Whoops I accidentally found my will to write with a silly little au my friend and I made only it’s just little snippets of Bernard and Tim being parents while in their villain era (Tim is a Cobblepot, long story, Riddler accidentally brought home a stray), except their child has lightning powers and is also a Raiden clone from another world (again another long story, Liu Kang was making baby clones of the Kombatants but then Kitana caught him so he started yeeting them through worlds, Tim and Bernard wound up with Raiden and Jason actually adopted Kung Lao). And Tim kind of took after Oswald so he’s also running a club and doing a lot of business, shady or otherwise, making connections, etc. and Bernard runs the front of house for The Den (Tim’s club) so sometimes their son is there but he’s wearing a dragon costume so it’s fine, he’s like their mascot.

And it’s just my two favorite nerds doing their best to raise a child who has weird powers, but they have the support of their villain/murder family and Oswald and Ed/Riddler are proud grandparents and Steph is the favorite bi aunt and also godmother (and also Spoiler has become more like Red Hood these days. She’s realized being friends with Tim that things would never improve without getting your hands dirty. She kills people now, but mostly she just controls part of the city and helps Red Hood out. Also she’s dating Cassie/Wonder Girl but that’s not important.)

New 52 was bad primarily because they killed off Crystal Brown and didn't even make up for it by having Bruce immediately adopt Steph like completely unrealistic :/

Listen I have issues with that fake reboot lady that dares call herself Crystal Brown but I can not BELIVE that DC just swept that under the rug, like god the fandom jokes about the reboot made the Batboys life a mess but reboots Steph life has also been a god damn mess, like both her parents try and kill her and then her mom dies so Steph lives on the streets for a little while before she moves in with Harper and her brother, then Steph starts dating Tim and lives with him, then Tim ‘dies’ and Steph declares war on Batman, Tim comes back and Steph runs away with him then they like propose to each other before Steph goes to confront her criminal father who is constantly trying to manipulate her and this all takes place in like what less than a year? God Steph is right up there with Dick in needing a fucking break in this reboot.

Though god imagine Crystal’s death in the preboot world back when Steph has a solid place in the Bat family and an actual support system, it would be addressed and there’d be no Steph living on the streets fighting crime until eventually she moves in with new crime fighting friends it would be half of Gotham’s crime fighting community helping Steph get through her loss and trying to get Steph to move in with them. Selina would offer, Jason would offer heck even Bruce would offer though Damian would have already offered before him.

I had trouble deciding if Steph would move in with Tim and Cass or move into the manor, I think she has rooms in both places she’d cry when Alfred shows her her room in the manor which was the guest room but now it’s her room because it’s got eggplant curtains. She’d be listed as another one of Bruce’s wards but I can see her being stubborn and trying to use as little of his money as possible almost out of principle like she would rather drive an uber than use more of Bruce’s money than she has to and the only way she’ll accept it is if she earns it which is another reason Steph is hired as the Wayne family baby sitter/ nanny for Damian and later for little baby Helena it’s the only way she’ll let Bruce pay for college.

Steph and Duke as the ‘we’re not actually his kids we just live in his house and eat is food except we kind of are his kids’ Wayne kids