Chapter Text
The first rule—well, okay, not the first rule, but honestly all the rules about where to stand and what to wear and how to eat and how often to wash and how long you could keep salami under the bed before it “went bad” (Obi-Wan thought this number was zero, which was obviously absurd) all kind of blurred together in his mind—the first rule that really stood out to Anakin was, “we don’t go to level thirteen, because the Bats live there.”
Anakin was immediately intrigued, in a way he never was when Obi-Wan went on about the proper way to tie a robe. It was a weird rule, and not weird in the “we don’t lick our plates, Padawan” way. For instance, when he said we don’t go to level thirteen, who was we? And, was it all of level thirteen, like over the entire planet of Coruscant, or was it only certain districts? Also, what was a bat?
It had taken Obi-Wan no little trouble to get to the bottom of all this to Anakin’s satisfaction. Obi-Wan had even gone to the Archives and taken out an absolutely massive holotext called “Galactic Fauna Through the Ages” and showed Anakin that a bat was an extinct flying mammal native to the Gotham system.
“I’ve never heard of the Gotham system,” Anakin said, peering at the holodisplay of various species. “These are totally wizard. Look, Obi-Wan, this one sucks blood.”
Obi-Wan looked a tiny bit squeamish at the vivid depiction of the bat in question feeding at the neck of some kind of bovine. “So I see,” he said. “But in any case, Anakin, the reason you have never heard of the Gotham system is because it does not exist anymore. Its sun went supernova twenty-five years ago and what planets were not immediately destroyed were ejected from the system to become rogue planets in other systems.”
“Wizard. Can I see a holodisplay of that?” Anakin asked.
“No, you cannot, Padawan,” Obi-Wan said, in a sharp voice that made Anakin go sullen. Obi-Wan reigned himself in and continued in a calmer tone of voice. “I apologize, Anakin, I forget you don’t know the circumstances. You see, Gotham was still heavily populated when the sun went supernova. Scientists had been studying it for some time and the local planetary governments were beginning to develop contingency plants. But the event occurred decades before anyone had predicted.”
“And everybody died?” Anakin asked, awestruck.
“Nearly everyone in the system, I’m afraid,” Obi-Wan said. “There is some footage, taken from long-range observation satellites and so on. As a Senior Padawan you’ll have a Disaster Management module where you’ll watch it as a case study. It’s quite…harrowing. Of course, there were residents outside of the system at the time. I’m sure you can imagine how they felt.”
Anakin looked soberly at the vampire bat. “So…how did the bats on the thirteenth level get to Coruscant, anyway? And how come no one’s sent pest control after them?”
“Oh,” Obi-Wan said, “the bats on the thirteenth level aren’t real bats. They’re survivors of the Gotham system who dress up as bats. Well, at least one of them does…a couple of them dress up as birds, I believe. Species native to their homeworlds.”
There was a silence. “What?” Anakin demanded.
“Yes, it’s quite strange,” Obi-Wan said. “The Bats have claimed level thirteen as their own. Of course, not every resident on that level is a Gothamite, but it doesn’t seem to matter. The Bats have appointed themselves the area’s own unsanctioned law enforcement. They are annoying enough to planetary authorities that they are mostly left alone. Plus, I understand that they have helped bring some of the more noxious crime rings to heel.”
“They sound all right,” Anakin said. “How come we’re supposed to stay out of their way?”
“They do not,” Obi-Was said, sure to emphasize every word, “like Jedi.”
…
The Bats, it seemed, was a touchy subject among the Jedi as well. Anakin had chosen to bring up the subject in his Current Events class and accidentally sparked a heated debate among the Padawans; Padawan Brophel swore they were only a hoax made up to scare Jedi younglings, while others loudly brought up stories of their Grandmaster’s tea-seller’s cousin’s sister’s daughter who went down to the thirteenth level once and definitely saw a shadow that looked like a bat. Knight Pell, who taught the class, had to rap on his desk with a yardstick until order was restored and reprimand them all sternly for repeating gossip and speculation.
