Disclaimer; Me no own, please no sue.

Author's Note; due to technical difficulties (stupid computer dying..) it'll be a month before the next update, apologizes!

You're sick of feeling numb
You're not the only one
I'll take you by the hand
And I'll show you a world that you can understand
This life is filled with hurt
When happiness doesn't work
Trust me and take my hand
When the lights go out you will understand

Three Days Grace, Pain

When I became older, my momma saw I had her grace. She pulled triple shifts to pay for the gymnastics, ballet, piano lessons… among other classes. Those were the only ones I could remember, though. I think ettiqutte classes might have been in there.

I was made, or bred, to be a gymnast. My body was balanced perfectly. I loved the uneven bars and the rings. It gave me a sense of freedom to control if I went down, up, turned, flexed… and at times, it felt like I could fly. Ballet gave my legs a strength I'd never felt before. How else can you describe being able to hold your entire body weight on one, singular bone in your foot? Balance in both was extreme.

For practice, I would watch the cats. While I had no tail, I knew I could use my arms and legs to recreate the same ability to distribute weight in a more even fashion to balance on, say, a flag pole… if needed. Piano opened the world of music to me: more importantly, it gave me patience and the ability to work for a long time and relish in the finished product - whether it was a homework assignment, and bringing home an A to my momma, or picking a lock to that satisfying 'ting' of opening. Everything my momma gave me has helped me, or fashioned me, in my current lifestyle.

I wished she could have been there to see us, Batman, running along the skyline as if gravity was our plaything, and the night was our domain.

But, dreams so often fade with the morning light…

She was diagnosed with leukemia when I was eight. How can you watch someone waste away? Someone who held the world in her hands and gave you little sips at a time? When the world begins to fall, you no longer take little sips, but great big swigs as life sloshes out of their hands and into you.

I didn't know how to handle everything. I took it out on my friends; I would dare the boys to do things they couldn't, and I could. Things like swinging and climbing on clotheslines, jumping over ditches I could make - but they ended up breaking their untrained legs. The girls hated me for being able to take all the classes, in a way being more, and less, feminine, then they were. I began to hang out in other neighborhoods, giving my mother's name as my own… in case anyone tried to tell on me. After a while, no one played with me anymore, which was fine. I had so much to do for such a small child…

One of the few things that gave momma pleasure was watching me dance. That had to stay. She pulled more shifts at work as she was dying to pay for my wonderful classes. My job was to do my best; to practice harder at everything and make her happy. I studied hard so she wouldn't take me out of the dancing she loved so much, loved to watch me in, to excel at. I had to work hard at that, too, so she could be happy. My personal love was gymnastics, and I worked hard at that for me. The added bonus is it made dancing easier, which gave me more time to study.

I had so few friends in my childhood: I built everything around my mother. Sometimes, I wonder, did I ever regret it?

No, not for a moment.

It wasn't too long after I began middle school when Momma had to quit her job. She was getting so tired, so weak, so very, very, sick.

She couldn't pay for my classes anymore. I had no gymnastics, I had no dancing, so I stopped studying. And with all that free time I thought about how to get my world back.

I would walk the streets, following the cats where they lead me. And one day, they lead me to a fire escape. I climbed up there after a dark little cat, and it sat down, demanding to be stroked. I put it in my lap and did so, thinking how a girl my age could make money. I watched the sidewalk and noticed a man running down the alley, and heard sirens wailing. I knew if I drew attention to myself, I was dead. So I stayed quiet and watched him set down a heavy backpack and wipe the sweat from his face. The cat jumped from my lap, and I lunged after it, but made no sound. It stopped and looked at me as if saying, "Stay". I did so and watched it run down to the alley. It slinked past the man and jumped into a pile of garbage, making such a noise! The man started and almost fell. He yelled, throwing something at the cat, turning his back on the backpack.

And it dawned on me what the cat wanted me to do.

I stood slowly, taking deep breaths and seeing everything as a gymnasium. Poles, vaults, bars, perfect.

I jumped down from the fourth floor, grabbing a flagpole on the third floor that spun me round once and took some momentum. I dropped to a second floor windowsill and with my small body, pressed inside it. The man's heart was so loud, he never heard the small sounds I made.

Still, I was two floors above him, and he was still there.

I prayed to whatever deity watched over me that this would work. A child, of course, never thinks of being caught past the fact of "it will be trouble if I get caught." Not "He'll kill me, hurt me, and make me wish I never thought what I thought."

I stepped onto the first landing of the fire escape just as the cats started to fight in the dumpster. The man was so agitated, he ran over to shoo - or worse - the cats away. This was my chance! With all the noise and the agitation distracting the man, it was easy for me to grab the bag… but the alley was too long, I couldn't run with it. So I grabbed it and chucked it into a thick pile of garbage bags and hid behind a trash can as tight as I could.

