Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Damian coughed, the blood he'd expected to feel filling up his windpipe gone. 

Breathing was easier, far too easy actually. Especially considering Damian could have sworn he'd been stabbed. 

His hand went to his chest, the pain non-existent. The sword gone. 

He looked around, the last remnants of where he was slayed fading until a more familiar place. One with a bed Damian knew to be soft, the first bed, actually, that he had ever slept in and not felt like he would be attacked if he closed his eyes. He knew there would be a knife under the pillow without looking. Even if he did feel... safe, life had taught him not to become complacent. Danger would come from anywhere, and hell if Damian would be unprepared. 

His curtains were pulled back, never closed actually since Damian liked to know what time of the day it was even if he wasn't awake. His sketchbook was still where he left it, and when he-

There was a clattering from the door, scratches that turned more bolder the longer it went unanswered. Damian lifted himself up, still not sure in this reality he'd found himself in. This had to be a trick, some ploy of Mother's that would keep him incapacitated while she went for Father. What was on the other side of this door would not be Titus, it would be something else. Something planted in his mind to battle, to prove himself worthy once more. He didn't fully believe Mother would abandon him after all. She wouldn't.

The scratching continued, Damian diving to his bed to retrieve the knife. Yet, when his hands touched it, he couldn't grasp it. He tried, he more than tried, yet no matter how hard or light or little he touched he couldn't hold it. He could feel it, he could feel the smooth metal on his skin, the slide of the metal at the hilt. He just couldn't hold it. 

Damian had felt terror before, he'd grown close friends with terror in fact, it had kept him company through his training, through the long nights on his own wondering where the next sword would come from. But, Damian was always able to defend himself if something happened in those days. He didn't think, not since he'd been too young to remember, a time where he'd been as helpless as he was now, and that was more terrifying than anything he'd faced.

The scratching started again, soft whimpers accompanying it. Damian sought higher ground. He may not be able to get a knife but he would be damned it he didn't take advantage of this time alone to get an advantage. 

He perched himself on top of the doorway, his toes sliding slightly on the smooth wood. He found his balance, readying himself as footsteps started towards his door. 

The handle turned, the door opened, and something big black and familiar again bounded into Damian's room. He felt himself deflate as Titus sniffed curiously around his room. Maybe he had been wrong.

"See Titus, Master Damian is not back yet," Pennyworth said, having the audacity to step into Damian's room. Damian had made it perfectly clear that he did not like Pennyworth in his room unsupervised. There were things in here that he knew the man would report back to Father if he got wind of, and he thought they had come to an understanding. Damian wasn't messy after all. He barely had enough belongings to be messy, unlike Drake, and always put his laundry in the hall when Pennyworth made his rounds. Yet, here they were.

Damian hopped off his perch, stepping in front of Pennyworth, hoping his glare was enough to drive his point home and not be cute like Grayson said it was. "I see we may have to speak about boundaries again Pennyworth. Father will not be pleased when I tell him you have been invading my private space. I have heard him specifically tell you in the past to let me be."

Pennyworth ignored him, he didn't even spare a glance at Damian, and instead followed Titus around as the big lumbering dog sniffed around Damian's things. 

"Pennyworth!" 

Nothing. Not even a look. Damian felt himself bristle. Father had said, he had promised that Pennyworth would respect what he said if he talked to the man. 

Maybe it was his tone. Damian huffed, trying to remember how Grayson asked for things. He was always listened to, people didn't immediately shut him down. "Pennyworth, I have asked you to keep out of my room. I will forget this lapse so long as you don't do it again in future."

Still Pennyworth didn't turn around, and Damian was out of patience. He tugged the mans' arm, or, he tried to. He tried again, his hand doing the same thing it did with the knife. He could feel the fabric of Pennyworth's blazer under his hand, the muscle underneath it, but he couldn't hold it, he couldn't physically grasp it. 

Damian tried, he tried until he felt fat tears land on his cheeks. He wiped them away, his breath hitching as he realised he could touch himself, he could feel himself, hold his other hand, his tunic, but when he tried touching other things... 

No. 

"Pennyworth," Damian begged. "Alfred, look at me." He heard his voice turn shrill, a tone he hadn't employed since he was five and asking why he had to learn about another martial art when it hurt reaching his ears. "Please. Alfred, please."

The man didn't look. Neither did Titus, who usually would have been slavering on Damian's hand by now. They didn't because they couldn't see him. He- 

The blade, the blood, the world outside the window still showed the shadows Damian had left in. It was night, his father was out, his family were out fighting for their lives. Damian had been out too, until...

The spit in his lungs didn't choke him like it usually did when he cried. He didn't have a need to choke any more, he didn't have a need for spit either. Damian didn't think he had cried as much as he did that night. Pennyworth left after Titus had wandered to a different part of the manor. He didn't disturb any of Damian's things, he didn't see Damian curl into a ball on his bed, he just left, and it hurt. It hurt because no one could see him, no one would ever see him again. Everything around him was a reminder of what he had lost. A room that would no longer be his, a dog that would never lick him again. His breath that came so easily despite the fact Damian was sobbing so hard it should have hurt.

Which it did. Not a physical hurt. Never a physical hurt again. But in his heart, his silent metaphorical heart, it hurt.

He stayed there crying, after a while just letting the tears fall because it was the only thing that felt right now, until something crashed down the hall.

Curiosity won out when he figured he had nothing to lose any more. Picking himself up, Damian was glad to note he didn't have to open doors any more, nor was he trapped in his room since he couldn't grab anything.

The hallway was silent, Damian wondering which direction to turn just as more crashing reached his ears. He made his way down to the second floor, Drake standing in his way at the bottom of the stairs. Damian would have liked to think Drake was the source of the crashing, perhaps he had gotten into a scuffle with an assassin that was besting him. Sadly, Drake was intact, nursing a bandaged arm, but intact. He was merely a spectator to the chaos coming from the study.

It took some creative manoeuvring to hop over Drake since there was no way Damian was touching him, not until he figured out what exactly being dead truly meant. Damian would be lying if he didn't half hope Drake would ask what the hell he was doing as he landed. Just turn to him, look at him, but Drake was just as blank as Pennyworth, focused entirely on the study, not knowing that Damian was mere feet in front of him.

Damian poked his head around, the tail end of Father's shout finishing. Grayson was on the receiving end, giving as good as he got. Damian had never seen him like this before. He'd been around when Grayson and Father got into small fights, one or the both of them shouting into the night, but never had he seen the violence. Damian supposed Grayson had been trying to shield him from this side of him since Drake didn't seem that shocked to see things flying around. 

Both of them were upset, both of them screaming, shouting, breaking things until they were trapped in their own world of grief. As the sun rose, Grayson finally collapsed, Drake waking from his sentry post on the stairs to come comfort him. Father was still up, still pacing. He was crying, Damian had never seen Father cry, not like this. It made him want to do something, it made him want to show them he was still here, because he was, he was still here. But Damian wasn't stupid. If Pennyworth hadn't seen him Father wouldn't either.

So Damian took a seat and watched. He sat there as Pennyworth came up from the cave, for once not even trying to lift the mood by offering food or some quip he, and the rest of the family, thought were amusing. He sat there as Father finally stumbled to the ground, and he sat there as someone very familiar ran to curl up in his father's lap.

Damian had never liked the original Robin costume. He understood the design when Grayson explained it to him, but that didn't mean he had to like it. The whole thing was too bright, too obscene for what they did. While he would never admit it, Damian was kind of glad that Drake had made the modifications he had to the suit. If he hadn't, Damian would probably be wearing those scaly shorts that hugged the boy in Father's lap.

"Don't be sad Bruce," The boy muttered. "I'm sure you tried your best."

Damian felt a stab of anger, for a moment, he believed that Father had replaced him already. That, maybe, what had the family down wasn't his death, perhaps something else catastrophic had happened. Yet, Father didn't look like he noticed the boy in his lap. He didn't hug back, he didn't twitch, he didn't look at the boy that was practically clinging to him. He just sat there and wept.

The boy hugged tighter, getting himself comfortable for what would be a long day. "You'll be fine Dad. You always are."

The 'dad' was the word that made it click for Damian. He could have brushed off the curly hair and skin tone since every single one of his father's wards looked alike. Even Damian shared some of their features, his skin darker than theirs but Grayson and Todd had some colour too. Unlike Drake who was as pale as a newly made corpse. 

But Damian had seen that face in pictures Grayson had shown him. The cheeks that still retained a slither of fat, the legs that were bony, that still hadn't filled out from his abuse on the streets. It was Todd. 

Fifteen year old, dead Todd.

But, that didn't make any sense. Todd wasn't fifteen. He wasn't dead either. Last Damian saw he was trying to subtly use Drake as a human shield against an army of ninjas. Yet, there he was.

The day was long, no one opting to move for a good few hours. Damian would have found himself bored, it wasn't like he was mourning himself, but he had Todd to figure out. Dead, fifteen year old Todd. He couldn't wrap his head around it. Or why he was being so nice to Father.

Sure, Damian had seen Todd speak to Father, he was even civil before they went out to confront Mother. But he wasn't cuddly, almost Grayson-esque like he was now. He didn't leave Father's lap, sure, he moved, even lounged, but he remained in the gap Father created with his thighs. Through the long hours they all sat there in silence Todd filled it with trivial things he had done. A new book he had found in the library. A portrait he found in the attic. He even told Father about Alfred the cat and how Todd had followed him all the way across the gardens to a rabbit hole.

He was trying to make Father feel better Damian realised. Grayson used the same technique when Damian was upset. He would talk and talk until Damian was distracted enough to start thinking about something else. Only, in these circumstances it wasn't working.

"He can't hear you," Damian said. 

Todd stopped his stream of none sense, his feet that had been waving in the air stilling as he tipped his head slowly towards Damian. He met Damian's eyes, looking at the other people in the room before pointing to himself. "Are you talking to me?"

"Who else?" Damian tutted. 

Todd swung himself up, "You can see me?"

Damian looked down at himself, "Obviously." His Robin suit was still on, not a speck of blood in sight. It looked like death removed the wounds but didn't have the heart to change him into something more comfortable. Todd either. 

"So you're..."

"Dead," Damian said, the word sounding wrong on his tongue. It was the first time he'd said it out loud. The first time Todd had probably heard it said to him in a while since he too flinched. 

Todd didn't stay down for long, most noticeably because Pennyworth entered the study again, a plate stacked high with pancakes he set shakily down on the desk. Todd was up and sniffing at them as soon as Pennyworth moved away, he hummed low in his throat. "They taste nice, right?" Todd asked.

"Pancakes?" 

Todd nodded, "I remember liking them. Tasting them. They were sweet, or, they weren't. It's been a while since I ate one."

Five years if Damian remembered correctly. Damian stood, approaching Todd slowly. He wasn't as dangerous as Todd of present but that wasn't to say he was a pushover either. When he was next to the kid, and wasn't immediately attacked, Damian took a sniff himself, his mind lamenting that he would never eat again now either. "Pennyworth always makes them sweet for you. It's one thing you and Grayson have in common."

Todd smiled, "Yeah, I know." He sent a look to Grayson, the man sleeping, or passed out, on the floor where he landed. It was a look Damian couldn't decipher. Really, he'd never seen Todd look at Grayson like that. He'd never seen Todd look at a lot of things, he usually had that ridiculous helmet on. "Doesn't mean I remember what it tastes like."

"Well, I am not going to describe it. I don't care much for Pennyworth's pancakes."

"Didn't," Todd said.

"What?"

Todd smiled sheepishly at him, "You didn't care much for them. Past tense."

Damian hit him. It was a defensive move more than anything else, and Damian was surprised that his fist actually connected with Todd's jaw. Todd was too, his eyes wide as he fell to the floor. Damian's hand was shaking as Todd stood. Damian doubted Todd's jaw hurt, they were dead, why would it hurt, but the fact that they could touch each other had obviously shaken Todd enough that muscle memory remembered that it hurt, that he should touch where the punch had landed and make sure the skin was alright. 

Todd didn't look mad, not his usual mad that was on his older face anyway. Yet Damian still backed away when he raised his hand. "Please," Todd said. 

Damian shook his head, running from the room. This was too much. He'd just died. He couldn't be dealing with this until he'd had at least a few days to process.

He hid in his room, not even able to burrow under the covers because he couldn't freaking touch anything.

Damian didn't stop himself from crying again. The rest of his family was crying, Damian had a right to as well. He stayed there as the sun set and night set in.