“But Master Obi-Wan told me they were real!” Anakin protested. He even remembered to raise his hand before saying it, though he did not remember to wait until Knight Pell called on him.
“Well, your master is correct,” Knight Pell said. “The Bats are real, and Padawan Brophel, I am not sure who told you they were not, but they were incorrect. I am afraid we know very little about them, as they have repeatedly made clear that Jedi are not welcome. We have chosen to concede the matter and give them their space.”
“But why do they hate Jedi so much?” Padawan Ruuir asked, sounding put out.
“We don’t know,” Knight Pell said. “I wish we did, for then we might be able to make peace with them.” He turned back to the wall map of the galaxy and tapped it with his yardstick. “This brings up an excellent point, students. Who can name a recent event in which one or both of the parties were hostile to Jedi, and was the Order able to rectify the matter?”
So much for Knight Pell. The holonet was more helpful. The first Bat began appearing on blurry security holostills about a decade prior. He appeared to be human, or at least humanoid, and really did wear a bat costume. The mask had pointy ears and everything. Anakin couldn’t find a still of the Bat with his mouth open; he wondered what his teeth looked like. Maybe he wore false teeth. Did he bite people? Reports conflicted. Anakin flipped through several old stills of the Bat suplexing a couple of spice dealers. Further research revealed that level thirteen was the only level on Coruscant where the spice trade was basically zero. No wonder the CPD left them alone.
It wasn’t too long before another Bat joined the first one. She had long red hair and her costume was very tight. By the time she appeared on the scene, the holonet was ready. People really seemed to like finding security stills of her for some reason and would even clean up the photos so they looked sharp.
Unfortunately, this was the moment when Obi-Wan decided to walk into their quarters and saw the fourteen holostills of Bat Lady projected above Anakin’s datapad and before he knew what was happening, Obi-Wan had sat him down in front of a power-point called “Your Changing Body and You” followed by a second one called “Staying Safe on the Holonet: A Guide for Younglings” and in conclusion, looking up holostills of Bat Lady for any reason was NOT WORTH IT.
After this, he researched the Bats when he was sure he wouldn’t be interrupted.
Luckily, the next person to join the Bat was different. For one thing, he wasn’t a Bat. Anakin wasn’t even one hundred percent sure he was a he, but at least he didn’t have long red hair. He wore bright colors and a cape he flung out when he leaped from building to building like a wingspan. Most importantly of all he was a kid.
Anakin took his datapad out and showed Obi-Wan, pointing out that clearly he couldn’t be a survivor of the Gotham supernova. Obi-Wan said, “Beware of assumptions, Padawan. They may just be a short adult. Or perhaps another species altogether.”
By the time Bird-Kid appeared, people were actually down on level thirteen taking photos of the Bats on purpose. Anakin zoomed in on a high-quality holostill of Bird-Kid somersaulting through the air with a huge grin on his face. He was very clearly human. “Would an adult do this?” he asked.
“I take your point,” Obi-Wan said. “The Council believes—” he hesitated, then continued, “the Council believes that the Bat might…recruit children to his cause.”
“Like the Jedi?” Anakin asked.
“Uhhhhhhhhh,” Obi-Wan said, “yes. No. I don’t--Look, Anakin, why are you so interested in the Bats, anyway?”
“I’m not looking up photos of Bat-Lady anymore,” Anakin said quickly.
“I didn’t say you were,” Obi-Wan said dryly. “I asked what was so interesting about them.”
Anakin gestured to the somersaulting Bird-Kid. “I mean, look. They’re so cool.”
“They dress up like animals and kick people,” Obi-Wan said.
Anakin turned back to the datapad. “So cool,” he repeated.
Behind him, Obi-Wan muttered, “I don’t even believe that child is wearing pants.” But he didn’t say Anakin had to stop.
