Chapter Text
Jason crouched in the grove, next to the fluffiest available tree. Not that it covered much. Anyone driving by who bothered to look around would see him. He felt like a kid portraying a bush in a school play. But it really couldn’t be helped. The little area was only masquerading as a ‘natural wild’; it was too well maintained to offer anything even approaching wild or natural. Including cover.
Fucking rich people.
Though to be fair, midday wasn’t the best time to try camouflaging in bushes regardless of the level of upkeep. But needs must. Sooner this was done, the better. Every day, every hour, increased the risk of discovery. Jason had made his decision two weeks ago. There was no going back. No other destination. No matter what Jason felt about it.
Jason took a deep breath to center himself and push down the itch that had started somewhere under his sternum when he’d first laid eyes on the depressingly familiar gate no further than a stone's throw away. How many times had he watched it swing open welcoming him h… No. Jason cut the thought short. There was nothing there for him. And no point daydreaming. Especially not now.
The most dangerous part of a mission is when the goal is within reach.
Jason couldn’t remember who had given that advice, the voices were mixed in his head like they tend to be nowadays. Regardless, the sentiment was apt.
They were not safe yet.
Jason glanced left in the corner of his eyes just to ensure that the boy was still there. It wouldn’t do to lose him at the very last leg of their journey. Damian was still there, like he’d been for the last ten minutes of their silent surveillance, still as a stone. He was significantly better hidden than Jason, taking full advantage of his size. Jason was kind of proud.
Jason spoke just loudly enough to be heard right next to him: “Ready?”
A stiff nod was his only answer.
Jason moved. The grass changed to gravel under his shoes. He could hear a second set of footsteps right behind his own, creating a slightly faster rhythm to keep up with his longer legs.
Jason didn’t bother with the gate, aiming instead at a stretch of the fence looking just like any other part to an unsophisticated eye. Once he reached it, he turned around and squatted, locking his hands together to form a step. Barely a breath and he heaved up, not that much strength was needed. He took a couple of steps back and took a running jump. He was a lot taller and stronger than when he’d done this last, so it was barely any effort at all to grasp the familiar edge of the brick, reach his other hand for the top of the fence and heave himself up. He rolled, tucked, and dropped down, not bothering with the large oak right in front of him. The drop didn’t even jar his feet. Damn, some change was good. Jason rolled on the ground to get into a bush right next to the oak and looked back.
The branches of the oak shook faintly as Damian swiftly climbed down and dropped to the ground, taking cover like Jason himself.
Jason didn’t give himself time to falter and stood up. He headed straight to the front door. They were within the premises. No use hiding any longer, the cameras by the door would get them anyways.
Damian almost sprinted after him, but Jason got to the door first and hit the doorbell. Damian glared at him but hastily took place next to him and pulled his spine ramrod straight, even straighter than his usual pose. He also adopted a polite, pleasant expression that Jason hadn’t seen directed at him since their first meeting. Like that time, it vividly reminded him of the boy’s mother. Apparently, the little demon had been taught about the importance of first impressions.
Jason breathed. The whole operation, including taking places, had taken barely a minute. Almost done. He was almost done.
‘Get Damian to the Manor’, had been a constant refrain in his head during their journey. He’d planned, hustled, bargained, and fought, and here they were. He’d thought of this moment countless of times, running through the possibilities and probabilities. He was prepared. And yet…
The sound of the bell almost echoed. What was taking so long?
Midday wasn’t the optimal time to drop by, especially on the weekend. Too much time for all the bats to wake up, too easy for all of them to be at home. But a choice to wait to check and scheme inevitably included fighting more ninjas with a kid to protect on his back. At least the risk included in dashing to the finish line was mostly to Jason himself. And it wasn’t like Jason often had the luxury of good choices.
Jason needed to get out fast. The steps forward were simple: leave Damian to safety and run away to the wide unknown, as far as he could get. Probably shouldn’t run too fast, because then the League would get revenge out of way and Damian could settle into normal life. Didn’t mean he had to make it easy for them though. He had some ideas. All, of course, hinged on getting this part of the plan over with.
The last note of the echo died to absolute silence. Damian looked at him. Jason could see the uncertainty on the boy’s face. Jason frowned. Nobody being home wasn’t an option he’d considered. There was always somebody in. Right?
He reached forward and ringed again, this time with more aggression.
Fucking stupid. All this time worrying that they might recognize him and then nobody opened the door. He couldn’t just leave Damian. The only place safe enough to put him to wait alone was the Cave, and that was packed with way more cameras than Jason felt confident he could dodge. Something new had to have been put in since the last time, and one of them, either through coincidence or design would catch his face. Then they’d never let go. An anonymous and soon dead League operative as the mysterious escort slipping away was one thing, but with a picture, following him would be too easy. A good picture could change the game. What if they recognized him?
What if they didn’t?
The door swung open. Jason moved.
He scooped Damian up by the armpits and pushed the kid forward. The indignant squeak drowned under the sound of blood rushing in his ears. Oh, he was a fool, a straight-up idiot, there was no way he could face Alf—
“Did you just try to hand me a child?”
…That wasn’t Alfred.
Notes:
Behold, Katz writes something else than SladeJay!
Originally, I got this idea early this year, very soon after I started writing fanfiction at all (I read a lot of ‘Jason returns home’ stories at that time and I love them). But at the time, I couldn’t figure out where the story would go from the starting pitch. So, I just let the kernel be, occasionally huffing and puffing about it.
Enter JayStephWeekend. And oh boy. This is the result.
My approach to canon is to pick and choose what I think best suits the story I’m trying to tell. So parts of this will be canon-compliant, some are fanon, some are my own preferences/interpretations and some just fit the story. Canonically, this will be closest to Lost Days, but again, I'm not sweating it.
Comments and kudos are much appreciated and adored.
If you notice any typos, please point them out.
Feel free to offer some concrit if you notice something.
(And yes, I do note the irony of a story for JaySteph week only featuring one line from one of them. But fear not, this is just the first chapter)
Chapter 2
Notes:
In honor of the JaySteph weekend, the second chapter on the second day.
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
The voice was a register higher and several decades younger than Jason had been expecting. Jason pulled Damian back to his chest.
“Who the fuck are you?”
A glare was the answer. Jason registered long blond hair. Teenager, not particularly tall but not small either. Obviously in shape but lacking the ethereal sense of immediate danger. No weapons visible, slightly belatedly drawing into a ready pose allowing for fast movement. Wearing sweatpants and a T-shirt, clear loungewear.
Not a guest.
“Did B adopt a new kid already?”
“What?” the girl said, indignant, “I’ll have you know I’m not B’s--- No actually, you first, who the fuck are you?”
“Language,” said Damian, dangling.
“Where’s Alfred?”
“He’s not – no, he’s right there with a shotgun, so start talking, mister!”
“If Alfred was in, he’d opened the door!”
Damian chose that moment to start wiggling. “Let me down, you goof!” he hissed, “This is unbecoming!” He tried to kick with his short legs, still hanging in the air. The kid must’ve known at least five ways of getting down (most of them ending badly for Jason) but apparently, he was still on his best behavior. Jason wasn’t. He unceremoniously let go.
Damian hit the ground and straightened up with a tut, throwing a quick glare Jason’s way before hastily pulling his face back into that polite ‘I’m much older than my height suggests’ smile. Damian smoothed his T-shirt down in a gesture that was mostly a lost cause as the T-shirt had been worn for most of the week and currently held a sheen of dirt and sweat. Not that it sporting some incomprehensible children's cartoon character helped much.
“Maybe we could continue with the introductions inside?” he suggested.
“No, I’m not going to let two strangers just waltz in! You could be crazy robbers or something!” the girl said. Her eyes flicked from Damian to Jason to scanning the empty yard behind them, never quite letting Jason out of her sight. She mightn’t be an active threat, but she was definitely something.
Regardless of her wariness, Jason was hundred percent sure he could overpower her. After that, he could leave Damian inside to wait for somebody else and haul ass away from here. Anywhere was better than here. But that’d defeat the purpose of showing up in the first place. He really didn’t want Damian’s introduction to the manor to be violence against one of his potential future allies. Something good had to come out of this. Had to.
The thing was that Jason knew what he looked like. The boyish soft curls, usually his main asset in smooth-talking, didn’t help much overgrown and sweaty. His eyebrow sported a grand new gash from the last batch of the ninjas trying to stop them. His clothes were worn and muddy, clearly cheap in the first place. With his muscles, he wouldn’t have been out of place in any gathering of Gotham goons in the darkness of Crime Alley. Down to the something desperate lurking in his eyes. He looked dangerous, like an animal that could lash out at any moment. Anyone with an ounce of training or street wisdom could read it of him.
“Look,” he said, trying to make his voice unthreatening. At least shoving Damian around like a sack of potatoes had shown he wasn’t hefting weapons. And the ones he did have were well hidden. “I don’t know who you are, but they’ve left you here opening doors, so you must know stuff.” The girl’s face drew alarmed for a moment before closing off, just a beat too late to be convincing of casualness. She opened her mouth, but Jason barreled on.
“We know that Bruce Wayne is Batman.” Jason heroically resisted a deep-seated urge to glance around conspiratorially to check if a bunch of villains had suddenly manifested to hear that highest of secrets said blasphemously out loud. “Alfred’s code name is Agent A, and we are all currently standing right above the Bat Cave. We need help. He needs help. Let us in.”
Us. Fuck.
But Jason couldn’t just leave Damian with an unknown entity. Wasn’t right. And he was at the door. He could see just a glimpse beyond the boundary. And he…
The girl stared.
“Please,” Jason gritted out.
The girl looked at Damian one more time before letting the door open all the way and stepping back to let them in.
And so, for the first time in years, Jason Peter Todd stepped into the Wayne Manor, once his home. Now a monument to all he’d lost.
The slight impression of empty space hung all around like a shroud that muffled all changes. The carpet was still the same. The parquet was slightly scratched by the stairs. The chandelier filled the foyer with dim light contributing to the grandeur, like the vases and other very elegant ornaments, placed with infallible taste. It looked exactly the same as when Jason had first stepped in as a scared twelve-year-old.
Nothing touched this place.
“Well?” said the girl, pulling Jason’s attention back to her.
Damian drew to his full height, chest puffing out, like a tiny peacock.
“I am Damian al Ghul,” he declared, with a voice that absolutely belonged in a room like this, “son of Talia al Ghul, grandson and heir of Ra’s al Ghul, the Demon’s head.”
