Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

I had a night I had a day

I did one million stupid things

I said one billion foolish things

I'm not okay

If there are two emotions Jason knows well, they are fear and anger. Both had accompanied him since his earliest childhood memories. His father’s shouting had been a constant source of anger and fear. His loud voice had forced Jason to hide beneath the table, his bed, the closet, all spaces he had falsely assumed would be too small for his father to reach. With bated breath he had waited for the screeching to stop until only his mother’s soft sobs had echoed through the rooms. Those too had angered Jason. He didn’t know whether it was on her behalf, because he had hated his father so much for causing her any pain, or because that anger had been for himself, the poor child whose mother wasn’t strong enough to leave her piece of shit husband.

On the streets, anger had kept him warm at night and fear had ensured he stayed alive. He had marveled at the shiny tires of the Batmobile, but even then, deep down, he had been so incredibly angry. He was going hungry while another drove a car like that. He had ignored his fear then and stolen the tires regardless.

It had been the best decision of his life.

So now, when once again  he was stuck between fear and anger, he chose to dismiss his fear and lash out instead.

“You can’t be serious!” Jason hissed, throwing up his arms.

Rage boiled beneath his skin like an active volcano. It infected his voice, his stance. He rose to his full height, making him the tallest in the room, but none of his siblings even blinked at it. They were too used to such simpleminded intimidation tactics, employed similar ones in front of villains who thought they could get the better of them.

“This is the right way,” Dick said, his voice strained with finality, a kind of authority he had no right to evoke.

He was not their leader, and he sure as hell was not their father. Dick barely understood what Jason was capable of and when he did, was too scared of it. The others didn’t see it, but Jason knew a coward when he saw one. Dick always tip-toed around Jason’s room like he expected the undead to crawl right out of it and drag him into a bloody casket. Beyond that, he also always took the patrol routes far away from Jason’s apartment complex and city district. Jason didn’t mind, he preferred it when the others kept their noses out of the Narrows and Crime Alley. His people didn’t particularly enjoy it either when the other bats and birds came around to play there as they tended to mess with the wards and ask uncomfortable questions. Jason understood too well how unsettling his presence could be and therefore knew very well that Dick had no room to make such decisions or judge Jason for them.

“The right way,” Jason repeated. “Do you even hear yourself? If everything was right, Bruce would still be here!”

Tim and Steph both winced when Jason said his name and even Dick’s face fell. They all didn’t understand it. Death was so final to them instead of just another state of being, one that Jason could reverse.

“I can bring him back,” Jason continued, desperation seeping into his voice. “Everything will be alright again. It’s all in these books. I just need your help.”

Why couldn’t his siblings just understand that he would fix it and then everything would go back to being the way it was before Darkseid had torn their lives to shreds. The Cave had become messy since Bruce’s death. It had been barely a month ago but it already showed despite best efforts. Jason had dragged all his books here to study and take notes, the constant hum of the technology as much a motivational hymn as it was a lullaby. His notes now were spread out all across the table, proudly displaying the work Dick was disregarding so very easily.

Dick only stubbornly shook his head. “No, Bruce wouldn’t want that.”

This wasn’t about what Bruce wanted, he was dead. This was simply about deciding how they were going to fix it.

“You don’t know that,” Jason countered. “It’s not like he wrote it in his will.”

Dick let out a low breath and dragged his hands through his hair as if Jason were causing him a headache. They had attended the reading of the will just hours before. Alfred had made sure they had all dressed up in proper suits the way they had for the closed casket funeral because there hadn’t been a body to recover. It would make it all more difficult to bring Bruce back without his original body to tie his soul too, but Jason was confident that he would be able to pull it off. Jason had only listened half-heartedly to the reading of the will. He knew its contents by heart, they all did. Every hero had a will set up and about ten proxies who knew every word and could recite it in case their death had been unnatural.

Alfred had been given custody over Damian while Tim had been emancipated. The Wayne fortune had been split five ways between Dick, Jason, Tim, Cass, and Damian while Steph and Barbara both got a huge stipend. It was all for nothing, Bruce would be back. Cass knew it as well, or so Jason hoped. She hadn’t even bothered to show for the funeral but had left the city the night before. Jason wished she had stayed, she would support him.

Instead, Jason had to make everyone else listen to him.

Tim was still straight up in denial and didn’t believe that Bruce was dead. His parents had died around the same time, just two years earlier. Of course, he wouldn’t be able to handle it and escape into his delusions instead. Steph, for all that she was a part of the team and family, Jason’s closest confidant out of all of them, had chosen to stay neutral while Dick protested vehemently.

Damian, meanwhile, just thought that Jason wouldn’t be able to pull it off, but that could be blamed on his superiority complex. While the kid, a perfect mix of Talia and Bruce, could imitate Bruce’s accent and body language as well as he wanted to, he still reeked of al Ghul arrogance and the Lazarus pit’s side effects. It was a foul stench, poisonous, and foreign to this world. It had hurt Bruce when Jason had told him what exactly was keeping Damian’s heart beating, but there was nothing that could be done about it. It wasn’t like anybody else besides Jason actually noticed.

“Had he wanted to, we would know,” Dick said.

“But-“

“Jason, stop.” Dick’s order, his tone couldn’t be mistaken for anything but a bark, was harsh. “Bruce is dead and he will stay dead. You will not experiment on his soul just because you think you can bring him back.”

“I don’t think so, I know so,” Jason argued. “You’re just incapable of trusting me! You still think I’m a foolish kid who is just playing around with powers he doesn’t understand!”

His voice rose with every shouted word. It had always been like this. Dick thinking that Jason was crossing too many lines, wasn’t good enough to be Robin or anything. Hell, he had accepted Tim more readily as Robin than he ever had Jason.

“Jason-“ Tim tried to speak up, but was harshly cut off by Dick.

Trust big brother to always know best.

“Because you are!” Dick shouted back. It hurt, cut into flesh like sharp knives, but at the same time it was liberating. Finally, Dick was actually speaking his mind. Honesty, so Jason had learned, was the only way to keep moving forward. They all lied, it was a part of their training, came as natural as breathing, but there was a line you had to be aware of.

“Bruce is dead and you can’t let go. Instead of helping me figure out how to keep Gotham running, you run off and bury your head in old books to find a solution to a problem that isn’t there! He’s gone. I needed you on patrol tonight and you didn’t show.”

Patrol had been just fine, Dick hadn’t needed him. Jason had kept an eye on the comms, they had done as good as they could with three men down. It hadn’t even been a busy night.

“You’re just giving up!”

“And you’re delusional!” Dick retorted.

He picked up one of the pages the closest to him. The originally white paper was covered by ink stains, diagrams smeared uncaringly all over it while Jason had been trying to figure out what exactly his ancestors had gotten up to when they tried to raise the dead.

“This is too much, Jason. You’re only setting yourself up for my failure. I let you keep researching because I thought it would help, but it’s only hurting you. You have to let go.”

“And leave?” Jason spat out. “Like you always do the moment something goes wrong with Bruce?”

Dick froze. His annoyance and misguided worry slowly twisted into dark anger. At that moment, it just felt right. Dick had ceased pretending that he was so much better than them, that he wasn’t struggling without Bruce around. Jason loathed how he sat at breakfast every day, acting as if it was all still alright and fine, smiling and lying continuously.

“I-“ Dick interrupted himself, reigning in his anger as everybody else watched him with keen eyes. “No, no, I’m not having this discussion with you. None of us are on board with your reckless endeavor, so you’re not doing it and that’s final.”

Jason turned to look at the rest of his family, but they were all averting their eyes. Of course, they would all side with Dick over him. He was older, more experienced, the first Robin out of all of them.

He wasn’t the resurrected boy who talked to ghosts and turned living beings to worthless decay with nothing more than a touch.

“I see,” Jason replied and grabbed his jacket from the chair.

Fine, it wasn’t like he needed any of them anyway. It would have been easier with more living anchors, but Batman had left his mark all over the city. Gotham was his, even the magic that buried itself so far underground that hardly anybody could see it knew who it belonged to. Jason had plenty of anchors he could use to bring Bruce back. What were five children compared to an entire city?

“Where are you going?” Tim spoke up. He had barely said a word since Jason and Dick had started fighting, but Jason supposed that it made sense given that Tim thought both of them were wrong.

“Away from here,” Jason replied. “Since Dick is so keen on running this show himself, he can do it. I’m out.”

“What?” Steph asked. “Wait! Jason, no, you have to stay!”

“What I need to do is fix this.”

Jason picked his backpack up from the ground and started stuffing his papers into it. He didn’t particularly care in which order he did it, he would have to sort through them all anyway once he was back in his apartment. He needed to toss those that were trash and copy the calculations and incantations that actually made sense and seemed like they were a good first step onto fresh sheets. Maybe he should get actual parchment. He didn’t usually work with dead writing materials, but with whatever he had on hand. His spells were powerful enough without, but he couldn’t afford any mistakes here.

Once he was finished, he threw his backpack over his shoulder and headed towards his bike, not sparing the group behind him another glance.

“Jason,” Dick started once more.

Jason just threw his hands up, dismissing him.

“Don’t worry, Richard,” he said. “It’s not like I can stay dead for long if something goes wrong. Don’t bother contacting me. I’ll come back once I’m finished.”

He couldn’t see his older brother’s reaction, but Jason would bet that he had flinched. They all hated to be reminded of Jason’s death, but it wasn’t like Jason could erase that part of him.

Jason put on his bright red helmet and turned on his bike. Then, without looking back, he drove off, disappearing into the dawn of a new day.

Chapter Text

- 4 Years Ago -

He couldn’t breathe.

The first thing Jason registered was that he was stuck in a small box, cutting off all air supply. It wasn’t the first time he had woken up in such a situation, it was part of the working hazard that came with being Robin.

Somebody must have knocked him out, Jason’s head hurt. He had always been prone to migraines, but this was a new low even for him. He tried to move his hands. Those, at least, weren’t bound. He wiggled his legs and found that those hadn’t been secured either. That was a bonus for him at least. Jason grinned and tried to raise his hands. His arms were heavy, his whole body felt numb. Whatever box he was stuck in, it was small. He barely managed to bring them up to his chest. He wiped over his face and was slightly panicked to discover that he wasn’t wearing his mask. If somebody had unmasked him, that was bad.

But Batman would be able to deal with it. They had overcome greater difficulties.

There was no light at all in his prison and Jason couldn’t feel his utility belt or any of the tools that came with it.

“Batman?” Jason called. His voice was rough, barely above a croak. “Batman!”

Jason began to hammer against the ceiling of the box. To his surprise, it was soft. The feather-light texture surprised him. Now that Jason was focused on it, the entire box was surprisingly soft. It was as if he were lying in his bed, or a coffin-

Jason’s eyes widened.

No- He couldn’t be-

Jason couldn’t recall what he had been doing last night. He had been on patrol, right? He must have been. There had been a noise of some kind, ticking. He had hated it, loathed it as if it were sin incarnate. There had been an explosion too, a bomb maybe? Ash in his lungs, fire and that horrible laughter-

The Joker.

Panic surged through Jason, closing his throat. He tried to scream but he couldn’t as the memories slowly began to surface. Jason had been in Ethiopia, chasing after his birth mother and she had sold him out to the Joker of all people. He had hit Jason again and again and he hadn’t stopped, no matter how much Jason had shouted, screamed, or tried to fight him. Jason hadn’t begged, he had been too prideful even then and Joker had just gotten angrier with every hit.

Jason thought he could feel flames licking at his limbs, but that was not the case. He should be hurting, healing, bleeding. It was all wrong and he needed to get out, out, out-

“Batman!” Jason shouted once more, putting as much strength into his voice as he could. “Batman! Can you hear me? I’m here! Batman!”

Jason heard no reply as he kept hammering against the ceiling of the coffin.

“Bruce!” Jason’s voice cracked. He had never been claustrophobic before, but the thought of lying in a casket now, his thoughts a mess-

“Bruce! Please! Dad, I’m here. Please, please, I’m here, don’t leave me, please-“

Jason began to babble as he sobbed, tears running over his cheeks while he heard absolutely nothing. Only his own screaming echoed within these walls. None of his kicks or punches seemed to do anything against his capture. He tried to rip off the soft coverings, but they wouldn’t tear. It felt as if it was getting harder to breathe- of course it was. He was stuck in a small room, the air was bound to run out sometime and then he would suffocate in this prison.

No, no, no. This wasn’t how he would die.

He was Robin, he could do this. He was magic, he could fly, nothing could keep him locked away for long. He tried to push away the voices that told him he would rot away in the ground in favor of attempting to focus. He had to do inventory, figure out a plan. He attempted to pat himself down first, see if he could find anything useful on himself. His breathing evened out only slowly, constant hiccups setting him into a state of panic again. Jason was wearing a suit. He could feel a tie around his neck like a cord. There were buttons on his dress shirts, but nothing hard enough to be of use. Tracing further down, Jason found that he was wearing a belt with a hard buckle.

He let out a relieved sob and fumbled the belt out of his pants. It took a little bit of adjusting, but a moment later he was holding it in his hands. Then he began to dig the sharp end of the buckle into the fabric. The metal immediately tore through the fabric and right beneath it Jason found wood. Jason didn’t waste even a second to consider whether he could make it out of a wooden box, maybe six-feet-under with nothing but a small metal buckle.

With desperation urging him on, Jason dug the metal into the wood and began carving it away. With his left hand, he began scratching at the wooden surface, trying to break off even more. His nails caught on the splinters and roughly tore at his skin, but Jason didn’t stop. He only kept going, his fingers soon becoming numb to the pain as the splinters became bigger and sharper. They took a hold of his hands and peeled off each layer until blood began running down his palms. Jason hissed, but like a man possessed, he continued, his fingers bent into claws. One particular rough scratch painfully knocked his little finger out of alignment, fracturing it. Jason cried out in pain and stopped for a moment, holding his hand close to his chest. He had had worse – the sight of crowbars flickered in front of his eyes like a flame – he could and he would withstand this. He bit down so harshly, he thought that his teeth might break and resumed his work. Both his hands were bleeding terribly and his fingers hurt. Every time his pinky knocked against the wood, it sent a jolt of pain like a hit with a live wire through him.

But still, Jason didn’t stop. He had to get out.

Finally, with one more punch that cut open his knuckles, Jason made it through the wood. What he first felt was smooth and cold – dirt. Earth.

He was buried.

Someone had buried him alive.

The panic set him off again and with renewed determination, Jason broke through the coffin and the earth above, pushing it away and making way for him. His hands had grown as numb as they had been when he had first awoken. With nothing stopping him, Jason pushed forward until finally, once more, he felt a change of atmosphere around his hands. Cool assaulted him, he mistook it for water for a moment and wondered whether he would have to dive through a whole ocean until he made it through the surface, traveling through his very own nine circles of hell. Then, thoughts clearing up only marginally, Jason realized that it wasn’t the currents of water rushing around his fingers, but wind. Surging forward, Jason pulled himself to the dirt, like a child, born anew from Mother Earth, Jason escaped to the surface. The first breaths of the cold night air were not dissimilar to breathing water. They stung in his lungs, but Jason wouldn’t want to ever miss the feeling. He heaved, starved as he had been for air and let relief wash over him. Soon the energy with which he had dug himself out of his grave vanished, leaving him feeling tired and exhausted. He turned around so that he was lying on his back and staring up.

Shivering, Jason tried to figure out where he was.

The night sky above was familiar, he had spent more hours than any other child his age beneath it, learning how to read the directions and star signs through the clouds that constantly devoured Gotham’s sky.

He was in Gotham. He was home.

Jason choked as the realization settled in. He wasn’t caught in some horrible infinite nightmare, he was within the boundaries of his city. He could walk home, he just had to drag himself forward. The cold wind brushed under his dress shirt, so Jason tried to pull his jacket closer around himself for warmth. Before, down in that hole, he had been so warm, but up here it was freezing. He wondered how long he had been down there, how many hours had passed since he had been stuck into a grave. Hesitantly, he tried to sit up to look around. The first thing he noticed were the many stones surrounding him. A closer look revealed that they were not mere fancy marble statues, but gravestones. Jason’s gaze drifted around until it landed on the stone angel towering above him.

It had a gentle face, a kind smile that somehow seemed incredibly cruel staring down at him. That figure had been keeping watch over him, the boy buried alive. Hot anger flashed in Jason’s heart and he wanted to do nothing more than destroy the angel. It was supposed to guide the dead, not imprison him-

Jason’s breath hitched as he read the writing on the angel’s pedestal.

Here lies Jason Todd.
Beloved Son

August 16th, 2001
-
April 28th, 2016

That couldn’t be true. Somebody must be playing a sick joke on Jason. Some villain must have figured out Jason’s identity and used it against Batman, or maybe he was trapped in a hallucination created by Scarecrow’s fear gas.

But Jason knew that wasn’t the truth. He could feel it lingering in his bones, horrible cruel and punishing. This was as real as the ice numbing him, the blood running down his arms. Nausea crawled up his throat and a moment after, Jason was heaving, trying to empty the contents of his stomach, yet nothing but acid left his mouth. He tried to stop it, to keep it down, but he only succeeded in panicking even more. He could hear the blood rushing through his ears, howling like a storm. Somebody had made a grave for him. He had been put in a fine suit and into a pretty casket and they had put him underground where nobody but the maggots could hear him scream.

He wanted to go home. He wanted Bruce.

Jason needed to check on him, if he was still alive- he had to be. He was Batman, nothing could stop him. Assembling as much resolve as possible, Jason pulled himself to his feet. He struggled to get up, his legs not willing to cooperate, but after a while, he found enough strength to do his first unsteady step. He stumbled and only caught himself in the last second on another cold stone. He bit down on his lip until he could taste the iron of his blood and forced himself to do another step. One step after another he walked farther and farther away from the grave he refused to acknowledge as his own. Soon after he had made it to the iron gate that marked the entrance of the graveyard. He held onto the bars just for a moment, smearing his blood over them, unable to step across the boundaries. He didn’t know why he was hesitating, he wanted to get as far away from this place as possible. He looked onto his hand, sticking to the gate as if glued to it.

Let go, he thought. Let me go. Let me leave!

Slowly his hand opened and Jason stepped off the dirty path of the cemetery and onto the paved ground of Gotham’s streets.