…
It was some time before Anakin was able to pick up his pet project again. The Jedi kept him pretty busy. Some of it was cool, like saber practice—Obi-Wan had upgraded him from the wooden bokken to real training sabers—and some of it was annoying. The Jedi were so decorous. Sometimes it seemed that everything Anakin did was wrong, like everyone spoke a language he had never learned. Some of the others looked down at him for it, and some seemed to feel sorry for him. He could never decide which was worse.
By the time he tumbled into bed at night, it was usually the first time he was alone all day. This was when that feeling of wrongness that lived under his skin welled up and overflowed, when he would miss his mother like a limb had been torn off, when he would decide that if he had to stay in the Temple one second longer he was going to go insane.
Luckily, it was not very hard to sneak out. The Jedi sort of operated under the assumption that the Padawans just…wouldn’t? Which was cute. Also, Padawans weren’t supposed to be able to project a see-me-not aura in the Force powerful enough to fool one of the Temple Guards, but Anakin had been sneaking around the streets of Mos Espa since he was a toddler and had no trouble at all. Was he really as powerful as the Knights and Masters sometimes gossiped about when they thought he couldn’t hear, or were the Guards just not great at their jobs? The third option, which was that they might be letting him sneak out, did not occur to him.
He discovered quite early that there was plenty to do on the lower levels. Anything you could imagine happened there, and a lot it had never occurred to Anakin to imagine. It was easy to make money, too, if you were quick and paid attention. You could find any kind of race, any kind of game. No one cared how old you were or even asked your name. Half the planet wore the comfortable tunic-plus-leggings that the Jedi did, but Anakin usually changed into spacer gear just to be safe, with a hood drawn up over his distinctive Padawan haircut. It was nice, sometimes. To disappear into the muddle of sentience, and not be special and different.
Weighing down his pockets with credits earned fair and square—well, mostly fair and square--was a nice bonus, too.
One night, after an especially bad day, Anakin bypassed the usual racetracks and betting rackets and liberated an empty speedercraft from a taxi stand. He drifted through the traffic lanes, going nowhere, barely paying attention. He descended through the shafts into the interminable lower levels, choosing exits at random. At some point, he realized he was hungry and flew through the nearest offramp, setting down near a likely-looking group of stalls that catered to the nocturnal residents of the city.
He was still running on autopilot, trying not to think, barely tasting the spicy flatbread wrap, when a Tamaranian appeared next to him. “Are you lost?” she asked, in accented Basic.
Anakin stared, shocked right out of his funk. Tamaranians were kind of rare outside their own system and Anakin had never seen one in person before. Her skin was golden, and she certainly had a lot of it. More than a normal person, he thought. And she had very large…hair. It was curly and orange and towered above her head and all down her back. Her eyes were green and had no pupils. “I don’t think so,” he finally managed to say, “are you?” and then immediately died a trillion deaths of humiliation.
She laughed, and it made Anakin want to laugh too. “No, I live here,” she said.
“You live here? On Coruscant?” Anakin asked. “Why?”
A shadow passed over her face and Anakin was immediately sorry he asked. “That is not a very nice story,” she said. She brightened, and it was as if she had never been sad. “But all my friends live here! They are very good friends. My name is Starfire.”
“My name is Skywalker,” Anakin said, because it seemed like a more impressive name than Anakin.
She nodded slowly. “I like that name. That is a good name. But Skywalker, if you are not lost, what are you doing here?”
Anakin held up the wrapper from his sandwich. “Getting a snack.”
She frowned. Anakin thought she was confused rather than angry. “The Jedi did not send you?”
“Send me?” Anakin said, “why would the Jedi send me? They don’t even know I’m here.” He shook his head. “Hang on, how did you know I was a Jedi? Wait,” he looked wildly about for a level marker. “Oh no. Am I on level thirteen?”
Starfire laughed. “I knew you were lost!”