The man turned just then and I closed my eyes tight, believing if I couldn't see him, he couldn't see me.

He swore, panicked, and just as he was about to search for the bag, a bunch of cop cars drove past, swerving by the alley, spotting him. He ran out of the alley and down the street. The tires from the police cars screeched angrily and swerved down the road after him.

I grabbed the backpack and ran the other way.

I put the backpack on and climbed up another building in the twinkling night. Feeling safe with the night air pushing me from all sides, and a cat who had followed me, purring by my side, I opened the bag.

I found out the next day on the news, the man had just robbed a jewelry store.

The bag was full of diamonds.

They glittered on my young face, and, I'll admit it, I dressed up in them and pretended I was a queen for a while until the it dawned on me;

I couldn't bring the diamonds home and hope to pay the rent. But I knew enough about pawn shops to know they were open 24 hours and wouldn't ask questions. But the pawn around here knew me (momma pawned what little she had for recitals and competitions). I had to go to the other side of Gotham to get money for these.

I had walked two hours before I felt far away enough to look for a pawn shop. I found one fifteen minutes after that. It was tucked away, blink if you miss it, shady and dangerous.

I went inside.

There was an old man behind the counter, thin, cold, hard. He laughed when I walked in. "We don't pawn Barbra doll jewelry for candy money here."

I set the backpack down, "This is my momma's… we hit some pretty tough times… she couldn't get here herself. I, I need money."

He eyed me, "Cops send you? I'm an honest man, dammit."

I shook my head, and kept it lowered.

He gave me an askew glance, "Let's see what baubles mommy has, shall we?" He opened up the bag and froze.

He was quiet for so long, I glanced up to see him that way, "It's all we have." I said quietly, under my breath.

"You… you couldn't have stolen these…" he was whispering, "No, you're far too young to even...and all these…" he gave a dry swallow, "Ten grand, and you never walk back in here, or your mommy or daddy. I'll claim I never saw ya and you'll never get these back."

"Deal."

Looking back, those rocks were worth a mil five, easy. But ten thousand dollars put me back in my gymnastics and dance classes and a roof over my head for the next year with momma's social security and Medicare.

She asked where I got the money, and I told her I had found a rich man's wallet, and he rewarded me. She never asked me questions, so I never knew if she believed me.

After a while, the money went away, and I felt it when all the food came from cans again. I knew it was time to get more money. But I'd never come across that windfall again. I had to work for it.

I tried stealing from grocery stores and picking pockets, to no avail. I always got caught and would claim, "This fell sir, sorry!" or, "Ma'am, is this yours?" several times. I wasn't good enough to steal, apparently.

And then this loud obnoxious woman moved in across the way. She had a tiny little dog that did nothing but bark. I hated her. The dog scared the cats away and kept me awake. Worse yet, the woman was so loud, whenever she was on the phone, she would cut through the radio stories, or momma's singing.

My original intention, when I crept over, was to let that noisy little barking rat loose and hoped it got eaten by a ­real dog. However, after I had broken in and let the little dog loose, I noticed something on the woman's dresser; a very large, fat, comical piggy bank.

I took it.

Now, a real thief would have thought, "Too easy, too much of a target," and moved on. This is what the woman had hoped. I, on the other hand, was thirteen.

When I smashed open the piggy bank I found a thousand dollars in savings. Just ten pretty little hundreds with a couple pennies inside for a believable sound.

I told momma I'd found a paper route.

I was smart enough to slip her smaller amounts of money so she'd think this was a very well-paying job. And the gymnastics competitions started to pay the winners.

I was getting better and better at breaking into homes and stealing from annoying people, from the trash of life. Thieves and mobsters began to wonder why their wallets were so light… but, hey, there was still money in them (I wasn't completely dumb) and in enough time… I had saved enough to go to Gotham University as a dancer. Just like momma.

When I showed her my acceptance letter, I wish I could say she was full of happiness. That tears ran down her face and she hugged me to her frail, birdlike body and whispered how proud she was of me and covered me in red-lipstick kisses.

The most I got was a quiet wind whispering across her grave.

Her body let out on her, and she had died months before I was accepted to Gotham U.

So, instead, I promised I would make her proud of me.

Bruce set the story down and rubbed his eyes. This was getting too personal. He was understanding why she started to steal and, God help him, it was hard to say he wouldn't have done the same in her position. All she wanted was to make her mother happy, and somehow the easiest path fell right into her lap and kept her there.

He called the Justice League. Flash picked up.

"Pizza in 20 seconds or it's free, what'll your order be? Hey, that rhymed…"

"Flash."

"Oh, it's you. What's up B-man?"

"I need you to send the Question to Selina Kyle's penthouse, see if he can find out where she went."

"Hey, you're the detective, why aren't you—"

Bruce hung up and turned the page.