Childhood – Toxicology 1/4
Damian Wayne x Daughter of Poison Ivy!Reader
He was an arrogant boy, struggling as he was pulled between the legacy of being born to kill and the promise that he could change for the better. She saw the world through the eyes of her fatalistic mother, but was forbidden to make sense of it on her own. They shouldn’t work together. But Gotham made their lives align despite all of that.
Word Count: 7,000+
Damian sprinted through the streets of Gotham. It was just another average criminal, which was why his father allowed him to go after them without his supervision. But they still needed the man for questioning. And right now, he was their only lead.
Suddenly Damian came to a stop and growled.
“What is it?” Batman asked in the comms.
“He ran into Robinson Park,” Damian sighed with annoyance. “As if he has some sort of death wish. Clearly he doesn’t realize it’s 3 o’clock in the morning…”
“Or he doesn’t care,” Batman offered darkly. “Should I send backup?”
‘Backup’ as in Damian's older brothers.
It made the 8-year-old boy roll his eyes.
“No,” Damian shot back. “I can handle it.”
“That’s Poison Ivy’s territory, Robin,” Batman warned.
“I’m well aware.”
But the park had only improved since Poison Ivy had claimed it as her own. It used to be filled with junkies and creeps. Ill maintained and unloved, Pamela Isley changed the park almost overnight. She had made it her own personal oasis, and then remained completely uninvolved during the Gotham turf wars between crime bosses.
However, that didn’t mean the park was safe – especially for Robin: the sidekick of the vigilante that tossed Poison Ivy in jail more times than anyone could count.
As soon as Damian crossed the threshold, he felt like he was no longer in Gotham City.
Dare he say the park was... beautiful?
The intention during its creation was to give Gotham its very own Central Park. But the city once again proved that nothing good lasts in Gotham. It was quickly ruined by disrespectful patrons, lack of funding, and criminals that saw it as theirs for the taking.
But now Damian saw the original vision.
Somehow the sounds of Gotham almost completely disappeared. Mumbled by the thick forests. And the air didn’t smell of sewage. No, this was what fresh air smelled like. Damian had almost forgotten.
“Do you have a visual?” Batman asked.
Damian blinked and refocused. His eyes narrowed as he scanned the area around him.
The park was over 300 acres of land. But the guy Damian followed wasn’t all that fast and he could easily catch up to him.
There was a shadow disappearing into the distance.
“Yes,” Damian confirmed as he returned to a sprint.
“Stay alert. Poison Ivy doesn’t appreciate visitors,” Batman warned.
The boy didn’t bother responding. He didn’t need to be babied.
“I have to handle something. I’ll be off comms for the next 20. If you need backup, call Nightwing,” Batman grunted, clearly fighting someone.
Damian rolled his eyes again. Dick would just baby him even more.
Finally he came across an enormous willow tree. The branches were so thick with leaves that he couldn’t even see the trunk. It might be one of the biggest trees Damian had ever seen – at least in Gotham.
The slender and agile branches swayed a bit.
But then Damian realized there wasn’t even a slight breeze. Nothing should be making them move.
As he looked around, Damian realized he was being watched.
Had the criminal double backed and snuck up on him?
No, he was far too much of an imbecile to pull that off.
But Damian felt on edge and unsheathed his sword from behind his back.
As soon as the metal caught the reflection of the moon, the tree seemed to come alive.
The branches rose into the air, like a million tiny arms.
Damian swore under his breath as he looked up at the now animated tree.
“Put your sword down,” a voice called out, almost like it had travel to his ears by the wind. It wasn’t demanding, but softly suggestive.
“Who’s there?” Damian growled. “Show yourself!”
But before he could get a response, his sword was ripped out of his hands by one of the branches. Then another whacked him across his middle, knocking him to the ground. He landed on his stomach.
Damian jumped to his feet and flung a batarang to the branches that were now holding his sword hostage, 25 feet in the air above him.
His shot landed, cutting through the branches and freeing his sword. It embedded itself in the earth.
“Stop! You’re hurting them!” The same voice called out. This time it didn’t sound timid. Now it was angry.
“Come out and I won’t cut this monstrosity to pieces,” Damian warned as he quickly dove for his sword as he dodged the branches that tried to snatch him.
The tree calmed all of the sudden. Which was somehow more unsettling than when it had come alive.
Damian held his sword at the ready. Maybe this person was one of Poison Ivy’s minions. And he wasn’t going to let his guard down.
There was a slight hesitation before the branches parted like a curtain. A figure was clearly hiding just behind them. The night still protected them, holding them in shadow so Damian couldn’t make out any features.
“Who are you?” Damian shouted.
But his tone seemed to make the figure take a step back in fear.
Damian wasn’t known for his conversation skills or diplomacy.
