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The fake concern in Dick’s voice as he limped behind Jason grated on his ears, and Jason did his best to ignore it before his patience finally snapped and he stopped abruptly.
Tension had been thrumming through his veins even before Dick had called after him, footsteps echoing in one of the shabby hallways hopefully leading out of this shitty warehouse he’d had the misfortune of spending the past seven hours in, with Bat company, no less.
“Jason.”
It took all of Jason’s willpower to channel his annoyance into gritting his teeth and not biting Dick’s head off.
He was tired. He was pissed.
Bruce had decided to crash his meeting with a rival drug lord, then they’d fought over the fact that Jason had decided to shoot the asshole he’d been meeting. Because of course Bruce would get his panties all in a twist over that.
Someone that unstable was dangerous to keep around, and when he’d mentioned getting into the human trafficking business, it had been the last straw.
Now Jason had a nasty bruise from a bullet that had ricocheted badly off of his armor, the humiliation and anger of Batman having interfered in his business once again and absolutely no desire whatsoever to deal with whatever it was Dick wanted, who was also here, for some fucking reason.
Jason took a sick sense of satisfaction in Dick’s decision to stop a few feet away rather than come closer.
Dick’s face was haggard, and he was clutching at his side, probably favoring an injury.
“Did you mean it? What you said to Bruce?”
Jason didn’t turn around, but didn’t move forward either.
“What part of it? You’re going to need to be more specific, Golden Boy. I said a lot of things to him,”
Dick hesitated. “The part about your helmet being rigged with bombs,”
“I have explosives in my helmet, dipshit,” Jason had snarled at Bruce in the aftermath of the fight. “Come any closer and I’ll blow both our heads off,”
He hadn’t realized Dick had heard that.
“Oh, that.” Jason tipped his head to the side. “Try to unlock it the wrong way and it administers a shock. Try a little harder and yes, it’s lined with explosives,”
He smiled sardonically, though he knew Dick couldn't see it under the mask, turning around fully to face him. “Why, want to give it a shot?”
He took a step closer to Dick, raising his chin slightly at him in invitation. “Easy way to take me out, no? Another crime lord you won’t have to deal with. Though, oh right, might become a little tricky with your no killing policy. Can’t have that on your pure little conscience. If you survive the blast, that is.”
Dick said nothing.
Jason scoffed. He had no time to waste trying to understand the Bats.
He whipped back around and left, feeling Dick’s gaze on him the whole way out.
A soft noise to his left and Jason was on his feet before he realized it, one hand on the gun at his side.
Alarm quickly morphed into annoyance at the sight of the newcomer, and stuffing his gun back into its holster, he sat back down on the edge of the roof.
It was a quiet night.
Small chunks of brick broke off the crumbling wall Jason was dangling his legs from to rain down to the alley below.
“Nightwing. Try to sneak up on me and I’ll shoot first and ask questions later,”
It was odd for someone to be able to sneak up on Jason in the first place, but Dick had always been light on his feet.
Just another thing Jason had never been able to beat him at.
Though, perhaps he hadn’t been paying attention to his surroundings as much as he should have. That wouldn’t do, he couldn’t afford to be sloppy.
“You wouldn’t shoot that recklessly.” Dick said easily, and really, his faith in Jason was cloying at times.
Jason rolled his eyes. “You're supposed to stay out of my territory.”
Dick tapped his chin. “Actually, I’m pretty sure Tim is the one who’s supposed to stay out of your territory. You never said anything about me. Also, this is a bit of a gray area, isn’t it? I’m not exactly in Crime Alley. ”
Jason grunted.
Dick changed the topic, maybe thinking that bringing up Jason’s replacement around him wasn’t the best idea.
Which, rude, Jason wasn’t about to break into Titans Tower again and beat him up. But fair.
The silence dragged long enough to border on uncomfortable before Dick spoke again. He nodded towards Jason’s head, hidden within the dark red of his helmet. “That thing's really filled with explosives right now?”
“Yea. What’s it to you?”
Bruce had tried asking the same thing the last time they’d seen each other.
Jason had told him he’d add more explosives to it out of spite, though he had no intention of doing any such thing. The helmet’s fit was already too snug to add anything unless he reworked its whole design, and he didn’t plan on doing that anytime soon. He didn’t have anything he particularly wanted to add yet.
“What’s the reason for it?” Dick asked, sounding so genuinely curious that Jason relented.
“I told you before. It’s so it doesn’t get taken off without my consent,”
In the few instances he’d been incapacitated, the electric shock usually deterred anyone who tried to take it off, and the threat of bombs sealed the deal.
The Red Hood had a reputation that would make most people believe he was dead serious about the explosives, and if they wanted him dead then, they could just shoot him directly. Overall, it did a pretty good job at keeping people’s prying fingers away from his helmet.
“Okay, I get that, kinda,” Dick was saying. “But what happens if someone needs to take it off for your health? Say you have a head injury or something, and you’re unconscious. What then?”
“More likely I get captured and some villain wants to take it off,” Jason said dryly.
“Humor me for a second.”
“I wont get into that situation.”
“What if you do?”
