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Batman fought to regain consciousness. His head throbbed, wrists burned—though, even worse, the lack of weight on his person told him his assailant had removed a good chunk of his armor and tools.
He must’ve jostled himself in his mental checklist, because a crackly voice boomed from a speaker somewhere—
“Oh, good,” it said. “You’re up.”
He opened his eyes, and his heart dropped.
Batman was sat in the middle of a cold, empty warehouse, the only other things stowed away with him were a singular handgun and the unmoving body of the Joker.
He wasn’t dead, his body shook and wheezed at every breath—it turned out their kidnapper had been rougher with the Joker than with him, an interesting choice—and Bruce understood. While Batman only had thin cuffs around his wrists, the Joker was in a full-body bind, tied, at length, with thick cord and chains, with no chance of escaping.
“You have one bullet,” the voice started up again. Batman couldn’t find a singular source for the audio feed, the warehouse was truly empty. The disembodied voice seemed to echo and bounce against each of the four metal walls before thundering through his skull, and chilling Bruce to the bone. “You’ve got one more chance to make this right.”
“Jason,” he said, because there was no doubt in his mind that this was his son, back again on his vengeance plot against both him and the Joker.
The voice did not reappear.
“I’m not playing this game again,” Bruce warned. He didn’t yet have an escape plan, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t one available to him. “You know how this is going to go.”
Jason knew his stance on killing, and his reasons why. Batman could not and would not kill the Joker—or anyone else—but Jason didn’t seem to understand that, even now.
“I know,” Jason said, after several long seconds of nothing. Across the room, the Joker’s wheezing still had not changed, for the better or worse. “It’ll be different this time.”
“I don’t kill.”
A rude huff came from the intercom, and Bruce could imagine the angry glare across Jason’s nearly-adult face. He didn’t like the angry butterflies in his chest at the thought of it—under different circumstances, he would’ve been able to see that face as it aged, as his son grew up. The image was ruined now—the son he’d known wouldn’t have kidnapped two adult men and created a Saw-inspired murder scenario to prove a point.
“Maybe not for me,” Jason growled, his voice warbled with what might’ve been emotion, but was most likely just static from the bad connection. “I know how important my life is to you.”
He gave a dry laugh through the intercom, giving Bruce pause.
“You showed me just how much you care about me,” he continued. “I know you’ll never choose me over the Joker.”
“Jason—”
“No! I don’t need to hear anything you have to say, this time. You made your point loud and clear, already.”
Color flickered to life on one of the tall, gray walls. A projector, something small, or embedded in the opposite wall, shone a grainy visual against the metal. Batman couldn’t quite make out the image, but two red-ish, black-ish figures wobbled vaguely as their camera pulled them into focus.
“You never kill, not even to rid the streets of Robin’s murderer, your partner ’s murderer,” he ranted. The front-most figure must’ve been Jason, then, bobbing and gesticulating at each word. He was wearing the red helmet, and the Red Hood was heavily armed. “You never do anything to actually help Gotham, long-term. You get to keep your shitty morals and stay on your high horse and pretend you’re still everyone’s fucking savior.”
The video quality slowly improved as Red Hood continued his long-winded villain monologue. The figure behind him was smaller, and just as unmoving as the Joker beside Batman. Another hostage.
“But that’s not true, is it?” He paused, like Batman could see the conniving look on his face through the helmet. It didn’t help that he actually could imagine it. “You’ve killed before. You’ve let people die. You’re not heavensent, you’re a vigilante. You’re no better than the rest of us.
“So maybe you drew the line at avenging me.” Jason quieted, thinking, but his rage quickly won over. “Robin Number Two wasn’t worth it for you? Because that’s all I was, a placeholder between two good kids. You push one kid away, so you pick up another, and when that one gets murdered, you can always get a third, right?”
Red Hood yanked a long rod into frame—a pole, a bat, a crowbar—and struck his hostage in the ribs.
The boy cried out. He’d been bound and gagged, but Bruce could hear the agony—
“Robin!”
Jason nearly laughed, but he set the pole down at his side, innocuous. “So now you understand.”
“What kind of sick game are you playing at, Hood?”
“Oh, so formal, now. What happened to ‘Jason’?” Red Hood twirled the pole lazily like a baton between his hands. “I only get to be ‘Jason’ when I have the benefit of doubt? ‘Jason’ was the innocent kid who died too soon, the obedient child soldier who followed your every rule. Even you know I’m not him anymore.”
“Let Robin go,” Batman warned, though he didn’t have any power here, wrists cuffed together, with only a gun he won’t use, locked in an empty room with no clue of where his partner was confined.
“Oh, I plan to.”
Batman hesitated. It didn’t sound like a death threat, but Red Hood didn’t appear to be quite of sound mind in this moment, either. He could’ve been just as risky and trigger-happy as someone like the Joker (who, at least, in this moment, had the smart idea to remain unconscious).