But he suddenly heard Dick’s voice in his head. ‘Sometimes people are more scared of you than you think, Damian. Ya gotta be patient.’
Damian sighed and thought of how Dick would handle this situation.
He slowly sheathed his sword again and held out his hands to show that he didn’t have any weapons. But clearly they were hidden all around his body still.
“I won’t hurt you,” he called out.
The words sounded so unlike him.
But apparently they were enough for the figure because, after hesitating, they slowly walked out of the shadows and into the moonlight.
It was a little girl.
Her eyes wide in fear. Leaves and tiny flowers were woven into her y/h/c hair. But it looked so natural and beautiful. She was wearing a white cotton dress, simple and light. Her feet were bare. Her petiteness from being a child made it even more obvious that she was slightly shaking. Even in the night, Damian was still able to see the y/e/c of her eyes.
Was it because…Were her eyes glowing y/e/c?
“Who are you?” He asked bluntly.
She narrowed her eyes. “Who are you?” For how terrified she looked, her counter was surprisingly confident.
“I’m Robin.”
Her eyes seemed to flow brighter when she asked, “Batman’s Robin?”
“Sure.”
Then Damian took a step toward her.
But the willow tree didn’t like that one bit, and instantly erupted back to life.
Just as Damian reached for his sword again, the girl jumped forward and held up her hands.
“You’re scaring them!” She cried out. “They’re just trying to protect me.”
Damian froze. But stopped reaching for any weapon.
The girl seemed to finally relax and smiled at him. “I don’t really know why they’re so scared,” she giggled. “You’re just a boy…can’t be older than me, even.”
“Just a boy,” Damian repeated in a growl. “I was trained to be the ultimate soldier. I was born to be a master assassin.”
Instead of getting scared or even apologizing, the little girl once again giggled.
“Stop laughing,” he snarled.
She managed to contain herself and stepped forward another step.
But Damian took a step back. ‘Always keep a certain distance between you and your enemy,’ he was reminded of his training.
“You still haven’t told me who you are,” he told her.
But just as the girl was going to answer, Damian was tackled to the ground.
When he looked up at the body that was on top of him, he realized it was the thug he had tracked into the park. When the hell did he get so bold?
Damian growled as he shoved the grown man off of him, putting distance between them so he could get back to his feet.
When the man tackled him though, Damian didn’t realize how close to the girl and the tree they’d gotten.
Then everything happened so fast.
The girl’s skin erupted into a green glow, her y/e/c eyes flared the brightest tonight had seen.
Vines appeared from the ground out of nowhere and latched onto the criminal.
The man cried out in fear and fought the vines that wrapped around his limbs and torso. But they looked to be stronger than metal chains. Before Damian could help him, the ground opened up and dragged the man down, swallowing him whole. The opening in the earth closed and the vines disappeared as if they had never appeared.
“I’m sorry!” The girl shouted out in fear. “I-I-I didn’t m-mean to!” She sounded both terrified of herself and what Damian would do to her now.
“Where did he go?” Damian asked in shock.
“I-I-I don’t know.”
“Did you just kill him?”
It was a stupid question. Clearly he was either buried alive or asphyxiated by the vines.
“I don’t know,” the girl started crying. “I didn’t mean to! I didn’t mean to! I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” She kept repeating it, getting more and more hysterical.
Damian didn’t know what to do. He stepped forward as if he was going to comfort her. But who was he kidding? He had never done that in his life. And he had no idea how to start now. Dick would know what to do. Hell, probably Jason even would.
Suddenly, the girl gasped. Her entire body tensed with alertness and her eyes zeroed in on something in the distance behind Damian.
The boy heard nothing but whipped around to see what she was looking at.
There was nothing.
When he turned back around, the girl was gone.
Damian looked to the tree, but there was an emptiness there now. Somehow he knew the girl wasn’t hiding in there.
“Robin,” a voice said behind him.
It was Batman.
“Where is the fugitive?”
Damian hesitated.
“I lost him,” he mumbled.
Batman narrowed his eyes. “You OK?”
Maybe it was his parenting senses going off that made him think Damian looked a little bit shaken.
“Fine,” Damian huffed.
“Come on. Let’s get back to the cave.”
“But it’s still early,” Damian shot back.
“Nightwing and Red Robin will handle the rest of the patrol. You and I are going home.” Batman’s tone left no room for argument.
Damian tried not to sigh as he followed his father.
Just before getting too far away to see it, Damian turned around and looked at the willow tree.
Who was that girl?
And why did he lie to his father for her?
Damian was never one to put his on the line for others – especially a literal stranger. His actions were out of character.
The girl’s ability were similar to Poison Ivy’s. Was she experimenting on children now?
The obvious thing to do was for Damian to explain what he saw to his father and the family would investigate together. But there was something inside telling him not to keep this little girl a secret.