Jason shrugged. “Then I die, I guess. Not like it hasn’t happened before.”
Dick’s mouth tightened in displeasure.
“Oh please, as if you care,”
“I do, actually,”
Jason scowled, turning away. “Did you come here to talk to me for a specific reason, or are you just here to be annoying?”
“Oh. Not for anything in particular.”
“Great. Get out of my territory.”
Perhaps taking that final question as permission, Dick came back two weeks later with a proposal for a team up. An investigation into the new and very odd gang activity that was moving between Jason’s part of Gotham and Blüdhaven.
Begrudgingly, Jason agreed.
It wasn’t like Jason Todd’s face meant anything to anyone at this point. But it was a point of pride, of vulnerability. It was the identity he'd taken from the Joker, the one he’d reclaimed for himself. If the Red Hood was going to show his face, it was going to be on his terms.
It was the little things that brought Jason satisfaction, the way Dick’s jaw tightened and his temper flared whenever Jason managed to rile him up.
Dick told him again and again they didn’t want to lose him again, sounding like he actually cared . Jason had half a mind to shoot him just to get him to stop talking.
“I'm not showing you how to take it off.”
“I'm not saying you need to tell me how to unlock your helmet,” Dick pressed. “I’m not even going to tell you to take the explosives out, though I really think you should. Just. Someone needs to know. In case of an emergency,”
His eyes searched Jason’s mask, as if trying to gauge a reaction, his face falling as he got no reply.
“Relax, just tell Brucie that it won’t be his fault this time if my head blows up. What more could he ask for?”
Dick let out a frustration sound, almost angry.
Jason smiled. “There are worse ways to go than dying from an exploding helmet. Trust me, I’d know.”
Jason listened to the chatter, the rumors on the streets.
He read opinions in the newspaper, heard the people talk during dull commutes on the subway from shitty apartments to equally shitty jobs.
Gothamites gossiped, especially about the vigilantes that patrolled their areas. The vigilante, or crime lord, or criminal, or anti hero, or any of the other words people associated with the Red Hood.
It was a good way to keep track of public consensus, keep an eye on his own lackeys in the business, smell the blood in the water before the sharks came and make an example of whatever arrogant soul thought it was a good idea to cross the Red Hood.
And of course, there were all the speculations about his identity.
“I think I saw the Red Hood yesterday,” a girl, no older than fifteen, was saying. She dropped her voice to a hushed whisper, though it was still audible two booths down where Jason was sitting in the dingy diner. “I even saw his face. He wasn’t wearing his helmet,”
Noises of protest arose from her companions at that, everyone talking over each other, voicing the same theories about the Red Hood’s identity Jason had heard over and over. Speculations varied from him being awfully scarred to the more outlandish one of him being a famous actor moonlighting (that was Bruce’s thing, not his)..
Most people in the business didn’t care who he was beyond the fact that they wanted him dead.
But still, the people gossiped.
“Nobody’s seen his face and lived,” One of the boys declared, “You’re lying Katya,”
Well, that last one was definitely an exaggeration.
Jason stirred his coffee and smiled.
Jason had forgotten what working with Dick was like, the dangerous professionalism underneath all the jokes and smiles. They crashed after the team up in Dick’s apartment, too tired to even argue properly as they had in nearly all their previous interactions.
Jason let one of his guns clatter to the floor, swearing loudly. “Well that went well ,”
“It could have gone better,” Dick agreed, already rifling through files and jotting notes on the mess of papers they’d left on Dick’s living room kitchen table, completely ignoring the ankle so twisted it hurt Jason just to look at. “We underestimated them. We can’t let that happen again,”
They still had a lot of work to do, looking into new leads and coming up with new plans, but thankfully, time was on their side.
There was another issue Jason wanted to address, however. “We’re not coordinated enough. We need to play off our strengths and weaknesses more. Not all of us enjoy hanging upside down from a rope for twenty minutes.”
He never wanted to have to do that again.
“You’re right.” Dick looked thoughtful, calculating. “That was an oversight on my part. We’ll need to take it into account next time,”
He glanced at Jason’s face, eyes lingering on his cheek, a concern setting into his features.
“You have a cut on your cheek,”
“Truly a tragedy I’ll never recover from.”
Of course Dick would worry about the superficial cut Jason acquired and not the foot he had that was currently twisted the wrong way.
Jason didn’t even know how he’d gotten the cut on his face, bruises were common, but cuts less so when his head was covered.
A quick analysis revealed that some of the wiring on the inside of his helmet had come undone. Nothing serious or too urgent, normally, unless one’s face was being slammed into a table, and by extension, directly on the loose, rough wires on the inside of his helmet.
He stepped in front of the mirror Dick had in his living room for some fucking reason- he probably liked to stand there and admire himself for hours-, and inspected the cut. It was a surface level scratch, not much, really.
Jason was just glad the gear hadn’t electrocuted him or anything.
A glimpse of movement in the background of his reflection caught his eye, and he turned around abruptly.
