothing about this situation made sense. The creature itself was impossible enough. The healing compound only complicated matters further.
Bruce folded his arms across his chest. āGotham Harbor is monitored.ā
Tim laughed once. A short, humourless sound. He leaned back, rubbing a hand across his face before immediately returning to the screens. Even exhausted, there was an almost relentless focus to him, dark eyes fixed on the data as if he could force the answers to reveal themselves through sheer determination.
āExtensively.ā
Wayne Enterprises monitored shipping lanes. The city monitored cargo routes. The Batcomputer monitored everything else.
Thermal scans.
Sonar systems.
Surveillance satellites.
Motion tracking.
Bruce had spent decades building a network capable of observing every inch of Gotham.
Yet somehow an entirely unknown species had existed beneath their feet without detection. The fact irritated him more than he cared to admit.
Tim opened another file.
Then another.
Then another.
Old newspaper archives replaced scientific reports.
Missing persons cases, maritime accidents, sightings dismissed as hoaxes, urban legends.
Anything remotely connected to Gothamās waterways.
Bruce recognised the pattern immediately.
Tim was no longer investigating the bridge. He was investigating history. Trying to determine how long you had existed. How long youād been there.
Whether anyone else had ever seen you.
Whether anyone else had known.
It should have concerned him. Instead, Bruce found himself pulling another chair closer to the computer.
Tim didnāt comment.
Hours passed. The caveās clocks drifted steadily toward dawn. Neither noticed.
A single image remained frozen on the central monitor.
A blurry frame extracted from the bridge footage.
The quality was poor. Far too poor to identify any meaningful details.
Yet two things remained visible.
A faint bioluminescent glow, and a pair of eyes staring upward from the darkness.
Timās fingers paused over the keyboard. āYou think itās alone?ā
Bruceās eyes lingered on the image.
The question itself was interesting.
Not what are they.
Not where did they come from.
Are they alone.
As though Tim had already accepted your existence.
Bruce considered the question carefully.
A species required a population. A population required territory. Food. Shelter. Infrastructure.
The implications only multiplied from there.
His gaze settled once more on the river maps scattered across adjacent monitors.
For the first time since the encounter, he found himself wondering something beyond the mystery.
Not what you were.
But how long you had survived there.
Hidden beneath polluted waters, surrounded by criminal activity, entirely unseen.
His expression darkened.
If the creature that saved Dick had truly been living in Gotham all this time, then one fact remained unavoidable.
Something had been sharing his city for years.
And nobody had been protecting it.
Jasonās apartment was dark, which wasnāt unusual.
Most nights he preferred it that way.
The city lights filtering through the windows provided more than enough illumination, casting long shadows across the sparse living room and the collection of weapons currently spread across the coffee table.
His helmet sat abandoned beside the couch. His jacket draped over the armrest.
Yet neither had been touched in nearly forty minutes.
Jason remained seated.
His broad frame sank into the old leather cushions as one hand rolled a strip of torn fabric between rough fingers.
Nightwingās suit.
Or what remained of it.
The material had been shredded where Tim had grabbed him. A desperate attempt to stop Dick from falling.
Jason turned the fabric over again.
The motion was absentminded. Distracted.
A sliver of city light spilled through the apartment window, catching against the sharp angle of his jaw. It traced the faint white streak near his temple before disappearing into shadow again.
Normally he wouldāve been asleep hours ago.
Or out on patrol.
Or finding literally anything productive to do.
Instead he found himself staring at a ruined piece of spandex.
Thinking.
The bridge replayed itself endlessly behind his eyes.
Dick falling.
Tim screaming.
The water below.
And then you.
Jasonās jaw tightened.
Whatever the hell heād seen.
Thatās what kept bothering him.
Not that a creature existed. Not even that it had saved Dick. It was the way it had looked at them.
The memory remained frustratingly clear. Those eyes emerging from the darkness, aert and curious.
Not the eyes of an animal nor predator, but a person.
The realisation unsettled him.
Because people were complicated.
People lied.
People hid things.
People got hurt.
Jason tossed the fabric onto the table. His hand dragged across his face.
He shouldāve left it alone. Shouldāve gone to sleep. Shouldāve trusted Bruce and Tim to spend the next month drowning in reports and surveillance footage.
Instead he found himself standing.
The decision made before heād consciously reached it.
A low curse left him. ā.. Goddammit.ā
An hour later, Red Hood stood overlooking Gotham Harbor.
The city stretched endlessly behind him.
Neon lights reflected across black water.
The cold wind rolled off the river, tugging at the edges of his jacket.
Jason barely noticed. His attention fixed on the water below.
Feeling vaguely ridiculous.
The logical part of his brain knew this was stupid. You couldāve been anywhere.
Miles away by now.
Hidden beneath countless waterways connected to Gotham.
The chances of simply stumbling across you again were practically nonexistent.
Yet here he stood anyway.
His gloved hands rested against the railing.
The position drew his shoulders forward slightly, leather pulling taut across his back. Beneath the jacket, muscle shifted with easy, practiced strength. The kind earned through years of violence, survival, and relentless training.
The movement pulled at the fabric stretched across his shoulders.
