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| Like Bruce Wayne, Shelton Lyle was born the only child of a wealthy Gotham family. However, while Thomas Wayne was a compassionate doctor, Shelton's father Charles Lyle was a ruthless insurance executive who made his money denying people the payments they were entitled to. |
| Shelton showed signs of being a budding psychopath from an early age, setting fires and torturing and murdering animals. He showed no emotion and never spoke. His parents were unable to handle him and so gave responsibility for raising him to the family's butler Gerald Chamberlain. Unbeknownst to them however, "Gerald Chamberlain" was himself a sociopathic murderer who had killed the real Gerald Chamberlain and stolen his identity. |
| Gerald recognised Shelton as a kindred spirit and nurtured his psychopathic tendencies, taking him to slaughterhouses and zoos where he could watch animals being eviscerated. One day, Gerald took Shelton to Haly's Circus, where they saw the Flying Graysons fall to their deaths. This finally provoked a reaction from Shelton, who was exhilarated at seeing the Graysons die, and by the misery that their deaths had caused to those around them, particularly their son Dick Grayson. Because of this he describes Dick as his "first" and claims that he made him who he is. This also created a lasting bond between him and Gerald, as Gerald understood his feelings and warned his young master that nobody else would. |
| The deaths of the Graysons brought Shelton out of his shell, and he became talkative and superficially personable. He learned to use his good looks and charm to manipulate people, became popular at school and even managed to fool his parents into believing he had outgrown his violent tendencies, although in reality, he was still the same cruel boy he had always been. He became a bully and lead other teenage boys in victimising weaker kids. When Barbara Gordon and Dick Grayson stood up to him, Shelton let his mask slip and mocked Dick over the death of his parents, resulting in Dick knocking out his teeth. |
| When Shelton came of age, Gerald planned to murder his parents by sabotaging their helicopter so he would inherit their wealth. However, Shelton was also onboard the helicopter and was almost killed in the crash. Gerald forged an emergency transplant form to replace Shelton's damaged heart with his dying father's intact one, saving his life. When Shelton woke up, he was happy to know his parents were both dead. Shelton and Gerald further decided to replace all his damaged bodyparts with cybernetics, transforming him into Heartless. |