Titus had come around four times throughout the day. Pennyworth shooed him off every time, the door remaining closed no matter how many times Damian wished he could have Titus with him. He didn't try and find Titus when he wandered off. While Damian wanted the dog next to him he didn't have the strength to get off his bed. Mentally anyway.

It felt weird that Damian didn't tire. Usually, while he was able to stay awake for more than one day, his body showed some kind of fatigue around this time. Yet, Damian lay there just as awake as he had been when he showed up in this room. 

Todd didn't bother him. Damian thought he either had more tact than Grayson, which was slightly true in the interactions they had shared previously, or he was busy comforting Father still. Both were plausible, and none had Damian wanting to find him again.

The night passed and pretty soon it was morning again. Damian didn't really know how may days passed after that. Two or three, maybe four. All he knew was that he lay there, uncertain and afraid, not knowing what he was to do.

Father had told him that dying meant he would be transported to this other realm. One where he would see his fore bearers, his grandmother and grandfather. Where he would live. Where he wouldn't be trapped in this half life, never touching those he cared for again.

He would never be held by Grayson. By his Father. Father would never wish him a good morning, he would never talk to him again. Not really. There wasn't much he could do.

It was loneliness that eventually drove him from his room. He couldn't be by himself any more. He needed to see someone, even if they were screaming.

Everyone had moved from the study. It had been days, of course they had moved, so Damian went looking for them. Strangely enough he found Todd first. The weird ghost boy looked unnatural poking his head through Grayson's door. Literally through Grayson's door. Half of his body was in the hallway and the rest through the wood.

Damian cleared his throat, Todd shooting out of Grayson's room, his ghostly pale cheeks dusting red as he straightened his tunic out. "Damian, didn't see you there."

"Tt. Obviously." Damian narrowed his eyes at Todd. "What were you doing?"

Todd's face went impossibly darker, his throat clearing, "Just, checking up on Dick. He's not been sleeping. None of them have."

Damian pursed his lips, walking around Todd to poke his own head through Grayson's door. Grayson was walking around like he was wounded, every other step he took stumbling slightly as he made his way from the drawers at the back to his bed. Somehow, despite being near his clothes, Grayson had neglected to find something to sleep in, his scarred skin on display as he flopped face first into his sheets. 

When Damian looked back at Todd he found the teen rubbing his neck wide eyed at Damian, embarrassment colouring every inch of his face. Damian didn't get it. "He has passed out."

Todd nodded, turning on his heel to some other part of the manor. Curiosity had Damian following. Despite how much it pained him to admit it, he was lonely, and Todd was the only one in this place that could see him. That could touch him if Damian let him. He didn't want to be an observer to his own family. Not yet.

Todd ended up in the library, his favourite place in the manor Damian remembered Father saying. Todd didn't look too put out however, not like how Damian thought he would, and the why became clear when he picked out a book from one of the shelves and set himself in the chair near the window.

"Wh- how did you do that?"

Todd shrugged, not pretending like he didn't know what Damian was talking about. "Practice."

Damian came closer, perching himself on the arm of the chair. Todd turned a page, then another as he found the number he was looking for. There was even a crease on the top of the page, a marker. Todd had moved it, he had made a crease in a book. "So you can interact with them?"

Todd nodded, but he looked anything but pleased about it. "Look Damian, I've been here for a while. You don't think I've had ideas about talking to someone. I do. Every day I want to tell them I'm here."

"So why don't you?" Damian would. He would tell Pennyworth to stop sending Titus away. He would tell Drake to look after Alfred because he was the only other person around the manor enough to remember there was a cat running around.

But, "I have. I've tried, but it only freaks them out. You know, as much as they say they miss you, they don't want to imagine you're still around. If you try and talk to them, they're gonna go crazy, they're gonna fixate and then where will that leave them? One time a few months after I... I started writing on Bruce's mirror. It was small things at first, just to see if he would get them. Have a good day, I miss you, I wish I could go out as Robin with you. You know what he did?" Damian shook his head, "He smashed the mirror and almost fired Alfred. He thought he was either going crazy or someone was playing a prank on him. It's best if we just leave them alone."

Damian didn't want to leave them alone. It wasn't fair. Why should he hide his existence? He was still here. But the way Todd was looking at him told Damian that if he even thought about going down that path, there was no way he would be hanging around. Now, Damian didn't exactly consider Todd a friend, he probably never would, but since he was the only person in this place he could safely interact with, Damian wasn't going to chance a life of solitude over a one sided conversation with Grayson.

"Fine," he huffed. "But you must teach me how to handle things in return. I refuse to spend my time here floating around when I could spend it doing something more entertaining."

Which, Todd agreed with. 

They had all the time in the world to learn, so when Damian didn't grasp something the first time he didn't give up. He refused to, after all, if he was the type to give up he never would have the skills he did today. So he didn't stomp off when his hand slid through the book Jason was touching. He may have pouted, even growled a little, but he didn't give up.

Todd, surprisingly had patience in abundance. He didn't snap at Damian, nor did he sneer or call him names. He was nothing like his other alive self, which made it slightly easier to get along with.

"What do you make of Drake?" Damian asked. It had been a week since his death. They were sitting inside Drakes room, Todd subtly pushing a cup of coffee further and further off Drakes desk when the teen wasn't looking. Apparently, while Todd said he didn't interact with him he didn't mean completely cut them off. Often times when Damian went searching for him Todd was up to some mischief or another. It made Damian wonder at how many accidents around the manor were actually Todd's doing. 

"Who, Tim?" Todd hummed, "He's okay. I mean, he's a bit righteous but, it could be worse."

"He is righteous," Damian agreed. It was one of the traits that sparked the arguments between the two. "He always insists he is right. He does not even listen to me if I suggest something different."

"He could've been more considerate. Like, I've seen him shut you down. But, like I said, he could be worse."

"How worse?"

The coffee cup teetered on the edge Drake still puttering about on the other side of the room. "Well, he could've been Randy Colestein." Todd pushed the cup over the edge, the pair of them watching Drake jump and swear at the spilled liquid. Damian spared a smile as Todd crawled back up next to him. "Randy Colestein was a kid I went to school with. Total stuck up asshole. He used to make fun of disadvantaged kids, push them about a bit. I got a lot of it. But like, imagine him with Bruce's training. You wouldn't have stood a chance."

Damian scoffed, "I doubt that. I'm not disadvantaged."

"No," Jason agreed giving him a pointed look, "But you aren't white either. If there was another thing he hated it was foreigners. Not even people from different countries. Just, if you weren't white you weren't right. You've seen what hate can do Dami. Trust me, Tim's not too bad."

Damian had encountered such people in his stay in America. They would hate him on sight for no other reason than his skin. There was a journalist once who shared some of these views, Damian remembered the article written had been disgustingly uncomplimentary. Damian hadn't stopped his father from suing the life out of that man. To think someone like that could be under this roof too just proved to Damian maybe Todd had a point when he said Drake wasn't too bad.

It also stood to reason that while Todd did say that, Drake was one od his moat beloved forms of entertainment. When he wasn't following after Grayson like a lost duckling he was with Drake. Hiding was his favourite thing to do. Todd would wait for something important Drake needed in the moment and take it, hiding it under pillows or in the hallway. Damian was surprised with how much Todd got away with. Surely, if he had been doing this for five years someone would have noticed.

But no. Time and time again Todd got away. It made Damian all the more determined to learn to pick things up.

"You gotta concentrate. It's like learning to make a fist, you gotta know exactly what you're gonna touch and ready your hand to make contact in the right place. You gotta think solid, otherwise you'll just whisp away."

Damian tried. The two of them were in Grayson's room today, Todd busy watching Grayson preen himself in the mirror as he gave instruction. The object Damian was trying to lift was Grayson's stuffed elephant. It had caught Damian's eye the moment they walked in. Mostly because Damian had never seen it before.

Todd had, which made it a rather old possession. Apparently Grayson only dug it out when he was scared or sad. When he needed help to sleep but refused to go see Father. 

Damian tried picking it up, solidifying his hand enough to do it. Yet, after fifteen minutes nothing happened. With a huff, Damian batted at one of the legs, surprised to see it actually moved.

"Did you see that Todd. It moved. I moved it."

Success was short lived since Damian couldn't do it again, but he didn't mind. Progress was progress, even if it was small.

It had been two weeks since Damian's demise when one afternoon the door slammed downstairs. It was such a loud noise, most noticeably because the manor had been so quiet. There had been no arguments save the one in the study. It had been like everyone was in their own little world, never intersecting except for meals.

Todd perked to attention, scrambling from the library they had holed themselves up in to the staircase. Damian followed, finding Drake to be the cause of the noise when he caught up.

He was crying, clutching his abdomen like he'd been punched. Damian thought he had been before he remembered Drake never showed signs of distress. It wasn't long before he slumped against the wall, sliding down until he was a ball of pathetic weeping.

"The clone must have said something distasteful," Damian said,.

Todd arched an eyebrow. "What makes you say that?"

Damian shrugged, "There are few things that leave Drake like this. His parents, the clone or Farther. Since I can't see father and his parents are dead I am guessing the clone."

Todd nodded, leaning his head on his elbows as the two of them watched Drake. "You know, I thought the same thing about Dick when he did that. I thought it had been Kori, or Babs. Maybe even another fight with Bruce. But, then I saw the suit, and the flowers. Dick didn't make it to my funeral. He dressed up all nice when he came back instead and went to cry over my grave for a few hours. He couldn't bring himself to give over the flowers, so he gave them to Alfred instead. It was nice seeing them when I went to the kitchen. Reminded me that, maybe Dick did care about me."

Damian looked at Drake again. At the suit that hung off him, that always hung off him because it was something Pennyworth had thought he would grow into. He caught the shoes still trailing specks of mud. How there was no one else in the manor. He caught the knife held in Drake's hands. The one Damian always kept under his pillow.

He turned away. Todd could handle Drake if something malicious happened with that knife. He didn't want to see this. He didn't want to accept... not yet. 

He ended up wiling away the hours practising. The kitchen, his room, Todd's room, anywhere that Drake didn't wander into on his quest to be pathetically sad.

The rest of the family stumbled in as it got dark. From the loud rambling below he knew before looking that Grayson was drunk. Damian had only seen Grayson drunk the once, after Father came back actually, and it had been seared into his brain. Most notably because Grayson was a touchy drunk. He latched onto Damian and didn't let go. Weird how Damian would kill for that to happen again.

it was Grayson's loud voice that eventually drew Damian from his sulk. He followed the noise to find them in one of the living areas Grayson already laid down before he could do injury to himself. It didn't hinder his mouth however, that was busy spewing half coherent tales of things he found funny that Damian had done. Damian didn't like hearing himself be referred to in the past tense. He hated it. He hated all of this and would have left had he not spied Todd lingering at the edge of this scene.

It wasn't the younger, as much as Damian would have preferred. No, it was the alive Todd, the one that was staring straight at him. At first glance there was nothing to assume there was anything wrong with Todd. He looked just as withdrawn as the rest of his family, even Drake who had managed to drag himself down to lean against fathers shoulder. He had taken sentry at the doorway leading to the gardens, and from afar it looked like he was merely lost in his own thoughts, staring at nothing. But Damian was in his eyesight, he could see Todd take in the Robin suit, his healed skin. Todd could see him.

He backed slowly out of the room, running as soon as he was away until he came to Todds old room. The younger was inside, he was adding a cat collar to a collection he had under the bed, one Damian had more than supplied when Alfred turned up missing his own.

"What's up?" He asked.

"Todd can see me. He saw me just now. I went down and he looked at me."

Todd's face didn't light up in surprise like Damian had hoped. He merely rolled his eyes and pried Alfred's tag from his collar. "Yeah, I know."

"You know? Why did you not tell me? I could have-"

"You could have what?" Todd prompted when Damian came up short. "You could have went, surprise big bro, I'm still here. Guess you can add me to the dead Robin club now."

"Shut up," Damian hissed, hopping on the bed anyway.

Todd sighed, pushing his collection back into place. "I was going to tell you. Really. But, it's not like you were on the best of terms with me when you were alive. That's right, I see everything. Besides, other me... he doesn't exactly believe I'm here."

"What?"

"I mean, he probably will now with you here too. But before, I think he just thought I was a product of some lazarus induced misplaced guilt."

"Todd never did like coming to the manor," Damian remembered. If his younger self had been haunting the place Damian didn't blame him. He was sure that if he kept seeing a younger him he would be questioning his sanity every time he came to the manor. "He will not take my presence here well will he?"