Robin would handle this on his own.
Sneaking away from his family on patrol was the real challenge. Being 8 years old meant that they all felt the need to babysit him. Even Jason, who acted like he hated Damian, would keep an on the kid.
Damian saw an opening when he knew his family would be preoccupied and in their own patrol territories.
He quickly deactivated his tracking device. Well, he froze it, making him appear to be sitting still on a map. A tactic he learned almost immediately when he arrived in Gotham. He hated the idea of his father always being able to track him.
He had about 30 minutes before Bruce noticed he hadn’t moved.
Damian hurried to Robinson Park.
Since he knew exactly where he was going, he made it to the willow tree rather quickly.
“Hello,” he called out to the tree, feeling rather stupid.
The tree swayed in greeting, almost like a wave.
“It’s Robin. I just…I came to talk.”
He already felt like an idiot, since he was notorious for not talking at all.
To his surprise, the willow branches opened their curtain once again. But the girl wasn’t walking out. Instead, it was telling Damian to go in.
He hesitated before walking forward.
Was this a death wish?
But his concern vanished when he looked around.
Hidden behind the thick branches of the willow tree was the most elaborate and beautiful treehouse Damian had ever seen. It looked so natural as it snaked around the wide trunk, almost as if the house had grown with the tree and was a part of it.
There were fairy lights wrapped around it, making it look even more magical. Apparently, the branches were thick enough to completely shield any and all light from escaping beyond the leaves. So no one would ever know the treehouse was there.
“Are you here to arrest me?” A tiny voice interrupted Damian from his observations.
He looked up to see the little girl looking down at him from what appeared to be a little balcony.
She looked so scared and…ashamed.
“Should I arrest you?” He asked.
Even though he had no such authority.
She didn’t seem to know that, though.
“It was an accident. I didn’t mean to,” the girl quickly defended.
“OK,” Damian said surprisingly gentle, trying to prevent her from falling into another panic attack. “Can you tell me who you are?”
She just stared at him for a moment.
Suddenly the same murderous vines from that night and appeared. They crawled up the trunk, wrapped around the girl’s waist, and then gently brought her down from the balcony so she was standing just a few feet away from Damian.
“Y/N,” She answered. “My name is Y/N.”
“Are you a prisoner here?” He quickly asked.
“Prisoner?” She laughed. “Does this look like a prison to you?”
“Guess not,” he admitted. “Did Poison Ivy do this to you?”
'This' clearly meaning her...abilities.
The mentioning of Poison Ivy seemed to wipe all amusement off the girl’s face.
She didn’t respond.
“Look, I’m not here to turn you in. I just want answers. Did she kidnap you?”
“She didn’t kidnap me.”
Damian could see that he shouldn’t push her, so he waited.
“She’s my mother.”
He couldn’t control himself as his eyes grew three sizes.
“She gave birth to you?” He sputtered out.
Y/N giggled again. “That’s usually how it works.”
“Huh,” was all Damian managed to let out.
“Would you like to come inside?” She suddenly asked softly.
It was in that moment that Damian realized one of the biggest things about the little girl.
She was lonely.
Where was Poison Ivy? Did she just let Y/N have free reign of the park and go about where she pleased?
Damian felt like he should say no. Y/N was technically the daughter of an enemy. Poison Ivy had somewhat of a moral compass and wasn’t blindly evil by any means. But she was still a criminal, and one that faced off with the Bat family more times than they could count.
But the yearning in the little girls eyes. It felt so familiar to Damian. An emotion that he refused to let himself reflect on.
“Sure,” he finally answered. “But only so I can ask all my questions.”
‘Good. Give yourself an out. Make sure she knows you’re only here on bat business. This isn’t a social call,’ Damian thought to himself.
Y/N beamed when he agreed to stay. Her y/e/c eyes glowed brighter, making Damian realize that their brightness must correlate with her emotions.
“Uhhh…Where are the stairs?” Damian asked when he realized there wasn’t so much as a ladder.
His head tilted back down, and he jumped when he found Y/N standing just inches away from him.
She smiled at him.
“Do you trust me?” Y/N whispered.
“Of course I don’t,” he snapped back.
“Well then…sorry.”
Next thing Damian knew, the vines grabbed the two children and carried them up into the air, carefully plopping them down at the balcony of the treehouse.
It made Damian uneasy being grabbed by the same things that killed that man. But he wasn’t one to show any fear.
“Would you like some tea?” Y/N asked.
She seemed so delighted to simply be able to offer it to someone for the first time.
“So you can poison me?” He countered with a glare.
Her face immediately dropped and she looked so heartbroken by the very idea.
“Why would I do that?” She mumbled quietly.
“That’s what your mother does. In fact, she probably planned to have you poison me to get back at Batman.”