Gotham was an incredibly loud city. The quietest place was the library of the manor, but even there Jason had imagined he could hear the city rumble. Jason hadn’t noticed how silent the graveyard had been. It was as if all noise had been washed away but now returned all at once. He could hear the noise of cars rushing over the asphalt, people screaming and thunder roaring above him. The loud crack surprised him and Jason flinched as not a moment after, rain seemed to drench him completely.

Had it been raining the entire time? He couldn’t recall. The sky had been overcast, but Jason hadn’t felt the sensation of raindrops falling onto his face.

It would explain he was feeling so damn cold now, but somehow he doubted that was actually it.

He crossed his arms in front of his chest and rubbed over his arms, carefully as not to hurt his fingers, not that he could feel them still. He must look like a mess, dirt all over his suit, blood – he must look like death warmed over. At least the rain hid his tear tracks, Jason thought hysterically.

He began walking down the street, eyeing his surroundings warily. Gotham at night was dangerous everywhere. There was not a single alley where you might be safe and Jason looked like easy prey now. He knew he wouldn’t be able to fight anybody off now, so he only hoped that his looks deterred most would-be attackers and that he could reach a safehouse soon. At the end of the road, Jason finally spotted a street sign. Never before had he been so thankful that a part of his Robin training had included learning the names of all of Gotham’s streets by heart.

Reading the sign, Jason realized he was about as far away from the manor as he could be. The cemetery he had been in was the Gotham Main Cemetery then. Cursing under his breath, Jason closed his eyes, only for a moment, to figure out his next step. There was a safehouse in the neighborhood, he knew it. From there he would be able to call Bruce or Alfred, maybe even Dick if the others didn’t pick up, and they would come for him. If not, then Jason had to figure out who to involve next. He could call the Justice League. He was fairly sure that was the protocol, but he wasn’t sure. His thoughts were so slow, so sluggish. Trying to recall anything as complicated as the dozen plans he had needed to memorize to be able to don the costume was giving him a headache.

Plan assembled, Jason crossed the street and walked into the direction which he knew the safehouse was in. Thankfully, the streets weren’t busy at this time, so Jason was able to slip away into an alley quickly. He kept careful watch that nobody followed, right up until he stood in front of the abandoned building he knew the safehouse to be in. Getting inside proved to be difficult as he had to climb in through the broken windows. He scratched his knee open on the glass, yet another wound to add to his wonderful collection. The first floor of the building wasn’t particularly impressive, it looked like the regular shitty place you might squat when you didn’t have a roof above your head. The real secret was down in the basement. That’s where they kept all their equipment.

Jason took a moment to orientate himself. His mind still felt a little hazy, bursts of sharp clarity notwithstanding. He took a low breath, trying to force the fog away without letting the pain of his injuries return as well, then he walked down the hallway. The house had two basements, a real one and the one below. The real one could be accessed by just walking down the stairs. It smelled moldy and looked like nobody had dared to set foot in here in a while. That was almost a little surprising considering that no empty building in Gotham was truly empty for long. Jason had squatted in one for months before Bruce had picked him up and he had known plenty of kids who never got that lucky or had any kind of luck at all. The basement Jason actually wanted to access was hidden behind a broken down wardrobe. He had to move it to get inside. As his hands were rather useless by now, Jason pushed against the wardrobe with his shoulder, slowly moving it away. It took much too long or so it felt and no matter how hard Jason leaned against the wood, the furniture was stubborn. He wanted to scream, but Jason feared that would only cost him precious energy. After another strong push, the wardrobe had finally moved aside, revealing a metal door with a passcode. Before Batman had let Jason out on the streets, he had had to remember thousands upon thousands of numbers. Bruce had failsafes for his failsafes. Codes to hand out to kidnappers when you were compromised and so on. Jason used his elbow to type in the numbers granting him access to the safehouse, then, when the biometric lock opened, had it scan his eyes. To his relief, the door opened easily with a swing and Jason could slip inside.

The room he found him in front of him was only sparsely furnitured. It wasn’t one of their most frequented safehouses, they had a much better one hidden only a couple more streets away, but Jason hadn’t been able to afford going to it.

“Message first,” he muttered.

That was the most important part. Batman always came for Robin, he always did, that was one of the only reasons Bruce allowed anyone to be Robin at all. So Jason had to let Bruce know he was here. After that, he could pass out. Treating his injuries on his own was near impossible. Everything would be better when his Dad was here again.

Jason dragged himself over to the computer console. He activated it with a few clicks, once more using his elbow since his fingers were out of commission and waited for it to ring. It rang once, twice-

“Batcave acknowledged,” a fine but tensed British voice rang out over the comms.

Everything Jason had thought about saying suddenly disappeared, his mind became blank and Jason could only think of how Alfred was here and alright and everything was going to be fine-

“Alfred,” he whispered, the name of his grandfather figure escaping him as a sob. “Alfred, I’m- I’m-”

The words were stuck in his throat. He couldn’t keep speaking, get even a single word out. Thankfully, Alfred immediately began to speak instead.

“Master Jason?” Alfred sounded surprised, disbelief was seeping into every note.

Jason could just picture him standing in front of the computer, his usually so smoothed over expression twisting with care and worry. Overtaken by the urge to see his grandfather, some proof that despite the situation he was in, his family was still alright, Jason tried to find the switch that would connect the computer in front of him with the Batcave. They usually capped that connection to avoid anybody remote hacking into their system, but Jason needed to see Alfred now.

He found the lever and hastily inserted the password, soon after the screen connected. And just like he imagined, he saw Alfred. He was wearing his uniform, pressed and cleaned and his face was a myriad of expressions.

“Master Jason,” he breathed again. “It is you.”

“Alfred,” Jason repeated. “I-I woke up- where’s B? Is Dad alright?”

Whatever had kept him from speaking before couldn’t hold him back now. His words fell from his lips like a waterfall, unending as the tears that streamed down his face. “Alfred, I don’t remember what happened. Where’s Bruce? I can’t- I want to go home.”

Alfred was frozen in a way Jason had never seen, then panic overtook him as he spoke up once more, but not to Jason.

“Bruce, reroute to Safehouse #21 right now,” Alfred snarled the last two words, even stricter in his tone than Jason had taught possible. “I don’t care, it’s Jason’s code and the boy- It’s him.” Whatever Bruce, and it had to be Bruce at the other side of the comm Alfred was talking into, replied - Alfred wasn’t pleased with it. “I would recognize my own grandchild even on the brink of death! The scan didn’t entirely match up, but I swear- get him. Now.”

Then he apparently cut the connection. He took a moment to compose himself, then he turned to Jason again.

“Jason, are you alright? Are you hurt anywhere?”

“My fingers,” Jason replied. “I broke them. And my knees and I have a headache.”

And I crawled out of my own grave. Jason could feel his breath quicken as a pressure settled right over his stomach. He knew what would come, had experienced this feeling so often during the first months at the manor.

Panic attack.

Don’t think about it, he told himself. Don’t think about it, don’t think about it-

“Jason, what is the first line of Romeo and Juliet?” Alfred asked.

That was a familiar game. Alfred always has Jason quote books at him when the world got too loud and too bright and too big.

“Two households,” Jason started to say. He was stuttering, the words repeating over and over again in his head. “Both- both alike in dignity, In fair Verona, where we lay our scene.” It became easier to speak, to keep going. He only had to focus on lines he had rehearsed, whispered in the dark of the night, hidden under his blanket, or shouted in joy while standing on the kitchen table, theatrically stealing Bruce’s sandwich. “From ancient grudge break to new mutiny, Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.”

Jason stared down at his shaking hands, covered in blood and dirt.

“Where’s dad?” Jason interrupted himself. “Is he going to be here soon? Alfred, I can’t- I can’t-”

“Keep going, lad,” Alfred urged him. “From forth the fatal loins of these two foes. A pair of star-cross'd lovers take their life.”

Jason hesitated, then he slowly began to speak again, stumbling over words he knew by heart.

“Whose misadventured piteous overthrows, do with their death bury their parents' strife.”

Death, death, death- it haunted him, rang in his mind like the reminder of something he was better off forgetting. He had dug himself out of his grave. It had been made for him. His name had been on it. Had Alfred known? Had Bruce? Had they buried him? what had happened, Jason couldn’t recall a thing-

“Jason!”

Alfred’s voice turned into background noise, like the humming of the air-condition during warm summer nights. Jason felt himself get lost in his own mind, dragging himself through a labyrinth of hazy dreams, nightmares come to life, whispering about terrible secrets Jason needed to know, lest he went mad. He dropped to his knees, the pain doing nothing to center him as he pressed his hands to his ears, hoping to drown out the screaming. It was all too much, the pained cry of a child, screaming out in terror.

“Jay?”

Reality came crashing down in soft hums, barely above the sound of the wind that had pulled at him while he’d crossed the cemetery. The screaming stopped and Jason’s throat felt hoarse, dry, like he had shouted for hours, trying to drown out a hurricane.

When Jason could lift his head again, he stared straight into the darkness.

Jason had never been afraid of the dark like other children. The darkness was safe, nobody could see him hide away, nobody noticed that he was there. Everybody left him alone and on the streets, the better you were at disappearing, the better your chances at survival. Since then, as Robin, that hadn’t changed much.

Jason had been dressed in sunshine yellow, apple green and cherry red, bright as a traffic light and twice as fun, drawing everybody’s attention to him and away from his guardian. There were plenty of villains lingering in Gotham’s streets with faces twisted to ugly snarls, monstrous bodies and voices like nails on a blackboard. But Batman, as scary as he could be, had never read as dangerous to Jason.

He had never been afraid of him, never could, when Batman didn’t know what it meant to be cruel to a child.

“Dad?” Jason asked, taking in the figure of his father.

The black cape was draped right across his shoulders and his frame, hiding away the shape of his body and providing protection against all kinds of weapons. The black cowl hid away most of his face, but Jason could still see his mouth, could read the tension in his jaw, the hand raised slightly to attack or defend or welcome him home.

“Dad,” Jason repeated and flung himself forward with all his remaining strength.

He didn’t even make it halfway across the room as Batman rushed to him, caught him under his arms and prevented his fall.

“You’re here,” Jason babbled. “You’re here, I didn’t know, I can’t find-”

All his words were lost in the endless stream of time and soon turned to cries again as he tried to hold onto his father but couldn’t because of his broken fingers that wouldn’t be able to bear any more pressure. He wanted to grip the cloth of the coat, trace over the lining of the suit and confirm that it was all real and that he was not caught in some nightmare of Scarecrow’s fashioning, that the smell of metal, plastic, and sweat was not imagined. But Jason’s hands were twitching so badly he couldn't do anything and Bruce was just silent, not saying a word despite holding him so close that Jason could feel his breath on his forehead.

“Dad, please-”

“Jason.”

Bruce’s voice sounded like he hadn’t spoken in decades. It was reminiscent of the whisper of before, but more insistent somehow, like Bruce was seeking confirmation for something Jason didn’t grasp.

“My son,” Bruce muttered and with one swift movement pulled back his cowl, revealing a raw face and the blue eyes Alfred had always joked about them all sharing.

Jason could count the times he had seen Bruce cry on one hand with fingers still left-over, and yet, like a mirage, tears appeared to be running over his cheeks freely now that the cowl wasn’t glued to his skin anymore.

Half lying on the floor, half cradled in Bruce’s lap, his father gently traced over Jason’s face with one hand before pulling him close, his head resting right above where he would be able to hear Bruce’s heartbeat if not for the armor.

“Jason,” Bruce said again, repeating his name over and over again like a prayer.

It sounded like a lullaby to Jason’s ears, surrounding him with warmth, security and love, so unlike the gruesome cold air of the graveyards, heated only by his blood and impressions of fire blasts. Like a helpless newborn, Jason let himself be held by his father, and buried his face in his chest, quietly succumbing to the darkness.

Chapter Text

He was staring at his dead son sleeping peacefully in the passenger seat of the batmobile. Bruce’s grip on the steering wheel was so tight, he wasn’t sure if he wasn’t going to break it off. When Alfred had notified him that someone had broken into one of their safe houses with Jason’s code, he had briefly wondered who would be so bold to dare try to step on Batman’s territory with a ploy guaranteed to send him into a fit of rage. He hadn’t wanted to listen to Alfred, hadn’t believed him when he said it was Jason and yet here his son was.

Breathing steadily in and out, his chest, covered by a dirt stained shirt that had been white when Bruce had picked it out, rising and falling.

He was alive.

He couldn’t be real.

He wasn’t as fake as the image Bruce chased in his dreams or the hallucinations that he struggled more and more to ignore. The boy next to him was made out of flesh and blood and he looked and sounded almost just like Jason, but it couldn’t be him. Bruce had buried his son and nothing could revive him, not even the pit. He had spent more than one night awake at the phone, wondering whether he should make the call and beg Talia for help she wouldn’t be able to give him.

The child had to be a clone of some kind, the vicious green of his eyes could be explained by that, or perhaps he was a shapeshifter or a magic construct or one of the other thousand possibilities that had come to mind when he had laid his eyes upon him.

He couldn’t be Jason, but Bruce desperately wanted him to be.

Worse, he wasn’t even sure if he could turn him away even if he weren’t Jason. He still looked like his son, sounded like him, and no matter how much it pained Bruce to see him, his absence had hurt even more.

The drive to the manor felt as if it took ages and was yet barely longer than an eyeblink. By the time Bruce parked the car, Alfred was already waiting on him. All sense of the pain Bruce had caused him with his outburst earlier today had vanished from his face as he too looked upon Jason with disbelief and awe.

“It is him,” Alfred whispered quietly, then quickly rushed to help place the unconscious child on a stretcher and move him towards the medbay.

Alfred stripped him out of his jacket and shirt, revealing a pale chest and what looked like old scars, already faded to white. They were placed exactly where they had made cuts for his autopsy, Bruce was starting to feel nauseous. Alfred kept moving, bringing syringes and an IV-drip, taking blood samples, cleaning his wounds and bandaging his hands and knees. All Bruce could do was just stand there and watch as once more his child’s body was made to look presentative, except this time it was to heal him and not those who’d look upon him one last time.

“His vitals are stable, he just fainted from exhaustion,” Alfred said. “I took a blood sample so we can confirm his identity.”

Bruce almost didn’t want to check, preferring to live in this twilight of uncertainties.

“Let’s go,” he replied and rose from his place at Jason’s bed.

X

When Jason woke up again, he felt disorientated. Not as bad as when he had woken up in his own grave, likely because the room he returned to was illuminated, but he still wasn’t all too clear. His surroundings were familiar and the scent that lingered in the air, earth, fresh water and disinfectant, was so well known to him that Jason was put at ease quickly.

He was home.

He tried to sit up and found that his hands had been bandaged. He must have been given painkillers as well or his hands would protest against the movement. Next he swung his legs over the side of his bed and set his feet on the ground. So far so good. Jason took his first step, a little unsteady and his knees feeling weak, and decided his IV drip would make for a wonderful crutch. Jason made his way out of the Batcave’s medbay and into the main hall. Everything looked more or less the same way he remembered it. Jason let out a sigh of relief and then looked around to see if he could spot Bruce or Alfred. He found them down at the conference table, a much too large table given how many people actually had access to the Cave, talking to a third person.

It took Jason a moment to recognize her, Zatanna’s appearance being not one he had expected. To Jason’s delight, the three of them didn’t notice him approach. Even with his injuries, he was still in a good enough shape to stick to his training.

“Which wizard are we hunting down now?” Jason asked.

As soon as he spoke up, all eyes fell on him.

“Master Jason!” Alfred exclaimed and immediately hurried to Jason's side to put an arm around his shoulder, supporting him. It annoyed Jason a little that Alfred apparently thought him this weak, but he was mostly relieved that he could fall back into his grandfather’s arms.

Alfred seated him at the table and rushed off to find a blanket to swaddle him in, muttering something about the cool temperatures of the Cave and Jason running a fever.

“Hey, Zatanna,” Jason greeted the magician. “Long time no see.”

“Indeed, Jason,” Zatanna returned with a soft smile. “It’s good to see you again. How do you feel?”

“I’m alright.” Jason shrugged. “Head still hurts a little.”

Jason looked at Bruce. His father was pale and he looked about as horrible as Jason had felt without the painkillers. Had they had a bad case? Jason still didn’t remember, but Bruce looked like he had seen a ghost.

“What happened, B?”

Bruce never flinched, he had trained himself out of it if his stories were to be believed. He did, however, curl his hands to fists and swallowed.

“You don’t have to worry, Jay. It’ll be alright. Zatanna, we can talk later-”

“What will be alright?” Jason hissed.

Bruce’s eyes flickered to Zatanna’s. He was tense, both of them were. Jason was being kept in the dark about whatever had caused him to be in this position when he should be upstairs, preparing for rehearsal. They’d perform their play in just under two weeks- that is, if it even still was April.

Jason found that he had no idea what day it was.

“What’s going on?” He asked, more agitated than before. “What happened?”

Bruce avoided his eyes once more, turning away again. Red hot fury flared up in Jason. He hated being denied answers, not knowing what he was getting himself into. The need to know everything had kept him alive more often than he could count and Bruce had never kept any secrets from him. Jason wasn’t going to let him now.

“Jay-”

“No!” Jason shouted. The earth seemed to shake with his anger as if it too was enraged. “I want answers. I don’t remember a thing about what happened and I want to know now.”

Even though he hadn’t said much, his lungs were burning as if he had shouted a whole tirade at them.

“Jason,” Zatanna said, her voice soft and kind and careful, holding the same kind of tenor you’d expect from someone talking to a wounded animal and Jason wouldn't have it.

He wasn’t going to let himself be placated into focusing on healing from whatever ordeal he had gone through that had left him buried alive in a fucking coffin in a grave with his own name.

“Tell me!” He screamed, the echo filling the whole Cave.

He must look like a child throwing a tantrum, but he deserved to know and learn what had happened to him. Jason had been knocked out a couple of times already, hazard of the job, but never like this. He had never lost time in such an all consuming matter.

At least now Bruce was looking at him. His eyes were wide, he looked afraid. Jason didn’t think Batman was capable of being scared.