“You don’t believe me.” He sounded—almost sad, disappointed.
Batman scowled, scouring the grainy video for any prominent injuries on Tim, with no luck. “Give me a reason to.”
“You already know what I want from you,” he said, nodding at the discarded gun between him and the Joker.
“I don’t kill,” Batman repeated. He’d told Jason; he couldn’t cross that line; he couldn’t be judge, jury, and executioner; he’s just one man.
“Not even for Robin’s life?”
Bruce tried very hard to not let it show that his heart was in his throat.
“I’m not playing your game.”
“You don’t have a choice,” he said, his voice just as manic as before. “And you don’t get to sacrifice me for the Joker, this time. Either you kill the Joker, or I kill Robin.”
Hood took the crowbar to Tim’s stomach once again. Harder, now. A second time. A third.
“Are you sure you want to watch a second Robin get beaten to death? Exploded in a warehouse before you could stop it? You’ve got full control now, just do it.”
Tim cried out behind his gag, watery with what Bruce hoped were tears and not blood, though neither was a necessarily good option.
“Stop,” Bruce bit out.
“We’ve done this song and dance once already, old man.” Jason’s grin bled into his voice, like he was happy to be whaling on Tim like this. “This is it. The Joker’s life or Robin’s. Decide.”
He slammed the bar into his chest, and Bruce wasn’t sure he imagined the sound of Tim’s collarbone shattering.
“You won’t do it,” Batman said, though his voice wavered more than he would’ve liked. “You won’t kill him.”
“Won’t I?”
He yanked Robin by the hair and unsheathed a knife from his thigh. It pressed into Tim’s throat, and the video quality wasn’t clear enough to see if there was blood or not.
“I don’t think you’re in a position to start calling bluffs,” he said. “You never know, I’ve always been pretty spiteful. Reckless. The bad kid.”
“Jason—”
“A-ha, I see now,” he said, jabbing the knife at the camera. Bruce let out a breath, at least it was pointed away from Tim, for the time being. “I get to be ‘Jason’ when you’re feeling nostalgic, or when you want to scold me like a child! How about that, I’m only your son when you feel you can lay claim to me.”
“You are my son,” he said, but Jason wouldn’t hear it.
“Then why won’t you do me this one thing?” The knife didn’t move, but Jason’s entire body remained tense and on a hair trigger. “Why won’t you take out this one man—this worthless, psychotic murderer? He barely counts as a person, but his life is worth more than mine? Than Robin’s?”
“I can’t,” Bruce said through gritted teeth, and it’s the hardest thing he’d ever had to say.
“You won’t.” Jason turned his back to him. “But I’ll make you change your mind this time.”
He’d lost the knife at some point, and now held a handgun to Tim’s temple.
“You know Hangman?” he asked, tapping the barrel against Tim’s skin, right at the edge of his domino mask. “Here’s your first chance: pick up the gun.”
Bruce hesitated.
Jason wouldn’t kill Tim. He wouldn’t.
But he’d attacked Tim, unprovoked, before, beaten him half to death in Titans Tower. Now, he had even more of a reason to, if Bruce refusing to kill the Joker was a punishable offense in his mind. If he could blame Tim for this, too. Or if he could use Tim’s life as a bargaining chip.
“Wrong answer,” Hood announced, and shot Tim in the foot.
“No!”
“I’m giving you plenty of time to make your choice,” he said, his voice slimy and rude, like any of the other villains in Gotham. “He’s got plenty of limbs left before things get too serious.”
The Red Hood was many things, and had his heroic moments, but no hero held others captive and played games with their lives. Batman could understand his desire to kill the worst of the worst—he didn’t like it, but he could understand it—but Tim was a child. He’d done nothing, but get between Jason and Bruce, and was now paying for it with his life.
“Come on, now,” Hood taunted, waving the gun airily in front of Tim’s woozy face. “You can’t get stuck on the first letter, that’s just sad. How about this: I’ll give you another, hmm, thirty seconds to really think it over before I shoot his other foot.”
He could do this. He could do this.
If Red Hood had removed all his gear, that meant his tracker would’ve sent out an alert to anyone looking for it. He’d been locked inside for a good ten to twenty minutes, help was surely on the way by now. And with Robin missing, too. Surely someone—Alfred, Dick, Barbara, someone—would be on top of it.
All he had to do was stall for time.
Batman rose to his feet, a bit wobbly and numb, but with purpose.
“There you go,” Hood cheered. Batman didn’t want to look to see the position of his gun now. Didn’t want to egg him on with his reactions. Hood wasn’t the Joker. He didn’t do this for the fun of it, he had his reasons, and Batman didn’t know which was worse—playing with fire indiscriminately, or with such razor-sharp precision. “All you needed was the right incentive.”