“My mother sometimes does bad things, yes. But she only does them to people who deserve it.”
“Deserve it?” Damian challenged with a scoff.
“Yes,” she snapped back. “People that have hurt her or the people she loves. And people that stand in the way of her cause.”
He rolled his eyes. “And what cause is that? Crime?"
“Saving the environment, obviously.”
Damian huffed.
“Would you like some tea or not?” Y/N asked, less polite this time.
“Fine.”
“Good. I promise I won’t poison you.”
Damian looked around. The treehouse was like a tiny home. More like a studio than anything. He noted the full bed tucked into a corner. And then the tiny nook of a dinner table with three seats. There was a little kitchen with a sink, stove, and small fridge. Somehow there was running water and electricity available. There was even a small, enclosed bathroom off to the side.
“You said you had questions…” she hummed as she boiled water.
Apparently she’d already gotten over Damian’s poisoning accusation.
He hesitated, thinking of where he wanted to begin, “Who’s your father?”
“Don’t have one,” she answered with a shrug.
But Damian didn’t believe her. “How is that possible?”
“Mother is a renowned scientist. So…she figured it out.” Then she smirk, “And she would rather die than depend on a man to conceive a child.”
“I don’t understand…”
“Do you not know how babies are made?” Y/N asked with a teasing smile.
“Of course, I do!”
“Well, she used bone marrow stem cells in place of sperm to fertilize her eggs. It’s rather fascinating, actually.”
“If you say so.” Damian scratched his chin. “I guess I shouldn’t be so surprised. Batman said Poison Ivy used to house so many orphans. But that was years ago.”
Y/N frowned.
There was silence as she poured the tea and then handed a mug to Damian before she sat down at her tiny table. She gestured to the other sit, silently telling him to join her.
“What happened to them?” He asked.
“My mother’s story is a sad one,” she said as her eyes stuck to the floor.
Damian stayed quiet.
“She had been experimented on by a terrible man. She didn’t know the full extent of her new powers. She always loved children, wanted to make a home and take care of the ones that Gotham spit out.”
Her eyes glazed over as she tried to remember a past that existed long before she was born.
“She didn’t know,” Y/N whispered.
“Didn’t know what?”
“That she was slowly poisoning them. And she couldn’t stop it – didn’t know how. Some of them–” She hesitated and swallowed, her throat clearly dry. “Died. The others… well, she sent far away. Found them homes away from Gotham.”
“I didn’t know that,” Damian admitted. “I don’t think Batman did either.”
“They were all orphans. Or came from broken homes. My mother said Gotham didn’t care about them. So...who would report them missing?"
A silence settled in the treehouse as they both processed that.
“When were you born?” Damian asked, quieter this time.
“A few years after that.”
“And you have the same… abilities as your mother.”
Y/N smiled at his observation. “My mother wanted a guarantee that she wasn’t a danger to me. It would’ve broken her heart. So she made sure I was immune – did a bunch of experiments and research.”
Then she frowned. “But she didn’t think I’d be twice as strong as her.”
“Is that why you can’t control it?” Damian asked darkly.
Y/N’s head hung as soon as he said it.
To Damian’s shock, he suddenly felt guilty for what he said.
Guess there was a first for everything.
“Y/N?” He pushed softly.
The only other time he spoke like this was when he was talking to his pets.
When Y/N finally lifted her head, she was crying. “I don’t mean to,” she whimpered. “I’ve been practicing. I don’t want to h-h-hurt p-p-people.”
Damian didn’t know what to do.
He had never even tried to comfort someone before.
But his stomach hurt. Why did it hurt?
Why did it bother him so much to see this girl cry? This girl that he hardly knew.
“You’re going to arrest me,” Y/N sniffed.
“No.” Damian surprised them both with how steady and strong his reply was. He sounded like his father.
“No?”
“Like you said, it was an accident.”
“But what…what about Batman?”
“He will never know,” Damian shrugged.
“But jail is what I deserve,” Y/N whispered.
“How old are you?”
“8.” She was the same age as him.
“Exactly. You’re a child,” it came out harsh, even though Damian didn’t mean it that way. “Furthermore, the man you killed was a criminal. He had over 15 sexual assault allegations against – amongst other things.”
"Mother says rapists should have their penises cut off," she managed to say as she sniffled.
Damian smirked.
She tried to rub the tears from her face. “How old are you?”
After everything, Damian still felt like he shouldn’t even share that.
“Same age as you.”
She smiled at that. “You seem older.”
“Thank you,” he crossed his arms arrogantly.
Y/N giggled. “I wasn’t complimenting you.”
Damian huffed at that.
“Why don’t you live with your mother?” He changed the subject, looking around at the treehouse again.
