guys... guys I’m coming back from the dead!! 🥹 (I’ve literally had the worst flu of my life but hospitals are far too expensive so I’m surviving off of over the counter medicine and my hopes and dreams)

Okay!!! THIS IS A SELKIE USER BOT!! 🔥🔥💯🗣️🔥 basically Jason got thrown off a boat somewhere in the southern ocean after trying to stop a new gang from circulating their stock in Gotham and getting kidnapped. then he gets tossed over the boat, yada yada, and user finds him. I vaguely specified that user is a leopard seal in the intro message, but it’s not in the bot definition and you can choose whatever kind of seal you want :3

guys ik my posting schedule genuinely sucks, but my personal life is genuinely crazy. I keep developing more health problems and am also genuinely considering estranging myself from my semi abusive mother. Not doing well here folks. I appreciate the support I get and apologize for my negligence towards you guys.

—OPENING SCENE—

The job had been routine. That was the first mistake.

Nothing in Gotham is ever routine, no matter how many times you tell yourself it is.

I’d been tracking the shipment for three nights straight—quiet dock workers paid too much to look the other way, crates that didn’t match their manifests, a ship that never stayed in port long enough to be inspected properly. Classic smuggling pattern. The kind I could usually dismantle in an hour with a few broken bones and a lot of fear.

Intel said drugs. High-grade, designer stuff. New formula hitting the Narrows hard. Kids overdosing faster than Narcan could keep up.

So yeah. I went in expecting dealers.

Not... whatever the hell this was.

It started clean. I shadowed the loading crew from the rooftops, dropped onto the deck when the shift changed, moved through the containers like a ghost. No alarms, no chatter. Just the hum of the ship and the stink of salt and oil.

I cracked open one crate.

Not drugs.

Weapons. Military-grade. Clean, packed, serialized. Not Gotham junk. Not even Black Mask’s usual stock. This was organized. International.

That should’ve been my cue to call it in. Let Oracle dig deeper. Maybe loop in B.

I didn’t.

I kept going.

Second mistake.

I didn’t hear them until it was too late—boots on steel, the click of safeties, the shift in air that says you’re not alone anymore. I turned, guns up, already moving—

—and got hit with something that wasn’t a bullet.

Electric.

High voltage, close range.

It locked every muscle in my body and dropped me like a puppet with its strings cut.

I remember hitting the deck. Remember the taste of copper. Remember thinking, dimly, okay, new players.

Then black.

—

When I woke up, I was in the container.

Metal walls. No light except what leaked in through the seams. The steady, nauseating sway of open water.

And hands on me.

They frisked me. Poorly.

That was the first thing I noticed, even through the haze still rattling around in my skull. They took the obvious—guns, a couple of blades, the big stuff. Left the rest.

Amateurs.

Or just not used to dealing with someone like me.

Either way, it was their problem.

I stayed limp, played unconscious while they finished up. Counted footsteps. Listened to voices—wrong accents for Gotham, a mix of Eastern European and something else I couldn’t quite place. Not local. Definitely not small-time.

Good to know.

Bad for me.

The door slammed. Lock engaged. Silence.

I waited.

Counted to sixty. Twice.

Then I moved.

Getting out was... honestly insulting.

A micro-blowtorch tucked into my boot. Two hidden blades. A lockpick kit that doubled as a prying tool when you knew how to use it right. Ten minutes, tops, and the container door was open just enough for me to slip through.

I ghosted my way across the ship, quiet and fast, taking down two guards before they could make a sound. Recovered a couple more tools. Got my bearings.

Open ocean.

No land in sight.

That was... inconvenient.

Still manageable. I’ve dealt with worse.

I made it to the upper deck.

And that’s where it all went to hell.

They were waiting.

Not panicked. Not scrambling.

Waiting.

Which meant they knew exactly where I’d be.

Third mistake.

The fight wasn’t clean. Too many of them, too coordinated. They adapted fast—kept their distance, used net launchers, tasers, anything to keep me from closing in.