“Give me that,” His helmet was out of Dick’s hands and in his own in a heartbeat and he had half a mind to snap at him for touching Jason’s gear without asking, but Dick was apologizing already, telling him he’d only wanted to move it off the floor and on the table, and all the fight drained out.
“Whatever,” Jason said, feeling put off. “Don’t touch my stuff,”
Someone was calling his name, Jason thought, but there was a buzzing in his ears and everything was blurry and shifting from side to side.
He tried to take a breath but there wasn’t enough air around and-
“Jason. Can you hear me?”
“Yea,” Jason snarled. “Can you leave me the fuck alone?”
“Jason.” Bruce’s voice was soft. “Can you take your helmet off for just a second?”
“Why?” The world was lurching again. “You can't face it, can you? The fact that I’m a villain? The reminder of what I’ve become? How you’ve failed .”
“Jason,” Bruce said quietly. “You’re hyperventilating. You’ll breathe easier if you take it off.”
“No.”
“Okay. That’s okay.”
The Replacement was next to him, eyes wide, face backlit by the fires.
Jason couldn’t breathe .
He fumbled with the clasp on the helmet and suddenly the night air hit him. It was far from fresh, Gotham’s air had always been musty in its own unique way, but suddenly he didn’t feel like suffocating anymore.
Bruce was still there, keeping his distance, not saying a word.
There was still too much fire.
Jason fled.
It pained Jason to have to resort to this, but he almost didn’t have a choice. For all his efforts, he was still outclassed by some aspects of Bruce’s tech.
Perks of being filthy rich, he presumed.
He’d put the case he was working on with Dick to the side for a moment (Dick’s fucked up foot had put him out of commission for a bit anyway) and moved to an older project.
Having had no leads for close to a month, Jason had finally caved and broken into the Batcave to see if Bruce’s extensive paranoiac computer files on anything and everything had the information he was looking for.
It took some searching (fuck, had Bruce changed the way he organized his files?) but eventually he found what he’d come for.
Bruce’s page on Alexandra Kosov was pretty scarce, but it provided him with a few clearer shots of the woman, along with previous activities and associates that would serve useful.
He copied the information on the woman to his USB, and, for good measure, copied a few other related pages.
He’d have to find a way to get remote access to Bruce’s substantial files in the future, but that was a job for another time.
As the computer finished copying the documents, he heard hesitant footsteps behind him.
“Should I, like, be worried?” Duke Thomas asked.
“Nope,” Jason told him, not bothering to look up from where he was scrolling through the Batcomputer’s database.
He stopped on the profile of a blond man with a grim face that looked familiar. He was a small fish, probably nobody of interest, but eh, he’d take advantage of the fact he was here. Jason copied that too.
Duke seemed to have accepted that as a response- Jason knew he’d always liked the guy, because by the time Jason finished up his work and cleared any trace of his presence from the computer, he was gone, though a new, older and more familiar figure had replaced him.
Jason allowed himself a small smile. “Hey Alfie,”
“I trust you found what you were looking for, Master Jason?”
“Yep,” Jason unplugged the USB, tossed it in the air once, caught it and tucked it in a pocket.
Good old Alfred, unphased as ever. Jason was pretty sure he could have opened porn on the Batcomputer’s giant flat screens and Alfred would have greeted him just as calmly and composedly.
Heh, maybe he should do that someday. He could get the ones where people would dress up as Batman and- actually maybe not, if only for Robin’s sake. How old was the kid, eleven?
Also to spare himself the horror of having to look for that stuff in the first place.
“Have you eaten today, Master Jason?” Alfred asked him. “Dinner isn’t for another few hours, but we have leftover pie, and the kitchen is always stocked with snacks if you prefer something else. You’re welcome to come up and get yourself something, unless you’re in a hurry of course.”
Jason hesitated. “Who else is home?”
“Masters Duke, and Tim, and Miss Casssandra.”
“Bruce?”
“He will be back this evening with Master Damian,”
Jason shrugged. “Alright.”
Jason had left his helmet in the Batcave for eight minutes. Eight fucking minutes while he went upstairs, grabbed a slice of pie and inhaled it, and in those eight minutes, a certain dickhead had entered the Batcave and come up the stairs with his fucking helmet in hand.
After a first moment of suspicion regarding Jason’s intentions with Tim (he wasn’t going to hurt him, they were well past that, though he could admit the caution was justified), Dick had relaxed.
“What are you even doing in Gotham? You live in Blüdhaven, in case you've forgotten,” Jason said, still on the defensive.
Dick looked startled. “I just got here. I’ve been dropping by every now and then to help Tim, Duke and Damian with some more acrobatic figures. Also because I’m working with you on the Knifepoint gang case?” His voice trailed off. “What are you doing here? Did you just decide to come by and visit?” Dick’s eyes brightened.
Huh, he was here to help train the brat and the Pretender. And Duke. Jason hadn’t realized he did that sort of stuff. He squashed down the odd jealousy at it.
