Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Knife met skin and Jason came back to himself, but not in time to stop the kid’s throat from splitting.

The pretender—Timothy Drake, Jason remembered; he’d stalked the kid, but knowing his name, address, and what his parents did for work didn’t quite prepare Jason for the head-over-heels feeling of looking at another black-haired boy in the Robin suit and only seeing himself—gasped and choked as blood spilled out of the gash that opened his throat from left to right.

Jason had slit his throat.

It had seemed like a good idea thirty seconds ago.

The blood just kept coming. To match it, tears ran out of the kid’s twin black eyes, visible behind the cracked and broken lenses of his domino mask.

God. Jason had done a real number on him. What had he been thinking? He couldn’t even see the kid’s throat under all the blood.

It wasn’t a lethal wound by itself. As long as Timothy Drake managed to stop the bleeding, he would be fine. Jason had made sure not to nick any arteries or sever his vocal cords. He could even breathe. Well, he would be able to, if he’d stop choking like a prima donna.

Jason smelled copper and tasted smoke. His head swam again. Titan’s Tower turned green, but the kid whimpered, and colors went back to normal.

Jason had to get out of here. This was such a colossal, stupid mistake. When had no more dead Robins turned into no more Robins? How had he convinced himself that injuring the kid until he could no longer return to the field was a smart decision?

“You’ll be fine,” he said brusquely, and pulled his helmet on. He felt bare without it, even though Timothy Drake had already seen his face. He knew who the Red Hood was, even though Jason hadn’t wanted any of the Bats to figure out his identity this early. “Call Batman for help,” he added. Then, bitterly, “Or Dickwing.” In his weeks spent stalking the kid, he’d seen just how much Richard Grayson cared for Timothy Drake. Looking at him now, no one would ever guess that he had once not wanted a brother. That he’d hated his old one so much he hadn’t even bothered to come to his funeral.

Leather creaked, and Jason realized that his hands had clenched into fists. He took a deliberately deep breath and relaxed them. “So long, kid.” But before he could turn around, he hesitated.

Something felt… wrong.

Timothy Drake hadn’t responded to any of his words, for one. Nor had he even twitched since Jason’s knife slit his throat.

Jason’s stomach flip-flopped. Was he…?

He inched closer. The kid’s eyes were wide open, glossy, still leaking tears, but unblinking. They were blue. Very blue. Jason’s eyes used to be that blue, but now all he saw was green in the mirror. Green out of the mirror. Green everywhere, under his skin, inside his—

Timothy’s eyes were also swelling rapidly. His nose might be broken, Jason wasn’t sure, but it was sure as hell bruised. As was his jaw. From ducking to escape Jason’s fist and meeting his knee instead.

Blood still gushed from Timothy’s ruined throat, the torn skin flaps gaping, and his chest barely moved with one breath about every fifteen seconds.

Shock. He was going into shock. Jason had sent a kid into—

If he was going into shock, he wouldn’t be able to help himself.

Jason had—

If Timothy Drake didn’t get his neck looked at, he really would die.

—meant to, had he, the kid was—

Before Jason knew what he was doing, his knees were sticky in the growing puddle of Timothy Drake’s blood, and he was rummaging through his meager first-aid supplies. Fuck. Jason didn’t have any sutures. Why didn’t he have sutures? Oh, right, because getting hurt was for fools, and dying was for children.

Except Timothy Drake didn’t look much like a fool. He looked small and pale on the ground. He didn’t look like a hero. He just looked like a kid.

He looked like a victim.

And that made Jason—

Fuck.

Where was the stupid tower’s med bay?

Jason tore through the silent halls, half-hoping, half-dreading, that one of Timothy’s teammates would hear him and wake up. But he’d done his job too well, and no one stirred.

That sparked anger anew in Jason’s chest, and he skidded to a halt. What were all the adult superheroes doing, letting a bunch of teengers live in this tower by themselves when just anyone could get in? Jason didn’t even have powers and he’d taken them all out so easily. They were undefended. Unprepared and unguarded. Un—

Right. Bleeding-out-kid. Worry about that first.

It felt like an eternity before Jason found the med bay. His hands shook as he scooped up gauze, sutures, a suture needle—he grabbed another, just in case—antiseptic wipes, and… He was forgetting something, but he didn’t know what, and the kid needed to stop bleeding more than he needed any more fancy medical treatment.

Jason sprinted the whole way back and fell to his knees before he reached Timothy, skidding a little as he went. His kneecaps rattled with the impact.

The bleeding had slowed to a trickle rather than a gush, but Timothy remained unresponsive. Jason ripped off his gloves—he couldn’t sew with them on—and realized that he could barely see the wound beneath all the blood. Fuck. Where was the kitchen?

Jason didn’t find a kitchen, but he found a bathroom. The only cloths in the room were pure white. Seriously? Did none of these kids bleed?

Actually, Jason mused as he ran the washcloth under warm tap water, considering everyone on the Titans team was a meta except Timothy, maybe they didn’t.

Bitterness rose in his throat and threatened to choke him once more. Timothy was just like perfect Richard, wasn’t he? Good enough to lead the Titans. Good enough for Batman to let him go off on his own.

Not good enough to fight Jason off, at least.

He knelt once more by the frighteningly-still teenager and wiped the blood from his throat. A soft whimper escaped Timothy’s mouth. Good. He was still present enough to feel what was going on around him. And the sound of pain didn’t twist Jason’s heartstrings at all.

More conscious than ever of just how many precious structures were present in the human throat, Jason slid the suture needle through the kid’s skin like a knife through soft butter and tried once more not to gag on the smoke that seemed to be filling the room. But the air was clear and Jason knew, rationally, that nothing was on fire.

He looked up anyway, just to check. Maybe that Kryptonian kid had finally woken up and was on a rampage with his laser eyes.

Nope. The coast was still clear.

Jason tied off the last thread and sat back on his heels to survey his handiwork. The wound was closed; a neat line of sutures ran across the kid’s throat like a grotesque second grin.

Jason felt sick.

The throat might have been the worst part, but it was far from the only. Timothy’s arm and fingers were broken, his ankle twisted, eyes swollen to the point of closure, and he was still in shock.

Jason couldn’t leave him lying on the ground like this. Even with the stitches, he could still die.

As he gathered the kid into his arms and set off for the med bay, all Jason could think about was how colossally stupid a mistake this had been.

Maybe he could still get away scot-free. After his ordeal, what were the chances Timothy Drake remembered the name and face of his attacker? Probably all of it would be a hazy blur.

He would be terrified of the Red Hood from now on. And it was better that way, anyway. When he wasn’t actively dying, just the thought of Timothy Jackson Drake made Jason want to kill him. Better for the kid to stay far away than trigger him again.

He laid Timothy on one of the cots and tucked him under three blankets. Then Jason walked straight out of the room without looking back.

He’d overstayed his welcome.

Until he became Robin, life had been a spectator sport to Tim.

He’d watched through the lens of his cameras, focusing on the angle, lighting, pose, all to get the perfect shot. He’d had plenty of muses and models over the years, but Tim knew that his favorite would always be the first.

Tim still remembered the night his parents took him to the circus. They were home celebrating a successful dig and he wasn’t quite so keen to be left alone as he was now, so they took him along to the circus that had stopped in Gotham for a week or two.

Jack Drake had been in such a good mood, in fact, that he’d bought Tim a green plastic Polaroid camera, and Tim had been so excited to use it, he saw the whole show through the camera lens. All the photos he took were terrible, of course. He was a few days shy of his fourth birthday and hadn’t even heard the word ‘clarity’ before, let alone knew what it meant, but he shook each shiny picture as it printed and begged for his parents to look at them. Janet said they were “very nice, dear,” which, Tim supposed as he looked at the decade-old faded snapshots, was surprisingly generous.

The only photo he’d taken all night with any kind of resolution was of the youngest performer they watched. By some miracle, Tim had caught the young boy’s flourish right as the crowd erupted with hysterical cheers because he’d landed a quadruple somersault. Arms up straight above his head, hands poised for applause, mouth straight and jaw set to conceal the look of delight that brightened his eyes. Tim had taken that photo, and fallen in love with photography. Tim had then taken three more photos, the first when two bodies streaked through the air, and the second as a mistake when he didn’t understand when they hit the ground and red started to pool beneath their bodies. Jack’s hand dominated the third, when he moved to cover the lens to keep Tim from seeing the corpses.

For some reason, Tim still had those photos. They were small, compared to the rest of his collection, and had the usual Polaroid border. Their glossy finish had long since started to peel, and the boy’s knees were blurred from Tim’s fingers rubbing over them so often growing up. He rubbed the picture again, just for good measure. Compared to the rest of his collection of photographs printed as small as four by six inches or as large as twelve by eighteen inches (he didn’t dare print any larger than that, as if that was the line where the hobby became weird), they could easily have been lost to time or carelessness.

But they had been Tim’s most precious possessions for over a decade, more so than the black Amex his parents let him use or any of the artifacts they deemed sturdy enough to store in their manor alongside their growing son. The only thing that came close was his skateboard.

They couldn’t come with him, but Tim didn’t know when he would be back. What if the cleaners vacuumed under his bed again and accidentally sucked up the Polaroids?

“Tim?”

Bruce’s voice outside the room startled him. He jumped and shoved the box of pictures back under his bed, which was a stupid knee-jerk reaction. He’d asked for privacy, and Bruce had acquiesced, as much as they both knew it killed him at the moment. He wouldn’t open the door until Tim knocked Morse code on the floor to let him know it was okay.

One minute, he tapped out on the cold laminate. Drake Manor was always drafty, just like Wayne Manor, but the Waynes lit fires and draped blankets over couches to make the people inside feel warmer. The only person that lived inside Drake Manor was Tim, though, and he didn’t want to tend fires, so he dealt with the chill.

Tim had to make sure… He dragged the box of photos back out. They weren’t sorted, so he had to dig through them to get to what he needed. There was a picture of Starfire kissing Nightwing, Kid Flash devouring a donut, a long-distance shot of Dick Grayson in his bedroom, a long-distance shot of Bruce Wayne in his bedroom, a mother and father holding the hands of their blonde son as they crossed the street, the full moon above a Gotham skyline… Ah, finally.

Determined not to feel the pain in his ruined arms or busted legs or broken hand—basically everything hurt, actually—Tim hobbled over to his desk and flipped the lamp on. He squinted against the glossy glare to make out the subject’s features.

Yep. Absolutely.

Tim would recognize that face anywhere, even if it was several years older and attached to a body two feet taller and a hundred pounds heavier than the last time he’d seen it.

Tim had spent almost nine years watching other people live through the lens of a camera, and no one could make him go back. Not even the resurrected son of his mentor.

He tapped, Ready, and his bedroom door swung open. It spoke wonders that Bruce Wayne, who was usually paranoid to a fault about his identity, had only half-changed out of his suit. He still wore his gauntlets and boots. The cowl hung down his back, caught in the collar of the sweatshirt he’d thrown on while Alfred patched Tim up in the Cave.

Kon hadn’t bothered to change at all. He hovered anxiously next to Bruce, brow alternately furrowing with anger and smoothing out when he gave Tim yet another once-over to make sure his good ankle hadn’t spontaneously broken itself in the five minutes of privacy he’d had to argue the both of them for. Tim would have to scrub the security camera footage later if Bruce didn’t remember.

Bruce carried the hasty bag he’d packed while Tim struggled into the backseat of the Bentley with Kon’s help, and the car peeled away from Drake Manor’s driveway with a screech.

Bruce really was freaked, Tim marveled internally as he watched the scenery flash by. First they were in Tim’s front yard—then the Wayne’s—then Bristol—then Mooney Bridge—

He was driving almost as fast as he did as Batman.

“You’ll make sure he doesn’t sleep too long?” Bruce asked Kon.

Tim bristled and signed, I’m not concussed.

Kon wasn’t as fluent in ASL as the Bats were, so he couldn’t translate. Luckily, Bruce was a maniac that never watched the road, so his eyes were glued to Tim’s hands in the rearview mirror as he signed.

“Tim,” Bruce sighed. “What you think you saw… it’s not possible.”

It’s true, he insisted. I saw it with my own eyes.

“I’ll take care of him,” said Kon, so worried about Tim that he was actually being polite to Bruce. Would wonders never cease.

This sucked. Tim should have broached the matter with a little more caution, but he’d been so out of it after waking up that the first thing he’d signed (after attempting to speak and realizing what an awful idea that was) was Jason’s alive. Jason Todd’s the Red Hood as Alfred taped up his broken fingers.

Bruce had dropped the mug of tea he’d been carrying to Tim.

Jason Todd had always been a sensitive matter. Dick liked to talk about him, but he was always sad after. Alfred answered Tim’s questions. But Bruce…

After the bad days, Bruce never talked about Jason. If he heard someone talking about him, then his face went white and his jaw set and he excused himself to brood or punch the bag in the Cave or torture himself by staring at the same Gotham cold cases. Which was fine. Tim had never lost a family member except for his grandparents, but he’d only seen them once a year until he was, like, four years old, so he didn’t really remember them. He hadn’t been close to them in the way Jason and Bruce had been close.

Besides, it was his job to keep Batman happy. If he wanted to pretend he’d never had a second son, then Tim could pretend right along with him.

But now Jason was back. Tim would swear his life on it.

Somehow, Jason was back from the dead, and he wanted to kill Tim. He wanted Tim to stop being Robin.

That would never happen.

Dick had thought it was a good day.

Judging by the little boy sitting on the ledge, it absolutely was not.

The child kicked his legs aimlessly. His heels hit the side of the building every time, just a quiet tap, one after another in the endless, repetitive rhythm, but so strange that Dick’s mind would focus on that.

Then again, Dick’s subconscious never really did like him.

He sighed and made his way over to the roof’s edge, then swung his legs over, too. He sat next to the boy, and though it was a chilly night—they always were, in Blüdhaven—he didn’t try to put his arm around the child. Their suits would keep them warm enough, although it only mattered for one of them.

The boy outlasted him. He always did; Dick had never enjoyed silence. He straightened his back and pushed back his shoulders until three vertebrae in his spine popped, then slouched and said, “How are you doing, Little Wing?”

Jason turned to look at him and Dick wished he hadn’t. From behind, Jason looked fine. Maybe the Robin suit was a little beat up, but that tended to happen when you fought crime. From behind, Dick could pretend that Bruce had dropped Jason off at his apartment so they could spend the weekend together as brothers.

Jason’s face never let him pretend that things were okay. His mask was always cracked, nose always broken, lip always scabbed. Always, always, that hateful jagged ‘J’ carved into his cheek sluggishly weeped blood.

He was always dead.

“I’m a’ight,” he said in his little Crime Alley drawl. He’d liked to exaggerate it sometimes in the Robin suit, but he’d tried so hard to hide it in public as Jason Wayne. Then Jason shrugged. “‘Cept I’m dead.”

Dick winced. Two and a half years had gone by, and the wound was as fresh as the day Alfred told him the news. It didn’t feel like the time had passed at all. Every day Dick woke up wondering what he could have done to fix things, to save Jason in time, and every night he went to sleep in a world where Jason was dead. “I’m so sorry, Jaybird.”

Jason shrugged again. “Don’t make a difference. But thanks, I guess. Woulda meant a lot more if you’d come to my funeral, but I guess we’re all busy.” His lips twisted into a smirk. The scab on his lip tore and a bright drop of blood streaked its way down his chin. “You wouldn’t believe how busy I am these days, Dickhead. Hauntin’ houses and answering Ouija board calls. You’re lucky I make time to stop by to see you.”

“I’m always happy to see you,” Dick told the ghost, well aware he was talking to thin air. If anyone saw Nightwing like this… “You know that, Jay.”

He liked to imagine Jason like this: mischievous and smiling. Not sullen or dying. Not that Dick would know if he’d ever been like this. He hadn’t spent enough time with Jason to figure him out, and that left him with his imagination and a hollowing guilt.

