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Chapter Text

Jason wakes with a gasp.

Hit sits up and immediately cracks his head hard enough he’s seeing stars.  His hands go to his throat where he tries to stop the bleeding.

His plan went perfectly, right until it all fell apart—he had Batman squared up against him, the Joker between them, gun at the ready.  Jason set it up perfectly.  Batman was supposed to shoot the Joker, sacrifice his morals to end Jason’s tormentor, but it all went wrong.  Bruce used a batarang and ricocheted it—

And why isn’t Jason still bleeding?

It’s too dark to see but when he pulls his hands back from his neck, he does not feel the familiar tackiness of blood.  Instead, he feels a stiff collar.  His helmet is gone and someone changed him out of his tactical gear.  He’s in a wool suit, starched shirt, and a necktie.

Jason reaches his hands forward and runs his hand over a familiar cushioned fabric.

No.

A casket, he’s been buried alive.

Not this again.  Jason feels his heart accelerate and forces himself to slow his breathing.  Hyperventilating will only make things worse.  He does not have time to think about how he got here or who did this to him.  Jason’s entire world narrows to a single goal, escape.

He searches his body for something he can use to break the heavy wooden lid of the casket.  He finds a tie pin to slice through the silken fabric above him.  He uses the edge of a belt buckle after the tie pin snaps, working a deep groove into the casket lid and sawing back and forth.

Clumps of cool earth sprinkle into his face.

“Stay calm, you can do this,” Jason mutters to himself.  He’s done it before.  His memories of his resurrection are spotty but he knows he must have done this before.

Don’t think about if they buried you deeper this time.  Focus on digging.

Jason’s body protests but the wood gives way under the weight of the earth on top of it.  Once he’s broken through the wood, it’s easier to chip away at the gash until he’s formed decent sized hole forming.

Dirt keeps falling into his face and Jason pushes it down to the bottom of his coffin to make space.  When he has enough room, he starts to leverage himself up.  He drops the belt buckle and begins to dig with his hands.

The dirt is cold and Jason fights the claustrophobia as he leverages himself first up to his knees, then to his feet.

Only a few feet to go.  Don’t stop digging.

Jason claws and kicks himself through the soil.  He keeps spitting it out of his mouth.  As he nears the surface, the dirt gets heavier, soaked with rain.  It sticks in his teeth and his eyes and under his nails, but Jason does not stop the press upward.  He promises himself just a few more inches, just a few minutes more.  He feels lightheaded and he’s losing focus so Jason grits his teeth (soil and all) and forces himself to keep going.

He breaks through the surface and hauls himself out of the earth.  By the time he collapses on the grass, he’s heaving for air and sobbing.

The night is dark but not as dark as his grave.  A flash of lightning cracks across the sky as rain pours down on him, turning the grassy soil to mud.  A stone angel stands vigil over him and Jason gets to his feet, suddenly angry.  He tries to pull it down off its pedestal but it’s too heavy.  He feels too uncoordinated for an effective attack and it drives him to a fury.

Jason reaches within himself for that well of rage that’s so often been his only constant, his only companion, and finds he can’t reach it.  The thought sends him into a panic.  The Lazarus rage slips through his fingers again and again.

He thinks about Bruce, the way he let him down, replaced him, and now did not pull the trigger with the Joker tied up in front of him to avenge Jason’s death.  Any of these should be enough to activate the Lazarus pit inside of him but Jason remains tugging ineffectually at a stone guardian.  Even his clouded brain sees the symbolism.

Everything feels wrong, from the fog in his head to his empty rage to his too-small hands.  Jason can’t grasp the why of it all.  Just that he’s back at his grave, in his teenage body, completely useless.

The storm rages above him and Jason lays down under the statue and lets the rain and the wind batter him.  He feels a pull towards the city, towards home but he can’t see the point in it.  He can’t go to Gotham, he can’t go to the Manor, so where else is left?

Everything feels so foggy.  Everything hurts.

