Chapter Text
Jason’s been Robin for two months. Two months of Batman hovering anxiously through patrols and stakeouts and fights. Two months of skinned knees, scrapes, and bruises. Two months of sarcastic quips and teasing grins and soft, flitting gazes when Batman ruffles his hair or offers carefully constructed praise on the way back to the cave. Two months of keeping Jason safe.
Until now.
Suddenly, Bruce is years younger, hovering over nine-year-old Dick after an ill-fated dodge sent him careening off a roof and onto a busted ankle. Bruce remembers the sour press of fear that came with Dick's first injury. He remembers shaking, bundling Dick into his arms, walking him to the Batmobile. He remembers Dick digging his head into Bruce’s neck as he cried. He remembers the familiarity that came with each ensuing injury, the instinct to pull Dick close and let him coast out the upset. Over the years, Bruce has gotten comfortable ruffling hair and squeezing arms. Brushing away tears.
But now…Jason isn’t crying.
His eyes are red but dry, his lips bloodless in the crush of clenched teeth. He sits, sprawled on the ground, hand hovering uselessly over the awkwardly twisted mess of his shoulder, toes digging into the dirt as his muscles flex uselessly against pain.
He doesn't scramble into Bruce's arms like they were crafted to hold him.
He's...not Dick.
It's Jason who's here, who's hurt. And Jason needs something different—something Bruce needs to give. Something Bruce needs to learn.
Bruce gulps down a swallow of nerves, pushing aside his own uncertainly, and drops to Jason's side. "Robin," he says quietly.
Instantly, Jason pulls back. His eyes cut to Batman, twisting so his body shields his injured shoulder. Something small and fleeting floods his eyes. Something Bruce hasn’t seen since Jason accidentally dropped a plate his first month at the manor—his small, child toes surrounded by pointed shards as he stumbled away from the mess. From Bruce.
“I-I’m fine,” Jason says, staggering onto his feet, a cry of pain caged between his teeth. His throat works, he blinks rapidly. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay,” Bruce says immediately, staying crouched as Jason tilts back, catching himself against a brick wall. His chest rises and falls and the boy— Bruce’s boy —winces as the movement jostles his injury. Jason slides down, curling against the wall.
“I should have seen him,” Jason says, every word and fearful flick of his gaze misguided and painful. Bruce wants to yank Jason into his head, to show him the things he sees. The things that need to happen and the correct concerns to have—because Bruce isn’t mad at Jason, he’s not going to do anything to Jason. He’s mad at the unconscious man sprawled, bloody, on the ground behind them. He wants to wrap Jason in painkillers and warm blankets and carry him into an hour ago, before Batman failed to protect Robin once again.
“It’s okay,” Bruce says instead, again, because that’s what he can do. “Can I see?”
Jason gulps. His breaths are still coming too quick, the paleness in his cheeks flooding down his neck.
"I'm sorry," he says.
“I want to help,” Bruce reminds him. “I'm here to help."
Jason's tongue flicks out over white, chapped lips. His eyes dart. His good arm curls around his hiked legs, stowing them against the safety of his middle. "I know," he mumbles with a sniff.
"Chum," Bruce says, the word aching. "Take some deep breaths."
That finally gets a new reaction—Jason bristles at the order. The insinuation, that he needs to be coached through control. "'M fine," he says.
"You will be." Bruce's voice remains steady, unchanged. "We just have to...get you fixed up. And then I'll get you home—"
“Fix it,” Jason interrupts, grimacing. But he doesn’t pull back, even though he’s well aware what 'fixing' means.
Bruce takes it as a sign to shuffle closer.
“I’ll be careful,” Bruce promises. He holds up a hand.
“Wait,” Jason says. “Wait, wait, wait—”
Bruce stops. “I want to help,” he coaxes.
The sight of Jason's arm, twisted and jutted awkwardly behind the dirt-smeared expanse of Robin’s colors is making him nauseous himself, and he doesn’t want to imagine the pain Jason is in. If this was Dick, he would have trusted Bruce to jerk the limb into correction instantly. But, Bruce reminds himself, rushing into this could do more than good.
So he rests back on his heels, palm up, and waits.