Built less like an acrobat and more like a wrecking ball.
Years ago, Dick had been trained to fly.
Jason had been trained to survive.
He wasn't built for Dick's effortless grace.
Where Nightwing moved like a blade through the air, Jason was something heavier. Broader. A force rather than a flourish.
The difference showed.
In the width of his shoulders. The powerful line of his chest. The scars hidden beneath armor and clothing. The hands that looked just as comfortable wrapped around a motorcycle throttle as they did a weapon.
Even standing still, there was something restless about him.
Like violence lived just beneath the surface.
His dark hair stirred in the wind. Moonlight caught briefly on the exposed edge of his jaw before slipping lower, illuminating eyes that remained fixed on the water.
Far more observant than most people gave him credit for.
Searching.
The same way Dick had searched from the bridge.
Though Jason would deny the comparison if anyone pointed it out.
Minutes passed. Then more.
Nothing.
Only the river moving steadily beneath him.
The sound of distant traffic.
The occasional cry of gulls somewhere overhead.
Jason exhaled sharply through his nose.
This was stupid. Absolutely stupid.
He was standing alone on a dock in the middle of the night because he couldnāt stop thinking about a pair of eyes.
A pair of eyes attached to a creature he technically wasnāt even sure existed.
Yet even as the thought crossed his mind, his gaze drifted back toward the water.
Toward the place where heād last seen you.
The moon reflected across the surface in fractured pieces.
Silver dancing across black.
For a moment, just a tiny moment, Jason thought he saw something move.
His body reacted instantly.
Straightening. Every muscle tensing. His heartbeat kicked once against his ribs.
The disturbance vanished almost immediately.
Nothing more than a ripple.
Yet Jason remained frozen.
And for the first time since leaving the bridge, a faint smirk tugged at one corner of his mouth.
Because whether you were real or not, whether heād imagined the whole damn thing or not, he knew one thing. He wasnāt done looking.
Not yet.
Not until he got a look at you properly.
Damian had endured exactly thirty two hours of this nonsense.
Nearly two days of Grayson staring into space.
Nearly two days of Drake monopolising the Batcomputer.
Nearly two days of Father and Drake discussing an unidentified aquatic creature as though Gotham hadnāt presented far stranger problems before.
Frankly, he was tired of hearing about it.
The manor was unusually quiet as he made his way downstairs.
Early morning sunlight filtered through the enormous windows lining the eastern hallways, painting pale gold across polished floors.
Most of the household remained asleep.
Damian preferred it that way. Silence was far more tolerable than conversation. Especially when the conversation inevitably circled back to the same topic.
The creature.
The creature.
The bloody creature.
As though the entire family had collectively lost their minds.
A faint scowl settled across his features.
He pushed open the door leading into the cave. Immediately he was greeted by the glow of computer screens.
Drake remained exactly where Damian had left him hours ago.
Predictable.
The older boy was slumped over the keyboard, several empty coffee cups scattered around him like casualties of war.
Father sat nearby reviewing reports.
Neither acknowledged Damianās arrival. That alone was enough to pique his curiosity.
Damian approached silently. His gaze drifted toward the largest monitor.
The bridge footage.
Again.
Still the same recording.
For a brief moment, all he saw was darkness. Black water. Static.
Then movement.
A faint glow emerged beneath the surface.
The footage blurred. Pixelated. Distorted. Yet even through the poor quality, he could make out the shape.
Long.
Graceful.
Powerful.
The tail appeared first. Then a shoulder.
Then the footage froze.
Damian frowned.
Drake had paused the recording.
āContinue.ā
Tim glanced up, dark circles worse than before lingered beneath his eyes.
āYou interested now?ā
āNo.ā A lie.
Tim smirked.
Which immediately irritated him.
The recording resumed.
Only a few frames passed before the image sharpened slightly. Not enough for identification. Not enough for certainty.
But enough.
Enough for Damian to see the eyes.
His expression stilled.
The cave seemed unusually quiet.
For a moment, he forgot about Drake entirely. Forgot about the reports. Forgot about Grayson.
The image remained frozen. The creature stared upward from beneath dark water.
His fingers tightened slightly at his sides. āThat is the frame youāve been studying?ā
Drake nodded.
Damian didnāt respond.
He found himself stepping closer instead.
The image quality was terrible. Objectively terrible. Yet his gaze remained fixed on the screen. Studying every visible detail.
The shape of the face. The faint bioluminescence. Both the familiar and unfamiliar anatomy.
Something ancient stirred in the back of his memory.
The sort of stories that the League wouldāve dismissed as myths, yet here it was.
Documented.
Real.
Damianās expression darkened.
Fools.
Every one of them.
Allowing themselves to become distracted by a mystery. Becoming emotionally invested before they possessed all the facts.
It was sloppy.
Irrational.
Unworthy of them.
His gaze returned to the screen.
ā¦ Curious.
The thought surfaced before he could stop it. Damian immediately scowled. Then looked at the image again. Just once more. Only to verify a detail heād missed.
Nothing more.
Yet several minutes later he was still standing there.
Studying the creature hidden beneath Gothamās waters.
Unaware that he had become exactly like the rest of them.