He wants to cry again but he used up any energy left on his tantrum.  Instead, Jason lays there as silent as, well, the grave.

Jason must fall asleep, or maybe he passes out, because the next thing he knows someone is screaming.

It’s morning and the sunlight is blinding.  His suit is still soaked from the rain but he tries to get to his feet.  His brain is still foggy and his limbs won’t respond.  The best he can do is get to his knees and raise his fists up to fight.  His eyes scan for the threat but the only person he sees is a groundskeeper.

“What are you doing here, kid?” the guy asks, approaching Jason and taking him by the shoulders.  Jason tries to shove him off but his arms feel like they’re filled with lead.  The guy is saying something but Jason can’t get his brain to process the words.

Someone is talking on the phone and everything blurs and tilts to the side.

Jason fades in and he’s horizontal.  People are talking again but he can’t tell if they’re talking to him.

He knows there’s something important he’s supposed to be doing.  His plan?  No, that already failed.  He failed.  He wants—He doesn’t know what he wants.  He thinks there are sirens happening.  Where’s Batman?

“B,” he tries to say.

“Kid, can you tell me your name?  Do you remember what happened?”

“I—Bruce—” he fades back out.

He fades back in.

He’s missing time.

He’s not cold and wet anymore, but he’s still laying down.  He’s in a paper gown and his feet are cold.  Must have lost his shoes.  He feels the ground beneath him slide and a massive machine settles over him.

“No!” he shouts, lashing out with his arms.  He dug his way out of the casket but he doesn’t have his belt buckle or tie pin.  He won’t be able to break the heavy machinery.

“Get him out of there.  Jason!  It’s okay!”

And suddenly Bruce is there.  He holding on to Jason’s shoulders but his grip just makes him fight harder.

“It’s going to be okay, son.  I’m here, I’m here,” Bruce tries to soothe him and to Jason horror, he’s crying again.

Jason doesn’t stop fighting Bruce.  “Let me go!” he cries.  “You did this.  You did this to me!”

Jason doesn’t know how Bruce did it, sending him back in time, trapping him in his younger body, but it’s all mixed up in his head.  Bruce hurt him.  He threw that batarang and Jason bled out and then he was back in his grave.  Bruce didn’t kill the Joker.  He killed Jason.

Bruce was supposed to save him.

Jason sobs and throws an elbow.  Bruce must be distracted or maybe he’s playing it up, because Jason cracks him directly in the face.

“Mr. Wayne!” there’s someone else there but Jason doesn’t know them, doesn’t trust them, and they’re touching him too.

He panics, lashing out as much as he can.

“Hold him still,” someone else says and Jason manages to cry harder.  He won’t be restrained again.  Not like before.  Not with the Joker.

“No, wait!” that was Bruce.  But someone manhandles him and Jason feels the prick of a needle.  It isn’t immediate, though.  Jason fights like a wild animal.

But he fades back out.

--

The hospital is a blur to Jason.

He spends more time faded out than in.  But he doesn’t hurt anymore, which is a definite plus side.  Or, it does hurt but the hurting feels far away.

When he does wake, the lights are normally dimmed.  Sometimes he can hear someone speaking to him.  One time it’s Alfred, then he blinks and it’s Barbara.  Jason hadn’t seen either of them when he returned to Gotham last time.  They weren’t part of the plan.

“Jay, you awake?” Babs asks and he feels another tear sliding down his cheek.

So he fades back out.

--

Bruce is there sometimes.  He holds Jason’s hand gently over his bandages.  He gives Jason a soft squeeze whenever he wakes up but lets him pretend to be sleeping until he fades back out.

--

Jason doesn’t know how long it takes but he’s moved to the Manor.  There aren’t as many machines plugged into him when he wakes now.  His head is bandaged but his hands aren’t so he must have healed enough the hospital released him.

He doesn’t know how much time he lost.  Weeks?  Months?  He’s in a bedroom at the Manor but he doesn’t recognize it.  Somewhere not in the family wing, then.  Probably Bruce’s way of telling him he isn’t family anymore.