Dick held out the helmet at him, hesitant. “I’m sorry I know you don’t want me to touch your stuff and I get that but there’s a weird condensation problem in the cave we’re trying to fix right now and it was right under one of the worst damp spots. The cave is too dark to see what’s causing it and Duke was going to help with the lighting problem one of these days but he hasn’t gotten the chance to yet. Personally I think the problem is-”
It was in the middle of Dick’s ranting about humidity and the lack of lighting in the Batcave and damp spots that need to be looked at that Jason finally let himself admit that fine, maybe Dick did care about him, even just a little.
“You thought my helmet would be ruined by some humidity?”
“Well, the water dripping down mostly, that’s not good. If it got inside the helmet, I know it has air filtering and the voice modulator and the explosives and I really didn’t want anything to possibly malfunction. Especially the explosives. Electronic stuff can be delicate,”
He held the helmet out, and Jason took it, a little taken aback.
He sighed, all his previous conversations and interactions with Dick running through his brain, and made up his mind.
“Fine,” he said abruptly. “There’s a button on the bottom left side that opens a small sliding mechanism. You need to get that open, slide it while- actually there’s a fingerprint lock too, but I’d need to program your prints into it. I’ll show you the manual way later. Not now though, the less time I spend in this house the better,”
“What?”
“I’ll show you how to remove the helmet without anyone being blown up. Dipshit.”
Dick had had a point about it possibly becoming a security risk. Not just for head injuries and the sort, but also from possible equipment malfunction that could end nastily. The helmet shielded his head, but he’d be lying if he said he’d never gotten knocked out before, even with it on.
Jason probably had little enough regard for his own life to be considered suicidal, but he wasn’t reckless, ironically enough.
He didn’t love the Bats. He didn’t know if he ever would again. But he did trust Dick. And there was no harm in telling him, in the end.
Dick’s smile was blinding.
“Take it off in a non emergency and I’ll shoot you myself.” Jason warned.
Dick just grinned harder.
“Next step is to get you to remove the explosives altogether,”
“Fuck you,”
Gotham was not big enough to allow Jason to avoid the Bats, especially given how many of them there were.
Hell, he ended up interacting with Dick often enough and he no longer even lived here.
He saw Batgirl (or was it Orphan now?) every now and then, though they never did much more than acknowledge each other from a distance. He didn’t mind meeting The Signal, he was a vigilante Jason could respect, though more of a daytime hero.
Weirdly enough, the Replacement had also gotten pretty high up on the list of people who didn’t piss him off that much.
They met sometimes, though not in Crime Alley, Tim still avoided that area like the plague.
He was twitchy.
Jason deserved that.
They were both sitting in silence, catching a moment of peace in between the turmoil of their respective nightly patrols, and Tim was staring at Jason.
“What?” Jason asked irritably. He had a minute or so before he needed to start moving again.
“Nothing. I just don’t see you without your helmet on often.”
Jason was cradling it in his hands right now, having taken it off earlier.
“Yea,” He slid it back on, checking the ammo in his guns. “Don’t get used to it,”
Jason checked the time again. It was half past midnight. He had a meeting to crash.
Jason’s hands were trembling in the way they did when he was forced to do more hand to hand than he was used to. Fuck. Maybe he’d become too reliant on his guns lately.
They were done. He and Dick had finally managed to take down the Knifepoint gang completely after months of work.
Dick didn’t look like he was faring much better, chest heaving lightly and heavily favoring one side.
It was a few tries into trying to unlock his helmet that Jason realized his gloves were still sticky with sweat and blood.
He cursed and pulled them off.
“We work well together,” Dick said.
Jason didn’t acknowledge it. It was a team up born out of necessity, nothing else.
“It's late, if you want to crash here for the night you’re welcome to do so,” Dick added.
Even without gloves, his hands were still too slippery and shaky. Why had he made the unlock mechanism so complicated?
He gave it another try before giving up.
“Dick.” he started begrudgingly. “Can you take my helmet off? I’m sweaty as fuck and it’s being a bitch,”
Dick raised an eyebrow, but complied, stepping closer.
Jason’s hackles rose at the proximity, even though he was the one who had asked in the first place, and he forced himself to quell at the feeling and hold still.
“I know you showed me how but I’m afraid I’ll blow your head off,” Dick confessed, searching for one of the release mechanisms on the back of the helmet.
Jason rolled his eyes. “You’ll be fine. The explosives aren’t rigged to the release right now. They’re only connected during fights,”
Dick visibly relaxed at that.
He knew Dick had managed when the helmet released with a soft click.
“See? Not dead,” Jason said.
“Not dead.” Dick agreed. “Congratulations to us,” he added, more softly.
“Red Robin. Report.”
“Alive. Heading your way.”
Jason ducked a blow and kicked the offending attacker in the chest, sending him stumbling back into the rest.
His comms came back to life again.
“I think my leg is broken,” Tim added.
Jason gritted his teeth. He was out of ammo, separated from Tim, and there were way too many people after them for them to handle non lethally, especially if Tim had a broken leg. “Tell me when you’re almost here,”
“Copy that,”
A blur of red crashed into Jason and Jason hauled Tim to his feet, pushing the younger boy ahead of him.
He paused to lob something behind him before running after Tim.
The hallway behind them collapsed in on itself in a show of fire and concrete.