"I wouldn't- oh wait," Todd laughed. 

Damian stopped himself from scoffing, Todds sense of humour cheesy but volatile if provoked. He wasn't that much different from his older self actually. Damian honestly didn't see what the others meant when they said Todd had changed. As far as he could tell, younger or older, he was still an annoying specimen of a human being.

They stayed in Todds room as Grayson's slurred stories grew fainter and fainter. When they eventually stopped, Damian was only minimally surprised when Todd, older Todd, stormed into the room.

He took a look around, his eyes lingering on the younger version of himself before focusing on Damian. "This really you or am I hallucinating?"

"Tt, believe me, I wish it were not so as well."

Todd hissed, his hands running through his hair until it stuck up in wild directions, "Fuck." 

Todd's younger self huffed, "Don't swear Jay, you know Bruce will make you pay up."

"Fuck," Todd said again, his tone louder than before, bordering on too loud if the rest of the family were still awake. "So, you're what, ghosts?"

"It would appear that way," Damian said.

Todd turned to his younger self, "okay, say I buy the ghost thing. What the hell does that make you? 'Cause as far as I know I'm alive and kicking right now."

Younger Todd shrugged. "Don't know. All I do is one minute we were tripping the mat from under Tim's feet and the next I felt weird and you turn up a year later."

Todd nodded, "So... so they're right. I'm not... me. Not all of me." A sound that was almost a sob croaked the back of Todd's throat. "Fuck."

Younger Todd hopped up to pat his older self's arm. "Maybe not, but you seem pretty you to me. And I should know."

Damian huffed, "Todd, your sense of humour is appalling."

Younger Todd stuck his tongue out. 

Things were awkward for a while. Older Todd took to pretending to be busy in his room, shooting the two ghosts looks when he didn't think they noticed. Younger Todd on the other hand left the room every two minutes to check on those downstairs, telling Damian, mainly, what father was doing. 

"I do not wish to know," Damian snapped the fifth time Todd told him Father was still upset.

Little Todd deflated, creeping slowly closer to him, "Look little D-"

"Do not call me that!" That was Graysons name for him. Only Graysons. Todd would not use it, and he definitely would not use it to appeal to his better nature.

"Damian," Todd corrected. "Look, like it or not, you're... dead. You're dead, and there's no going back. I know it's hard and I know it's even harder to do nothing but watch, but that's what's happening now. We're both trapped here, and like it or not, they're here too. If you're avoiding someone just because it's painful it's not going to go away. It's going to get worse and worse until when you finally see them it's going to destroy you. Bruce is hurting, so's the rest of them. If you don't see this now, when they're not grieving, when they're walking around trying to forget you, you're going to wonder whether they really cared." 

"Is that what we did?" Older Todd asked. "Ignored them?"

The younger shrugged. "Kind of. We didn't want to see Bruce so upset so we stayed away. Then, when we wanted to see him, he was trying to forget us. He had Tim. He never said the things we wanted to hear, the things he had already said when we weren't there. Maybe if we hadn't avoided Bruce, you wouldn't be so angry at him."

Older Todd scoffed. "Doubtful. The old man would've found some way or another to make us angry at him."

"Maybe," Young Todd agreed. "But maybe if you had seen him at his worst you would have more compassion, understanding, for why he does what he does. You don't remember being dead do you?"

Older Todd shook his head slowly. All the answer the younger needed. 

Damian kept that conversation in mind as the hours passed and older Todd finally found another room to sleep the night in. Come the next morning, when older Todd checked in, "Just to make sure I'm not going crazy," Damian followed him down to breakfast.

Drake and Cain were the only two up, both of them with dark circles under their eyes. Damian could see Todd actively trying not to look at Damian as he sat next to Cain. Now Damian had grown used to his life of not eating he could see why Todd missed it. The smells alone had his stomach aching in phantom want. He knew when Todd got in one of his moods he would steal a few pancakes or Grayson's cereal from someone's plates to spite them. It happened more often than Damian had thought, which, again, made him wonder how no one had noticed. Was his family really that unobservant?

"Morning," Grayson grumbled, wobbling his way into the room.

"Surprised you can move with how much you drank last night," Todd said.

Grayson mumbled something under his breath, leaning his head heavily on Todd's shoulder. "I think I need to sleep a few more hours."

"You can," Drake offered. "I can go with Bruce to the graveyard. I want to say hello to my parents. It's been a while."

Grayson shook his head as much as he could on Todd's shoulder. "No, I'll go. I promised Dami I would. I managed to find the batarang I flung at him when we met. Thought it would be nice to give it to him."

Damian rolled his eyes. Unless Grayson meant his knife there was no batarang to give over. Damian had tracked down the small batarangs a month after his partnership with Grayson. He'd melted them all down to make the knife as a reminder to not underestimate Grayson. Also maybe so he could drive it through Grayson's skin if this arrangement didn't pan out.

"I'm sure he will appreciate it," Todd ground out, warning Damian with a glare like there was some way his little brother could still find a way to make Grayson upset.

"You think?"

"Yeah." Todd didn't look away as he said, "I'm sure if he were here now he would tell you how much he appreciates it. How much he loves you too."

Damian huffed, "I do not love him."

"I mean, he wouldn't say it out loud, but you could always read him better than us. In his own weird way, he would tell you."

Grayson sniffed heavily on Todd's shoulder, his eyes tearing up. Damian was over in a second, his hands still not grasping as he tried to pry Grayson away. "You are upsetting him. Cease at once Todd."

Todd just gave him a look, like Damian had just proved exactly what he wanted. Todd brought his arms up, catching Grayson as he slid over to latch himself on Todd's shoulders. 

"Did it hurt?" Grayson sniffed.

"Did what hurt Dickie?"

"When you died. Did it hurt? Do you think Dami..."

Todd didn't answer for a while. One because Damian could see him remembering his own death and the boy still lingering around the manor. Two because Damian had nodded, he couldn't help it. Dying had hurt, he could still feel the blade through his chest. 

Todd had an ability that Damian did not have however as he shook his head, drawing back to focus on Grayson as he said, "You know what Dickie, I can't remember. It must have been fast, real fast. The same was probably for Damian too. So fast he didn't have time to hurt."

"Yeah," Grayson agreed shakily. He wiped his eyes, grabbing his box of sugary flakes. "I'm gonna go wake Bruce. I wanna get going soon."

He didn't dawdle, nearly running from the kitchen. The rest of them turned back to the sparse food on the table, Pennyworth too busy with fending off the paparazzi to make them a big breakfast these days.

"How long are you staying?" Drake asked.

Todd shrugged, "Few days. Thought B might like to have someone out who's not compromised. I didn't really know the kid after all."

Drake hummed, Cain levelling Todd a look like she knew part of that statement was a lie. 

"You're helping him," Drake said. "Bruce too. What you said yesterday, I know it helped Bruce sleep a bit easier."

"Don't know how."

Drake smirked, well, his lips upturned slightly, as much of a smirk as it could be these days. "You know for a fact Bruce wants to think Damian's happy. That whole image of Damian meeting his parents... I know I felt a bit easier believing it."

"Whatever."

Breakfast passed with sparse conversation. Todd mentioned they would have to get Alfred a new collar, which proved he had, at least, found the collection under his bed. Drake promised to go get one after taking Titus for a walk. Something Damian could no longer do.

Not once did father come down, and by the time Damian went looking, dead Todd was telling him Father had left with Grayson. He would have been more perturbed  had something else not been niggling at the edge of his mind.

"Who else is here?" Damian asked. They had relocated to the library, ghost and alive Todd both fighting over a book they wished to read. 

Older Todd let the book go, the thought most likely just crossing his mind too. "I don't think I've seen anyone else. I didn't even think I was seeing myself until last night."

"That's because there is no one else here," younger Todd said.

"No one? But, surely Grandmother and Grandfather should be here?"

Todd shrugged, "If they are they've done a good job hiding. I haven't seen them, and believe me, I've been looking."

"So there is only the two of us?"

"Looks like it," Todd agreed.

"That can't be right," Older Todd said. "You've seen the journals in this place. It should be teeming with ghosts around here."

"Ghosts?" The three of them turned to see Drake lounging in the doorway. "Why are you talking about ghosts to yourself?"

Todd bristled, his volatile nature rearing its head. "What are you doing skulking the halls? Making sure I'm behaving myself? I never should have come here. Can't believe I was actually trying to be nice. I see where it gets me now."

Drake visibly backed up, well versed with where Todd's mood swings landed him. "I wasn't checking up on you, I swear. Alfred sent me after you. Said something about needing help with the cake for tonight."

Todd didn't calm down, and Drake didn't hang around longer now his message had been delivered. The weird thing was that as soon as Drake was out of sight Todd switched faces faster than Two Face. He deflated, turning back to the ghosts in the room, "you gotta warn me when someone's coming. I'm not heading back to Arkham."

Younger Todd chuckled, turning back to the book in his lap. 

 Older Todd left when no answers were forthcoming from his younger self. Damian thought he was just being cautious before he remembered. Todd had been here for five years. Five years of lonliness, of looking for someone to talk to. He probably thought there were others too, like there should be. When there wasn't,it just proved there was something either going on or gone wrong.

Either way Damian didn't push. He merely sat down and tried practicing moving things around.

Father and Grayson returned just after noon. Father headed straight for the study, Damian hesitating, but following after a while. 

Father was in his chair, a usual sight. What wasn't was the blank screen. He was just sat there, staring at nothing. 

"Father?" 

He couldn't hear Damian. He never would. But Todd hadn't turned away when Father was breaking down so Damian didn't either.

"Father, I just... it wasn't your fault. With mother. I was the one who wouldn't listen. I did not trust you to do what was necessary. It was my own fault. Mine and mothers." It hurt to look at him. This was the man Damian had yearned to meet ever since he found out what a father was. He wwasn't how Damian had imagined. But, somehow, that made him more real. "I am sorry we did not get a chance to know each other better."

There was a shaky breath, then father was folding himself in his hands. Damian stayed with him through it. He couldn't bring himself to leave. It was his fault father was upset after all.

The hours passed and father didn't move. His tears had dried but he couldn't bring himself to remove himself from the cave. Eventually, it was Drake that came to get him. 

"Everyone's upstairs."

Father nodded, "Don't suppose I can wait it out down here?"

Drake shrugged. "You probably could. No one would blame you. But Dick looks like he's going to drown his sorrows in wine again. I don't think it's a good idea to leave Jason alone either. He was mumbling something about ghosts earlier. I think he's taking this a bit closer to heart than we thought."

"Jason." Father stood rather shakily, but managed to make it up the stairs and to the living room.

There were more people than there were the night before. Damian spotted both Todds making eyes at Wonder Woman. Almost all of the Justice League looked to be there, the alien the first to approach father with condolences. Damian supposed they could not have made it to the funeral without some qiestions being asked. This must have been what Drake meant by later. True enough, Damian could see a rather sugary looking three tier cake at the back of the room, Robin's colours on each of them.

Despite how much Damian wished to find something else to do, he stayed by Fathers side all night. He couldn't make himself leave. Even if he couldn't touch like he wanted he could lean against him, Damian could still feel, and Father had always been a source of comfort to him. It made listening to people share some not so flattering stories about him that much better. Made accepting his death that little bit easier.

Younger Todd joined him at some point through the night, they took sentry posts around father, people seeming to unconsciously know to steer clear. Todd didn't stay still all night. He seemed excited with all these capes around, telling Damian his own stories. Ones these heros probably didn't want Damian to know. Apparently a lot used to happen in these walls.

Eventually however, father retreated to his room. Damian didn't follow, he'd had enough of silence, so he stayed with Todd as the boy stole glass after glass from the alien's hand. 

They had a pretty good collection when they hid themselves in Todd's room. Damian helped line them up, each one a trophy stolen from one of the most powerful beings alive. 

Older Todd came up after an hour, he poked his head in, sniggering when he saw the glasses. "He was blaming me. Guess he wasn't wrong."

Younger Todd beamed, especially when Todd added his own to the mix, claiming he may as well be blamed for something he'd done. 

The door clattered like someone had fell against it. Damian tensed as the other two sighed, older Todd standing and opening his arms as Grayson opened the door.

"Jay," he whined, falling into them readily.

"You gotta stop this Dickie. You know it doesn't do any good."

Grayson grumbled swaying the two of them to fall on Todd's bed. Younger Todd dragged Damian out, demanding he lead them to where Alfred was hiding- he needed a new collar for his collection. Damian went, if only so he didn't have to see Grayson cry again.

