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Jason didn’t cross paths with Ivy a lot. He wasn’t entirely sure if that was by design—Harley often gave him a wide berth when she was functioning on as many cylinders as she had left, which by association might have meant Ivy did as well—or just because Ivy left kids the fuck alone, so she didn’t end up on his shit list as much as the other psychos in town.
Still, it wasn’t as if they were friendly, or anything. Which was why it was a bit of a surprise when she intercepted him on a fairly routine evening patrol and said, “I have something I need you take off my hands.”
Jason raised his eyebrows. Not that it mattered, seeing as he was in the hood, but he felt like his silence adequately expressed the level of ‘say what’ happening in his brain. Ivy clearly caught on, because she twisted a hand in her hair, not seductively, but like a woman who needed something and was considering the most straight-forward route to getting it.
As a fan of straight-forwardness himself, Jason asked, “Is there a good reason I should?”
Ivy muttered something that might have been “define ‘good reason’,” but said aloud, “Harley says you care about them. The other Bats.”
“The fuck does Harley know?”
“When it comes to human psychology? Probably more than the board of the APA put together.”
Touché. The worst part was, Harley wasn’t wrong in this instance. “If this is about the Demon brat—”
“I would find Batman if it were the child. He knows I wouldn’t have intentionally done this to Robin.”
That got Jason to pause. “What did you do, Ivy?”
“I’ve been working on…look, a girl’s gotta have weapons in this world.”
“We’ll save the discussion of necessary armaments for a) another time and b) someone with more of an objective ethical bent than I have. Try Wonder Woman, she’s good at that shit. What did you do?”
“Dosed Nightwing with an experimental serum.”
Jason’s stomach clenched. It would have to be Dick. “What, the hives are really bad this time?”
Ivy glanced off to the side. “Not quite.”
“Ivy.”
“The anti-toxins you’ve all developed over the years won’t work. It has a different base. At best, it will cause severe fever, delusions, and anything touching his skin to be excruciating, like a burn, only, maybe more like being burned from being frozen.”
“At best,” Jason said flatly. “Let me guess. At worse I’m going to be dealing with a dead Bat to explain to head Bat.”
“I wasn’t aiming for him,” she said.
“Who were you aiming for?” Not that it really mattered. Especially since, if Dick had been there, Ivy’d known darn well he wouldn’t let anybody be shot with something that might be lethal in his place.
“Two-Face. He’s been—”
Jason cut her off with a slash of his hand. “Busy giving no fucks. Where’s Nightwing?”
“The northeast bower in Blain Street Park. He’ll be safe there until you can get him.”
“Except for from your poison.”
She inclined her head. “I’d owe you one.”
Jason said, “I collect,” and threw out a grapple.
“Shit,” Jason said softly. Dick was indeed, in the bower. His hair was soaked through with sweat—it was a perfectly temperate evening—and he was trying to rip his uniform off with fingers that wouldn’t cooperate, but had managed to dig a few furrows into his skin with the effort. The smell of vomit on the air told Jason that Dick had been sick at least once.
Even more bothersome, Dick hadn’t noticed Jason approaching. Jason knelt and took the helmet off, so that at least the lines of his face would be present. He wasn’t taking the domino off either of them here. “Nightwing.”
Dick startled so hard he crashed into a tree trunk and let out a sound Jason wasn’t sure he wanted to classify. His eyes went wide when they focused in on Jason and he stuttered, “Hood. H—hood. Don’t. Red Robin, don’t. Don’t hurt him. He—”
Jason cut him off. “Not here to hurt anyone, Nightwing. You need medical.”
“I don’t—can’t remember—” Dick hunched over and dry-heaved.
“I’ll explain, I promise, but you gotta let me get you somewhere we can try and work on this. It’s going to hurt. I need you to cooperate.”
Dick was panting, shivering. “Not sure I—” He looked at Jason, pupils blown wide, clearly not entirely cognizant. “Gonna try.”
“I’ll take it,” Jason said.