There was a moment of silence.
“Okay,” the girl said, stretching the word, “good for you. And they are?”
Jason swallowed a laugh only to produce a strange cough as Damian blinked, looking more flabbergasted than Jason’d ever seen. After a second of floundering, he took pity.
“Try the other side of the family tree if you want a reaction, squirt,” he said, keeping his voice light and teasing. Damian glared at the nickname but rallied, drawing straight again.
“I am ibn al—”
Jason coughed. The girl stared at them blanked faced.
“Using Arabic won’t help your case, kid.”
“Fine!” said Damian, glare morphing to a pout, “I am Damian Wayne. My father is Bruce—”
“What?!” Shit, the girl had mighty lungs. “B has a kid?” Her face contorted in outrage. “He left you?” she demanded, stepping arms raising as if to sweep Damian into a hug, ready to raise hell on his behalf.
“B doesn’t know,” Jason blurted before he had time to think better. Damn. A surprise urge, almost a reflex, to defend B had surfaced without his conscious input. Defend his parenting even, what the fuck.
His statement got the girl to stop moving and frown. Jason continued before she could ask, “Talia hasn’t told him.”
“Ah,” said the girl, losing her steam almost as effectively as Damian.
There was an awkward silence as all three of them stared at each other. At least he could take comfort in knowing that he wasn’t the only one who was floundering in the unexpected.
Damian was the fastest to rally. Jason got the distinct impression that the boy had prepared a speech in his head and was trying to salvage what he could. “Mother send me here to learn from my Father, to complete my training with the best there is.”
Yeah right, thought Jason, just managing to keep a snort inside. Bruce was plenty good, but Jason seriously doubted he was the best at anything. What made him so formidable was the combination of preparedness, obsession with gathering information, and ability to improvise. And what really raised him above anyone else was the sheer bullheaded determination. The man just didn’t quit. Hell or Highwater, Batman pulled through. His way.
None of that made him a good teacher.
Based on the look on the girl’s face, she shared at least some of that assessment. There was none of the worship and wonder Damian’s voice or almost glowing little face held. That Jason had held before a crowbar and six feet of dirt had taught him better. She was polite enough to keep from voicing any of it, though, which, nice of her. To not crush the dreams of a child about his father.
“Sure,” she said, “And how –not to doubt you – do I know you are B’s son?”
Damian looked at the girl and his polite mask slipped to an incredulous ‘are you an imbecile’ look that was much more at home on his face in Jason’s experience.
“DNA, of course,” he said, “I am perfectly willing to give a blood sample for analysis.”
The girl grimaced. Jason sighed.
“She isn’t going to lead us to the Cave with just her here, Damian.”
Her mouth pulled to an ironic expression. “Yeah, not gonna happen.”
Damian frowned. He didn’t enjoy being doubted, Jason was sure. He had probably pictured a triumphant entrance to the manor, valiantly reclaiming his new rightful heritage. And suddenly, he had to prove it some other way.
“Check the pictures.” Damn, his mouth really was running away from him today. Maybe that was a side effect of approaching death. Or maybe just the manor. Anyway, it was out now and both Damian and the girl were looking at him. No way out but forward.
“Damian looks a lot like Bruce as a child.” He gestured to the wall of the corridor that was covered by family pictures going back decades. “They say,” he added belatedly, when the girl kept looking at him.
Damian perked up at the chance to prove his claim and took a beeline to the picture wall. Jason followed more leisurely trying to look like he didn’t know exactly where Bruce’s childhood pictures were. The girl hovered, borderline awkward, not quite letting either of them out of her sight, but also not able to hide that it was what she was doing. Hmm. B’s social training was incomplete then. But good instincts. She shouldn’t trust Jason.
He should help though if nothing else then to speed things up. The girl seemed fine and Damian was in. The faster they proved Damian was who he said, the faster Jason could leave. Before anyone else showed up.
He let his gaze lad on the wall, ready to stroll through, and then casually nudge Damian to the right set. Old ones mixed with some new ones Jason didn’t want to look closer. Dick with his parents, an official portrait of Dick and Bruce, Dick making a cartwheel in his Gotham Academy uniform. The placements had significantly changed, where were the pictures of—
Then he saw it.
Jason stared. He had seen it hundreds of times. Had stared at it too many times to count, always with an immense feeling rising in his chest. It was of a little black-haired boy standing on the stairs of the City Hall, protected under an arm of a man standing beside him. The boy was staring at an official-looking piece of paper he held, almost clutching it. Wonder and awe were clear in a shy smile he sported. That picture had been on the front page of many local newspapers and spurned almost a media storm with praising stories following one another. Jason could recite some of them from memory.
GOTHAM’S MOST CARING MAN ADOPTS AN ORPHAN.
BRUCE WAYNE EXPANDS HIS FAMILY.
Pity that the little boy wasn’t him.
Notes:
Next up, Steph POV
Chapter Text
“Well, shi—gosh darn,” Steph said, glancing down from the picture to the boy beside her and back. The resemblance to an eight-ish-year-old Bruce was stark. The hair, the nose, the shape of the face. The most obvious difference was skin color, the baby Bruce was as ghostly-white as the adult version. But other than that… Anyone making the comparison would have a hard time explaining the blood connection away.
Damian examined the picture closely and turned to Steph. “They were right, I do look like him.” A boyish, excited grin spread to his small face. He looked like a weight had been lifted from his shoulders. The alternatingly prickly and polite shell cracked and Steph saw a little boy thrust into a new situation in desperate need of a connection.
She grinned back. She had a sudden desire to see more of that grin. “Yep,” she said, “Alfred’s gonna blow his casket, when he sees you, right?” She aimed the last part at the other boy.
Who didn’t react. Steph looked around; he’d been right there beside them…
His was focused on the other part of the picture wall. It held the current family pictures, the one showing Tim’s adoption, very young Dick, and a few newer portraits of all of them.
“Hmm?” he said, gaze snapping back to Steph.
“I said,” she repeated slowly, trying to pinpoint what had captured his interest, “that Alfred is going to blow his casket.”
The pictures didn’t show anything incriminating or new, and they haven’t changed the whole time Steph had been around. She had the impression that changes happened only when somebody joined the family, and nothing ever came down. They were the showpieces for a reason, nothing should be new for a person who knew as much as this man seemed to.
His slightly vacant eyes focused. Then he snorted, not soon enough to be a natural response.
“Nah,” he said, voice almost successfully approaching something you could call light, “Alfred would never do anything as uncouth as that.” He reached to ruffle Damian’s hair, not even slightly deterred by the resulting swat and an indignant squeak. “Though you might warrant an oh my.”
Steph laughed before she could stop it. Damian beamed even as he tried to flatten his hair back.
“Well, nice to meet you, Damian Wayne. I’m Stephanie. I’m…” What was she? Part of the gang? Daughter of an overworked nurse and small-time crook whose megalomania got better of him? “A friend of the family,” she finished lamely. To cover, she quickly continued, addressing the older boy: “And what’s your name?”
The boy shook his head. “I’m the escort. Doesn’t matter.”
“I have to call you something,” she insisted. ‘The older boy’ was getting really old on her head.
“I don’t give a fuc..fudge what you call me, call me whatever you like.”
Steph tilted her head. Really?
The boy’s thoughts run the same route as he quickly pointed at Steph and said, “Nah-ah! Don’t try to be cute.”
“I don’t need to try,” she said and winked. Boy’s lips slightly ticked up. Steph looked at him critically up and down. Tall, moving in a controlled way very reminiscent of Bruce, wearing ratty clothes and in need of a shower. Young, but in that ambiguous way that made it difficult to pinpoint the exact age, especially because of those eyes. They had the same look many hungry kids on the Crime Alley had. A caustic mix of determination, pain, and loss. Steph would eat her mask if he was more than a few years older than her. She didn’t particularly want to cement any of that to a name though. Something obvious and not insulting then.
“How about… ‘Red’?”
“How imaginative,” Damian said.
“And what does Ibn al Xu'ffasch mean exactly?” Red said pointedly. “Red is fine,” he added to Steph.
Steph looked from one to the other. “What does it mean?”
Damian looked extremely reluctant, but at Red’s lifted eyebrow muttered, “Son of the Bat.”
Red snickered and Steph grinned. “Yup, sounds creative.”
“Would you call my father now?” Damian asked, pulling them back to the point.
Steph looked at the hopeful eyes of the little boy. If this was a ploy, it was a damn good one. And Red, while he was obviously a threat, also knew Alfred. And well.
Well, damn. Bruce and Tim could chew her out later for trusting too easily.
“I would if I could,” she said, “B’s away. He’s expected back early next week.”
Damian’s face fell.
“Away like... in a business trip?” Red asked.
“Business trip in space.”
“Can’t you send him an emergency signal or something?”
“If you don’t mind the Justice League busting through the ceiling.”
Red got a faraway look in his eyes. “Wouldn’t mind if it was Wonder Woman.”
Damian elbowed him hard.
“Hey!” Red yelled indignantly, “Don’t knock it! She is the best member of the League, by miles.”
Steph interrupted the starting scuffle by saying, “Sorry to crush your dreams of meeting her, but that’d have to wait for Alfred anyway. I can’t get to the Cave. Not by myself.”
Both boys looked up, eerily similar surprised looks on their faces.
“Seriously?” Red asked, “How long have you been a vigilante?”
Steph shrugged, suddenly uncomfortable. “Not long enough, apparently,” she said, trying to keep the defeat out of her voice, “B says I need more training.”
“Everybody needs more training,” Damian said.
“How are you supposed to train if you don’t have access to the Cave?” Red asked, frowning.
Steph swallowed. She made do. But she had to admit that it stung. Not that she wanted to say it out loud to somebody so obviously trained as Red. He didn’t seem condescending though. More like honestly baffled.
“Anyway,” she said quickly, “Bruce is not available, Alfred should be back in an hour or so. He’s just picking up Tim.”
Red grimaced.
“That’ll have to do. Time for us to go our separate ways, squirt,” he said and slapped Damian on the shoulder, “There’s a pair of Wonder Woman socks somewhere screaming my name.”
Damian’s hand darted forward and grabbed Red’s wrist. “But Father is not here yet!”
“Kid, you’re safe here, we talked about this,” Red said and gently pried Damian’s fingers off his wrist. “Though-” he addressed Steph, “-you might want to call Nightwing for backup until Bruce is back.”
“Why?”