“How’re you doin’, though?” Jason asked. A beam of light caught his blue eyes. They glinted yellow behind the mask like an animal’s. “Got something to say?”

“Nothing, really,” Dick lied smoothly. It really was getting too easy these days. He couldn’t burden his hallucination-brother with his problems. That he worried himself sick about Tim constantly. That Bruce hadn’t been the same and Dick was tired of talking to a stranger that wore his father’s face. That everything felt like a dream and if only he could wake up, Jason would still be alive.

His comm buzzed. By the time he answered, Jason was long gone, as if he had never been there in the first place. Because he hadn’t. Not really.

It was Bruce. Dick’s stomach flip-flopped and he remembered that he hadn’t really eaten anything other than cereal in three days. He swallowed with a dry throat and answered. “Hey, B. What can I—”

“I need your help,” came Bruce’s ragged reply.

The tone—that mix between Batman and B that used to be comforting and now just hurt—and the fact that Batman never, ever asked for help had Dick shooting to his feet. “What happened?” he demanded. “What’s wrong?”

“Robin,” was all Bruce said.

Oh.

Oh, no.

Dick hadn’t even been in space this time.

The world tilted. Dick whispered, “What?”

“He’ll be staying at your apartment until he recovers. I have to—”

Bruce said something else, but the roaring in Dick’s ears drowned him out. Recovery meant Tim was still alive. Dick could do recovery. He was a master mother hen; everyone said so.

“When?” he asked hoarsely, cutting B off mid-word. It was a testament to how frazzled he was that Bruce didn’t reprimand him for it.

“I just picked him up from Titan’s Tower in a zeta. Alfred will look him over. Once he’s given the all-clear, I’m bringing him straight to you. You’re the only person I trust to keep him safe right now.”

Bruce never spoke this much, at least not to Dick. They’d stopped fighting after Jason died, then just kind of… drifted away. Dick had never known him to ramble before. He didn’t know if Bruce had even meant to say that he trusted Dick, but the sentiment made his chest warm just a little.

“What happened to him?”

“Debrief once we arrive. Be ready.”

Dick had to clean. He had to stock up on groceries. Tim had been over before, but Bruce had never gone to his apartment once he moved out. When he dropped Tim off, he stayed in the car until Tim walked through the door. If Dick was lucky, sometimes he waved. Then he always drove away without looking back.

Dick didn’t know if he feared pity or disgust more when Bruce looked at his place. He was pretty sure the man had never stepped into an apartment so small in his entire life.

Five minutes later, in the middle of Dick’s grocery run, his comm buzzed again. “Yeah?” Please let Alfred have said Tim was okay. Please, not another Jason.

Was that why the ghost had stopped by? Some kind of too-late warning?

“On our way,” Bruce said. “Thirty minutes out.”

Knowing how B drove, that was twenty minutes tops.

The clerk wouldn’t let Nightwing pay, which Dick would have resented if he could have actually afforded the food. He made a mental note to pay them back someday, then juggled the bags awkwardly as he grappled through Blüdhaven and landed on the fire escape by his window.

The very second he finished stocking the fridge, someone knocked on his front door. It was undoubtedly a Bruce-knock. Dick didn’t know if the man was aware of the rhythm he always used.

A creature of habit if nothing else.

He hadn’t had any time to clean. All Dick could do was kick old napkins and takeout boxes beneath his couch as he passed, then he wrenched the door open.

Bruce held Tim in his arms bridal-style. He was swaddled in a blanket up to his chin. Judging by his sour face, he did not appreciate the position or his constricted limbs but knew better than to argue.

After all, Dick had gotten his mother-henning from Bruce.

Behind Bruce was Conner Kent, Superman’s clone-slash-child-slash-it’s-complicated-okay? Dick vividly remembered watching the boy die at the hands of Superboy-Prime, but as far as he could tell, Conner had suffered no ill effects since his resurrection. He hovered over Bruce’s shoulder—literally hovered—alternating between peering at Tim anxiously and glancing around as if he expected someone to jump out of the shadows.

Dick stepped aside and Bruce barged in. He headed to the couch without hesitation. Dick frowned. He didn’t like Bruce’s familiarity with his apartment. As far as he was aware, Bruce had never been here before. But Tim had also broken into Dick’s apartment without his knowledge and, well, he was much more similar to Bruce than Dick had ever been. Maybe they’d done it together as a bonding experience; Dick had never wrangled the circumstances out of Tim.

When Bruce laid him down and Dick got a good look at Tim’s battered face, he gasped. “Oh, my God. What happened?”

“Some motherfu—”

“The Red Hood,” Bruce interrupted Conner’s furious snarl in a weary tone. Dick suspected Superboy had done his fair share of swearing on the ride over. “Broke into Titan’s Tower and attacked Tim.”

“What? Why?” They knew next to nothing about Hood, except that he had risen to power alarmingly quickly and that his men were surprisingly loyal. Bruce had wanted to keep Tim away until they learned more about him.

“‘Cause he’s a sadistic asshole and the second I get my hands on him—”

“Absolutely not,” interrupted Bruce. “You are to stay with Tim at all times.”

“Come on, you can’t honestly believe—”

“Whether or not Tim is right, I have to investigate Hood’s motivations.”

“Whether or not Tim’s right about what?” Dick asked, but Conner and Bruce continued to bicker; judging by Tim’s face, this had been going on for a while.

“It doesn’t matter what his motivation was if I just kill him now,” argued Superboy.

“While you are in my city, you follow my rules,” said Bruce. “We do not kill. Nor will you fight crime in Gotham.”

“Your no meta rule’s bullshit!”

“And yet we don’t have aliens invading every other weekend. Nor does the entire infrastructure of Gotham change once a year due to time travel shenanigans.”

Tim snorted at Bruce saying ‘shenanigans’ with such a straight face and looked like he wanted to say something sarcastic but refrained, which was quite out of character.

“I’m so confused,” said Dick. “How did Hood get into the tower? Weren’t you there?” he asked Conner.

“I don’t know how, but he got past all our defenses and… put me to sleep,” said Conner, somewhat uncomfortably. “Same with everyone. Except Tim.”

“That shouldn’t be possible,” said Dick. “There are access codes, and—”

“Yeah, well, Hood has tricks, I guess,” said Conner. “Look at Tim! He looks like fucking roadkill!”

“Tim?” Dick asked. “What are they talking about?”

“He can’t talk right now,” said Superboy.

“What?”

Tim grimaced. After a lot of squirming, he unearthed an arm and pulled the blanket down past his chin, revealing a neck swathed with bandages. He mimed cutting his own throat.

“Oh, my God.” Dick rushed to his side. “I can’t believe—are you okay?”

Tim gave him a scathing look that wouldn’t have been out of place on Bruce’s face.

“Okay, dumb question,” Dick conceded. “But holy shit.”

“That’s what I said!” Conner exclaimed.

“His vocal cords are intact,” Bruce said quietly. “His carotid arteries were not cut. Hood was very precise with the wound—and with his sutures.”

“Hold on,” said Dick. “He… you know, to Tim, then patched him back up?”

“We found him in the med bay on a coat,” said Conner. “He was in shock, but Hood had left him with blankets.”

Dick stared at Bruce blankly. For once, the man looked lost. “I have to check the security tapes,” he said. “I have to investigate.”

“I hate him,” seethed Conner.

“Here.” Bruce fished a bottle of painkillers out of his pocket and handed them to Dick. “One pill every six hours. His bandages will need to be changed. And—”

“I know how recovery works,” said Dick, slightly nettled, although he’d never suffered a slit throat before. “I’ll take care of him. Let me know what you find on Hood, okay?” Dick would be checking his own intel as well.

“Of course,” Bruce said like it was a given. Like he and Dick had never stopped being partners. He knelt by the couch and said something very quietly to Tim, who nodded with a wince.

Dick looked away at the sight of Bruce pressing his lips to Tim’s forehead. He remembered Bruce doing that to him as a kid when he was sick to check his temperature. They hadn’t been close enough for that in years.

When Bruce stood, both his knees cracked, and Dick abruptly remembered that Bruce was pushing forty.

Conner plopped down on the other side of the couch by Tim’s feet. Immediately Tim lifted them to set in Conner’s lap. Superboy rolled his eyes and pulled out his phone. Tinny sound began to play from the small speakers, and he leaned so that Tim could watch the video, too.

Bruce clapped Dick on the shoulder. He nearly jumped out of his skin.

“Hold on,” Conner said before Bruce could leave. “Aren’t you gonna tell him?”

“Tell me what?” Dick asked sharply when Bruce said nothing. “B.” He refused to be treated like a sidekick. Not at twenty-four years old.

“Hood’s identity,” said Conner. “Tim saw his face. Apparently, Hood wanted him to. The whole thing was a reveal.”

“Who?” Dick asked.

Bruce turned. The shadows of Dick’s apartment made him look haggard, or maybe that was just how he looked now. “Jay—Jason,” he said, voice ragged. “Tim said that the Red Hood is Jason.”

Chapter Text

Jason’s mom was cooking dinner in the other room. He was on the couch working on an English assignment, curled up under the old scratchy blanket he’d always hated but Catherine always loved.

“Five more minutes!” she called from the other room.

“Okay!” Jason hollered back.

No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t focus on the words on the page in front of him.

Finally, she called, “Dinner’s ready!”

Jason leapt up from the couch. He was starving. He flung himself into a chair just in time for Catherine to set a steaming bowl of soup in front of him. “Enjoy, darling,” she said.

Jason didn’t start eating. The room was freezing. He should have brought the scratchy blanket in.

“Aren’t you going to eat, too?” Jason asked when she turned away. They hadn’t spent any time together yet.

“Of course, baby. I’m just getting my own plate.”

She took a long time to fix her own plate. The sickness was probably messing with her.

Jason smiled when she sat, but her hair was covering her face. So he leaned over to brush it away.

Catherine’s teeth were sharp points like a shark’s and her eyes glowed neon green.

“How does it taste?” she asked, tilting her head just slightly too far, in an ancient voice that belonged to no human.

Jason fell out of his chair and landed—

On his bed.

Heart racing and awake.

And desperately wanting to cry.

At two in the afternoon, Dick rolled out of bed. His dreams had been full of blood-spattered fabric and a muddy, empty grave, but the nice thing about dreams was that they never stuck with him. Almost as soon as Dick’s feet hit the floor, all he could remember was a faint sense of dread, and even that passed quickly.

Yawning wide enough for his jaw to crack, he stumbled out of his bedroom and into the small area he called a living room. A dark head of hair was visible over the back of his sofa. The sight had become a staple for Dick’s mornings, though it hadn’t been around for very long. “Morning, Tim,” Dick said. He yawned again.

Tim waved a hand in his direction without turning around.

“You ate already?”

Tim held up an empty takeout box in reply.

Well. Okay, then.

Dick opened his fridge and sighed. He wasn’t in the mood for the apples he’d stuck inside to prolong their going bad and the Pad Thai had been at the apartment longer than Tim. At this point, Dick was scared to open the lid to see what sorts of molds were growing. So his options were to scramble some eggs—too much effort—drink a protein shake—what had he been thinking, buying blueberry flavor, absolutely not—or pivot to the pantry for the most trusted breakfast food of all: cereal.

They were out of milk, so Dick would have to eat it dry, but he didn’t mind.

As he poured himself a bowl of Lucky Charms, his phone rang. Dick checked the Caller ID: Bruce Wayne. Not ‘Bruce’. Not ‘B’. Not any affectionate nickname he’d tried out for the man while living under his roof.

With a sigh, Dick accepted the call and put him on speaker. Tim might as well hear what he had to say.

“Good morning,” Dick said grouchily before Bruce could get the first word in. He wanted to add a snarky comment about waking him up, but he also knew, somehow, that Bruce was aware he had already woken up five minutes ago. He had some sort of meta ability, Dick was sure of it.

“How is Tim doing?”

Finally, Tim turned around, just to roll his eyes at Dick, who grimaced with shared misery.

Tim had spent the last two weeks at Dick’s apartment recovering, and during that time, Bruce called at least five times a day to check in. As if that wasn’t enough, between those calls, he placed a few to Dick. It was the most they’d spoken in years, Dick noted bitterly. And only ever about Tim. He never asked how Dick was doing. Dick didn’t care about how Bruce was doing, so he didn’t ask, but if he ever made a subtle inquiry into the investigation of Red Hood, he was met with a grunt and the three unpleasant beeps of a dropped call.

At least he was trying to make an effort with Tim. Dick was a trial run child. It had taken him ten years to figure it out, but after Bruce let him walk away without even trying to stop him, it became abundantly clear. He’d been so much happier after Dick left. Sure, maybe that had something to do with… to do with Jason—his brain still stumbled over the boy’s name, years after his death, and months after his potential rebirth, if Tim’s vehement claims were to be believed—but still.

That relationship had ended sour, too, but Tim and Bruce’s seemed to be going strong. Possibly because Tim was the first Robin with living parents. They were so caring they didn’t even know about Tim’s injury—he didn’t seem keen on alerting them—but how did they miss his absence for two whole weeks? It alarmed Dick more and more by the day.

Tim was grouchy but recovering. He’d begun to use his voice again, albeit sparingly, and never louder than a whisper. His vocal cords hadn’t been damaged, and his sutures had been taken out several days ago, but the skin was puffy and obviously sensitive, so he mostly stuck to ASL with limited success since his right arm was bound tightly to his chest. It had been a quick refresher for Dick, but serendipitous when a witness for a mid-level case at the precinct turned out to be Deaf and Dick was the only officer on duty that could communicate with her.

Dick relayed all that information to Bruce, even the part about the witness, although he doubted the man cared.

Bruce grunted. Without seeing his face, Dick was much worse at translating Bruce-grunts, so he had no idea what this one meant. “Keep me updated,” he said. Always an order, never a ‘please’. “And good job with the witness. I hope it helped the case.”

Dick was so shocked at the praise he just stared at the phone.

Bruce hung up. That had probably been too much emotional vulnerability for him. He would spend the rest of the day brooding to make up for it, Dick was sure.

They had at least two hours before Bruce called to check in again, and it was Dick’s day off, so he supposed he and Tim may as well spend time together.

The dilemma only occurred to Dick as he settled into his armchair: in order to spend time with Tim, the younger boy had to actually look at him.

All things considered, Tim was a much better patient than Bruce had ever been for Alfred. Sure, he kept odd hours, and was almost invariably awake to wave hello to Dick whenever he stumbled in through the window or door after a long shift or patrol, and ordered more takeout than seemed possible to fit into his lean frame, but he kept quiet, didn’t make messes, and spent almost all his time on a screen. Like, all the time. He never looked up. When he had to go to the bathroom, he pulled out his phone.

His friends were another story. Conner was loud and seemed to spend most of his energy on taking up space. Bart Allen could create messes without breathing in their direction. Garfield, who’d joined the Titans as a young member right around the time Dick left, spent most of his time trying to lighten the mood whenever anyone showed the first inclination of feeling down. Cassie Sandsmark was polite, at least as long as Conner wasn’t antagonizing her. Sometimes the two seemed to be in a competition for Tim’s attention, but he never noticed. He hardly looked up from his computer when they came over, even though he hummed along with whatever his friends were saying enough that it seemed like he was paying some attention.

The company was nice, Dick had to admit. He’d never lived alone before Blüdhaven. His acquaintances at work were fine to chat with, but there weren’t any meaningful relationships to be found there.

Unfortunately, every time another one of Tim’s friends visited, it reminded Dick that he hadn’t responded to Donna’s calls or Wally’s texts or Roy’s sporadic emails (the man still had a flip phone in the twenty-first century). At first he’d been too busy, then too exhausted. Then, as the notifications piled up, he started to get overwhelmed. At this point, his radio silence had gone too long. It was probably best for them to assume him dead.

“So, Tim,” Dick said carefully, then paused. He didn’t actually know what Tim did for fun, apart from watching YouTube videos with Conner and listening to his friends bicker.