“We can tell you,” Zatanna said and stepped closer towards Jason. She kneeled down in front of him and took his shaking hands into her own, gentle to avoid hurting him. “But Jason, it might be better if you don’t know yet. You’ve been through a lot and should have time to heal.”

But how was Jason supposed to heal when he didn’t know what from? He bit his lips and shook his head.

“Tell me.”

Zatanna shared a look with Bruce, who obviously wasn’t on board with this course of action. Apprehension was written all over him, from the broad line of his shoulders to the way he favored his right side.

Zatanna, however, must have also detected something that Jason couldn’t see. It shouldn’t surprise him. She was a magician and one of Bruce’s oldest friends. They’d known each other since their childhoods. It was one of the reasons Jason liked her so much. She was able to tell him all kinds of stories about Bruce’s misadventures and failures, oftentimes illustrated them pointedly with her magic as well. She was strong and fun and Jason had never thought of her as somebody he had to avoid or couldn’t get along with.

“What is the last thing you can remember?”

“Waking up in my grave,” Jason replied immediately.

Zatanna raised her right hand and put it on Jason’s cheek, wiping away a tear he hadn’t noticed escaping him.

“I know, and I’m sorry we didn’t find you sooner. But Jason, what do you remember before that? Where were you before you woke up.”

“I-” Jason stopped to focus on his memories.

What had he been doing?

He had fought with Bruce, he remembered that. It had been ugly and mean and Jason had said things he hadn’t meant and even more he wished he could take back before running off, chasing after the ghost of his mother.

“Ethiopia. I went to Ethiopia.”

“Good. What happened next?”

He found his mother, talked to her too and tried to find the similarities between them. And then he had overheard her talking, breaking the law for her own benefit, proving herself to be just the kind of woman Willis Todd would hook up with.

And then there had been the heat-

No, that happened after.

Before, he had returned to Bruce and they had geared up so they could take down the Joker.

“Count for me little bird! One, two, three!”

He’d ran straight into a trap and the Joker had left him there in chains, bleeding out in that cold warehouse with Batman half-way across the country. Jason had tried to get to the door, he really had done his best, but his legs had been too bruised so he had resigned himself to waiting for Batman, listening to that awful ticking noise.

But Batman hadn’t come, hadn’t made it in time.

Jason doubled over and if he hadn’t been sitting in a chair already, Zatanna in front of him, he would have crashed to the ground. Bruce was at his side immediately, his warm hands a steady presence on Jason’s back.

“There was an explosion. I was in that explosion. But you weren’t there. You weren’t there and I didn’t make it out.”

Jason felt his voice rise an octave, high-pitched and near hysterical he tried to find any sign of Batman in his memories but there was none.

“Where were you?” Jason asked. “And where was I!?”

He remembered having been in the explosion. No normal human, no matter how advanced their equipment was, could survive a blast like this.

The hollow pit in Jason’s stomach only confirmed what he was already thinking. He shouldn’t be here anymore. Not talking, not sitting, not even breathing.

“I arrived just in time to see the warehouse blow up. The Joker was long gone and you were-”

Bruce’s words were not descriptive, they hardly counted as a coherent narrative, but Jason could picture it so very easily. No matter how good Batman was, he couldn’t protect Robin from everything. Jason had seen plenty of broken bodies in his time on the streets, but naively he had assumed Batman would prevent Jason from ending up like that.

“I should be dead,” Jason concluded. The truth rang out like an ugly monster. “I was dead.”

“Yes,” Zatanna confirmed.

It was bizarre. Normal people didn’t come back from the dead and they sure as hell didn’t resurrect as sane individuals. Jason kind of knew about Talia al Ghul and all the ways Bruce refused to talk about her and her poisonous green eyes the same way he knew about Clark’s deaths and Bruce’s reaction to those, even if Big Blue always got back up again because he was Superman.

But Jason was just Jason. As much as he had adored pretending that being Robin made him magical like Zatanna, that he wasn’t just jumping through the air but flying, he knew better. He had been confronted by death plenty of times already. Catherine, the woman who had loved and raised him, Willis, her bastard of a husband, homeless people on the streets, victims of the villain of the week - death was everywhere. And Jason still had expected it to let him go someday.

“How? You already know, don’t you?”

Bruce was still looking at him with his overcast blue eyes. Jason hated it, he wished he could just wipe the clouds away and return those sweet open skies of the early spring. Jason hadn’t looked into a mirror since he had returned from the dead. Were his eyes still blue? Were they red? Maybe even green like Talia’s-

“Did you put me in the pit?” That would explain it, wouldn’t it? Bruce calling his old girlfriend and putting Jason’s dead body into the pit. But maybe that thing didn’t do anything fast enough because he had been dead too long already so this was all a delayed reaction-

“Jason, Jay, no,” Bruce insisted, suddenly much closer than before.

Jason hadn’t even noticed Zatanna stepping aside so Bruce could put his hands on his cheeks.

“I thought about it, but no. I’d never do that to you.”

“Good,” Jason hiccuped. At least there was that and he’d never be resurrected as some empty echo of a person. “But what happened then?”

“We are not entirely sure yet,” Zatanna said. “That is, we have a hypothesis but it is based on a very unlikely situation.”

“Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth,” Jason quoted.

Zatanna grinned and Jason had no idea whether it was an honest smile or if she was trying to cheer him up. She had a very impressive stage persona that she could slip into with ease . In other words, Zatanna was a brilliant liar used to a difficult audience. Jason supposed it wasn’t all that different from talking to some scared teenager who had no idea what was going on.

“Correct, I see Batman’s training stuck.”

Zatanna put her hands to her hips and then, with one swift movement, pulled something out of thin air, or so it seemed to Jason.

“I could actually only think of one way you could come back to life out of your own free will. You don’t know much about your birth mother’s family, do you?”

Jason shook his head. Had he known, perhaps then he wouldn’t have fallen for Sheila’s lies.

“While the last couple generations or so are not very remarkable, your mother-”

“She’s not my mother,” Jason interrupted Zatanna harshly.

Zatanna hummed and continued speaking, accounting for her mistake. “Sheila Haywood is old Gotham blood and before that even, one of her and therefore your ancestors was a powerful necromancer. Necromancers are a rare breed of magic users. Death magic can be studied of course, Constantine and Blood know of it and probably also how to use it, but real necromantic talent has to be innate. It is in your blood and gets passed down to your children and so on. There aren’t many necromancers left in the world. My father knew of one but I don’t. The magic they practice can be very destructive. Many end up killing themselves in their experiments or go insane from the continuous resurrections. Everytime they pass back through the veil and into the land of the living, another little bit of their soul gets chipped away.”

None of that sounded particularly good to Jason. And it still didn’t explain how he was alive. He hadn’t even known that he had necromancer blood or whatever, nor would he even know how to use it.

As if she could read the question of his face, Zatanna answered. “Necromancers can only die by magical means. Your death was not supernatural, so you regenerated. It took time because it was the first time, you’ve never practiced magic before and your injuries were severe, but that is what saved you.”

His blood.

His connection to the woman who was willing to sell him out and leave him for dead. Jason wanted to hit something, Sheila or a punching bag - it didn’t matter.

“And what now?”

“You’ll need training and a lot of supervision but we can talk about that later. For now you just need to rest and recover. You hurt yourself pretty badly, kid.”

Jason looked down at his hands and closed his eyes just for a moment to recover some of his calm. “I know, I crawled out of my grave. I had to dig through the wood with my fingers.”

“I’m so sorry,” Bruce said and pulled Jason into a hug. This one was better than the first Jason had gotten since he had come back from the dead, given that he didn’t feel like he was on the verge of breaking down from exhaustion. Jason put his arms around Bruce and tried to push the info that had been dumped on him to the back of his mind.

“I know.”

“But you’re home now, Jay. Everything is going to be alright.”

“I know,” Jason repeated and tried not to feel too guilty for lying to Bruce.

He had died.

Nothing was okay.

Chapter Text

Reviving someone from the dead was much easier when you were rich and already well-practiced in it. Bruce only had to make a few calls, forge a signature or two and Jason Todd was alive again. The child he had buried, an unfortunate, nameless, second victim who just had happened to look similar enough to Jason for a case of mistaken identity. Gotham, of course, celebrated loudly. The front gates of the manor were covered in flowers, stuffed animals, balloons and get-well cards. Bruce hadn’t bothered to go through them, to do anything beyond giving a short speech detailing his son’s sudden resurrection and then promptly disappeared from the public eye again as he’d done since April. He hadn’t even notified the Justice League properly, merely changed Robin’s KIA status to inactive. Jason wasn’t going out on the field again - Bruce had even taken away his access code to the Cave. Jason shouldn’t be exposed to such violence again.

Right now, Bruce simply didn’t have the time for anything at all that required his attention when his son obviously needed him much more.

Jason was healing from his ordeal and already walking through the manor again. At every meal they took together, he was chattering away about the most mundane things as he’d always done. From the school work he was trying to catch up to again, and was bound to surpass once more soon, to books he was reading and TV shows he watched, curled up next to Bruce on the sofa.

His son had, against all expectations and hopes, returned to him.

And Bruce would let no harm come to him.

X

Jason was pretty sure that he was one bad day away from another hysteric breakdown. Everything was completely fine, as if the Joker had never fucking blown him up, and yet he could feel himself slipping at every turn. 

It started with the wounds that healed, but the scars that stayed. They had performed an autopsy on his body, he had a Y-shaped cut running down from his collar bones to just below his navel. He hated looking at himself in the mirror, seeing how deathly pale he was and staring into eyes that he could swear flickered green in windows and mirrors when he wasn’t paying enough attention. Clothes were another issue. Bruce had bought him new ones, but Jason never could seem to find or remember them. Since his resurrection, he found that new memories and impressions fell from his mind so much easier, as if it didn’t want to keep them and remain in the past instead.

The worst part was the manor.

In all the years he had lived there, it had kept on changing a little, bit by bit, day by day. Jason had been there to witness it all, had even helped paint one of the rooms green when Alfred was on vacation and Bruce and he had accidentally ruined one of the walls with Jason’s chemistry homework. But now Jason found so many changes, it was like there was a constant itch at the back of his head, reminding him that for weeks he simply hadn’t existed.

He had just been gone.

Jason tried to return to normal, he really did, but how was he supposed to when he learned that Alfred and Bruce - or mostly at Alfred’s behest from his observations - had decided to move the whole family wing so that Bruce wouldn’t have to sleep next to the room of his dead child.

He put on a brave face, tried to pretend that he didn’t hate all the new episodes he missed of the show that used to be his favorite. He threw himself into his homework to avoid thinking too much on all the everyday things that set him off. He read books, painted, listened to music and even tried out learning the freaking cello once his hands had healed enough, anything and everything to keep himself busy.

He needed to do something, needed to return to whatever used to be normal once upon a time.

He didn’t want to worry Bruce.

Bruce never said anything to Jason directly, but it was difficult to ignore that something was wrong with him when he was always hovering. He hadn’t paid this much attention to Jason since his first arrival at the manor. He didn’t go to any parties or galas, he didn’t even work. He was just, always there except when the city needed Batman. That, at least, he hadn’t given up for Jason yet.

It almost pained Jason a little how much he enjoyed the few hours away from scrutiny. His sleeping rhythm had reached its newest low, night terrors keeping him awake. And when he sneaked down for a midnight snack, or just some tea to calm himself, it all tasted like dirt and ashes, rot and decay.

It was exhausting.

He hated lying awake in bed, tossing and turning when it all did absolutely nothing.

Especially when it was the eight night in a row, three days after Bruce had announced that Jason was alive.

He wasn’t sure how to feel about all the attention he got now. He had even gotten a card from school which all his classmates had signed. He was pretty sure that at least two thirds of them had actually loathed him when he had been alive for the first time around.

All he had to do to gain their approval was die, it was so freaking hypocritical.

“This is bullshit,” Jason whispered into the night and threw his blanket off his legs as he crawled out of his bed.

There was no point remaining in bed when he knew he wouldn’t be able to fall asleep. Instead, he tried to find his slippers and wasted 15 whole minutes searching for them as he had last night until he remembered that they had thrown them out months ago. Grinding his teeth in frustration, Jason walked barefoot out of his room, mindful to pass Bruce’s door quietly so as to not wake him up, and then headed towards the kitchen. Maybe tonight the chamomile tea would actually taste like it was supposed to. Jason knew the way to the kitchen blind, it being one of the first routes he had memorized after moving in.

When he was down the hall however, he was surprised to see that light was on. It was early morning, the few odd hours between patrol being over, but Alfred still sleeping. Nobody should be in the kitchen yet. On silent toes, Jason walked closer until he could hear murmurs, then suddenly a crash that had him wincing and a shout.

“My son crawled his way out of his own grave!”

Bruce.

Oh, so he hadn’t been asleep either.

Bruce had rarely, never actually, raised his voice like that in Jason’s presence. It woke up memories of a childhood spent hiding away. And even now, so many years later and knowing that Bruce didn’t mean for Jason to overhear this conversation, he couldn’t stop the hairs from rising on the back of his neck. His muscles tensed, preparing for him to have to run away even though there should be no need to.

Bruce, and whoever he was talking to, probably thought him asleep upstairs in his room but here he was, sneaking into the kitchen as he had now done for weeks.

“I should have known, Alfred. I was supposed to protect him from this.”

Silence followed Bruce’s outbreak. For a moment, Jason thought that Bruce was now alone in the kitchen again, only being able to hear his heavy breathing. But with his reanimation and consequent awakening, his senses had sharpened somehow, had started to evolve . He did not hear Alfred’s breathing or his heartbeat, but he could still easily detect it with a percept he could not name.

“And how do you think the young Master feels?” Alfred asked into the tense silence.

“What?”

The sound of a teacup being set on the counter reached Jason’s ears.

“Bruce, you’re not the only one frightened by this development. You have only had to hear about it and witness the aftermath, but Jason had to actually go through it. The poor boy is scared and wants nothing more than for things to go back to normal.”

Bruce scoffed. “How are things supposed to go back to normal now, Alfred?”

“If I may suggest, start with going back to work and letting Jason access the cave. Things have changed and we have hardly even touched upon the arrangements we will need to make once Miss Zatanna decides Jason is strong enough to begin with his training. Returning to a state mirroring our regular normalcy instead of this forced one might be for the best.”

“Do you really think so?”

Jason could hear his heart beat in his chest. Going back to the Cave- He’d do everything to be allowed down there again. Bruce had been so fixated at making sure Jason was fine and okay and healing and good , but had excluded him from the space he had always felt the safest in. Despite the very violent reasons the restriction existed, it had still hurt tremendously.

It just felt like Bruce wasn’t trusting him with even the simplest things anymore, not even knowing his own limits. Jason knew he had a bit of a history of overestimating himself, but it didn’t go this far. With bated breath he waited for Bruce’s decision. He hoped Alfred would speak another encouraging word, tell Bruce that nothing really was improving if they just continued as they did. It felt like Jason was only holding everything back for as long as he could until the dam he had built up would break.

“This family has never been quite normal by anyone’s standards,” Alfred replied. “Perhaps it is time we remember that and return to our usual business.”

Alfred’s tone was a little resigned, but there was a faint ringing of amusement to be heard as well. Jason smiled slightly. They had made plenty of jokes about how odd their habits were in the past, from strange sleeping patterns to having contests on obscure knowledge that Alfred somehow still always won despite the many hours Bruce had to research the oddest things for all his cases.

“You are right, Alfred,” Bruce finally gave in.

Jason had to hold himself back from jumping up in joy, letting a shout of excitement escape him. That reaction would be rather counterproductive to his current situation and attempt at staying undercover so they wouldn’t know he was overhearing their discussion.

“I’m always right, Master Bruce. I thought you would know this by now.”

“I don’t think that particular lesson will ever sink in fully.”

Bruce sounded happier, his voice was lighter.

This was good.

They were finally getting somewhere. Jason couldn’t see the end of the tunnel yet, but he knew it was there.

“Let’s call it a night then, Master Bruce. Jason would be very disappointed if he knew you were up at this time when you preach to him about getting enough hours.”

Alfred’s words were a not so gentle reminder that Jason too should be sleeping right now, but before he could ponder a little more on that guilt, he heard steps. They were going to leave the kitchen.

Quickly, Jason looked around and tried to find an appropriate hiding place. He spotted one of the larger drapes that hung around a huge painting of some famous artist Jason couldn’t care less about. He had always thought it was strange to cover paintings with those. What was the point of owning them if you didn’t look at them? He rushed behind the drape and that not one second too late. He heard the door of the kitchen close and Bruce and Alfred walk up the stairs, saying one thing or another.

He didn’t know how long he was standing there, just waiting for them to pass until he was sure that they were indeed gone. He sneaked out from behind the curtain, looking around in the darkness to see if he spotted anybody else. It wouldn’t be the first time he had been caught and Bruce just decided to sit in the dark and wait for him to scare the crap out of him. Thankfully though, it seemed like nobody was waiting for him now, all expecting him to be sleeping. He just hoped that Bruce wouldn’t think to check in on him in his room now. Jason stepped onto the floor and headed towards the kitchen.

He should listen to Alfred’s words and get some sleep himself, but he had been trying that for hours already and it wasn’t working out. As quietly as he could, he opened the door of the kitchen. He didn’t even bother to turn the lights on. He didn’t need to. The room was well illuminated by the moonlight shining through the window and everything else- Well, Jason had noticed that his sight too had improved in the dark. He also happened to know the insides of his kitchen by heart. It was a relief that no matter how many new fancy kitchen applicants were invented, Alfred still stuck to the same and never let anyone mess with his order.

Jason filled water into the kettle and grabbed himself a mug and fished the dried chamomile out of a glass. Alfred grew most of their herbs himself in his wintergarden. They always dried them too so they could enjoy them year round and Alfred didn't have to use anything store-bought. Homemade always tasted better according to him and Jason was inclined to agree. It was always fun to pick the flowers and leaves and seeds, clean them and then leave them out to dry.

When the kettle whistled, Jason poured the water into the mug and added the leaves as well as a shot of honey. Blindly, he grabbed a spoon from the drawer and stirred the tea. When all the honey had spread and the leaves had been drenched in the water long enough, he raised the cup to his lips and took a sip.

It tasted like earth.