“Well, when he said his mother send him here… That might’ve been a bit of an overstatement. She didn’t exactly clear it with Ra’s.”
“The Demon’s Head.” Nobody with a title like that could be a good guy.
“The leader of the League of Assassins. We might’ve been running away, just a bit.” Yup, just like advertised. Bruce’s long-lost son showing up wasn’t enough drama, there had to be assassins after them. Of whom she knew nothing. Great. A wonderful time to be out of the loop.
“Don’t worry though,” Red added quickly, “you’re all safe here in the Manor. Ra’s respects B too much to raid his home. And it’s too late to hide Damian again anyway.”
True. Say what you want about B, but the man was relentless: if Damian would be snatched back now that his existence was known, B would track him to the end of the earth. And further, considering his recent planet hopping.
That left only one end dangling. “What about you?”
Red, already halfway to the door, seemed surprised that she’d asked about him. After a second he shrugged, careless. “What about me? I brought Damian, safe and sound. Not much else to do.”
That didn’t exactly answer the question. Based on Damian’s frown, the kid had noticed it too.
“But—"
“I can’t stay here,” Red said quietly, cutting Damian’s protest short.
Steph opened her mouth to offer up one of the numerous guest rooms like she was sure Alfred would’ve insisted if he were here. Red’s eyes flickered to her and the words coming out of her mouth changed midstream.
“How about the Drake Manor?” she said instead, floundering for other options, “Or my place?”
Red wasn’t declining out of politeness; his eyes told her that much. When he said he couldn’t stay here, he meant it.
“You need to hide, right? Somewhere not obvious.”
Damian was now looking at her too, a kindling hope in his eyes, nearly holding his breath.
“Drake Manor is cold and empty and just over there.” She vaguely gestured in the right direction. “There’s not much market for hundred-plus room behemoths. And Tim’s lazy with stuff like that, there’s nothing upcoming.”
Red grimaced. Steph was sure he was about to decline and hurried to continue, “Or my place! It’s in the Narrows, so much closer quarters, but it’s still nice.” Better than running.
Red’s head tilted and a considering look settled on his face. “What about your folks?”
“Oh, it’s just my mom and me. And she’s…” away in business, she stopped before that came out. She lifted her chin. She wasn’t ashamed. She was proud.
“She’s in rehab, for the month at least.”
Red’s demeanor changed. But not in a way of many others she’d said that to, even Tim. There was no pity in his eyes, only solemn solidarity. Understanding.
Red would be proud too.
“You’re welcome to it,” she blurted trying to avoid the sudden prickling in her eyes. She prattled out the address. “It’s in…”
“I know where that is,” Red interrupted, “Used to live about seven blocks east.” His voice had a new, intimately familiar drawl. Steph stared. Seven blocks east would be smack in the middle of the very worst of the Crime Alley. Red smiled grimly.
Then he stood up, severing eye contact and the strange solidary settling between them.
“Thanks,” he said, “I’ll check it out.”
Damian looked at him. “I’ll stay around,” he said gruffly. Damian opened his mouth. Red threw his hands up, “All low like, cheez. I’ll be fine.” Damian smiled and nodded, pleased.
Red shook his head. Then she looked at Steph and drew straight. Somehow, in a span of an eyeblink, he was no longer a teenage boy in ratty clothing but someone Steph wouldn’t have wanted to meet in a dark alley. He pulled threats around himself like a cloak. The hair on the back of Steph’s neck stood up.
“One more thing,” he said. Steph wasn’t sure if she wanted to hear it.
“You’ll see a bunch of bodies show up today or tomorrow. The dead kind. The League usually cleans after themselves, but since Damian is out of their reach… You’ll know when you see them. It’ll be obvious who I was talking about. It will ring all kinds of bells.”
“Why leave them then?”
“Cause Ra’s is a petty bi—guy,” he corrected, apparently remembering the man’s grandson standing right by. “Can’t have Damian back, so the next best thing is to ruin things as much as he can.”
Steph frowned. “By murdering his own people?”
Red’s face hardened. “I killed them,” he said, “and a lot of others, to get Damian here. Safe.”
Steph swallowed. Dangerous, she thought. She’d forgotten in their newly found solidarity that she knew nothing about the young man before her.
“Which brings us to the point. Tell B that if he makes Damian Robin, I will do that again.” He turned around and marched to the floor. Without sparing as much as a glance, he was gone.
Steph looked at the boy he had been left with. Damian looked back, suddenly looking a bit nervous again.
“Well,” said Steph, trying to keep her voice from shaking, “let’s see if we can find you something nicer to wear before Alfred comes back.”
Notes:
The rest of the chapters won't be out this rapidly as I have to work next week, but I do have a sizable chunk of them written.
Next up, Alfred and Tim will show up for a while.
Chapter Text
“For the hundredth time, I don’t know anything more.”
“There has to be something! Has to be!” Tim’s hands gestured restlessly, encompassing the large screen that was sporting dozens upon dozens of pictures of Red. They were all stills from the security cameras, and notably none of them, even compounded, showed his whole face. Stephanie was grimly impressed. Tim, not so much.
“It is not that difficult to avoid the cameras,” Damian raised the point he’d repeated more than a few times too, with an increasingly bored voice. “All one needs is a deep hood and a slightly lowered head.”
“No,” exclaimed Tim, slightly more manic than in previous repetitions, “that’s where you’re wrong, my young friend.” Okay, that address was new, and based on Damian’s face he didn’t much care for it either.
“He also somehow managed to show the same side of his face to the cameras, every time!” Tim pushed a couple of buttons on the computer and the pictures pulled into a stack that started to flick through rapidly. “Every time!” he yelled as picture after picture flashed on the screen. “Coincidence? I think not!”
Damian threw Steph a look. She didn’t yet know the kid very well, but was pretty confident that her interpretation of This is where you’ve brought me? was pretty close to the money.
“Tim…” Steph started, only for him to ignore her completely and barrel on. She sighed. There was a reason they hadn’t worked together. Though that might’ve also had something to do with him refusing to tell her his name while asking, nay, demanding to know everything from her mother’s maiden name to her freaking college plans.
“He must’ve known where the cameras are!” Tim continued, again repeating a well-trodden point, and brought up new pictures, “And he knew how to get to the Manor grounds without any alerts!”
Steph felt like she was slowly boiling over. They’d been at this for hours. She really wanted to push Tim’s chair over and maybe stamp on him a little. The distinctly murderous look on Damian’s face told her that he was contemplating something similar.
“Both of those are information he could have received from Miss al Ghul”, said a measured voice behind them all, “who, as I am sure you all know now,” - Yes, after Steph had received an incredulous how can you not know the League? and then, after some yelling from her part, a slightly sheepish crash course to the inner workings of the al Ghuls clan - “is in possession of such knowledge and perfectly capable of getting such information. Any member of the League she would charge with the protection of her son surely is capable of using it.” Alfred gracefully stepped around Tim’s cast to the loose circled three of them had formed around the computer. He offered Damian a slight smile. “More tea, Master Damian?”
Tim sighed. His shoulders slumped a little and he raised a hand to pinch his nose between his eyes. A frustrated gesture copied right out of Bruce’s habit bank. Steph wondered if either of them had noticed.
“Did he say anything?”, Tim asked, slightly subdued, swiveling in his chair to face Damian, “Made any impressions, revealed any interesting habits? You were with him for two weeks.”
Damian shrugged and sipped his tea declining, this time, from repeating what he’d said several times before. By now, Steph could copy the boy’s intonation in his head: He is a member of the League. Mother charged him with escorting me to Father. He answers to ‘Red’ here in America. Could be American, talks several languages with different accents. I don’t think he was planning to stay in Gotham.
Such carefully drafted and fully factual statements.
Steph copied the gesture. “He wasn’t exactly forthcoming,” she said, “we spend most of the time going over the introductions.”
“That’s a lot of time for introductions.”
The first time that particular sentence had come out, especially laced with the questioning, almost suspicious tone, had come out, Steph had very nearly started throwing things and looking for the closest brick. Tim had retreated, at least a little, after Damian had asked how much time exactly it should take to introduce the long-lost son of the owner of the manor. This time, Steph just shrugged again.
“Dangerous, trained, young,” she repeated her own previous points, slightly abbreviated, “Apparently, his next goal is the get Wonder Woman boxers.”
“Socks”, corrected Damian.
A teapot clinked against the table. Alfred abruptly straightened up from where he had been studying the pictures on the screen. The picture show had ended on the best shot of Red’s face that Tim had further manipulated. You could see the line of his jaw and just a hint of one of his eyes, the curls falling over the other. Not good enough for reliable recognition, but just enough to set some search queries running. Not that Steph held much hope on good matches, no matter how many secret databases Tim had.
“Interesting aspiration for a young man such as himself”, Alfred said mildly, his gaze lingering on Red’s curls for a moment longer, “Nevertheless, it would seem that this avenue of inquiry is quite exhausted. I’m afraid we will have to wait and see what comes of this mister Red if he resurfaces. If his connection to Gotham was only to Master Damian, he had now fulfilled his duty and we may never see him again.”
Alfred looked at the stubborn set of Tim’s jaw and redirected his attention to a more receptive target. “Master Damian, I have set up your room. If you follow me, I’ll show you.”
Damian nodded and slid down from the table. As he walked by, he cast Steph a look far older than his years. Yeah kid, thought Steph and looked back steadily, we’re in this together. Somethings you didn’t say to obsessed detectives. It just didn’t feel right.
Tim swiveled back to the screen, cast almost knocking to the legs of the table. “I’m missing something,” he declared. Back in the day, Steph had thought he was talking to her when he got like this and eagerly tried to help, but now she knew better. When he got like this, he didn’t really need anyone to bounce against and definitely didn’t need (appreciate) anyone else’s input. A rubber duck would do just as well.
Steph turned around. She might as well do something useful.
***
Steph yawned wide when she came down for the breakfast the next morning.
“Good morning,” Alfred said, all prim and proper even this early in the morning. Steph felt distinctively out of place in the pristine kitchen in her pajamas.
“Morning,” she replied and sat down. In moments like this, she really missed her mother, no matter how good the food was.
Damian, finishing his toast and what looked like a cup of tea politely nodded at her.
Alfred pushed a cup of coffee and a plate containing a beautiful omelet in front of her. “We were just working on a list of things master Damian needs,” he explained. Before Steph could object, he continued: “All of which I will be purchasing, as master Damian should stay in the manor, as discussed.”
