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“I’ll be fine —”
“You were bleeding out in the bathroom, Jay—”
“ That’s fine! ”
“No, it—crap—Steph, can you—thanks. No, it’s not fine.”
Stephanie glances at them through the rear view mirror after handing more paper towels to Dick, her eyes shining with mirth. She’s still in her Spoiler costume, her hood and mask sitting on the passenger seat next to her. Jason likes Steph. She’s the most tolerable out of all the Birds, but at this moment? He hates her.
He kicks the back of her seat. Dick scowls, applying just enough extra pressure to Jay’s wound to hurt.
The thing? The stab wound? They’re making a big deal out of it. It’s just a stab wound — they’ve all been stabbed, at one point or another. It’s no big deal, nothing out of the ordinary. And Jason knows for fuckin’ fact that he wouldn’t have bled out in the bathroom and he would’ve stitched himself up and no one would be the wiser. It’s no big deal. But Dick came bounding in, and got that worried look on his face, and the next thing Jason knows, he’s shoved in the back seat of Steph’s car.
So, yeah. Huge ass stab wound and an older brother who can’t mind his own fuckin’ business isn’t the best combination. The three of them are on a journey to Wayne Manor from Jay’s safe house — a broken down apartment building on the outskirts of Gotham — with a shoddy patch job on the stab wound.
“I’ve been through worse.”
Dick goes still, his eyes closing. Stephanie’s grip tightens on the steering wheel. They all get like this when he alludes to his death, but they’re more vocal about their distress when he outright says it. When he jokes about it.
Jason tries to say it as often as possible. To keep them on their toes.
(And because that makes it easier to deal with. Makes the laughter that haunts his dreams sting a little less and the scars on his chest seem a tiny bit more faint and the memories of dirt — suffocating and coarse and everywhere — seem a bit more far away. Because it’s just a joke.)
“Yeah, and I’d rather you not go through that again.” Dick mutters.
Stephanie drums her fingers against the steering wheel. “Ditto.”
They fall into silence. Stephanie turns up the radio — something pop, he thinks, he hasn’t had time to catch up on the latest music — and taps along to the rhythm. Dick hums softly under his breath. Jason lets himself exist in the same orbit as them, leaning his head back against the headrest.
The car rolls to a stop a bit away from the front gate, engine cutting off and lights going dark. Stephanie leans back, kicking her legs onto the dash and pulling out her phone. “Tell B I said hi.”
“Will do.” Dick opens his door with his feet, slipping out of the suit and tugging Jason after him.
“Remember, Hood,” she shoots him a vicious smile, “snitches get stitches.”
“I’m getting stitches anyway, Brown.”
Her eyes darken slightly. (It’s moments like these that Jason remembers she was raised by a supervillain. The reminder always makes his blood run cold.) The car engine growls as it comes to life. She sing-songs; “You know what I mean.” And then she’s driving off, leaving the two of them outside Wayne Manor.
After a moment’s consideration, Dick gestures to the front gate. “You wanna knock or should I?”
“I’m not gonna just knock on the front door, Dickhead.”
“Why not?”
“Are you fuckin’ serious? ‘Hey, dad, it’s me, Jason. I know you think I’m dead, but here I am! Also, I got fuckin’ stabbed , can you stitch me up?’ No.”
Dick hums. “I don’t see the problem with that.”
Jason shoots him a glare. “I can’t tell if you’re joking or not.”
The older man just grins. “We can go through a window in the study. Dad stashes stolen medical supplies there, and then you can slip back out when he’s done. Sound good?” Without waiting for a reply, Dick lets go of his younger brother and makes a running start for the fence. He jumps over it in a single leap — what a show-off — and looks over at Jason expectantly.
Jason’s climb over the gate is much less elegant than his brothers — considering the huge ass stab wound that got him here in the first place. But he manages to drop down to the otherside with only minimal pain and discomfort. Dick is by his side in an instant, taking half his weight and helping him lumber along.
“Thanks for the help, jackass. I’m fuckin’ stabbed, in case you forgot.”
“You said you’re fine.”
“I hate you.”
Dick grins wide. “Aw, love you, too, Little Wing.”
“ Fucks sake. "
When they get to the window to Bruce’s study, located on the second floor, they do the same. Dick leaps up first, opening the window, then reaches down to help Jason make the climb. Cause, you know, stab wound to the side. The minute he’s inside, Jay collapses onto the window seat, a million pillows cushioning him.
Having successfully manoeuvred him into the study, Dick slips inside the building and immediately blends with the shadows. Jason stays put, because the thought of moving makes him internally groan and maybe Dick is onto something. Maybe the huge ass stab wound is reason for worry.
A moment later — maybe a few moments, time started blurring together — the door to the study opens and floods the room with yellow light. Bruce stands in the doorway, hand still on the knob, and freezes when he sees the crime lord turned vigilante in the window seat.
“Uh,” Jason says, “I got stabbed.”
Bruce blinks. “So I see.”
The pair stare at each other for a moment. Then Bruce is sighing, heading over to the cabinets behind the desk. He ruffles through them, pulling out
“You’re…not gonna — I don’t know. Pry? Try to get me to the hospital? Nothin’?”