Jason knew that the absolute first rule of dealing with unknown toxins was to not further alter the chemical toxicity of the person who’d been dosed. In other words, he knew he couldn’t give Dick painkillers or a sedative or fucking anything that might have helped. Dick forgot Jason was there to help him twice in the five minutes it took to get both of them to Jason’s bike. Even drugged out of his mind, Dick could be a threat if he put his mind to it.
But that was better than once they were on the bike, Jason lashing them together with a cord so Dick wouldn’t fall off. It pressed Dick into his back, which meant more and more surface area on Dick that would feel like it was being burnt off by way of a nitrogen freeze ray. Dick seemed to have enough presence of mind to scream into Jason’s shoulder.
He screamed the entire way.
Thankfully, since it was the only thing that had gone right so far, one of Jason’s closest safehouses was one of his more secure ones: underground, sound-proofed, and stocked to survive a damn apocalypse. Also, wired by Roy, so he had access to just about any terminal he wanted.
He helped Dick peel the uniform and domino off, so nothing was touching his skin, and put him in the bathroom, where if he needed to be sick again, he could be, without getting it all over himself or Jason’s floors. Jason debated starting a saline and fluids IV, but he had a feeling that was going to feel like he was killing Dick. Instead, he went and filled one of his plastic tumblers with room temperature water, and stayed with Dick until he’d swallowed most of it. Dick freaked out every few sips that Jason was trying to poison him—in fairness, it wasn’t clear he recognized Jason at this point, and he was poisoned—but Jason stayed calm enough to get him to keep drinking.
Jason told him, “I need to call Alfred, okay?”
Dick blinked several times. “Alfred.”
“Yeah, I need his help. Just—just try to remember you’re safe, okay?”
Dick looked around, as if to convince himself of that. Jason sighed and locked him in the bathroom, mostly to avoid the situation where Dick wigged and found a way out onto the street while naked and drugged to the gills.
He went and tapped into the channel for the cave generally open to outside lines so long as you knew how to dial in. As Jason had suspected, it was early enough that Alfred was still manning the cave. Alfred blinked and said, “Master Jason.”
“Hey Alf, problem. Ivy dosed Dick with something new and nasty, she says none of our developed stuff is going to make a dent and I believe her, since she led me to him. I’ve got him in my bathroom and got about twenty ounces of water in him, but touch is painful, he’s in and out of lucidity, emphasis on out, and I’m worried about how high his fever probably is. I doubt he’s gonna let me take his temp, but observationally, I’d guess we’re cresting 102 or 103.”
Alfred nodded. “I can’t leave the cave, there’s a situation with Barbara and Master Tim. You’re going to have to do what I would do: get the toxin flushed as best you can, and keep the fever down.”
“Lukewarm bath, IV-flush?” This was going to suck all the balls. Ever.
Alfred gave him a sympathetic glance. “Send me the coordinates of where you are, I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
“Just you,” Jason told him.
“Just me, you have my word. Keep him alive, Master Jason.”
Jason rubbed a hand over his face and pressed the end button. Fuckfuckfuckityfuck.
Dick was missing. Jason had left him locked in the bathroom for five minutes, this was a two bedroom apartment, and he was missing. Jason was going to be hunted down by the entire batclan and he would deserve it, because somehow he had allowed Dick to wander off naked and poisoned and—
A whimper from the small pantry Jason had built into a nook off the kitchen broke through his thoughts. The pantry that in no way, shape, or form should have been big enough to house Dick even empty, let alone with the canned goods and spices Jason kept in it. Sure enough, though, when Jason pulled the pantry door back, there was Dick, naked, high as balls, and squeezed into a space a third of his size.
Jason could see the lines of pain in Dick’s muscles, the way he had bitten his lips bloody. Softly, he said, “Hey there.”
Dick looked at him, his eyes widening. “Jay? Jay, you have to—go. You have to get out of here. It’s not safe.”
Jason pushed aside the part of him that splintered right apart at the protectiveness Dick was displaying, even out of his mind. “It is safe, Dick. I promise. We’re in one of my places. It’s got a security system that Roy set up.”
Jason was pretty sure Dick wasn’t processing words. He wasn’t touching him, and Jason could feel the heat coming off of him. Dick looked around, clearly having forgotten where he was in the five seconds since Jason had told him. He focused in on Jason again and said, “I—I don’t feel great.”