“I do,” she answered, as if it were obvious. “The park is our home. She let’s me have my own space. Mother mostly sticks to the greenhouse. I'm there a lot, too."
He slowly nodded.
Damian knew his window of freedom was quickly closing. He had probably already spent too much time here. And surely his father would notice his faulty tracking device soon.
“How can you just tell me all your secrets?” He blurted out.
Did this girl have no self preservation?
Damian had been raised by both his mother and father to never fully trust anyone. Yet this girl held no suspicion towards him. Even when she thought he was there to turn her in, she still invited him into her home.
Y/N shrugged innocently. “I figured the way to make friends is to trust them. I don’t think keeping secrets about my life is how you give trust…”
The truth was, Damian didn’t really know how to make friends. For a long time, the closest thing he had to them were his brothers. Even that was pushing the actual definition.
It took awhile until he got a real one: Jonathan Kent. Though Damian would never call him that.
Clearly, Y/N didn’t have any friends. But she seemed to have a better understanding on how to make them – at least far better than Damian ever did.
“But I didn’t tell you anything about myself,” Damian argued.
In Damian’s mind, everything was a score, a game. And this new affiliation was not an even playing field. He knew Y/N’s life story. She gave him enough information for it to be used against her. And in return, he had given her nothing.
Y/N gave him a shy smile. “Maybe you can come back another time and tell me then.”
Damian just stared at her with amazement. “I…I have to go,” he managed to stutter out.
Instead of waiting for the vines to grab him, he gracefully jumped over the railing of her treehouse balcony and landed in a controlled roll.
Y/N rushed to the balcony to look down at him, worried that he hurt himself. But quickly saw that he was perfectly fine.
“Robin!” She called out before he could disappear past the willow tree’s branches.
He turned around.
“Thank you for listening to me,” she told him shyly.
That wasn’t the last time Damian and Y/N saw each other.
They continued their secret little meetings, always at Y/N’s treehouse.
At first Damian convinced himself that he was on an undercover mission. That he’d find a point of weakness of Poison Ivy – and maybe even Harley Quinn – through Y/N.
He could prove his independence and full capabilities to his father.
But he couldn’t lie forever. Eventually, he allowed himself acknowledge that he’d grown fond of the little girl.
Little girl. She was the same age as him.
Maybe Y/N seemed younger because of her innocence and her kindness. She wasn’t stupid or naive, that’s for sure. She was just as smart as Damian. Poison Ivy clearly had prioritized her daughter’s education – even if it was through her own gaze.
Both Damian and Y/N could probably be college students in another world.
Y/N loved reading books. And she loved watching movies even more. And despite being shielded from the world, she knew an impressive amount about it.
She was a romantic, sometimes allowing herself to only see what her heart wanted to and ignoring the dark realities.
But often she would have moments of clarity, clearly coming from the teachings that her mother and Harley Quinn had made sure to ingrain in her young and impressionable mind.
Y/N hated the government. She understood that not only was it the reason for the planet slowly being destroyed, but that was just the beginning of the issues. It also oppressed so many groups of people, including women and people of most sexualities.
And she had a certain distrust towards men, as well – also compliments of her mother and Harley. Both of them had been in abusive relationships with a man, and had no hesitation on telling Y/N their tragic stories.
“But I’m a man,” Damian explained once.
Y/N giggled. “Not yet. You’re just a boy, Robin. Whether you like to admit or not.”
“So, does that mean you’ll stop seeing me when I am?” He challenged.
Her eyes teared up from the thought alone.
Damian immediately regretted even suggesting such a thing.
Y/N was sensitive and not afraid of her emotions. ‘Hiding your emotions was a disease started by the patriarchy,’ Harley once told her. Y/N cried openly and without shame. She knew it didn’t make her weak.
“We’ll always be friends. You’ll never be like them,” Y/N clarified.
“Always,” Damian repeated. “You can’t promise something like that.”
“Of course I can,” she shot back.
“And who said we were even friends,” Damian scoffed. “You don’t even know my real name.”
Y/N glared at him.
She understood that Damian had a hard time opening up. But she knew what was real and what was the walls he put around himself. But that didn’t mean it wasn't exhausting to constantly hear him in denial.
“You just haven’t told me your real name,” she tested.
Damian whipped his head in her direction.
“Damian Wayne,” she whispered, watching his reaction closely.
Damian's entire body tensed. “How long have you known?”
“Months. I’m not as stupid as you think,” she added.
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
Y/N shrugged. “I didn’t want you to stop seeing me. I thought it would scare you away.”
Damian was lost in thought. Should he panic? Should he leave Gotham? Was his identity out in the public? What would his father think?
“Damian,” Y/N said softly as her hand reached for his. “Your secret is safe with me. I’ll never tell anyone. Trust, remember?”
He quickly shot to his feet, making her jump.
