AU OF THE CITY MARKS AU
AKA THE GOTHAM'S CRYPTID CHILDREN AU
(City Marks 2.0)
Ok so basically an extension of the City Marked AU and technically the same thing but they're all homeless........
In this, Marked aren't common and once they are Claimed, they are feral. Cryptids.
They shift as they're Changed and the Mark appears on their wrist.
Their nails become clawlike and ears more expressive and pointed, and their teeth sharper, senses heightened, that sort of stuff. Basically feral humans. They can 'shift' these features when they want to though. So pretty much cryptids.
So, when Thomas and Martha are murdered and Bruce is Claimed, he's scared and confused, even as Gotham comforts Her child.
But as Bruce hears sirens, probably police alerted by the gunshots, he realizes what is in front of him- Maybe he'll get his inheritance and hopefully stay with Alfred, but CPS and foster care and everything is still a large threat and that paired with..... whatever just happened to him, he can't stay.
So he runs. He disappears, instinctively stepping into the shadows and letting them wrap around him, embrace him, and he lets Gotham's Wind lead him through the city.
After this, I haven't fully decided what happens to Alfred, but Alfred has to leave but knows Bruce is alive and Bruce takes over the abandoned mansion.
All the public knows is that the Waynes were found murdered in Crime Alley and their little seven-year-old was nowhere to be found. After three years of fruitless search, they give up and decide he's dead as his parents are.
Bruce grows up running around as a feral little cryptid (with Alfred sneaking in and out to take care of him and all).
Once Bruce is 16, he becomes Batman.
Years later, Gotham randomly urges Bruce to sneak into the circus to watch. He doesn't know why. Yet.
The Graysons fall.
Bruce knows what that nine-year-old is feeling because he feels it himself. And he senses it then. The boy has Gotham's Claim on him, not fully Marked yet, still a faintling, but still.
Bruce watches from the shadows as CPS does its shit.
Dick runs away the first chance he gets. Bruce finds him curled up in an abandoned building and coaxes the cub out of hiding. Bruce takes him back to the broken-down abandoned Manor.
Not a month later, Dick is Changed as well.
About three months after that Robin joins Batman.
Barbara is also a faintling and soon after joining the Bats she is Changed. Once her injury happens, she becomes Oracle, and she is better at controlling her instincts than the others so she doesn't have to go into hiding.
Jim Gordon is half-Claimed, so he can understand and speak Marked-Tongue.
Years later, Bruce finds another faintling child, a little street boy trying to steal tires of the car he made. Bruce catches the cub and soothes him.
Bruce takes him back to the broken-down abandoned Manor.
Just like Dick, Jason decides to let Gotham Take him as She Took his dad and brother.
It goes on, Every time they meet another Bat, Bruce and the others feel Her Claim on them.
Cass meets them on a rooftop and Bruce feels Gotham's Winds swirl around the cub. he brings her to the Manor. Gotham Marks her soon after.
Bruce Dick, Jason, and Cass are on patrol when Gotham whispers for Her children to follow. Her Winds lead them to a small back alley where they find two little kids, a boy and girl, the same age, scrawny and malnourished, two runaways from neglectful and abusive homes, trying to find food in a dumpster.
The scent of Gotham's coming Claim all over both.
The two faintlings freeze up and bolt when they see the shadow of the Bats from above. The Bats chase them to another abandoned building, where they half-coax-half-force the little ones out of hiding and bring them to the broken-down Manor.
It takes a few hours to calm the little kids down enough to learn their names- Steph and Tim.
Steph's father was bad enough for her to run.
Tim doesn't speak. Soon Bruce manages to see why.
There's a still-healing scar on the boy's throat. Red and angry.
The cub's parents were neglectful and once when the autistic little boy (Similar to Bruce and Cass) refused to speak because he did not want to, his father cut deep enough to damage his vocal cords.
Once Changed, Tim can speak in feral-speak without trouble but any human language is harder and sometimes it hurts him.
Years later, Damian comes to them. Talia didn't know about Bruce's being a cryptid, or his being a missing person, though she did see how strange he was.
Damian had slightly pointed ears and sharper teeth from birth, though Talia and Ra's never saw this much because he shifted out of it.
When Talia leaves Damian with Bruce at the meeting spot she and Bruce used to meet and meet then, she doesn't note how Damian starts acting differently, how Gotham starts to Claim him the moment he steps on her soil.
After a series of hijinks, of craziness, Damian chooses and lets Gotham Take him as She Claimed his father, sisters, brothers.
Duke is a faintling for a long time. After Joker takes his parents, Duke escape from foster care and is found by the Bats.
Duke becomes both Meta and cryptid. He is Changed yet also a meta.
in all their legal files, all of the Bats are either 'missing' or 'missing presumed dead'.
Bruce is 'Missing presumed dead' and the file says that 'No body was found with his parents, but his whereabouts were never heard of again ever since this event when he was 7'
Dick is just 'missing' because cases of orphans running from CPS are common and he's probably a street kid somewhere.
Jason is 'missing' because cases of orphans running from CPS are common and he's probably a street kid somewhere.
Cass is just 'missing' because.... well, her father is a criminal so they assume she ran away.
Tim is 'Missing presumed dead' because what else are you gonna think when a rich couple's weirdo 7-year-old just vanishes into thin air?
Steph is 'missing' because they didn't find anything to indicate 'dead' but found everything to indicate 'runaway'.
Duke is 'missing' because cases of orphans running from CPS are common and he's probably a street kid somewhere.
Damian is 'missing' because Talia told CPS that he's with his father but refused to say who or where said father is.
Yeah that's..... what I have in mind for this AU. So far.