Ah, the Bruce Wayne School of Understatement. “I know. I know. Will you let me help?”
“What if I get you sick?”
The part of Jason that could never quite take for granted being cared for, that always had and always would want to be noticed by Dick Grayson, basically exploded in his stomach. He took a deep breath and said, “You’re not contagious.”
Dick looked at him, eyes wide, breath shaking. “You’re sure?”
“Positive.”
After a moment, Dick nodded. Jason stepped back and said a quick prayer to whomever might be listening that Dick could get himself out of Jason’s pantry.
Dick tucked himself between the toilet and the wall—again, this should have been physically impossible—and started hyperventilating. Jason said, “Hey, hey, Dick, let’s…play a game.”
It made Dick ask, “What kind of game?” which made him regulate his breathing somewhat, and that was the whole point.
Jason hadn’t really thought that far ahead. He turned the taps on the bath until the stream was lukewarm, then pulled the stopper tight and let the water run. “Um. Twenty questions.”
Jason doubted Dick was tracking well enough for that, it was just the first thing that came to mind. After a second, though, Dick said, “You ask first.”
“Sure. Is it in this room?”
Dick blinked and Jason was pretty sure he’d forgotten whatever it was he had in mind. Right when Jason was about to suggest maybe doing something else, Dick said, “No.”
Jason checked the water. Still lukewarm. “Does it belong to you?”
The wait for, “yes,” was shorter this time.
“Is it one of Nightwing’s things?”
Dick made a face. “No.”
Jason bit back a laugh. He wasn’t sure what the face was about, but Dick had enough reason not to be fond of his Nightwingsona at the moment. “Is it Sitka?”
“That’s—you cheated.”
Jason did laugh, then. “Dick, how the hell did I cheat?”
“I’m sick,” Dick said, like that was an answer.
“Poisoned, really, but semantics. Still not sure how I cheated.” Jason closed the taps and turned to Dick. “C’mon, circus freak, bath time.”
While Dick levered himself out of his hidey-hole, at one point causing himself to dry-heave again from pain, Jason grabbed the oatmeal and milk powder he kept in his medicine cabinet and sprinkled some in the water. It might help draw out some of the poison, and if not, well, it wasn’t going to harm anything at this point.
Dick put a toe in the water and whipped it out. “That’s cold,” he said, accusatory and betrayed all at once.
Jason swallowed down a sigh. “We talked about this, remember? We need to get the fever down.”
Dick seemed to be thinking about this. Jason saw the moment when his focus slipped and he lost the thread. He looked around and asked, “Jay? Jay, where are we? Why—I’m naked.”
“I know, I know, you’re safe, we’re safe. We’re at my place, and you are very sick, and I need you to get in the bath and help me get you cooled down.”
“When did I get sick? Why don’t I remember—I don’t remember coming here.” Dick was starting to hyperventilate again.
“I’m going to touch you, sweetheart, it’s going to hurt, but I’m scared you’re going pass out if you keep breathing like that.” Jason winced internally at the misstep with the pet name, but Dick probably wouldn’t remember it, and if he did, Jason could claim temporary insanity.
He put his right hand lightly to Dick’s chest and said, “Breathe in when my hand is touching you, out when it’s not, can you do that for me?”
Dick’s breathe was coming out in a whine, but he managed to nod and breathe in. Jason said, “Good, there you go,” and took his hand away. It took longer than Jason was really comfortable with for Dick to get himself to exhale. Even so, better than the hyperventilation. Jason repeated the action a few more times, and once Dick was breathing somewhat regularly, he calmed a little. Jason asked, “Can you get in the bath now? You’ve got a really high fever, we need to get you cooled down.”
Dick put his foot in and made a pained noise. This time, though, he put his other foot in and carefully lowered himself in. Tears Jason knew were completely involuntary trickled out of his eyes. Jason made soothing noises, feeling a little desperate and a lot useless. Dick was shivering in the water, but still giving off heat when Jason reached out to touch his forehead gently.
“Jaybird?” Dick’s eyes were glazed from pain.
“Yeah, I’m here.”