Hearing her say his name for the first time had done something to him.
“I have to go,” he blurted out without making eye contact.
“Damian, please. Stay.”
“Stop saying it!” He shouted.
“Why?” There was nothing but sincerity and innocence in her question.
“Because. Because…”
But he didn’t really have a reason.
Because he knew he could trust her. She had never given him any reason not to.
Y/N slowly stood up now, too. “We are friends, Damian. Even if you refuse to believe it. That’s what we are. And friends trust each other.”
Then she held out her right pinky.
“What are you doing?” Damian asked.
He had never seen this gesture before.
“A pinky promise,” she answered as if it was obvious. Because it was. “When Harley does this, I know she’ll keep her promise to me – no matter what it is.”
Damian was still confused what he was supposed to do.
So Y/N gently grabbed his hand and adjusted his fingers so they matched hers. Then she grabbed his pinky with hers and pulled them closer.
“Pinky promise,” she declared.
"Sometimes, if ya really mean it, you kiss right where your thumb is," she explained with enthusiasm.
"Gross."
Y/N giggled at his reaction and did it just to mess with him.
Instead of being disgusted, he was taken aback.
And Damian finally acknowledged that Y/N really was his friend.
His best friend.
The two children thought they could live in their secret bubble forever.
In that sense, they were both naive.
To their credit, they almost made it year without being discovered. But it all came crashing down eventually.
Y/N and Damian were laying in a field late at night.
Bruce and Alfred were out of town, which meant that Damian was left under the supervision of Dick. But he’d received a called from Barbara that she was sick. Dick immediately went to her place when she refused to be taken care of at Wayne Manor.
It left Damian unsupervised. He packed a backpack and made his way to Robinson Park with the intention to have a sleepover with Y/N.
Damian tried to hide his smile as he sat on the ground. Y/N was running around him, giggling, with her hand outstretched. With her powers, she surrounded Damian with Moon flowers. They glowed in the dark and even the Gotham smog couldn’t stop the moon from making the flowers brighten the space around them.
“Do you ever get tired?” Damian pretended to be annoyed with her antics.
“Nope!” Y/N called and continued making herself dizzy with her circling.
Finally she had to catch her breath and threw herself on the ground beside him in a fit of breathy giggles.
“They like you, you know.”
“Who?” Damian asked.
“The plants. The trees. The flowers. All of them. They like when you come to visit.”
Little did she know, they liked that he made her happy when he visited.
“You can talk to them?” Damian asked with skepticism.
He always had thought she was just able to control them, that they were just an extension of her.
“Of course,” she laughed. Then she tilted her head. “It’s not like we have conversations about philosophy. But it’s like…I don’t know how to explain it. I know what they’re feeling. I know what they need.”
“Huh,” Damian sighed.
Suddenly, the surrounding flowers disappeared, burrowing into the ground as if they were hiding in fright.
Y/N looked around in a panic and Damian realized it was not her doing.
Next thing they knew, roots shot up from the ground, latching around Damian's neck, pulling him off his feet to hang and strangle.
Y/N jumped to her feet and turned to find her mother walking towards them.
“I knew you’d been keeping secrets from me,” Poison Ivy growled to her daughter, “But I never expected this.”
“I’m not afraid of you,” Damian managed to choke out.
Poison Ivy brought him slightly down, closer to her face. “Well, you should be.”
“Mother! Please!” Y/N begged. “Let him go! He’s my friend!”
“You choose him – him – over your family!?” Poison Ivy yelled.
“I’m not choosing anyone over anyone!” She cried. “He’s my friend. My only friend. Please, mother, please don’t hurt him.”
Poison Ivy had never seen her daughter react in such a way. Suddenly she remembered how Y/N was so used to hide in the trees, watching kids playing in the park. Y/N had always been cautious of the outside world, scared she might have an episode or accidentally entrance someone with her powers – or worse, poison them to death.
So much of Y/N childhood was filled with isolation and fear.
And her mother suddenly had a depression realization: her daughter was lonely.
Poison Ivy’s anger was traded for sadness.
Slowly, she lowered Damian to the ground.
He fell to his knees and was overcome with a coughing fit.
Y/N rushed to his side and comforted him.
“I’m fine,” he told her, feeling how stressed she was for him.
Then Poison Ivy’s feet walked into his line of vision.
Damian looked up to see her towering over them.
“Listen to me and listen to me carefully,” she hissed. “If you do anything to hurt her – anything – I will end you.”
Damian wanted to say he would never do such a thing. But he didn’t want to validate such a threat with an response.
“I know who you are now,” Poison Ivy added as she looked him up and down. “And I’m not above using it against you if you should do anything to my daughter.”
“He won’t,” Y/N spoke for him as she glared at her mother.