Disappointed, but not surprised, Jason dumped the contents of the mug into the kitchen sink and threw the tea leaves into the trash before putting the used mug into the dishwasher. 

Chapter Text

Dick had been able to understand that Bruce needed a break after Jason’s death, that he needed time to recover and come to terms with the boy’s passing. He had been way too young to die, he should have been able to grow up happy and safe without having to worry about the end of the world or other horrors. But such was not the life of a vigilante, especially not of one dwelling in Gotham.

Their lives were harsh and left deep scars. Barbara had come to terms with her disability over time, but it still made Dick angry. Instead of being able to just pick whatever college she had wanted and continue studying as normal, she now had to check for accessibility, whether she could even get into lecture halls while she was using a wheelchair.

It was ridiculous.

Fighting the good fight had ruined relationships, but somehow Dick had thought that Bruce and he were better than this. Despite their many arguments, Dick had still thought that he could count on Bruce to call him when he seriously needed help or when something critical had happened. And when Bruce hadn’t reached out, Dick had come to him, offered to look after Gotham so Bruce could take time off to mourn, but he had been harshly shot down.

More than just that, Dick had to learn that Jason was alive from the freaking news. Bruce hadn’t called, hadn’t asked him to come, not a single message had reached Dick before “Jason Todd found in Ethiopia!” had been plastered across the morning news. Dick had wanted to rush off to the manor immediately, but as always, something grander had gotten in the way. He couldn’t just abandon the world because of family matters, no matter how miraculous or life changing they apparently were. He had to let it go and push it back until he had the time and perhaps also the cool head needed to deal with Bruce Wayne and the apparently revived Jason Todd.

X

Jason’s days had improved so much since he was allowed back in the Cave. Instead of just spending hours upstairs walking the same rooms again and again, he got to roam the dark underground. Reminiscent of his early days in the manor, he immediately moved his schoolwork downstairs. Even when Bruce was not in there, but slowly branching out and taking up his work as the face of WE again, Jason could be found downstairs. He made himself comfortable at their conference table and started on his home work that he needed to do to start the next year successfully. He couldn’t put this situation behind him, he couldn’t forget and didn’t want to either, so he thought he might try to learn how to live with it.

Jason got up from his chair and stretched. He had been sitting all morning, writing a book report that the teacher had told him wasn’t necessary to hand in, but Jason had decided to do anyway. He wanted to go back to school as soon as possible, even if Bruce wasn’t entirely set on it yet. He was convinced that they should wait a little longer, at least until it was clear that there were no obvious side-effects to his resurrection that could suddenly show up in daily life. So far Jason hadn’t seen any magical powers he might have besides his shitty taste buds and weird senses, so he thought Bruce was overreacting. Those things didn’t feel like things he could learn to control, rather that was simply his new state of being, something he would have to get used to.

Jason couldn’t claim that his wish to return to school was entirely related to wanting normalcy back. He hoped that once he was back to school, Bruce might also let him return to being Robin. He missed the freedom of the night, the adrenaline rush, the knowledge that he had done good. This drive hadn’t disappeared despite the fact that he had died on the job.

Jason just wished that Zatanna had at least given him some books to look at, so that he could at least start researching what exactly he was supposed to be able to do. Bruce’s files on necromancers hadn’t been exactly informative either, containing mostly some old texts and rumors, from what Jason could see. That had been another reason Jason had wanted access to the Cave. He wanted to know how much Bruce had already figured out that he wasn’t sharing, but it didn’t appear to be much. Or perhaps he had printed out the files and deleted all digital copies. They kept some sensitive information on paper. Paper couldn't be hacked while the Batcomputer could, no matter how genius the technology behind it was.

Slowly Jason walked over to the training mats and warmed himself up. He stretched his legs, his arms, his sides, in the same order as Bruce had taught him once. He always stuck to the same rhythm. Once he was done, he started on going through katas that had been drilled into his mind. Blocks, attacks, jumps - only hand to hand right now but give it some time and Jason would work his way up to a wider arsenal. He just had to get back into shape once more. His insufficient nutrition wasn’t exactly helpling either, but there was only so much dirt he could shove down his throat before he retched. He was deep in training when he heard the hum announcing the arrival of a motorbike in the cave.

Jason stopped working out and, frowning, walked over to the Cave's entrance. Bruce couldn’t be back yet and Alfred was upstairs - had Zatanna perhaps come? No, she wouldn't arrive by bike. Curious, and perhaps already a little on the defense and itching for a fight, Jason watched as a black and blue bike rolled into the cave. It’s driver was male, lean, dressed in a black and blue suit.

Nightwing .

Jason somehow hadn’t expected that. He had talked with Dick Grayson maybe once or twice. The older boy had been very clear on the fact that he had wanted nothing to do with Jason. While it had hurt at first, he had gotten used to the thought. He didn’t need Grayson’s approval to be Robin. Bruce had said he was doing a great job, and it was Bruce who had allowed him out on the streets after he had completed his training.

That had been enough for Jason.

Dick took off his helmet and placed it on his bike. He looked around the room and for a moment Jason contemplated ducking, and just observing Grayson first, but then decided against it. He wasn’t going to let Grayson scare him away. He stood up straight, ensuring to take up as much space as he could, Dick was quick to spot him and Jason wasn’t sure what to think of the face the older boy was making. He looked shocked first, then something akin to anger and disbelief flashed over his face. Dick shouldn’t be surprised to see Jason here. He had earned his place in the cave fair and square and there was nothing unusual about it-

Oh.

Except his presence at all. The whole world knew Jason was alive by now, but apart from a few cards and messages Jason hadn’t been bothered by anyone. Bruce and Alfred were acting as protection, though it was really the strict house arrest and the distance between the manor and the reporters camping outside that kept Jason away from people. Dick must know that Jason was alive, but had Bruce even told him in person or just let the news speak for him? He was thoughtful about most things, but in all the chaos, he might have forgotten to actually inform people who weren’t in the need-to-know circle like Zatanna.

“Hello, Dick.” Jason finally thought to say. He tried to go for a casual tone, but it really just sounded awkward.

“Jason,” Dick replied, his voice barely above a whisper. “It really is you.”

Jason took that as a no on Bruce telling Dick in person. He suddenly wished that Bruce were here again and not still on patrol.

“In the flesh,” Jason said, hoping the comedy would take the weirdness of the whole situation away, but it was to no avail. Why did Dick have to show up unannounced? Jason should have run away as soon as he had spotted Dick, but no, he had to be brave and stupid. 

“You really are alive,” Dick repeated.

Jason certainly thought he was alive. His heart was beating and he bled when he hurt himself, but often enough he felt like he wasn’t all there, merely a ghost inhabiting a shell.

“Debatable.” Jason winced. He hadn’t meant to say that out loud. “I- Sorry, did you want anything?”

“Did I want anything?” Dick echoed. “You come back from the dead and you ask me if I want anything?”

So much for hoping they could skip the whole "you’re back from the dead?" talk that heroes frequented in much too often. He knew there were plenty of people who thought it was only a matter of time until they were all claimed by death, but Jason didn’t know how that was supposed to make anything easier. You still died, your friends and family still passed away. He thought of having to bury Bruce one day and found that he couldn’t imagine doing so.

“Well, you didn’t exactly call ahead, I’m not sure what you are here for.”

Dick’s face darkened. Perhaps Jason shouldn’t have been so snippish and put some kind of effort into sounding welcoming, but he hadn’t been given a manual and now also didn’t particularly feel like doing that. He had died, come back from the dead and was catching up on lost time now. No big deal. Grayson had never cared before, why would he care now? They had worked out this wonderful system in which Jason ignored him and he ignored Jason and the few times they had to interact for Bruce’s sake, Jason tried to drop as many snarky comments about Dick leaving as possible.

Because that was what Dick Grayson did, he left only to show up in the worst possible moments, thinking he had any right at all to speak up.

It wasn’t like Jason hadn’t wanted to get along with Dick at first. Which kid didn’t? Dick had been Robin, the first child hero. And Dick himself was also pretty cool, having grown up in the circus, being taken in by Bruce - Jason bet he never had to struggle for good grades. He was just too good to be true and that assumption had been proven right.

“I heard that you are…” Dick trailed off.

“Back from the dead?” Jason finished. “You can say it, you know. I died. Wasn’t fun. I bet my funeral was equally depressing, not that you’d know.”

“Not that I would-” Dick looked shocked. “Jason, did you think I didn’t go to your funeral?”

“Why would you?” Jason asked. “You never cared before.”

“That wasn’t about you! That was-” Dick let out a string of curses and ran his fingers to his hair. “Jason, I never had a problem with you.”

“So only with Bruce then? But you had to take it out on me? Oh, real mature, dick ,” Jason hissed, pronouncing the other vigilante’s name just so that he knew it was meant to be an insult. “And now that you had some time to get back into Dad’s good graces without me interfering, you want to play big brother.”

“That’s not it!”

No, that was what Dick had deluded himself into thinking it wasn’t. He probably thought he was doing something grandiose now, coming to visit the kid he had never bothered with before. Dick had had three years to come to terms with the fact that he wasn’t an only child anymore, but the switch had only flipped after Jason had died.

Well, screw him.

“Well, I’m back,” Jason hissed. “And I’m going to stay, so you can go back to Blüdhaven, Nightwing .”

Jason turned his back to Dick and walked over to the corner where he had dropped his clothes. He picked up the hoodie and pulled it over his head. Then he marched right towards the direction of the stairs, keen on escaping from the Cave. Dickhead could do whatever he wanted, Jason wasn’t going to listen to him and his stupid excuses.

“Jason, wait!”

But Jason didn’t care. He disappeared from the Cave and quickly rushed to his room. He loudly slammed the door and then proceeded to barricade it in hopes that no soul could enter his room easily. That was incorrect of course, everyone in this house was a professional when it came to breaking and entering, but Jason still liked to pretend that nobody could come in, no matter how Bat-trained they were.

“Stupid, dick,” Jason muttered as he angrily stamped around his room. “What was he thinking anyway? That we hug and make up and everything would be great?”

Jason dropped onto his bed and buried his head in the soft comfort of his pillow.

He took in a few deep breaths, one, two, three, then he screamed into the pillow, releasing all the anger buried deep within him. He prefered hitting something, tearing it to shreds, but he doubted Bruce or Alfred would appreciate it if he were to wreck his room so Jason thought it was quite responsible of him that he chose to pursue a less destructive course of action.

And so Jason shouted into his pillow until his voice rang out and he became hoarse and started to sob.

It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fucking fair that he had to die for Dick to get the fucking memo. Jason didn’t want to cry, he had done so much of that already lately and was just so tired of it all. He hated feeling so exhausted, that everything was emotional labor, that he couldn’t go through one day without something setting him off.

Jason’s shoulders shook and he startled when he felt somebody’s hand on him. He jumped back and immediately attempted to get the nearest tool. The first he could spot being a knife in this case. It was halfway across the room, but only a split second later it was in his hands and Jason was holding it to the jugular of his attacker-

“Jason! Woah! Careful with that knife Jaylad.”

That was Bruce.

Jason blinked. Bruce shouldn’t be back yet. He was sure that there were supposed to be hours still between him leaving for patrol and returning. Jason’s eyes drifted to his windows where he could see the sky. He didn’t find himself looking at the expected dark coloring of the endless calming night sky. Instead, Jason realized that his bedroom was illuminated by the soft tones of sunrise.

Hours must have already passed in which Jason had just laid there doing nothing. He had missed out on time again. He clenched his hands to fist, hoping he could chase the thought away before it lingered on his mind for too long. Jason dropped the knife on his bedsheets.

“Sorry, Bruce.”

Jason didn’t even know what he was apologizing for. Not the knife, not really. Those were the kind of instincts that had been drilled into him early in his youth and been honed under Batman’s tutelage.

Bruce only studied him with tired eyes. What a pair the two of them made, neither really knowing what to do with the situation at hand.

“Jason-”

“I won’t apologize to Dick,” Jason blurted out. “I shouted at him. If he told you. He probably did.”

Bruce shook his head. “No, he didn’t say that.”

His lips twitched.

Jason squinted at him. “But he shouted at you , didn’t he?”

Bruce’s expression was neutral for a moment, then he dropped his head and sighed. “Yes, he did. Things aren’t the easiest between me and Dick right now. He came by once already shortly after your… passing.”

Bruce didn’t say death, Alfred didn't say death either. Jason wasn’t quite sure on what he should think of it. He had died, that was fact. He didn’t want to think back on it, the flickering images of the Joker’s assault and the horror of crawling out of his grave still haunting him, but he had died. Fact. He was starting to get used to the concept, the idea of death in general.

“It didn’t end well?” Jason concluded.

“It didn’t,” Bruce confirmed. “But that is between me and him. I should have talked to him earlier too. He shouldn’t have had to hear about your return from the news of all places, it just escaped me. Dick means well, I promise. He does want to get to know you, Jay.”

“What if I don’t want to get to know him? He didn’t care the first time around.”

“And that was my fault,” Bruce admitted. He had never elaborated on what had caused his and Dick’s falling out and Jason had never really bothered to ask. Anybody who wanted to leave the manor was stupid, it never ended well. “But we should be glad for this second chance. I know I am, Jason.”

Bruce put his arms around Jason’s shoulder, hugged him so close that Jason could bury his head in Bruce’s shirt and inhale the scent of that fancy flower detergent that Alfred always bought at some small corner store only rich people shopped at.

“I’m so glad you're back.”

“Me too,” Jason muttered.

It wasn’t like he remembered what it had been like to be dead. Dying was one thing, it had hurt so much until it just hadn’t. Death itself had been just like sleeping. He wondered if other heroes experienced the same thing and were terrified of that dark nothing engulfing them. Jason found he wasn’t. If anything, he was curious as to what would happen when he began to reach for that darkness. And that, that urge, that was the thing he was actually afraid of.

Once Jason had distanced himself from Bruce, the two headed downstairs for dinner/lunch/breakfast or whatever one called the first meal of the day. In vigilante households, those terms were rather interchangeable.

“I can’t eat,” Jason confessed quietly on the staircase. “It all tastes shitty, no matter what I stick down my throat.”

Water was the only exception so far. It just tasted like nothing, but Jason didn’t want to survive on water alone. He certainly could , or so he liked to pretend, but the lack of sense was much like missing a limb, phantom pains throughout the whole day.

“I know,” Bruce said.

Jason quickly looked up. “What?” He had thought he had hidden it well, not pulling a face whenever they ate together.

“I noticed, but you didn’t seem ready to talk about it.”

“Oh.” That didn’t really seem like the Bruce whom Jason knew. His father wouldn’t just let such a matter rest. “And you didn’t ask anyway?”

Bruce paused in his steps to study Jason with a puzzled look, then he shook his head.

“I talked to Zatana about it. She said that it’s likely magical residue that should vanish soon. You do still need to eat, but perhaps, until then, we can switch to pills or intravenous-”

“No!” Jason interrupted hastily. “No, I don’t want to take any pills.”

Jason liked to have a clear head and not to stick any chemicals down his throat. He wasn’t even sure if Alfred kept as many medical herbs and flowers as he did nowadays before Jason and his aversion to pills had come around, but he definitely prefered those.

When they reached the kitchen, Jason was not surprised to see the feast he found on the table. It had smelled heavenly, even if it was sure to taste horrible to him. He could spot salads, sweets, some ham and more side dishes than all of them could possibly eat.

And Dick was there too, looking a little rougher than he had before, but already like he had recovered from whatever horrible thing had made him look like that. The perfect image of the aftermath of a heavy cry.

“Jason,” Dick greeted hesitantly, he held up a bowl of carrots wrapped in bacon. “Alfred said those are your favorites?”

They were. “I can’t eat that,” Jason replied and then, glancing at Bruce and knowing how much effort Alfred had put into all of this, added, “at least not right now. Food tastes weird.”

Dick smiled and Jason figured this counted as progress of some sort.

He sat down at the table and took a bit of everything that was not his favorite. There was no need to taint the memories of those dishes. He picked a few potatoes and some of the sauce, bland stuff that he wasn’t too excited about anymore. When Jason had first come to the manor, he had been excited about pretty much everything. Alfred’s food was always heavenly, even when the butler himself only thought of it as mediocre. Jason didn’t think he’d ever get used to how awesome it was, though by now he definitely could differentiate between what he only enjoyed generally and what he thought was excellent.

Everyone began to eat and Jason was keenly aware of the eyes that lingered on him. They were all waiting for him to finally get around to eating. Grudgingly, Jason stacked a couple potatoes on his fork and shoved them into his mouth, hoping that if he just bit down once or twice, he could escape most of the terrible taste.

To Jason’s surprise, the food didn’t turn to ash in his mouth. It didn’t taste pleasant, mostly it kind of felt like he was chewing on carton, but that was still a major improvement compared to before. Jason took another bite and didn’t struggle to swallow the mush inside his mouth.

“... back to school soon.”

Jason listened only half heartedly as, slowly but steadily, the conversation picked up around him. The whole dinner was tense and the questions were weirdly stilted, but at least he didn’t feel as watched anymore.

Once dinner was over and dessert had been passed around, Alfred ushered them out of the kitchen, though he kept Bruce to help him clean up, which left Jason and Dick standing in front of the door, awkwardly staring at one another.

“... Look, Jason,” Dick started. “I am sorry that I never came around before and for the way I reacted earlier.”

“I’m sorry too, I guess,” Jason replied. “I didn’t mean to say you didn’t care at all about me.”

Okay, that was a lie. Jason had absolutely meant to say that because that was what it had felt like. Dick had never come around or called or asked after Jason.

“Well, I did mean it,” Jason amended with a wince. “But I think I was kinda off in that assessment as well, so sorry for that.”

“Thank you,” Dick replied and the two of them fell back into their awkward silence. Jason could go up to his room again, bury his head in another book and spend the rest of the week there, hoping Dick would leave and he didn’t have to interact with him anymore.

On the other hand, it wasn’t like he ever had the chance before to really talk to Dick. Despite everything, or perhaps because of all that had happened, Jason wanted him around. He was lonely. Being under house arrest sucked and the Dick he knew from Alfred and Bruce’s stories had always sounded like fun, the kind of big brother Jason could get behind. Jason just didn’t know how to start a conversation.

“By the way,” Jason finally spoke up, “Your organization sucks.”