Damian looked slightly rebellious before the polite look settled in again. He hadn’t liked the decree they’d settled on yesterday but had to admit that going anywhere before Bruce was back and they knew if the League was hanging around wasn’t smart. Steph could sympathize but there was probably enough new territory to explore in the Manor to keep from boredom. Damian would be fine. Especially as it seemed that Dick was very enthusiastic to get to know his new little brother.
Steph slowly ate her omelet as Damian and Alfred finished the list. Finally, both of them seemed happy and Alfred stood up.
“We will try to contact master Bruce again today, after Master Dick wakes up.” Steph noticed he didn’t mention Tim, but both of them knew full well Tim would spend this day too hauled in the Cave, trying to crack the case of mysterious mister Red, or failing that, move to some other mystery. Whatever the focus, nobody would see much of him for some time.
“And what are you planning on doing today, miss Stephanie?”
Steph looked up and caught Damian’s eyes. Kid’s face stayed the perfectly polite mask it had been the whole day after Red’s departure when anyone else was in the room. But he kept looking at Steph, again and again.
Steph thought about the defeated look in Red’s eyes. The way it seemed as if he had lost something between arriving and looking at the pictures.
Don’t go, Damian had asked. Steph was getting a bit of an inkling of how difficult it was for Damian to ask for things.
Not much else to do, Red had said. No going back. No plans going forward.
”I think”, Steph said slowly, “that I’m going to swing by home.”
Notes:
In the next chapter, we get (back) to the focus of this fic, ie Jay and Steph.
That chapter needs some rewriting though, so we'll see how my schedule goes.
Chapter Text
Jason balanced the grocery bag against his chin as he pushed the door open with his shoulder and gingerly stepped in. Now to actually—
Somebody was in here.
The door started to swing closed. Jason slid his hand to his waistband, towards the hidden knife. Where exactly were—
“Oh, thank god, you’re still here.”
--and relaxed. He stepped forward, rebalancing the groceries, and looked over the bag. There, standing in the middle of the living room was Stephanie.
She grinned: “Didn’t want to explain to the kid that you were gone.”
Jason frowned. “I said I’d stay.”
“Yeah, but there’s like zero signs you’ve ever been here, did you even sleep? Wait, are those groceries?”
Jason huffed and walked into the kitchen. “A guy has to eat,” he said.
Stephanie trailed after him, settling in the doorway. “Plenty of food in the fridge.”
“That’d be rude.”
Stephanie’s eyebrows rose. “You’re a member of an international league of assassin-ninjas and worry about manners?”
Jason laughed as he started putting the groceries away. “You haven’t met T. Talia,” he elaborated at her uncomprehending look, “She’d had my hide if I was a bad houseguest.”
Stephanie blinked. “Did you just call the Daughter of the Demon T?”
Jason frowned. “Well, Damian calls her mother.”
“Are you…”
“No, she’s not my mother,” Jason cut in sharply, “I have enough of those.” No more mothers for him, two was more than enough. “She’s…”
What was Talia to him? His training and the highest quality of it was purely on her, but it wasn’t for the goodness of her heart. She’d manipulated him and stalled him for years. He’d finally meant to confront her about it and start the ball rolling on his actual plans in their last meeting. But the logistics of it had been tedious and extremely slow to arrange. When he’d finally got to the meeting place and came face to face with Damian, he’d understood why the extra hoops.
Talia had given him everything he’d asked for, gotten to know him and when it was finally time to reach for his goal, yanked it all from under him. He hadn’t seen it coming and couldn’t walk away. And she must’ve known it. Had she planned for it all along? Had Jason been a deliberate escape hatch for her son?
He’d never truly know. After all, the best manipulation led to where there was only one option. And an escape hatch only needed to work once.
“She took a huge risk for me. She saved me and took care of me when I couldn’t do it myself.” All of that was through. Regardless of the motivation, he owed her. It also didn’t change what would happen when or if they’d meet again. “And when we meet again, she’ll have to kill me.”
Stephanie blinked. “What?”
“I took her son.”
“With permission!”
“Allegedly.” Jason smiled a little, remembering Talia’s very careful wording of the location of Damian’s room and the security around the building. “The Daughter of the Demon, the second of the League, couldn’t just give the heir away.”
Stephanie’s gaze sharpened. “But ‘T’ could.”
Jason nodded. “Say what you want about Talia, but she does love Damian.”
Of that Jason was absolutely sure even if he’d only seen them together briefly. She loved him enough to send him away while it was still possible. To the only place he’d be safe for the years to come, no matter how much it hurt her or her chosen carrier. A hard choice with a steep price to be paid. Jason respected that.
Stephanie hummed thoughtfully. They lapsed into silence as Jason put away the groceries. It was weirdly comfortable. Jason should be freaking out about an unknown vigilante at his back, but somehow, he wasn’t. Huh.
“I thought you’d be staying at the manor,” he said.
“I am, mostly.” Stephanie shrugged. “I come around every couple of days or when I feel like it. The manor is just so...”
Empty. Cold. Full of history and ghosts. Jason could sympathize. It’d taken him weeks to touch things without feeling he’d taint them with his grubby hands.
“Besides,” Stephanie continued, “I wanted to check on you.”
Jason’s mood soured. Fuck. He didn’t need any more busybodies watching his every move and making sure he stayed in line. He made his own line, thank you. Before he could say it, Stephanie continued.
“Damian misses you.”
Really? The kid had been pretty fucking excited to get to Gotham and not particularly nice to Jason, driving him up the wall on more than one occasion. Though it might be that that was the sign of Damian liking him. There couldn’t be many people who treated him like a kid, not a prince or a mission statement.
Well, Damian should have plenty of attention from his new family. Dick would probably be around for him like he’d been for the new Robin.
“He should concentrate on bonding with his new brothers.”
“He likes you better, I think.” Something warmed in Jason’s chest. Huh. Well, the kid was the only one then. And whatever fondness there might be it wasn’t going to withstand Dick’s charm offensive for more than a few days. Everybody loved Dick. Especially when the other option was measly him.
“Besides, Tim is wholly consumed with finding out more about you. Doesn’t have much time for actual people.”
Jason huffed. Should’ve guessed, like father, like son. That also meant that his days of obscurity were numbered. Damn. Jason had tried to keep Damian out of the loop, but the closer they’d gotten to Gotham, the more tidbits he’d let slip, mostly to entertain the kid or calm his (admittedly quite well hidden) nerves. The picture every piece of information would form was fragmented, but someone with the tenacity of Batman could and likely would see through it given enough time. He’d counted on being far away at that time. Or dead.
“It’s a bit difficult though as all he has to go on are hair color and a bunch of partial pictures. About the same part of your jaw, I might add.”
Good, at least that part of the plan had worked-- Wait, what?
“What?”
Stephanie looked at him shrewdly. “According to Damian, you didn’t talk much and won’t stay in Gotham. Just an escort chosen by Talia.”
“Oh.” He’d thought Damian would tell his new family everything he possibly could and gleefully. Damian didn’t owe Jason anything, at all and he had a lot to gain by talking. Him staying mum was… Jason wasn’t sure what he felt about it. The warm feeling in his chest was back.
But Damian wasn’t the only one with information that could fill the picture.
“What about you?”
Jason wasn’t sure what had possessed him to divulge where he’d used to live, but he could keep it in when faced with Stephanie’s fierce eyes just daring him to drop some lukewarm platitude or judgment. Bleeding heart, Talia’s voice whispered in his mind. Yeah, right. As if his kill count didn’t prove otherwise.
Stephanie squirmed a little under his attention. “Didn’t seem right to expose the kid,” she muttered. “Besides,” she continued more strongly, “I have a distinct feeling that if Nightwing busted through the window, you’d be long gone. I don’t want to make you break your promise.”
“And you’d never hear the end of it from the kid.”
They grinned at each other. Jason felt a bit of the pressure slide off his shoulders. Damian would be fine with Stephanie watching over him.
“So, you want dinner?”
“You cook?”
“Hey, an international assassin-ninja isn’t a 24/7 gig. I do have hobbies. You’re welcome to help.”
Stephanie smiled again and slid fully into the room. Yeah, they were going to be alright.
***
Stephanie gulped in a large mouthful of spaghetti. After a second her eyebrows shot up. She chewed and swallowed with some difficulty. ”Is this…”
“Alfred’s recipe, yeah.” Jason couldn’t contain a proud smile. The spaghetti had come out exactly as he remembered it.
Steph lowered her fork. “Alfred doesn’t let anyone in his kitchen.”
Jason thought about the fire Dick had somehow managed to cause one of the few times he had been around and decided to make some popcorn. Then of the unforgettable pungent smell of the smoke column that had resulted in one of B’s adventurous attempts on something more intricate than a sandwich.
“No, he doesn’t,” he agreed.
He’d like to say that him being the exception was about skill and recognition of those, but the truth was it was more likely about pity, at least in the beginning. Jason had been so eager to learn to cook, learn any ‘real’ housekeeping, really. He’d wanted so hard to be good and earn his keep. Later, it had been about enjoyment, the joy of cooking and spending time with one of the few friends he’d had back then.
God, he’d been such an eager little twerp.
Steph squinted at him. “Okay, are you fishing?”
”What?”
”You keep throwing around all these little hints and hooks. Alfred this, and Bruce that, and you keep calling him ‘B’!”
Jason blinked. He had been dropping hints, hadn’t he? Coming to Gotham had loosened up his tongue, hearing the familiar lower city accent all around him. The secure feeling he had hanging around Stephanie left his guard down. And things slipped through.
“Are you someone I should know?” Stephanie asked, “Like the League?”
Jason a year ago would have yelled ‘yes’ at the top of his lungs. Of course this girl, obviously part of Batman’s troupe should know about him, should recognize him, should avenge him…
But she hadn’t known who Talia and Ra’s were. She didn’t get to the Cave alone even though she was older than Jason had been. B’s secretive and controlling tendencies were on full display here. And he already had a Robin.
Besides, it wasn’t like Jason was important enough to avenge or mourn or even keep as part of the family. Why would he be important enough to mention?
Better he just came to terms with that.
“No,” he said, “apparently not.”
Steph frowned at the forlorn note in his voice. Jason tried to steel himself against the inevitable questions. Guess this was the moment it all had to come out and he would have to run after all. How would he even explain it? He was so fucking tired already.
Then Stephanie proved once again she was made off a different cloth than the Bat clan. She let go.