Batman didn’t say anything, didn’t emote at all.
He moved mechanically from his spot on the floor to the center of the room, where the pistol laid at his feet.
Grimacing, he picked it up, and hated the cold weight of it in his gloveless hands.
“That wasn’t so hard, was it?” Hood taunted, safely tucked away in whatever hideout he’d found for himself.
Batman didn’t know if it was the same building, or miles away. Was he even in Gotham anymore? How quickly could he have nabbed Tim and rushed off?
He didn’t seem like the type to run away, though. Red Hood would want to stay and view the show, up close and personal. He’d want to be there to witness Batman killing the Joker—the only reason he wasn’t in the room with them was Bruce’s rocky attempt at disarming him before.
“Now, don’t think you can outsmart me here, old man,” he threatened, his glove tightening around his own gun. “I’m sure you remember the last time. How that ended.”
Bruce slowly swiveled to face the screen. In one hand, Jason held his gun to Tim’s head, just as before, but in his other hand, he held a glowing red button. A detonator. But where was the bomb?
“The Joker will die tonight, either way,” Hood said, nearly tipping the scales of his composure. “Your choice decides if Robin will, too.”
Was the Red Hood okay with killing himself for this cause? Killing Batman? Was the only outcome of tonight making sure the Joker died, no matter what?
Hood’s goal had been to get Batman to kill the Joker, he wouldn’t do it himself, though the opportunity presented itself again and again. But was he even in the right state to know his own goal anymore?
“Are you willing to let another Robin die the way I did? Will you save this one? Avenge this one? You get to decide.”
“I didn’t just stand by and watch you die, Jason,” he said, hoping to break through to him in his rage. “I did everything I could to get to you, but… I didn’t make it in time. I’ll never forgive myself for not being there.”
“And now that I’m back?” he argued. “All you care about is the child that died, you don’t care about the one who came back wrong.”
“I care about you, Jason. I never stopped caring, never stopped thinking about you, after all this time.”
“Then why has nothing changed?” He was angry, and Batman had caused that. Fueled his anger, spite, righteousness. Not just in this moment, but every day, month, year that he’d not been there for him. “Why is Gotham still the same shithole it was the day that I died? Why are murderous bastards like him still allowed to live when I wasn’t? Why do you protect his life more than your own son’s?”
“We can’t be the ones to make that call. It’s not the way we do things.”
“It’s not the way you do things,” he countered hotly.
But something changed, a switch flipped in him, and he sobered immediately. All anger left his body, replaced with a cold stoicism that Batman didn’t know how to handle.
“I really thought it’d be different this time.” His voice was robotic. Hollow. “I thought it was just me you hated, but it turns out you’ll never put any of your kids first.”
Jason looked pensive for another half-second, like having an epiphany, but he took his second shot at Tim’s foot. It didn’t make him any happier, though.
“Stop, Jason,” Bruce snapped, horrified, but Jason wouldn’t have listened to him anyway. The only thing that would stop him was a bullet plowing through the Joker’s face, and Bruce couldn’t give that to him.
Defeated, Jason removed the helmet and looked at Bruce through the camera. He opened his mouth to say something, but thought better of it and shut it again.
He shook his head, reached for the detonator, and said, hollow, “You have two minutes. But I’m sure you won’t need it.”
The video shut off, leaving Bruce alone, once again, with just the Joker, the gun, and now, the added ticking of a hidden bomb—or bombs, more likely—somewhere in the building.
Jason gave up.
Jason gave up.
Was this a trick? When had Jason, ever, in his life both before and after the explosion, ever given up on anything he set his mind to? What happened to his excitable, passionate, headstrong child? The kid who fought tooth and nail to do the right thing? Even if his methods and morals didn’t align with Bruce’s, when had Jason, ever in his life, walked away like that?
Bruce could barely focus on the literal ticking time bomb, because his brain was entirely stuck on Jason flat-out giving up on him.
Had Bruce failed him so badly? Did Jason really lose all hope of them ever becoming civil again?
This anger, this vengeance, that Jason had, Bruce had assumed it would be temporary. That, once the family reached out again, Jason would return to normal and come home.
But Jason seemed convinced that this was who he was now. And who he was was someone so fundamentally different from Bruce that he was certain they’d never again see eye to eye.
Bruce didn’t realize when he’d left the warehouse, or when he’d gotten strapped into the passenger seat of the Batmobile. There was no smoke, no shrapnel.
Dick skidded the car into the cave, as far as it would go, and hauled Tim’s bleeding body into the medbay on his own.
Meanwhile, Bruce’s brain was still cloudy. He wasn’t quite here, because he was still there.
Trying to remember at what point he’d lost his second son.