Work Text:
I hate time travel! It always happens at the most inopportune times! Bruce and I had finally started to make up our differences and I get sent back in freaking time! The last thing I remember is being on a mission with the team and a flash of light. Okay, first I need to find out where, and when, I am; second, remember what happened and third, if I need it, get help. I was in some kind of storage area so first: get information about my whereabouts. I cautiously make my way towards a door in the corner of the room. I try the handle as silently as I could and pushed it open. I walk on silent feet down the corridor. I can faintly hear shouting. As I make my way towards the noise I can hear the words. “Who are you? How did you get here?” I turn the corner to see what's going on. The sight that meets me nearly makes me laugh out loud. Dick-Nightwing-was standing in front of a livid Bruce-Batman-silently while Bats asked him questions. He catches sight of me standing there, shaking from my silent laughter, and his entire body relaxes in relief for a half-second. He quickly tries to hide it but Bruce caught the movement and looks behind him. Before any of us can say anything the Justice Brats come running in.
“Batman! We got the alert! What happened?” Superman asked.
“There are intruders-” he started but I cut him off, I am so not in the mood to deal with this.
“We’re not intruders, Bruce.” He was visibly shocked, as were the Justice Brats and Dick was disbelieving. Whether all those emotions were from the fact that I cut Bruce off or because I said his name, I don’t know, nor do I care. Bruce rushed at me but I sidestepped out of the way.
“How do you know that?” he growls.
I glare and reply, “So,” I begin. “You not only let me die but you forget about me and your Golden Boy?! What the hell?”
“Little Wing,” Dick cuts in.
“Screw off, Dickface,” I growl back at him. “The Justice Brats are here and we’re in the Watchtower that means that at least he would know you.”
“Little Wing, we didn’t travel through time,” he starts to explain in a gentle voice. “We traveled through dimensions.”
“Son of a bitch!” I yell. Superman and Dick both flinched at the volume and language that I used.
Dick then decided that shouting, “Jaybird! Language!” would do something.
So, I then said the same thing that I had previously said, but in Spanish.
Dick glared at me and said, “That’s not what I meant.” I just shrugged. Clark and Bruce turned to each other and talked quietly. After a minute they turned to us.
“Martian Manhunter will look through your memories to determine if you are telling the truth.” I groaned, of friggin’ course, he doesn't believe us. Dick walks over to me and wraps an arm around my waist.
“Little Wing, calm down,” he whispers in my ear.
I glare at him and grit, “I am calm,” through clenched teeth.
He smiles disbelievingly and answers, “Sure you are.”
“Why, of all people, did I have to be thrown through dimensions with you ?”
Clark hears my mumbling and questions, “what do you mean?”
“Well,” Dick starts. “Little Wing is my little brother and Batman is out dad-”
“He is not my dad and you are not my brother. I have a death certificate!”
“If you keep using that excuse he will legally resurrect you, you know this, right?” Before I could answer with something along the lines of ‘I don’t give a crap, shut up’, Clark asked the question that I’m assuming was on all of their minds.
“What do you mean you ‘have a death certificate’? How is that possible?” I was about to answer but Bruce beat me to it.
“It’s not.”
“Oh?” I question. I’ve just about had enough of this shit! “Then how am I here? How did I die, dig myself out of my own grave, get found wandering around Gotham by Talia al Ghul of all people and then thrown into the Lazarus Pit because I was a vegetable that only responded to violence?” The eyes of the JLA got larger the longer I went on. Finally, Bruce spoke, “Ra’s would never allow that.”
“ He didn’t, Talia did. Then she sent me to be trained by Durca and the All-Caste.”
“You’re an assassin?”