Jason blinked as Steph took up her fork again and stuffed an enormous bit of spaghetti into her mouth. At his stare, she shrugged. “’ is good,” she mumbled around the mouthful, just managing to keep all of it inside. Gross.
”So,” Stephanie said after some chewing and swallowing, mouth blessedly empty this time, ”while you’ve been taking time off assassin-ninja-ing, have you been following Gotham Knights?”
Jason groaned even if a smile tried to creep into his face.
***
Jason looked out of the window. The sun was setting, illuminating the objectively weird but to Jason oddly comforting shapes of the Gotham skyline. Even though some details had changed, it was still his city.
The last time here he’d had a clear and singular objective of killing Batman that had kept the desire to explore at bay. This time he’d planned to be in and out in less than a day. Now, he’d been roped into staying for a week or at least as long as it took for Damian to forget about him. He hadn’t considered how deeply the city itself would feel like home. Gotham was in his bones. Not even dying in a faraway country could sever that bond. How the hell was he going to stay sane doing nothing?
A polite cough behind him stalled his thoughts. Jason turned around. Stephanie had changed to her costume. Jason blinked. It was a lot of purple. A dark hue though, not too bad for a city camouflage. And it wasn’t like Jason had a leg to stand on when it came to colorful attire. At least he could blame Dick.
Stephanie’s suit was comparatively plain, with not a lot of padding, but well placed. The mask had tech, but the hood was just a simple hood attached to a cape that looked way more homemade than the bat brand usually sported. No utility belt, just a grapple gun hanging from a regular belt. Good, sturdy boots.
Not bad. Just nowhere near what Batman could do. Didn’t B fucking finance her?
“Catch,” she said and threw him something.
Jason didn’t fumble, just caught the item and looked at it. It was a grapple gun.
“Want to come to patrol with me?”, Stephanie asked.
Jason looked at the gun. The weight was hauntingly familiar in his hands. “That isn’t exactly laying low”, he hedged.
“Noup. But were you going to do that anyway?”
“…Do you have a spare mask?”
Notes:
Well, the chapter count went up by one as this chapter became way too long with the patrol scene... I didn't want one chapter to be doubly as long as the others, hence cutting here. Hence, next up, Steph&Jay patrol, Jason POV :)
As usual, comments and kudos are much appreciated. Also, if you notice typos please point them out. I get really blind to my own writing.
Chapter Text
Jason had forgotten what it was like to fly. The catch and release of the rappel gun, the wind in his hair, the exhilaration of the moment when he was weightless.
The first few swings had been kind of awkward, but then it’d come to him, like an old friend. Despite everything, his past, his new size, some things remained.
Jason grinned and let a little bit of a laugh gathering in his lungs out.
Stephanie, no Spoiler now that they were out, made the bat signal for stopping. Jason almost startled, he hadn’t thought about those in years, yet the meaning was immediately clear. She neatly landed on a roof that didn’t seem any different from the ones surrounding it. Industrially grey, decrepit, seen better days.
Well, that was Crime Alley for you.
Jason followed suit. At the last moment, he couldn’t resist and added a double flip before landing steadily on two feet. Parsing the expression under Spoiler’s mask was difficult, but he liked to think it was just a little bit awed. That’d been picture perfect, thank you very much. Yeah, he still got it.
“Okay,” Spoiler said. She didn’t sound impressed. “Ground rules. No killing.”
Jason stopped grinning. “Playing by the Bat rules, huh?”
“I’m serious, Red. We are not going after some super criminals here, just some patrolling.”
Translation: play by the rules or stay on the bench.
Jason looked at the city, felt the wind on his face. It was a beautiful night. The city lights glinted; the air was light with promise. He could stay or Spoiler could take her toys back and go home. At this time, he was the guest.
“Fine. No killing. I can play nice.”
Spoiler nodded, smartly declining from thanking him or making it a bigger deal than it had to be. “Good,” she said, “Anything special you want to see?”
Everything, anything, Jason thought. It had been so long. The last time had been colored by a single-minded quest for revenge and the weirdly bubbling green rage. And he’d walked away at the end of it, bomb unexploded, plans forming. All that was gone now, no purpose anymore. So now, this time, he had this moment to just enjoy it. His city.
“Lead the way.”
***
“You know,” Jason said, swaying his legs over the edge of the roof, “just because I have killed and will kill again doesn’t mean I just kill everybody willy-nilly.”
Stephanie froze in the middle of chomping into a large bat burger. (Fucking bat burger. Jason loved the entrepreneurship in this city).
“I do see the desperation, hell, I’ve lived it. I know that a lot of the people whose heads we’re busting don’t have much of a choice.”
It hadn’t escaped Jason’s notice that their patrol route had kept them strictly in the Narrows, Crime Alley, and East End. At first, he’d thought she was trying to keep him contained but it had become increasingly clear that this, especially the Narrows, was Spoiler’s turf. She knew many of the people, from the girls on the street corners to the apparent repeat offenders trying to steal from the corner store. And she cared. Not that they always respected her, but that was what a good right hook was for. She was of this city, of this neighborhood, and knew how it run. Nobody could ever tame it, but she had chosen her corner and tried to make it better. Funny, how different people made similar plans, even if their approaches differed. Jason’s plans had been a lot more bloody.
“But some people will never change, no matter how many chances you give. They just take and take and take and scramble everybody else under their feet. Sometimes you just gotta put the vermin down. Permanently.”
There was a long moment of silence as Spoiler chewed her burger. Finally, she swallowed the last time and asked: “Do you know why I chose the name?”
“Spoiler?” Several jokes about sleds and seeing dead people were on the tip of his tongue, but he swallowed them down. Teasing her about her self-chosen identity didn’t seem right, especially when he was starting to learn more and more about the lack of respect held for her. There were a lot of hits still needed. And she was going somewhere with this. “I’d guess you spoil the plans of bad guys.”
“You got it in one. But not ‘guys’, just a guy.” She looked down at the streets below them. “My dad-he…. He’s not just a thug. He’s Cluemaster.“
The name wasn’t familiar to Jason, but he didn’t need the details. Every Gothamite knew what it meant when someone was referred to with a name like that, with a capital letter.
“Somebody had to do something. And since I knew, that somebody could be me. Weren’t many others queuing up for it. I…”, Steph hesitated, “When we were after him, I was so glad Batman doesn’t kill. I don’t want my dad dead. ‘Cause even after everything he did…”
“He’s still your dad,” Jason finished quietly.
“Yeah. Everybody is somebody’s dad or brother or sister or something. Prison might make my dad better. I don’t think I want to be the one to decide who is too far gone.”
“And what if it’s Joker?”
Spoiler froze. Jason hadn’t meant to blurt that out, especially not with laced as much hate and fear as it that. After a long moment of silence, Spoiler said quietly: “Joker’s a special case.”
“He should be dead,” Jason said. How many burned orphanages were left in his wake? How many kids in graves they didn’t crawl out off? “Batman should’ve killed him a long time ago.”
“I…” Steph seemed to struggle with herself. “I don’t think I could do it.”
Jason looked at his hands, feeling the phantom weight of the trigger for the bomb under the Batmobile.
The first time Jason had killed with the full knowledge and intent had been at Egon’s compound. Vermin, each and every one of them, preying on the vulnerability of others. Traffickers deserved nothing else.
He wasn’t completely sure if those were his first kills per se; the only thing he remembered from the hotel room when he’d first heard about Joker being alive was the green fog of rage and despair and his hands breaking on various surfaces, furniture and faces alike. He hadn’t turned back to check, not even to look up the local newspapers. But by then, it’d been too late anyway; the League did clean after itself.
“And you won’t know until you do it.”
Stephanie cocked her head. “That’s it?”, she said warily.
“Hey, I’m not telling you what to believe, that’s B’s thing. Not everybody can do it. Or should do it. Can’t deal with themselves after.”
For him, it had been… Not easy as such, but clear. Nothing else but death would’ve put stop to it. He could've left them all be, just kept his head down and complete the training. But he’d been the one who was there.
Jason didn’t shed tears for the thugs, mercenaries, and child molesters he’d left at his wake.
The yawning abyss B had evangelized about, the slippery slope, the inevitable end, hadn’t materialized for Jason.
And yet…
“Cause B is right in that it does take something.“ Jason wasn’t sure if the old him could’ve done it, the boy with the stars in his eyes and hope in his heart. “Especially if you don’t have a choice.” ‘Cause wasn’t that really, when it came down to it, why he was here? He wanted Damian to have the choice.
“Other than that… Sometimes it’s worth it, sometimes it isn’t. It’s just a tool. Like with any other, you can get over-reliant.”
“Everything looking like a nail…”, Spoiler muttered.
Jason laughed. “Yeah, something like that. But the point is: B’s way isn’t the only way, even if he makes it seem like that.”
“My way or the highway,” she said. Hah. That could be the bat motto.
The companionable silence settled again as they both took bites of their burgers. After a moment of chewing, Stephanie broke it.
“Dad’s in prison now,” she said, “Bruce wants me to stop. Tim wants me to stop.”
Jason mulled that over and swallowed the rest of his burger. “It’s not up to them though, is it.”
“They could make doing this safer. Make me better.”
“They could.” He shrugged. “But if they’re always trying to make you stop in the background, can you trust them to train you?”
“You’re saying I should quit?”
“I’m not saying that. Only you can decide that. B could prance ‘round the world in his training tour ‘cause he had money and nobody leaning on him. There are no perfect choices for us Alley kids.”
Stephanie smiled a little sadly. “Just the ones you can live with.”
Wasn’t that the truth. Every alley kid knew that it wasn’t about the big things. Those were the shooting stars, the one in the million chances. Like a hungry kid trying to jack the tires of the Batmobile. Even they had their price, and somebody always paid. Sometimes it was about the small things you could set right, right here, right now.
Jason considered his burger. Since he was here…
“Hey, Stephanie? Do you have a sledgehammer?”
“…why?”
“I wanna desecrate a grave.”
Chapter Text
Gotham graveyard was damn creepy after dark. Steph followed Red as he weaved his way between the gravestones, a sledgehammer hedged over his shoulder. They’d ended up breaking into a hardware store for it (leaving money on the counter, naturally. They didn’t even need to discuss it). Steph had suggested a crowbar as an easier option but was denied with a vehemence that’d shut down any further argument.
“You been here before?” she asked as Red expertly avoided a very large, almost grotesque grave statue. It was a cupid, probably. Otherwise, it was just a fat baby holding a bow. Steph wasn’t sure which was the better option.