Dick stared at him in confusion. “I’m sorry, what?”

Jason shrugged and leaned against the wall, just a bit, and attempted to look like he wasn’t struggling to start a conversation.

“I’ve borrowed your old school books to keep up with my classes again. Their organization sucks and the notes you took in them are shitty.”

For a moment, Jaso thought that Dick wouldn’t pick up the line, that he had been too antagonistic and Dick would just feel insulted again. Then Dick let out a theatrical gasp. “He dare insult me! You nerd .”

Jason grinned, just a bit. Not enough to make up for all the lost time, but Bruce had been right. This was a second chance and Jason was tired of just playing catch up. It was time to start something new.

Chapter Text

The first time Bruce drove Jason to school again, his excitement was almost enough to take away Bruce’s anxieties. Jason had looked happier that morning than he had ever since his awakening. His smile had stretched over both cheeks and he had been pretty much vibrating on the entire drive to school. Bruce hadn’t known how much he had missed his son’s honest joy until he saw him like that again.

It had made all the many late-night talks with Zatanna worth it. He had consulted her multiple times over the course of the past months, and had her reassure him that unless Jason got terrorized so terribly at school that it would trigger his fight-or-flight response, he wasn’t going to display any kind of magic accidentally.

That wasn’t, apparently, how Necromancers work.

Bruce usually trusted Zatanna. She was strong and smart, not to mention one of his oldest childhood friends. However, she had also been surprised to know Jason had pulled off telekinesis, summoning a weapon to him when he had been startled. This was apparently not a skill he was supposed to be capable of yet.

Zatanna had insisted that it was a sign of his strength, and perhaps also a hint for the focalizing medium he was suited for, but that hadn’t exactly put Bruce at ease. It just meant that there were even more unexpected variables to account for.

Never mind all of the children and teachers around Jason. Jason had never been well liked amongst the upper class children due to his background. His few friends had attended Gotham Academy on scholarships or been the children of friends or colleagues of Bruce Wayne. They knew better than to treat Jason ill, but that didn’t stop the other hundreds of students attending the academy. Bruce wished Jason would have taken the whole thing just a bit slower still. Kept on with the homeschooling, or perhaps joined private tutoring lessons instead of a classroom with 25 children just waiting to pry any secret he was willing to share out of him.

Jason was, unfortunately in this case, a convincing conversationalist and had managed to outdo all of Bruce’s counter arguments as to why he should stay home just a little while longer. The only relief he had was that Jason hadn’t said a word about Robin yet. He knew it was only a question of time until his son would decide that he wanted to hit the streets again, but for now Bruce let himself believe he could stop that too once it happened.

X

Being back at school was everything Jason had dreamed of and more. People gave him weird looks, yes, but at least he got to be around people again. He had expected countless insensitive questions about his supposed disappearance and return, the cover story they had thought of, but Bruce had either looked threatening enough when Jason had gotten out of the car, or he had spoken extensively with the staff beforehand.

It was probably both.

The lessons themselves were almost a little boring. Jason already knew most of the stuff they were covering in his classes. It was given in the STEM subjects, he needed those for Robin, but he was also ahead in the other subjects. He had indeed managed to catch up and surpass his classmates again, something they were not too fond of given the five months he had been away from them in total.

But, at least, he got to go to school again and was free of his isolation. From here on it was just one small step to returning to being Robin, or so Jason hoped. Rationally, he knew that it took a bit more than just one jump, but hope died last, right?

It certainly had the first time round.

So during the entire month of October, Jason gave it his best. He attended all his classes, did well on his tests and earned good grades. He did everything he could to show Bruce that he was adjusting just fine. He almost felt normal again too with his sense of taste returned. He still got very cold at times, didn’t feel entirely at home in his body, but even those spells passed more quickly than they had before.

And so Jason worked and waited, worked and waited and then worked and waited some more.

Additionally to all his schoolwork, he also kept up with his Robin training. He refamiliarized himself with Gotham, got to know the current criminal and political climate, which was largely the same, the new buildings that had been constructed, the connections Batman had made. He carefully kept it all in a folder of his own creation, ready to be shown off to Bruce the moment he truly felt ready to return to the field.

The day that he thought he could handle going on the streets again was a warm Saturday morning. Jason woke with the sunrise, a new habit now that he wasn’t awake throughout the entire night. Jason would lay in bed and watch the sky turn orange and pink and finally light blue. He found that he had won a new appreciation for sunrises. There was something soothing about watching the night melt away at the break of a new dawn.

Once the sun was up entirely, Jason crawled out of his bed and headed downstairs for breakfast / dinner. Bruce was bound to be back now from patrol, sitting at the kitchen table and eating at Alfred’s insistence. True enough, once he entered the kitchen, smelling heavenly of pancakes, he saw Bruce half lying on the kitchen table, a cup of tea standing just in front of him while Alfred sat on his side, reading the newspaper.

“Good morning,” Jason greeted and got a mumbled reply from Bruce while Alfred swiftly stood up and started the kettle and the stove.

“Good morning, Master Jason,” Alfred said and put the pan on the stove, followed by the pancake batter soon after.

“Morning, Alfred.” Jason went to grab himself a plate and a cup before sitting down next to Bruce. He exchanged a look with Alfred and grinned when he saw the butler roll his eyes at Bruce’s horrible posture.

“Hey, B,” Jason whispered. “Can we talk after your nap?”

Bruce’s yes was barely audible, but Jason took notice of it anyway and decided it meant he could relax at least a little. He finished his breakfast quickly and, after helping Alfred clean up because he wasn’t rude like Bruce, went back into his room to finish his homework. The morning passed quietly as it often did on a Saturday with Bruce sleeping away most of it. Only after lunch was he awake enough that Jason thought it was the right time to start his conversation with Bruce.

He found his adoptive father in the Cave again already, cleaning up the Batmobile. Perfect, that meant Jason didn’t have to drag him there first and already ruin the beginning of their conversation. He headed towards his locker where he had hidden his folder, all papers printed out neatly and in color, and walked over to Bruce, the folder clutched tightly in his sweaty hands.

“Bruce?” Jason called out. “Can we talk?”

“Of course, Jason. Wait a minute.”

Bruce crawled out from beneath the Batmobile. He was wearing only a tank top and some sweatpants, the former guaranteed to have Alfred scowl at him should he spot that. Just because he didn’t feel cold, didn’t mean that it was warm enough in the Cave to not get sick. It had been one of the first things Alfred had told him after Jason had started spending more time in the Cave. It was his constant reminder now as well, given how much of a trouble he still had with feeling temperature right now.

Bruce swiped his greasy hands on his pants and walked closer to Jason. “What is it, Jay?”

Right, this was it. Jason took a deep breath to ground himself, then felt like he was strong enough to speak clearly.

“I want to go on patrol again,” he said determinedly. “I am caught up with all my school work and I have extensively studied Gotham’s current climate. I am ready.”

Bruce’s previously open expression twisted into something stubborn and haunted. Jason gulped. He had expected it, but that didn’t mean it didn’t hurt. He could still do this, win this, he was sure. He had prepared all his arguments well and he had gotten Bruce to budge on the school thing as well. He could pull this off. He just had to get Bruce to give him a chance, then he could convince him.

“Jason-”

“I can assure you, I did not make this decision lightly,” Jason said. “Here.”

He pressed his folder into Bruce’s hands. “I researched which open cases you're working on and what new angles we could tangle and also made some observations about which situations are bound to escalate sooner or later. I’m more well prepared than I was the first time I went out. Looking back, I can definitely say this now.”

Of course, the first nights he had been out as Robin, Bruce hadn’t really let him do any of the dangerous stuff either. It had mostly been milk runs, saving cats from trees and the like, but he had definitely been unaware of how dangerous, how deadly, the job could get. He had thought the uniform would be enough to protect him.

Bruce read over his report, which was honestly more than Jason had expected him to do in the worst case scenario. That one had involved dreams of Bruce shouting at him for even just considering going out again and ripping the folder to shreds.

Entirely unrealistic, but his nightmares didn’t often make sense anymore.

So this situation was already better than the worst case. Jason just had to think positively.

“Jason,” Bruce started. “I can’t-” He sighed and ran his hand through his hair. “Jason, you’re not going out as Robin again.”

“What?” Jason couldn’t help the sharp question escaping him. Quickly he schooled his expression into something more calm and relaxed. There was no need to freak out just yet or anything. He wanted to show Bruce that he could keep a cool head so that was what he’d do.

“But you see how well I’ve done my job?” Jason asked,. “Check page fifteen, I even included a diagram of the actual crime rates, more accurate than the bullshit the GCPD puts on their website.”

“I’ve seen it Jason and I also know which databanks you broke into to get this information.”

Jason wouldn’t say break into. They practically had a permanently opened channel to the GCPD servers. Barbara had built it into their system when she had revamped the police’s security. It was just a matter of exploiting that loophole.

“This is great work, it really is. I am proud of you.” Bruce emphasized the praise so strangely, as if he thought Jason wasn't hearing him. Of course he heard him, understood what he was saying as well. Jason knew he had done a good job, but that didn’t explain the rejection.

“But you’re still not going out as Robin.”

Jason crossed his arms in front of his chest.

“But why? Dick gets to go out as Nightwing! He even helps you!”

Dick and Jason had actually begun texting and Dick had even come over to the manor a couple times, whenever he managed between his Titans, Blüdhaven and his normal day job. Jason had no idea why exactly he was still working with the police - personally, he thought it was just part of throwing a tantrum at Bruce still - and Dick had told him a little about what he got up to as Nightwing.

“Dick is an adult and I can’t tell him what to do or leave be,” Bruce replied, sounding like it pained him. Of course it did, control freak that he was.

“So why-”

“Because you’re my son, Jason, and I already lost you once. I do not want to lose you again.”

“But you won't!” Jason insisted. “You can’t! Zatanna said it, didn’t she? No dying unless some magical whatever goes wrong!”

That had apparently been the wrong thing to say as Bruce paled even further.

Jason didn’t understand it. Bruce could die any second out there, from everything, and Jason had at least gained some sort of immunity but it didn’t count because he was a child still? Really? That was Bruce’s excuse? Jason seethed with anger. He couldn’t believe his adopted father. This was unfair and stupid and all just a weak defense and he was sure that Bruce was aware of it.

He was the one who was afraid when it should be Jason. Bruce hadn’t actually been blown up by a manic clown, hadn’t had to crawl out of his own tomb.

“This is dumb and you know it,” Jason said. “I am ready-”

“You are not going out as Robin and this is final, Jason,” Bruce interrupted him rudely. “This city doesn’t need Robin and I don’t need Robin by my side when it has such disastrous consequences. Never mind that you are obviously not ready if you consider that even the possibility of your death, even if non-permanent, might be an acceptable course of action-”

“But-”

“No buts. End of discussion. You may stay in the Cave as support, but you will not go on patrol.”

All words were stuck in Jason’s throat. He wanted to scream, to throw a tantrum, whatever would get Bruce’s attention and force him to admit that he was wrong. He could feel his blood rushing through his veins, anger pushing his heart to beat twice as fast and Jason thought he could hear bones cracking, snapping as easily as they had under the Joker’s tender care.

“Fine!” He finally shouted and grabbed his folder from Bruce’s hands, uncaring if a few of the papers fell to the ground. Jason turned around swiftly and rushed out of the Cave, once more fleeing from the place he had thought was his favorite. He didn’t want to stay there with Bruce’s unnecessary paranoia, surrounded by the tools that should be at his disposal. The sight of the Robin suit, his old one, much too small now, seemed like a taunt.

He thought about running to his room, but that only meant that he was giving Bruce the satisfaction of proving him right with a childish action. Instead, Jason headed outside where he knew Alfred to be. Certainly Alfred would have an open ear for him and let him complain. He had been the one to talk some sense into Bruce the first time around, perhaps he could work another miracle and help Jason out once more.

Jason found Alfred by his herb garden, attending to his sage, thymian and peppermint bushes. Watching Alfred garden was always a little funny because he insisted on wearing his fancy butler uniform beneath a bright yellow apron he had been given by Superman, if Jason remembered the story correctly. Vaguely he recalled being told that it was a handmade gift from Martha Kent. Jason had met Superman’s mother once and could easily see the caring woman making a gift like that for Alfred. She had just been sweet and fun like that, telling Jason embarrassing stories of Superman’s youth while feeding him her apple pie.

The bright yellow apron had tiny ducks printed at the bottom and a rather big front pocket where Alfred always put his gardening gloves. With as much noise as he could, embracing his moody teenager identity, Jason threw himself to the ground next to Alfred. The butler didn't even look up. He just continued on cleaning up the bushes and so Jason decided to do the same. He began digging his fingers into the dark earth and, ignoring the memories attempting to surface, ripped out weeds. Jason didn’t know how many minutes passed in which they just worked silently side by side until Alfred decided to speak up.

“Are you alright, Master Jason?” Alfred asked calmly. “Can I help you somehow?” 

“Yes!” Jason said, throwing up his hands. “Bruce is being dumb again! He never listens to anything I say and is being stupid about everything and I hate it!”

Perhaps Jason could have, or should have, phrased that a little more refined given that he wanted Alfred to be on his side, but right now he didn’t have the brainpower for it.

“What can I do to make him listen?” He asked.

Alfred humed under his breath as he dug into the ground, planting a new lavendel bush. “There are not a lot of things that can get through Master Bruce’s thick skull.”

“There really are not,” Jason huffed and crossed his arms.

Bruce was very much a my way or the highway kind of person and it was more than just a little annoying. He was willing to listen, yes, but often enough Jason felt like he did that just so he could think of moure counter arguments.

“Time will get through to him, believe me. Time always does.”

“But I’m sick of waiting,” Jason replied. “I’ve been doing nothing but waiting and preparing for months and nothing gets better. It just all stays the same.”

Alfred finished planting the bush, then he turned away from his plot and turned to pay Jason his full attention.

“Do you really think nothing gets better? Have you not been feeling better? Learned to eat again? Forgotten less and less?”

Well, yes, Jason had. He could eat just fine again and it was getting easier to recall where he had put new objects and which ones he had already thrown out, but that was the point. It had all happened because he had been preparing to be Robin again. He must have said the last part out loud as Alfred now looked at him, his eyebrow raised.

“Was it really just because you decided you wanted to be Robin again, or because you have been given the time and place to heal?”

How was Jason supposed to know that? It was all the same anyway. As soon as the thought materialized in his brain, he voiced it, causing Alfred to nod along.

“And if Bruce had made you Robin again after a month, would all those issues have disappeared or healed all the same?”

Jason opened his mouth to reply with a “yes of course” but he actually wasn’t so sure. He would have gotten what he wanted, sure, but perhaps it would have been too early.

“Still,” he insisted. “I’m ready now. What’s holding Bruce back?”

“He worries for you,” Alfred said. “He lost his son.”

“Yeah, well, but I’m back and I have no intention of dying again,” Jason muttered. He really didn’t want to. Being dead itself, that he had no memories of but dying and waking up again? He never wanted to go through that again. He would be careful and not just use his newfound immunity as some kind of free pass, it was just meant to reassure Bruce that he wouldn’t be hurt quite as easily again. Not that Brue saw it that way, he always misunderstood everything.

And the claim that he didn’t need Robin - ridiculous. Jason had saved his life countless times when it had been just the two of them. They worked well together and Jason knew that Bruce had been struggling on his own, he had seen it black and white in his reports. Bruce needed permanent support and not just something like Nightwing showing up once every other night. He needed a permanent partner out on the streets with him.

“Be patient with him, Jason,” Alfred said and, after taking his gloves off, put his hand on Jason’s shoulder. “Master Bruce just needs to learn to cope with it all. In the meanwhile, manning the comms with me isn't so bad, is it?”

That teased a smile out of Jason. “No, it really isn’t. And I get free snacks all night while Bruce has to eat dumb muesli bars.”

“There you have it, Master Jason,” Alfred said. He stood up and brushed the dirt off his knees. “Now let’s go prepare something to eat this afternoon while Master Bruce is busy being his usual gloomy self.”

That reply made Jason’s smile widen. The two of them spend the rest of the day going through various household chores, the like of which Jason even normally didn’t have to do. He didn’t mind too much, knowing somewhere that this was Alfred’s attempt at distracting him. He wasn’t always the most orderly when it came to his own stuff, enjoying a little chaos in his rooms to brighten it up and make it feel lived in, but the manor as a whole had to be kept in shape.

They made their way from one room to another. In the library, Jason climbed on top of the shelfs and wiped the dust there, standing on the large and dark furniture. He jumped from one shelf to the other and, on a few occasions, did so with a flip, causing Alfred to shake his head.

Sooner than expected, daylight turned to twilight and they all ate dinner together. It was a tense affair, with Jason still being annoyed at Bruce and Bruce unwilling to budge from his position. Still, they somehow managed to make their way through dinner holding civil and kind of boring conversations. Jason helped Alfred clean up and pack away the leftovers for breakfast.

When he accompanied Alfred down to the Cave, he didn’t even give Bruce another snippish comment at being left behind. Personally, he thought that it was something to be proud of.

Bruce got changed into his uniform and then took off into the night as Jason made himself comfortable in the large chair in front of the batcomputer. He’d put on a large oversized WE hoodie that shielded him against the cold and warm fluffy socks. Computer duty wasn’t necessarily the most interesting, especially with all the background protocols Oracle had set up.

Mostly, he monitored the various streets of Gotham, gave Bruce a heads up when the police got a call in and informed him how quickly they would get there and how much faster Batman would be. He was also just one man, he couldn’t be everywhere and it was easier when an actual person made a call about who needed more help than a string of code.

Jason kind of hated though how he could tell where it all would be easier for Bruce, were Robin there as well. Still, he kept his quiet and continued on doing his job. He would do it well, so well that Bruce would slip and call him Robin on the comms, admitting to himself that he needed Jason.

“Any sighting of Ivy?” Batman asked.

Jason shook his head. “No, nothing. She’s not in her usual haunts at least.”

Ivy had escaped from Arkham about two weeks ago, another reason Jason had wanted to be back on the streets. Usually, she would be right back in action now, showing off her green thumb. It was strange that she hadn’t done a thing yet, it made everyone a little uneasy. The last time she had been gone for long, she had come back with a Caribbean plant whose name Jason couldn’t recall because it had been obscure as shit and twice as deadly.