God, Dick really was a shit older brother, wasn’t he? He’d spent all his time hating Jason for Bruce’s flaws, and Tim had spent two full weeks at his apartment while Dick hadn’t done anything apart from getting mildly annoyed at Conner and Bart, who together were a lethal pair.

“Do you want to go watch a movie?” he tried. It was just another screen, but at least it would be several meters from Tim’s eyes compared to several inches.

Tim shrugged.

“I saw ads for a new horror movie a few days ago. It looks… fine.”

You hate horror movies, Tim signed.

It was true. The last thing Dick wanted was to give his subconscious more ammunition the next time he got a faceful of fear toxin.

“Well, there’s probably an action movie out as well. We could go see that. You like Dwayne Johnson, right?”

Tim looked up and signed, Who?

Dick just about had a heart attack until Tim cracked a smile and signed, Just kidding.

“So do you want to go?”

Tim shook his head.

“Okay,” Dick said slowly. “So what do you want to do?”

Tim shrugged.

“Do you want to do anything?”

He signed, Not really.

Of course. Screenagers these days. Honestly.

“I’m going to get a board game,” Dick declared, standing up. Families did board games, right? “And we’re going to play it when I get back.”

Tim’s mouth pulled to the side and a small furrow appeared between his brows, but he was yet again sucked into the world of technology, so that was all the response Dick got.

It was fine. Tim was still recovering. It didn’t mean that Dick was a bad brother. He could still salvage this relationship.

That didn’t explain why his heart couldn’t stop racing, or why he had to sit in the hallway outside his apartment until Mrs. Kramer, whose eyesight was so bad Conner had flown in front of her accidentally before and she hadn’t noticed, asked Dick if he was okay.

Jason’s agenda today had been topped with things like ‘Torture so-and-so for information’ and ‘Avoid/psychologically torment Bat-stard.’ Not ‘Follow Bruce Wayne like a creeper.’

Believe it or not, Jason didn’t have that much of a problem with Bruce Wayne.

See, most people had no idea that the ‘Brucie’ Wayne persona was a mask. They thought he was as bad as Kim Kardashian, except his company donated to charity and started nonprofits to benefit the average Gotham citizen. They thought he could barely dress himself in the mornings, and remembering information was a total no-go. Sometimes he did strange things like walk through the park in nice clothes while carrying a shovel. Maybe he would trip over it later, coincidentally right as a swarm of paparazzi descended, and his picture would end up in some tabloid.

People closer to Bruce Wayne could see under the mask. They saw how smart he could be. They saw his drive to do good, to protect Gotham no matter the cost. The sacrifices he made. The work he put in. Fucking Saint Bruce, Gotham’s would-be hero.

But people closest to Bruce Wayne (like Jason) knew that both were total lies (unless they were in denial, like Alfred or Lucius Fox). Bruce Wayne was a complete and utter selfish bastard that used justice as an excuse to keep anyone and everyone at an arm’s length. His whole mission was fueled by the desire to be morally superior to everyone around him. And he couldn’t even help it. It was who he was. So, sure, he hid behind masks, and he adopted orphans, but it wasn’t a surprise to a single person when he replaced them once he got bored.

Batman was who Jason truly loathed.

Batman had lied to Jason. Had dressed him up like a walking streetlight and shoved him right into the Joker’s sadistic arms. He’d pretended to care. He’d given Jason the best present in the world just to steal it from him and give it to fucking Timothy Drake, who already had everything.

Just the thought of that emo furry made Jason’s vision wash green. He allowed himself five seconds to fantasize about wringing Batman’s neck, then shoved the desire away. If he wasn’t careful, someone might notice a burly man in a baseball cap and leather jacket in seventy degrees and call the cops on such an obvious creep.

As much as Jason ignored the fact, though, Batman and Bruce Wayne were the same person. So he was tailing the civilian to learn about the vigilante.

It was so much easier to hate a mask.

It was around sunset that Jason realized where they were going.

For nearly three scorching hours, he’d tailed Bruce Wayne as he meandered his way through Gotham, only for the man to be leading them to the fucking cemetery the whole time. Jason grit his jaw. His back was drenched with sweat and his boots practically squelched every time he took a step. He’d have to get the jacket dry-cleaned or it would smell for the rest of time.

Bruce knew. That was the only logical reason. It was stupid of Jason to think he could tail Batman without the man realizing, so he’d led him on a wild, sweaty goose chase, and now he wanted to have a confrontation over Jason’s grave just to remind him that he was supposed to be dead, that everyone had preferred it when he was, that he might as well climb back into the coffin.

Just the thought of it made Jason’s palms sweat. Well, sweat more.

Most of his memory was hazy before his dip in the Pit, but he remembered being stuck in that box. Suffocating and choking on dirt as he clawed his way up through dirt and rocks and mud, crying out for safety.

He didn’t dream about it every night. About once a week, though.

Stupidly, Jason didn’t understand the shovel until Bruce stopped in front of his empty grave.

He stood for a long, long time, just staring at the grass.

Jason made himself comfortable leaning against a tree where no one would see him unless they came within five feet, which they would never do, because it was a patch of trees and brambles in a cemetery.

He had to hand it to Talia and her assassins. The plot was perfectly smooth. No one would ever guess that a boy had clawed his way out of it.

Bruce’s put the shovel’s blade to the grass. Used his foot to wedge it in deeper.

Then he began to dig.

Was there any kind of good fath— guardian that dug up the coffin of his three-years-dead adopted ward?

First Bruce started off slow. After about ten minutes, he seemed to lose his nerve. He dropped the shovel and stared at the headstone for a long time, then turned with a jerk and made it five determined strides away from the empty grave. Then he stopped and stood still.

When his shoulders slumped, Jason knew he’d lost some internal battle.

Bruce turned back around and took up digging again, his pace even more feverish than before. Somehow, his anxiety leaked into the air, and Jason’s heart started to race in response. Bit by bit, his vision went greener.

He was cold now, as the sun disappeared. Clammy T-shirts and leather jackets weren’t much protection against Gotham night winds.

The pile of dirt grew.

Didn’t anyone patrol this fucking graveyard? Why hadn’t someone stopped him yet? Anyone?

Bruce really didn’t know how to dig a grave. The hole he dug was deep, sure, but only wide enough to fit two severed heads side-by-side. He hunched awkwardly to start at the surface again, until he finally gave up and stepped into the hole to dig with a better angle.

Jason’s skin prickled. He wasn’t sure if it was because of the cold or because someone was walking on his grave. That was a saying, right?

Dirt flew in every direction, too haphazard to form a real pile. Bruce’s huffing breaths were audible from meters away. His expensive clothes were beyond ruined. He wasn’t doing his breathing exercises like he always did while exerting himself like Batman.

He sounded panicked.

Jason didn’t know how long he stood watching. Long enough for the sun to completely set. Long enough for Bruce to dig six feet and make contact with expensive wood.

The dirt-covered shovel went flying. Bruce fell to his knees and scrabbled at the dirt with his bare hands, out of breath and wheezing. Wood cracked under the strength of his desperate blows.

And then he stopped.

All the green seeped out of Jason’s vision when Bruce fell to his knees, put his head in his hands, and let out two great, dry sobs.

It was so odd for everything to lose its color in seconds. Jason half-worried he’d gone colorblind.

His hands shook. An odd ringing filled his ears. Why did he feel like he was back in that coffin? He couldn’t breathe. The trees were closing in on him. They wanted to drag him belowground. He belonged with the maggots and worms. His brain knew that, why didn’t his body? They’d both been eaten through.

Jason had to leave.

He didn’t look back to see whether Bruce did the same.

Dick ignored Jason, who sat on the countertop, swinging his legs and whistling cheerfully. Tim was on the phone.

“Little rude to be making noise, don’t you think?” he muttered once absolutely sure Tim wouldn’t overhear him.

Jason tilted his head and smiled. The jagged, curved scar on his cheek wept blood. Every time his cobweb eyes blinked, two tears of pus sluggishly tracked down the sides of his face. Smoke curled out of his nostrils every time he breathed, and Dick wanted to choke on it.

It was all in his head. He knew that. Tim would say something if he smelled smoke.

He could deal with it. He had to.

“I’m bored,” Jason pouted.

Dick turned around and muttered to the cupboards, “I can’t talk to you right now.” Why had his subconscious conjured Jason now, after so long without him? Tim was still living at his apartment, so it wasn’t like he was for want of little brothers or the company they brought.

Jason’s cloudy eyes narrowed. “So you’re choosing him over me?”

“Don’t say things like—”

Tim looked over with reproach in his eyes.

Dick grimaced with apology and said, quieter, “You know that’s not true.”

Tim said into the phone quietly, “You’re sure it’s him?”

Dick frowned. He didn’t know who Tim was talking to.

Jason hopped down from the counter and struck a Robin pose with his hands on his hips. “Come on, Dickie. Ditch the rich kid and patrol with me!”

“I can’t,” Dick gritted out.

“How long’s it been since you went out, anyway?” Jason inquired. He looked paler. “Weeks. Didn’t you hear about that big bank robbery on Halyard Street? You could have stopped it. Someone was shot. Did you know that?”

“Jay,” Dick said, “stop.”

“Of course, you could have stopped my death, too.”

“Stop.”

Jay wasn’t getting paler, he was getting grayer. His skin was cracking. Hair falling from a shriveling scalp, the ghoul said, “It’s like you don’t even care.”

He was dying. Oh, God, he was dying again. No—already dead; his body had finally caught up. It was rotting. “How do I fix this?” Dick asked, horrified, rooted to the spot.

“Dick?” Tim had hung up the phone and was looking at him in concern. What did he make of Dick staring into thin air with horror and demanding answers from nothing? “Are you okay?”

When Dick looked back at the spot Jason had been dying in, it was empty. No bloody footprints or loose hairs. Where had he gone?

Tim was fine. He could talk, the bruises were gone, and even though it was June and he still insisted on wearing hoodies or turtlenecks, he seemed okay. Dick could leave him for a bit. Just thirty minutes. An hour tops.

“I’m fine,” Dick said, but he could barely hear the words over his bounding heartbeat.

Tim didn’t look convinced.

“Just stir-crazy,” Dick assured them both. “I was thinking about doing a quick afternoon patrol today, actually.”

Tim perked up. “That’s great! I have my suit, just give me—”

“I think you still need to recover,” Dick said. “I’m fine going alone, really.”

Tim sank back into the couch cushions and chewed on his bottom lip. “I could help you.”

“You don’t have to try to help me,” Dick assured him. He checked Tim’s temperature just to make sure, even though he hadn’t run a fever since the initial days of recovery (Bruce’s doting was rubbing off on him), and sure enough, he felt fine. “I’ll bring takeout back, all right? What are you in the mood for?”

“Takeout again?” Tim frowned. “Do you know how to cook anything?”

Dick froze. The ghoul was on his fire escape. Jason smiled on the other side of the window, teeth loose in their sockets, half already fallen out. They looked small. Did fifteen-year-olds still have their baby teeth? Dick didn’t remember when he’d finished losing his first set.

“Okay, I’ll see you later, okay? Text me what you want to eat!”

Just before Dick shut his bedroom door, he heard Tim mutter, “I miss Alfred.”

Less than a minute later, Nightwing flipped out of the window and swung away. Robin jumped off the roof in pursuit, crowing with excitement.

Dick grappled and swung, flipped and flew, pushing his body to its limit. Too soon, his muscles burned and lungs felt tight. The weeks spent worrying in his apartment had done their damage.

Still, he couldn’t stop. The ghoul was hot on his heels no matter how fast he grappled, gleeful as the sun set. He didn’t want to look back and watch the body crumble into dust.

Maybe fifteen minutes after setting out, Dick chose a convenient roof to land on. He stared at the sunset as Jason landed softly at his side.

“We don’t see it like this in Gotham,” the boy said softly. No lisp, so he still had his teeth. And dust couldn’t speak, so he had to be okay.

Dick risked a glance down and saw—

Jason.

Robin.

Bright and happy. Not rotting, not dead. Beaten and bruised, yes, but he wasn’t winded from the chase even though Dick’s breaths had yet to even completely. He wasn’t a ghoul. He was just a boy.

The brother Dick had abandoned.

The one he was still abandoning.

“Oh, God,” escaped Dick’s mouth. His lips felt numb.

Jason looked at him curiously as he staggered and had to sit down with his head between his knees. “Dickie? What’s wrong?”

Dick reached out blindly, but his fingers touched only empty air. Because Jason wasn’t really here, was he? He was dead.

Or he was alive and hated them enough to kill Tim.

“How are you here?” Dick croaked. He was too scared to look up. “You can’t be here.”

No response.

When he gained enough courage to lift his head, he was alone on the roof.

As if Jason had never been there at all.

Chapter Text

Jason’s neighbor, Mrs. Reyes, had left another book on the mat outside his apartment. It was kind of her, but the other four she’d already given were piled on top of Jason’s small table and it was starting to get crowded.

His back hurt when he leant down to pick it up. Were eighteen-year-olds’ backs supposed to hurt? Wasn’t this supposed to be the prime of his life? Or un-life? He’d never gotten a definite answer from Talia about his status as a zombie.

Jason disabled the three locks and two alarms on his front door, stepped inside, and took two steps before he froze.

Someone had been in here.

He was sure of it.

They hadn’t left any evidence behind. Everything was exactly as Jason had left it.

So… was he sure?

He took another step and grimaced. No, someone had definitely been here, but it made no sense. Unless the intruder was a ghost, there was no way or reason for someone to break into his tiny Crime Alley apartment without leaving a trace behind.

“You’re being ridiculous,” he said aloud, but that didn’t stop the sick feeling that screamed wrong wrong wrong! and made everything look green in the dying afternoon light.

Wait.

No one could break into his apartment, bypass his security, and leave no trace except a foul feeling behind unless they were a ghost… or Batman.

“Bastard,” Jason growled. He wasn’t ready. His plan was barely put together, and he couldn’t think of breaking Joker out of Arkham without breaking out into a cold sweat. He should have had more time, but Timothy Drake had changed all that.

Well, if Batman had been here, he was long gone, or he would have confronted Jason by now, so he triple-checked the locks on his door before toeing off his shoes and putting his guns on the table on top of a stack of receipts from last month that he hadn’t gone over yet. The booby trap on his window hadn’t been triggered, either, but Jason had once watched Dickface disable one of Riddler’s bombs in less than three seconds. Maybe it had been a family effort. Everyone, join together to bring down the big bad Red Hood!

Jason should improve his security. Maybe install a camera or two.

Honestly, this wasn’t the worst case scenario. Jason didn’t have anything in his apartment that identified himself. Everything was addressed to Travis O’Ryan who, thanks to Talia, had a valid birth certificate, social security number, records, and paid his taxes every year. The alibi was so airtight Jason sometimes worried he’d stolen it from the real Travis O’Ryan, but knowing the League of Assassins, if he had, Travis was in no position to worry about it.

So. Worst case scenario, Batman could chase down Travis O’Ryan without any inkling of who the Red Hood really was. After all, the odds that Timothy remembered Jason’s big reveal were slim to none. Even though it smarted Jason’s pride to know his grand speech had been for nothing, he knew it was for the best.

It took Jason a moment to realize he was still holding the book from Mrs. Reyes. It was some hardcover with a dust jacket that depicted a dog: A Dog’s Purpose. Jason liked dogs enough, but he dropped the book on his table only somewhat reluctantly. The truth was, he hadn’t read a book since…

Fuck, since he was fifteen.

He just didn’t have enough time to read. Well, he had spare moments here and there, but he was a perfectionist. Jason didn’t like to start a book he couldn’t finish in one sitting.

Besides, he’d left his copy of Little Women half-finished when he’d run away to Ethiopia. Sometimes, when Jason couldn’t sleep at night, the question of how it ended nagged at him, but the one and only time he’d tried to pick up where he’d left off, he felt so nauseous he had to lie on the ground until everything stopped spinning. And he had principles, so he wouldn’t look up the ending on Wikipedia.

