His name was Colin Wilkes. He was an orphan at the St. Aden’s Orphanage. He was terrified of bats, closed spaces and abandonment, but his worse fear now was probably his own strength. Strength he gained from being tormented and experimented on. He was kidnapped and used by Scarecrow against the greatest hero he ever met, Batman.
At first he was terrified of the man, terrified at the sight of a huge bat. He attacked, he maimed, he did everything he could to harm the dark knight, but the man did nothing to against him. Instead, he did whatever he could to save him, to help him. He even got his teddy bear Rory back for him.
The hospital and Wayne Enterprises worked to return him back to normal, but something unexpected happened. He was still able to access the monstrous form the venom granted him. With this he decided to follow in the footsteps of Batman.
He started his attack against petty crimes as Abuse before eventually he stumbled across a trail of children corpses and found an illegal children fighting ring ran by Zsasz. He met Damian and there he found the temperamental young man was the new Robin, Batman’s prodigy. He wouldn’t say they became the best of friends, but they were friends at least right? Either that or Damian was more generous than his grumpy self showed. He gave him a gift, a motorcycle of all things, geared with weapons and all the works. That was six years ago, now he was sixteen and in his second year of high school.
“Move it loser!” A rough hand shoved him into a wall of lockers.
Colin grimaced as he braced himself. He tried his best not to let the venom rise in his blood. If he turned into Venom here, it would be a pain to hide. How do Damian and Batman do it? How do they keep their skills in check and keep the public from realizing who they were? Thinking back on Damian, he decided the current violent wonder was not a good example. The Wayne heir acted no different from his night persona.
He waited until the bullies passed before he pushed himself up and away from the lockers. He clapped his clothes clean mildly miffed that he had to keep his strength in check. Colin sighed as he picked up his dropped books.
“Are you okay?” A soft voice asked as he spotted a pair of caramel colored legs and the end of a dress helm before him.
He glanced up and found a worry set of green eyes. He felt his heart flutter as she knelt down and helped him. It was Rose, the girl of every guy’s dream in the school. The nicest, sweetest—er… not that he was interested in her that way. He had someone else in mind… not that he had a choice with him either.
“I’m fine.” He flushed in embarrassment as she handed him the rest of his books. She was a good few inches taller than him and it was hard not to see her as an older sister or a mother even.
“I should really give them a stern talking to.” She crossed her arms as she glanced towards the bullies.
Colin laughed sheepishly as he waved away her concern. “It’s all right, you don’t have to.” He didn’t want to draw attention to himself, much less getting the nicest girl in school in trouble with the wrong crowd.
“Rose!” A shorthaired blonde ran up to them and latched herself onto Rose’s arm. “So there you are. You left without me this morning!”
“That’s because you’re a big sleepy head, Rosalie. I bet sister Mary had to wake you up again.” The girl smiled at her.
“UGH!” Colin jumped at the other girl’s reaction. “Rose I told you for years to stop calling me that! Call me Ro!”
“Why? You don’t like to be called Rose? Rosalie? Rosie?” Rose giggled as the other girl continued to flail at her childishly.
Colin smiled and quietly stepped away from the two. It was nice to see them so relaxed and joking with one another. He knew they were both orphans just the same as him. They were all close to their legal age. Soon they would have to leave their orphanages and make a life on their own, but how, he was still worried about that himself. Hopefully, they would be able to figure it out on their own.
o.o.o.o.o
The two Ivys stopped their banter as they watched Colin leave. Rose grinned with an amused chuckle.
“He’s so adorable. It’s hard to believe he has some dealings during the night.” Rose rested a hand on her chin.
“How can you tell?” Ro crossed her arms and leaned back with mild interest.
“Didn’t you notice earlier? He was trying to hold back from responding to those bullies.” Rose commented.
“Well, I saw that.” Ro commented.
Terry had trained them well, not a day could they go through without noticing something around them. Ro and the other Ivys have shared a class with Colin at least once in the last two years and out of trained habit, they noticed the boy was peculiar. He was covered in bruises and always asleep in class. Rarely did they find him without injuries or exhaustion. There were no signs of drug use and the injuries seemed too severe to be from bullies.
“Well, whatever he’s doing, I hope he’ll be fine. He’s such a sweet boy.” Rose sighed as she adjusted the strap to her bag. She was about to leave for class when she realized Ro was no longer at her side. The tanned girl gave a huff as she shook her head. “Where did she run off to now?”
Little did Rose know, Colin had peaked Ro’s interest and she was more than excited to stalk the quiet boy. She followed him a good part of the day without him realizing he gained a stalker. That alone should have made her happy, but she was bored to tears. He did nothing of interest in school. He was mediocre in class, clumsy in gym and he had no interest in extra curricular activities.