She now shifted her glare to her daughter. “And you…we’re going to have a long discussion about keeping secrets from us and fraternizing with the enemy.”
Y/N was smart enough to at least look guilty.
Her attention shifted back to Damian. “I think it’s time for you to go home.”
It wasn’t a suggestion.
“I’ll walk him out,” Y/N said gently.
Her mother hesitated before nodding.
As Y/N escorted Damian to the edge of the park, a silence had enveloped them.
They didn’t speak until Damian reached his hidden opening.
“Please come back,” Y/N almost whimpered, frightened by the idea that her mother might’ve scared off the only friend she'd ever had.
“I meant it when I said I wasn’t afraid of her,” Damian promised.
Y/N pulled him into a tight hug, holding on for dear life as if it was their final goodbye.
“I’m not leaving you,” Damian whispered into her hair.
Slowly, he was getting better at comforting others. Well, he was getting better at comforting Y/N. He didn’t really care much for trying with anyone else.
Finally she allowed him to pull away from her embrace.
“Believe me,” Damian smirked. “It would’ve been much worse if my father found out.”
“Well, I hope we never have to worry about that,” Y/N sighed.
“Will your mother really allow us to be friends?”
“I know you only see my mother as just another criminal of Gotham,” she muttered. “But she is still my mother. And she only wants me to be happy and safe. And you make me happy, Damian. She would never take that away from me.”
“And she’ll keep our secret?”
“Well…” Y/N cringed. “Yes. But that means telling Harley, too.”
“Oh, great,” Damian moaned.
“But they are overprotective of me. And they’ll know telling your secret is more dangerous to me than anything else.” She placed her hand on his shoulder. “I promise.”
Damian nodded, believing her.
Even though all his training was screaming at him that this was the worst possible outcome.
He shook his head. “Hey, I was planning on giving you this tonight.”
Then he pulled out a cellphone and handed it to her.
“I know you don’t like technology,” Damian shrugged. “But this way we can keep in touch. It’s completely untraceable, and all of the calls and messages will be encrypted.”
Y/N seemed shocked at first, and a beaming smile slowly formed on her lips.
She tackled him into another hug. “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”
“It’s not a big deal, Y/N.”
“Yes, it is!” She argued.
And by the time Damian returned to Wayne Manor, he'd already received a message from Y/N, asking him to tell her when he got home safely.
Y/N hadn’t been lying about her mother and Harley keeping her friendship a secret and keeping Damian’s identity a secret.
It made the children’s friendship easier. Who knew it was better to only keep it a secret from one family instead of two? And who would've thought the family to be the first to accept it would be the villainous one?
But Poison Ivy made it clear she still hated Damian. But at least she tolerated him.
Now that the two kids had phones to communicate, they grew even closer.
Everyday, Y/N would send Damian videos of flowers she’d magically grown or her trees waving hello.
In return, Damian would send photos of his pets. Usually it was Titus playing in the yard or Alfred the cat sleeping in his lap.
Y/N fell in love with all of Damian's pets and constantly begged him to bring them on his next visit.
Harley thought the two of them were adorable, but Poison Ivy would roll her eyes and scoff whenever her girlfriend made that known.
Y/N Isley and Damian Wayne's friendship continued for years.
Damian never told a soul about her.
And Y/N kept Damian’s identity close to her heart.
3 YEARS LATER
“This is ridiculous!” Damian growled as he paced in the cave.
“Our dads said it was pretty dangerous,” Jon offered with a shrug.
“You might as well be a pet for how compliant you are,” Damian snapped back. “I’ve trained my whole life to be capable enough to handle missions like this. We could be helping them right now. But they treat us like we’re children!"
“We are children,” Jon deadpanned.
“We’re 11 years old.”
Jon rolled his eyes.
Damian was going to continue his tangent, but something on the cave’s monitors caught his attention. He shot forward to get a better look.
There was a fire – a huge one – in Robinson Park. Then he zoomed in on the live feed of the news broadcast that was reporting it.
“The Joker,” Damian growled.
“The Joker? But that’s not who our dads are dealing with.”
“This is Gotham, Kent. The Joker is probably using that as a distraction to make a move on Poison Ivy.”
“Poison Ivy? What beef does he have with Poison Ivy?”
“Harley Quinn,” was all Damian had time to explain.
He whipped around and tightly gripped Jon’s shoulders, staring into his eyes.
“Jon, I need your help.”
“Okkkkk,” he said slowly. “I’m not gonna like this, am I?”
“I need you to fly me to Robinson Park.”
“Dami, I don’t know. Dad’s told me about her before. She was strong enough to hypnotize and control him! He almost killed your dad because of it!”
“Do you trust me?” Damian challenged.
“I-I-I…”
“Do you or not?” Damian didn’t have time for this.
Jon glared. “Yes.”