If he got up and died without knowing the ending to another book, he would be so pissed.

Maybe if she’d left a copy of How to Kill Clowns for Dummies, Jason would find the time to read it. Or, more likely, he’d forward it to Batman.

Jason was too bone-tired to do anything but heat up leftover Chinese takeout, which he devoured within two minutes. Feeling like a zombie, he showered. At least he thought he did. Jason definitely remembered getting into the shower and then stepping out, but had no recollection of whatever happened in the interim.

Finally, his bed. His glorious, glorious bed. Jason loved his bed. He would do anything for it. Commit war crimes, possibly.

He was really, really tired.

He flopped onto the mattress and something under his pillow crinkled.

That was odd.

The only thing Jason kept under his pillow was a knife.

Goosebumps rose on his arms as he sat up and reached for his bedside-drawer-gun. He checked to make sure that it was loaded, then turned off the safety and aimed with his right hand. All drowsiness forgotten, Jason whipped the pillow away with his left.

Nothing jumped out at him or exploded.

His pillow-knife was gone. A printed photo sat in its place. It was dark and slightly blurry, and there was nothing written on the back to clue Jason in to what it was.

He flipped on his reading light and swore profusely.

Jason recognized that costume. That hair. Why had someone left a photo of Timothy—

Jason’s heart stalled. The costumed boy in that picture was not wearing pants, and he was a little thicker than Timothy around the middle, a little slimmer in the shoulders.

Ignorance shown in the boy’s eyes. Easy to take advantage of. Easy to trick. Desperate for approval. He scowled.

It was Jason in the photo.

Batman had broken into Jason’s apartment to leave a photo of his old self dressed as Robin under his pillow.

Dick didn’t realize it was his phone ringing until Detective Verit nudged his shoulder and asked, “You gonna get that, man?”

“Huh?” Dick shook himself back to the present.

“Somebody’s popular today,” the affable older man chuckled, shaking his head. “Your phone’s been ringing for the past five minutes, Grayson.” The tread on his boots squealed as he shuffled his rolling chair closer to Dick’s, even though it would have been easier for him to walk. All the rolling chairs in the precinct sucked. Dick had learned that the hard way the first time he tried to roll over to Officer Towlin’s desk. One of the wheels had jammed and he’d toppled over and eaten shit in front of Captain Mallory and Lieutenant Crowley.

“You’re still working on that missing kids case?” Verit questioned. “This was before your time, wasn’t it?”

Dick looked at the old case in question sometimes, as a brain puzzle, but he wasn’t obsessed with it. He wasn’t Bruce. More often, he pulled it up so that it looked like he was being productive. “Yeah, I just, uh…” His phone chirped again and Dick held it up as an excuse. “Let me just…”

“Put it on silent next time, Grayson,” Lieutenant Crowley said in passing.

“Yes, ma’am,” Dick said sheepishly, but he probably wouldn’t unless he was on a stakeout. He’d witnessed Bruce’s panic whenever someone missed a check-in. And developments concerning his night job were usually time-sensitive.

The missed calls and texts weren’t from Bruce, surprisingly. They were from Wally.

Dick clicked on their text thread and his stomach dropped. Shit. He hadn’t realized just how long had gone since he’d last replied to the man’s texts. It was late August now, so February was… five months ago?

[Feb 19, 19:34] Wally: hey rob you back from your undercover job yet?

[Feb 20, 03:29] Dick: yeah just finished

[Feb 20, 08:18] Wally: howd it go?

Dick had slept for almost two days straight after that job infiltrating a group of dock workers. He’d drafted a response to Wally but forgot to send it.

[Feb 23, 20:38] Wally: linda and i are making wings on saturday do you want to spend the weekend at ours?

Dick had lost his phone working overtime at the station and hadn’t seen the text until after wing night. He had, however, seen that Donna and Kory had made it to Wally and Linda’s apartment. He was pretty sure Bruce told him that Wally had contacted him asking after Dick.

[Mar 13, 08:25] Wally: How’s it going, man? You want to catch up soon?

[Mar 31, 22:00] Wally: Donna said she hasn’t heard from you in a bit and Barry said the JL hasn’t sent you to space for an undercover mission. Did you lose your phone?

[Apr 01, 9:29] Wally: Hey, man. How’s it going?

[Apr 24, 2:03] Wally: Dude, I’ve been checking up on you and I know you’re alive. Nobody’s heard from you in a hot sec, but I asked Batman and he said you haven’t lost your memory or anything. I’m here if you need anything, all right?

So that explained Bruce’s odd behavior. Dick vaguely remembered the man asking him strange questions around that time. He’d written it off as a weird manifestation of overprotection; that was around the time Red Hood showed up decapitating crime lieutenants around Gotham.

Then… nothing. Not until today, at least, when Wally had messaged him asking for help on a case.

A case!

Dick could help with a case. Act professional, be the hypercompetent Nightwing everyone expected him to be, and evade all personal questions. It was what was expected of the Bats.

“I’ll be right back,” he told Verit.

“Whatever shuts your phone up,” sighed the detective, but a smile belied the harsh words.

Dick was already dialing Wally’s number before he was out of the bullpen. It didn’t even ring once before Wally answered, but the second Dick stepped into the elevator, his voice became so grainy that Dick couldn’t hear a word.

The phone beeped three times with a disconnected call. Immediately, it vibrated with an incoming call from Wally again, but Dick was still in the elevator. Stupid shitty service. He jabbed the button for Floor 1 again and the whole thing shuddered as if in retaliation.

Dick glared at the small screen as it counted down from Floor 4. It took forever before the little screen displayed a pixelated star—ground floor—and the steel doors opened.

Dick dialed Wally again, and this time when the speedster answered, his voice was clear. “Dick? Can you hear me?”

“Hey, Wally,” Dick said. “Sorry, there’s no reception in the elevator.”

“How are you doing, man? I haven’t heard from you in a while.”

Dick cringed, even though Wally’s voice was as far from judgmental as could be. “Yeah, I—I’ve been… busy,” he said lamely, waving to the officer at the information desk before pushing out of the building. Sunlight nearly blinded him, but once his eyes adjusted, it felt better than the awful fluorescents in the station.

“Yeah, I heard. Some new up-and-coming crime lord in Gotham, right? I heard from Donna who heard from Kori who heard from Raven who heard from Garth who heard from Superboy who heard from Robin that he has major beef with you guys. I bet that’s stressful. How are you feeling?”

Dick rubbed his temple, barely able to keep up with the list of names. How many people knew about the Red Hood? How many people knew that Tim thought he was—

How many people had heard whispers of the Red Hood’s supposed identity?

“Slow down, Walls,” he said instead. “Yeah, the dude’s been giving us a run for our money, but it’s nothing we can’t handle.”

“You sure?” Wally asked eagerly. “You say the word, I can zip over and help you in five seconds flat.”

Dick heard him get up and exclaimed, “No! No, Wally, it’s okay.” Bruce didn’t want metas in Gotham, and he didn’t want his friends anywhere near the Red Hood. “I called about your case, remember?”

“Right,” Wally said after a pregnant pause. “Yes, of course.”

“Okay, give me the lowdown. What can I do to help?”

For reasons completely unrelated to the stalker photo showing up under his pillow, Jason decided to switch apartments. His old one wasn’t close enough to his crime base, anyway. Wasn’t a shorter commute a good thing?

Unfortunately, he didn’t get his security deposit back. By the time the fire department got there, almost everything was ash, and Jason was well on his way to drunk at a bar whose floors didn’t want to let go of his shoes and whose seat cushions had lost their stuffing about a decade ago.

He should have felt low, drinking at an empty bar on a Tuesday afternoon, but Jason was getting very good at not feeling anything. If he didn’t feel anything, then he didn’t feel lonely. Or sad. Or scared.

And he was getting really fucking tired of feeling scared.

Jason scowled into his glass. Did drinking make him weepy?

Better than angry, he supposed.

The bartender asked, “Another?”

Jason nodded.

She poured him another, then walked away to chat with an old man that she’d known by name when he walked through the door. He hadn’t ordered anything alcoholic yet, only water, and practically lit up every time he got around to chatting with the bartender again.

Jason took a sip and his chest slowly froze as the drink trickled down his throat and, it felt, through his veins. Would that be him, if he even survived another sixty years? Lonely and old and killing time with someone paid to talk to him?

The door opened and let in a burst of sunlight. Shit. It was barely two o’clock. The dim lighting in here had made Jason feel like it was more like nine.

Whistling obnoxiously, a scruffy redhead in need of a shave sauntered up to the bar and slid into the seat directly on Jason’s right. His elbow bumped Jason’s and he smelled like sun. Why would someone so cheerful, so obviously happy, be here now?

Jason wanted to shoot him.

Jason’s heart dropped. No, he didn’t want to shoot a stranger, even if they were being mildly annoying. He didn’t hurt people for being annoying. Jason might be a violent person, but he had standards, and there was a line.

“Rough day?”

Jason took too long to realize the redhead was talking to him.

“Huh?” He cleared his throat, flushing slightly at the way his voice cracked.

The redhead grinned. “You look like you’ve been through the wringer, buddy. Rough day?”

“I guess,” Jason grumbled. “My apartment caught on fire.”

The redhead whistled. The bartender turned, a plastic smile on her face. “Oh, no, sorry,” he said immediately, “that wasn’t for you, I just—” He lapsed into silence, gesturing vaguely between himself and Jason.

Jason snorted when she pointedly turned around. Maybe he liked this stranger after all. “Smooth.”

“Shut up.” The redhead’s face was crimson. “So what brings you here at this hour?”

Jason paused with his drink halfway to his mouth. Just a second, and then he pretended to take a sip of the alcohol. “Lotta questions tonight.” He wiped his mouth on his sleeve and put the glass on the plastic counter.

The redhead grinned sheepishly. Jason knew this tactic. He wanted Jason to lower his guard. Well, that wasn’t going to happen. “Sorry,” he said cheerfully. “I like to run my mouth. I guess that’s why my wife left me.”

“No way you’ve been married.” He couldn’t be much older than Jason, maybe Dickface’s age.

The redhead’s grin widened. He tried to wave at the bartender, but she pretended not to notice. “Nah, you caught me. But tellin’ people I was means they judge my little girl a little less.”

So he had a daughter. Single fatherhood could drive anyone to drinking, Jason supposed. Regular fatherhood had been enough for Willis Todd.

Of course, Bruce had never been one for alcohol, but—

Jason shoved that thought away and asked, “So where you from?” Gotham didn’t make people like him anymore.

“Seattle first,” he said easily. Too easily. “But really, I’m from all over.” The redhead stuck out a hand. “I’m Roy.”

Jason shook it and said, “Call me John.” Lie for a lie.

“You don’t look much like a John.”

Jason shrugged. “What can you do?” A joke about his mother having bad taste got stuck in his throat. He signaled for the bartender, who came over at once. “I’ll have another,” he said, “and the dude next to me—”

“Just a beer, please,” said Roy. He studiously avoided looking directly at the bartender’s face.

“I’ll get your beer,” she said to Roy, but to Jason it was, “but I’m cutting you off.”

Jason blinked. “What? Why?”

“You’ve had four drinks and nothing to eat,” she said. “Now, if you order some food, I’ll get you another drink, but—”

“Never mind,” Jason said. He pulled out his wallet and threw enough cash to settle his tab on the barbench.

“I’ll see you around, John,” said Roy.

“It’s a big city,” Jason replied.

The sun blinded him on his way out.

It was Jason.

Tim resisted the urge to punch his arm in the air and cheer.

He’d known it was Jason!

The League of Assassins had nothing on Tim. He still hadn’t figured out how or why Jason Todd was back, but he’d tracked the Red Hood to Travis O’Ryan’s identity (R.I.P. the real Travis) and hacked into enough security cameras to track ‘Travis’ donning the Red Hood mask in and out of his apartment. After that, it was easy to hack into all the records for phones of Travis’s make and model, which were basically public information with the minimal security protecting them. He didn’t use the phone much, but he did place a lot of calls to a phone line attached to a VPN in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, which was suspicious enough that Tim had bothered to piggyback onto the signal. He double-checked the paperwork for Travis O’Ryan’s apartment, just to be sure, and everything added up.

In fact, it was so easy to locate the League of Assassins’ hideout, Nanda Parbat, that Tim was pretty sure Bruce had never actually tried to. He knew the man trained with them about a decade ago, but there was probably some history there that Tim had yet to parse out. Unfortunately, Bruce was so on edge that all of Tim’s questions were treated as suspect.

He missed the good old days when adults just ignored him. It made sneaking out of the house and falsifying school report cards so much easier.

Dick, who was washing dishes in the sink, looked over curiously at the movement and Tim couldn’t stop himself from fingerspelling, Suck it! because his chest swelled too much at the thought of Dick’s potential reaction to say it out loud. Signing it dulled the edge of the words a little.

Dick just shrugged, smiled, and blew a couple strands of hair out of his eyes, because apparently that was something you could do to him. Or maybe it was just something Tim could do to him, because if Bruce tried that—not that Bruce Wayne would ever tell someone to ‘suck it,’ the thought was so ludicrous Tim couldn’t even picture it—Dick would probably punch him in the face.

Dick might not punch Tim for taunting him, but unfortunately, he took it as an invitation to talk to him. “What did you get up to today, Timmers?”

Tim shrugged. “Nothing much. Binged The Witcher on Netflix, mostly.”

“Really?”

His tone was light, but Tim’s guard rose immediately. It was the same tone well-meaning adults used when they asked the last time his parents had been home. Or Bruce used when he asked if Tim had stayed up the whole night researching a case instead of sleeping.

Luckily, Tim had looked up the plot of the TV show he was using as his cover.

Don’t get him wrong. He didn’t like lying to Dick. But obviously Dick didn’t know that Tim was old enough to look after himself, so really he didn’t need any supervision or anyone standing over his shoulder telling him to put the screens away.

So maybe he didn’t like lying to Dick about staying inside all day, but come on. It was kind of a nightmare being told when to go to sleep, when to wake up, what to eat, how often to shower—

Dick took out his own trash. He’d asked Tim to take out the trash. To clean. To clear hair out of the shower drain.

And he’d thought the boarding schools were bad. Tim would never take Drake Manor for granted again.

Besides, if Dick found out that Tim had been sneaking out, then Bruce would find out that Dick hadn’t been keeping a close enough eye on him, and everyone would fight again. And he’d probably want Tim at Wayne Manor where Alfred would really stop him from sneaking out.

So Tim screwed up his face with pretend confusion and said, “Yeah. Why? We weren’t supposed to watch together, were we?”

As expected, the thought of doing anything together pleasantly flustered Dick. He was a little predictable that way. Tim would feel bad about manipulating him…

Actually, no. Tim didn’t—and wouldn’t—feel bad about it. Adults had a hard time understanding things sometimes. Besides, it made Dick feel good, so Tim wasn’t technically doing anything wrong.

Dick set down the sponge and leaned against the counter, soapy hands spreading water and bubbles where they touched the cheap salt-and-pepper laminate. “Did you want to watch The Witcher with me? What episode are you on?”

Crap. Tim had already read the plot synopsis for the whole series and he wasn’t sure how many episodes were out.

“I finished it,” he said slowly.

“Which season? I could catch up with you.”

“Oh, I finished the whole series. That’s why it took me the whole day to binge.”

Dick’s smile deflated into a pout.

“But you pick out a show and we can watch that together,” Tim said hastily.

Truth be told, he hated watching TV and reading books. If it was really important, he would much rather look up the plot synopsis on Wikipedia or something instead of spending hours watching characters muddle through the simplest plots someone could possibly conceive of. Tim could always guess them coming a mile away.

