Godfather Owl: Guardian of Batman

In an instant, the surroundings shifted.

Gotham and Wayne Manor disappeared, replaced by the sterile interior of a laboratory.

Everything from before had been an isolated fragment of a dream, deliberately constructed by Martha.

At its core, they were still inside Homelander's mental domain.

Martha shed her disguise completely now.

Her pale skin, green hair, and grotesque smile—all laid bare before Bruce's wide eyes.

He had heard Kathoom describe this figure before.

The Joker.

"My mother is the Joker?"

Bruce's worldview shattered in an instant.

How could Kathoom have kept something this monumental from him?

Martha understood her son's shock. She had hoped to keep this truth from him forever, but she couldn't hide it any longer. Bruce would have to come to terms with it on his own.

"Bruce, I need to use some... unpleasant methods on you," she said softly.

With a wave of her hand, Bruce's clothes transformed into a straitjacket, binding him tightly.

"But don't worry. Once we return to our original world, I'll have someone erase this unpleasant memory. We'll still be the inseparable mother and son we've always been."

Another flick of her wrist, and Bruce's body floated into the air, carried into one of the lab's chambers.

As he entered, a piercing scream rang in his ears.

Turning his head, Bruce saw a blond boy locked inside what appeared to be a furnace chamber, wailing in agony.

The heat inside the chamber was almost visible; the boy's tears evaporated the moment they left his eyes.

No one showed him any mercy.

Outside the furnace, countless staff members took notes, seemingly observing just how much heat the boy could withstand. Someone turned up the temperature, and the boy's screams escalated further.

"Homelander?"

Bruce recognized the child.

This was Homelander's mind, after all—a place where all his buried pains resided.

Though Homelander often proclaimed to the world that he had never experienced pain, the truth was quite the opposite.

He had not only felt pain—it had defined his childhood.

But the memories were so traumatic that Homelander had buried them deep within his psyche.

Inside the furnace, the boy's skin remained unscathed, but he clawed desperately at his own body, trembling from the unrelenting agony.

The damage might be prevented, but the pain could not be masked.

"Pathetic," Bruce muttered, shifting his gaze.

A difficult childhood might explain, but it did not excuse the horrors Homelander had inflicted as an adult.

Bruce didn't judge others for their choices.

But everyone had to face the consequences of those choices.

"Do you really have the time to pity others?"

Martha stood outside Bruce's chamber, gazing gently at her immobilized son.

"Don't you see? I'm trying to save you," she said.

"What?"

Bruce frowned, sensing layers of implication in her words.

He quickly put on a defiant expression. "How could you be saving me? You're treating me terribly!"

"I don't blame you, Bruce. You can say whatever you want about me now."

Martha didn't take his rebellious tone to heart.

"You have no idea how hard I've worked to come up with this plan—to get you out of here before Barbatos' five metals are delivered and the real suffering begins."

Barbatos' obsession was with Batman's body.

Martha's concern was Bruce's soul.

Bruce had long suspected that Barbatos had changed his approach since the Deathstroke incident.

Rather than dragging him back by force, Barbatos now seemed content to let events play out naturally, delivering the metals one by one to open the door to the Dark Multiverse.

If the mountain won't come to me, I'll go to the mountain.

If Bruce wouldn't return, Barbatos would cross over instead.

Martha's words confirmed Bruce's theory.

"Damn that owl," Bruce thought bitterly. "Always keeping the most important details from me."

He couldn't help but notice how Barbatos' ability to send people across worlds was eerily similar to Kathoom's powers of multiversal travel.

Yet Barbatos himself couldn't cross over directly.

Kathoom remained tight-lipped about it, forcing Bruce to rely on conjecture.

But guesses weren't truth. There were still too many missing pieces.

The adjacent chamber opened as Bruce pondered, and the boy Homelander was dragged back to his room after the furnace test ended.

Bruce could hear muffled sobs through the wall.

The young Homelander was crying in secret.

"It will take a bit more time," Martha said from outside Bruce's chamber. "Homelander's body needs to fully transform into a vessel for your soul."

She and Bruce were unique presences in this domain. The other figures—the lab staff—were mere fragments of Homelander's memories, unable to respond to their conversation.

Martha left, leaving Bruce alone in the chamber.

He closed his eyes in a daze and opened them again.

In that single second, he had experienced another dream.

It was a vision of him and Martha living happily in Gotham.

It seemed Martha planned to fill his mind with an endless cascade of dreams, reshaping his thoughts and altering his perception.

She wanted him to forget the multiverse, Kathoom, and Batman.

To remember only the happiness of being with her.

As Bruce struggled to stay awake, his eyelids drooped again, and drowsiness overwhelmed him.

"So that's how it works—every time I blink, I fall into another dream."

Determined, Bruce forced his eyes wide open, trying to resist the pull of sleep.

Mom, I'm your own son, and you're really doing this to me?

His internal complaint was tinged with exasperation.

