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The horde had been what had done it. The bottleneck, the bodies advancing, his addled mind recalling the last time he’d felt so weak. Jason had been there to save him. Move it, I’m blowing the tunnels! He’d been so brave, so brilliant, so reckless and resourceful even as Bruce had stumbled and struggled through drugs and brainwashing and-- he’d been so weak. He’d been numb and dazed. And here, here he was anything but.
These past few hours had unlocked so many emotions. He tried to think of what Mother had said. Maybe it was enough to simply feel them, to let them exist unnamed. To let the weight of them settle in his heart and his chest and his soul.
“I don’t look that bad, do I?” Jason’s jaw didn’t move quite right as he smiled. Bruce had to suppress a shiver. Disgust, it was wrong to feel disgusted at his own son, but-- he looked wrong. Broken. Beaten.
Jason kept glacing at him. Studying him. His left eyelid sagged oddly as he watched Bruce’s reaction. The dust had settled, Radmuller was powerless.
“See ya around, Batman.” Jason raised a hand and-- no! Bruce rushed forward and caught it. Black gauntlet wrapped around green glove and pulled, tugging his son towards him. Just keep thinking of him, keep thinking of the happy times, the-- what’s his favorite dinosaur? What’s his favorite color? His favorite movie?
The-- the arm wrenched from it’s socket, a loud velcro-like noise as it tore free. Bruce blinked behind the cowl and stared at it for a while. Dead. Lifeless. No! No, he had to hang onto the memories of when Jason was alive. A tight-lipped smirk as he recalled Jason slapping him down in the sewers, the sheepish grin afterwards.
He looked up. Jason looked slightly more whole. The arm in Bruce’s hand was gone, Jason looked less decayed. Merely burned, bleeding, suffering and crying and alone and--
“Geeze, wouldja stop that?” Jason grimaced and wiped at his face. The decay came back, but the pain was gone. “You can’t wish me back to life. Not anymore than ya can Ma or Pa.” A lopsided smirk, recalling the day he’d declared that Thomas and Martha were his grandparents now, since his own had been “a sorry coupla’ jerks”. “I know you wish you could. Hell, I wish you could. But...” Jason shrugged with a small pout. “We got this, at least.”
Bruce didn’t want to settle for this. Couldn’t. There had to be something. His parents, he... he had to remember the happy times. And he had eight years worth of memories, albeit hazy ones, to draw on. With Jason, it had only been two. Two years-- the father needed more, deserved more. He didn’t want to let go.
Jason’s eyes brightened up and he smiled, that old lopsided smirk. With a sigh, he plopped himself down on the concrete. Cross-legged, the cape curled around him and hid most of the decay. “Nah, you’re right. We did deserve more time together, didn’t we?”
Jason understood. This strange liminal space where thoughts reigned supreme, Bruce didn’t have to bother with words and the mess of vocabulary and grammar and syntax. He could simply feel, and Jason understood. The ache in his chest, the stinging in his eyes, the shaking in his knees and hands as he knelt and caressed Jason’s cheeks. There was a gruesome gaping spot where his forehead’s skin had sloughed off, but Bruce kissed him there anyway, trying to eek out any comfort he could before the illusion shattered.
But it didn’t. Jason simply sat there, content. His son, not alive but not gone. Still present, still mock-breathing as he huffed out a sigh of Dad, stop being such a sap.
“You didn’t have to run away, son. Robin or not, you had a home with me.”
Another shrug from Jason, he tried to scoot away but it was half-hearted, still wrapped in his father’s arms. “You called me Robin when you first brought me home. Kinda felt like it’s all you wanted me as. To replace Dick. Then... I dunno. You’re not the most emotionally available. Thought maybe a mom would be.”
“I tried to get you to talk about--”
“We can...” Jason shifted again, pursed his lips and tapped his jaw. “I don’t wanna get into that, Bruce. We can talk about that later. I dunno, I’ll be there in your dreams, okay?”
“My dreams?”
“Duh. I told ya I’d see ya around. But I... the talk you’re tryin’ to have is one of those ‘go gentle into the night’ talks. Like the one Ma gave you. I ain’t ready for that yet. I wanna stick around to bug ya for a few more nights.” Jason glanced over at Boston, who merely shrugged noncommittally.
“So... what do we talk about?”
Jason scratched his head. One of his fingers fell off and he stared at it before pushing it back in, the bone snapping softly. “If I’m solid enough here... Dick told me he went on a joyride in the Batmobile. I know we can’t leave,” a gesture to the psychic-suburb, “here. But that’s a part of bein’ Robin that I never got to do.” He grinned, and the light, for a moment, made Jason’s face look normal again. He looked whole and human and joyful. "Maybe we don't need to talk about anything. Maybe we can just drive 'round and have fun."
Bruce grinned. "I didn't bring the Batmobile with me, but I can do you one better." He pushed a button on his belt and his cape rolled up around his shoulders, revealing the jetpack. Ever-prepared, it still had plenty of fuel. "Do you want to come fly with me?"
Jason practically leapt in his arms and Bruce held him close. It was good, to feel him breathe again. He was still so small, even lighter with the decay. But he was here, in some form. Even a broken form.
They took off into the air and Bruce pushed the jetpack to it's limits, looping and spiraling in the clouds. Jason wrapped his arms around Bruce's neck, laughing and hollering as the patchwork houses fell away. Father, son, and sky.