Trapped in the horizon
(Yandere batmfamily x female reader) (choose your adventure type)
( English is not my first language so I apologize for any mistakes in the following text.)
This is a choose your pown path fic, by each choice you make you have a different outcome! Have fun!
The air in the storage room was a thick, dusty soup that had been simmering for decades. You’d been counting the slow, sticky ticks of the ancient wall clock for what felt like an hour, but the minute hand had barely advanced. Your summer job as a detention monitor at Northwood High was, by design, mind-numbingly boring. You were just a warm body in a chair, a pair of eyes to ensure the handful of sullen teenagers in the main room didn't set anything on fire. But for now, you were on a supply run.
The vice-principal, Mr. Henderson, had scrawled "BOX OF RED REINFORCEMENTS" on a sticky note and pressed it into your hand. "The old history closet," he'd said. "Should be on a metal shelf in the back."
The "closet" was, in reality, a cavernous storage room at the end of a forgotten corridor. The door was heavy, made of solid oak with a single, clouded glass pane. You’d turned the cold, brass knob and stepped into another world. The scent hit you first—a layered perfume of aging paper, lemon-scented polish from a bygone era, and the faint, sweet decay of cardboard. Dust motes, fat and lazy, drifted in the slanted bars of afternoon sunlight cutting through the high, grimy windows.
You wove through a labyrinth of towering metal shelves, each one groaning under the weight of history. There were boxes of outdated world atlases, their borders all wrong. A stack of filmstrip projectors, their reels empty and waiting. You ran a finger along a box labeled "Mimeograph Supplies," leaving a clean trail in the grime. It felt like a museum, a tomb for obsolete things, and for a moment, you weren't a bored college student on a summer job; you were an archaeologist.
You found the reinforcements on a lower shelf, right where he’d said they’d be. The box was lighter than you expected. As you stood, your hip brushed against a precarious tower of student records from the 1980s, sending a few manila folders slithering to the floor with a soft whump. You sighed, crouching to gather them. The faces of teenagers, now probably in their fifties, stared up from faded black-and-white photos. It was while you were on your knees, carefully reassembling a life from 1984, that you heard it.
A sound like a great, weary exhalation. A solid, final thud.
You froze, a photograph of a girl with feathered hair and a hopeful smile clutched in your hand. The ambient hum of the school’s air conditioning, which you hadn't even registered until now, had vanished. A new, profound silence pressed in on your eardrums. Slowly, you rose, your knees popping in the quiet. You walked back toward the door, your sneakers whispering on the thin layer of dust coating the linoleum.
The door was shut.
That was fine. It was probably just the draft. You reached for the brass knob. It was cold and unyielding. You turned it. The mechanism clicked loosely, a hollow, pointless sound. Nothing moved. You jiggled it, a spike of annoyance flaring in your chest. Still nothing. You pushed against the solid wood. It didn't so much as shudder.
A cold thread of panic began to unspool in your stomach.
You placed the box of reinforcements on a nearby crate and used both hands. You turned the knob with all your strength, throwing your shoulder against the door. The impact was absorbed by the immense, dead weight of the oak. It didn't creak, didn't complain. It simply was. A permanent, immovable object.
"Hello?" you called out, your voice sounding thin and reedy in the cavernous room. "Hey! I'm stuck in here!"
You pressed your ear to the cool wood. From the distant world beyond, you could hear the faint, ghostly echo of a locker slamming. A burst of laughter from far away. Life was continuing, completely unaware that you had been swallowed by the past. You pounded the heel of your hand against the door, the thuds muffled and insignificant. "Hello! Can anyone hear me?"
No one came.
You stepped back, your breath starting to come in short, sharp pants. The dust you had found charming moments before now felt suffocating. The sheer volume of *stuff* in the room seemed to press in on you, the shelves leaning closer, the boxes watching. You fumbled in the pocket of your jeans for your phone, your fingers clumsy. The screen glowed to life, a beacon of the modern world.
No Service.
The two words glared at you from the top corner of the screen. Of course. You were in the heart of a building constructed from brick and steel and asbestos, in a room that probably hadn't been updated since the invention of the corded phone.
The reality of the situation settled over you, as heavy and silent as the dust on the boxes. You were locked in. No one was coming to look for you. The detention kids would assume you'd gone home early. Mr. Henderson wouldn't give you a second thought until you failed to return his reinforcements tomorrow morning. You were alone, entombed with the ghost of a school, with only the slow, ticking clock for company. The air grew colder. You wrapped your arms around yourself, staring at the impenetrable door, and wondered how long a person could last in a room full of forgotten things.
The cardboard box, tucked under the lowest shelf, was labeled "CONFISCATED" in faded black marker. Desperation had become a physical ache in your chest, a cold knot tightening with each failed rattle of the door. Your phone was a useless brick. Your shouts had been swallowed by the silence. This box was a final, flimsy hope.