“I miss you,” Dick said softly.
Jason frowned. “We run into each other’s patrols like every third week.”
“No. Miss…Jason.”
Jason felt the assertion like a punch to the stomach. “Yeah, well, kids grow up. Even the ones that get killed, sometimes, I guess.”
Dick shook his head. “No, no. No. I mean…Jason out of—not Red Hood. Jason.”
He almost said, “we’re not two different people,” only, he knew that was a bit of a lie. Just like Batman wasn’t really Bruce and vice versa. There was overlap, but the people they were when they donned their masks weren’t quite the people they were out of them. They couldn’t be.
“Well, I guess I could stand to have you around, now and then, if you brought pizza.”
Dick’s eyes were slipping shut, despite the fact that his breathing was still ragged. Jason was fairly certain he was cooling down a bit, so he turned the cold tap on to add a little. Dick made a mewling noise and mumbled, “You like hamburger and green peppers.”
Jason’s hand slipped on the tap and it took him a second to get it shut off. “How do you even know that?”
“You’re Jay,” Dick said, like that was any kind of an answer. His teeth were chattering and his muscles were drawn tight. Heat was still pouring off of him.
Jason didn’t press. There were asshole moves and then there were asshole moves.
Once Dick was cool enough for Jason to not be worried his brain was going to boil in his own damn head, he helped Dick out of the water and wrapped him in a towel. Dick whimpered some more and swore quite fluently in Arabic. Jason swallowed back inappropriate amusement at the fact that Dick was learning bad words from Damian. He asked, “How about bed, do you think you could handle that?”
Dick didn’t really agree, but he didn’t argue, so Jason settled him in bed, glad this particular safehouse had a queen on an actual frame. Also, that the ability to afford freshly laundered sheets and clothing had never stopped being novel for him. When Dick was lying down, Jason started toward the closet, where he’d have the kit for the saline drip. Dick’s hand shot out and dug into Jason’s forearm. “Don’t leave. Don’t—I can’t—”
“No, hey, no. I’m not going anywhere. You’ll be able to see me the whole time, I promise. I just need to get an IV started on you, and the stuff is in my closet. It’s that door, right there, see? I won’t be out of your sight.”
Dick looked down at his hand, seemingly willing it to loosen. It took a bit, but it did. Dick said, “Sorry, I—”
Jason said, “You’ve got some pretty serious drugs pouring through you.”
Dick’s eyes stayed on him, desperate and nearly unblinking, as Jason pulled the first aid box from a set of cabinets in the closet. Jason came back with it and sat by Dick while working the tubing, picking the correct bag, and setting up the line. He said, “Alf agreed it’s probably not a good idea to do anything but help you flush the drug. I’m gonna get a little blood for him, okay, so we can figure out an antidote, but then it’s just going to be water and electrolytes.”
Jason found the smallest gauge needle he thought could reasonably carry the liquids into Dick’s system. He took the rubber tie and said, “Make a fist for me, yeah?”
Dick did and held out his arm. Jason tied the band, and watched as Dick lost all color whatsoever and swallowed frantically. Jason murmured, “Shit, hold on, okay?”
Because if that hurt that much, putting the needle in was going to be a nightmare. Jason did the only thing he could think of, and if it was the thing Bruce had done when he was a kid, the thing Alfred had clearly taught them all. Well, in this moment, Jason could push down whatever issues he had with being anything like Bruce, and do what he could to help distract Dick. He talked about whatever came to mind. The book he was reading, his budding relationship with the alley cat near one of his safehouses, the redesigns on his armor Roy wanted him to consider.
Dick moaned through lips he was clearly biting all to hell when the needle slid in, but he didn’t stop breathing or vomit. Jason considered it a win. He untied the band, gently taped the IV, and said, “Good, you did great. You were great.”
Dick’s eyelids were fluttering shut, but more in a passing-out-way than a getting-sleepy way. Jason put his hand to Dick’s face. “Hey, Dickiebird, stay with me, please.”
Dick forced his eyes open, breaths slowly deepening. Jason asked, “Can I get you water if I talk loud enough you can hear me the entire time?”
“In—in a bit?”