I took a few down. Not enough.

Another shock. Stronger this time.

Everything went dark again.

—

I woke up tied to a chair.

Of course I did.

I swear, criminals have zero imagination.

Rope around my chest, arms, legs. Wrists cinched tight. Ankles too. The chair itself was weighted—metal plates bolted to the legs, heavy enough that even if I tipped, I wasn’t going anywhere fast.

I flexed my fingers.

Still had blades.

Still had options.

But then I heard the water.

Close.

Too close.

And the wind.

Open deck.

That’s when it clicked.

“Oh,” I muttered under my breath. “That’s... new.”

They didn’t bother with speeches. No monologue. No threats.

Just a couple of them hauling the chair across the deck, boots thudding against metal.

One of them leaned down, tapped the side of my helmet. “Let’s see how long you last, Red Hood.”

Cute.

I considered my odds.

Rebreather in the helmet—roughly an hour, maybe a little more if I stayed calm. I could cut myself free eventually. Probably. Depends on how tight they’d gone with the knots and how much movement I had.

But we weren’t in Gotham Harbor.

I’d seen the stars before they dragged me out here.

Different sky.

Different hemisphere.

No lights. No shoreline. Nothing.

Middle of nowhere.

“Yeah,” I said, more to myself than them. “This is gonna suck.”

They shoved me over the edge.

—

Cold.

Jesus Christ, the cold.

It hit like a punch to the chest, even through the suit. Water closed over my head, the world going dark and heavy and silent except for the roar in my ears.

The weights dragged me down immediately.

Fast.

Too fast.

I forced myself not to thrash. Panic burns oxygen. Panic gets you killed.

Think.

Cut the ropes. Get free. Swim up. Figure the rest out later.

Simple.

Except my hands were bound tight enough that getting to the blades was... complicated.

And the deeper I sank, the darker it got.

Pressure built. The kind that makes your bones feel like they’re being squeezed.

I twisted, strained, managed to get one wrist angled just enough—

Something moved.

At first I thought it was my vision going.

Shapes in the water. Shadows.

Then it moved again.

Closer.

Big.

Really big.

“...you’ve gotta be kidding me,” I breathed.

It came out of the dark like something prehistoric.

Long, sleek body. Powerful. Fast. Eyes that caught what little light there was and reflected it back cold and curious.

A seal.

Except not.

Too big. Too sharp. Too wrong.

And it was looking right at me.

Great.

Fantastic.

So this is how it ends.

Not a blaze of glory. Not even a decent fight.

Just me, tied to a chair at the bottom of the goddamn ocean, about to get eaten by a nightmare.

It circled once.

Then came straight at me.

I braced instinctively, muscles tensing, already running through useless escape plans—

—and it bit my helmet.

There was a sharp, cracking sound.

For a split second, I didn’t even process it.

Then the seal pulled back.

And half my helmet went with it.

Water rushed in.

Freezing.

Immediate.

My breath caught—instinct overriding training, lungs trying to suck in air that wasn’t there.

No, no, no—

The rebreather sputtered, useless now, pressure and water flooding the system.

I thrashed, real panic kicking in this time, vision flashing white at the edges.

And the thing—that thing—was still there.

Right in front of me.

Close enough that I could see every detail now.

The elongated skull. The teeth—God, the teeth—long, interlocking, built for tearing things apart. Eyes wide and bright, not even aggressive.

Curious.

Like I was something interesting it had just found.

My brain, because it hates me, decided this was the perfect time to start listing facts.

Leopard seal.

Twelve feet long.

Up to thirteen hundred pounds.

Second deadliest predator in these waters.

And I had just lost my only source of air.

“...seriously?” I tried to say, but it came out as a stream of bubbles.

The seal tilted its head.

Watching me.

Waiting.

Like I was about to do something entertaining.

My lungs burned.

Vision tunneling.

And for the first time in a long time, a single, very clear thought cut through everything else.

I am absolutely screwed.