“So then take me there.”
Jon had never seen Damian desperate before – or even stressed.
The boy didn’t fully understand what was going on. But from Damian’s reaction, he could tell it was important.
“Fine. Hold on, OK?” Jon asked before wrapping Damian’s arms around his back.
They shot out of the cave.
Damian managed to scream directions to Jon, but the boy already knew where the fire was from his super hearing.
Jon managed to land right in front of the Y/N’s willow tree.
Damian was horrified when it was completely engulfed in flames.
“No,” he gasped. “No, no, no.”
He jolted into a sprint.
“Damian, no!” Jon tried to cry out.
But he ignored him.
“Y/N!” Damian screamed at the top of his lungs.
In a panic, Jon started blowing out the fire with his freeze breath. He knew there was no stopping Damian, so all he could do was try and help – even though he didn’t really know what he was helping with.
Why was he worried about a single tree?
The willow tree should’ve been protecting her. It should’ve been keeping her safe. But the branches hung limp. The fire had already killed it.
Damian’s Robin suit barely protected him from the heat of the fire.
“Y/N!” He screamed again.
Once he got through the flaming branches, the treehouse had somehow remained untouched by the flames… for now. But behind the branches, smoke had taken a home.
With the fire, the vines wouldn’t bring him up to the treehouse. Damian quickly put his gas mask into his mouth. He would do no good if he passed out from smoke inhalation. Then he grabbed his grappling hook and shot it upward.
He perfectly landed onto the balcony.
When he walked into the treehouse, he found Y/N on the floor, unconscious.
She must not have noticed the fire and her creepers were already killed before they could get her out.
Damian rushed to her side and checked for her pulse.
Y/N was alive.
But she wouldn’t be for long if he didn’t get her out of there.
Damian picked her up in his arms and used his grappling hook to bring them back down to the ground.
With Jon’s freeze breath, there was a window in the fiery branches for Damian to escape.
As soon as he emerged, Jon rushed to them.
“Who is she?” He asked.
“A friend,” was all Damian supplied.
“Is she dead?”
“No.”
“Y/N!” A voice screamed.
Jon shot up with wide eyes to see Poison Ivy and Harley Quinn sprinting to them.
They were both covered in blood, proving that they had to fight through Joker and his men to get here. They must've been on the other end of the park with the way they were panting.
“She needs to be taken to a hospital immediately, I found her passed out from all the smoke. She needs treatment,” Damian reported to her mothers.
“No hospitals,” Ivy explained. “I have the necessary equipment here.”
Damian just nodded.
“I’ll carry her,” Jon chimed in as he lifted Y/N into his arms. “Tell me where.”
Harley took over, giving the boy directions as she ran after his flight.
It left Damian and Poison Ivy, surrounded by flames.
“You saved her life,” she whispered. “I tried to get here. But Joker–”
“I saw the attack on the news,” Damian interrupted.
Poison Ivy kneeled so she was at the same level as the boy. She slowly put her hand on his shoulder. “Thank you, Damian. I can never…there’s nothing…just…thank you.”
To his shock, her eyes filled with tears.
She had been scared. Terrified.
When she and Harley had arrived, she probably thought they'd been too late. And they almost were. If it hadn’t been for Damian and Jon, Y/N might be dead.
Jon landed a few yards away, trying not to interrupt.
“I must go before my father realizes what I’ve done,” Damian told her.
Ivy nodded.
--
When Jon and Damian returned to the cave, there was an awkward silence.
Jon didn’t know what to say. And he didn’t want to push Damian to explain. Clearly he was still distressed from tonight’s events.
Out of all their years of friendship, Jon had never seen Damian scared – not once.
Until tonight.
“Jon,” Damian had never sounded more serious. “You can never tell your father about this. Do you understand me? He can never know about her.”
The very idea clearly made Jon uncomfortable. Secrets were slim to none in the Kent family. Jon’s relationship with his father was built on honesty, patience, and understanding.
But Jon understood how important this was to his best friend.
So, he nodded.
Damian stepped closer. “No. I need to hear you say it.”
“I’ll never tell anyone about her, Damian. Never.”
Damian still seemed nervous.
“Pinky promise,” Jon added as he held up his pinky.
Damian blinked.
After that night, there seemed to be a significant shift.
And there seemed to be one surprising benefit from Y/N nearly dying…
Poison Ivy no longer just tolerated Damian Wayne.
She grew to care about him. And she swore she’d protect him after what he did for his daughter that night. It made her realize that Y/N befriending a hero was a good thing.
And that was the beginning of the Poison Ivy and Wayne alliance.
However, no one from the Wayne family knew about it beyond Damian.
And that was the problem.
--------–
I'm very, very excited about this serious, so please let me know if you liked it. 🍃
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Juvenile – Toxicology