Damian managed to hold his first object four days after that night. "You're despicable!" He didn't even notice it at the time, too angry at older Todd to care. "How could you? You deceitful, arrogant ass!" He threw another book at Todd, the man blocking it as another got him in the stomach.

"For God's sake will you calm down."

"You kissed him!" 

Younger Todd looked distinctly satisfied as Damian repeated it again, the older hissing as another book made contact.

"For crying out- he kissed me. Me. I pushed him off."

"You still touched him!"

Damian hadn't even been meaning to see Grayson that morning. He had decided to spend the day following Titus, curious as to where he went when Damian wasn't around. Titus just so happened to be passing Grayson's door where Damian had seen him and Todd kissing none too chastely against the wall. Todd hadn't been lying when he said he pushed Grayson off, but he hadn't done so until he saw Damian. 

"The hell?" 

The book landed on Todd just as Drake rushed in. He took one look at the many books littering the floor and Todd covering his midsection before whispering, "Damian? God, Dami? You here?" He turned to Todd. "You weren't- you meant Damian. When you were talking about ghosts. Damian's here isn't here. Dami?"

He threw a book at Drake, "Do not be familiar with me Drake."

"He doesn't like you calling him Dami," Todd said, straightening from his crouch. He kept his hands up just in case however.

Tim didn't seem to feel the book, his eyes wide as he looked around the room. "This isn't my imagination. God, you're here. You're here. Damian I am so sor-" 

Damian threw another book at him. 

"Ow! Stop it," Todd snapped the book landing on him rather than Drake.

"Then stop kissing Grayson."

"He kissed me!"

"Who kissed who?" Drake asked.

Todd reddened, glaring at Damian. "No one," he said, knowing full well Drake couldn't hear Damian shouting back.

That didn't mean Damian couldn't throw a book at him. 

"This is so weird," Drake said. "Wait, can you hear him?"

Jason nodded, blocking another flying object. "Turns out my resurrection may have granted me some abilities."

"So, you can see him?"

"Unfortunately."

"And it's Damian. Like, really Damian?"

Todd nodded again, "Trust me. It's the brat."

Drake started pacing, "How long have you had this ability? Can you see anyone else? What's Damian saying now?"

Todd edged slowly behind Drake, trying to use him as a human shield as he said, "Since I came back. Just one other ghost and he's screaming at me to face him in single combat for Grayson's honour."

Drake accepted all of this far too easily. He must have been desperate for some confirmation of the afterlife. "Wait, Dick? What's Dick got to..." he hit Todd in the arm. "Seriously? First off, ew, he's your brother. And second, he's grieving."

"He kissed me!" 

Drake made another face, the support making Damian calm down a bit. 

"Okay, you know what, I don't need this judgy attitude. Especially not from you."

"From me? What have I ever-"

"Kon?" Todd let that sink in. "That's right, I know all about that little affair. I think someone who kissed a taken man has no right to spout judgement on me."

"He's your brother."

"Adopted, and not until after I died so technically I started this incest free. And at least my guy is single."

"Your guy is Dick," Drake shouted.

"So what? We're both consenting adults. I'm not pressuring him into anything."

"He's grieving."

"He wasn't when we started this."

The room went silent, Todd realising what he'd said. Damian was the first to speak, "This has happened before?"

"Fuck," Todd hissed as the first book came at him. 

It took younger Todd holding him back for the books to stop flying. He hauled Damian to one of the chairs, telling him there was nothing he could do.

"Okay," Drake huffed when he realised there would be no more attacks. "I think we got a bit off topic here. Whatever you have with Dick,"he ducked like he expected to be attacked again. "We need to put aside. I mean, Jason, ghosts. Damian, I can't believe you're here."

"That's because your brain is underdeveloped."

Both Todds chuckled, the older telling Drake something Damian definitely did not say. Drake got back on topic, "So, ghosts. Like, are you hanging around for some reason? What do you think is keeping you here?"

Damian turned to older Todd. "Could you please tell Drake I did not get to speak with death when I died and therefore am just as much in the dark as him."

"He said he doesn't know," Todd paraphrased.

Tim nodded, "Guess if it was that simple Damian wouldn't be here." He paced a bit, "Wr gotta tell Dick. Bruce. Jason you should have said something."

"And be locked back up. No thank you. If you are going to be telling the big man about this count me out."

"Coward," Tim muttered, everyone present knowing Brucewasn't going to take this news well. "Fine," he still said, stalking out.

No one spoke for a while, mostly because they were waiting for the inevitable explosion, only slightly because Damian refused to have any more contact with Todd than possible. It didn't take long for the fireworks to start. The shouting started almost immediately followed by Grayson and Pennyworth hurrying into the library. 

The obviously thought it was a joke since Grayson started with a sad, "Jay." Stopped from saying more as younger Todd handed a book over to him, taking another on his way back to read. "What the-?"

"Ghosts," Todd said.

"Ghosts," Grayson repeated. "Damian?"

"He's there."

Grayson slowly edged in. "If you're joking Jay. It's not funny."

"I wish I was."

Grayson looked around, "where? Damian? Where is he? Can he hear me?"

"He can, and he's there, sulking."

Grayson frowned, levelling Todd a look, "Why is he sulking?"

"Caught us this morning? Little demon didn't take it too well. Hence the..." he motioned to the books as Grayson slowly reddened.

"In bed?"

Pennyworth perked at that, Todd almost as red as Grayson now as he gave a pained moan and said, "No, but he knows about it now."

Younger Todd had to physically hold him down. He couldn't believe Todd had lied. Well, he could, but still.

He had just managed to escape and lift the nearest object to him, a globe they somehow needed, when Drake and Father entered. Father's eyes were red, his hands shaking as they clenched by his side. They stilled when they saw the globe, to them probably floating in mid air. 

"Damian?"

He dropped the globe, scurrying over to latch himself on father's shirt. "I demand justice. Todd has defiled Grayson. He has taken him to bed, knowing Grayson was in a vulnerable state."

"For God's sake- It was consenting," Todd snapped.

"For you, however I will not allow you to use my death as a means to satisfy your libido."

"I wasn't satisfying anything. I love him you brat."

"You do?" Grayson cooed.

"What?" Father asked, finally taking charge instead of staring at where his shirt was clenched.

Todd and Grayson shrunk down, father's ever knowing eye most likely catching what was being unsaid. Damian prepared himself for some retribution.

But, like Drake, father thought the family drama came second as he reevaluated and looked down at Damian instead. "We'll talk later," he still promised. "Now, what exactly is this? Magic? Some trick?"

"I thought so too," Drake said. "But it's definitely Damian. He's been firing books at us in a tantrum for about half an hour now."

"Me you mean."

Father rocused on Todd, "I don't understand. You've been able to see him?" Todd nodded. "All of this time?"

Todd nodded again. "Don't start on the why didn't you tell me spiel. We both know you wouldn't have believed me."

Father exhaled shakily, looking down at where Damian was still touching him. Damian didn't want to let go, his hands flexing as his mind caught up with the fact he could really touch things again. "How long have you had this ability?"

Todd scuffed his foot, "Since I came back I guess."

"You guess?" Grayson asked.

Todd reddened, "It's not like there's a lot of ghosts for me to see. I thought I was going crazy okay?"

"So you can see them?"

"Hear him too," Drake piped in. "He's been the go between since I found out."

Father crouched slowly, his eyes never leaving Damian's hands that didn't let go of the shirt he was touching. He didn't know when he might get the chance to do this again. "Damian?" Father asked.

"It's me father." He looker back to Todd, "tell him I am here Todd."

"It's him."

"God, Damian." He was happy to say now he didn't like the sight of father crying. It wasn't a nice sight. Mostly because he set Grayson and Pennyworth off too. "I am so, so sorry. I should have-"

There was another pair of hands wrapping around father, younger Todd curling around like he usually did when father was upset. Unlike the other times however, father noticed the contact.

Wide eyes locked with Todd, "Who?"

Todd looked most uncomfortable as he said, "Me. Fifteen year old me. Turns out you might have been on to something when you said not all of me came back."

Father was horrified, Damian could see everyone freezing as they questioned and accepted the new ghost. 

Grayson broke the silence, his fingers interlocking with Todds and causing Damian to hold back from attacking. "No wonder you thought you were going crazy."

A broken chuckle slid from Todd. Father wasn't listening, too transfixed by the pull in his shirt. Damian wondered if he could feel the arms around his neck, the head against his own. It must have been awful for Todd all these years not knowing. Yet he still did it when father wad upset. 

"Is there-?" Farher asked, looking around the vacant room.

Todd shook his head, "Mini me says there's only him and Damian. Think he would know if there were more."

Fathers face fell slightly but he righted himself in an instant, looking to where the younger Todd was. "Hi."

Grayson turned to Todd, "what do they look like? Are they?"

Todd shook his head, "Both brats are fine. Nothing on them."

Grayson breathed in relief, Father relaxing somewhat too. They stood there for a while, most of them watching the phantom hands only Todd could see.

"Well this explains all those shattered tea cups," Pennyworth said, young Todd beaming. 

Father called an emergency meeting in the cave when the shock wore off. Damian and Todd were both forced to hold papers with their names on, Drake's idiotic attempt to keep track of them. Damian didn't even stop Todd from switching their names around and noticed older Todd didn't call them out on it either. 

It was a long night, reminiscent of a harrowing case that crept up every now and then. Father insisted there must be a reason for Damian's lingering just as Todd had. Through the night they came up with multiple causes for why this was and why only them were left behind when so many others had cause too.

Eventually it was Drake who came up with the common denominator. Todd had lingered until he came back. Perhaps Damian too was to follow this path.

The arguments ranged long and loud. Father did not want to think down that route. He didn't want to think of another traumatised son, Damian watching Todd throughout that rant as he edged closer to Grayson. 

Eventually however, he had to concede to defeat. But only on his terms. Later, Damian would bear witness to plans for Apokalips, for a lararus incarnarion. Right then, father merely promised, "It's going to be fine," leaving Damian what would become of younger Todd should Damian leave.

4 Years Later:

"Father?" The door slammed behind him, Titus not far from licking him a hello. "You will be pleased to know I have whipped Jon into shape. He will be a credible superhero yet."

Damian made his way up to the study, knowing full well father was listening the whole time. Sure enough, when Damian poked his head in Father was waiting expectantly behind the desk, his eyes on Damian not the screen in front of him as Damian continued to inform him of their latest mission. 

"How have things been here?" 

A small smile graced father's face, his eyes on something behind Damian's head. "Good. Dick and Jason are coming around later however, so I want you on your best behaviour."

Damian tutted. He couldn't believe he was the last to know about their relationship. He couldn't believe they were dating at all. Grayson could do better. If he were honest however, what hurt more was the fact they waited until Damian was dead before they told everyone about their relationship. Like they didn't trust him.

Still, if Grayson was happy, "Very well. But if Todd starts a fight I will not be held responsible for my actions."

"Fair enough," father agreed.

Damian retreated to his room to wipe the gruel from the last few days away. Alfred joined him on the way, Damian tutting again before calling, "Father, we will need to go to the petstore again. Alfred has lost his collar."

This was the sixth time this month as well. 

"You must learn to live with it. I will not have you be a stray," Damian said, stopping as bright colours crept in to the edge of his vision.

He turned, catching a fleeting glimpse of yellow.

Sometimes Damian could see why Todd disliked staying in the manor. It wasn't often, but on occassion, Damian swore he saw himself running about the manor, and once, just briefly, when he caught the visage outside, he saw another boy running alongside him.

Chapter Text

Being  Robin, Jason learned a lot of things. He learned how to swing between rooftops with just a grapple and his nimble feet. He learned how to spot the difference between normal and poisoned liquids. He learned that when someone was confused when they were hurt it was always a bad sign.

Right now, Jason was confused. It wasn’t the confused of someone trying to figure out a problem they couldn't solve. It wasn’t the confused of being lost and trying to figure out where they were in the world. The confusion Jason was feeling right now wasn’t even confusion at all. It was a loss. A loss of brain function.

He was in pain, he knew that. He’d felt every blow as they came to him. His bones shattering and limbs giving way the more that madman beat down on him. He’d felt the pain of his skin splitting. He’d even relearnt the reason why it was never the blows themselves that hurt the most. Yet, as he lay in the wreckage of a building crushing him he couldn’t recall that feeling of pain, that sting he knew he’d been feeling moments ago. It was like everything had just switched off and Jason was left in a void.

