Detective Rex Mallory was a name etched into the heart of American crime lore. Based in Chicago, he was the guy who brought down the Southside Butcher, cracked the Midtown Arson Ring, and once solved a triple homicide with just a shoeprint and a hunch. Gritty, sharp, and always two steps ahead - Mallory was untouchable.
Or so everyone thought.
It was a warm Friday night when Rex stepped out of his favorite diner, coffee in hand, coat slung over his shoulder. He had just closed another case - clean, textbook, no loose ends. The city buzzed around him, but something felt off. A tension in the air. A silence beneath the noise.
He turned into a narrow alley to cut through to his car, whistling a soft jazz tune. Halfway through, a figure appeared from behind a dumpster. Young, maybe late twenties. Hoodie up, hands shaking.
"Hey," Rex said, cautious but calm. "You lost?"
The figure didn't speak. Just lunged.
Pain exploded in Rex's gut. He stumbled back, eyes wide as the knife plunged again. The world tilted, the brick walls spinning, the streetlamp above flickering like a dying star.
The attacker dropped the blade and ran, no wallet taken, no name spoken. Just…gone.
Rex collapsed against the wall, blood pooling beneath him. His last thoughts weren't of glory, or regrets, but confusion.
He didn't know this person. No enemy. No grudge.
Just a stranger.
By the time officers found him, the alley was silent again. No witnesses. No leads.
Rex Mallory, America's finest detective, killed not by a mastermind—but by the chaos he spent his life trying to understand.
And in that chaos, even legends can bleed.
Gotham is a city wrapped in perpetual twilight. Its towering skyscrapers cast long shadows over alleys teeming with secrets. Corruption festers in its government, crime thrives in its streets, and justice often hides behind a mask. The rain seems eternal, washing over cracked concrete and flickering neon signs. It's a place where fear lingers in the fog and hope feels like a forgotten dream. Yet amid the darkness, a few still dare to fight for light.
In the heart of Gotham's decaying soul, he moves like a shadow - Batman, the silent warden of a city that forgot how to save itself. Cloaked in black, he is fear incarnate, a myth whispered among criminals who know the night doesn't belong to them. Beside him, his main disciple - Nightwing, shaped by tragedy, driven by vengeance. A boy carved from pain, wearing colors that defy the darkness but fighting demons just as deep. Together, they haunt the city's rooftops like revenants, bound by loss, wielding justice not as mercy, but as punishment to the evil that roams in the Gotham's streets.
The fire cracked again. Somewhere distant, a grandfather clock chimed the hour. Rex Mallory—at least, that's who he thought he was—sat upright in a bed far too grand to belong to any hospital.
His body felt… wrong.
Lighter, leaner. Stronger.
His hands, once rough from years gripping revolvers and pouring coffee, were calloused in new ways—like they belonged to a gymnast, a fighter.
The door creaked open. A man with silver hair and a spine like iron stepped in with surgical grace. He didn't flinch when he saw Rex awake.
"Master Richard," the man said softly, relief in his voice. "You gave us quite the scare."
Rex blinked. "I think you've got the wrong guy."
The man smiled faintly. "You've said stranger things after concussions."
He set a glass of water down and turned. Rex opened his mouth to protest again when the windows rattled, and the room darkened.
Then he entered.
Tall. Cloaked. Cowl casting his face in shadow.
Batman.
Rex's heart stopped. Not metaphorically—actually skipped.
"You're awake," Batman said, voice like crushed gravel. He walked to the foot of the bed. "We thought we lost you, Dick."
"Dick?" Rex repeated. "As in... Grayson?"
Something inside him twisted. A name, foreign but familiar. A voice in his head—childlike, acrobatic laughter, a rooftop chase, the crunch of broken ribs, a promise sworn in blood. It was the the character from the DC comics - Nightwing, the person who was the first robin of batman.
Batman stepped closer. His white eyes narrowed behind the mask.
"What's wrong?" he asked. "You're not yourself."
"No," Rex breathed. "I'm not. I don't know what's going on. I was a detective. Chicago PD. My name is Rex Mallory. I got stabbed in an alley and now…
He gestured to his body. "Now I'm this?"
Batman didn't move.
For a long time, there was silence.
Then Batman stepped back, studying him, as if trying to see who—or what—was truly there.
"If this is true," he finally said, "then Nightwing died. And something else took his place."
Rex rose to his feet, nearly stumbling but catching himself with unnatural ease. Instincts not his own carried him upright.
"Not something," he said. "Someone."
And somewhere deep inside, under layers of memory and shadow, Nightwing stirred.
Because even if Rex had never been him… now, in this world, he was.
And Gotham needed him.