“Not one word” Jason warned, conscious of Tim’ curious gaze on him as he pulled off his helmet. There was a small chunk missing out of the normally smooth surface. He’d have to get that replaced before he went out again. “Not one fucking word about my helmet and its explosives,”
Tim’s interest sharpened. “Wait, is that what you threw in the warehouse? Your helmet has removable explosives?”
Jason pinched the bridge of his nose and counted to ten.
Tim promised not to ask about the explosives. He was laying on the couch in Jason’s safehouse with a broken leg and unfortunately not in enough pain to get him to stop asking questions.
“I just think your helmet is cool.”
Jason regretted improving his relationship with Tim sometimes, actually.
“Okay, I'm not going to ask about the explosives, but I admit, I am curious about your helmet though,”
“Why,” Jason asked flatly.
“I can poke at Bruce's tech as much as I want, but it’s not like I’ve gotten the chance to do so with yours. How many things can it do? Gas mask, explosives, what else?”
“A lot,” Jason said shortly. He started stripping off all the layers of armor, the innermost ones soaked with sweat. God, he needed a shower. He hoped Dick and Leslie got here soon to pick up their wayward charge.
“Like?”
Jason smirked.
“It plays TV shows and podcasts if needed. If you’re interested I can use the same system to set up your comms to run the teletubbies,”
Tim scowled. “I’m just curious. Your tech is cool. Did you design it yourself?”
Jason pulled off the last gun, gathering everything up and shoving it into his closet. He could sort it all out later.
“Yes. And I don't give out information for free, Replacement. If you want to poke around my stuff, you’re going to need to come up with a trade I’m interested in.”
Tim grinned. “Deal.”
For all his openness and quips, Dick kept a comfortable distance with Jason, relegating physical affection to shoulder pats and occasional hair ruffles.
There were benefits to opening up to the people who are tentatively becoming family again, he had to admit, their knowing some of the ins and outs of his gear being just one example of it.
Tim, his leg in a cast, bombarded him with questions from the first second they saw each other. Jason allowed it, upholding his end of their deal.
“So is this going to blow up in my hands or something if I move wrong?” Tim asked, gingerly holding the helmet. For all he’d wanted to take a look at it, he was acting like it would go off any second now.
“No. I temporarily disabled the link between the bombs and the unlocking mechanism,”
“I'm still surprised nobody gave you shit about the explosives,” Tim commented, poking at the inside of the helmet.
For lack of better things to do, Jason lay down across from him on the floor.
“Incorrect. Literally everyone did. Dick pestered me about it until I showed him how to remove it in case things malfunctioned while it’s on and I was incapable of taking it off on my own,”
“Surely it can’t be that complicated to take off,” Tim muttered, and Jason raised an eyebrow.
“I bet I could do it without you showing me.”
“You’re welcome to try. You’ll do me a favor, actually. You know how they test child proof packaging and stuff by giving them to actual children and seeing if they can open them? That’s kind of what this is.”
Tim tossed an empty soda can across the room at him.
“I’ve watched you take it off enough times I think I could do it,”
“You would watch me take the helmet off? You're a little creep, you know that?”
Tim just grinned at him.
Despite his claims and best efforts, Tim was unable to get the helmet to open. He looked a little disappointed as he passed it back to Jason, though Jason told him not to take it personally. The complicated locking mechanism was kind of the point.
“Here, I'll show you,”
Jason ran through the explanation he’d given Dick some time ago, repeating it twice and then having Tim repeat it back to him.
“Is it harder to take it off when you’re actually wearing it? Since you can’t see what you’re doing” Tim asked.
“You can try it out yourself,” Jason tossed him the helmet. It hit Tim on the ankle and clattered to the floor.
“Ow, don’t throw stuff at me,”
“Oh boo hoo, you started it. And be careful with my stuff,”
“You’re the one who threw it!”
Tim was still scowling as he fitted the helmet over his head and searched for the unlock mechanism.
He did succeed.
Jason could tell by the telltale soft click the helmet made whenever the helmet unlocked.
Yet, he didn't pull it off his head.
“Uh.” Tim said finally. “I think my head is stuck,”
Jason laughed till his chest hurt for the first time in months.
He showed Bruce the unlock mechanism eventually, giving him the same warning about not taking it off in a non emergency. Their relationship was still far from optimal.
But in the aftermath of an explosion that left Jason bleeding out a river and lashing out at everything despite his best efforts, it was Bruce that came to his aid.
Jason opened his eyes in the Batcave’s infirmary in crisp, clean clothes the day after. His gear had been carefully stripped and was sitting neatly in a pile on the ground in the corner of the room.
He left before anyone could come back to check on him.
Tim came to Jason with a notebook of scrawled ideas and rough sketches and designs Jason could add to improve the helmet’s functionality.
The fucking nerve of the kid.
Some of the ideas weren’t half bad.
Dick just short of crashed into Jason, making both of them stumble back a bit. His arms came up around his waist, lifting him off the ground just a bit.
“Put me down you asshole,” Jason grumbled, placing his hands on the other man’s shoulders to stabilize himself.