Jason’s thoughts spiral but he can’t work out a full narrative and he has a sneaking suspicion why.  It’s the same reason Talia threw him in the pit, why his memories before the League are so spotty.

How many times did the Joker beat in his head?

Jason grasps at his thoughts ineffectually before giving up.  Maybe it’s a blessing, not being able to remember every detail of his time with the Joker.

He changes focus to getting up from the bed.

Jason is attached to an IV.  The text on the bag swims in front of him but whatever liquid in it is clear.  He grips the stand and pulls himself to his feet.  So far, so good.  He can stand on his own at least.  He takes a few experimental steps and finds that’s well within his ability as well.

Good.

Jason makes it to the door but it takes two attempts to turn the knob.  Okay, so fine motor control isn’t fully back yet, but that could be his brain more than his hands.

He gets the door open and realizes he’s on the ground floor of the Manor.  At least he won’t have to brave the stairs.  Jason’s legs feel steady enough but he doesn’t want to put that to the test on a twenty-foot drop.

The Manor is quiet.  Given the light coming in from with windows, it’s sometime in the morning.  Jason squints at it.  He can see some of the Manor grounds through the glass and the leaves on the big oak tree are just starting to turn.  Autumn, then.

His IV pole gets stuck on the carpet in the hallway but slides smoothly over the marble floor of the entry hall.  Jason isn’t sure exactly where he’s walking until he finds a familiar door.  The library.

When he first arrived at the Manor, Jason often wished the library was located on the second floor with the family bedrooms.  He mentioned this to Alfred who explained the books were too heavy.  The floor to ceiling shelves required rolling ladders and there was a whole section that was kept out of direct light.  Heavy curtains surrounded the windows and there were plush chairs to read in, but Jason found a spot between the stacks where he could curl his knees up and be out of view from the doorway.  It was a hiding spot.

At fifteen, he was probably too big for it.  It took some skillful maneuvering of the IV pole, but Jason carefully got on the floor and pulled his knees in.  He picked a book off the shelf closest to him and just cradled it on his thighs.  A glance at the doorway told him he wasn’t completely out of sight but the short trip to the library exhausted him.  There are plenty better hiding spots in the Manor but this was his first and this one feels the most right.

--

“Oh thank God.”

The fog dissipates and Jason registers someone in front of him.  At first, he thinks Bruce but realizes the shape of him is all wrong.  It’s Dick, down on one knee in front of him.

“We’ve been looking everywhere for you, Jaybird.”

Jason frowns and for a moment he wonders if he’s lost more time.  But as he orients himself, he realizes he’s still on the floor of the library.  His legs feel stiff and his neck hurts.  On his lap, a heavy leather bound book is open somewhere in the middle.  He looks down at it instead of Dick.

Jason hadn’t gone to Dick when he returned to Gotham the first time.  Too fixated on Bruce and Tim and the Joker… Dick didn’t fit into any plans.  He watched Blüdhaven get destroyed on that rooftop with Bruce.  He wonders now if Dick was there or if he was off in space again.

“Let’s get you back to your room,” he says encouragingly but Jason doesn’t move.

He turns a page in his book but something is wrong with the words.  Jason knows they’re words.  He can see each letter, but his mind can’t connect them to any meaning.  Jason furrows his brow and tries to refocus, the book more interesting than Dick by a mile.

“Let me help you up,” Dick says and then he reaches for Jason’s book and Jason kicks out his leg as hard as he can, catching Dick in the hip and pushing him back several feet.

“Oof,” he grunts but Dick stays on his feet.  He holds out his hand placatingly.  “Bruce mentioned you still have your muscle memory.”

A comment like that would normally have green clouding his vision.  Jason tightens his grip on his book.  He waits for his anger to well up, tries to reach for it, but just like at his gravesite it slips through his fingers.  Like the words on the page, it remains out of reach.