“I’ll check again, though,” Jason said, already anticipating what Bruce would ask of him next. He flipped through the various channels until he saw something dark hush across a security camera near Robinson park.

“Hold up,” Jason announced and followed up that recording. It could have just been another shady figure, but perhaps it had been Ivy. It took a couple seconds to flip through all the channels, but then he found a clear picture of what must have been the mysterious shadowy figure - and indeed. It was Ivy.

“I have visuals on Ivy!” Jason announced

The camera had a horrible quality, he had to remind Bruce to set up something better. They had enough money to spare to up security. It wasn’t like they weren’t already keeping the public transport system running on their own.

“Where?” Bruce asked.

 “Near Robinson park. Where the two streets cross, McKenzie and Old North Road.”

Squinting at the screen, Jason tried to make out anything about Ivy’s from. “She’s wearing a trenchcoat, she might actually be armed beneath it.”

Ivy wasn’t one for guns or knives usually, but there was never being too careful when it came to her. She was one of their smarter opponents.

Then, suddenly, Ivy stood still. She opened her coat to take something out that Jason couldn’t see clearly. It looked like a flask. She took off the cap and tilted it so that a liquid slowly poured on the ground. At first, nothing happened, the next moment something started to wind its way out of the cracks in the asphalt and began to grow rapidly.

“Ivy’s made another super growth thing,” Jason announced. The thing grew fast, tall and taller until its vines were tall enough to possibly crush a child and do some lasting damage should the planet be capable of sentient thought-

Oh, who was Jason kidding? it was Poison Ivy’s creation, of course the plant was sentient.

It turned what Jason could only describe as its neck.

The recording sadly had no audio, but he was positive that Ivy was cooing at the plant. She gently patted its head and whispered something at it. Alfred and Jason exchanged a look and Alfred immediately began heading towards the chemistry lab where they kept whatever kind of plant killer needed to deal with Ivy. On his own again, Jason focused on the screens in front of him again.

“It’s growing quickly,” he told Bruce. “You should hurry.”

“Already on it,” came the gruff reply and Jason could hear the motor of the batmobile accelerating. He checked the screens to see where Bruce was and directed him towards the streets that would take him to Ivy the quickest. He kept an eye on her as well, seeing that Ivy kept drooping more of her weird planet stuff everywhere, growing her own army.

This was going to be rough.

He crossed his fingers that she planned to assault another big company name building and wouldn’t stick her plants on the common people. Sometimes Ivy was balanced enough to leave the civilians alone, but other days she was just so full of rage, she lashed out at everyone. Jason could empathize with that desire, though for him that usually meant slamming his door, not terrorizing an entire city.

Soon after he could see the Batmobile rolling up on the street Ivy was on.

Jason wasn’t the only one who saw the car approach. Ivy turned around, her furious expression visible even on the horribly flickering camera image. She appeared to roar and one of her newly grown plants heeded her call and attacked the Batmobile. Its vines crawled beneath the car, held it back and then they began to squeeze. Jason had never before seen something causing a dent in the Batmobile so easy. They used special metal when manufacturing their weapons and tools, something durable that could stand being tossed around a couple times.

Jason couldn’t tell whether Bruce was shocked, only hearing a few grunts over the comm. “Batman?” Jason asked. “Batman, please come in.”

But Bruce didn’t reply.

Jason cursed and if he didn’t need the comms to guide Bruce and stay up to date, he’d cut the feed just for a moment to see how Bruce liked it when he wasn’t talked to.

On the video feed, Jason saw that Bruce climbed out of the batmobile, and that not a moment too early as in the next moment, Ivy crushed the car entirely. Had Bruce still been in there, he would be dead now.

This was stupid. Jason should be out there, helping. If they were together, Ivy’s plants wouldn't even have looked at the Batmobile twice.

“Bruce needs help,” Jason decided after watching the fight on the cameras.

Ivy was too strong on this new concoction she had cooked up. Batman needed Robin and Jason wasn't going to let Bruce die just because his father thought he wasn’t ready for it yet.

He rushed towards the dressing rooms, trying to find something that would fit him. His own uniform was about half a year and a growth spurt too small. He supposed he could attempt to fit into it, but the tight clothes would likely only hinder his movement given that they tailored their uniforms to their exact size. They had to take all the advantages they could get and Bruce had more than enough money to compensate for all of Robin‘s growth spurts.

Jason discarded his own old uniforms and began looking through Dick’s old ones. He grabbed the closest pair of pants that seemed like it could fit. It wasn’t completely comfortable, but it had enough armoring that Jason was content with it. It was certainly better than any of his own.

He quickly grabbed a utility belt and stocked up what it was missing on batarangs, poisons and other nifty gadgets. The moment you lost your utility belt, the fight was already twice as hard as it had to be. Bruce had drilled that particular sentence into Jason’s mind. As much as many other heroes liked to make fun of Batman’s magic pockets, Bruce was right.

Once he was all dressed up, he rushed towards the cars, searching for a bike. He knew it was here somewhere, he had tinkered on it when Bruce had looked away, making improvements and ensuring that the moment he needed it, it would be running smoothly. He found it parked at the very back - not quite where he had left it, but that didn’t bother him at the moment.

“Master Jason.”

Jason froze, then slowly turned around. He had thought that Alfred was still busy in the lab, searching for the appropriate plant extinguisher and that he would be quick enough in running away.

“I’m sorry, Alfred,” Jason said. “But I can’t wait. I have to help him.”

Jason knew this deep in his bones, there was no other option. He was Robin and he belonged at Batman’s side. Robin was his shadow, his support, his help and he was his magic.

And Jason had plenty of it.

“Be careful, Master Jason, I do not want to mourn either of you again,” Alfred said, giving Jason his hesitant approval.

Jason beamed at him and threw his leg over the side of his bike. “Don’t worry Alfie. We’ll both make it back.”

He started up his bike and it came alive with a familiar roar. He had worked on it for weeks, trying to find a way to improve it, and it now ran smoother than it ever had before. He quickly drove out of the Cave and followed the underground tunnels that he’d never been afraid of despite the shadows casted in them. He emerged in one of their safe houses and soon after Jason found himself on Gotham’s streets. He passed in between various cars with only a hair’s breadth separating him from them, rushed across pedestrian walkways and people on bicycles, their shocked screeches following him. The wind tousled his hair and despite the danger Bruce was in, and all the worry biting at him, Jason had never felt more alive than he ever had, right in this moment.

“Agent A,” Jason spoke. “What’s my ETA?”

“Five more minutes, Sir.”

Five huh? Jason grinned. “Bet I can do it in three.”

Jason imagined Alfred’s tired sigh at his family’s need for speed as he forced his bike to accelerate even more and flew over the highway. Another laugh escaped him as he rushed past people who were running away from Ivy’s destruction. She hadn’t yet made it through this block, so Jason had arrived just in time. As soon as he spun around the next corner he spotted Ivy’s growing army. Wistfully, Jason squeezed the steering wheel of his bike one last time. It was sad that so much hard work was going to just blow up.

Then, in the next moment, he turned his bike sideways and let go, jumping off as it crashed into the nearest of Ivy’s plants, which cried horribly in anguish. It was an awful sound, like nails on a blackboard. Jason couldn’t tell whether it was the scream or the following explosion or both that drew the attention of the other plants, but Robin focused only on those straight ahead near Ivy - the plants holding Bruce capture.

“Batman!” Jason shouted and threw two batarangs in Bruce’s direction. The older man caught them easily, despite the plants’ attempts at pushing him down. He used the blades to free himself from the vines, making the corresponding monsters shriek as they were cut. Ivy shouted in outrage and pain as Bruce escaped her, but Jason only grinned triumphantly. They were working together like a well oiled machine, as if they had never stopped and the last months could just be erased.

“Robin!” Ivy shouted once she spotted him, her face twisted into a snarl. “Where has the Bat been hiding you?”

“Oh, I went on vacation,” Jason replied easily as he side-stepped another one of Ivy’s creations, barely escaping it. They were much faster than they looked and ought to be given their size. Jason only hoped that Alfred was quick enough in figuring out what could destroy them reliably. Fire, surprisingly, didn’t always work.

Jason glanced at Batman, who was kept busy by three of the things. Damn it, this really did feel just like one of their old patrols, just a bit too hectic, not as well prepared as they wanted to be and still, somehow, at the top of their game.

Jason smiled and immediately threw himself at another plant.

He was right at home here in the middle of the battle, blood rushing through his veins and his heart pumping. He had found his purpose again. The action was exciting, shook him awake and out of a trance he hadn’t even known he was in.

“I thought the Joker had killed you,” Ivy said. “He’s been going on and on about dead little birds.”

There was hesitation in her voice, just a bit. Jason supposed it was because she hadn’t actually ever wanted him dead really. Harley might react similarly, but all the other villains usually didn’t care too much about whether they would give Robin life-threatening injuries. There were very few villains who actually cared that he was a child. Truthfully, Robin  did have the reputation for being not exactly human, or even just enhanced. Robin was a little more than that, a spirit following the shadow of the bat.

“You shouldn’t listen to any clowns,” Robin replied. “Isn’t good for your health. And fighting us isn’t either.”

Robin jumped backwards over again and landed swiftly on his feet again as if he had never stopped flying through the air.

“You’ll get burned,” he teased.

Ivy screamed and set two more of her plant monsters on them. This was fun, much more than Jason had anticipated it would be. Nothing horrible was going on, no random civilians left to protect still around; it was just Batman and Robin against the villain of the week, bringing peace to Gothan’s nights.

“You’ll see, right B-”

The words froze in his throat.

Batman was fighting two of the monsters, but more and more kept piling up on him. Viciously, Bruce pushed them away, cut through their limbs, struggled and but as the plants dominated more and more of the fight, leaving Bruce helpless. Where before he had been holding his ground, winning too, he now was losing it quickly. Jason hadn’t even noticed it, too caught up in his own dreams.

“Batman!” He shouted as another plant aimed to grab his throat and squeezed.

Jasons stopped breathing.

He could feel the way Bruce fought valiantly, the way his heart slowed. The plants were still holding onto his neck, wrapped around his throat and cut off his air supply. They just needed to tear his neck the right way and it would crack.

“No!” Jason shouted, his voice sounding distant even in his own ears. But even so, it was already too late. The plants dropped Batman and he fell to the ground like a broken doll. Anger and fear rose up in Jason, boiling heat and terror. Time slowed down as he watched Bruce lying there on the asphalt, motionless.

He had come here exactly to prevent something like this from happening.

“Batman!” He shouted and tried to make his way over to him, but, again and again, more and more plants interfered and got in his way. They ripped at his limbs painfully as if they wanted to pull his arm straight out of its socket.

They were trying to keep him away from his father and it was simply unacceptable. Jason wouldn’t let them get in the way. How dare they when there was nothing that could hold Jason back, not even something as fickle as death? And yet, another plant reached for him, made it through his failing defenses. There were simply too many of them. They took a hold of him and held him stead, tried to restrain him.

“Poor, poor Robin,” Ivy sang. “Not so brave now anymore, are you?”

Jason struggled against the restraints and spat bitter curses at her. How dare she do this to them? The earth seemed to shake beneath Jason’s feet the more he struggled to escape the grip of Ivy’s vines, but they were too strong for his flesh and blood body.

Please, he begged nobody because nobody was listening. No hero, no god had answered his prayers in that abandoned warehouse and yet Jason had still screamed to the heavens above. This couldn’t be it. He didn’t want to die again, he didn't want his father to die.

Fury and desperation mingled, became one as fire ignited in his mind. He twisted and turned, but it was no use. All energy seemed to have left him, his body remaining as a hollow shell. As he turned his head, he caught sight of his reflection in the window. His eyes were glowing bright green, like vicious poison, deadly and unreal.

Was this the result of the blood that had torn him from his grave? Was the hammering in his chest, the feeling of gentle fingers tracing over his cheeks to dry his tears, magic?

Jason found that he didn’t particularly care, tired as he already was. All that he could think of was that Bruce was hurt and Ivy had done it. He had to save his partner somehow, had to get out of this trap.

This wasn’t how Batman and Robin were going to end. He refused it. A cry of anguish left his throat, a shriek so high and deafening that Jason almost couldn’t believe it had come from him.

Right where he was standing, the earth split open, torn apart by his will alone. Slowly, steadily something emerged from the rift, reaching into the world of the living with no hurry at all, only cold determination.

White, thin, not alive but not quite dead anymore either, a hand reached out and gripped the green ropes holding Jason in place. Another hand joined it, decaying flesh still clinging to bloodied bones, and with it a body pulled itself out from the earth. The sight made Jason’s stomach turn and yet he couldn’t look away from the horrific birth. Dressed in tatters that might have once been clothes, the mass of bones and meat threw itself on the vines and began tearing through them endlessly, ruthlessly ripping them to shreds.

Jason thought he could hear its thoughts, or perhaps they were his own, demanding the destruction of the plant in front of him. The gap in the ground widened as yet another summon made its way through the asphalt, pale fingers breaking as Jason’s once had. There was a price to be paid for this kind of resurrection and this damage was it.

This new hand wasn’t just the bare bones of a skeleton, and no decaying corpse yet either. Maggots and other kinds of worms stuck to the skin, slowly devouring the decaying body as this summon too followed Jason’s bidding. More and more dead escaped the rift Jason had torn into the veil between two words, following his call and aiding him.

Jason dropped to the ground next to the rift after his creations had freed him and watched in awe as they began attacking the other plants. He was dizzy, as if he were suffering from a concussion, but the dull alarm he felt at the back of his mind at this spectacle was nothing compared to Ivy’s horror.

“What are you!?” Ivy screeched, accusingly pointing at Jason as she tried to fight off the dead finishing off her army one after another.

“I’m Robin,” Jason replied, voice low and for once not caring about justice. “And I will make you pay.”

The last of the plants were apprehended by his summons, their green remains laid splattered across the entire street. 

On shaking legs, with the aid of a skeleton dressed in rags that were once a uniform, Jason stood up. He threw one last look at the rotting plants and the now incapitated Ivy, then he looked back at his father’s crumpled form, still unmoving.

“Batman!”

The remaining adrenaline in his veins gave him just one last push so he could hurry to Bruce’s side. As soon as he reached him, he dropped to the ground next to Bruce’s unconscious form and checked him over for injuries. He seemed alright, just knocked out, but there was not telling what internal bleeding he might have. The strength of the plants had been enamoured, they could have broken any bones and Jason would be none the wiser. He tried to focus on Bruce, but his head was a mess, all attempts at trying to scan him left him feeling woozy.

“Agent A,” Jason hailed the Cave. “I need an extraction, right now.”

“Robin, what is going on?” Alfred’s voice chimed in over the comms. “I lost sight. Nightwing has already been sent out.”

Jason tore his eyes away from Bruce just long enough to look at the surrounding chaos. His summons were starting to fall apart again, turning to dust, but there was not much left of Ivy’s plants either. They had been brutally torn apart by his creations. Ivy herself was just knocked out, or so Jason hoped. She had to be alright, she couldn’t have died.

More importantly, Bruce was still alive too.

Jason hadn't been too late.

“Pick us up quickly, please,” Jason muttered as he brought his attention back to his father. Under the cowl, he couldn’t see his face and he wanted to do nothing more than pull it back and look at it, but that had to wait until they were back home again.

The thought of returning home had never been so sweet. He wanted to sleep, but, with all the willpower available, he forced himself to stay awake. He couldn’t leave the two of them without any protection. He had to stay awake at least until Nightwing arrived. Jason didn’t dare rest his eyes even for one moment, too afraid he wouldn’t open them again due to his sheer exhaustion. He patiently began to count, tensed his whole body every few seconds to reduce the stress and stay awake. It was a well proven method, one they usually used for long stake outs.

Still, nothing could compare to the relief he felt when he heard the tell-tale sound of one of the cars. Jason turned his head to see Nightwing jumping out of one of their spare cars and rushing towards them.

“Robin,” Nigtwing breathed, his voice steady and calm in a way Jason desperately hoped he could be right now. “Are you alright?”

“B’s hurt,” Jason muttered. “We have to check him.”

“We will, kid,” Dick replied and carefully pulled Jason away from Bruce’s still body. He, with some effort, picked Bruce up - a feat unto itself given how much Bruce weighed with the Batsuit on, and transported him towards the car. Jason followed him with much difficulty, swaying from one side to the other. Once he had arrived at the car, he had just collapsed onto the front passenger seat, similarly to the first time he’d ever been in one of Batman’s cars.

Usually they would stay behind to help with the clean-up, but with Ivy incapitated, the police should be able to deal with this on their own. They were morons, yes, but they weren’t that incompetent, at least when Gordon was around.

Jason’s eyes fluttered shut.

“Don’t worry, kid,” Dick’s voice rang out. “We’re going home now.”

And with that, Jason let the darkness claim him.

X

When Jason came to himself again, he was comfortably lying next to a warm body. He snuggled closer to the other body, dug his cold feed in between warm legs and wrapped his arms around an equally comfortable stomach.

His personal pillow grunted.

It took Jason one, two, three, seconds to realize who he was holding onto until he flung himself out of the bed. He fell backwards to the ground, only caught himself in the last second and so prevented himself from hitting his head painfully.

“Bruce!” Jason exclaimed and immediately stood up again. “You’re awake! Are you alright? Does anything hurt?”

Bruce didn’t look any different from usual. Perhap a little paler, but that could also just be the light of the medbay. A bandage was wrapped around his head and another few covered his torso. The rest of his body was out of sight as it was hidden beneath the blanket Jason had just been lying beneath as well.

“I’m fine, Jason,” Bruce reassured him. “Thanks to you, or so Alfred and Dick tell me.”

Jason knew a reprimand when he heard it. He grimaced and attempted to look casual as he crossed his arms in front of his chest. “Well I couldn’t leave you alone, could I? We’re Batman and Robin, we’re supposed to be a team.”

Bruce was silent at first. He was holding a book in his hands, old and worn, one that Jason had never seen before. Bruce, for all that they had a very impressive library, hadn’t read a proper book in years, perferring online texts he could download to a reader. It was more practical, allowed for a better search or so. Jason wasn’t entirely sold on the idea, though he supposed it had some merit. He just prefered proper leather bound tomes he could scribble in. The last time he had seen Bruce holding onto a book, they had been reading together for one of Jason’s English classes.

