A Treacherous Thing

by Lasgalendil

In the shadow of Fear Night Brisby finds a friend in a camp counselor who encourages her to excel. She receives a Wayne Enterprises scholarship and resolves to leave her family behind. But Gotham City, secret sins and the long-reaching fingers of unintended consequence turn her American Dream into an Arkham Nightmare.

1. Chapter 1

Let me tell you a story.

My story. Gotham's story. A Tale of Two Cities. The best of times, the worst of times, so inseparable and entwined I can't tell the two apart even now. I grew up in Gotham City, and if you'd grown up there too during those darkening days you'd know that the half-life of a horrible childhood is forever.

You have to understand: I'm not a bad person. But after Shannon died and Paula pulled away and I watched my mother and father fall further and further apart I just wanted out. Away. To Escape. Wayne Enterprises and my scholarship were everything. I had to be perfect. I had to be independent. I had to break free. I caught a glimpse of hope, a way out of Gotham and the pregnancies and drugs and drudgery that surrounded me and my peers and I clawed towards it no matter how much or who it hurt. I left Lydia behind. I left my Micheal behind, I ran away from my best friend and my brother and nearly had to bury them both.

Micheal wasn't so lucky. Paula I haven't heard from in years.

Dead or alive, I buried my parents in Gotham long ago.

I was young. Capricious. Anxious. I never meant for any of this to happen. I never meant to hurt anyone. But consequences are like parents, as James always says, you don't get to choose them. But you have to live with them. I've lived with mine for a long, long time.

You have no choice but to live with them. No one ever said you have to accept them.

And no matter how much time passes you still find yourself sweating and sleepless in the middle of the night, shaking him awake and asking him for forgiveness.

But James is James. I never had to. I never will.

Once upon a time, he tells a story beside me in the dark as his fingers soothe my skin, once upon a time it was no one's fault. There was no one to blame.

It was never easy growing up in Gotham…and Fear Night only made it worse. When the good die young and all life is meaningless, adolescence in Gotham City dissolved into sex, money, drugs and fame. I came of age in an era of violent vigilantism, secret sins and unforeseeable consequences where even the good and great were poised to fall. There were no certainties, no gods, no justice. No heroes, only idols. And amidst it all the Joker carved a religion of chaos against the bleak and bloodied background.

Dent is dead. The Batman has fallen. Now comes the winter of our discontent.