Jason nodded. “Okay, yeah, it can wait a bit.”
Dick was sipping at the water glass Jason was holding for him when there was a knock at the door. Unsurprisingly, Dick’s eyes went black with panic, since that was basically his immediate reaction to anything at that moment. Jason said, “Sh, it’s Alfred, I’m sorry, I forgot to say he was coming.”
He picked up his phone, thumbed Alfred’s icon and said, “Security system’s wired to accept you, it’ll unlock when you put your hand on the knob.”
“Are you saying that you’ve mapped my fingerprints, Master Jason?”
“You can yell at me when it won’t scare Dick into a premature heart attack,” Jason promised, and hung up the phone.
Dick still looked unsettled. “Is he—you don’t want me here?”
It took Jason a second to follow that line of questioning. Then he said, “Nobody’s taking you anywhere right now, I just wanted him to help me make sure we were doing all we can to make you comfortable. That’s all.”
Dick’s eyes were searching Jason’s face, as if looking for the lie in that statement. Alfred came in the room and said, “Good morning, boys.”
Jason said, “Blood sample on the nightstand, he’s taken about half the saline bag, temperature has stayed pretty stable, and he hasn’t forgotten where he is in the last hour. I think it’s getting better.” Then, after a second, “Thanks for coming.” Jason was maybe a little tired.
He lifted the glass of water to Dick’s lips again, and Dick sipped. Alfred asked, “Are you hungry Master Richard?”
Dick went a little pale at the suggestion. Jason said, “Take another sip.”
Dick obeyed, and a few sips later some of his color had come back. Jason glanced over to where Alfred had already set out the equipment he’d brought and was testing the blood. He placed the glass on the bedside table.
Dick said, “You’re exhausted,” and Jason startled, accidentally bumping into Dick’s legs, and causing him to go pale again.
“Shit,” Jason said, “sorry, I didn’t—”
“You—you should sleep.”
Jason leveled him with a look. “You gonna sleep?”
Dick looked away. Jason was pretty sure he was still in a significant amount of discomfort, if not outright pain. “Okay, well, let’s just assume that’s an issue for me.”
“Jay.” Dick closed his eyes. “Jay, Alfred’s here. I’m okay.”
“Mhm,” Jay said, and picked the water back up. “Another sip, if you please.”
Jason was shaking from the effort of staying awake when Alfred spoke up. “I think I have something that will help.”
Dick’s eyes were bloodshot, he’d slipped into disoriented panic once more, and even the slightest twitch was causing him to swallow convulsively. It had probably only been about an hour since Alfred had arrived, but felt closer to a small eternity. Jason asked, “What do you need?”
“Just to put it in the IV, give me a moment.”
Jason almost cried with relief. He just managed not to. After all, it wasn’t certain that whatever Alfred had come up with would work. Also, there was always a risk in trying new combinations against these kinds of toxins. Even so, it felt dangerously close to a miracle.
Alfred injected a miniscule amount of liquid into the IV line. He said, “I apologize, Master Richard, it might burn a bit.”
The way Dick’s mouth drew tight suggested that it probably burned like napalm having its merry way in his veins. He choked out, “Thanks, Alf.”
Jason and Alfred watched, then. They needn’t have. After a few minutes, Dick slipped his hand into Jason’s—the first time he’d voluntarily touched anything since all this had begun—and fell right asleep.
“Well,” Jason said, “at least monitoring him won’t be like watching someone kick puppies.”
“Indeed, and only one person need do it.”
“Alf—”
“Sleep, Master Jason. You look nearly as pathetic as he does.”
“You really know how to stroke a guy’s ego,” Jason said, but it was somewhat ruined by the fact that he finished the sentence on a yawn.
Alfred said, “Yes, because that is exactly what the members of this family primarily need,” and began unlacing Jason’s boots.
Jason woke to all one hundred and eighty pounds of dense Grayson muscle doing its darndest to kill him. Or maybe snuggle him. Thin line. Either way, it was hard to breathe. He shifted cautiously, not wanting to wake Dick. He needn’t have worried, because Dick made a smacking noise that was too adorable for Jason to handle, and burrowed back into Jason’s side.