But Dick was on a ‘quality time’ kick, which meant he wanted Tim to play board games or chat or watch TV (talking during the show about what was going on) or other inane activities with him every night to ‘strengthen their relationship’. Dick said that watching YouTube in silence didn’t count, which was definitely wrong because that was pretty much all he and Kon did when Superboy was over since Kon also insisted on treating Tim like glass while he recovered. But he was Kryptonian, so he got a pass about knowing what was normal for human healing.

Tim didn’t get it. His own parents never bothered with that stuff, and they had a great relationship.

The only quality time Tim needed was in the Robin suit, spending time improving the quality of his work. But Dick and Bruce wouldn’t let him back into the suit just because his body was still bruised and broken from Jason’s assault, or something stupid like that.

“Great!” Dick said. He turned back to the sink, picked up the sponge and the bowl he’d used for cereal that morning, and said, “I guess the apartment got a little stuffy this afternoon, then, huh?”

“Why would you say that?” Tim squinted and considered asking Dick if he’d run face first into any hallucinogens.

Dick pointed with the sponge at the window that led to the fire escape, dripping water all over the linoleum kitchen floor. “Well, that wasn’t latched when I got back.”

Tim’s stomach clenched. Crap. He’d been gone longer than anticipated; Dick was basically walking through the door by the time Tim tumbled through the window. He must have forgotten to lock it in his haste to get back to the couch. He kept his voice casual and suggested, “Did you forget to lock it after patrol?”

“Nope,” Dick said cheerfully. “I always remember. Plus, one of my traps is disabled; it only looks like it’s still latched. So you must have opened the window to let in some fresh air, right?”

Tim slowly closed his laptop. Probably wouldn’t be the best thing if Dick looked over his shoulder and saw a feed of Gotham traffic cameras on the screen. “Right.”

“Because it would be pretty reckless to sneak out while you’re still injured,” Dick prompted.

“That would be reckless.” Tim raised his chin and didn’t let go of Dick’s gaze.

“I’m glad we agree.”

“Me too.”

They held the staring contest for another few moments before Dick finally broke, rolling his eyes and turning back to the sink.

It didn’t take long before he started to talk to himself. He did that a lot. Tim was pretty sure Dick was lonely, but he was also avoiding his friends and the Manor. So, like, what did he expect?

See? Adults were stupid sometimes.

Chapter Text

Tim dreamt of Titan’s Tower.

Tim dreamt of running for his life in Titan’s Tower.

He woke with a gasp, jerked from sleep by a sharp pain. Wha… Oh. His body weight was crushing his shoulder.

When he tried to roll over, his left hand slipped and white-hot pain shot from the joints of his broken fingers. Tim faceplanted into the couch’s cushions, rolled off, and hit the ground butt-first.

Pain lanced up his tailbone.

Tim gulped down air, doing his best to keep any noise from rousing Dick from sleep; he never got enough. His hand shook and he clenched and unclenched the unbroken fingers, but the tremors traveled up his arm and overtook his whole torso.

Tim was really, really cold, despite the blanket, hoodie, and sweatpants. Why did the shadows of Dick’s apartment look so menacing all of a sudden?

He was in Blüdhaven, miles from the Jason that had decided to wear a red helmet, pick up guns, and pursue a life of crime. But Tim had been in Jump City the last time the Red Hood decided to seek him out, and San Francisco was a lot farther from Gotham than Blüdhaven.

It was just a nightmare, Tim told himself firmly. But Jason had used the shadows inside the shut-down Titan’s Tower to hide. He could be anywhere.

Dick’s alarms would go off if someone broke into the apartment, but Tim had figured those out immediately. And if Jason could figure out Titan security, then he would certainly be able to disable Dick’s security.

Was anywhere safe?

Tim hit his forehead with the heel of his palm. His eyes burned. Not even in his dreams could Tim escape the Red Hood. He dreamt of the attack nearly every night, always trying to think a way out of his colossal failure. If he’d just turned left instead of right, or kept a hold on his bō after Jason dislocated his right shoulder and crushed two fingers on his left hand, then maybe he wouldn’t have shattered Bruce’s confidence in him.

The whole point of Tim being Robin was to fix Batman.

He’d screwed that up.

And he was so sick of dreaming his way out of an impossible scenario.

He didn’t remember making the conscious decision to pull out his phone, but he found himself staring at the dial screen that showed Bruce’s contact.

Tim still hadn’t mustered the courage to change his name to anything except ‘Bruce Wayne.’ There was no photo attached to the contact.

The phone rang four times before changing to the ‘Active Call’ screen.

Tim swallowed through the lump in his throat. Slowly, he raised the device to his ear.

“—you okay? Tim, can you hear me?” Bruce’s voice was groggy but growing more alert. Shit. It wasn’t even five in the morning. Tim had called maybe an hour after the usual time Batman finished his patrol.

“Hi,” Tim said, his own voice scratchy from sleep.

A relieved grunt. “Status report.”

“I—” Tim’s voice cracked. He licked his dry lips. He’d been shaking from cold before, and he was still chilly, but his frame was no longer wracked with tremors. “I shouldn’t have called so late,” he said in a whispered rush. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry,” Bruce said immediately. And the oddest thing was that Tim really believed he meant it. Even though he’d woken Bruce after only an hour or two of sleep, he didn’t think the man would resent him for it. “What’s the matter? How can I help?”

Tim’s cheeks flushed. It was so silly. His dad would have scolded him for it. “Do you think…” God, how spoiled, that he would wake Bruce for something so stupid.

“Yes?”

“Do you think you could bring me the blanket from my guest room?”

“Of course,” Bruce said immediately, not even a hint of hesitation. Tim heard him throwing off his own blankets. Seconds later came the telltale grunt Bruce always unconsciously let out when standing up.

“You don’t have to do it now,” Tim said, but why else would he have called Bruce at four-fifty in the morning?

“Tim, do you want the blanket now?”

Tim chewed on his bottom lip. If he said ‘yes,’ then Bruce would bring it to him right away, even if he resented Tim for asking. If he said ‘no,’ then he’d woken Bruce for nothing, and no one wanted a stupid child calling them in the middle of the night because—why? Something stupid like Bruce’s voice making Tim feel better?

Tim wasn’t a child.

Bruce grunted into the phone, interpreting something from Tim’s silence that he was too scared to admit to anyone, even himself. “I’m in your room now. Do you want the comforter or the blanket with the Van Gogh pattern?”

“The Van Gogh,” Tim whispered. His parents had bought it on one of their trips abroad.

“I’ve got it. I’m on my way.”

“Thank you.”

“Of course, Tim. Do you want me to stay on the line while I drive?”

Tim squeezed his eyes shut. They were burning again.

He hated when Bruce asked him questions like that. His parents told him their expectations. Batman was always clear with his instructions. But these open-ended questions felt like traps. Tim wanted whatever Bruce preferred, but Bruce wouldn’t tell him what that was.

“Tim, are you there?”

“I’m here. It’s okay. You can hang up. It’s illegal to talk on the phone and drive, anyway.”

“Okay,” Bruce said. After a moment, the line clicked off.

Tim really hoped he’d chosen the right option.

Dick wouldn’t be too mad that Tim called Bruce here… right?

Tim convinced himself that Bruce wouldn’t stay long. That worked exactly up until he opened the door to let Bruce in and saw the dark circles under the man’s eyes. The strain on his face. The new gray hairs. He looked… blurry.

Guilt cramped Tim’s stomach. He shouldn’t have woken Bruce. He knew how much work the man was doing to investigate the Red Hood. It wouldn’t be safe to send him away immediately, even though Bruce would agree if Tim told him to. But then Dick might be upset with Tim if he woke up and Bruce was in his apartment without his permission.

“Hi,” Tim managed to say. His throat felt swollen.

Bruce didn’t smile, exactly, but his eyes softened. He held up a paper bag filled to bursting with the Van Gogh blanket and a couple other items, judging by the lumps. “Alfred sent you a few things as well.” Quickly, he scanned the apartment behind Tim, obviously looking for Dick.

“Thanks.”

When Tim didn’t take the bag, Bruce frowned. He felt Tim’s forehead for a fever and didn’t grimace at the clammy fear-sweat. “Are you feeling sick, Tim?”

Tim shivered, but he shook his head. It took a long time for his sleep-muddled brain to realize that maybe he shouldn’t keep Bruce standing in the hallway. Silently, he stepped aside, and let him in.

It was a testament to how tired both were that Bruce was in pajama pants and a hoodie, and that Tim only realized that after latching the door.

Bruce suppressed a yawn. He frowned at the couch in the living room, which was still a mess from Tim’s abrupt awakening. “My offer still stands to buy an air mattress.”

Tim hugged himself. “You said this was temporary. You said I could come home—I mean, back to the Manor, soon.”

“I know.” Bruce rubbed his eyes. “I’m sorry. The case is taking longer than I anticipated.”

“I could help.”

“Tim.” Bruce set the bag down and put a heavy hand on his good shoulder. “I know. But I don’t yet know why the Red Hood attacked you, and I need you safe.”

“I told you why he attacked me,” Tim hissed back. “Roy Harper confirmed it for me. The Red Hood is Jason Todd. He’s mad that I’m Robin. So all you need to do is—”

“You involved Roy Harper?” Bruce’s mouth turned down.

“He met Jason—”

Bruce’s eyes shuttered at the name, but Tim barreled on, sick of everyone ignoring him. Sick of walking on eggshells around the name of the person that plagued his nightmares because he had slit Tim’s throat.

“He met Jason in and out of the mask. That fencing competition you and Oliver Queen set up, and two missions where he tagged along with Dick and the Titans. But they didn’t have a close bond, and it would be a long shot for him to even recognize Roy after so many years have passed. I mean, Roy lost his arm. They’ve changed.”

“Exactly,” Bruce said. “They’ve changed. Immensely. How can you be sure that Arsenal’s testimony is accurate?”

“Roy knows how Jason moves. They fought against each other and together. He was able to get close enough to ID him. I promise, B. I thought this through before involving an outsider.”

Bruce curled in on himself, and for a moment Tim was wildly terrified that he’d broken the Batman. Bruce hadn’t looked so defeated in two and a half years.

“Let’s pick this up again later,” Bruce said in a thick voice.

“Okay.” Tim deflated. He picked up the bag, which was heavier than it looked, and attempted a smile. “Thanks for bringing this.”

Bruce studied him with keen detective eyes, but he didn’t ask Tim why he’d called in the middle of the night. He could probably tell. “Do you want to try to sleep some more, Tim?”

Tim didn’t want to, but he probably should.

The shadows in Dick’s living room loomed. If Bruce left, the Red Hood in Tim’s dreams would pounce on him. He knew it.

For some reason, Bruce scared away the Jason in Tim’s dreams.

Tim wondered if the real-life Jason was scared of the real-life Bruce, too.

“Can we watch one episode of The Gray Ghost first?” Tim thought it was kind of a silly show, with low-stakes villains and predictable episodes, but Bruce loved it. Hopefully just because of childhood nostalgia, or Tim would worry about lack of taste.

“Of course,” Bruce agreed. He fetched Tim’s laptop and let the boy turn on the program while he fussed with the Van Gogh blanket, bundling him up like it was a cocoon.

“Bruce,” Tim complained. He hoped the hint of whine wouldn’t wake Dick up.

Bruce’s mouth twitched. It was as close to a smile as Tim had ever seen when he wasn’t acting as Brucie. Once Tim found the next episode, he set the computer on the coffee table in front of the couch, made sure the speakers were on silent and subtitles were turned on, and picked the discarded blanket Tim had borrowed from Dick off the floor. That he settled over his own lap as he sat next to Tim, shoulders barely brushing.

Tim swallowed. Now that he was sitting down, exhaustion was hitting him hard. But he was still so cold. The only part of him that felt sufficiently warm was the shoulder touching Bruce’s age-softened hoodie.

He faked a yawn, but it turned real halfway through. Bruce followed suit, jaw cracking.

Tim slumped a little more against Bruce, but it wasn’t until Bruce lifted his arm and wrapped it around Tim’s shoulders did he feel warm.

It wasn’t long until they were both asleep.

Dick wasn’t still dreaming… right?

That low-level crook he’d beaten up with Wally—and that had been such a joke, Wally needing his help with a pair of bank robbers in Star City, it was almost an insult—had landed a good hit and knocked him out.

He rubbed his eyes and pinched the crook of his elbow.

Nope. When he looked again, Bruce was still on his couch next to Tim. A laptop was open playing that old show Bruce loved so much, but both were fast asleep, which was odd for ten in the morning.

Another odd thing: neither had stirred when Dick woke up and stumbled in, making no apparent effort to soften his footsteps.

What had happened last night? Dick’s stomach swooped. Tim hadn’t snuck out for patrol, had he? But neither looked bruised.

A blanket was tucked around Tim’s lap, but he must have shifted in his sleep, because he was curled up and his feet were exposed. At some point, he had slipped so that Bruce’s right thigh acted as his pillow. Bruce was still sitting upright, his left arm slung over the back of the couch, right hand on Tim’s shoulder, head tilted back. He wasn’t deeply sleeping; though his breaths were deep and a little nasal, he wasn’t snoring.

Dick tugged the blanket up to cover Tim’s feet and frowned. It was a soft blanket with a pattern Dick didn’t recognize, some famous painting he’d seen once or twice. There was a bag next to the couch, too, with Alfred-approved healthy snacks, an unopened pack of boxer briefs, a pair of fuzzy Batman-patterned socks, and a note inside. Just something from Alfred wishing Tim better sleep in the future.

Dick made sure to stay quiet when  he shoved everything back into the bag. His mouth tasted sour, and it wasn’t because he hadn’t brushed his teeth yet.

Lucky Tim, being able to call Bruce every time he had a nightmare.

Guilt washed away the jealousy as soon as it came. Dick frowned at himself. Jealousy had poisoned his and Jason’s relationship. Well—it had pitted Dick against the younger boy. Jason hadn’t done much except be a better son than Dick could ever hope to be.

When he looked up, Bruce’s eyes were open. They stared at each other.

Bruce’s eyebrows raised. Do you want me to leave?

They hadn’t seen each other since Dick found him digging up Jason’s grave.

He’d been immediately terrified, and immediately sick.

Bruce hadn’t been present, mentally, when Dick found him kneeling over the broken lid of Jason’s beautiful, expensive coffin. The beautiful silk interior had faded and molded, and Bruce’s fingers were bleeding from tearing at the wood with his bare hands.

Unresponsive in a way that terrified Dick in a way nothing else did, Bruce listened dully to all of Dick’s hysterical commands to get out of the hole immediately. Dick hauled him out of the vicinity, on the verge of throwing up, and it wasn’t until the mauled gravesite was out of sight did Bruce say, “He’s not there.”

“What?” Dick had said.

“His body isn’t there.”

Dick wanted so badly not to believe Bruce’s testimony, but he’d seen the empty coffin, as much as he’d tried not to look. It was terrible—awful—it made no sense—it made perfect sense—

Jason didn’t belong underground.

He would go, if Dick told him to. They’d vowed not to fight as much in front of Tim. They’d fought in front of Jason, and they’d fought in front of Tim for a while, but it wasn’t a healthy dynamic, according to the self-help books Bruce bought, read, and mostly ignored.

If he got up, he might wake Tim, so Dick shook his head.

Bruce didn’t smile—he never did, nowadays—but the skin around his eyes crinkled. Dick half-expected him to say Good to see you again, chum, the way he always did when Bruce came back from a JL mission or Dick came back from a trip to Uncle Clark’s parents’ farm. Maybe ruffle his hair.

But Bruce and Dick were older, now, and there were so many angry things to be said between them that Dick could choke. But he was tired, too, tired of being angry and just plain tired. Just because the bank robbers had been a simple case didn’t mean they hadn’t landed a couple good hits to Dick’s ribs. His hip hurt, too, from a mistimed kick he’d needed to overextend.

Dick could start yelling, put Bruce on trial for every way he’d fucked up, or he could eat a bowl of cereal and pretend he was fifteen years old again, sitting down for breakfast with Bruce. Alfred wasn’t here, but it was close enough.

