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The Grand Ballroom of Wayne Manor was always cold, but on rainy Gotham evenings, the chill seemed to seep directly out of the dark mahogany paneling.
At sixteen, Leticia Wayne had mastered the art of walking through her own home like a ghost. She moved with a fluid, natural grace—strikingly beautiful, with features that mirrored the sharp, aristocratic lines of her father, Bruce, yet softened by a warmth that Gotham rarely bred.
Her bright eyes held a sharp, observant intelligence, though she often masked it behind a lazy, easygoing smile. She loved comfort, she loved peace, and she loved the simple thrill of adventure, but inside Wayne Manor, adventure was replaced by a heavy, suffocating silence.
Eight years ago, her world had cracked open. She was only eight when her mother died right in front of her eyes—a sudden, violent theft of the only anchor she had. Soon after, she was brought into the Wayne family, arriving just after Jason Todd had entered the fold.
Tonight, Leticia stood in the threshold of the manor’s main living room. The heavy velvet curtains were drawn against the storm outside. Inside, the family was gathered. But as her foot crossed the threshold, the room shifted.
The lively, murmured conversation about patrol routes and tech upgrades instantly withered. The silence that followed was not polite; it was a sudden, jarring halt, as if a stranger had walked into a classified military briefing.
Leticia kept her expression light, her posture deliberately relaxed, leaning against the doorframe with a casual, lazy air. "Don't stop on my account," she said softly, her voice carrying a natural warmth that none of them seemed to know how to return.
At the center of the room sat Bruce Wayne. He was hunched over a tablet, the blue light accentuating the deep lines of exhaustion and obsession on his face. When Leticia spoke, Bruce blinked, looking up as if trying to place her face.
It was a familiar, agonizing look. He was her father, the result of a single night that changed both their lives, but to Bruce, she was an equation he couldn't solve, an aftermath he didn't know how to program into his crusade.
He nodded once—a clinical, distant acknowledgment—before his eyes drifted back to his data. He forgot she was there when she was in the room; he forgot she existed when she left it.
In the corner, Dick Grayson was pacing. The eldest son was a storm of nervous, aggressive energy tonight. His jaw was clenched, his arms crossed tightly over his chest. He had just finished another roaring argument with Bruce.
Dick’s eyes scanned the room, passing over Leticia without a fraction of a second’s pause. He was always too angry, too consumed by his fractured relationship with his father, and too busy being the shattered golden boy to ever waste a glance on a sister who didn't wear a mask.
Leticia’s eyes shifted to Jason, sitting on the windowsill. A heavy ache tightened in her chest.
When she first arrived, Jason had been her protector. They had been inseparable, bound by the shared trauma of a rough childhood. But after his accident—after his death and violent resurrection—everything had shattered.
Jason sat in the shadows now, cleaning a disassembled firearm with methodical, aggressive movements.
He didn't look at her. The boy who used to sneak her hot chocolate after her nightmares was gone, replaced by a cynical wall of muscle and resentment. He had closed his door to her, and no matter how hard she knocked, he wouldn't let her back in.
Seeking any sign of warmth, Leticia glanced toward Tim Drake, who was buried under three laptops at the coffee table. She had tried, so many times, to offer him a smile, to ask about his day, or to just sit with him. But Tim merely adjusted his coffee cup, his posture turning instantly cold and rigid.
He deliberately angled his shoulders away from her, a silent, intellectual wall shutting her out.
It was the same everywhere she looked. Cassandra stood like a statue near the bookshelf, her expressive eyes reading body language with lethal precision, yet choosing to read Leticia as blank space. Stephanie and Barbara were huddled together near the comms station, their voices dropping to a sharp whisper the moment Leticia entered. Duke Thomas looked up, but quickly shifted his gaze to his boots, unwilling to break the status quo of the house.
Then there was Damian. Her blood brother. The youngest Wayne sat perfectly upright in an armchair, his hands resting on the hilt of a sheathed katana. When he looked at Leticia, his eyes were still filled with the same volatile distrust from their very first meeting—the day he had drawn a blade on her, viewing her birth as a threat to his bloodline. He didn't attack her anymore, but his glare was a promise of exile.
The only saving grace in the room was Alfred Pennyworth. The old butler stood by the tea cart, his posture impeccable despite the weight of the family's dysfunction. He offered Leticia a gentle, sorrowful smile, pouring a fresh cup of chamomile tea just the way she liked it.
But Alfred was only one man. With a house bursting with bruised egos, trauma, and vigilante secrets, there was only so much the faithful butler could do to shield the forgotten daughter.
Leticia walked over, took the tea with a whispered "Thank you, Alfred," and took a slow sip. She stood there, a vibrant, beautiful girl teeming with life and affection, completely surrounded by her own blood, yet entirely alone.
She watched them. She watched how Tim would lean in to show Dick a screen, how Stephanie would laugh at something Jason muttered under his breath, how Bruce would give a rare, approving grunt to Damian. They were a unit. A deeply flawed, scarred, but unbreakable circle. And she was completely outside of it.
Holding the warm porcelain cup, Leticia took a step backward, fading back into the shadows of the hallway. As she retreated, the tension in the living room visibly thawed. The voices began to pick up again. The circle closed.
Standing in the dim corridor, listening to the muffled sounds of the family she wasn't allowed to fully belong to, Leticia let out a quiet sigh. She looked down at her tea, her heart aching with a familiar, heavy wish. She wished, with everything she had, that she could just be like her siblings. She wished she could be a part of the noise, instead of the girl who brought the silence.
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