Generally speaking, Ren believed no one was born evil.
Sure, Gotham was the kind of place that made "exceptions" feel like the rule, but even here, there were tragedies more than villains—and Victor Fries was one of them.
Before everything fell apart, Fries had been a brilliant cryogenicist. A genius in the field. A man deeply in love with his wife, Nora—a bond people often described as soulmates. But like Drake had said, Nora had been diagnosed with a terminal illness. No known cure. No effective treatment, not anywhere in the world.
Fries didn't fall into despair. He didn't run. He didn't surrender.
Instead, he poured everything—his intellect, his obsession, his love—into researching a solution. Desperate to buy time, he designed a revolutionary cryostasis chamber: a high-tech sarcophagus that would place his wife in suspended animation, halting her biological deterioration while he searched for a cure.
But this was Gotham.
And in Gotham, every good story takes a sharp left into darkness.
The company funding Fries' research saw no profit in compassion. When they tried to shut down the project, Fries resisted. The confrontation escalated. There was an accident—a chemical explosion involving the cryogenic gases.
Fries survived. Barely.
But he was no longer human.
The incident rewrote his very biology. His body became incapable of surviving above freezing temperatures. If exposed to normal room temperature, he'd die almost instantly. To survive, he constructed a custom suit—an armored exoskeleton that kept his body at sub-zero temperatures.
And thus, Mr. Freeze was born.
He became a supervillain in name, but his actions were rarely evil. He wasn't interested in chaos or crime for its own sake—only in preserving his wife's life. He stole. He threatened. Sometimes he killed. But always, it was in pursuit of the same impossible goal.
And Gotham had gained another tragic name on its long, bitter list.
A genius lost. A villain gained.
His wife still lay frozen, locked in time, waiting for a miracle.
And he? He was still trying.
Still hoping.
---
Ren sighed, bringing his attention back to the rooftop and the man sitting across from him.
"So… you and this doctor. Got any bad blood?"
Drake frowned. "What? No. Why?"
Ren could tell that Drake actually had to think about that for a second.
"Do you even know what Victor Fries is up to now?"
"I heard… after some lab accident, he disappeared. Him and his wife. No one's seen them since."
Thank god, Ren thought, relief washing over him. At least Drake hadn't actually made contact with Freeze. Yet.
"Okay. So what's your plan?"
"I don't have one." Drake's voice cracked, and his hands clutched his scalp again. "I just… we finally found somewhere safe. We settled in. I was trying to scrape together hope. But now? It's all gone again."
He trembled, curling into himself as he sat on the rooftop's edge.
"I didn't know what else to do. I just… I needed money. Anything. Enough to pay next month's meds."
Then, out of nowhere, the sorrow gave way to fury.
"You know what's messed up? You! I meet you! I actually bought into your nonsense, thought maybe you could help—and I brought you home! I'm such an idiot! I'm a useless, pathetic piece of—!"
His voice cracked into sobs.
Ren didn't stop him.
Sometimes crying wasn't weakness—it was pressure leaving the system before it exploded.
The guy had been carrying the weight of two lives on his shoulders. If he didn't fall apart now, he'd shatter later.
Ren dragged another rusted chair closer, wiped the cold rain off it, and sat down beside him. The chill bit through his jeans and straight into his bones.
Gotham's skyline loomed before them, a mess of lights buried beneath fog and shadows. The occasional flicker of sirens lit the horizon. The sound of distant rain tapping puddles was all that broke the silence.
Ren sighed quietly, his breath a pale mist in the dark.
Misfortune, it seemed, always picked the ones already on their knees.
---
CLACK.
A rusted lock twisted open.
The front door screeched on its hinges.
"Drake?"
A woman's voice—fragile, wavering.
Her footsteps were soft and uneven, as if every step cost her strength she didn't have to spare.
"I'm back, Camila."
Ren followed Drake inside. The apartment was old—really old—but surprisingly clean. Someone had clearly taken time to tidy it up, to create a space that felt livable, even if the furniture looked like it had come from three different decades.
From one of the rooms, a pale, thin woman emerged.
She had no hair.
Her skin was ghostly white, stretched tightly across sharp cheekbones. Her eyes were sunken. She held onto the wall as she walked, steadying herself with every step.
Still, when she saw Ren, her expression shifted to one of gentle surprise. She didn't speak until Drake made the introduction. Then she gave Ren a warm smile.
A real smile.
Not forced. Not hollow.
Even like this—frail and sickly—there was a glow about her. A hint of the woman she used to be, and maybe still was underneath it all.
Ren's stomach tightened.
He wasn't a doctor. But anyone with eyes could see it: she didn't have long.
Maybe three months.
Probably less.
She didn't look sick. She looked like death's shadow had already made itself comfortable.
And then—
Ren caught it. Just before she turned away.
She slipped a handgun from behind her back and returned it to a drawer in the nearby bedroom.
If it hadn't been Drake walking through that door just now, she would've opened fire without hesitation.
Ren didn't even flinch.
This was Gotham. In the Narrows, pulling a gun on a guest wasn't rudeness—it was routine.
Now that he thought about it…
Was Drake's gun even real?
A moment later, he got his answer.
Drake entered his bedroom, pulled the handgun from earlier out of his coat, and clicked in a magazine from his drawer before locking both away.
So it was real.
Just empty earlier.
Somehow, that didn't make Ren feel any better.
In fact, he was kind of pissed.
That gun had been pressed right against his head. If it had been loaded?
Game over.
He opened the system interface.
His newly purchased starter save point was still unused.
Not anymore.
[Save Point Activated.]
> Save Slot Created.
You now have 20 read attempts for this point. No time limit.
When approaching fatal injury, you may choose to reload or ignore this save.
> ⚠ You may only hold up to five active save points at once.
⚠ Save points can be relocated using funds or manually deactivated at any time.
Ren exhaled slowly and closed the interface.
This place wasn't safe.
But for now?
It was home.