Thought was there, he could think very well in fact. As he lay there he was making a list of things he needed to read for his History assignment he needed to finish. Yet, memory seemed to be evading him in parts. Like, why Jason knew that being confused when he was hurt was a bad thing. He knew it was important, that if he just remembered it he would unlock something crucial. Something that could keep him fighting to regain that feeling of hurt he knew was edging at the back of his mind.

Yet, Jason couldn’t. His chest kept getting tighter and Jason just didn’t have the strength to think anymore. So he didn’t. He promised himself he would figure it out later and just, let go.

Then woke like he’d been doused in a bucket of water. “No!” he gasped, fighting for breath in his lungs. It came easily, flowing swiftly through his chest and leaving Jason sitting there stupidly as he got his bearings around him.

He was… in his room. Not the crappy hotel room he’d scarcely used. He was back home at the manor. His posters were all staring down at him, the bed underneath him as comfy as he remembered. He was home.

“Huh.” He clambered off his mattress, his feet not making a noise as he trodded along the carpet to his bathroom.

Jason could have sworn he’d been in Ethiopia. But, if he was here, then, maybe he hadn’t been. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d dreamt up things he thought had happaned. He remembered once, when he was nine he’d dreamt up a whole day where he and his mom went to the movie theatre. Even now, he could recall the movie they saw and the popcorn they ate, everything seeming super real. Yet, he’d woken up, and there his mom had been lying on a mattress with a needle sticking out of her arm.

Bruce had told him, years later, that sometimes people had such good imaginations that if they wanted it that badly, their mind was able to conjure up whole scenarios that seemed real. Jason hadn’t believed him until Bruce had brought up Scarecrow. When comparing the two, the realness of Scarecrow’s nightmare realm and the sensations from Jason’s dream, he could see that Bruce wasn’t lying about the mind being a powerful thing.

It wasn’t like it was too far fetched to think that he might have dreamed up that nightmare of Ethiopia. Him and Bruce hadn’t exactly been seeing eye to eye recently. It had been a sore subject to start with that Jason wasn’t biologically Bruce’s. For some reason, that lack of blood between them just made it feel to Jason like he was disposable. He knew Bruce loved him. Hell, Jason loved Bruce. But sometimes- sometimes Jason would remember the hell he’d went through with his real mom and dad and how they still called him family. How his dad, even if he’d beaten Jason bloody the night before, if someone so much as looked at him wrong on the street he’d put them right. His mom too, how she sold him to those men, but only because there was no other way she could get money for them to eat that night. How Jason still loved her anyway because she was his mom.

With Bruce, it felt like they had an expirery date. Like, at any moment, Jason would say the wrong thing or put one foot out of place and be out on his ear again. He’d seen how Bruce was with Dick. How he threw Dick out after they fought. Yeah, Dick said it was mutual, that he wasn’t intending on staying for a full weekend like he said the first day he showed up. But Jason always saw his duffel bag when he came around. How full it was, like, if Bruce just let him, Dick wouldn’t even consider leaving for New York again.

So, no, it wasn’t far fetched for Jason to dream up this secret mom. Or for it to all go wrong. Dreams were mean like that. Hell, for all Jason knew this really was just one of Scarecrow’s toxins. It would certainly explain why he was still wearing his Robin suit when he grinned into the mirror.

If there was one thing Bruce didn’t do when Jason was gassed up it was strip him. He’d learnt the first time around that Jason was not afraid to bite and bite hard. So waking up in the manor with cape and boots still on wasn’t the strangest thing to happen to him.

What was the strangest thing to happen to him was when he tried to turn one of the taps on. He thought for a moment he simply missed the handle. Yet, when he tried again, then again, making extra sure that he was getting the angle right he found he couldn’t grip it. He could feel it, the cold smooth texture, but when he tried to wrap his fingers around and twist, his hand just didn’t.

He tried to turn the tap on for a full ten minutes before giving up. “It’s just another hallucination,” Jason told himself, retreating back to his room and onto the sheets. “Another few hours and we’ll be waking up to Alfred’s fruit platter.” The one he was punishing Bruce with after he’d forgotten to go to Jason’s parent teacher conference. If there was one thing Bruce hated for breakfast it was fruit. Jason had learnt through the years that Bruce only indulged in his sweet tooth when it was early morning, he said it was because he could work off the sugar throughout the day. Jason thought it was because it just too early for Bruce to remember what no meant.

Jason lay down, shutting his eyes and willing himself to sleep off the gas. There couldn’t be much left in him. If he was actually seeing his bedroom then the gas was wearing off.

He tried to will himself to dream things like unicorns and rainbows, things as far removed from the dark recesses of his brain as they could get. He was there for hours, ending up just watching hand on his Wonder Woman clock tick away. Strangely, he didn’t get tired. Usually, if he was lying with nothing to do he’d just drift off to sleep. It was one habit he still had from his childhood that had stuck with him. Yet Jason lay there, still awake and starting to get more worried.

Eventually, it was his fear of what was happening to him that had him getting back up. That, and he’d heard Alfred wandering around outside. Again, when he landed, his boots made no sound, Jason starting to worry about that as he stomped purposefully towards the door. He tried the handle here, willing himself to touch it, praying for it, and time and time again his hand just refused to grab hold of the metal.

It worked him into a panic. So much that Jason was attempting to bang on the door, screaming at the top of his lungs for Alfred. Only his screams made noise.

“Alfred!” He pitched, his voice not even speaking words now as he made as much noise as his throat could handle.

He was there for longer than he expected. Jason had good lungs, he knew that. Hell, he’d needed them dealing with his dad and Bruce. Yet, even Jason knew he had his limits on screaming and he had long ago passed them by the time he decided to shut his mouth.

“No,” he begged, pawing at the wood again. “No!”

Something was starting to niggle at the back of his mind. The reason for why it was bad for someone to be confused when they were hurt.

“Alfred!” he screamed again, hoping against hope that the man just hadn’t heard him.

Jason had learnt about wounds before Bruce found him. He knew that it happened, that people would get dazed. At the time he’d thought it was drugs or the head wound making them loopy.

“Alfred!”

Bruce was the one that taught him different. He’d made sure Jason knew all the warning signs. That confusion was often a sign of blood loss. Heavy blood loss. The kind that wasn’t easily stopped. It was also a sign of the body shutting down. It slowly cut off different parts of the body, shock helping it along if the wound was that traumatic.

“Bruce. I’m here. I’m here! Let me out!”

There wasn’t much someone could do if the body went into shock. Not without a whole host of medical equipment nearby. Had Sheila still been alive she probably would have been able to help out. But she wasn’t. She was right next to the bomb, there was no way she could have made it out of the blast. Jason on the other hand, had been a good few feet away. Enough that the blast wouldn’t have killed him. Scorched him beyond belief. But it wouldn’t have been the explosion that would kill him. More, the building collapsing on top of him. Or, if that failed, then smoke inhilation was always an option. There was always shrapnel as well, not many people knowing that it could be just as lethal as a blast.

“No, please- please let me out.” He slid down, his eyes blurring as tears escaped.

His dream hadn’t been a dream. If it had, even if it had been a hallucination, he should have been able to hold things. He’d been in Ethiopia. He’d met that- that- and she-

“Bruce,” Jason sobbed, hoping that he could hear, that he would come and get him. “Bruce please come get me.”

He was stuck in his room for days. Literal days. Alfred, for some reason, decided that he didn’t have to come into Jason’s room, that it was clean enough or something since the door stayed closed and Jason stay trapped.

Jason hadn’t taken his incarceration well. He’d screamed. He’d thrown tantrum after tantrum until he ended up crying, curled up in front of his door hoping someone would let him out. All the while he was in he wondered what the hell this all meant, why Jason was here instead of somewhere else. Was he not good enough for heaven? Was he really that broken that they didn’t want him? He’d tried so hard to be good. This wasn’t fair.

It was on day five that Jason figured out how to move around the manor. He was pacing the floors, sizing up his door with every sweep until he ended up in front of it. He figured, if he was dead, it wasn’t like the wood could hurt him, so he’d took a running start and rammed. Then fell through the wood like there was nothing there.

Jason found himself having another tantrum as soon as he was on the other side. His happy laughter descending into sobs as he realised he could have been roaming this whole time if he hadn’t been such a coward.

He was screaming profanities at the wood long enough for Alfred to come around on his rounds. It was like a switch had been flicked as soon as Jason saw that tailcoat. He straightened, wiping his mouth and eyes as the man passed. It didn’t take long for Jason to follow.

Any company after the days alone was welcome at this point. He knew for a fact Alfred couldn’t hear him. Quite frankly, even if Alfred could, Jason didn’t want to chance it. He didn’t want to be given this hope only for it to be taken away. So he kept his mouth shut and simply followed Alfred as he made his way to the gardens for his noon walk.

The flowers were beautiful. Jason remembered before he’d left he’d promised Alfred he’d help plant some new roses for Martha’s garden when he came back. Looked like he wouldn’t be doing that anymore.

It came to him in a rush after that. All the promises that Jason had made that he could no longer hold up to. The History assignment he had to hand in. His homework. The case he was going to work with Bruce about the kidnappings. Hell, he even had a date. Well, Jason couldn’t feel too bad about that one. He hadn’t even wanted to go out with her in the first place. She didn’t want to go out with him either. It had just been a thing they had agreed on, Jason because he wanted to see if he could forget about- well- someone- for a while, and Laura because she’d needed someone to make the boy she really liked jealous. Jason wanted to tell her there were better ways to impress someone than going out with him, but since he was using her back he figured keeping his mouth shut was the wise solution.

Looked like both of them were getting off that situation lightly now. After all, if it had gone through, Jason was sure he would have ended up with a black eye at some point. Sometimes he hated the fact that Bruce insisted on him being a pansy at school. It wasn’t like the other kids were buying it. Jason was raised in Park Row, everyone knew that those kids learned how to make a fist before their first word.

Alfred stopped at the greenhouses, Jason spying the flowers that were supposed to be his sectioned off carefully to the side. He wondered if Alfred knew yet. Whether he was just doing busy work until Bruce came back. It seemed like something Alfred would do. Yet, when Jason looked at his face he couldn’t really tell. He knew that Alfred got upset, the fruit platter was proof of that. He knew that Alfred was capable of tantrums too. One memory Jason had was of Alfred storming into the batcave, sending Jason calmly off to bed before shouting bloody murder at Bruce for a good hour about something. It had made Jason more wary of the man, but also more fond. It was nice to know that there was something behind Alfred’s exasperated visage.

The garden did a great deal to calm Jason down. The sun, the wind, even the grass he could somewhat feel under his bare arms, it was much better than his room. It was also nice to find out what Alfred did when Jason wasn’t there. How he had little conversations with himself. Not the kind that would have Bruce worried about Alfred losing it, but just little bits of conversation with the plants like remarking how one of them had grown. It made Jason forget, for a while, that anything was wrong.

When Alfred finally called it a day and retreated inside to start on the top floors, Jason didn’t know whether to follow him in or not. He didn’t want to be boxed in again, and the sun really was nice, as scarce as it was seen around here. But Jason didn’t want to be alone.

It took almost running to catch up to Alfred before the door shut Jason out.

All in all, Jason spent three days following Alfred around. Even when he went back to his rooms, the ones Jason wasn’t technically allowed in, he followed Alfred in. Jason didn’t want to be alone. He just couldn’t right now.

The fourth day, Jason was watching Alfred make a cake, the chocolate one Jason loved to the point of hoarding. He didn’t try and dip a finger, finding, after the first time that not only could Jason not touch, but he couldn’t taste either. Being dead was as sucky as it advertised.

The icing was a nice Nightwing blue, Alfred making little birds along the sides. It was a toss up right now whether Alfred was making it for Jason or Dick. Maybe Bruce since Jason was sure Dick was still in outer space right now. Whoever it was, Jason hoped they enjoyed it since he definitely wouldn’t.

Alfred had just finished half of the detail as the phone rang. Jason held back a grin at the expletives that fell quite frequently out of Alfred’s mouth when he was alone. It seemed, when there wasn’t Master Bruce to be a good role model for and Master Jason who they were trying to curb his own swearing, Alfred had quite the sailor mouth. Especially when his routine was thrown off.

Yet, when Alfred answered the phone, no hostility at all could be detected. A feat if there ever was one. “Master Bruce?”

“This is probably it,” Jason huffed, surprised it had taken a week for Bruce to man up. Alfred was going to be furious when he found out. “You might want to put the icing bag down.”