Bruce smiles easily, putting on surgical gloves and dragging a seat across from the window with his ankle. He takes a seat, gently pulling away the mess of gauze and paper towels keeping his wound from bleeding. “You’re newer, aren’t you? I patch up your friends fairly often. Usually after a fight, out in the streets, but at some point they started showing up here.” He chuckles to himself. “Convincing them to go to a hospital is futile, I assume it’s the same with you.”
Jason grunts an affirmative.
And then his dad gets to work. Everything blurs together as he cleans the wound, the world around Jay fading away as he hisses through his teeth. Bruce shoots him an apologetic look
“You have a family?”
He’s trying to distract him. With conversation. Get his brain to focus on formulating actual words instead of the pain. Dick does the same thing with Tim. Tim is a blabber, too, so it always works. Jason isn’t much of a talker. But some emotions are bleeding through — because at the end of the day, he really fuckin’ misses his dad and it’s been hell not talking to him. Declining any invitation Dick extends.
So he talks. “You’ve met them.”
A hum. “Lots of siblings.”
“Yeah.”
Bruce sets aside everything he used to clean the wound, grabbing the stitches. “Parents?”
Jason pauses. Tastes the words in his mouth. Makes a split second, terrible decision that might come back to snap him in the ass. “Just my dad.”
“Does he know about the…” A pause. “Crime lord slash vigilante gig?”
“I’m—” He laughs bitterly. “—not really on good terms with my dad.”
Bruce hums again. “That’s a shame.”
“Not really,” he says quickly, resulting in a raised eyebrow — a silent question, prompting; “I…uh, he doesn’t know I’m in town. After I…left. Kinda hard to, ya know, patch that up. Or whatever.”
A pause. Not an uncomfortable one, by any means, but a heavy one. It presses on Jason’s ribs and makes him squirm. Bruce continues his methodical movements, thinking to himself. Planning out his words before he responds. He did that a lot, when Jay was a kid. Took a moment to plan where he wanted the conversation to go. He finds it oddly comforting that his dad has the same habits after all these years.
“I’m sure he’ll be happy to see you. No matter how bad the fallout was.” He purses his lips, hands stilling. “Unless, you had to get away…?”
Jason pauses. Takes a moment to comprehend the underlying comment in that sentence. And then immediately stiffens, on the defensive. God, if Bruce fuckin’ knew.
“No! No, he — nothing like that.” He blinks. “ Fuck , man.”
Bruce relaxes and nods, getting back to work. Even goes as far as to smile to himself, lips twitched in amusement. “Just wanted to check.”
“Yeah, well…” Jason trails off. Shifts in his seat. “I was a lil shit as a kid. And it’s more complicated than just showing up at his doorstep and going ‘hey, dad, remember me?’”
“I’ve found that when people say a situation is more complicated than one thinks,” Bruce’s words are measured, “that they’re just scared of the outcome.”
“Or it is complicated.”
“How so?”
Jason bites his tongue. There’s no way to say you died, came back to life, and crawled out of your grave without causing concern. He cringes at the thought of Dick’s worried expression on Bruce — like a puppy whose owner is sick and just wants to cuddle up with them for a few days. But. Well.
He can’t think of a good excuse. Bruce wouldn’t push if Jason asked to drop it.
But he finds himself saying it anyway.
“I died.”
The silence that follows is uncomfortable. Bruce leans back in his seat, removing his gloves one finger at a time. His gaze is scrutinising — like Jason is another one of his patients whose treatment plan he can’t figure out. Jason lowers his shirt and shrugs on his jacket. He tries not to fidget under the gaze, his own fixing on the desk.
Instead of a million questions, or the pinched face, Bruce forces a laugh. “Looks like you recovered.”
He snorts. “Yeah, it left a few scars.”
Bruce’s eyes flash. Panic startles up Jason’s chest.
“Hey, dad,” Tim appears in the doorway, dressed in Nightwing pyjamas too big for him, “you busy?”
“One minute, Tim, I—” He turns back to the window seat, but Red Hood is already gone. The window is still open, moonlight filtering into the dimly lit room and curtains fluttering in the wind. Bruce frowns. “Nevermind.”
Dick is at his safe house when Jason gets there, Nightwing costume exchanged for a blue hoodie and grey sweats. He leans against the balcony railing just outside the apartment, looking over his shoulder as Jay approaches. The two stand there in silence as the sun begins to come up, casting Gotham in a grey-yellow light.
“You could come back to the manor, you know,” Dick says softly, “we could figure out a way to explain it. We’ve gotten away with all this for so long, it wouldn’t—”
“No.” Jason says quickly, too quickly, ignoring the pained look on his older brother’s face. He recalls the flash in Bruce’s eyes, the flash he always gets when he figures something out or gets an idea. The flash that came right before he solved a case and saved someone’s life. The flash that signalled he was onto something. On the verge of discovering. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
He’s expecting a fight. Maybe an attempt at guilt tripping. Anything to convince Jason. Instead he gets a soft nod, downturned lips, and a pinched brow. “Okay.” He says. Then, again, softer. “Okay.”
Jason nods sharply. Dick shifts on his feet, taking a few steps back. And then he leaps up and disappears into the shadows.
Like a bat.