If not the overwhelming anger of the Lazarus pit, Jason can still muster up some annoyance at Dick’s tone.  He isn’t a child.  He was probably older than Dick.  The math wasn’t happening, but Jason feels pretty confident.

“Leave me alone,” Jason snaps instead.  Dick looks shocked at his words, like he didn’t expect him to be able to speak.  It makes Dick’s face look dumb and Jason hates it.  “…Shouldn’t be a problem for you,” he adds just to be mean.

Dick shutters his expression and squares his shoulders.  It’s his Nightwing look.  Jason let the fog roll back in and disappears into it before his ‘brother’ can respond.

--

Some days are better than others.

The nights Jason goes to sleep of his own accord, he has nightmares. He moves back up to the family wing, if only so it cuts down on the time it takes Bruce to rush into his bedroom to check on him.  It doesn’t matter if he pushes Bruce away or ignores him completely, Bruce stays until Jason falls back asleep.

Jason isn’t sure who’s driving when the fog is heavy.  Sometimes he can only surface for a few seconds at a time and he takes those moments to lash out at Bruce if he’s around.  He shoves Bruce’s hands away or tells him to fuck off and once screams at him for not saving him.

Every time, Bruce looks at him brokenly.  And every time Jason waits for it to make him feel better.

Most day, there are appointments.

He goes to a therapist to help him with walking and mobility.  Alfred takes him.  Those are grueling sessions but they are Jason’s favorite because they involve a long car ride and physically moving his body.  He thinks he had a few sessions with a speech therapist but he isn’t present enough to make any progress.  If the fog comes during any medical appointments, he lets it.

Then there are appointments in the cave.

He remembers locking eyes with J’onn J’onnz but never feels the Martain Manhunter digging around in his head.  Then there’s Zatanna.  He wonders what she’d do if he summons the All-Blades.  But he’s only lucid for the end of their appointment, long enough to hear her tell Bruce there’s nothing magical about his injuries.

And no explanation for his resurrection.

--

The first time he sees Tim in the Manor, Jason is sitting at the kitchen table eating breakfast.  He comes to midway through the meal.  No more IV pole, no more bandages, but Jason can’t see out the window so he does know if it’s still Autumn.  Bruce is reading a paper at the table like he normally does in the morning but Jason knows by now he won’t be able to read the date.

He lifts the spoon back to his mouth and takes another bite of oatmeal.

Then he registers the additional presence at the table.

Tim is wearing a faded t-shirt and eating a bowl of oatmeal as well, eyes locked on a tablet Jason can’t read.

Jason wants to be furious.  If anything was going to set him off, surely this would be it.

He came back to life and Bruce still replaced him?  What the fuck?  Was Tim running around in his uniform too, playing at being Robin when Jason wasn’t even supposedly cold in the ground?

“Replacement?” he asks and the kitchen screeches to a halt.

Jason gets the impression that when he isn’t lucid, he doesn’t do much talking.  Everyone’s reaction is always so disproportionately dramatic.  Bruce practically throws his paper onto the table and Tim looks like a deer caught in the Batmobile headlights.

Luckily Alfred is there to bail them both out.

“Master Jason, this is Timothy Drake,” Alfred says smoothly, pouring Jason a glass of orange juice and setting it in front of him.  “He lives at the Drake Manor next door.  He is here to temporarily assist Master Bruce in the evenings and due to the late hour, he sometimes stays overnight.”

“Where’s his dumb camera?” Jason grumbles.  Tim honest-to-God squeaks and looks frantically at Bruce.

“How are you feeling today, Jason?” Bruce asks tentatively.

“Partly cloudy,” Jason shrugs with no further explanation.  The fog feels far away.  He might have a few hours or a few minutes.  It is hard for him to tell, but at least his words come easier.  He pushes his hair from his face and frowns at the length.

He looks at Alfred.  “Can you do a haircut today?”

“Of course, there is some time after breakfast.  I’ll grab the supplies from upstairs,” Alfred says easily, as if this is a normal day and Jason makes requests all the time.

