Alternative Rewritten

Chapter Three: Purpose

Batman's stoney expression barely wavered during Renegade's expression, completely unaffected by the horrors Renegade just revealed. To his credit, he must have seen much more gruesome things in his own city, but it still left Renegade feeling like he had been slapped. He had been expecting some sort of reaction. Maybe the rumors were true; Batman was an emotionless robot. "What was your next purpose?"

"...I was-" He flinched as he considered what he was being trained for, and swallowed. His saliva felt thick and heavy down his throat. "There was a man, some kind of assassin. He was meant to train all of us, something about testing whether or not the drugs we were administered affected our physical abilities. In the beginning, I was just like the others. We saw him maybe twice a week, and that was it."

Batman regarded him, considering. "What changed?" He asked quietly, his voice cutting through the phantom images of training mats and glittering blades that had begun to cloud Renegade's head.

He swallowed, lowering his gaze. "I don't know. One day, he just told me that he had chosen me for a more permanent position as his pupil. From then, I stopped seeing the rest of the kids. I was separated from them, the scientists stopped giving me drugs, and I was no longer treated like a test subject. He started training me daily."

"And what exactly did your new training regime entail?" Batman pressed further, a warning sandwiched between words, daring him to give him any reason to distrust him.

Renegade laughed, but there wasn't a single trace of humor to be found in the sound. "Besides beating me to a pulp for hours at a time?" He mumbled, tracing the invisible blood stains on the floor with his eyes. "It was basically what you're doing with me now, but he was cruel. He wanted me to learn, but he wanted my lessons to hurt. It's hard to forget your instructions when they're beaten into you until you can barely manage the strength to stand."

He didn't lift his gaze from the floor, overcome by a powerful wave of shame. He couldn't bare to look anyone in the eye while recounting the treatment he endeared, especially not someone like Batman. "And why is it that out of everyone, you were the one chosen by this man?"

Why indeed? "He never told me," he said bitterly, scowling at the tile. "I don't know why he chose me. I don't know why he had me stay in Cadmus while I trained with him. He told me they had an agreement, that I belonged to him. Surely if that was the case, he could have taken me away, right?"

Batman grunted, but did not grace him with a verbal response.

Something tightened in Renegade's chest. "Why would he tell me anything? Why would anyone?! I was nothing more than some vermin they found, alone and easy to ambush. They told me to do something and- and I listened. I had to-" It was suddenly extremely hard to breathe. "If- If I didn't then-" He shuddered. "You must think I'm a coward for not fighting back."

He saw the Dark Knight shift from the corner of his eye. "I would hardly describe doing what it takes to survive as cowardice."

To his embarrassment, Renegade felt tears pricking at his eyes. He quickly blinked them away, sucking in a sharp breath between clenched teeth as he attempted to calm himself. He tried to say 'thank you,' but he wasn't sure if the breathy rasp that came out of his throat did enough to express his gratitude.

He was grateful that Batman gave him a moment to recover before speaking again, "That assassin..." He said slowly. "What was his name?"

Renegade closed his eyes. "Slade. His name was Slade." The name felt like a curse word, heavy against his tongue, threatening to send him spiraling. He risked glancing up at where his interrogator stood, waiting with bated breath for his reaction to the name.