“Yep. I also got these magic swords that come out of my hands when they sense evil and can kill anything. For a while, I was also the leader of the League of Assassins. I defeated Ra’s in combat and when I did that he had these weird powers. Supergirl also called me not human when I broke her grip on my arm.” Everyone was gaping at me now, including Dick. I look at him and ask, “you didn’t know that?” He shook his head no. I shrug at him, “Whatever.” I thought for a minute, “Oh yeah, I also don’t age anymore and heal faster than an average person.”
Little Wing…” Dick breathlessly said. “Why didn’t you tell us that?”
“I rarely talk to any of you. I don’t like or even trust any of you either.” Dick is silent for a while with a broken, hurt look on his face.
“We mourned you, Bruce most of all. He blamed himself for-”
“Good!” I interrupted, “He should blame himself. If he hadn’t made me Robin, hell, if he hadn’t taken me in, I wouldn’t’ve died!”
“Little Wing, you know that’s a lie. You still would’ve died in Crime Alley.”
I snarl, “Like my mom?”
Dick recoiled, “Little Wing…”
“No! Joker planned my entire life just so he could kill me! He got Willis arrested. He gave Catherine the drugs to overdose on. He’s the one that got me sent to Leslie’s. He’s the one that gave Bruce the tip to go to the clinic. And, let’s not forget, he’s the one who killed me ! Beat me almost to death with a crowbar and then blew me up! So, you can stow your crap about all of this and leave me alone!” Everyone was still gaping at me. It got weird after about thirty seconds.
Finally, Bruce moved forward, “I would like Martian Manhunter to look through your memories to make sure that what you are saying is the truth and possibly see if he can find out how you got here.”
“Fine,” I grumbled. I consciously lift my mental defenses to let J’onn take a look.
He does and, after a minute, stumbles back while staring at me in shock, “How are you still sane? Not even counting what was done to you as a child, all that pain... all that suffering... not to mention what happened to you after you died. How are you even still slightly sane? The Lazarus Pit, all of the pain, death, anger...how?”
I lightly snort before replying in a soft tone, “Who says I am?”
“How is your mind not broken?”
“Who says that it isn’t?”
Dick makes a noise in the back of his throat that sounds like pity. I hate pity, so I ignore him entirely. I don’t need pity. I don’t want it. “The Lazarus Pit broke me. That’s it, plain and simple. I’m broken. Kori and Roy are helping, but...it’s not going well.”
“Little Wing…” Dick breathes out. “We can help you.”
I scoff, “How? By putting me in Arkham again? Next to the Joker? Who knows who I am!” Dick flinched. Good. He deserves that pain. He’s the one who put me there in the first place.
He pauses to regain his composure before speaking, “Jay, I’m sorry. Really I am. We thought that it would help you.”
“Oh yeah? So I passed all the psych evals, multiple times, and you all still thought that I belonged in Arkham?”
“You got transferred to Blackgate,” Dick defended.
“And they sent me right back to Arkham.”
“You killed almost a hundred inmates your first week.”
I shrug, “So? You were the one that allowed them to move me into prison with about a thousand criminals that needed to be taken care of, without putting me in protective custody, and expected me to just sit back and do nothing? Really? While I may have a good grasp on it, I do have this little thing called Lazarus Syndrome coupled with some PTSD symptoms. Translation: I’m fucked up in the head.” Dick gave me another pitying glance. I responded with a glare. “I don’t need or want your pity, Dickface.”
He glares back, “You still think that I pity you? Okay, yes I do, but I am worried about you, Jay. You’ve already been taken from us once. Let us help you, please. None of us could handle you being taken again.”
“Just admit it: you were all happier without me. You didn’t have the street rat there to screw up your lives.”
“Do you honestly think that? You really think that we were happier when you were dead?”
“I screw everything up, Dick,” I chuckle, “hell, I even screwed up dying.”
“That is not true. We care about you.”
I ignore that last statement, “whatever. Can we just find a way to get back to our dimension?” Dick gives me his look saying ‘This is not over and we will talk later’ but agrees with what I said.
Clark hesitantly steps forward, “We may have something that can help.”