“You weren't supposed to follow me into the field, Jason,” Bruce finally said.

“But I-”

Bruce held up his hand and Jason shut up, willing to let his father finish speaking. He just wanted to ensure that Bruce knew that he hadn’t just jumped at the first chance to go back into action. Okay, maybe he had, but just a little. His primary reason for putting on the uniform again, however, had been his worry for Bruce. That was what being a Hero was all about, saving people and Jason had wanted nothing more than to keep his father safe.

He wanted to prove that he wasn’t some naive kid anymore, that he understood the dangers and wanted to make sure that no people were endangered. If just one person was enough to turn the tide, then certainly they had to act, right?

“I wanted to keep you away from this to protect you,” Bruce said. “To let you grow up without any more worries.”

Jason stared at Bruce with a flabbergasted expression. Surely he hadn’t really just said that?

“I will always worry,” Jason replied. “You're Batman- you’re my Dad. I don’t have another father and I don’t know how I’m supposed to just sit back and watch you get bat around by a bunch of killer plants. If not for me there, you would have been dead.”

That Jason knew intimately. Ivy’s plants wouldn’t have stopped. They would have kept squeezing Bruce’s throat, snapped his neck-

He would have died right then and there if not for Jason’s interference and he refused to feel guilty for it.

“I know, Jay. And I’m glad you came to help me, even if you pushed yourself much too far.”

Jason smiled sheepishly. “Well, I had to do my job.”

“So you summoned the dead,” Bruce said dryly, but not without humor.

Jason looked down at his hands, thinking of the skeletal ones he had seen drag themselves out of the grave. He still wasn’t sure how exactly he had done that. He had just wanted someone who would come aid him, something that would be able to defeat Ivy and free him. He hadn’t meant to pull anything from the ground or revive them, partially at least. He had no idea either if all his summons had actually disappeared when he had blacked out. He had seen them turn to ashes, but there could still be a chance that they hadn’t all ended up like that.

“There are no zombies running around, are there?” he asked carefully.

Bruce shook his head just a bit, and winced, the motion hardly noticeable if you didn’t pay attention to it. He probably had a concussion. It wouldn’t surprise Jason if he did.

“No, Dick went back to check, but there were no zombies running around, just ashes in the places they disappeared.”

Oh.

That was good at least, Jason thought and promptly said so as well. Bruce agreed with a low hum, then his eyes dropped back to the book he was holding. A moment of silence passed between them before Bruce spoke again.

“I may have miscalculated when I tried to keep you away from this. I see now that leaving you in the Cave is no real option, you will already be immersed in this and will continue to want to fight.”

Jaso felt the blood leave his face. Did that mean Bruce was going to kick him out of the Cave entirely again? Leave him so that he wouldn’t be tempted into going out to save his life? That was ridiculous! He couldn’t do that!

“You can’t be-”

“Jason,” Bruce chided him. “Will you let me finish first?”

Bruce fixed him with a look and Jason sank back into himself. “Yeah,” he muttered, “go on.”

“Thank you, Jay. Now, as I was saying, leaving you behind is no option, but I also can’t take you into the field when you might summon the dead at any given moment and exhaust yourself so.”

Jason was actually pretty sure he wouldn’t do that again unless he was in a state of total fear and panic, but he kept that to himself. He knew what it was like to reach for the beyond now, he could avoid doing it in the future.

“Which is why I talked to Zatanna again while you were still sleeping and arranged for your first lesson. She gave me this to hand to you for some introductory reading.”

The book Bruce had been holding onto suddenly seemed about ten times more interesting than it had before.

Bruce held it out for Jason to take and the moment his fingers touched the leather, he felt as if a spark surged through him. Eagerly, he opened up the book, discovering pages upon pages of diagrams and notes. The oldest script appeared to be Latin, but there were countless annotations in all kinds of languages, ink and handwriting. Some languages Jason didn’t recognize and the handwriting was hardly decipherable in some places, but even so, he knew the content of the book. He read it off its sketches, the paintings of death and decay that had to be centuries old already.

Jason flipped the book around to read over its cover.

Beginner’s guide to necromancy, it said in elegant writing. Cursive letters curling around each other to create a circle of some sort.

“Zatanna found it in her father’s old archives,” Bruce elaborated. “It should make for a good first reading. You can be Robin again, my only condition is that you throw yourself into your studies first and gain some kind of control of your abilities before you accompany me again. I do not want to risk another uncontrollable element.”

“Thank you,” Jason said. His eyes stung, some dirt must have gotten into them. Carefully, he set the book aside and leaned forward so that he could carefully wrap his arms around Bruce’s shoulder. “Thank you, Dad.”

Bruce returned the hug, held Jason so close that he could almost hear his heartbeat as well. “You’re welcome, Jaylad.”

They let go of each other just as Alfred entered the medbay, holding a tray of snacks and a few bottles of pills.

“Master Jason,” He greeted warmly. “I’m glad to see you are awake.”

“And I’m glad to see you,” Jason returned the greeting as if they hadn’t seen each other in months. “I hope Bruce didn’t give you too much trouble about seeing me off.”

Jason grinned cheekily as Alfred only huffed. “Master Bruce wouldn’t dare complain when he returns home to us like this, now would he?”

He pointedly looked at Bruce who only sighed. “I got it Alfred, I’ll be more careful in the future.”

The fact that this was an excuse Jason had already heard a hundred times and Alfred likely thousands of times was ignored.

“Good.”

Alfred continued his check up on Jason first, but only prescribed him a lot of rest against the overexhaustion. He cleared Jason to leave the medbay, but urged Brue to stay a little longer where they had machines monitoring him.

Bruce, predictably, didn’t want to listen. With Alfred’s disapproving stare on his back, he ended up following Jason upstairs. He pretended to be fine, but Jason could tell that the walk was a struggle for him, so Jason slowed down a little to give Bruce the needed time to keep up with him.

Once they were upstairs, Alfred swiftly prepared a tray of tea and scones for them as they made themselves comfortable on the living room sofa. Jason curled into Bruce’s side and it only took a few minutes until Bruce fell asleep. Jason, meanwhile, began reading through the book he had been given. It was a very slow process, having to stop every other paragraph to translate - and he guessed he kind of saw the point of learning Latin now besides random confrontations with the Riddler when the Ancient Greece and Rome Exhibit was at the museum.

What Jason discovered in the book was incredibly fascinating and so much more than he could have hoped for. It described his powers, the kind of abilities he’d gain and what he, one day, would be able to pull off.

He almost wanted to jump up and try some of the exercises out right now, but he didn’t want to get scolded by Alfred either, so he just continued on reading, enjoying Bruce’s warm presence.

After a couple hours or so, Dick stormed into the manor, though the “what the fuck-” died on his lips as he saw Bruce snoring on the sofa. He blinked once, then he shot Jason a questioning look.

“I think Alfred drugged his tea,” Jason admitted and grinned back at his older brother. Dick snorted in turn and, after running through the manor for about half an hour, probably talking to Alfred, he too returned to the living room and took a seat on one of the armchairs. He mindlessly began scrolling through his phone, keeping the silence and their newfound peace.

Things were going to get better now. They’d be alright.

They let Bruce sleep through lunch and afternoon tea, both which he complained about in a few grunts that were barely coherent to anyone after he woke up. Dick peppered Jason with questions about what had happened throughout the meals, his face flickering from worry to fear to anger and shock at hearing how Jaso had actually taken out Ivy.

“So, what?” he finally asked, eyes darting to the book Jason had yet to let go of. “You can bring back the dead just like that?”

“Yes,” Jason answered, then stopped. “Eh, no. It’s complicated. There are a lot of ways of making dead things alive again. I’m only just through the first two chapters.” He raised his book to further highlight his point, showing off clearly that he hadn’t really read much of it yet.

But he had discovered already was stunning.

“Still, Dick muttered. “That’s impressive and terrifying. You should be careful with that, there are plenty of bad guys around who’ll be interested in it. If it becomes common knowledge that Robin can actually do some sort of magic….”

Jason just grinned back. “They already think so. It just happens to be the truth as well.”

Dick sighed and for that one moment there was no denying that he had been raised in the Wayne household. He looked just like Bruce and Alfred.

“Perhaps. Just- be careful, Jason, alright? Don’t start building your zombie army just now.”

“I won’t,” Jason promised, only a little annoyed.

Dick meant well, he could see that, and things had gotten better between them, but it was still a little awkward.

Otherwise, dinner was, despite Jason’s exhaustion and Bruce’s general tiredness and injuries, a fun event. Dick cracked jokes about his latest cases with the Titans and shared gossip from the hero community at large so much that Jason couldn’t wait to be able to be part of that again. He seriously missed it.

Once night rolled around, Alfred sent them all to their beds. Jason’s mattress was heaven sent, soft and like a cloud, and yet he couldn’t find it in himself to fall asleep despite the rest he obviously needed. He tossed and turned and finally gave up after what felt like hours.

This would simply have to be another sleepless night.

He was just about to crawl out of his bed and sit down at his desk to read some more, when he heard a soft thump against his window. He quickly turned his head, but he couldn’t see anything. Scrambling out of his bed, he walked over to the window. He opened it and stuck his head out.

It was dark outside, only the lights of the city far away illuminated the night, pollution making it much too hard to see the sky above. Jason looked down and then he finally saw what had caused the noise. It was a bird, lying just an arm’s length below on the ledge. It must have flown against the glass. He leaned forward to scope it up in his hands, see if he could help it, but the bird, a magpie, as Jason realized once he got a better look at it, was already dead.

There was nothing he could do for it.

Except-

Well.

Death wasn’t anything of permanence, was it? Not to him at least, not anymore.

Jason walked back to his desk and gently settled the magpie on the table. He grabbed his book and began flipping through it until he found the chapter where he had left off. He ought to get some sticky notes he could put into the book to mark up the important pages.

Bruce’s warning about not overdoing it still rang in his mind, but Dick’s comment haunted him even more. He may not be able to resurrect a whole army, but right in this moment he also didn’t need to. He was just going to resurrect one little bird that had been unfortunate enough to fly against his window. Its resurrection shouldn’t even require the complexity of a human soul.

The sketches on the book pages were a little messy and it took Jason a bit to make out what exactly the instructions were. When skimming it, he had understood the bare bones Diagrams over diagrams confused his research so much that Jason grabbed one of his own empty notebooks to take some notes in and clear the whole mess up. However, once he had actually figured out what they were attempting to tell him, it didn’t seem all that complicated. Guided by an instinct he couldn’t quite identify, the world began to to make sense again.

First, he needed to identify what had killed the bird to rectify it. If he wanted to bring it back properly and not just summon mindless zombies as he had in the fight with Ivy, he needed to fix the body. It was one of the things he hadn’t actually expected about the whole necromancer deal. He thought that he’d be a mere death mage, dealing in blood too perhaps, but healing hadn’t exactly been up on his list of expectations.

Carefully, Jason cradled the little bird in his hands. It had flown against his window and broken its neck, that was easy enough to tell.

Now he only had to fix it. The book said he shouldn’t need any kind of circles or spells or special incantations for this. His will alone should be enough to reanimate one little dead magpie.

Jason closed his eyes and focused.

He thought of the small body in his hands, the now broken neck and spine that had to be healed, all possible brain trauma gone. After that, he focused on the blood that ought to be flowing through the bird’s veins. Birds were made to fly in the open skies, far away from the ground. He thought of the wind rushing through his hair, spreading his fingers, his wings, and letting the wind carry him to far away places. He imagined sitting on a tree, staring down at the world below out of his nest, warm and made to shelter him. He drew alive and vibrant images of a bird’s life, brilliant where death was the end, the cold earth and decay eating away at you.

Jason felt a warmth rush through him, just the tiniest of sparks that slowly grew until it became a roaring fire. And then he, once more, focused on the bird. He forced all that energy inside of it, made it leave his own body. The more of the strength he transferred, the more did he feel his own exhaustion. He thought that all the sleep he hadn’t had was finally catching up to him, draining him entirely.

And then something in his hands moved.

Slowly, Jason opened them and there, nestled in between his palms, was the bird, slowly shaking its wings as if it had just woken up. Jason leaned back against his chair, watching the bird's awakening in a state of awe. The magpie‘s feathers brushed against Jason’s fingers and soon the bird was standing again, jumping around in his hands. Jason laughed in delight as the little magpie flapped its wings experimentally, once, twice, thrice, then it jumped off his hands and flew. It rose high to the ceiling, then let out an irritated trill when it realized it couldn’t fly out of the room this way. Jason watched the bird attempt to figure out which way to go until it finally landed on his desk again, staring at Jason almost a little accusingly.

“Alright, little bird,” Jason said and scooped the magpie up again. “Time to set you free.”

With one hand he held onto the bird while he used the other to push himself up. His grip on his desk chair was like iron, his knuckles faded white from the strength of it. On shaking legs, he did his first step. He loathed how weak he felt and was suddenly very glad that neither Alfred nor Bruce or Dick were here to see it, Jason would get the talking to of his life. He kept holding onto his furniture with one hand to keep himself upright and slowly made his way over to the window. Once he had reached it, he lowered himself onto the comfortable armchair standing in front of it. It was his favorite to curl up in and read.

He leaned forward and held his hand out while the little magpie kept chirping, attempting to tell him a tale he couldn’t understand. The bird turned its head to look outside and then at him again, staring at its surroundings with its large black eyes. It was unsure if the black night was real.

“C’mon,” Jason encouraged it. “You’re free.”

As if the magpie had actually heard his words and understood them, it jumped off his hand again and flew away into the dark night.

Jason rested his head on the windowsill and watched until it disappeared, his eyes straining the entire time and fluttering shut. He was pretty sure he was going to become unconscious any second now, the whole experience having taken too much energy from him, but still, at the same time, he couldn’t help but smile.

He had done it. He’d be able to figure it out all on his own and successfully, purposefully, had made use of his powers.

He need not be afraid of death, it couldn’t hurt him anymore.

Nothing could get in his way.

Chapter Text

It’s alright, oh
It’s okay, oh
It’s alright, oh
And I believe, yes I believe
That you will see a better day

Jason’s anger hadn’t vanished by the time he reached his apartment, but it had calmed enough that he didn’t feel like smacking his door closed. He threw his jacket over a chair and kicked his shoes into a corner before marching straight into his study. The large room was styled similarly to Bruce’s office at the manor with a huge desk, some plants, and more books than he dared to count crammed into boxes and giant shelves. Most of those, Jason had collected over the years or Bruce had found for him. Only some of those were loaned from other sources. Jason didn’t worry too much about anybody discovering that he had borrowed them. Constantine’s house liked him; it wouldn’t protest or alarm his old mentor too quickly.

Jason dropped his backpack on his desk and began taking out all the papers. Some he discarded right from the bat, other sheets he carefully set aside. Like that, Jason went through the whole backpack. Once he was done, he walked over to the whiteboard Tim had brought as a housewarming gift. Jason took down all the other random notes he had pinned to it and washed away the writing, then he began to hang up his useful notes, rearranging them in a way that would hardly make sense to anyone but him. By the time he had finished, his stomach was growling, but Jason didn’t particularly feel like eating. He was sure it would taste like ashes again. The sun had risen, night had disappeared entirely.

“Shit,” Jason muttered and rubbed his eyes as he stepped away from the wall.

The scrambled notes were like chicken scratch in some places, but the theory behind it looked sound to him. Ingredients would be a little more difficult to find, but nothing unreasonable with the Wayne wealth to back him up. He could snatch some blood from Damian, and if he did a cleansing ritual on it, the Lazarus taint should wash away. It was very hypothetical, of course, and Jason supposed it said something about his theory that the al Ghuls were still running around with the pit’s taint. Then again, cleaning blood was very different from doing the same on a person that was technically speaking alive.

Sighing, Jason glanced at the rest of his list. Some of that he needed he already had here. But none of that mattered if he couldn’t get a working summoning circle together. He could technically bypass any and all hiccups with sheer willpower, but that was dangerous and reckless to a degree he had been trained out of.

“Okay,” Jason mumbled to himself. “I can do this.”

He had to do this, pull it off, and then show the others how far a little determination could take him.

The following weeks passed in a blur. Dick attempted to call Jason a couple of times, but he ignored all his messages. Tim apparently had also decided to fuck off to gods knew where following his crazy theory of Bruce’s disappearance. Jason couldn’t fault him. He certainly wouldn’t want to live in one place with Dick and the demon brat right now either, but that was just how it had to be. Jason contemplated calling Tim for one second, but he was sure that Alfred had an eye on him. Alfred didn’t take up as much as much obvious space in their lives as Bruce did, hovering in the shadows as expected of a former secret agent. Bruce, however, was omnipresent, ready to give his input whether you wanted it or not. But Alfred always kept his watch too, and Jason had no doubt that he had his eyes on both Cass and Tim and probably Jason as well, even if he hadn’t left Gotham.

Gotham was about as alright as it could be at the time. They still had enough members helping out, and it wasn’t like Jason abandoned his duties entirely. He still kept track of what went down in Crime Alley and made sure none of the more magically inclined citizens caused any troubles. He was a well-known face around here and couldn’t afford to drop off the face of the earth even with Babs and Steph still doing their rounds.

They’d be able to deal for a while, but it wouldn’t be pretty. Jason knew that Oracle could keep Gotham safe on her own if she decided to abandon her social life entirely and Spoiler was frighteningly competent given her overall lack of training. She had caught up to Tim quickly enough and Jason was willing to bet she could take him in combat by now. And little Damian was just fine as well, even if a little rough around the edges, spilling too much blood when he incapacitated people.

Really, everything was running just about as fine as it could. They had gotten through rough times before when the Justice League business had taken Batman out for a while, this was no different.

Bruce would be back, after all.

While doing his research, Jason returned to his ancient old books and manuscripts. He scribbled his own notes into his Beginner’s Guide so that some decades down the line, another poor soul might be able to figure out what to do when their loved ones died too early. Jason hardly noticed time passing as busy as he kept himself, patrol being the only stable in his schedule. The hardest part of the ritual was figuring out his anchor point. Ideally, he would have chosen his siblings. There were enough of them for the solid circle he was starting to craft, but since they had refused to help him, Jason had to make do.