“Terrorizing local kids, Star?” another voice asked. A heavily modded near-human came up next to Starfire and nudged her with his shoulder. He looked more closely at Anakin and narrowed his eyes. “Hey, kid, listen, nothing personal, but you really shouldn’t be here.”
Anakin was not listening. “Your cybernetics are wizard,” he breathed. “Is that a 9.3 Optomicon laser scope? That’s top-of-the-line! Does the biological interface ever glitch out? I read that the 9.0 couldn’t render the color red.”
The man threw back his head and laughed. “Hey, I like you, kid! You’re all right, for a Jedi.” He held his fist out and Anakin obligingly bumped it. “And it’s been customized to bypass the worst of the interface defects.”
“Really? Who’s your modder? What kind of code did he run?” Anakin asked eagerly.
The man shook an admonishing finger. “Ah-ah-ah. You can’t come down here asking about all our secrets.”
“He says he is lost, Cyborg” Starfire interjected. “He did not even realize what level he was on.” Anakin realized that since Cyborg was almost certainly not the man’s real name, Starfire probably wasn’t either. It was a disappointing thought.
“Okay, well, whatever,” Cyborg said. “For real, though, you’ve got to get out of here before Nightwing—”
A blur of blue and yellow somersaulted down from the building above and landed in front of them. “—too late,” Cyborg sighed.
“What’s going on?”
“Listen, Nightwing, he was just leaving,” Cyborg said.
Nightwing was not much taller than Anakin, but like Starfire, seemed to have more than the usual amount of skin. His tight suit was cut into a deep V from the collar almost all the way down his sternum. He wore a mask that looked like batwings spread across his face, and the eyes themselves were hidden by glowing disks that no doubt hid some absolutely wizard tech. Despite his eyes being obscured, he seemed familiar. Anakin peered at him closely. “Hang on,” he said, “You used to be Bird-Kid!”
“BIRD-KID!” Cyborg shouted from behind them.
“No, you did!” Anakin said excitedly. “With the green…” he gestured downwards “and the wing cape…” he stuck his elbows out.
Nightwing, who had previously looked as if he’d like to read Anakin the riot act, now stared with his mouth open.
“Bird-Kid,” Cyborg wheezed.
Nightwing visibly pulled himself together. “We had a deal with the Jedi,” he said sternly. “We don’t meddle in their affairs, and they don’t spy on us.”
“I’m not a spy!” Anakin protested hotly. “I didn’t even know I was in your territory til Starfire told me.” He frowned. “Wait. Did the Bats and the Jedi used to be at war or something?”
“Like you don’t know,” Nightwing said.
“Nightwing, he is only a child,” Starfire said.
“The Jedi use their children as soldiers,” Nightwing said. “Everyone knows that.”
“But,” Anakin said, “so do the Bats.”
“Oh, man,” Anakin heard Cyborg say.
Nightwing glared at Anakin. “Consider this a warning. You’re lucky Batman wasn’t the one to find you.”
“Why?” Anakin asked, genuinely curious. “What would he do? Oh! Would he bite me? Does he have the teeth…?” he held up two crooked fingers to his mouth like fangs.
There was a split second of silence, and then Cyborg and Starfire collapsed into helpless laughter. “The teeth!” Cyborg gasped, between wheezes. “This is the best day of my life.”
“It’s gonna be the last day of your life,” Nightwing muttered.
“You must not mind Nightwing,” Starfire said consolingly, pulling herself together. “He is much nicer than he looks. He just does not care for Jedi. It is not your fault.”
“But why---” Anakin tried to ask, but Nightwing propelled him bodily towards his speedercraft.
“Leave, kid,” he ordered.
“Fine, fine, kriff, you don’t have to push!” Anakin threw a reluctant leg over the speeder. There was nothing quite like being told you weren’t welcome to ignite every speck of curiosity.
Just before he hit the ignition, he heard Nightwing shout, “And it’s not Bird-Kid, it’s Robin!”