With how bored she was, she hadn’t realized someone was trailing after her. By the time she noticed, a hard limb was latched around her torso. She could barely scream as she struggled against her captor.
o.o.o.o.o
Class was the only time Colin could sleep. Being a night crusader meant his nights were used to hunt down criminals and doing homework. Sleep was second priority if he wanted to keep his grades up and protect Gotham at the same time. At least he had the Cycle of Abuse from Damian to thank for the time he saved in traveling.
He could count all the classes he managed to stay awake in with a single hand. Scratch that, on a single finger and that was phys ed. He needed to stay awake long enough to dodge the incoming balls.
By the time school ended, he was well rested and ready to repeat the whole cycle again. At least that was what he thought when he heard the scream. He made a hasty dash to the source and found Ro in the grip of… Ro? The hell? She glanced at him briefly before she pounced away in an inhumane manner. He had no time to get his ride, but the least he could do was change to abuse and chase after them.
Within moments, he lost Ro to her imposter. Even so, he was no quitter. He made his way back to the garage Damian bought for him and grabbed his ride to her down street by street, block by block. It doesn’t seem like he would be able to patrol tonight, but hell be damned if he was going to let her go.
o.o.o.o.o
Ro pinned herself against the wall as the robot with her face dropped her into a room. It frisked her and took away the emergency phone Terry had given to each of them for such occasions.
“What do you want?” She asked, terrified, but the robot said nothing as it left a paper bag on the floor and left through the only exit in what seemed like a storage unit. “Wait!” Ro tried running to the exit, but the gate closed. She was locked from the outside world. She banged the gates, metal clattered against metal. “Let me out!”
She struggled for ten minutes, but there was no one to her rescue. She sighed dejectedly and picked at the paper bag the robot left. Much to her surprise, she found a sandwich at the bottom with a bottle of water.
“…What kind of a kidnapper is this guy?” Ro said in annoyance as she set the sandwich aside.
She was not sure how long she would be here and she was far from hungry. No need to waste the only food source she has now. She searched about the seemingly empty warehouse. If she was a prisoner, she would be a prisoner with a weapon. In her search she found a sturdy pipe. With a few test swings, she weighed the heftiness of the weapon and kept it close as she banged on the gates again, hoping someone would hear her.
“Somebody! Anybody! Help!” She shouted as she banged.
One hour, two hours, three, she was tired of yelling, but she kept bashing at the gates wishing someone would come. She stared at the sandwich for a moment before she set her resolve she was not going to give up. The roar of a motorcycle gave her hope as she regained her vigor and banged loudly.
“Is someone out there? Help!” Ro shouted, she didn’t care whether it was a friend or foe at this point. When thick fingers dug through the gate and ripped it aside a scream escaped from her throat. Maybe she should have wished for a friend. She raised the pipe and bashed down at the monstrosity in front of her.
“Ro! I’m not here to—” Bash! “Hurt you!” Bash! “I’m here—” Bash! “To save you!”
The awkward explanation made her slow her assault, but she kept her distance from the monster. “No offence, but your ugly mug doesn't exactly scream friendly.”
“Geez.” He rubbed the soreness from the pipe attacks. “I spent hours looking for you!”
Hours? Ro stared at him for a moment before she realized who it was. It was cute little Colin from school. Except he was an ugly monstrosity now. “So what should I call you anyway? Or should I just call you Colin?”
The monster before her spluttered in disbelief, it was almost adorable to watch. “A-Abuse! My name is Abuse!” He said hurriedly.
Definitely Colin. Ro thought in amusement. “Well, big guy are you going to sweep this damsel off her feet and save her? Or am I walking home from here?”
“I have a ride, I can drive you back to the orphanage.” Abuse said.
“How’d you know I live in an orphanage?” Ro crossed her arms, amusement ran through her veins as her adrenaline rush died.
“I-uh-I…” His shoulders slumped dejectedly. “Please don’t tell anyone.”
“Then don’t make it so easy for people to find out. You have to be careful about what you say around people or else you’d expose yourself to worse people! You’re lucky it’s just me and I’m not going to blab!” She winked.
“Er… thanks?” He murmured sheepishly.
“And another thing—”
“Ro!” The familiar voice of her brother drew her attention away from Abuse and towards the door. There she spotted the robot with her battered brother at hand.
“Casey!” She shouted in horror.
Abuse looked between her reaction and her brother’s state and decided the robot was the culprit of the whole thing. He was about to charge with his massive arms swinging when Casey stepped between him and the robot.
“Listen to me, he’s not the one you need to fight against.” He held his arms out protecting the damaged robot. “Zeta’s not bad.”
“He kidnapped me!” Ro protested.
“He was trying to get close to me.” Casey interrupted, his eyes kept at Abuse’s massive form.
Abuse sighed as he looked between the two siblings and the robot. “You better explain to me what happened.
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