Jason sucks harsh breaths between ground teeth and squirms in vivid anxiety. Sweat and grime clings to his hair, his skin, his uniform. Bruce forces his gaze away from the kid, dragging over their surrounds. The box of Gotham street—smoggy air and wet, dirt-packed asphalt. Bruce has a keen awareness of slack bodies, serial muggers, tied up and waiting for Gotham PD's pick-up just an alleyway over. Soon, Bruce will need to make a move, to take Jason away from here no matter his condition. Bruce is growing restless, trying to hide his own concerns.
And then.
“B,” Jason says.
And then he’s gritting his teeth and sucking in a terrified, pained breath as he nods sharply. Bruce's hands fall into position. The shoulder has popped forward—Bruce knows what to do. He takes a steadying breath of his own, and then, he doesn’t bother to count.
The sickening, organic clenching and grinding of moved bone, paired with the sharp cry that bursts from Jason’s throat, has Bruce grimacing, his stomach squeezing. “All done,” he says quickly. Slowly, movements orchestrated, he drags Jason to stand at his side.
He’s so little, he’s so small. Jason barely comes up to his chest. Bruce folds his arms around his son, and they stay like that for a long moment. He would stay longer, nose tickled by the hair under his chin, but they've stayed here too long. They're too vulnerable.
“Robin,” Bruce mumbles, too soon. “We need to return to the cave.”
Jason keeps his good arm wrapped around Bruce. He shakes his head.
“I want Agent A to take a look at your shoulder,” Bruce says.
Jason shakes his head again, sagging against him. Bruce feels something stir. Tonight’s been one event after another, remembering Robin, Dick’s Robin. Even having worked through Jason's instead, Bruce is prompted into old, muscle memory. He moves, acclimated to physical affection by a baby acrobat in a way Jason hasn’t allowed yet, but that he doesn’t resist now.
Bruce scoops him up. He’s too old to sit on Bruce’s hip, but he fits right in his arms. In a practiced move he doesn’t think twice about, Bruce slips his cape around the boy, tucking fabric around him.
“B…” Jason says, voice shy. Bruce is relieved to hear it, tentativity replacing panic.
“It’ll be okay now,” Bruce says, walking them to the car. “You’re safe.”
Jason doesn’t speak again as Bruce opens the Batmobile door, settling him into the passenger’s side. The most he moves is to flinch when Bruce goes to buckle him. Bruce mumbles something comforting and tries again, slowly, carefully, as Jason’s hands clench around his cape, eyes squeezing. Bruce detaches the curtain of black fabric in one fluid movement, tucking it around Jason’s waist before slipping into his own seat and starting the ride back to the cave. Jason nibbles on his bruising lip.
“Don’t hurt yourself,” Bruce chides.
Jason nods and stretches the cape around nervous fingers instead.
There’s a brief conversation with Alfred over the coms, mentioning the injury, explaining why their trackers show them heading back so early. Bruce barely hears it though. His eyes cut a well-worn path back and forth to Jason, scanning him.
Logically, Bruce knows he’s okay. A dislocated shoulder is a drop in the bucket compared to the pain and injuries of most vigilantes and heroes. Logically, Bruce knows he, and Dick, have had worse. That eventually, despite the raging heat behind his ribcage that says he won’t allow it to happen, Jason will be injured again. Logically, Bruce knows he shouldn’t be worried.
But he is.
Bruce drives them back to the cave, the remnant warmth of Jason curling close, small, breakable, burrowing into him. Far from the first time, he regrets it. Letting Dick become Robin. Letting Jason follow in his footsteps.
Letting his sons face this kind of danger.
Bruce mentally sighs, fingers curling tight around the inanimate cold of the Batmobile’s wheel. He glances again at Jason, eyes red, hands wrung, still shaking. Hurt.
For a moment, Bruce pushes aside logic.
I won’t let it happen, he decides, heart hammering. I won’t let him get hurt again.
Bruce turns into the cave, parking the Batmobile, twisting to help Jason with the seatbelt before he can reach for it himself. His thumb finds a speck of dirt smudged carelessly across Jason’s cheekbone, rubbing it away, so gentle that Jason can only pause, surprised.
Bruce sighs softly, and makes himself a promise.
I’ll do better for you.