They hadn’t seen each other in close to seven month, as a result of an undercover mission Dick had taken part in.
He looked tired, purple under his eyes and normally fluffy hair stringier than usual.
Jason told himself he was only allowing the hug for Dick’s sake.
Dick loosened his grip on Jason and smiled, tapping the side of his helmet.
“Can I?”
“Yes.”
Without saying a word, Dick moved his arms to the back of Jason’s head, unlocking it, gently pulling it off.
Jason shook his sweaty hair out in the cool wind.
“You changed the design,” Dick said, noting Jason's helmet.
“Tim helped come up with it. Changed a bit of the wiring too, that fucking kid.” Jason said, hating every second of it. He felt compelled to add. “He also got his head stuck in it. Serves him right though.”
“Really? I’m surprised he got stuck. Tim’s got a small head,” Dick said, amusement filling his voice.
“Not that surprising, given his lack of a brain.”
Dick snorted, then grinned mischievously. “Do I get to try to put it on too?”
“If you get stuck I’m not helping you,”
Dick laughed. “I missed you Jay,” he said, frighteningly sincere.
Jason stilled, voice hoarse. “I have to go.”
Dick arrived late to the scene.
He had no excuse for it.
He’d been in public, hanging out with some non vigilante acquaintances that were tentatively becoming friends when Oracle’s request for all able bodies to head to Metropolis.
He arrived straight into a fight against a plethora of. Things.
There was probably a better way to describe them, but Dick had never fought this specific brand of alien creature before, and their rapid movements and tendency to amass in groups made it hard to distinguish what they were fighting individually, at least at a glance.
“Be careful,” Wonder Woman warned as she passed. “Their fangs have barbs,”
Oh fantastic, their fangs had barbs.
“Oracle, I need to know what these things are”
He got a better idea of what it was he was fighting as the battle waged on. Dick found himself fighting side by side with Green Lantern for a while, but lost sight of the other man later on. He’d individuated three kinds, two of which had the barbs Wonder Woman had warned him about, while the third seemed less lethal and more just plain annoying.
The main fight was going on in the distance.
Superman and Shazam were flitting about, taking out the primary alien, a monstrous thing that had attached itself to one of the skyscrapers.
Dick watched them in the distance when he had a second of peace, and yea that was definitely the boss of all these other ones alright.
A lot bigger. A lot more barbs.
He ducked a brick thrown his way and threw one escrima stick at the offender.
They weren’t done yet.
The sun had reached its zenith, heat beating down on the ground when it all ended.
Bodies, thankfully none of them human, abandoned vehicles, and debris were scattered all over the streets.
Status reports were pouring in over the comms and Dick listened with half an ear as Martian Manhunter announced that an impromptu infirmary area had been set up onStonefast Street, wherever that was, and any injured civilians were to be brought there.
“Any serious injuries?” Bruce asked, his voice as low and gravelly over the comms as in person.
“Lagoon Boy and Aquaman are attempting to recover… a person who fell in the river.” There was slight hesitation in Superboy’s voice as he reported.
“Wondergirl took a bad hit. She's at the infirmary area already.”
“Got it. We can transfer her and anyone else that requires it to the League’s medical facilities if needed.”
Dick let out a breath of relief as none of the more serious injuries reported after that concerned any of his family members or closest friends. He was worried for everyone, of course, but he could breathe easier knowing certain people were okay.
Metropolis’ main bridge looked like a warzone. Cars were still jammed from where people had abandoned them, while the few who had instead decided to take shelter in their vehicles were cautiously coming out, emerging amongst the concrete and scorch marks.
Tim was standing there on one side, face ashen, talking furiously with Superboy.
Dick bounded over an abandoned Honda to land lightly on his feet next to them. “If you two are hanging around with nothing to do, I’m sure Oracle can find something for you guys to do,” he said sharply.
“Sorry-” Superboy gestured widely. “I’m trying to tell him he doesn’t need to be here. Go to the infirmary area or something,” The last part was directed at Tim.
“Red, are you alright?” Dick assessed him a little more carefully.
“I’m fine,” Tim reported.
Superboy glared at him.
Tim glared back. “I would've been a lot worse if he hadn't come in.”
This was clearly a discussion that had been going on for a while.
“Superboy. Is he fit to go on or does he need to go to the infirmary?”
“He’s okay. “Superboy replied grudgingly. “We’re waiting on Lagoon Boy,”
Dick frowned. “If the person is in need of urgent medical help once they resurface, Superboy can carry them. Red Robin, I don’t see why you’re needed here.”
“He refuses to leave.” Superboy sounded frustrated. “The man- he. He stepped in and parried a shot for Tim. Left his guard open and was knocked off the bridge as a result,”
Dick had a bad feeling about this.
“Who was it? A civilian?”
Tim’s eyes were red. “It was the Red Hood,”
The blood in Dick’s veins turned to ice.
“Impulse is coming this way with injured people,” Dick said blankly. He could not deal with the same panic he was feeling reflected back at him in Tim’s face right now. “RR, go help him see them to medical care and-”
“I’m not leaving,”
Dicks patience was thinning.