He chose the latter option.

His clattering in the kitchen woke Tim, and when he looked over the young boy was bolting up, face bright red. His elbow caught Bruce somewhere; the man grunted.

“Good morning,” Dick said. “Do you want some cereal?”

Tim’s head whipped back and forth between Dick and Bruce, obviously expecting some blowback for inviting him in the middle of the night.

Tim wasn’t supposed to be scared of Dick’s reactions.

Dick cleared his throat. “Tim,” he prompted softly.

The younger boy rubbed sleep out of his eyes the same moment Bruce did. For a moment they looked so similar that they could be father and son. “Uh, sure,” he said. “Can I have some Lucky Charms?”

“Yeah. Dry or wet?”

Tim grimaced. “I hate the way you described it, but wet.”

Dick had his face in the fridge grabbing milk when he asked, “And you, Bruce?”

“I’ll have a bowl,” the older man said. “With milk, please.”

Dick handed out the bowls. For a moment he was transported back in time, watching Bruce eat cereal on the couch in front of a screen playing The Gray Ghost. Everything was okay. Dick could sit next to him and tuck his toes beneath Bruce’s legs to warm them up. He was already nudging Tim away from the couch’s arm rest so the younger boy would be sandwiched between them.

Then Bruce looked up and said, “From now on, we operate under the assumption that the Red Hood is Jason Todd.”

Jason’s mom was cooking dinner in the other room. He was on the couch working on an English assignment, curled up under the old scratchy blanket he’d always hated but Catherine always loved. It was red. Jason used to love the color red. He couldn’t remember why he didn’t anymore.

“Five more minutes!” his mom called from the other room.

“Okay!” Jason hollered back.

No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t focus on the words on the page in front of him. They swirled around and up off the page, dancing in a whirlpool above the open book on his lap. It didn’t seem strange. For some reason, everything felt loosely tethered.

“Dinner’s ready!”

Jason leapt up from the couch. He was starving. He flung himself into a chair just in time for his mother to set a steaming bowl of soup in front of him. “Enjoy, darling,” she said. She’d curled her hair. It looked lighter than it normally did.

Jason didn’t start eating. The room was freezing. He should have brought the scratchy blanket in.

“Aren’t you going to eat, too?” Jason asked when she turned away. They hadn’t spent any time together in forever. He really missed his mom.

“Of course, baby. I’m just getting my own plate.”

She took a long time to fix her own plate. The sickness was probably messing with her.

Jason smiled when she sat, but her hair was covering her face. So he leaned over to brush it away.

His mother wasn’t Catherine.

Sheila.

Jason leapt out of his chair. “What are you—how did you—” he stammered.

Sheila stood up. And up. And up. Until she towered over Jason, about a hundred feet tall.

He wasn’t used to looking up to people anymore, but his hands were small and lacked the callouses that came from League training and handling guns. His feet didn’t have any blisters, either, and his hamstrings felt stiff.

Jason was in the wrong body. He was a child again.

He couldn’t fight her off.

“Aren’t you hungry, Jason?” Sheila asked. Her teeth had all been filed into points. Her eyes glowed neon green. “I cooked just for you.”

The apartment door opened, then closed. Heavy footsteps in the foyer.

Jason recognized those footsteps. Now was the time to run, to hide, to sit down quietly and not attract attention, but he couldn’t move.

A heavy hand landed on his shoulder. Jason nearly jumped out of his skin, but no one was there.

It was just him and Sheila.

“What are you doing here?” he asked in his shaking twelve-year-old voice.

“Why, I’m cooking you dinner, son.”

“You’re not my mom.”

Sheila’s eyes narrowed. She smiled, but all Jason could picture were those teeth tearing into his flesh. Her curly blonde hair began to float around her head, as if underwater. “Of course I am, Jason.”

“No,” Jason denied. “Catherine was my mom. Sheila was just—”

“Oh, but that’s where you’re wrong, Jason.” Sheila’s hair settled down around her shoulders again.

“What?” Jason asked warily.

“I’m not Sheila.”

The teeth overtook her mouth and not-Sheila lunged for his throat. Jason tried to jump away, but the heavy hand on his shoulder wouldn’t let him move, so he could just watch in horror as the teeth descended to swallow him whole—

Jason woke up.

It took a long time to convince his brain that he wasn’t in danger.

When his heartbeat dropped below 120 beats per minute, he sat up to look around grimly.

His new apartment… was.

Like all the cheapest places to live in Gotham, it was small. Not better or worse than his old one. Both had reminded Jason of the apartment he’d lived in with Catherine and Willis.

The nightmares were from sleeping somewhere strange, Jason reasoned with himself. He just had to settle in.

Judging further sleep impossible, Jason got out of bed with a groan. His back cracked in several places. So did his heart. How many times had he heard B make the same sound getting up from the medical cot?

The sun hadn’t begun to rise yet; it was very early morning. In fact, Batman had likely just gone to sleep. Maybe that’s what had woken Jason.

There was some sick poeticism in the thought that Jason and B could only exist in a world where the other was unconscious. Maybe that was why Jason hadn’t seen him for weeks but felt the man’s looming presence anyway.

Maybe they’d spend the rest of their lives dancing around any signs that the other existed.

As he made breakfast—scrambled eggs—the cardboard box labeled ‘BOOKS’ glared at him. As he ate breakfast, the box bored holes in the back of his head. As he cleaned up after breakfast, the box was a palpable presence seething at his back.

He had to get a better place to store it.

Jason gave up and ate the rest of the eggs while he showered for the first time in his new place. His expectations were low, but he was still disappointed. Typical.

The pipes in this place rattled and groaned when he turned on the faucet and the showerhead didn’t even try to put any effort in. The water ‘flow’ was more drip than stream; he’d never missed the manor’s water pressure more. Half his shower was spent with teeth rattling under ice-cold water, and the other half was spent wincing as the water’s temperature racked higher and higher by the second. Jason’s skin was bright pink by the time he was clean, but he shivered anyway.

He donned his leather jacket that gave him the confidence of kevlar and checked each and every weapon that could be stored on his person. Some, like the razor in the hem of his jacket, were hidden. Others, like the guns strapped into their thigh holsters, were not.

And, yeah, technically all of them could kill someone, but so could a Batarang. Or blunt force trauma to the head.

Some people needed killing. Batman was just too weak to see it.

Contrary to popular belief, working as a crime lord wasn’t a nocturnal activity. The fun stuff didn’t start until nightfall, but a lot more went into running a criminal empire than spying on other bosses’ runners and shooting assholes. Paperwork easily took up more than half his time. Jason’s days could start as early as ten in the morning or as late as four in the afternoon, and they could end anywhere between nine p.m. and well after midnight.

People came and went out of headquarters at odd hours, but he made sure that at least three trusted agents remained at all times. Jason wasn’t Roman Sionis or Cobblepot; he didn’t use terror and torture to inspire loyalty in his goons. The smarter ones stuck by his side. The greedier ones sometimes branched off for more lucrative opportunities.

And the smartest goons went to work for Wayne Enterprises or one of its many subsidiaries.

The motorcycle ride did good to clear his head.

As Jason arrived at the current headquarters of his operation, he nodded to a couple of the more loyal goons whose faces he remembered. One of his lieutenants, a man that thought himself to be in Jason’s inner circle (he wasn’t, but it was cute that he thought so, and the feeling of importance made him loyal) nodded as Jason passed. “All good here, boss.”

“Glad to hear it, Wobeser.”

Inside, four people sitting on upturned buckets—three women and a guy—played cards around a cardboard box. A street kid hovered in the shadows not that far away, watching them deal the hand with dark, keen eyes. Judging by the way everyone moved around her, she was an expert at making herself unnoticeable.

Except by the sole guy at the table. Every so often, he would look up at the girl, and she would hold up a couple fingers in a code Jason would have to watch to learn.

When the dude won the hand, she slipped back into the shadows as if she’d never been there in the first place.

Jason filed her face into his memory. He would keep an eye out for her. It was good that she’d latched onto Jason’s crew; God knew how corrupt the city’s orphanages were.

“Hey, boss!” someone said loudly.

There was a sudden flurry of movement as everyone rushed to assemble their posts.

Jason grunted in the direction of the speaker but didn’t break stride. Anyone that wanted to speak with him could do it in his office.

‘Office’ was a strong word. The room in question had once been a balcony that overlooked the old warehouse’s production floor, but had been boxed in with thin plywood at some point. It did little to cancel the noise of his operation, and did nothing to keep away a cold Gotham night’s chill, but he liked sitting behind the old moth-eaten desk and listening to reports or signing forms. It made him feel like Bruce working in his study—

No. No, it didn’t. Jason felt like himself. And he liked to watch people get more and more uncomfortable the longer they stood while he said nothing.

There was already someone in the room when he walked in, and the only reason he didn’t yell at them was because she knew far too much of his operation to tolerate any disrespect.

“Important papers for you,” the woman, one of his best lieutenants, last name Marzan, first name forgotten, grunted. She didn’t look up from her phone. Jason didn’t need to see its screen to know what she was doing; Marzan had an unhealthy addiction to sudoku. “Because God forbid we use a computer.”

Computers could be hacked, and Jason was pretty sure the machines made nowadays barely qualified. He remembered what computers used to look like. Then he’d died, come back, and found out that people were selling glorified cutting boards and calling them laptops. He would stick with the paper.

“What are you doing in here?” Jason demanded.

She didn’t flinch. “Wanted a break from the idiots.”

“And you chose my office to hide in?”

“I couldn’t go upstairs. Smithe and that new guy Robert Rogers were screaming at each other.”

Jason stared at the ceiling for patience. Finding none, he looked at Marzan and growled, “This isn’t a jungle. Get rid of them.” If he was going to make his crime syndicate a safe haven for street kids, they couldn’t be surrounded by heathens that can’t control their tempers.

“They’re already booted for the night,” she said flippantly and finally looked up from the screen. “I’m not an amateur.” She tapped the file on his desk with a fingernail. “You’re not gonna be happy when you see these numbers, boss.”

Just what everyone wanted to hear right before work.

Jason stared at the recruitment report. It didn’t take long to understand what it said, but it couldn’t be right. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.” Except Marzan wasn’t one for jokes.

She shook her head grimly. “Some bigwig opened up employee housing in the Tricorner. Until people get tired of an honest living, muscle is scarce on the street.”

Jason groaned. He wanted to pull on his hair with frustration, but was wearing his helmet, which he never took off around his subordinates. He didn’t want to terrorize them, per se, but a little intimidation kept them all in line nicely.

Bruce had to be doing this on purpose. Instead of Sionis, Ventriloquist, or Cobblepot poaching his goons, Wayne Enterprises was Jason’s biggest competitor for hiring muscle. It was harder and harder to find good criminal help nowadays if you weren’t interested in Joker’s sadists or Riddler’s weirdos or Cobblepot’s cowards—which Jason wasn’t—because if they didn’t fall into those categories, there was a good chance they were normal people. And most normal people would jump at an offer from Wayne Enterprises or their many subsidiaries, which offered good wages, paid maternity and paternity leave, paid vacation and sick leave, and now, apparently, quality employee housing at a discounted rate in the Tricorner. Open to ex-cons, high school dropouts, and entry-level workers alike.

Bruce had to know how much this inconvenienced Jason.

Especially so because he wasn’t exactly mad about it.

No one dreamed about being a criminal on the Gotham streets. No one wanted to live in constant fear and stress and risk their lives every time they went outside.

No one but Jason, at least.

Every person that WE took off the streets might be a loss for Jason, but the opportunity was nothing but a miracle for them.

“There’s gotta be a catch, right?” Marzan’s eyes flicked back and forth between the two glowing lenses of Jason’s helmet. “It seems too good to be true.”

“Won’t last long,” Jason grunted. “Board of execs will throw a coup if Wayne keeps hurting the company like this.”

“What do you mean, hurting the company?”

“I heard about their starting salaries,” Jason said. Heard right from the CEO’s mouth about three years ago, which meant they were likely even better now. “WE’s barely breaking even with their employee benefits. Trust me, the execs hate the man in charge.”

“What do you know about how Wayne Enterprises is run?” she snorted.

“More than you think,” Jason said. “Now get out of my office.”

Looking slightly impressed, Marzan left. Good. Jason liked to stay unpredictable and appear infallible, even among his most trusted workers. After all, ‘most trusted’ didn’t mean there was a lot of trust. Just… a little more than was usual when dealing with crooks.

Jason checked his syndicate’s expense reports. All the numbers added up. Then he moved on to background checks on his recent recruits. Or, at least he tried to. He got through two, then found himself staring at the wall and clicking his pen open and shut repeatedly. He felt slightly restless. Unsettled, but he didn’t know why.

Click. Open.

Click. Shut.

Click. Open.

Click. Shut.

Click—

His door opened.

“What?” Jason growled. His employees knew to knock before entering.

“I, uh, got an informant for you, boss,” said Marzan. She grimaced for some reason. “You busy?”

“Who is it?” he demanded. “No one’s on my schedule.” Dammit, he needed a secretary.

Not anything like Bruce’s secretary, Lucy, though; she was so scatterbrained she contributed to half of Brucie Wayne’s ditzy persona. She was nice, though. Always kept candy at her desk for when Jason or Dickface stopped by.

A broad figure slipped around Marzan and stepped into the office. He had to duck to get through the doorway. “Matches Malone, Mr. Red Hood, sir,” he said, sticking out a hand that Jason didn’t take. “It’s nice to finally meet you.”

It wasn’t often that Jason was shocked speechless, but this man managed it.

Jason had never seen a more cartoonish thug in his life. The shadow on his jaw was well after five o’clock, he wore a trench coat like he expected it not to make him look like a creep, and despite the low lighting because they were under a roof, kept a pair of sunglasses over his eyes. A cap with a low visor swathed most of his face in shadow. Despite all apparent attempts at being inconspicuous, this was a man that no one would forget anytime soon.

And yet… he seemed familiar, but Jason would remember meeting him. Anyone would remember meeting this man.

“‘Matches?’” Jason repeated.

The informant smiled. He was missing two teeth, one on the bottom row and one on the top. A single matchstick dangled from his bottom lip, because everyone needed a gimmick nowadays.

“That’s me, boss,” he said. “Say, uh, you got another chair?” He scratched his head. Jason hoped he didn’t have fleas.

“No.”

Matches shrugged. “S’all right, then. Don’ think I’ll be here long. Jus’ wanted to introduce myself, s’all.”

“Really?” Jason drawled. He leaned back and crossed his arms. “You’re doing the rounds, then? Visiting all the up-and-coming crime lords in the neighborhood? And here I thought I was special.”

Marzan took a hint and ducked out.

Matches grinned. Something about the smile… It itched at Jason, but he couldn’t tell why. “I like to stay informed. Hence… informant.”

It was the eyes, he realized. He needed to see Matches’ eyes. And… well, maybe there was still something wrong. He made Jason’s skin crawl in a way few could.

“And why should I be interested in your services?” Jason asked. He didn’t like employing older informants. They usually didn’t survive to Matches’ age unless they’d treaded on quite a few toes on their way up. Whether that meant offending the wrong people or beating out the more desperate kids was a toss-up. Or he was new to the game, and Jason had no interest in amateurs. Either way, an informant like Matches already had a system, unless he’d betrayed them all. There was no good reason for someone like him to seek out someone like Jason.

And yet… his presence nagged at Jason. He’d met him before. He just had to figure out where.

“Well, there’s a lot that goes on in Gotham,” said Matches. “Have you heard what they’re saying about Batman?”

Jason thought he did a good job appearing unaffected at the sound of that bastard’s name. “I’ve heard a lot of things about Batman.”

“Oh, I think you’d know what rumor I’m talking about if you’d heard it.”