“Twice,” he said over his shoulder, “once visiting, once just going.”
Okay, that wasn’t ominous at all.
Steph considered for the hundredth of time if she should confront Red about all the hints he kept haphazardly dropping. But the look of pain in his face when he’d said Steph shouldn’t know him stopped her once again. She didn’t want to pile on whatever tragedy Red had going on, especially since it seemed to be intrinsically linked to Bruce. Steph didn’t particularly want anyone to come poking at her relationship with him; she could allow Red the same courtesy. No matter how much her curiosity itched.
That was the reason she was here after all. It wouldn’t really do for Spoiler to vandalize a public graveyard, but come on, there was no way she could let Red go alone. Especially since she had a niggling feeling that Red really shouldn’t be alone to do whatever it was he came here to do. Setting something right left a worryingly wide spectre of options. Digging up a grave would be Steph’s limit though. Graverobbing, no thanks.
In front of her, Red finally stopped. Steph warily drew beside him and looked at the gravestone before them.
SHEILA HAYWOOD
LOVING MOTHER
Date of death roughly three years ago. The name meant nothing to her.
Red’s face was as stony as the granite before them. He stared in silence, not even blinking.
Then, in one swift movement, he stepped forward and swung the sledgehammer. It connected with the stone right in the middle of the letters with a resounding bang. In the silence of the graveyard, it echoed.
Barely stopping, Red swung again. As the hammer lifted, Steph could see that the words had already shattered to cobwebs in the position of impact. Bang, the hammer hit again, and the stone tilted back with the force.
This time Red didn’t immediately repeat the action.
“What a fucking joke,” he said, “Such love that she sold out her son to keep her embezzling scheme going.” He lifted the hammer again, hefting it back for more force. “To fucking Joker! What the fuck did she expect to happen? That he’d just left her go after?” More letters shattered with the new hit and the ground around the stone loosened. “And then they fucking buried her right next to him, just to add insult to injury. As if there wasn’t enough of those, but no, fucking crowbar and a bomb were not enough.”
The stone tilted. Red put his boot on it and pushed. For a moment, the ground held, but then, slowly, the stone tilted over and fell to the ground. Red stared at it, panting harshly. Then he picked up the hammer again and set to demolish it, to erase the last remnants of the offending text.
Steph swallowed and blinked rapidly to keep the emotion in. Joker. Suddenly she really didn’t want to know who she’d been to Red. Okay, maybe she could ensure that Red had his moment by making sure that nobody had heard the ruckus and come interrupt them.
She started to turn around when the grave next to Sheila’s drew her attention. Unlike Sheila’s it had a statue: a large angel hovering over it. Something about it’s posture made is seem more threatening than protective in the dark. The epitaph read:
HERE LIES JASON PETER TODD
BELOVED SON
Jason Todd. Where had she heard that name?
Some other phrase tried to push to the forefront of her mind besides ‘beloved son’, something else belonging after that name. She could almost see it, engraved in a small impersonal plaque, efficient and cold. Not on a grave though, but something similar…
‘He was reckless and he died’, Tim’s voice said in her head. He was showing up the Cave and she’d asked about the thing that stood out like a sore thumb, impossible to miss especially when sitting on the computer. A glass dome enclosing a green and yellow uniform, fit for a form much smaller than Stephanie or Tim. Scrupulously clean, but the mending lines glaringly visible under the harsh light. B turning away the only time she’d try to ask him about it. The ominous warnings to stay far away from Joker and to follow orders. Stricken sorrow on Alfred’s face when she’d asked his help, trying to spot the boy in the wall of photos to have a face to the name.
“I hate that angel.”
Steph swirled around. Red stared at the grave, the sledgehammer and shattered remains of Sheila’s gravestone on his feet.
“Jason,” Steph whispered.
Red’s eyes flickered to her. For one maddening moment, she thought, hoped, that he’d deny it. Frown and call her an idiot for drawing wildly inaccurate conclusions based on nothing, just her imagination without a shred of credible evidence.
Instead, he grimaced.
“You…” Steph choked on the word ‘died’. It couldn’t be a lie, right? A ruse? To what end? “There’s a memorial for you in the Cave,” she blurted.
“Yeah? What does it say?”
“A good soldier.” What a thing to say, she realized belatedly, about a dead child, an actual person in that empty uniform.
Red, no, Jason, huffed out a laugh.
“Funny,” he said. “Everything left of me is a lie. I’m not even lying there, so it’s three in two lines, that’s almost impressive.” The forced smile dropped off his face after a long, painful second and he stepped forward, crouching on the edge of the grave.
“Did you know,” he asked quietly, “that there’s a graveyard in the Manor? Every Wayne is buried there, going back centuries. Bruce’s parents, his grandparents, all of them.” Jason reached out a scooped up a handful of dirt. “Except me.” He tilted his hand, letting the dirt slip through his fingers.
“Guess he never did mean any of it. The adoption was just a formality.” He looked up, a bitter, mirthless smile twisting his mouth. “I was just a soldier. Not even a good one.” He laughed, once. It’s such a hollow, forlorn sound. “Never did follow orders very well. Especially not at the end. But what’s a boy to do when Batman says ‘stay put’ and Mother says ‘Come in. He’s gone.’” His voice broke at the last word. He hung his head and had to push one hand on the ground to stay balanced. Faint choking sound game out.
Steph didn’t know what to do. How could she possibly make this any better? Should she even be here?
But ‘should’ didn’t matter because she was here. The only one here.
She stepped forward and put her hand on Jason’s shoulder. His breath hitched, but he didn’t shake her away. Steph squeezed gently. She wasn’t going anywhere.
“Why do you do it?”
Steph startled as Jason broke the silence. His voice was rough, but he wasn’t crying anymore. Steph had no idea how long it’d been.
“Keep going out,” he elaborated without looking up, “You caught your dad. Why continue? Especially if Bats want you to stop.”
“I want…” Steph paused to put her thoughts in order. Jason deserved a real answer, not a flippant ‘spite’. “Batman wouldn’t have even noticed Cluemaster without me. I wonder how many others slip through when their schemes are small enough. Or hit the people in my area.” Steph thought about all the kids she’d saved from beatings, the small amount of order she’d managed to bring to the Narrows, the way it was getting safer to walk around at night. “I can help. I want to help. I am helping.”
Jason looked up. His cheeks were tear-stained, but his small smile was real. “Yeah, that’s what I loved about it too.”
He swept a hand on his face and stood up, turning his back to the grave and the angel. Steph kept her gaze at him. She couldn’t help with all of it, it was too large, but something smaller, maybe manageable tucked at her.
“You’re not a lie,” she said.
Jason blinked. Then he shook his head. “Jason Todd died in that warehouse. I’m just what crawled out of his grave.”
“No,” Steph said firmly, putting that tidbit of information aside, for now, Jesus Christ, how was this information dump getting worse and worse, “whoever you are now, however different, it’s not a lie. People change, but they are still themselves.”
Jason blinked. Then he blinked again, very hard. Steph broke eye contact and turned around to pick up the sledgehammer. When she looked back, some of the sharpness Steph now knew was customary to him had returned to Jason’s eyes and he looked a bit less like a kicked puppy.
“You know,” she said, “I have a real hard time imagining you in those scaly shorts.”
Jason let out a startled laugh. It was a bit wobbly, but so much better than before. “Start with me being about a foot shorter and 100 pounds lighter. I was pretty fucking cute.”
Steph grinned. She handed the hammer back to Jason and they started walking away. Steph kept glancing at Jason from the corner of her eyes. She had some difficulty believing this was real. She suspected that that’d continue for some time. There were so many pieces she’d need to arrange in her head to actually get the complete picture. Which might be difficult since she wasn’t sure if she really wanted to see all of it. Sometimes ignorance was bliss.
For now though, she was curious about something in particular. ”Can I ask you something?”
Jason shot her a look. She was pretty sure it meant to convey ‘you just did’. She resisted the urge to stick out her tongue.
“Why now? I mean you’ve been back for- I mean dead, not-dead…”
Jason, luckily, seemed more amused than offended at her awkward floundering. “I’ve been back about a year, one and half more if you count the time I was pretty much braindead.”
Aaaand, there it was, the next awful tidbit of information to put on hold for now.
Steph persisted. “I mean, you don’t seem like you wanted to come back to Gotham. Why now?”
Jason was quiet for a moment as if pondering the answer. They’d reached the gate before he spoke. “Damian is almost seven,” he said, “Within next month or two, he’d be expected to swing a sword in one of Ra’s trials. And those are not for show.”
Steph stumbled. “But he’s six!”
Jason shrugged. “It’s the League training. There’s a reason it’s so efficient. Anyway, Talia made his age explicitly clear when she introduced us. And since I knew about him…”
“You couldn’t just leave him,” Steph said.
“Yeah. I was there, so. Even if it meant…” Jason trailed off.
Steph nodded. She didn’t know what else Jason had given up to be here, but Damian was safe at the Manor. It seemed to be worth it. “He’s a good kid,” she offered.
Jason tutted, huh, where was that gesture familiar from? “You clearly haven’t shared a room with him. He’s insufferable.”
Steph laughed. She couldn’t help smiling. The city lights of Gotham were again bright before her, washing away the creepy silence of the graveyard. Small things, she reminded herself, made all the difference in this world.
“What?” Jason asked, glancing at her.
“Oh nothing. You’re just such an older brother.”
“We’re not brothers! I met him what, two weeks ago.”
“Mm-hmm.”
“We’re not!”
“Yeah, keep telling yourself that.”
***
In the end, Stephanie didn’t see them coming.
A scream caught her attention and she cut her swing short to drop on a low roof. She scanned the streets below, they were almost totally abandoned at this witching hour right before dawn. A scream sounded again; there! Two figures rounding on the third in a dingy, dead-end alley.
Steph dropped down, faintly hearing Jason call after her. Whatever, explanations could wait, he’d follow her down.
She landed neatly right behind the two thugs and cleared her throat. “Haven’t you heard it’s impolite to--“
The rest of the sentence dried on her throat as she was harshly tucked back and pushed by a strong arm, Jason was suddenly standing between her and the trio.
Except it wasn’t three anymore.
Men and women, tall and short, all clad in identical black, loose, slightly oriental garb, faces hidden. If she’d ever pictured what an assassin-ninja would look like, these were textbook examples.
Jason looked at her over his shoulder. All the vulnerability from earlier was gone, his face now again the hard mask, ready for anything.