Alfred didn’t, and when the annoyance melted to horror that icing bag was use to no one. “Please tell me you’re joking. Master Bruce I swear you had better be joking.”

It took the phone hanging up for the message to set in. “I’m sorry Alfred.”

Jason had never seen Alfred cry. He never thought he would. It was like witnessing Bigfoot taking a shower, something so out of this world that it couldn’t be real. The cake didn’t last long, Alfred throwing all that chocolately goodness away. Jason would have been upset had a petty part of him thought good. If he didn’t get to eat it then the others shouldn’t either.

He skipped out around the time Alfred took a seat. Jason was used to big exclamations of emotion, of hands being raised or arms waving. Alfred’s quiet seat, his shoulders shaking minutely, it wasn’t anything Jason knew how to deal with.

So he went somewhere else instead. He stayed somewhere else over the next few days, exploring the manor and hoping Alfred would be back to his usual self when he did end up running into him again.

Jason learned a lot about the manor. He learned that there were indeed other secret passages he’d never found before. He also learned about Bruce’s secret porn stash Jason knew he kept somewhere in the manor. Sure, it looked to be a good five years old, but porn was porn and Jason wished it hadn’t taken death for him to find it. God, so many opportunities to tease Bruce were now gone.

A clattering summoned him from beneath Dick’s bed. Jason thought for a moment it was merely Alfred back from his errands, Wednesday always the day he’d go out and organise the family shop so they wouldn’t all starve, or worse, order in.

Yet, when the door shut again it wasn’t the usual clattering of Alfred hefting bags to the kitchen. Instead there was silence, a weighted silence. One that pricked the back of Jason’s neck. He was downstairs before he could think never so happy in his life when he saw Bruce lounging in the doorway. Alfred wasn’t far away, setting two suitcases down, his hand lingering on the smaller one Jason had quickly packed before leaving.

“Was it fast?” Alfred asked.

Bruce made one of his grunts, his usual aura of not wanting to talk about it radiating loud and clear to everyone present.

Unlike the last times Bruce got into these moods Alfred didn’t let this one go. “Just tell me,” he begged. “If nothing else Master Bruce, just tell me if he was in pain.”

There was silence again, long enough for Alfred to turn back to the cases, anger overtaking the sadness right now. He looked about ready to lay into Bruce, Jason ready to start running if that happened. Yet, “Probably,” Bruce murmured. “He- I can only hope his body started numbing everything before the explosion. But-”

When Alfred turned again this time the anger was gone.

Bruce lingered when Alfred left, just hanging in the doorway staring at nothing. Jason stayed with him, right now, he didn’t care that it was his fault Bruce was upset. All he did care about was that Bruce was here, right now, and Jason hadn’t known until then just how much he’d needed that.

He stayed close to Bruce, his hand resting just out of reach, not wanting to spoil the illusion of his absence just yet. “Bruce?”

The man didn’t react, he couldn’t hear Jason after all. But he was there.

It was dark by the time Bruce actually moved. Even then he merely ended up in the kitchen, Alfred setting some half thought out sandwich in front of both of them. It was hard to sit there with them and not be heard. Usually, it was Jason filling the silence, cracking jokes or making Bruce annoyed. Just so he wasn’t sat there like he was now, listening to nothing. Silence in the Todd household always meant someone was in trouble after all, and Jason still hadn’t adjusted to the fact that it wasn’t the same in the manor.

It was nearing the crusts when Alfred finally spoke. At first it was menial things like what needed doing around the manor. Then, while he was dusting his fingers from crumbs he moved on to other things. Things that had Bruce tensing where he sat, the picture of closed off.

“We must talk about this Bruce. I know it’s hard, but the sooner we organise everything the sooner we won’t have to think about it again.”

“No,” Bruce shook his head. “I can’t. I can’t say goodbye to him Alfred. He was fifteen.” Fifteen, the magical number that had Bruce breaking down at the kitchen table.

Jason wrung his hands watching them. Alfred wasn’t any help, he was too busy himself trying not to cry in front of Bruce. Jason wanted to do something. He wanted to tell Bruce he was alright, that he hadn’t really left, but he couldn’t. He couldn’t even touch Bruce. It left Jason keening at the table, stifling his own screams that wanted to come out again, the ones that would leave him crying for hours and thinking about things he’d been trying really hard not to think about.

But Jason did have to think about them. As the next week passed and Bruce was barely in the manor, Alfred always with him as well, Jason was left alone, and alone, he couldn’t stop himself from thinking about those things. Like why he was there.

It hurt more than he thought possible that he had been left behind. Even in death no one wanted him and it made him look back on everything he did and wonder why. Why was it him that was here and not someone else. What had he done that was so wrong that he couldn’t be with his mom again. His real mom. The one that didn’t tell him she loved him and try to kill him the next. Catherine wasn’t the best woman on planet Earth, but, at least when Jason thought of her he knew she loved him, really loved him. That everything she did was so Jason wasn’t left on the streets alone. Even if he had ended up there.

That spiral didn’t end well no matter how Jason looked at it, and it always led him to the next point on his list. Why he was the only one here. Jason had listened to one or seven tours of the manor, and as far as he was aware at least ten people had died here in these walls. Jason hadn’t even been at the manor when he died yet here he was, so where the hell was everyone else? There should have been ghosts of Waynes past teeming the halls. Yet, no matter how often Jason walked or looked he couldn’t find or hear anyone but himself when he was left alone. It scared him. Made him wonder, again, what he’d done so wrong that he was the only one here.

He was looking again, day three of his search for other life. He looked high and low, calling out names he could remember of Bruce’s family. He even went outside, hoping somewhere in the gardens he’d find a tea party waiting for him. Or, in the bunker, there would be a host of Wayne’s doing their Wayne things.

He didn’t.

Jason didn’t find anyone. Worse, when he tried to venture off the Wayne estate he found himself stuck. It was like an invisible barrier keeping him captive to the Wayne line. Jason tested it, travelling the border until that sickening feeling overwhelmed him and had him fleeing back to the house.

It left him crying along the halls.

He couldn’t get out. It was just like the warehouse, freedom just within his sights and Jason knowing he would never be able to reach it. He was stuck here. Alone. He was-

“Bruce.” He was in Bruce’s room, night having fallen at some point in his misery. It must have been late, or early, since Bruce was in bed, the covers hanging off his waist. Jason couldn’t stop crying looking at him.

He wanted to, quite sick of the act if he was honest with himself. But, just the idea that he would never be able to talk to someone, really talk to someone again, had him bursting out into another round of hopeless tears.

At this point, he was sure he just needed to hear himself make noise, to know that he was capable of it. “Bruce,” he said again, his hand reaching out, feeling the skin he remembered grappling against not so long ago. It was warm beneath his touch, Bruce either having a shower before he went to bed or being here a while since he usually ran cold.

Jason kept his hand on him, the warmth soothing as he climbed onto the sheets, shifting as best as he could to fit his legs in the gap Bruce’s body made between blanket and bed. He barely noticed his legs tenting the fabric when he got in, too focused on keeping Bruce next to him.

“Please don’t leave me,” Jason begged, curling up and willing the hours away.

It was a long existence that next week. Bruce was even more grumpy than he had been before, his mood sending Alfred shouting after him at one point. Jason made sure he was out of the manor for those parts. Mostly because he had a new gift to explore.

While he hadn’t noticed at the time, that wasn’t to say that he never noticed his legs filling Bruce’s sheet. Jason could touch things. He’d proven he could. But the how was alluding him.

He tried everything from staring really hard at something to just surprise attacking it to get himself to touch it. Most of these tries resulted in nothing but Jason throwing another tantrum, questioning whether he had just seen things that night with Bruce. Other times, happier times, something would move. Not much, minutely at the very most, but it was something. It was proof that Jason was still a part of this world somehow, and it was good enough for him to keep going.

“Master Bruce,” pulled Jason out of his latest attempt to try and grab one of his favourite books. Moping was all well and good, practicing too, but sometimes Jason was just plain bored. Hence the book. The one Bruce was currently studying.

There was a slight cough from Alfred, Bruce eventually giving his grunt to show he was showing. It was typical primal behaviour from these two, especially when they were fighting. Had Jason still been able to be heard and therefore garner a laugh he’d be doing his best nature documentary voice over on them. Bruce used to love it, and it helped get him to stop fighting with Alfred when the man proved he was still capable of smiling.

“Master Bruce, the coroner phoned again this morning. He says we can not put it off any longer.” There was silence, Jason seeing Bruce ready to lash out again. He backed out, not really wanting to listen to this topic of conversation anyway. He knew they were talking about him after all. Yet, he couldn’t help getting the tail end of, “I know you wish to wait until Master Dick is back, but I fear Jason’s… Jason may not appreciate being forced away from his rest.”

Bruce’s response, if there was one, was lost in the winding hallways of the manor.

Jason took solace in one of the secret rooms he’d found in his wanderings. Alive wanderings that was. Dick had been the one to clue him into the manor’s secret rooms. He’d come home from a Titan’s mission. It had been around the third or fourth time Jason had met him really, and things were, well, not good, they hadn’t really been good until about a year ago. But Dick had been feeling particularly nice to him on that visit. Jason put it down to Kori mellowing Dick out before he came over. Whatever it was, when Dick found Jason looking for something to occupy himself with, he’d shown Jason the first secret passage Dick had found when he had been a kid.

It was a nice memory. One he knew that could never come to life again. Jason couldn’t even call Dick a dick again. Not with him hearing it anyway.

He flicked a lamp, his spirits not even lifted when the shade rotated a few centimetres.

What did lift them was a part of Alfred’s words that lingered in his brain. It took longer than he was proud of for him to really take notice of them, but when he did, all thoughts of living a lonely existence as Wayne Manor’s poltergeist evaporated.

Alfred had said that Jason wouldn’t want to be kept from his rest. That was it. That was the reason why he was here and not with the others. He wasn’t in the ground yet. But when he was, well, God would have no choice but to take him.

He spent his days hanging around Alfred afte that. He needed to know what was going on, when he was going to be put into the ground. It took a lot of arguing with Bruce before Jason was listening to Alfred order flowers for next Thursday.

Thursday. Six days away.

Jason didn’t know what to do with himself. He spent the first day of his countdown telling Bruce everything he’d ever wanted to. He knew Bruce couldn’t hear, but it was cathartic to let everything out. Like, how much it annoyed Jason when Bruce did that thing with his tongue, the tutting noise, the one he did when he was comparing Jason to Dick without saying it out loud. Like, how Jason wished Bruce hadn’t spent so much time on his work. How Jason hadn’t asked for much, just maybe one night a week where the two of them didn’t have to patrol. Don’t get him wrong, Jason loved being Robin, it was the best thing in the world. But sometimes, when Jason had school the next day, Bruce didn’t let him out, but just because Jason wasn’t out didn’t mean Bruce wasn’t. He just wanted one night where he could drag out a board game and know Bruce wasn’t going to ditch him for the cave.

He told Bruce how he thought it was completely annoying that he was allowed to fight bad guys on a nightly basis, that Jason had lived on the streets for half of his life, yet, when Jason wanted to go to the bad part of town because they did the best pizza he had to have a chaperone. If anything, Jason should have been chaperoning him, Bruce without his suit had no sense of street smarts to speak of. He didn’t even know the difference between a homeless man and a druggie scamming people out of money.

He told Bruce that he thought that stupid thing he’s got going on with Dick should be sorted out and soon. But mostly, well, mostly Jason told Bruce about how much he was going to miss him.

He did the same with Alfred the day after, and when he was done there, well, he had a lot to say to other people. The problem was, Jason didn’t know how he could say it to them. He couldn’t leave the manor grounds. He could only just pick things up. Even then it was the hardest thing he’d ever had to do.

But time was pressing against Jason, so, he spent all the time he had left focusing on picking the pen in his room up. He managed it, on the second to last day. At four thirty exactly Jason managed to find a way to keep the pen in his hand long enough to write on a notebook he dug out.

He wrote to Bruce first, stopping a few times when he lost control with his pen. Then Alfred, telling them just the things that he’d said the day before. Lastly, he wrote to Dick.

There was a lot he wanted to say to Dick. He wanted to call him an ass one last time, since Dick was. He also wanted to instill that Jason was still a better Robin than Dick had ever been. Mostly, he wanted to tell Dick that he wished things had been different. That Dick didn’t hate him, and that Jason really had tried his best to live up to the example the older boy had set. He also said, and here Jason debated putting pen to paper, figuring he may as well since it wasn’t like he was going to be around to examine the consequences after Thursday. So, he also noted down that Jason had, well, a bit of a crush on Dick. That he wished the guy had shown him an ounce of the kindness he knew Dick showed to his team.