“Rumor?” Jason parroted, leaning forward. “I’m not interested in rumors, Mr. Malone.” It came out as a growl, and Matches didn’t even flinch. He just kept grinning. Jason’s eyes kept catching on the black holes between his remaining teeth. The shape of the smile was all wrong. It was nowhere close to Joker’s rabid grin, though—honestly, probably the opposite.

“I’ve heard some about you, too, Mr. Red Hood.” Matches scratched his chin. “Now, that’s a namesake. Funny—you named yourself after him, but I heard you’re no fan of the Joker. Now, why’s that?”

What hurts more?

A… or B?

Jason sat rooted in the chair and said, strangled, “That’s more expensive than you can afford.”

He had the unmistakable feeling that, behind the sunglasses, Matches’ keen eyes were evaluating every twitch of his body.

Matches didn’t smile. His face settled into a neutral frown, and Jason could have been bowled over from deja vu. He’d always complained about Bruce’s neutral face of disappointment to Alfred while they cooked dinner, and—

But this wasn’t Bruce. Bruce didn’t—

Forehand? Or

“Well, I suppose I’ll have to find the right payment,” Matches said. He’d lost his affability. “Good to meet you, Red Hood. I’ll see you around.”

“Don’t count on it.”

“Really?” Matches gave him an appraising look. “Well, how about a tip? Think of it like a—a sign-on bonus.”

Backhand?

Jason gripped the seat of his chair with both hands so hard his fingertips tingled from interrupted circulation. “What,” he gritted out.

“There was a breakout from Arkham today.”

Okay, boy blunder—

Jason bolted upright. “How do you know that?”

“I have my sources.” Matches tilted down his sunglasses to wink and Jason felt as though he had been shot. He felt stripped bare. Naked. “I could be one of yours, if you let me.”

Matches’ eyes were bright, icy, keen blue.

Jason didn’t stop him from leaving. He couldn’t breathe.

He tore off his helmet, took a deep breath, and swore. Now he knew why Marzan had grimaced. Malone’s cologne reeked. It hung in the air, so thick it was almost visible.

To leave an impression, or cover up something else?

He needed that man traced.

Jason needed to verify that information. Because if it was true, then…

Then a monster had just escaped its prison.

Chapter Text

Too early.

It was too fucking early, and Jason had no time—

He tried calling Talia thrice, but she didn’t pick up. Busy or ignoring him, could be either one depending on her mood, but it didn’t matter.

So what if the timeline was accelerated. Jason could handle a few bumps in the road. Or the abrupt end of the road as it led directly into a thorny ditch, as it were. But semantics.

Jason tore out of the warehouse like the Grim Reaper himself was back on his heels, ignoring the concerned questions from Marzan and a couple of his more dedicated goons.

He would have to change a couple aspects of the plan. No more tearful revelation on the edge of a cliff in the pouring rain (in case there was an absence of tears on one or more faces). And he didn’t have time to blow up the Schwartz bypass over the Sprang River. Jason would have to abandon the chase through Arkham ending in the Joker’s empty cell, too.

“What,” he growled to the presence that hung over his shoulder, always judging, always condemning, never forgiving, never understanding, “is the point of throwing them into a prison that they keep breaking out of?” It was a fucking rotating door for the lunatics, and Batman perpetuated it. It was up to Jason to stop it. He would do what the Bat couldn’t. He would be better for Gotham. Make a real difference.

If only his hands would stop shaking.

“Come on, Talia, pick up,” he groaned, but she didn’t listen. Jason rang to voicemail twice more before he remembered that he still had some pride.

He’d survived before without Talia. He would again. At least until she picked up her damn phone.

At least the fucking clown was consistent.

He was tearing up Amusement Mile at this very moment, probably licking his wounds with Harley and summoning his followers back. Jason wondered what the clown’s next scheme would be. Would he poison the water supply and all the fish in Gotham’s bay, kidnap the mayor, or beat another child to death?

He had done all that and more, and Batman still wouldn’t kill the fucking clown.

Well, Jason had some tricks up his sleeve. A few cowards on his own payroll.

They would finish their job by midnight. After that, it would be up to Jason and his guests to finish theirs.

He let his first target know that he was coming. That gave the target enough time to call the cops and alert the Bats. Then Jason moved onto the next, and the next, until the last had already wet his pants with the knowledge that Jason was coming. After collecting eight in total, he couldn’t fit another head into his duffel.

Jason kept to the shadows, used the streets’ most secret routes that one couldn’t see from the air, but he could still feel the Bat’s presence at his back. Not quite looking over his shoulder yet, but getting closer. He was a phenomenal tracker, of course, and Jason could only throw him off for so long.

He just had one more stop before ACE Chemical Plant.

Iceberg Lounge had been rented out for the night. Eight men and women milled around the room, set aside from the waitresses holding drink plates by their ridiculously fancy clothes and hoity-toity attitudes. Acting like this club was better than all the others in Gotham, even though just as many people were doing lines in the bathroom.

Jason watched the party through the skylight until he couldn’t stand it anymore. He couldn’t stand the smiles on their faces, these people that profited off the suffering of others. They undercut each other, sucked up to Black Mask, sold to children, intimidated people into buying their laced products. How dare they stand underneath him with vapid smiles on their faces? They deserved to feel the same terror that Jason did. They deserved to spend the rest of their lives looking over their shoulders.

He shot twice into the glass beneath his feet and plummeted to the ground amid screams and the tinkling sound of glass hitting marble.

Cobblepot was in the middle of the party, enjoying attention from Black Mask’s sycophants. Unfortunately, the place of honor wasn’t the best place to be after the Red Hood had literally crashed the party.

Dealing with any of these scumbags made Jason shudder like he was shaving a nerve fiber, but it was necessary. He didn’t remember everything that was said apart from a whole lot of posturing and pointing of guns, all of which abruptly ended when he tossed the bag of heads in their midst. Jason felt kind of bad scaring Cobblepot’s waitresses, but his mission was more important at the moment.

None of them agreed, but none of them disagreed, which was basically confirmation, so Jason threw down a smoke bomb and shot his grapple at the ceiling. Broken shards of glass sliced at his hands through the leather gloves, but he clenched his teeth and breathed through the pain.

Jason swung onto the roof and froze. It was already occupied.

Batman glowered at him. With his cape flapping in the wind, he seemed larger than the last time Jason saw him.

Nightwing was right behind him. It was the first time Jason had seen his new costume up close. His mouth tasted sour when he admitted it, but it didn’t look bad.

Then again, nothing looked worse than the Discowing costume.

Three sets of white lenses stared at each other.

Jason grunted and stood to his full height. “You’re too late to stop me, Br—atman.”

“You murdered eight people,” Batman growled.

“Eight drug dealers,” Jason corrected. “They didn’t matter.”

“Every life matters.”

Jason groaned and rolled his eyes. “Oh, spare me the ‘every life is sacred’ talk. I’ve heard it enough.”

“Who are you?” Nightwing shifted forward.

“Here’s an idea.” Jason smiled, even though they couldn’t see it. “You take off my mask, and find out.”

Dickwing was already moving before Jason finished talking. He lunged with escrimas out and crackling. Jason barely dodged the paralyzing currents. He tried to punch Nightwing’s side, but he was too goddamn slippery.

Dickwing might be smooth, but Jason was faster. He attacked, a flurry of fists, but Nightwing dodged every one. Jason blocked every blow that Nightwing attempted, too, but he could feel sweat prickling at his hairline. He was better than Nightwing, right? Talia always said he was.

Between blows, Jason puffed out, “Still letting your proteges fight for you, Batman? Who’d’ve thought the big bad Bat was such a coward!”

Batman didn’t respond. He was much harder to goad than the usual person, but Jason had still hoped the low blow would land.

Nightwing slipped up. He made a mistake. Jason capitalized on it immediately and landed a punishing kick to his spine, not really caring to pull back his power to make sure he didn’t paralyze Nightwing.

The only indication Nightwing gave that he was hurt was a sharp gasp of air as he tumbled to the ground, clutching his back.

Batman twitched.

No—he flinched.

“Let’s see if you’ve lost your touch, Bats,” Jason said. He ran to the edge of the roof and swan dived off.

Midair, he twisted backwards to watch Batman help Nightwing to his feet. The asshole held his back like an old man complaining about scoliosis, but he seemed fine.

Jason would take the headstart, but he didn’t need it.

He pushed himself hard, swung tight around corners, kept Batman and Nightwing in his dust. His lungs started to burn, and his shins jolted with every half-controlled landing, but he grinned. It was almost like a game of tag. Honestly, this was kind of fu—

A batarang zipped through the air less than an inch away from Jason’s helmet, and adrenaline narrowed his vision.

All of a sudden, this wasn’t a game of chase, leading the Bats through his city. The Bats were chasing him, and Jason was running for his life, because he had tried to kill one of their own.

Batman wouldn’t kill—

that fucking clown

—because of his moral code, but that didn’t pull his punches. Jason didn’t want to spend the next two months recovering from their encounter.

He had to be better than how Batman remembered him. He had to be the warrior that Talia had trained.

The Bats were falling further and further behind. No! Jason swung to a set of train tracks and landed, giving them an easy target. He might be the smaller fish in Gotham when the Joker was free, but they didn’t know that they could catch two fish with one hook if they just followed a little bit longer.

Jason watched Nightwing register that he’d stopped. The blue-and-black vigilante hesitated for a moment, obviously torn between approaching Jason and veering off course.

Curiosity won out.

Nightwing flipped head-over-heels all the way to Jason. He watched each gymnastic flourish with narrowed eyes, ready for the concealed toss of a batarang or escrima stick.

Jason was so focused on Nightwing that he didn’t realize that Batman wasn’t swinging along next to him.

Something cold seized his heart. As casually as he could, Jason said, “You haven’t lost your touch, have you, Bruce?”

Not very many people could sneak up on him without alerting any of his senses.

Nightwing landed. The ever-present smile was still on his face, and Jason wanted to shoot it off.

He hated Dick. It was hard to explain that he hated Dick more than most people, because Jason didn’t have a problem killing most people in terrible ways, but he wanted to kill Dick Grayson in the worst way. There was no resentment he held quite like the one he held for Dick; Jason hated Batman, sure, for his failures, but he hated Dick for his rejection.

No. Not rejection.

Dick had seen Jason. Had known him.

Before anyone else, he’d seen that Jason wasn’t worth anything.

Jason hated Dick the way he hated the mirror in his apartment.

A train horn sounded.

“How do you know my name?” Batman growled.

“You’re not as good as you think you are.”

Nightwing asked, “Are you?”

Jason snarled, “I’m not talking to you right now. This doesn’t concern you. Why are you even here?”

Nightwing flinched, obviously taken aback at the vitriol in Jason’s voice. “This is a family matter. You made it one when you attacked Robin.”

“I just wanted to remind you of your failures.”

With Nightwing at his front, and Batman at his back, Jason was feeling distinctly trapped. He shifted slightly, trying to get both in his field of view at the same time. He said, “You take these kids and you shove them into costumes and you act surprised when they get hurt! Robin’s running around wearing neon in Gotham, and you’re surprised that someone accepts the invitation? You’re the problem!”

“So all this…” Batman took a step forward, and Jason stepped backward so that he was balancing on one side of the tracks. “To prove your point about how you don’t approve of young vigilantes?”

“Sure. And to get revenge on you.”

“Why? What did I do to you?”

“It’s what you haven’t done for me.”

Another step forward, but Jason had nowhere to go. He gritted his teeth at allowing the vigilantes to so easily herd him into a metaphorical corner.

“So what do you propose?” Batman asked. “Take away their armor? Lock them in the house? So when they sneak out, it’s without protection, and without supervision, and without the knowledge that they can call me at any time?”

Jason’s mouth opened and closed.

“Would that have worked on you, Jason?”

A concussive blast went off in Jason’s head. The entire world felt like it was shaking.

Nightwing was frozen, watching him closely, and Batman’s mouth was turned almost comically down.

Jason unstuck his tongue from the roof of his mouth and said shakily, “Wh… what did you just call me?”

“Jason. Jay.” Bruce said it kindly, the way he did when Jason was Jason and Jason was younger and his body didn’t hurt so much and actually felt like his own. He said it the way he did at dinner, when picking him up from school, when tucking him in for bed.

No, Bruce didn’t say it like that, because he’d never done that. He’d never cared for Jason. Jason was a fucking tax write-off or whatever for another rich capitalist pig, and no one had ever liked each other in that house, and that was why it didn’t hurt at all when Jason thought about the manor.

“Tim told me.”

Fucking Timothy. Jason growled so loud the ground shook.

Next time, he would finish the job.

Well, there was no point in the helmet anymore. Jason took it off and strapped it to his side, enjoying the way Nightwing blanched, how the color leached from his skin. They couldn’t even see the green of his eyes replacing the old blue, but they could see the jagged letter carved into his cheek. ‘J’ for Jason. ‘J’ for Joker. ‘J’ for judge, jury, and justice, because that was what Batman failed to bring to this city.

“I would like to know,” Batman said carefully, “what happened.”

What happened after the Joker beat him to death, Bruce meant? Green washed over Jason’s vision. He snarled, “You didn’t kill the Joker, that’s what happened.”

Nightwing straightened his shoulders like a soldier.

Something peculiar twisted Batman’s mouth.

“He murdered me,” Jason said, voice ragged. “He beat me half to death, then locked me in a warehouse filled with explosives. And you never punished him for it.”

He had been so good. Well, maybe not at the moment, not when he and Bruce were fighting because Garzonas wouldn’t stop for anything, and Jason might not have pushed him, but he sure as hell hadn’t caught him—

But Jason had wanted to go to college, and instead he trained in the League of Assassins. Jason had wanted to be Robin, and all he could be was what the League made him. Jason had wanted to be a son, and he belonged to no one.

Another train horn, and headlights now, too. The tracks shook beneath his feet as it approached, but Jason wasn’t a chicken.

“I put him in Arkham when I could,” Batman said quietly, but even he knew it was a weak excuse. “I put him in the highest security cell.”

“And somehow, he keeps breaking out.” Jason laughed, but it had a hysterical edge. He could barely keep his footing on the tracks. “Isn’t it funny, how he keeps doing that? If only there was a surefire way to ensure that he never breaks out to kill someone again—oh, wait.”

Three frantic horn blasts. The train was rounding the corner now, less than a hundred yards away from their stand-off. And still Jason refused to jump first.

“He broke out again tonight, you know,” he said. “You do know, don’t you?” Batman knows everything that goes on in Gotham City, or so the saying goes.

“We also know that he’s not at Amusement Mile anymore,” said Nightwing.

The train was upon them.

Nightwing backflipped off, while Jason and Batman shot their grapples at the last possible second. Everyone fell in different directions, and Jason felt his stomach swoop when the scaffolding his grapple was attached to gave out.

He dropped three feet midair and hit the ground with an awkward roll that nearly dislocated his shoulder. He groaned. That would definitely bruise later.

He saw Nightwing check in with Batman, who’d fared much better than Jason. He took the opportunity to bolt off. They were nearly at his destination anyway.

Jason pulled off into the shadow of a chimney on a roof, pressed a button at his side, and the skyline to their right exploded.

The crash disrupted Nightwing and Bruce’s chase, sending them flying through the air. They recovered fine enough, but then came the screams.

Screams of innocent people just caught in the crossfire.

Screams that the Bat couldn’t resist.

But he also couldn’t resist Jason, and that was what he was counting on.

At Batman’s directive, Nightwing peeled away to save the civilians, and left Batman and Jason alone.

Batman could tell that Jason was nearby. His senses were too keen to be fooled. But he hadn’t quite spotted Jason yet, so he stayed hidden, crouched in the shadow. Eyes categorizing every weakness in the older man’s posture.

He was stiffer than Jason remembered. Not by much, but he carried himself like a man in his mid-thirties, not his early thirties. There was more control in his movements; absolutely no energy was wasted.

Jason’s nerves prickled. Pit water ran up them, against gravity, and the sensation was so wrong that he couldn’t stand it. He stood up.