Tim’s glare was back, directed at Dick this time. “He’s my brother too,” he hissed under his teeth.
Superboy opened his mouth, then closed it without saying a word, eyes full of questions.
“My hands are full, but I can make it on my own, don't worry.” Impulse said over the comms. His voice got gentler. “You can both wait for the Red Hood.”
Time traveler, Dick remembered hollowly.
It was a large bridge, four lanes of cars, a robust structure of metal poles and wires and bolts all painted a red that gleamed in the sun.
It was a long way down to the water.
“Was he injured?” Dick asked in the resounding silence.
“Probably. If not before, then from the fall. And the water,”
Dick let out a breath. “Okay,”
The news had spread to the rest of the heroes as Aquaman emerged from the water with a limp figure in his arms, Lagoon Boy following shortly behind.
“Wait, repeat that. What do you mean the Red Hood is in the river?” That was Shazam’s voice, sounding a little incredulous.
“What is the Red Hood even doing here? Isn't he a drug lord? What the fuck?”
“He saved Red Robin’s life,” Superboy interjected harshly. Dick could hear his voice both in real life and slightly delayed on the comms as they huddled on the shoreline around Jason.
“He’s - We've worked together on a few occasions,” To an outsider, Bruce sounded just as impassive as usual, but Dick could hear the slight tension in his voice.
“I’m near your location, Aquaman. I will come assist,” Wonder Woman declared.
The water was freezing, which was something Dick hadn't even considered until he started unbuttoning the soaked, frigid layers of clothing off of his brother. His hands were shaking.
“Is the Red Hood’s helmet watertight?” a voice asked, and Dick vaguely registered the fact that Wonder Woman had joined them, but all his attention was on Jason and he was cold and dripping and on the ground next to Dick and he still wasn’t breathing .
“It’s not made to stay underwater for such long periods of time.” Tim said, his voice tight.
“We need to take it off,” Lagoon Boy's words were met by a handful of yells, both in person and through the comms, judging by his wince.
“This is the Red Hood ,” Shazam said. “They say he has explosives in his helmet. It might explode if you try to take it off.”
“Seriously?”
“How crazy do you need to be to put explosives in your helmet?” another voice marveled, too fast for Dick to recognize its owner.
The person in question apologized under his breath as every Bat currently connected replied as one that he wasn’t crazy .
“Even more reason to remove it, then,” Wonder Woman’s eyebrows had knit together, her usual unfazed demeanor betraying worry. “Can we cut it off, fast?”
“It’s too close to his face to risk it,”
Dick and Tim exchanged a glance.
“We’ve got it,” Dick said.
He reached towards the helmet, to everyone’s alarm.
“The explosives.” Superboy interjected.
“Connor,” Tim cut sharply. “We know what we’re doing,”
Jason’s face was pale as a sheet, domino mask clinging to pallid skin as Tim gently placed the helmet to the side.
Wonder Woman sucked in a breath. “That’s a child.”
Jason choked out water on the shitty artificial concrete shore of Metropolis’ river and Dick could finally breathe easily again.
“Dick?” Jason rasped. He moved his head to the side, meeting Tim’s gaze.
He gasped Tim’s name before losing consciousness again.
“Wonder Girl and Blue Beetle are being moved to the Justice League infirmary,” Batman’s voice came through. “Get the Red Hood to us so he can be taken up with them,”
“Wait, seriously?” Green Arrow said. “He’s a criminal,”
“He's wounded,” Wonder Woman declared. “He’s young. Batman says we can trust him.”
Her gaze lingered on Tim and Dick. “And I believe Nightwing and Red Robin would vouch for him too.”
Dick watched as Superboy lifted off with Jason in his arms, getting smaller and smaller in the distance. He set one hand on Tim’s shoulder.
“Wait, so what happened?” Green Lantern asked.
“Nightwing took the helmet off,” Wonder Woman informed the rest. Nosy bunch of superheroes.
“What? How?”
“Questions later,” Aquaman declared.
“What do we do about the helmet?” Lagoon Boy asked as they all still stood there, Superboy having long since disappeared.
“Is there still a risk of it blowing up?” Aquaman’s question was directed at Dick and Tim.
“Oh,” Tim said blankly. “Don’t think so. It should be waterproof, and I can shut down most of its functions temporarily,”
“Why do you know all of this?” Lagoon Boy looked thoroughly confused.
Dick smiled tiredly. “Later,”
The Justice League infirmary didn't have a waiting room, not really.
It was no hospital after all, the base included meeting rooms, holding cells, a gym, armories, and so on, but no infirmary waiting room.
That being said, a handful of chairs had been set out in the hallway.
It was quiet, save for the slight creaking of the chair as Dick shifted his weight back and forth, first on one foot, then the other, then leaning back, then back to the first foot.
Bruce sat with his back straight, still as stone. “You can’t react like that everytime he gets hurt.”
Dick stared at the black and blue soles of the Nightwing costume he had yet to change out of.
“I’ve gone on missions with Jason before,” Dick said finally. “He’s gotten hurt before. It’s not that. It’s. He was underwater. He was down there and I couldn’t do anything and I just felt so-”
“Helpless,” Bruce finished.