You pulled it out, the bottom sagging, and a cloud of dust made you cough. You sifted through the sad, forgotten relics of teenage rebellion. A Tamagotchi, its screen dark. A handful of pogs and a slammer. A Walkman with its tape door sprung open, the ribbon of magnetic tape spilling out like entrails. Your fingers brushed against the hard, angular shape of an old cell phone, and your heart leapt. You pulled it out—a Nokia, indestructible, legendary. You pressed the power button, praying for the iconic chime. Nothing. The battery compartment was empty, a hollow plastic cave.
You let it clatter back into the box, the hope extinguished as quickly as it had flared. At the very bottom, your fingers closed around something else. A heavy, rectangular cartridge. You pulled it out. It was a console game, its plastic casing yellowed with age. The label was sun-bleached, the title almost illegible: "Over the Horizon." Beneath it in the box was the console itself, a sleek, grey relic, and a tangle of wires.
Your eyes drifted to an old television on a rickety AV cart in the corner, its screen dark and dusty. It was one of the thick, heavy ones from the 90s. Without any real hope, only a numb, mechanical need to *do* something, you carried the console and the cartridge over. You wiped a layer of dust from the TV's inputs with the hem of your shirt. The plugs from the console fit perfectly into the ports on the back of the television. Your hands were steady, the actions methodical, a stark contrast to the frantic panic clawing at your insides. You pushed the game cartridge into the slot on the console. It clicked into place with a solid, satisfying finality.
A sharp, static crackle cut the silence as you pressed the power button on the console. The old television screen flickered to life, the glow painting the dusty air around it in an eerie, blueish light. A low, orchestral melody, rich with synthesized strings and a haunting choir, filled the room—the sound quality surprisingly deep and clear from the television's aged speakers.
You gasped, leaning forward. The graphics were impossibly good. This wasn't the blocky, pixelated art you associated with 90s consoles. The title screen was a masterpiece of gothic pixel art: a sweeping, dramatic panorama of a rain-lashed Gotham City under a blood-red moon. Gargoyles leered from towering spires, and a bat-shaped silhouette was etched against the lunar disc. The title, Over the Horizon, burned in the center in ornate, silver script.
Below it, a text box appeared, the prose as dense and dark as the imagery:
"The Veil thins. The eternal night descends upon Gotham, a city forever caught between the glamour of the old blood and the desperation of the new. The ancient houses stir, and the creatures of shadow walk openly in the gaslit streets. Your lineage, your choices, will determine the fate of the city. Choose your Path."
Five ornate, coffin-shaped icons materialized on the screen, each labeled.
Path of the Hunter
Path of the Scholar
Path of the Familiar
Path of the Noble - [LOCKED]
Path of the Outcast - [LOCKED]
Your breath hitched. A DC game? Here? The hunter, scholar, and familiar paths were accessible, their icons glowing faintly. You used the clunky controller to highlight Path of the Hunter. It expanded, revealing three character portraits.
Your blood ran cold.
It was Bruce Wayne. But not any Bruce you knew. His pixel-art form was paler, more severe, with sharp canines just visible behind his lips. His eyes glowed a faint, predatory red. The name below read: Bruce - Vampire Lord.
Next to him was Jason Todd. His depiction was bulkier, his skin a stony grey, with vestigial wings folded against his back and small horns curling from his forehead. Jason - Gargoyle Hybrid.
The third was a boy, Damian, his expression haughty, a smaller, more feral version of Bruce. Damian - Vampire Scion.
"This... this can't be right," you whispered to the dusty air. Damian Wayne wasn't even a widely known character until the 2000s. This game was supposed to be from the 90s.
With a trembling hand, you navigated to Path of the Scholar.
Two portraits. Dick Grayson, charming but with an unnerving sharpness to his smile and faint points on his ears. Dick - Dhampir. And Duke Thomas, his hands crackling with ethereal, golden energy, holding what looked like a shrunken skull. Duke - Necromancer.
Finally, you selected Path of the Familiar.
There was Alfred Pennyworth, impeccably dressed but with a deathly pallor and eyes that held a deep, unsettling hunger. Alfred - Ghoul Butler. And Tim Drake, ethereally beautiful with sharply pointed ears and eyes that held the glitter of a starless night. Tim - Dark Fae.
You stared, your mind reeling. This wasn't just some obscure, forgotten licensed game. This was impossible. It was a relic that shouldn't exist, showing you a Gotham, a Bat-Family, that was years ahead of its time and twisted into something ancient and monstrous. The locked paths—Noble and Outcast—seemed to pulse, promising even more impossible secrets. The controller felt suddenly heavy and alive in your hands.
The impossible reality of the game held you transfixed. With a hand that trembled slightly, you navigated the clunky controller, highlighting each character portrait. As you did, a text box unfurled beside them, not describing their stats or abilities, but their quest.