Batman remained impassive as he faced Jason.

“It’s just you and me now, old man,” Jason said, seething.

Bruce did something that Jason never would have predicted, not in a million years.

He took off his cowl.

Jason couldn’t breathe.

That was his da—

There was a difference between seeing him from afar or on a TV screen and seeing him in person. The lines around his mouth from frowns of disapproval had been etched deeper, and so were the crow’s feet by his eyes. He wasn’t even forty, but there was a sprinkling of gray in his black hair. There were a couple of new scars that were usually covered by makeup, too.

Jason had never seen this look on Bruce’s face.

“Jay?” Bruce asked softly. “Is it really you?”

He took a step forward, hand outstretched, and Jason had a gun trained on his forehead before either could blink.

“Why are you doing this?”

What kind of a stupid question— “Why do you think?” Because the Joker had killed him? Because the Joker was still alive? Because Bruce had dressed another boy in the suit Jason had died in?

Because Bruce hadn’t been by his grave the night Jason crawled out. Because Bruce hadn’t taken him home. Because the League of Assassins took him in and promised to make him someone that would never be powerless again, and all they’d made him was a monster.

“I’ll tell you why,” said Jason. And he jumped off the roof.

Batman jumped after him.

A window on the third story of the ACE chemical building was open, and Jason angled himself through it, nearly clipping his foot on the bottom edge. Though Batman was larger, he soared through the opening without any issues, and when he straightened, it was to see Jason standing in front of a chair. He’d readorned his cowl midair, which made any attempts to read his expression nearly impossible.

Someone was tied to the chair. Someone with white skin and green hair and smudged red lipstick in a grotesque smile.

Something tore inside Jason at the sight of the Joker, but at least the monster was tied to the chair this time. He was still in his orange Arkham uniform, hair greasy and uncolored roots starting to show. He was just a man. A psychotic, murderous, scarily intelligent man, but a man nonetheless.

And men could die.

Jason could hardly wait. This was it. He’d waited years for this moment. Talia stoking his anger, thoughts of Timothy brewing resentment, fantasies of violence at times the only things keeping him going.

The nightmares would end tonight. Jason would sleep peacefully again.

Everything would be put to right tonight.

The Joker smiled wide and exclaimed, “Batsy! I wondered when you’d get here. I’m not quite ready to head back home, although someone’s already started my destruction for me.” The wannabe clown eyed Jason, who swallowed and wished his helmet was on his head and not his hip. The Joker’s eyes widened when he saw the scar on Jason’s cheek. “Why, the old Boy Blunder!” His head whipped back and forth between Jason and Batman. “I thought you were the unlucky canary in the coal mine, but I suppose you’re a little more resilient than you looked.”

Jason clicked off his gun’s safety, then offered it to Batman.

It was a very, very rare moment that anyone saw Batman stumble, but he backed away from the weapon so quickly he almost tripped over his cape. “What are you doing, Hood?”

“The piece of shit right here killed me,” said Jason, “and he’s still alive.”

The Joker cackled with laughter.

“He suffered in Arkham for what he did to you.”

“Do you know what I would have done if the situation was reversed, B? I would have hunted him to the ends of the earth. I wouldn’t have rested until this monster was dead. So why isn’t he?” Jason’s voice cracked. Why didn’t you love me as much as I loved you?

“I don’t kill,” Batman said in his usual growl. Jason hated it. He wanted to slice the man’s vocal cords. He never wanted to hear Batman’s voice again.

“He took me away from you!”

A giggle.

Then a chuckle.

Then laughter.

Then a peal of hysterics.

The Joker convulsed in his chair, laughing maniacally like any of his victims exposed to Joker venom. “Who had him first, Second Boy Blunder?” he cackled. “Batsy was so much more fun before you birds started—”

Jason shot the floor between his feet. “Shut up.”

For a moment, something like fear passed over the madman’s expression. If he could even feel anything.

“He’s not human,” Jason implored Batman. “He’s a rabid dog, and you know what happens to rabid dogs? They get put down.”

“Batman won’t kill.”

That stoked a rage in Jason so potent he could taste it. “Shut up!” he screamed, firing just over Batman’s shoulder. “Get off your fucking high horse. I don’t care about morality, I care about the people of this city that you’re too fuckin’ good to see. You put him in Arkham and he breaks out again and kills more people. You know how many lives would have been saved if you’d just killed him the first time he drew blood?”

“Morality?” Batman parroted. “It’s not about morality.”

“Then what is it?”

Batman’s mouth thinned. “If you care so much about the people of this city, why would you endanger innocents by setting fire to those buildings?”

Jason scoffed. “You always did believe the worst in me, B. Just because you hear people screaming doesn’t mean there are any. Maybe I cleared out the buildings before I set the bombs, maybe I didn’t. Does it matter what I say? You didn’t believe me about Garzonas!”

“I believed you,” Bruce said lowly. “You are my son. Of course I believed you.”

“Liar!”

“I’m not lying.”

He was such a good liar, Jason almost believed it.

“Jay, put down the gun.” And Bruce sounded so weary. “Look. He’s not scared. He’s laughing; he thinks this is funny. Jay, no one wins in the Joker’s games.”

“So why are you still playing?” Jason demanded. “Just kill him and end them all!” He threw the gun, and Batman caught it on instinct. He held it as far from his body as he could. “It’s him or me,” Jason said flatly.

He tried to battle down the hope, but it rose like a tide in him anyway. Now Bruce would listen. He had to choose Jason. Just this one, he would choose Jason.

He wouldn’t choose the fucking Joker over Jason.

With the familiarity and precision of a fellow League-trained vigilante, Bruce took the clip out of the pistol and set it on the ground. “I can’t kill. You can’t make me.”

And he—

He fucking—

He fucking turned. And walked away.

Slowly, the adrenaline faded from Jason’s body as he stared at the abandoned gun on the ground.

It had never occurred to him that Bruce might just… walk away. Refuse to choose at all.

He’d built up this confrontation so much in his head, imagined all the ways it might go down. Maybe Bruce would pull the trigger himself. Maybe he would put a hand on Jason’s shoulder and give him his blessing to kill the Joker. Maybe he would turn the barrel on Jason for all the people he’d killed since returning to Gotham, all the destruction he’d wrought.

Jason had never imagined that he would choose to do nothing.

And now Batman was gone, and Jason was alone in the Joker’s birthplace with the man himself, and he hadn’t been the one to tie his restraints. His hands were behind his back, but maybe he was just holding them there.

The man that haunted his nightmares, that made him look over his shoulder, that set his nerves on edge, was in this room, and Jason had no one to protect him.

He was in a warehouse. Alone. With the Joker.

Jason pulled out another gun and stared at the white-painted face down the barrel. The Joker was still smiling, damn him. Smiling and chuckling, like he saw a punchline.

You know what, Jason felt so pathetic in that moment, he almost laughed, too. What kind of father left his son like that? It was almost funny.

Jason couldn’t pull the trigger. His finger wouldn’t respond.

His breath was coming faster. Jason’s hands tingled, and he turned around sharply, but he couldn’t see the window anymore. Was it gone? Was he locked in the warehouse?

He had to get out.

Jason pressed the button on his side a second time, and something started to tick. Another flash of fear on the Joker’s face, and he started to struggle against his restraints. “Hey! Hey, Boy Wonder! Let me go! This isn’t funny!”

Jason stumbled out of the room into the hall, using the wall as a support. He couldn’t think straight; he could hardly see. All he knew was that he had to get as far away from that monster as possible. Hand over hand, he limped forward, barely able to breathe. Something was lodged in his chest. It hurt every time he tried to inhale.

The room was rigged to blow. Hopefully the Joker would blow with it.

Three… 

Two…

One.

The floor shuddered beneath Jason’s feet and dust billowed out of the room, sweeping down the hallway in less than a second. Jason gasped and sucked in a mouthful of the ash.

The whole building shook.

He may have put too much charge into the explosion.

The whole building was about to collapse, and he saw no way out.

And he still couldn’t breathe.

Jason tried to suck in air, but his chest wouldn’t expand. He didn’t know if all the lights were out, or if his eyes weren’t working.

His legs gave out. Jason slid slowly to the ground, feeling oddly as though his head was disconnected from the rest of his body.

Nothing about tonight had gone to plan.

At the end of it, all he could focus on was the pain in his bruised shoulder.

Then came a shout: “Jason!”

Hands. Hands on his body. An arm like an iron bar around his chest, and then he was thrown over someone’s shoulder.

Glass shattered, and Jason’s stomach swooped when the person carrying him jumped.

He blinked at a splash of red in his black vision and realized that he could breathe after all. Then he realized that someone was carrying him over their shoulder.

Batman.

Batman had come back to save him.

Jason stabbed him in the arm.

Batman grunted and dropped him, and Jason twisted midair. He shot his grapple and rolled to a stop on a nearby roof. His face felt hot like midday in August.

The fires he’d set had spread. Real screams reached his ears. Real people, not the recordings he’d set. Jason didn’t see Nightwing saving them. Maybe he’d died of smoke inhalation the way Jason had, the first time.

Jason rolled over. His vision blurred.

“Just tell me why,” he pleaded, the words ending in a sob. So many expectations for the night, and everything had gone so terribly, horribly wrong. His chest had turned into an empty void.

Jason had nothing. He wanted everything, he wanted nothing, he wanted—

“Please, B.” He rose to his knees. “Why can’t you do this for me?” The lenses of his domino filled with water. It burned his skin to rip it off.

He had never seen Batman look so defeated. Even the points on his cowl meant to look like ears drooped. “I… can’t. I’m sorry, Jason.”

“But why?” It was just one person, and he was barely a person anyway.

“I’m so sorry, Jason.” He kept saying that, but if he really meant it—

you would have killed that fucking clown why would you walk away and leave me like that I was alone again you weren’t there again why did you do that why won’t you do what I ask why don’t you feel torn apart when you see me how are you fine when I can barely breathe around you

—Jason didn’t care if Bruce was sorry. Sorry didn’t get clowns dead.

“You deserved so much more than this. You were… you were my greatest failure.”

“If I’m such a failure, why would you save me?” Jason demanded. He scrambled to his feet. The tears that streaked down his cheeks were a relief against the oppressive heat of the fire.

Batman was a blob of cape and shadow, huddled against the roof like a sad, wet, black umbrella. He sighed, and Bruce asked, “What else could I do, Jason?”

“You didn’t save me the first time!”

Jason hurled a knife because it felt like there was one lodged in his ribcage. Batman dodged it easily.

“Why would you do that?”

“What else could I do?” Bruce repeated. “You’re my son.”

“I hate you.” Jason hated the wobble in his voice, the way it cracked. He really did mean it.

“I know,” Bruce said. “That’s okay.”

“I hate you!” Jason threw another knife, which Batman dodged again. Then he drew another gun, and the man stilled. He wanted to shoot, so badly he wanted to shoot, but again his finger wouldn’t listen to his brain.

Feet scuffed against the roof when Nightwing landed, eyes darting between the bare-faced Jason and stone-faced Batman. “B, I could really use your help. And you, Jay—”

“Don’t talk to me,” Jason seethed, not looking away from Batman’s face. “Don’t you fucking talk to me.” This was all too much. He couldn’t deal with it.

What fucking right did Batman have to save Jason right after he’d left him with the Joker?

Jason could tear Bruce into a million pieces with his bare hands and the man would still never understand what this felt like.

“Is this what you wanted?” Jason shouted, fury alight with the Gotham that burned around them. His eyes blurred with tears until he couldn’t tell Batman apart from the shadows.

“What I want is all my sons alive,” Batman said. Nightwing flinched as if he’d been struck.

“They won’t be,” Jason vowed. “Not if I have anything to say about it.”

What he meant was that he would track down Dick and Timothy and slit their throats again and again until the death actually stuck, then stab them a couple times in the chest for good measure, and just to be sure, dissolve their bodies in acid. If Jason couldn’t have a family, then Bruce didn’t deserve one, either.

But Batman seemed to take that a different way, because he said, “That’s what I’m worried about.”

Softly. Not angrily. Tired.

Jason was so, so tired, but he couldn’t sleep. Something other than the Joker was haunting his dreams, and Bruce couldn’t scare away these nightmares like he used to.

Batman said, “You’re killing yourself in pursuit of a revenge that you don’t even want, Jay.”

How dare he call him that. That was the name of the child he’d let die. Jason had crawled out of the grave entirely different.

“Who says I don’t want it?” he snarled. He wanted it. Jason wanted to see the Joker die; the explosion in ACE Chemicals certainly hadn’t been enough to get rid of that cockroach. Whenever he resurfaced, Jason would be ready to see the life leave his insane eyes. Jason would bleed every criminal in Gotham dry if it would convince Bruce to kill the Joker for him.

“Then shoot me.”

“Wha—” His voice cracked. Jason swallowed and said, “What?”

Nightwing moved forward, frowning with worry. He’d made up with Batman, obviously, heart big enough to care for everyone in the world except Jason. “B—”

Batman held out a hand to keep Nightwing at bay. And it did. When Jason died, the slightest suggestion of an order from B made Dick bristle with indignation, but he listened without hesitation now. “It’s okay,” Batman said.

And Jason knew he would be. If Jason shot him and he bled out on some random Gotham roof, he’d die feeling superior that Jason had enacted some revenge that he considered juvenile.

So Jason only hesitated a second before shooting Nightwing.

This time when Talia’s phone rang, Jason Todd was not on the other end begging for answers she was not sure she could provide.

She would likely not be able to answer these questions, either.

“Hello, beloved?”

“Was it you?”

Bruce Wayne’s voice was more haggard than Talia remembered hearing in a long time. Not even during their League trials had he sounded so defeated. Only when he confessed in the dark, when it was just the two of them, about his parents, his guilt, his obsession. It was then that Talia had realized he would not be her absolution. His pursuit for justice would always outweigh loyalty to her. It was why she was not surprised when he left.

“I am afraid I lack the context of this conversation, beloved.”

“Don’t play stupid, Talia, you and I both know you’re anything but.”

“You have a strange way of offering compliments, my love.”

“Don’t call me that. You have no right.”

“Tell me what troubles you, beloved.”

“Jason. Jason Todd, my—” His voice caught. It was impossible, but he sounded even more distraught over a boy he’d watched over for three years than his own parents. “I recognized his tactics. The League trained him, didn’t they?”

“Why would you ask me to confirm what you already know?”

“How could you do that?”

“I made him better, beloved.” Made him into the perfect weapon and pointed him at the only things standing in the way of her plan to thwart her father’s. And he’d failed. On both counts.

“He was a child,” Bruce said, his voice eerily calm. “He was a child, and you forced him into training that nearly broke me—”

“But you survived, my love,” said Talia. “And so did I.”

“I was an adult!”

The bellow was so loud that her phone’s speakers rattled. Something on his end shattered.

“I was an adult and I consented. You took a child, you took my child, and forced him to be tortured and to torture. How could you? He was my son! You should have given him to me the moment you resurrected him! How could you keep him from me?”

Talia’s fingers spasmed around her phone. She stared at the door that connected a child’s room to her own. In a short while, they would be having this conversation again. “It wasn’t my plan, beloved.” It hadn’t started out that way, at least. She’d taken some creative liberties with her father’s initial idea. He hadn’t exactly been pleased when she sent Jason back to Gotham.

“You’re a coward, Talia,” he said after a moment. “If you wouldn’t go against your father, you should have told me. I would have gone to the ends of the earth to get Jason back.”

“My love—”

“Don’t call me that,” Bruce snapped. “You don’t love me. You can’t feel anything for anyone. If you did, you wouldn’t have kept Jason a secret. You wouldn’t have turned him so angry and encouraged him to attack Tim. If you had even a shred of decency, Talia, you wouldn’t have tortured my child.”

The line went dead. Talia waited a long time to lower the phone from her ear.

Bruce was wrong. She did care. About him. About Jason.

But she cared about Damian most.