It made him cringe at every word he wrote down about that, but it felt good all the same. Like a load had been lifted off him.

When he was done, Jason took the notes and hid them under everyone’s pillows. He knew for a fact no one would see them until long after Jason was gone. Bruce didn’t even hit his own pillow when he went to bed. Jason had found him sprawled sideways, sometimes upside down since Bruce didn’t know what it was to go to bed without being completely exhausted. Alfred, well, maybe Alfred would find his. But Dick most definitely wouldn’t get his until he came back.

Jason’s last day on Earth he spent it outside, enjoying the sunlight that graced the gardens. It seemed a fitting end, something extraordinary like a clear sky appearing just as Jason was saying goodbye. He heard Bruce go out, Alfred too, the both of them arguing like mad this morning. Jason tuned it out, wanting to remember them as they had been when he’d been alive. Arguing still, but always making sure not to do it where Jason could hear.

He took a breath, watching the roses drift in a slow breeze and waited.

Then waited again.

Then some more.

It grew dark, Alfred coming home with Bruce slurring on his shoulder.

Jason still waited, knowing that sometimes the funeral didn’t mean he was buried completely. They would finish in a day or so. So he stayed, watching the sky, and waited.

It was on the fourth day of waiting that Jason gave up. He jumped up from his spot, slamming the veranda doors open and stormed off to the kitchen.

“I’m still here,” he snapped, Alfred and Bruce continued to eat their breakfasts. “Why am I still here? What did you do? What went wrong? Why am I still here!”

They wouldn’t answer. They would never answer and he could never ask them.

He screamed, grabbing Bruce’s plate and smashing it against the counter.

Food got everywhere, Alfred snapping at Bruce immediately for losing his head.

“I didn’t,” Bruce mumbled, staring at his hands like they had betrayed him.

“No! I did! I’m here! Why am I here?”

“Don’t bother,” Alfred hissed, batting Bruce’s hands with a dish towel as the both of them set to picking up the pieces.

Jason harassed them all day. His anger spread from a broken plate to mirrors and clothes being torn under his hands. By nightfall, Bruce was barricaded in his study, the only reason Jason didn’t destroy anything in here due to the fact Bruce was having a panic attack. With his anger subsiding, Jason could see why Bruce might be in this state. He was already worried about his psyche without all this unexplained happenings. With it, well, if Jason had been Bruce he would have been crying into his knees too.

“I’m sorry,” Jason said, taking a seat next to Bruce’s knees. He stayed there all night as Bruce fought to get himself back together.

It quickly became apparent that Jason wasn’t leaving. Two weeks and Bruce taking a trip to the gravesite himself proved that it wasn’t Jason’s body being laid to rest that would help him move on. That meant that Jason’s worst fear was being realised, he was trapped here forever, alone.

Panicking did no good he found out. Neither did boredom which, when he was actually paying attention, did still exist when he was a ghost. About a month after his funeral, Jason took to making it his mission to be the most well read ghost there was.

He started with his favourites, piling them up and hiding them out of Bruce’s reach. His room was still a no go zone for stowing things away. Around a few days after the funeral Bruce had got the stomach to go into Jason’s room. He’d been coming more and more often every day. One time he didn’t move for forty eight hours. If things started finding their way there without Bruce moving them Jason didn’t think Bruce would respond well. Either, he would spend another time with his head between his legs, or take it out on Alfred, something Jason definitely didn’t want.

So Jason found a secret cove in the library to keep his books and his place in those books. With no sleep and no need to strain his eyes reading was easier than ever. Jason got through about three books within four days, and when the manor’s doors opened with a bang, Jason’s count had significantly increased from the measly number he’d held before he’d died.

“Where is he?”

Jason recognised that voice. Even if it was screeching Jason would always know Dick Grayson.

He didn’t even think as he abandoned his books, running down the corridors until Dick, still clad in his horrific Nightwing gear came into view shouting at Alfred. Jason was starting to think this was the only way this family knew how to communicate.

“Master Dick.”

“No Alfred. Don’t even think about sticking up for him. That’s- Jason was my- I had to hear from Kori!” He’d been crying. His domino wasn’t doing a good job of keeping the tears behind the mask. As more fell, the fabric started slipping from Dick’s eyes.

“We wanted to tell you. We thought about leaving you a message. But, leaving a message in a time like this…”

“You still should have told me,” Dick hissed, leaving Alfred at the door as he went in search of Bruce.

Jason tagged along, admiring the dirt that clung to the Nightwing suit. Dick must have come straight from his mission. Jason wondered what it had been like. What the aliens had looked like. It was so unfair that Dick got to go to outer space while he was Robin but Jason hadn’t.

Bruce was in Jason’s room, where he’d been since early morning. He had the note Jason had forgotten to take from under his pillow in his hands. The day Bruce had found that had been a dark day. Really dark. Made all the worse when Alfred revealed he had one too. Jason had never seen the two of them so mad, both flinging accusations at each other until they retreated from exhaustion.

Bruce barely glanced up as Dick came in, he’d probably heard Dick like the rest of the manor when he banged his way inside. “You shouldn’t have that on up here,” Bruce muttered.

Dick hissed, his whole body tensing. He’d been a ticking bomb since the moment he’d come into the manor. If Bruce didn’t play it right, Dick was going to be set off. “Is that all you have to say to me?” Dick asked, one last try for civility. Jason was surprised, if it had been him he would have been screeching Bruce into a fight by now.

“What else is there?”

Jason ducked out as Dick charged, knowing that both him and Bruce together were just toxic. “-MY BROTHER!” followed Jason as he went down to Alfred. He wrote a note out, leaving it conveniently where Alfred would read it, telling the man that his two alive charges were trying to trash Jason’s room.

The war went on for hours. The shouting turned to actual fighting, the location changing when Alfred finally took note of where they were and threatened them out with his shotgun. It was a bad day to be at the manor. One that ended with Bruce and Dick stalking off to different parts of Gotham to punch their frustrations out.

Dick came back before Bruce, his suit gone when he came back up into the main part of the manor. He ended up in Jason’s room, breaking down before he got beyond the threshold. The tears stopped long before Dick’s sobbing. It was weird thinking this was all about him. He knew Dick cared, just not this much.

Maybe it was misplaced guilt. Jason wouldn’t put it past Dick to start blaming himself for everything he could have done different. What he could have done to prevent Jason from leaving and getting himself blown up. Never mind that Dick was out of this atmosphere when all this drama started.

Dick picked himself up when his throat stopped making noise. He dragged himself the rest of the way to Jason’s bed, burrowing down into the covers.

If this had been any other time, Jason would have bust a nut knowing Dick was in his bed. As it was, Jason just left Dick be and went back to his hidey hole in the library. It wasn’t like he could talk to Dick anymore.

When morning came, Dick joined the family for breakfast. Jason sat in his usual seat, wishing again that he could have the pancakes that looked so nice on Dick’s plate. Bruce was there, silent as usual, his paper in front of his face, hiding the bruises Dick had dealt. It wasn’t as if Dick didn’t look just as ugly, but Dick had a way of wearing his bruises proudly. Jason had been terrified the first time he’d seen the two in a state like this. He thought it was just like home, that Bruce had lied to him, that sooner or later Jason was going to end up on the tail end of one of these beatings. But, then Jason had seen them actually fight. Dick gave as good as he got. Maybe even more so. He was usually the one to instigate the fights, Bruce merely reacting until Dick pushed one button too many.

It was a different dynamic what Bruce and Dick had to Bruce and Jason. Bruce was most definitely Jason’s dad, but to Dick, that label didn’t apply. Dick was Bruce’s equal. He had the authority to call Bruce on his crap and actually be heard.

“Where is he?” Dick asked as he mopped up the last of his syrup.

“In the Wayne lot. Next to his mother.”

Dick left. He left the table, then he left the manor, not a word to anyone whether or not he would be coming back tonight.

Jason kind of hoped he didn’t. After all the excitement of yesterday Jason needed a quiet day to relax.

He read through five short stories when the door went again and Dick ran past the library. He was back in Jason’s room when he went looking. Jason debated leaving, but this was his room, so he hopped on up next to Dick. Surprisingly, Dick didn’t just go to sleep like he did the night before. Instead, he reached through Jason, which was a weird experience, and felt around until he picked up a magazine he was sure no on in the manor had known about.

“Honestly Jay,” Dick sighed, flipping through the porn magazine before putting it back. He felt back under again before coming up with more of Jason’s hidden treasures.

Jason should have been pissed. As it was he was more embarrassed and shocked that Dick had known about his stash as his so called brother made an “A ha!” and came up with a book Dick definitely shouldn’t have known about.

It was one of the magazines Dick had bought for him when he turned thirteen. It was scarcely used, Jason preferring to hide things in it. Dick seemed to know this as he flipped to the right page and a number of photo’s dropped out.

Jason grabbed them before Dick could, moving them out of his grip, hoping the message would get across that Jason didn’t want Dick looking at them. Dick didn’t get it, grabbing them anyway and flipping through them like they were his own.

A few were of Bruce and Jason. Dick and Jason. But the rest were of his other family. His mom, his real mom, Catherine Todd that actually cared about him. They were stupid photo’s of his life when it was okay. Of his mom and dad crowded around him, Jason standing proud in his diaper between them. There was one of his dad feeding him. His mom and dad on Christmas. It was happier times that Jason pretended didn’t happen because they didn’t. They all looked happy on the photo’s but Jason was sure he could remember the fights that broke out not long afterwards. The only reason he had them in the first place was because they were the only photos he had of them. Anything else had been thrown in the trash with the rest of Jason’s stuff when he left his apartment.

Dick looked at all of them ten times over before slipping all but one back into the magazine. It was the one of them. Dick had invited Jason to Titans tower for the weekend. Not long ago actually. It was a few months before he went into outer space. Dick had been trying the whole brother thing for real this time, taking Jason out sightseeing and even to a play. The photo was in intermission, Jason getting a picture of them. He took distinct satisfaction in this photo since Dick was asleep, snoring loud enough for people to complain to Jason and not waking even when the flash went off.

Dick brought that one back to his room, Jason getting only a few minutes of silence before Bruce was taking Dick’s place. He inspected the place like a bloodhound, looking for things that might have been upset or disturbed while Dick was in. It took a while, and when Bruce calmed down he took up Dick’s prior spot, only he stayed the night.

Jason stayed next to Bruce all night, wondering who else knew about his photo’s.

The next morning, Dick was the one to come wake Bruce up. He looked like he’d been crying, Bruce eyeing him warily, only when Dick rushed him this time it was for a hug.

“I’m sorry,” Dick said.

“Me too.”

There was something hanging out the back of Dick’s pocket,  paper Jason was sure he’d hidden after he found out he wasn’t going to be journeying to the beyond. He’d debated whether to destroy it or not, settling, for now, hiding it in the air duct of Dick’s room.

Looked like Dick had found it. Jason wondered if he could snatch it out of Dick’s pants without it being seen by either of them.

They pulled back, Dick wiping his eyes and grabbing the paper. “I found this in my room. I think he must have wrote it before he left.” Dick let Bruce snatch it out of his hands, that same anger rearing its head before furrowing into a frown. “Do you think he knew he wasn’t coming back?”

The paper crumpled under Bruce’s fist, Dick reaching over to grab it before it was destroyed beyond recognition. “Where did you get it?”

“In my vent,” Dick straightened out the edges. “I don’t think he wanted me to find it. But, he should have thought about hiding it somewhere else if that was the case. This isn’t he first time he’s hidden something in my vent.”

Oh, right. That time Alfred had told him to write his frustrations down in letters and give it to the person. It was a way to curb Jason’s anger. It, kind of, worked. But when it came to Jason giving the letters to people he chickened out and hid or destroyed them.

“It’s not from Jason,” Bruce mumbled.

Dick frowned, looking down at the paper, “Er, I think it is B. It’s his writing and everything.”

Bruce shook his head. “Alfred changed my bed before I came home. There’s no way Jason could have written these.”

“These? Like more?”

“It was under my pillow. Under Alfred’s pillow. It can’t be from him. Who else knew about the vent?”

Dick spent the whole morning arguing with Bruce after that. He was adamant that Jason had to have wrote it, Bruce denying it again and again until he was accussing Dick of making this up just to spite him.

Alfred had to intervene again when they got physical.

