Eye colour more often than not is an unnoticeable feature for most people. Old friends and close relations alike, their eyes tend not to be of much significance.

Damian couldn't get hers out of his head.

So different, so new. They lingered in the back of his head- projecting themselves in to his mind when he closed his eyes and lay down to sleep. Soft, and quiet, and the strangest of colours.

One shameful night, he had tried to put paintbrush to paper and cast the haunting image out of his mind. The hues had escaped him- nothing quite right- and her periwinkle gems remained.

His sole salvation, perhaps, was that patrol and school assignments kept his mind occupied from her...for some of the time at least.

Dick, upon hearing the boy's sudden, wistful sigh one day after school, prodded, "What's going on?"

Damian adamantly denied that anything was going on, throwing his school bag on to a stool and slumping on to another around the kitchen table. The boy welcomed the  meowing cat at his feet it to his arms, stroking its head absently.

Eventually, after Damian had shot down all of his attempts at conversation, Dick stopped pressing. In all his wisdom, he recognised that Damian was in another one of his silent, brooding teenage moods.

"If you're not going to tell me what's up, that's going to be on you when it all piles up." He picked up some stale toast, left over from breakfast, and bit in to it. "But if you need an ear...I'm gonna be in the training room- kay?"

Damian grunted something that might have been a yes, rubbed behind Mr Pennyworth's ears.

Walking out of the kitchen Dick chuckled as he thought, Bruce had never left that sulky phase.

It seemed to be only seconds before Damian found himself once again on patrol with his father.

Batman communicated with Alfred over their comms link, gathering info on crimes in the area. Commissioner Gordon had failed to turn on the Batsignal that night and give them something interesting to work with: Damian thought them doomed to deal with petty street theft that night.

Seeing his son's lack of enthusiasm, Bruce ended a fruitless search for criminal activity with Alfred and ventured to start a conversation with Robin. Leaning against a chimney, the boy regarded his father with a sceptical eye. He recognised that look in Bruce: he was going to try a heart-to-heart.

That wasn't something Damian was keen on- because if Bruce wanted to know what was bothering Damian, the honest answer would be the eyes of a girl in his class. Undoubtedly, if he were to confide that he was spending so much time stressing over her eyes, Bruce would do two things that would make Damian wish his tongue had been cut out before- so that he'd never had the opportunity to speak to his father.

1) Bruce would almost certainly tell Dick...who would then doubtlessly slip up and tell the rest of his siblings. The torment would be endless.

2) Bruce would initiate something that Damian did not want to have. The Talk. Frankly, it was his job to caution his father about safe sex. Damian was upfront on the matter; Bruce was awkward when it came to explaining these things. Damian had heard horror stories from his adopted siblings about their Talks with Bruce.

"The criminals of the city are quiet for the moment." Batman said. "That makes a change for once."

"TT. A boring one." Damian commended, rolling a throwing star between his fingers, careful not to nick the flesh in his practiced movements.

"It at least gives us time to talk." Bruce said. "We've both been preoccupied lately, it's been a while since we've caught up." He sat down besides Damian. "So how has school been?"

For all the expectation Damian had of wanting to shut down personal conversation with his father, once the man actually asked the question, Damian found that he actually wanted to answer- at least, in part. Behind the cold-shoulder act, Damian recognised a desire within himself to strengthen the bond with his father.

"It's been going better than expected, actually." He answered. "Not all of the teachers are insufferable- my chemistry and English teachers are particularly nice to have in class seeing as they do appear to actually know a little about their subjects. Maths-however- is intolerable. Mr Morgan is a pleb with all the knowledge of the wheat farmer in the subject." He sniffed and his father laughed. Jason used to complain about Mr Morgan too.

"Not all of my classmates are horrendous- though many are idle-brained idiots who can't string together a single sentence in Latin having taken the subject for four years." Damian looked up at the stars and sighed- wasn't that girl's hair the same colour as that sky? "Some are acceptable though."

"Any friends?" His father asked.

Damian tutted and glanced at Batman out of the corner of his eye. "Those people? Not in a million years." He thought about it for a moment longer and redacted his statement. "On a second thought...perhaps...at a stretch...some aren't completely unviable options..."

"Oh? Any names?"

Damian had one but he dared not say it.

Before he had time to answer his father, a crime alert sounded and Alfred's voice eschewed in their ears.

Saved by the bell- sort of.

***
Raven took her seat unobtrusively, throwing her bag under her desk. Elbows on the table, she closed her eyes and rubbed her temples.

"Long night Rachel?"

She looked up at the teacher and straightened her posture, answering a polite, "I'm just a bit tired Miss."