Bruce glanced around the room, noticing its warm, homely décor—a stark contrast to the sterile, cold laboratory aesthetic he expected.

Directly in front of him, an old-fashioned television flickered with static before displaying a live broadcast.

The screen showed a metallic, egg-shaped object sitting in the center of Times Square.

It wasn't perfectly smooth; instead, its surface was irregular, like a crude shell.

Around the egg were numerous personnel conducting scans and inspections.

"This isn't just a program!"

Bruce instantly recognized the scene on the screen—it was happening in real life.

Is this something Mom wants me to see?

On the screen, cracks began forming on the egg's surface, as if something inside was preparing to hatch.

Whatever emerged would undoubtedly spell disaster.

Bruce's eyes were unbearably dry. He blinked, falling into another dream.

This time, his father, Thomas Wayne, had survived, and their family was whole again.

It seemed Martha had softened her stance, unwilling to make Bruce relive the pain of a broken family.

When Bruce woke from the dream, the muffled sound of crying still came from the next room.

"Stop crying!"

He shouted toward the wall. "Crying doesn't solve anything!"

The sobbing stopped abruptly. Then, a timid voice answered, "Am I not even allowed to cry?"

"No, you're not!"

Bruce snapped. "You're disturbing me!"

The silence that followed was eerie. The boy on the other side didn't stop crying, but he clamped his lips shut, stifling the sounds entirely.

Huh?

Bruce had only meant to test the young Homelander's resilience, but he hadn't expected the child to be so obedient.

So, it's true…

The realization dawned on him. The young Homelander and the adult were polar opposites.

His behavior in the furnace earlier had already revealed that the boy was a sensitive, fragile soul.

He could have broken free, destroyed the room, and annihilated everyone tormenting him.

But he didn't.

Instead, he endured all the pain in silence, submitting to the experiment.

"Is Homelander… a people-pleaser?"

The thought flashed through Bruce's mind. It would explain so much about the adult Homelander's twisted psyche.

Even as a child, he tolerated abuse and cooperated with his abusers, believing that enduring the pain might earn their approval or affection.

But that was impossible.

All his submission did was embolden his tormentors to push him further.

The damage accumulated over time, twisting his mind into the monstrous figure he'd later become.

After another dream, Bruce shifted in his restraints and knocked against the wall.

"Homelander, are you still crying?"

"Who's Homelander?" The tearful voice responded. "My name is John."

"Alright, John. I have a question for you."

"Okay. What is it?"

The boy's voice trembled as he waited for the question.

Bruce thought for a moment, then asked, "When they burned you with that heat, why didn't you just leave the room? You could've done it, couldn't you?"

Silence fell on the other side.

After a pause, John's hesitant voice replied, "But if I did that… they'd be disappointed."

It really is a people-pleaser mentality.

Bruce's tone turned firm. "Let them be disappointed. Why should you care? Do you really think your submission will earn their approval or love?"

John didn't reply.

Bruce's words had clearly struck a nerve.

"John, I feel sorry for you, but I have to say—your suffering is self-inflicted. Why don't you fight back?"

Bruce continued, "People who truly love you would never be able to stand hurting you!"

He thought of Martha. Even though she had locked him up, Bruce was certain that if he feigned distress—cried out in pain or fear—she would appear at the window instantly, asking what was wrong.

Bruce's dry eyes forced another blink, pulling him into yet another dream. Once again, he was submerged in Martha's constructed world, where her love enveloped him entirely.

When he awoke, the muffled voice from the other side called out to him.

"Why do you keep trying to make me fight back? Who even are you?"

"My name is Bruce, and I'm a warrior for justice."

Bruce shifted his restrained body, propping himself into a sitting position.

On the television, the cracks on the metallic egg were now dense and deep. The shell was seconds from shattering.

Then, with a deafening crack, the egg burst open.

From inside, a figure shot into the sky.

It was Homelander—but transformed.

He looked no older than ten years old now, his adult form regressed into that of a child.

Hovering in mid-air, the child Homelander let out a maniacal laugh. His eyes glowed red as beams of laser vision cut through several skyscrapers in an instant.

Bruce had always wondered why his mother could move so freely within Homelander's mind.

Now he understood.

Homelander's psyche housed a Joker-like persona.

So that was the "preparation" Martha had mentioned.

Bruce realized her plan: use the Joker persona to obliterate Homelander's consciousness, then erase the Joker persona herself.

Once that was done, Bruce's mind would be the only one left inhabiting this body.

But—

Bruce watched the carnage on the television as the child Homelander wreaked havoc, utterly unchecked.

Isn't this cost a bit too much?

"John," Bruce suddenly called out.

"I need you to do something for me. If you don't want to disappoint me, you'll do it."

"Huh?"

John sounded utterly baffled by Bruce's audacity.

"Why should I listen to you?"

"Because I'm a hero of justice, and I've decided to recruit you!"

Bruce smirked, an idea forming. "From now until this is over, you're my Robin."

---

T/N: HERO OF JUSTICE AEIFAIFNAIP

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