So instead of picking the love Bruce had for his children as an anchor, Jason had chosen the love he held for this city and took the most important places there. The first one was an easy pick, Crime Alley, right the street where Thomas and Martha Wayne had died. This was the birthplace of Batman. If there was one place Jason couldn’t do without, and that one was it. There was power in Crime Alley that other mages were wary of and Jason had never tapped into previously either.

Next, Jason picked the manor, the Batcave. He had to sneak in there when Dick and Damian were out, which was a hassle and a half. Sneaking into your own home always left a bitter taste on Jason’s tongue, but it couldn’t be avoided. Once he had arrived in the cave, he took great care that none of the security recordings saw what he was actually up to and instead gave Dick something else to focus on. He showed himself plenty of times just messing with the organization so that Dick would be too annoyed to look closer into his appearance. In one wall, a small crook where he used to hide to scare Bruce, Jason carved the sigils he needed for his ritual. Dick certainly wouldn’t think to look there.

After that had been done to, he rushed to the next place: Robinson Park, right where Haly’s circus had once stood. Finding a place to hide his circle from destruction here was a little more challenging, but nothing Jason couldn’t manage. After that, he was off to the WE main office, ACE Chemicals, Arkham, the mayor’s office. Jason crossed the whole city twice over, all hoping that it would be enough.

After Jason had finished that particular part of his preparations, he set out to find all the other ingredients he needed that he didn’t have available readily. He imported candles from China, parts of a delicately crafted porcelain doll out of Russia and went out of his way to actually fly to Uganda to haggle with one of his former tutors for a bunch of her herbs. It was strange how easy and difficult it was to get together all he needed. Just a little cash and the whole world was open to your dreams. Jas wasn’t sure if he’d ever get used to the knowledge that if he just desired something, chances were, he could actually buy it or get as close as humanly possible, at least.

When all was said and done, more time had passed than Jason had thought it would. After he had returned home, he had rechecked over his circles, seen if they had soaked up enough of the energy running through the city’s very foundations to pull through once he attempted his summoning. Thankfully, none had been disturbed and they were all much stronger than he had thought they’d be. Satisfied, Jason allowed himself just another day of rest to recover so that he would be at 100%.

And then it was time.

Jason was as ready as he could be. He had brought all ingredients together and he had prepared the city as well as he could. There was nothing left for him to do but hope that he was going to pull this off. He couldn’t afford to make any mistakes with this; the backlash would be horrible, perhaps enough to swallow him whole. Jason could create a mindless homunculus with Bruce’s face or keep Bruce’s soul stuck in the veil, or worse, the in-between before the veil, just where all the horrible monsters lurked. He could be responsible for tearing his father’s soul apart—

No.

Jason couldn’t think like that. He had to focus on what he knew. Concentration was the most crucial part of successfully pulling off something as dangerous as this. It was the first lesson he had learned as Robin and the first lesson his magical instructors had imposed upon him as well. If you want to do magic, you have to be focused. 

Slowly, Jason walked down the steps to the basement where everything laid prepared.

The magic was thick and potent down here from all the rituals he had already done in this place before.

Jason had carefully cast diagnostic spells before he had finalized painting the room with the right sigils. He couldn’t afford a previous spell interfering with this one, so he had examined each one cast down here and work out whatever magical residue they had left until he could determine whether to keep it as yet another helpful anchor or clean it.

The circle on the ground was terrifyingly large and complex, layering centuries’ worth of necromantic knowledge upon each other. He had gone through more cultures and practices than he could count, even borrowed some from modern spellcasters and old hedgewitches who couldn’t care less about reanimating the dead as surrounded by the living as they were.

It was a freaking masterpiece.

Jason stepped into the middle where now laid a porcelain doll. He had reanimated things before, though never something as complicated as a person. People had more thoughts, more defined emotions, they were more difficult to handle than animals and usually, he also had a body to work with. Body’s were a complicated thing. You needed them to live, but you didn’t need them in death and yet the dead clung to them, yearned for mortal shells that could contain their souls. If anything could go wrong in this after successfully summoning Bruce’s spirit and making the doll turn to flesh, it would be actually getting Bruce to accept his new body.

Humans were troublesome like that and Bruce was just stubborn enough that he might rebel during this step. Jason allowed a nervous smile to sneak onto his face as he, one by one, turned on the various candles - counterclockwise, of course.

There was no reason for the clock to turn the way it did except that it had become so ingrained into everybody’s perception of how time flowed that magic had accepted it.

Jason hated dealing with space-time concepts, but, unfortunately, as a necromancer messing with the natural order, he did very few other things than worrying about the interference of space and time. For this ritual, he hadn’t even let the choice of date be random. He had known exactly what he was doing by picking the date he had first called someone to live again. That would anchor the ritual to that part of the city which would further tie it to Jason’s own grave, Crime Alley, the place Batman was born, the manor, and the many small little shrines that had been taking over Gotham bit by bit as they all prayed for Batman’s protection.

The real Batman, not Dick and his little parlor trick performances.

He worried a little that he had many anchors tying Batman to Gotham and not enough to connect Bruce to the living world, but it wasn’t like he had had too many options with everybody else refusing to help him. He simply had to make do and hope that it was enough.

Jason had finished setting up the candles.

Next up was preparing the doll.

He had decided to pick an heirloom to place into the doll’s chest. Typically, some blood of the deceased’s relatives would go inside first, but their family hadn’t been built on blood. It hadn’t ever factored into it at all as a thought until Damian had come to join them, so Jason had picked something different. The heirloom was a small gold rose pin with just a seam of tiny rubies. It was incredibly fancy and expensive - and something Bruce had promised Jason would get ever since he had discovered it in Martha Wayne’s jewelry boxes. Jason placed the pin inside the doll and then went to fetch Bruce’s blood. He was lucky that they had some on hand. Their family was just a little weird like that, having each family member’s blood lying around just in case, ready for whatever. Thankfully Jason didn’t need much of it. He poured the blood over their heirloom, then closed the small box inside the doll’s chest and wrote the right runes on it. One step done, more to go.

Mechanically Jason went about preparing the other ingredients. He cut up dried flowers, used bones and feathers he had painfully collected himself and, finally, when all was ready, said and done, he cut into his arm. 

Not his palm; that was important. For one, because drawing blood from the palm of your hand was just stupid, you could damage so many nerves when you did that, on the other hand, this kind of ritual didn’t demand the implication of thievery as hand’s blood did. Jason wasn’t stealing anything, merely retrieving.

He stared upon his work, bloody and unholy as it was, brimming with power. He could do this. It would all work out.

Just think of the little magpie, the bird you brought back because it had been so young and hadn’t deserved death yet.

One last look at the timer confirmed what Jason already knew: it was time.

He knew his verses by heart, had learned them had whispered them night after night until they had slowly burned themselves into his mind. His heartbeat began to pick up, rising as his voice did. The air just felt heavier with every passing second, almost oppressive. Jason felt like he was standing underwater, drowning. He wondered if this was what it felt like to be submerged in the Lazarus pit, to be caught in a domain where you shouldn’t be.

And steadily still, Jason kept going. His voice did not waver, it didn’t shake. It was as steady and strong as it needed to be. Jason visited each anchor location in thought, traced the circles he had drawn there in the air to reach for the required power.

He thought he could hear whispers.

At first, they were like white noise, the buzzing of the TV somewhere in the background, but slowly they became louder and louder, annoyingly distracting. He tried to bat them away and reach for them at the same time. It had to be the dead, wanting him to pick one of them, but they weren’t the person he was searching for.

Where was Bruce?

Dad, Jason called out, Dad, can you hear me?

He felt desperation crawl up and tear at his confidence. He should be able to at least find his father. He wasn’t fifteen and helpless against the Joker anymore, and yet he experienced the same kind of terror. He just wanted to bring Bruce back; where was the damned problem!?

Bruce! he shouted. Dad! Where you? Answer me!

But nothing replied, nothing. The only change came with the whispers slowly turning into angered screams. Blood boiling, Jason shook off a thousand hands reaching for him, wanting to take ahold of him so that he would bring them back, create devastating poltergeists while he was at it.

And so Jason pushed forward instead, on and on and on—

Ỵ̴̧̯͈̭̜͈̠̘͚̪͙͓̲͚̯͖͚̮͖͈͍̟̪̤̭̦͉͖͇̘̥̪̥̳͒͒̋͋̇͋́̑͂̕͜͜͝O̸̱̬͕̥͕̯̖͈͖͍̳̽̅͛̆̓̀͛͌͒͌̂̒̿̐̕͝Ȗ̸̢̧̢͍̤̤̻͕̦̥̗͈͇͎͚̗͉͓̟̐̈́̆͌̒͜͜͜͠ͅͅ ̶̟̅͂̐͒̈́̔́͊̅̉̉̎͋̾̒D̴̡̞͚͔̼̹̞͎͉̬͙͍̭͓̦̮̳̦̝̱͐͑̌̈͒̉͐̐̎͒̂̌̒͌̾̇̃͂͘͜͠O̷̻̖͚̫̱̳̠͉̘̣̼̘̫̮͆͌͒̒͐̃̐̈́͂̈͐̉͐̅̈́̽͒̏͗̈́̀̈̽̈́̂͌͗̏̓̕͠͠͝͝ ̸̧̛͙̲͊̓̉͂̈͂́͊̇̔̇̓̈͑̈̔͆̊̄͂͗̕͝͝͝N̸̨̡͓̰͙͉̤͉̮̬͚͔͓͖̳̣̬͒͋̈́͆̐̈́̊̆̃̆̈́̌̈́́̍̈́͐̀̐͘͘͜͝͝͝ͅỎ̷̤̼̗̭̥͇̣̗̠̼̻͍̙͖̩ͅT̵̨̨̢̻̻̥͖͕̮͔̱͚͎̺͖͖̺͎̱͕̪͉̼͎͍͎͉̭͚͎͓͍͚̰̮̀͐̉̀̈́̉̈̇͐̐̿̍̒͒ͅ ̴̡̡̨̛͚͔̦̦̳̣̼͙͕͇̭̲̲͇͖̰͇̪̰̰̤͊͋̄̍̏̐̉̎̊͘ͅḄ̴̡̡̢̛̜͖̣̦͚͙͖͈͕̘͇̲̰̜̻͖̩̜̬͎͎͐ͅȨ̸̧̨̨͉̖̥̣̝̥̪͉̦̦̮̹͈̖̣͇̤͇̙͛̾͋͜L̶̡̧̩̼͓̯̞̝̫̬̼͇͈̝͕̹͙͙͉̤̹̹͘͜͜Ơ̴̻̭͇̙͊̾͐̎̏̌͋̓́̓̈́̊̃͛̈͆̈́̔͜Ṇ̵̨̛͓̰͋͌̔̉͂̏́͂̎̂͛͐̋͛̂͗̇̓̆̐̄̎̌͗̅̉̕͝͝͝G̵̛̲̲̪̺̭̪͎͛̿̅̆͒̿̄̆̑̉͌̒͝ͅ ̶̨̢̧̛̛̣̰̘͈̗͇̳̦̩͙͈̙̳̯͇̜̹͕͚̺̠͙̙̰̖̯̟͖̉̔̾̔̉͑̏̊̎̂͆̊̌̑̀̈́̒̽͐̽͗̆͂̒̂͌͆̕͝H̵̡̗͙̟͉̦̰̗̳̰̞͙̬̯̪̙̘̻̯͍̹̤͖͍̳̮̺͚̘̣̟̟̯̼̍̌̾̍̿͗̔̆̌̍͘͜͜ͅȨ̶̢̛̛̩͙̱͎͇̙͎͙̱͚͓̯̤̺͈͎̯͎̼̩̺̟̥͚̝̓̌̽̽̓̓̓̂͑̏̊͌͘͘͘͘̕͜͝R̵̨̢̧̡̨̢̯̯̜̩͚͔̳̲̦̖̦̘̹̮̱̺̪̫̗̖̞̹̱̜͗͗Ȩ̴̵̨̢̨̥̫͔͉̞͇͍̙̖̼̣͔̠͇̺̠͇̩̺͎̬̠͉̫͕͚̦̺̼̮̙̣̗̮̤̲͔̩̺̹͖̗̏̌̏͛͛̾̊̊̿̀̑̉͆̅̈̈́͂͊͊̚͘̚ͅͅ

Darkness.

Louder and more terrifying than anything else, it swallowed him whole. Jason tried to escape, tried to evade its reach, but he could not, wouldn’t unless—

Forcefully, he was pushed back into the world of the living.

The candles had all burned down much quicker than they should have, and the circle beneath Jason’s feet burned so hot and brightly, he thought he might be set aflame as well, once more returned to the warehouse, the Joker beating down on him.

He could feel the magic brimming in the air like it was all waiting to be used. Jason didn’t understand.

He had done everything correctly.

This first step, retrieving Bruce’s spirit, was supposed to be the easiest one. He had summoned spirits plenty of times already and never had he experienced anything like this. It was as if the veil had been entirely empty of anything even just resembling Bruce. He was much too strong to be torn apart by the powers that kept the dead from awakening. He had to be there; Jason should have been able to sense and find him. The only possible explanation as to why he had failed would be that Bruce wasn’t—

Jason froze.

No.

It couldn’t be.

Bruce had to be dead.

Jason couldn’t feel him anywhere in the living world and the Justice League had confirmed that he had perished. The puzzle had fit so neatly together, it still should. The only other possible explanation why Jason hadn’t been able to find him was that somehow, against all odds, Tim had been right. He hadn’t believed Bruce had died and Jason had thought of it as one last childish illusion Tim had allowed himself to cope with losing three parents in such a short time.

But perhaps Tim had been right.

It was a fact that Jason hadn’t been able to even see the tiniest hint of Bruce, had been violently repelled from the other side for searching for him. It would make sense. The dead didn’t agree with the living world, so why should they tolerate the living being sought in their realm?

Hastily, Jason rushed upstairs into his study. Standing in front of his bookshelf, he tore through his manuscripts, throwing ancient fortunes to the ground until he found what he had been looking for, an old and worn leatherbound diary. Hastily, Jason opened it to read through the various pages until he found what he had been searching for.

I did not manage to even retrieve the soul of my sweet Evangeline, for she was not dead but trapped in a torment I cannot even begin to understand. When I opened the veil, madness upon me, it spat me right out again. I was blind for anger and did not see its reaction for what it was: not rejection of me for I am the living dead, but rejection of my query. I shall attempt to find her in another matter…

For she was not dead.

The sentences repeated over and over again in Jason’s mind. While his ancestor’s brief description of the veil didn’t do Jason’s experiences justice, they did basically mirror what he had experienced. He doubted that his ancestor’s dear Evangeline had been attacked by Darkseid, pulverized in a possibly world-ending conflict. Still, he had believed her dead as well; no locator spell could find her and yet she hadn’t been in the veil and dead, but alive in some form of the other.

The same could have happened to Bruce. They barely understood the technology Darkseid had used; it was entirely possible that he hadn’t killed Bruce. Perhaps he had just been displaced somewhere, in another universe, or another time where Jason couldn’t sense him. Jason tried to recall what Tim had said before they had more or less rudely forced him to shut up about his theories. Had he mentioned what exactly he thought had happened to Bruce?

Possibly, no, very likely yes. Tim was as science-focused as Bruce, to their father’s delight. Dick had taken more after his detective ways, Jason and his magic were a little bit of an outliner, but Tim was Bruce’s kid all the way through.

His stomach turned.

He hadn’t even bothered to listen to his younger brother explain what he thought, too convinced that he was right. Jason should have been there for Tim instead of running away, obsessing over how to fix it all.

But it wasn’t too late yet.

With newfound strength, Jason began searching his apartment for his phone. He found it lying on the kitchen counter, dozens of messages lighting up on it. Right, his little magical stunt couldn’t have gone unnoticed. He could probably spin a convincing lie about some advanced wards. There was no need to tell Dick he had been right after all. Jason swiped away all messages and only kept searching for any updates from Tim. He must have left some notice about his whereabouts. Jason was sure he had left America; he just didn’t know where to.

“Think, Wayne,” Jason muttered under his breath. “Who would Tim leave a message with?”

His team? Usually yes, but not right now. This was a family matter, and Tim wouldn’t drag any outsiders in. Alfred definitely knew, but he also couldn’t keep Tim from leaving with Damian around, an act that used to be unthinkable. For the longest time, Alfred couldn’t stop only two people in their family: one of them was Bruce, the other Cassandra. Cass had been out of the loop for weeks, so she wouldn’t know anything about Tim either.

Well, it seemed like Jason just had to call him and hope that Tim would pick up the phone.

He opened Tim’s contact and hit call, waiting patiently to get a reply.

The phone rang, once twice—

“This is the phone of Timothy Drake-Wayne, leave a message—”

Jason cursed. For fuck’s sake, couldn’t Tim actually answer his phone?

“Tim,” Jason spoke into his mobile. “I don’t know if you’re even getting this message, but I…” He trailed off and ran his fingers through his hair. “Tim, I think— I strongly suspect you were right. I tried to bring Dad back and—”

“Did it work?”

Jason was so surprised to suddenly hear his brother’s voice at the other end of the line that he almost dropped his phone.

“Fuckin Christs, Tim, you can’t just—”

“Did it work?” Tim repeated, his voice on the edge of desperate.

Jason sighed. He had wanted it to work and perhaps, halfway across the world, Tim had wanted it to work out as well so that he and Cass, all of them, could just come home again and it would all be fixed. “It didn’t. I couldn’t find his soul in the veil. I was just thrown out again. It’s as if he was never actually dead in the first place so you might be…”

“Right,” Tim finished for him. “I might be right. I am right. Jason, you wouldn’t believe what I have already found—”

Tim’s voice sped up, his words blurred together so quickly that Jason had a hard time following them.

“Woah, woah, kid, slow down!” He told his brother. “What did you find?”

“Come to England,” Tim said. When the fuck had Tim traveled to England without anybody noticing? “I have found something interesting. Please, Jason?”

Who was he to say no after his own failure?

His life had proven to be nothing but a riddle of second chances.

“I’m coming, Tim. Just give me a night to pack.”

He wouldn’t disappoint his family.