Yes.
Bruce moved minutely. “I know the feeling,”
Dick let out a breath. “Yea,”
“You know, he’s going to be pissed we brought him to the League,” Dick said.
Bruce snorted.
“If he’s pissed, it means he’s awake enough for it. That’s all I ask for.”
The younger heroes were, for lack of a better word, gossiping.
“Tim’s acting weird,” Arrowette declared.
“Maybe he’s annoyed that he was saved by a drug lord,”
“Is the Red Hood still a drug lord?”
“They know each other,'' Superboy said.
The general consensus was that that was weird and they would need to pester Tim further about it later.
Superboy shrugged. “I mean the adults aren’t making a big deal of it? I’m sure it’s all fine,”
He had his own questions for Tim, but those could wait.
“Where is Tim now?”
“The Red Hood woke up. Tim went in to see him.”
“See, that’s weird-”
The discussion began anew.
Tim was drooling on his bedsheets, head lolling at a frankly painful angle as he slept when Jason’s other bastard of a brother burst in.
“Are you okay?” Was Dick’s first question to him.
“I’m alright” There was a dull pain in his chest from the ribs he’d broken through the combined trauma of the impact with water and the CPR he’d received afterwards, but overall, it was a miracle that those were the worst of his injuries.
“Aren’t you glad you showed me the unlock mechanism now?” Was the second one, and Jason rolled his eyes at him.
“Yea, fine.”
He looked down at Tim, itching to muss his hair up in an even worse rat’s nest than it was now, but didn’t want to risk waking the boy up.
“Thank you,” he told the speck of dust on Tim’s cheek. It was preferable to looking up and saying it to Dick.
“You know it was nothing, Little Wing.”
Jason could hear footsteps outside pass the room by, and the occasional murmur in the hallway. He still wasn’t a fan of the fact that they’d brought him to the Justice League infirmary. But he got it. They hadn’t had the luxury to take him to the Batcave.
“Sorry about the whole Justice League thing,” Dick said, as if reading his thoughts. “I'm sure we can get you out without anyone asking questions. Or well, more questions. Bruce can do his intimidation thing.”
Jason grunted a response. He nodded towards Tim, still fast asleep.
“I looked away for two seconds and he was out like a light. Did he rest at all after the fight?”
“I think you know the answer to that.”
Idiot. But no more so than Jason, for stepping forward and blocking that hit for Tim despite the hilariously unbalanced position he knew it would have (and had) put him in.
Hence, being knocked back by one of those alien fuckers and falling off the bridge. That hadn’t been part of the plan, admittedly.
“He was worried about you,” Dick removed his jacket and draped it over Tim’s shoulders, looking at him fondly. “So were we.”
He leveled the same gaze at Jason, the same open sincerity he’d worn the night Jason had made fun of Tim and Dick had hugged him.
“You know I love you, right? We all do, though B is too emotionally stunted to say anything and Tim would die of embarrassment.”
Jason tensed, then relaxed. “Yea.”
He’d be able to tell them too someday.
Tim came down the hallway with a duffel bag and about the same amount of caginess Jason had seen from drug dealers seconds before they realized he was there to beat their asses.
“You look suspicious as hell, Timbers, lighten up. Did you bring my stuff or are you smuggling cocaine?”
“Sorry,” Tim handed the bag over to Jason. “I’m pretty sure I was supposed to check the stuff out of the equipment room or something? But I didn’t? Kept expecting alarms to go off or something.”
Jason unzipped it to reveal his guns and leg holsters, costume under armour, and boots, the rest of his clothing and equipment hidden deeper in the duffel bag. Everything except his jacket, which Dick had recovered for him earlier the day before, and the domino mask, which had remained sealed tightly over his eyes throughout his stay with the Justice League. Satisfied he had everything, he swung the bag over one shoulder.
“Oh, and here you go.” Lastly, Tim handed over Jason’s signature red helmet, Jason fitting it under one arm.
“I couldn’t fit it into the bag,” Tim looked apologetic. “Also, I disabled most of its functions. The others were ansty it was going to blow,”
“No big deal. Thanks Timbo,”
Jason had noticed that, but he could still see and breathe out of it just fine, so he could deal with the rest later.
He’d been told the Zeta Tube was going to take him to a back alley telephone booth in Gotham, and a quick Google search had confirmed the place was within walking distance of one of his apartments. Now all that was left was to make a discreet exit out of this place.
“Are you coming tomorrow for dinner?” Tim asked hopefully.
Jason grimaced. “I’m not sure. Sorry.”
The few days he’d been out of commission hadn’t cost his activities anything yet, but he couldn’t afford to get lax with it. His ribs were far from healed, but he could still- had to still hold the meeting he had organized with his lieutenants for the day after.
“What about Sunday for lunch?”
“I might be able to make that.” Jason allowed.
Tim brightened. “Cool! Cool.”
“Um. See you around I guess?” Tim’s voice raised at the end, making it sound more like a question.
Jason slipped the helmet over his head, hiding a smile. “See you around,”
Yeah.
He wouldn’t mind that.