“Run,” he said.
Where to? Even if she wanted to leave him, all the exits were covered. And she wasn’t leaving him, that much was sure.
Instead, she turned and pushed her back against Jason’s and drew to a ready stance. Let’s see how assassin-ninjas fight.
Nobody talked. Nobody moved.
Stephanie wasn’t sure who broke the standstill but suddenly the alley erupted into a cacophony of movement.
A hit from the left forced Steph to dodge, and she moved with the momentum to punch another ninja in the ribs. The ninja nimbly contorted in a way Steph hadn’t expected and the solid hit became more of a grace. Steph danced away from the counter strike and tried to swipe the legs under another ninja; damn, they’re fast. The sweep became kick in a move borrowed from one of Dick’s and it connected solidly with a knee; Stephanie felt something give and couldn’t keep a bit of a grin away. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Jason deftly elbow a ninja on the nose, pull a backward flip, and hit another without a pause. Steph had about a millisecond to be impressed with his moves before she had to dodge again. She spun and dodged and punched, some connecting, some don’t. The ninjas swarmed and there was nothing but the fight.
Steph sprung up from a dodge when a strong arm wrapped around her neck and wrenched her back. She staggered, losing her balance. Her flailing arm was caught and painfully yanked up. Her knee hit the ground, but she barely noticed the jostle through the pain radiating from her shoulder.
“Stop”, a voice hissed in her ear. Something slid right under her chin, forcing it up. Steph froze.
“Stop!” The voice was yelling this time. All the ninjas moved backward as one, a few of them staggering unsteadily. Now free of other bodies, Jason came to view. He was standing in the middle of the alley a fighting stance Steph didn’t recognize, somehow both light on his feet and absolutely planted. His sleeve was torn, the hood was off and there was blood on his face. He was holding an enormous, serrated knife with a grasp that showed he absolutely knew how to use it. Had used it, in fact, based on the blood that was slowly sipping from the blade.
Everything was still. The muscles in Jason’s jaw jumped as their gazes connected.
Steph stared into his eyes and horrifyingly, felt her own starting to prickle.
There are stronger foes than you have seen, Stephanie. Stronger than you know. You’re not ready. Bruce’s voice echoed in her head, loud, condemning. I’m sorry’, she wanted to yell. Not to Bruce, but to Jason who’d been holding just fine on his own. But because he was with her…
Liability, whispered Tim’s voice.
The ninja holding her said something in a language Steph didn’t understand. The harshness of a threat was plenty clear, though.
Please, Steph thought, not even knowing what she was pleading for.
Jason dropped the knife.
Notes:
...Surprise?
The tag will come to play next chapter.I'm experiencing *a bit* of a burnout at work, so I'm not sure if I have the bandwidth to edit the next chapter during the work week. Writing is a good way to think a something else though, so maybe? Anyway, it is mostly written so it should be okay by the next weekend. :)
Chapter 8
Notes:
In this chapter, the tag ‘character death’ comes to play. Check the chapter end note for more details and instructions if you want/need to avoid it/know more.
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
Steph’s knees hit the hard ground and she couldn’t stifle a grunt. It came out muffled even to her own ears in the confinements of the sack over her head. She didn’t have much time to adjust before the sack was unceremoniously yanked off. She instinctively tried to cower as the lights hit her eyes, but the light was so low that it didn’t take much to grow accustomed. A single lightbulb. What a cliche.
A low grunt drew her attention to the left just in time to see Jason’s face appear under the similar sack. His eyes snapped to hers, Steph could see the question in them. She didn’t have time to try to summon a reassuring expression before Jason’s gaze slid left and hardened. Something cold settled on Steph’s throat and she couldn’t help swallowing. She could almost feel her skin splitting. Damn it.
She tried to remember the protocol for capture. Where was the emergency beacon when she needed it? She wouldn’t have minded Wonder Woman busting through the ceiling right now.
Okay, parring that. What were the steps if there was no hope of immediate rescue? Tim and Bruce had drilled her on endless protocols, one of them had to be useful for once.
Assess.
She was on her knees, hands tied back. She was pretty sure the ninjas had used simple zip locks, at least that was what they’d used on Jason. The most pressing obstacle on her road to freedom was the damn blade on the throat. It was at a perfect angle so Jason could see it, but had no way to reach the wielder with Steph between them. At least not before Steph would be bleeding out on the floor. And Steph… She briefly fantasized about bursting into a fast movement and freeing herself, dazzling everybody with sheer awesomeness, Jason’s face twisted in awe. Right. Sure. That’d totally be the outcome of her moving.
She was stuck. And because she was, Jason was too.
Wasn’t that kick to the teeth.
Steph slowly released the air in her lungs and tried to keep calm. She didn’t need a step-by-step guide to know that if the ninjas just wanted to kill them, they'd already be dead. This was about something else.
Okay. Assess the location.
The warehouse was empty as far as she could see in the scant light, just various boxes scattered around. It looked exactly like any other warehouse in Gotham. Sometimes Steph really lamented on what a crook’s paradise Gotham was.
None of the ninjas said anything. They didn’t even move. Steph almost admired the discipline. Her own muscles were quickly growing tired of the forced position. She felt the itch to move under her skin, just a finger, or a toe, or…
She stole another glance at Jason. He had frozen too, staring resolutely ahead, not moving and seemingly content with that. She was just as unnaturally still as the ninjas around them.
League training is efficient.
Something moved in the shadows. Footsteps on the concrete. Every ninja snapped to attention, spines straightening to ramrod. Steph’s head snapped up.
Click, click, said the heels.
A woman stepped into the dim light, emerging from the darkness that a moment before had held nothing but empty space. A day earlier, Steph wouldn’t have recognized her, but the painfully thorough briefing had included an ample number of pictures.
Talia al Ghul. Daughter of the Demon.
They were screwed. Talia was here personally.
Steph wished they would have used the emergency beacon to summon Bruce back home, damn the Justice League missions and the universe.
Steph swallowed when Talia’s gaze swept over her, disinterested and cold as a snake. Having taken her measure, Talia’s attention moved to Jason.
“Jason,” she greeted, voice cultured and honey, holding the same kind of vaguely Arabic accent as Damian’s.
“Talia,” said Jason, his voice gruff and cracked.
Then… They just stared at each other. Jason looked so tired there on his knees in front of the woman who would judge him. Resigned, almost. Like the moment he’d been waiting for had arrived.
Next time she sees me she’ll have to kill me, echoed in Steph’s head.
“B—Bruce knows he’s alive,” Steph blurted into the intense silence. The end of the sentence came out a pained hiss as a hand grasped on her hair and pulled sharped, forcing her head up.
“Steph—“ Jason said sharply, just as the ninja hissed:
“You do not talk to the mistress unless talked to.” The pain nearly brought tears to her eyes. She gritted her teeth to keep them at bay as the ninja tightened their grip. At least the knife hadn’t moved.
“Let her speak,” Talia said.
The relief was immediate. Steph nearly hit her face to the blade herself bringing her chin back down to a more natural position. She took a deep breath before looking Talia in the eyes. She nearly faltered when they connected. Talia’s eyes were the coldest she’d ever seen, bright green, much like her son’s, but this green was swirling, and deep, alluring but so, so cold. Almost alive. A shiver run up Steph’s spine, but she pushed forward. She had to make this point.
“Bruce knows now, about Jason. You already kept Damian from him, you’ve kept two of his sons.” Steph put her all into making her voice as confident as she could. Oh, how the mice puff up in front of the cat…
“I’m not his---“ Jason tried to interject but Steph plundered forward.
“He’ll never forgive you if you kill Jason now. Bruce won’t just let it be, he’ll make it his life’s mission to dismantle the league. If for nothing else, then on principle.
“And he’ll never---” Talia was a ruthless snake, Tim had said. Hard and scheming, the files had characterized. The second of the league and absolutely loyal, Jason had said. Mother, said Damian. It had to count for something. “He’ll never let you see Damian again.”
Talia cocked her head and studied Steph. Steph had never felt so much under a microscope, like a specimen under assessment. Even Bruce at his most Batman-y had more warmth and regard than Talia. Steph had absolutely zero doubt that this was the most dangerous woman she’d ever met. She could kill everyone in this room, hell, any room she was in. And would, too, if she so chose.
The files didn’t do her justice.
“I know,” Talia said silkily after an eternity of silence, still staring at Steph. Steph felt like lumping down in relief, but Jason drew straighter in an abrupt movement.
“Talia,” he said hoarsely. There was a new note in his voice, one Steph hadn’t heard before. “She is one of B’s too.” His eyes flickered to Steph, before returning to Talia. That small glimpse told her everything she needed to know. He was scared. He wasn’t before.
“Is she now?”
“She’s his new apprentice, protégé, whatever.”
“Then why-”, Talia asked, “-have I not heard of her before?”
The blade on her throat suddenly felt a lot sharper. And closer.
“She’s new,” Jason said, a bit desperately. It was a plea. Not for him, but for her. “I mean, look at her clothes. You think B would let another vigilante operate freely in his city?” Jason almost spat out the last words.
“With his control issues? Never.” Steph found her voice again to chime in, even if saying it out loud rattled. Couldn’t be worse than calling Gotham B’s city for Jason. He’d miss me, she’d say too but that was too big of a lie. She’d choke on it.
Talia looked at both of them, still as unreadable as stone. Dammit, woman, some, any, emotion would be nice! Steph was struck with a sudden comparison to Damian, on how the excitable little boy so easily vanished under an impenetrable veneer of cold readiness. Would this be what he’d become had he stayed?
Steph suddenly understood much better why Jason had been ready to give up everything to get Damian out. Including his own life.
“You took our prince,” Talia said. Hair at the back of Steph’s neck stood up. Her tone… It was like a sliding of a blade, too sharp for the initial cut to feel. “Damian is gone from us, for now. But you…” She regarded Jason again, looking down on him like a king of old, wielding judgment. “Payment must be made.”
Talia stepped backward, leaving a large space right before Jason and Steph. She raised her voice: “Bring him forward.”
Jason tensed as the two ninjas behind him stepped level and grasped his shoulders. Steph tensed too, though she didn’t know what she could possibly do. The blade still on her throat was an effective deterrent. But come what may, she wouldn’t leave Jason to face it alone. For a moment their eyes connected. She would’ve nodded if she could but could only hope her eyes conveyed the message. She’d be ready to back him up if he managed to find a play.