Now that he could breathe, Jason took a second to catalogue Dick. His color was back to normal, and while he was his normal convection-oven-of-a-human-being, he wasn’t running a fever anymore. He had bruising surrounding his eyes, speaking to needing more rest, and there was pretty extensive bruising basically everywhere on him. Still, Jason suspected the worst was over. He released a long breath.
Since Dick was still dead to the world, Jason let himself run an arm along Dick’s spine. It wasn’t taking advantage. Dick was a touchy-feely guy with the people he lo—cared about, he wouldn’t begrudge Jason the grounding touch. It was just that, well. Dick wasn’t supposed to get hurt. Jason knew this was a child’s view of things, that invincibility wasn’t even a thing for Clark, not if you had the right tools. It still shook Jason in a way it shouldn’t, Dick being weak.
And maybe there was also the fact that Dick was the one who had held out believing in Jason, hadn’t lost faith, had never stopped seeing a human, even when Jason couldn’t necessarily suss out his own humanity. Maybe.
As pissed as Jason often was at Dick for being the Boy Who Could Do No Wrong—and honestly, even when Bruce wanted to strangle Dick, there was usually some element of pride underneath all the frustration—he got it. Granted, sometimes that only pissed him off more, that Dick was such a stupidly good person even Jason had a hard time staying angry with him. But it never managed to keep Jason from wanting to spend time with Dick.
Moth to a fucking flame, Todd.
The thing was, Jason was a Bat. None of them were afraid of getting a little (or a lot) burnt.
Jason drifted in and out of sleep for a bit, catching up, but when he was awake in the way where he knew he wasn’t going back to sleep he carefully extricated himself from Dick—who made the world’s most stupidly adorable noise of disgruntlement before sprawling out in the space Jason had vacated—and went into his kitchen.
Alfred was gone, but he’d left oatmeal cranberry breakfast bars, a quart of his tomato tortellini soup, and a twelve ounce bag of the dark roast Jason was having an intense love affair with currently. Atop the container with the bars was a note saying, “If you need anything, call.”
Jason would send a written thank you note. It was something he only did for Alfred. Something Alfred had taught him, and he knew Alfred appreciated.
There was another dose of the anti-toxin sitting on the sink in Jason’s bathroom with a sticky saying, “If any of the symptoms remain when he awakens.”
Jason got in the shower and spent some time letting it clear away the fog always a little present when he slept enough, like his body didn’t know how to process a healthy amount of rest, only adrenaline and emergency survival instincts. Once he was dressed, he brewed some of the coffee Alfred had left, and chewed on a breakfast bar. It was well after noon, but breakfast was for when a body woke up.
He was catching himself up on texts and email when Dick slid into the other chair at the tiny breakfast-nook table. Jason looked up and considered Dick. “Well, all things being equal, you don’t look dead.”
Dick’s laugh was dry. “Thanks for that.” He was being sincere.
“Yeah, don’t mention it?” So was Jason. “Alf left us breakfast. You probably shouldn’t have coffee yet.” He got up to pour Dick a glass of water. “Are you still feeling any residual symptoms?”
Dick tilted his head, then shook it. “Pretty sure it’s all just my body trying to claw its way back.”
“Kay, well, we might wanna do another round of saline, get everything as flushed out as possible.”
“Probably,” Dick acknowledged. “I can do that at home, though. Get myself out of your hair.”
Jason pushed down the super-irrational panic that rose up at the idea of letting Dick out of his immediate radius just yet. He’d never gotten particularly good at policing the worst of his protectiveness. “Um, right, yeah, if that’s what you want. Yeah.”
He handed Dick the glass of water. Dick drained half of it, then looked up at him. “Isn’t that what you want?”
There was too much water under the bridge for Jason to simply say “no,” simply admit he wanted Dick here, in his space, where he could make certain everything proceeded according to plan, and maybe get another night of snuggling in. Instead he said, “I’m not good at leaving things unfinished.”
After a beat, Dick smiled, soft and warm and pleased and said, “Right. I’ll stay, then, if it’s all the same to you.”
Jason smiled back. “Totally the same.”