Bruce - Vampire Lord
His text was written in a sharp, Gothic script:
"An eternity is a long time to spend alone in the dark. The Hunter seeks not prey, but a conscience. A heart that remembers what his own has forgotten. A soul to anchor him when the thirst for dominion grows too strong."
Objective: Tame the Beast Within.
Reward: Happily Ever After.
Jason - Gargoyle Hybrid
His quest was in a rougher, blockier font:
"Stone and flesh at war. Cursed to watch from the spires, never truly a part of the world below. He seeks not pity, but proof. Proof that a thing forged in violence and stone can still hold something gentle."
Objective: Mend the Broken Wings.
Reward: Happily Ever After.
You moved the cursor down, the synthetic choir of the soundtrack swelling.
Dick - Dhampir
His text was fluid, almost musical:
"Caught between two worlds, belonging to neither. The sun hurts his eyes, the moon feels like a lie. He dances on the knife's edge, seeking a melody that is his alone, a partner who can hear the rhythm of his divided soul."
Objective: Find the Middle Ground.
Reward: Happily Ever After.
Duke - Necromancer
His words glowed with a faint, sickly yellow light:
"He speaks to the silent, commands the departed. But the world of the living feels distant, muffled. He seeks a spark of vibrant, uncomplicated life, a warmth to banish the chill of the grave that clings to him."
Objective: Light a Candle in the Dark.
Reward: Happily Ever After.
Alfred - Ghoul Butler
The font was elegant, yet brittle, like aged parchment:
"Service is his existence, but eternity is a long time to pour tea. The Familiar seeks not a master, but a purpose beyond duty. A reason to lay down the silver tray, and simply... be."
Objective: Remember the Man.
Reward: Happily Ever After.
Tim - Dark Fae
His quest was in a script of twisting, silvery vines:
"Bound by ancient pacts and older magic, he sees the world as a web of lies and loopholes. He seeks a truth that needs no manipulation, a contract written not in cunning, but in trust."
Objective: Untangle the Knot.
Reward: Happily Ever After.
You sat back, the controller heavy in your lap. A cold shiver, entirely separate from the room's chill, traced your spine. This wasn't a game. Not really. It was a series of pleas. Each of these impossible, monstrous versions of heroes was reaching out from the pixelated gloom, each one defined by a profound, existential loneliness, and each one offering the same, simple, impossible prize for their salvation.
Happily Ever After.
The words glowed on the screen, a promise that felt both childish and deeply, terrifyingly sincere. The silence of the storage room was no longer just empty. It was waiting.
The weight of the controller in your hands had become more than just plastic and wire; it felt like a conduit, humming with a silent, impossible energy. The low, haunting melody of the game’s theme seemed to seep out of the television speakers and into the very air, thickening it, making each breath feel heavy with portent. The dust motes dancing in the television's blue glow slowed, as if time itself were clotting.
Your thumb rested on the selection button. The pixelated eyes of the characters seemed to hold your gaze, not as programmed sprites, but as windows into something real and desperately lonely. The promise of a "Happily Ever After" echoed in the hollow silence of your own confinement, a siren's call against the crushing reality of the locked door and the fading light.
***
Choose your own path
Path of a Hunter:
Bruce Wayne
Damian Wayne
Jason Todd
Path of a scolar:
Richard Grayson
Duke Thomas
Path of a Familiar:
Timothy Drake
Alfred Pennyworth
***
You made your choice.
You pressed the button.
The click of the controller was unnaturally loud, a sound that severed the last tether to the world you knew. For a heartbeat, nothing happened. Then, the television’s glow didn't just illuminate the room—it began to consume it. The blue light intensified, bleeding from the screen in visible, liquid waves that washed over the shelves, the boxes, the dust, leaching them of color and substance. The orchestral music swelled, no longer coming from the speakers, but from everywhere and nowhere at once, the choir’s voices wrapping around you, pulling you forward.
A pressure began to build in the center of your mind, a dizzying, vertiginous pull. The world didn't fade to black; it stretched. The rows of metal shelves elongated into impossible, shimmering corridors of light and shadow. The scent of old paper twisted into something else—ozone, cold stone, and a faint, coppery tang. The physical sensation was not of falling, but of being poured. Your body felt insubstantial, dissolving at the edges, drawn toward the screen like iron filings to a magnet.
You tried to gasp, but the air was no longer yours to breathe. It was the game's air, cold and electric. The last thing you saw of the storage room was the old wall clock, its face a blur of melting numbers, its tick-tock swallowed by the rising symphony. Then, the light from the screen enveloped you completely, a tidal wave of pixels and sound.
There was a final, wrenching sensation—not of impact, but of reassembly. A feeling of your very self being coded, rewritten, and slotted into a new reality. The pull ceased. The music softened, settling into a new, ambient track. The light receded from your vision.
You were no longer in the storage room. You were no longer sitting down. You were standing. And the world around you was made of gothic spires, a blood-red moon, and the profound, chilling certainty that you were inside the game.