The ninjas pushed Jason down, but stopped after only a moment, keeping him steady on his knees, unable to move. Instead, a new pair appeared from the shadows. They were dragging a third between them.
The man’s head lolled as the ninjas hefted him down on his knees and pulled him up to face Jason, Talia, and Steph. He was all trussed up like Steph and Jason, a sack covering his head. He had not been treated kindly, based on the dirt and blood on his clothes.
Clothes that looked very familiar.
Talia stepped beside him. One of the ninjas reached forward and yanked the sack off.
“Behold,” said Talia as a shockingly familiar white face came to view, grasping a handful of green hair and harshly tucking up, “your greatest enemy.”
Joker’s face was bloody. He was thoroughly gagged with what looked like a green rag. His eyes, as crazy as always, were rapidly jumping from one person to another, before stopping at Jason. His jaw moved as if he was trying to say something before his chest contracted rapidly. He was laughing, Steph realized. Bound and gagged on his knees and he was still laughing.
Jesus Christ.
Jason choked. Steph wrenched her eyes off the display before her to check on him. Jason’s eyes were practically bulging out of his head, he was pale as a sheet. Rage, surprise, pain, all flickered on his face, before drowning under the hurt in every line, every corner.
“Talia...”, he pushed out. Steph had never heard a more desperate sound.
It didn’t even dent Talia’s calm demeanor. In one smooth move, she pulled a long, wicked-looking dagger from her waist and brought it to Joker’s throat. The man’s chin shut up what little it could move under Talia’s grip on his hair. But his chest still moved. Steph could see the corners of his mouth twisting as if he tried to smile under the tight gag. He didn’t wither under Talia’s cold gaze.
Then she moved the blade.
Red bloomed. Something hot splattered on Steph’s face. Joker full-body spasmed, limbs contorting in ways that were unnatural and pure animal desperation. His head snapped forward, eyes blown wide. A weird gurgling that would forever star in Steph’s nightmares filled the air.
“Ghh,” said Jason. Steph couldn’t look.
Nothing moved but a rapidly expanding puddle beside and around Joker’s knees. It stained his purple suit and started to seep into the fabric. That’ll never come out, Steph thought.
Talia let go. Joker – his body, his corpse, his dead-dead-dead---- – slowly overbalanced and tilted forward. Falling like a cut tree it crashed to the ground, right onto the puddle, causing it to roil and splash.
“I have taken your revenge from you,” Talia said. Her voice was unaffected, exactly as efficient as before. She pulled a green rag from her pocket, the movement finally dragging Step’s gaze from the blood (there was so much blood, how was it still coming, how was five liters so damn much blood when spread out on the floor?). Talia wiped the blade clean in neat economic motions and dropped the rag on the pool as if getting rid of the trash. She didn’t spare the corpse, still twitching, even a glance.
“You’ll never hear him, your greatest enemy, beg for mercy. Never get the satisfaction of his blood in your hands and your hands alone.” Talia stepped in front of Jason, breaking his eye line to the corpse. She raised a hand to Jason’s cheek, smearing a bit of blood there. The grasp forced his chin up and eye connection between them.
“This is your payment,” she declared. Then she lowered her voice, so quiet that only Jason and Steph would hear it. “You’ll never hear his laughter again.”
Jason drew in a sharp breath. Talia’s thumb moved minutely. The moment stretched between them.
Then Talia stepped back. “Our business here is done,” she said.
There was a flurry of movement, too fast and all-around to follow. Take care of my sons, a whisper rang in Steph’s ears as her hands snapped free from their bonds.
Steph blinked and looked around. Every ninja was gone.
Notes:
Character death: It’s Joker. Talia slits his throat and there’s a lot of blood. If you want to avoid it, stop reading when she pulls a knife. At the very latest with the paragraph starting with "It didn’t even dent Talia’s calm demeanor" (or if you want to avoid mentions of it all-together, when Joker first appears on the scene). The rest of the chapter includes various mentions of his body and the blood mulling about, so if that is triggering, skip the rest of the chapter altogether.
And yeah, apparently I'm a liar about scheduling, whuups. I kinda lost the wind on my sails and simply didn't have the energy to write (or edit). Next chapter out when I get inspired the next time, I do feel a pull to finish this up, since noncomplete stuff stresses me out. Anyway, comments and kudos are much appreciated. And as always, feel free to point out typos etc :)
Chapter Text
”You know,” Jason broke the silence, “we met before.”
Steph looked sharply back at him, abandoning trying to pinpoint the exit points the ninjas had used, gaze skittering around the edges of the still expanding pool of red. Jason hadn’t moved, not even to move his head back down from the position Talia had pulled him.
“Not too long ago. Kicked his ass,” Jason continued, the same eerie, dreamlike quality in his voice. “Meant to kill him myself. For what he did.”
He shivered and finally looked down. Right at… It.
“Held the fucking lighter in my hand,” he whispered. The red was creeping closer and closer to his knees.
“But he didn’t stop laughing. Just laughed and laughed. Just laying there on his back drenched in gasoline, laughing like he was in control, exactly where he wanted to be. Like it was all a giant joke. By him. Like the time before. And I… I couldn’t. I was back there. And I just couldn’t.”
A tear ran down Jason’s cheek. Steph wanted to reach out and wipe it away, but she felt rooted to the spot. This monologue was wrenched from somewhere deep and gnarly, so full of feeling it was taking all the air around them.
“He’s dead.” Jason huffed out something that at another time might have been a beginning of a joyous laugh. Here it died right after coming out of his mouth. An exclamation, full of elation and something horrible too.
“I knew when I came that I couldn’t force B to do it. Not now when Damian needs him. So I thought... I thought he’d never pay. Not for me.
“But she… She did it for me.” Jason swallowed. “No one has ever…” He took a deep, almost rattling breath and released it in one long sigh. Then he looked up, away from the corpse and the blood, right at Steph.
“I’m free,” he said, wonder in his voice.
Steph suppressed a shudder. If that was how Talia showed love… Jesus. She reminded herself to smother Damian in hugs when she got back to the Manor. The kid could probably do with some less intense taking care of. But for now, she’d take care of another of Talia’s sons.
She stood up and took the step that had separated them.
“Come away, Jason,” she said, “There’s nothing more for us here.” She extended her hand to help him up, but he shook his head.
“No, not yet.”
Steph frowned, “What are you—”
“I have to be sure.”
Steph took a look at the corpse. It had finally stopped switching. She quickly averted her gaze to stop seeing how the finally expired smile had twisted.
“Looks pretty dead to me,” she said. She was absolutely not questioning Talia’s handiwork. She seemed like a woman who left nothing half-done.
“No,” Jason repeated staring at the corpse, “Have to be sure that no one can…” He gulped.
Ah. Of course, a man who was mysteriously resurrected, apparently in his grave – not thinking about that right now thank you-, might have a harder time than most in believing somebody was really gone. Steph glanced at the corpse again. No medical means would make any difference, but then again, there were plenty of others she knew nothing about.
Shit fuck. Things she did for friends.
“Okay,” she said, “What do you want to do?”
Jason looked up. “Burn it.”
***
Steph now knew more about dead bodies than a hundred of Tim’s detective lectures could impart. Most of it was information she had zero interest in knowing and deeply, reverently hoped would wash out of her brain after some nice R&R.
She watched, Jason by her side as the first flames burst through the closed door of the warehouse. The inside had to be engulfed already after they had thoroughly doused everything. Jason hadn’t been surprised when they found very convenient canisters full of unidentifiable liquid. He’d just say it’d make the burning faster and hotter. The number of the matchboxes (excessive, in Steph’s opinion) they discovered scattered around the area had received similar nonreaction. Steph was now also pretty accomplished in arson. That, she hoped, might come more in handy and with fewer nightmares.
Steph thought that she should be horrified. A man was dead. Killed, no, murdered right before her eyes. Bled out in a decrepit warehouse, throat slit. And then burned.
But it was Joker. The Clown Prince of Gotham. The most despicable force of pure evil chaos Steph knew of. Every Gothamite had felt his touch, if not directly then by some associate or a horror story. The unspeakable number of tragedies, small and large, he’d left at his wake, one of them now squatting right beside Steph, face flickering from one expression to another as if he couldn’t decide what he should be feeling. Steph could relate. She had no idea what to feel. She was sure of only two things: One, what had happened was monumental and it would shake Gotham in ways she couldn’t see right now. And two, she couldn’t find it in herself to be really sad or outraged about it.
Joker was dead. And gone. Tomorrow would show what the world would make of it.
But what was still here… Steph shifted her weight and turned to her companion. Steph looked at his face, still flickering, but starting to stay more in a small smile. The same relief Steph had noticed inside the warehouse was still in his eyes as if something had been lifted. He looked younger in the predawn light, illuminated by the flames.
Because while Gotham was free, so was Jason. In more ways than one. The League of Shadows had come, extracted their pound of flesh, and gone. Damian was safe in Wayne manor. Jason… Jason was free to do whatever he wanted.
And Steph… She didn’t want him to go.
Jason looked at her from the corner of his eye.
“You do need more training,” he said.
Steph fought down a blush and looked down. She’d sort of hoped they wouldn’t have to jump to that conversation right away. Or ever. Never was good too.
She’d been, once again, useless. Tim and Bruce were right, thank God, they were not here to witness it and bring their disapproval and disappointment. Steph could almost feel the icy silence, hear the rustle of cloak or the dismissal hmm. She’d hoped for being able to impress Jason, or even show him she was competent, but the reality had bitten, as it always did.
”Hey.” Jason’s elbow gently nudged her, halting her spiral. “Everybody needs training,” he repeated. “I happen to be an excellent trainer. And my schedule is wide open.”
Steph looked up. Jason was smiling at her, a little crookedly, tear tracts still visible on his cheeks. His eyes were warm, with no trace of disdain or superiority in them. Just the same Red had looked at her at the beginning of the night. A tiny hope was kindling in her chest.
“You’ll have to stick around to do that,” she said.
Jason grinned. “Yeah, I guess I do.”
Notes:
Aaaand we're finished! Oh this was difficult, I've been having a bit of a hard time in general. But I really wanted to push this out and finish the story. And yes, I am aware a lot of things are left open, but I wanted this story to be about J&S getting to know each other, about their feelings and (limited) perspectives.
Let me know what you think! Also, I was pretty fast with this, so please point out typos if you notice any.
And, dear reader, thank you for reading this far. Hope you are having a nice day.
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