The English teacher frowned, tapping Raven's desk, and gave the girl a warm smile, "Make sure you're taking care of yourself hun, I want you bright eyes and engaging with the lesson. Okay sweetie?"

Returning the smile, she nodded, taking out her pencil case and copy of Macbeth. It was safe to say, Miss Osman was Raven's favourite teacher: tortoise shell glasses, a fashion sense straight out of the fifties, and always sprinkled with the scent of lemon zest, Jemima Osman was a gem of an English teacher. Like Raven, Miss Osman was a woman full of surprises- beneath her cottagecore exterior, Jemima was something of a subtle revolutionary, often suggesting The Black Jacobins or Marx to any bright minded students. That flare within her had immediately drawn in the empath and she found the teacher wonderful company for a rainy lunchtime chat.

"Alright now fellas," she hushed the rowdy lot at the back of the class, "how's about we take our seats and start the lesson?"

The door slammed against the wall, followed by a curt, quiet apology.

"Five minutes late honey, you gotta be on time Mr Wayne." Miss Osman light-heartedly chided.

"My brother dropped me off." Damian offered in explanation.

The teacher nodded with an understanding smile. "Well I know your siblings alright hun- come on in Damian, we haven't started yet."

The boy nodded and slipped in to his seat at the front of the class. Before he did so, Damian glanced back and ended up inadvertently catching Raven's eye. Abashed to have been caught looking, he made a silent vow not to turn back all lesson.

Raven bit the inside of her cheek as she tried to pay attention to what Miss Osman was saying. In truth, she was too caught up with wondering at the boy at the front of the class. From the day she'd first seen him, Raven had been taken aback. Mister Damian Wayne had first sauntered in to the classroom two weeks ago, cold, curt and (Raven felt some heat rise to her cheeks) cute as fuck. He'd practically harassed the geography department on his first day over inaccuracies on a display board while also winning the hearts of all the school's foreign language teachers with his fluency in Mandarin, Spanish and even Latin. Yet the boy sat alone, every lunch time, in his own corner of the cantine.

She'd watched with a smile as he shot down the invitations of the other rich kids to sit with them. Certainly, Damian Wayne had gained the quick reputation of being a complete asshole, but the empath saw something within his aura that was positively magnetic in its familiarity.

Miss Osman had taken a shine to Damian, the new student with a million criticisms and appraisals for Shakespeare, and had endeavoured to make him one of the students she would take under her wing: one of the special students for the lunchtime talks about class warfare and social constructs. She'd yet to persuade him but didn't plan on giving up anytime soon.

When the bell sounded the end of the lesson and the students were dismissed, Miss Osman asked the two students (Raven and Damian) to stay behind to talk to them separately. One can imagine the sort of panic that caused.

Damian pulled the strap of his bag over his shoulder; it had threatened to slip as he hoisted it up. The boy brushed his hands on his trousers and grimaced. Sweaty palms (yuck). It was a first for sure- and an unpleasant one.

He waited at his desk as the teacher first spoke to Raven, frowning as the girl remained in the room after they apparently finished the conversation.

"Damian sweetie I've got something to ask- if you wouldn't mind?" Miss Osman clasped her hands together and clicked her heels.

Something to ask... Damian didn't know what to think.

"You're an organised young man- even if you're sometimes a bit tardy-" she grinned kindly, "and a generous dear... so would you mind coming back here at lunch to help reorganise the bomb site that is the bookshelf?"

Damian blinked. He looked at the disarray of books in the cozy corner. He looks to the purple-haired student clasping her elbow and staring out of the window.

Then he clocked Miss Osman's question and gave a quick answer- the first that came to his mind on the simple logic of his current existence: he spent his lunches alone; he liked Miss Osman; perhaps Rachel too would be there- though he couldn't understand why that was a reason.

"Sure Miss, that's no problem." He said.

Raven raised her head.

"Excellent! I'm sure Rachel will be glad for the help and I've got a feeling that you two'll get along just great-
Oooh also perhaps you can squeeze in getting the Sherlock Holmes display up, but I won't count my chickens just yet." She winked, then cleared her throat. "Now, you two had best get to period two; tell Mr James to call me if he asks why you're late- I'll vouch for you!"

She shooed them off and the pair parted with dread.

What had they gotten themselves in to?

***

A.N:

Sooo... this is my surprise for you!!! A small series of Itty Bitty Bonus Chapters. This is part one and we've got a few more coming up!

These will have no updating schedule but I'm not going to leave you guys waiting for a million years jdkdkdkd.
I hope you enjoyed this my darlings!

-Mwah!