Dick’s stay lasted only two more days before he’d had enough and went back to New York. Jason was sad to see him go, especially because he sneaked into Jason’s room before he left and stole the rest of Jason’s photo’s.

When Dick was gone, Jason went back to his hidey hole, avoiding life as much as possible. It wasn’t like he could do anything with them after all.

Things were, well, productive. Jason made it through a whole shelf of the library before things got worse. Jason didn’t think they could. There wasn’t any way really since he was dead.

It happened on a Wednesday evening. One moment he was feeling okay, and the next, it felt like he’d just been punched in the gut. The feeling only lasted for a momen, and when they finished Jason wasn’t sure if they had happened at all.

He waved it off.

Or he did. Later he would think of it as a prominition. That later being when the doorbell went and Tim Drake was introduced into his life.

“You little shit,” Jason hissed, listening to Tim make his pitch to Bruce. “Did you not just say what happened to me? Is death not enough of a deterrent? Are you that whacked in the head that you’re actually speaking these words right now?”

Of course, Tim couldn’t hear him. He couldn’t even sense him, so when Jason tried to tell the kid to never come back Tim did the opposite. Then he saved Bruce’s freaking life. Then his- no, just no!

“You think you’re so great, don’t you Tim?” Jason sneered, pacing in front of the kid trying on a new and improved Robin costume. “You know you’ll never be a real Robin. You aren’t even wearing the uniform. Do you even know how to throw a punch, or are your hands only good for organising garden parties?”

Kind of unfair, but Bruce had just given the kid the job. Jason’s job. The job that should have died with Jason. Make Tim something else. Or, hell, here’s an idea, how about keep kids out of Gotham’s nightlife.

“You know you’re going to get hurt right?” Tim remained blank, fiddling with the belt he’d just been given. “You’re going to get shot. You know what being shot feels like brat? You know what being stabbed is like? You know how much throwing a punch hurts? You know nothing. You’re going to get killed faster than me.”

Right now Jason didn’t know if he was hoping or dreading for that to happen. Bruce needed to learn. He needed to learn that he couldn’t just keep making kids Robin, even if they forced themselves into the job. He couldn’t.

“You’re going to die kid. And don’t expect me to share this place with you when you do.”

Tim, surprisingly, did not die on his first patrol out as an official Robin. Instead, he came home with a sour Batman and a grin on his small face.

“Dick,” Jason muttered as Tim passed him to the showers.

Bruce took a seat at the computer, bracing himself there until Tim was out of sight. Only then did he slink down, his cowl covered head cowering behind his arms. “What am I doing?” Bruce hissed.

“Hell if I know,” Jason answered.

Tim survived the next patrol. Then the one after that. A month in and the kid was still alive and kicking. Worse, he was visited by Dick. Jason, when he saw Dick’s face on the other side of the manor door, had honestly never been happier to see the man. For one, Dick had gotten himself a haircut which was nice. Two, a new suit that had delicious thoughts running through Jason’s head whenever he glanced at CCTV footage Bruce sometimes had running in the cave. Three because, well, Jason had always been happy to see Dick, and lastly four, because while Dick had liked Jason as a person, he had not liked Jason as a Robin. Which meant, little Timmy downstairs trying to learn his poisons from his sodas, was about to learn about what happened when someone took on the Robin mantle.

Only, when Dick got down to the cave, instead of Dick asking what the hell Tim was doing down there, Dick went over, clapped Tim on the shoulder and asked, “You doing okay kid?”

“Mr Grayson,” Tim gushed, his poisons completely forgotten in favour of Dick. “What are you doing here?”

“I came to see you.”

Which, no, just, no. No!

This couldn’t be happening. Either Dick was being mind controlled, or something else was at large because this wasn’t the Dick Grayson Jason knew. The Dick he knew would avoid any and all mention of Tim in favour of hissing Bruce out until they fought. He would spend all day hiding in the manor or the cave or anywhere Jason wasn’t because he didn’t know what to do or say when they talked to each other. He certainly never asked the kid if he wanted a few pointers and started sparring with him on the mats.

“No!” Jason was once again ignored, his screams for Dick to wake up falling on deaf ears.

He went upstairs, finding Alfred baking in the kitchen, Dick’s favourite cookies laid out and ready for the oven. Dick had called ahead then. Bruce was with Alfred, the paper open in front of him, a late start since it was the weekend as he spooned cereal to his mouth.

“I believe Master Dick will be staying for a few days.”

“Good,” Bruce said. “It’ll be nice for Tim to have someone to talk to.”

Tim like he was a part of the family. Like Dick came every week to show Tim new moves. Like there wasn’t something missing in their day to day lives.

“Indeed. The poor boy looks like he needs a friend. Perhaps we should bring up the idea of sending Master Tim to New York with Master Dick. I believe there are quite a few new recruits within similar age range that he will benefit from.”

Bruce hummed in agreement. Like he hadn’t pitched a fit when Jason so much as brought up the idea of going to see the Titans. “If he does, I can invite Clark over, have him check out the Drake situation. I’m not liking how often they’re away from home.”

Jason smashed Bruce’s bowl. More, he tossed Alfred’s cookies so the dough went everywhere. “What about me!”

The two adults looked in shock at the broken bowls before Bruce sprang into action, calling down to the cave for Dick to grab the scanners. Jason held out hope, maybe some part of him would be seen. Yet, when Bruce turned his narrow eyes to every way to look for the hidden there was, Jason didn’t show up.

“I’m still here,” Jason said. He latched onto Bruce’s shirt, the fabric bunching but the man not seeming to notice, too wrapped up in his scanner. “I’m still here.”

If Jason had been playing Casper before, he certainly wasn’t anymore. Gone was the friendly ghost that just sat back and let people get on with their lives. The more Jason stood back and let them, the more he was forgotten, and Jason was damn well not going to be forgotten. Not when he was still around. Dick had been the last straw of a tolerance he didn’t know he’d had until now

He started with the mirrors. Every time Bruce went for a shower, Jason would wait for the bathroom to steam up before writing messages for him. At first, they were angry, telling Bruce to fire the kid. That it was Jason’s suit not TIm’s. But as the weeks went on and more mirrors got smashed, Jason ended up writing agian and again, ‘I’m stil here Bruce.’ ‘Don’t forget about me dad please.’

Dick wasn’t around enough to pester. He came every two weeks, and even then only for a few days before he was back in New York. Jason tried to mess with him while he was there. Pants him in the hallway, which was more for Jason’s benefit than Dick’s. Move his stuff around. Leave him notes that had him screaming at Bruce. But, like he’d said, Dick wasn’t around enough to truly try and persuade on his side.

Tim got the brunt of Jason’s anger. Often times Jason would empty out all of Tim’s suit pockets before patrol, getting a great satisfaction from listening to Bruce drill again and again how he couldn’t take Tim out on the field if he wasn’t willing to put the effort in.

He sometimes desecrated Tim’s suit too. Sometimes it was a sharpie, sometimes it was acid, but all of it had Alfred telling the kid to be more careful, and Jason getting to see that frustrated scowl paint its way across Tim’s skin. When the kid stayed over on the nights he was too tired to go back home, Jason would play poltergeist. He’d take Tim’s covers, shake the bed. One time, he ominously drew the curtains back until the kid was screaming, running for Bruce’s room. While it wasn’t the result Jason wanted, he did enjoy hearing Tim screech.

Some nights he would follow Tim to Bruce’s room, mess with him a little more until the kid was shaking Bruce awake and telling him of the ghost in the manor. Bruce didn’t want to hear it, the mirror already putting him on edge.

Most nights however, Jason would retreat to the kitchen where Alfred was. The man never seemed to sleep on nights Tim stayed over. He heard the screaming, was often in the hallway when Tim went running, and ended up in the kitchen when he’d finished investigating Tim’s room.

Alfred was the only one Jason didn’t mess with. He didn’t want to. Alfred’s nerves were already frail with having Bruce, a ghost on top of that would just be cruel.

It was Alfred that eventually had Jason letting up on Bruce.

One argument too many had another smashed mirror and Bruce ordering Alfred out.

“I’m sorry,” Jason cried later, huddled up next to Bruce, “I just didn’t want you to forget me. Please don’t fire Alfred.” He was the only one who still set out Jason’s Wednesday cupcake.

Bruce seemed to listen, or at least realise how much Alfred meant to him since the man was allowed back into the manor the next morning.

Jason didn’t write anymore messages. None to Bruce, and none to Dick when he was there. He would have stopped messing with Tim too, but, well, Jason needed some way to alleviate his boredom.

It didn’t help that the kid started spending even more time over at the manor. So much that he investigated the library on one of his visiting days. Bruce was giving his same old tour, telling Tim about the different sections and the ancient collections all connected to this manor.

Tim listened to it all starry eyed, following Bruce like a lost puppy until Bruce told him to go have a look. Then, well, then Tim really did get into Jason’s bad books. Not only did the kid manhandle the books like they were worthless, but he found Jason’s little stash.

“Hey Bruce,” Tim called, the man coming immediately. “What are those for? Are you doing some kind of project?”

“No,” Bruce hummed. He edged closer, picking up a few of Jason’s books before setting them down. “I’ll have Alfred clear them away. Dick probably forgot to put them away last time he was here.”

“Dick likes to read?” Tim asked, already turning to look at a different part of the library.

“Some genres,” Bruce agreed.

Now, Jason could have excused Tim if this was a one time thing. However, thanks to his little tattle tale, Jason could no longer stack his books up. Tim seemed to find them every time he was over and either steal one, or put them all back. If he didn’t do it, then Alfred would on his new rounds.

Jason didn’t ask for much, and now the one thing he did ask for was being messed with. It was Tim’s own fault what happened next.

Exactly one year after Jason died, Tim stayed over at the manor. He had the nerve to snuggle up with Dick and watch a movie, no one in that God forsaken manor even caring that he had died today.

Dick dropped off first, as he usually did. His stupid face hit the back of the sofa just as Tim started up another film. Jason waited until the snoring started, having gotten Dick’s sleep down to an art form. He knew when Dick was deep enough he wouldn’t wake without a serious jolt. He was like Bruce like that, the two of them light sleepers to a point then dead to the world until their bodies decided to wake up.

Tim didn’t seem to mind, hesitantly leaning himself on Dick’s sleep soft shoulder. It was sickening.

Jason paused the movie, watching with satisfaction as Tim pressed play as much as he liked and the film pausing every time it got so much as a second in. Jason kept it up for a good two minutes until the kid got frustrated enough to hop up and see what was wrong. The little tech wizard would see there was nothing wrong in a heartbeat. But Jason wasn’t planning on messing with his electronics, he just needed the kid away from DIck.

Jason got to work as the kid turned his back, running behind the sofa to grab the suit he’d stowed and slide it in TIm’s place. When the kid turned around, Jason wished he’d had a camera.

“D- Dick?” If TIm had been in his Robin suit Jason had no doubt he wouldn’t have sounded as scared as he was now. “Dick!”

Jason let the kid call for Dick a while, long enough that he would gather some courage and step forward. When he did, Jason was ready, lifting his old Robin suit’s top half until it looked like it was standing.

Tim nearly fell over himself as he scrambled back, a sob working its way out of his throat as Jason started moving the Robin suit out of the room. He laid it down a corridor away, running back to Dick’s room and pushing the kid until he stumbled forwards to the door.

Tim looked around wildly, unprepared for the next shove that had him screaming as he curled up on the floor.

Bruce came in before Jason could go through with the rest of his plan. He scooped Tim up like a lost bird and shook Dick awake until he got some kind of answer as to why Tim was screaming like a banshee.

Jason smashed Tim’s mirror in retaliation for getting Bruce involved, spending the whole next day sulking. He wasn’t surprised when Bruce sent Tim off with Dick that afternoon. He was angry because that meant he couldn’t even try for a round two, but he wasn’t surprised.

What did surprise him was Tim coming home the next day, running the halls until he found Bruce, Jason blowing the pages of Bruce’s book every now and then, and gasping, “Jason’s alive.”

“What?” Bruce demanded.

Jason scarecly believed it himself since, well he was pretty sure he was still dead. But TIm had been adamant that a guy dressed up in an old Robin costume had ambushed him in Titans tower. He had the bruises to prove it.

Jason put it all down to a hoax until that very night.

He was in his old bedroom, wishing that Tim was there so he could mess with the kid, when the latch to his window opened.

There, standing in the moonlight, was himself. He was sure of it, no amount of age could disprove it. He could feel it in his gut. There, in front of him, was himself.