Bruce watches the exchange with intense scrutiny which Jason ignores.

Alfred is a pillar in a storm.  A safe harbor.

Jason misses him so much it feels like an ache in his bones.

After breakfast, Alfred doesn’t bat an eye.  He just holds open a coat for Jason that takes him an embarrassingly long time to negotiate his arms into before leading him to the patio.  Alfred already set up a chair out there with a blanket for Jason’s lap.  The weather is cool, not cold. But it could be due to the day rather than the season.

It occurs to Jason he can just ask.  “Alfred, what day is it?”

“Saturday the fifth of February,” he answers, spraying a bottle of water on Jason’s hair and combing it through.  Ah, a warm day in winter then.

Jason lets himself relax into the feeling of Alfred combing out his hair, the quiet snip of the scissors.  When he was on the streets, Jason wouldn’t get his hair cut for months.  It was an unnecessary expense like cigarettes and toothpaste.  The only time he would go to a barber was if it was free, or if he could trade something he stole for it.

Then he moved to the Manor and Alfred, every two weeks like clockwork, would cut his hair for him.  Alfred would listen to Jason vent about Bruce or complain about the kids in his classes.  Then they would discuss novels and plays and the antics of the Gotham social elite.  He knew the haircuts would go faster if Alfred didn’t make him laugh so hard, but Jason never felt rushed out of Alfred’s chair.

He couldn’t remember the last time he and Alfred did this, just the two of them.

Alfred keeps up a steady commentary for him about planting tulips.  He got a late start this year so he isn’t sure they’ll bloom come spring.

“Alfred?  Is Tim Robin?” he asks.

“Would you be upset if he assumed the mantle during your convalescence?”

Jason appreciates how Alfred doesn’t change the way he speaks to him like sometimes the doctors or therapists do.  He speaks to him like he expected Jason to understand every word, like there isn’t any anything wrong with him.

“Yeah,” Jason admits.  “But it’s not like I can do anything about it like this, huh?”

“You’ve made remarkable improvement these last few months, Master Jason,” Alfred says, trimming another stray lock of hair.  Jason wonders if he’d recognize himself in a mirror.

“Months,” Jason breathes to himself.

February.  He should be in school.  It looks like his lessons have been replaced with the appointments.  It was supposed to be his junior year of high school.  He remembers wanting to go to college, trying to figure out a way to convince Bruce to let him stay as Robin if maybe he went to GCU--

Jason shakes his head, accidentally throwing Alfred off with the scissors.  “Sorry,” he mutters.  He can feel the fog rising.  “Alfred?”

“Yes, Master Jason?”

“Don’t let Bruce ship me off somewhere, okay?” he says almost desperately.  He’d been so certain Bruce was going to kick him out after Robin, that his love and Jason’s place in his house were conditional.

“Oh my boy, he would do nothing of the sort,” Alfred assures him.  He moves in front of Jason and leans down so he can look him in the eye.  He says with surprising vehemence, “If he so much as suggests it, he will have to go through me.”

Jason nods.  He feels the fog moving in.  “Okay Alfie.  I believe you.”

--

Some days, Jason feels closer to fifteen than he does twenty.  It’s like there are two versions of himself superimposed on top of each other. The longer he spends as a teenager, the farther away his adult self feels.

He feels his teenage insecurity more than his adult anger.  As much as he wants to be mad at Bruce, without the pit fueling him, there are only so many times Jason can wake up in the care of his family before he starts to believe they really do care about him.

It’s deep into winter, now.  There’s a heavy blanket of snow on the Manor grounds.  Maybe still February but maybe March.  Hell, if Mr. Freeze is on the loose then it could be June.

Jason watches fat flakes fall on the oak tree outside.  It’s not… a bad life.

The fog inches away and Jason finds himself in Bruce’s office.  He’s sitting by a window, the book in his hands unopened.  Jason wonders if his catatonic self just enjoys holding them.  At his desk, Bruce reads something on his computer screen.  Jason recognizes it as Wayne Enterprise work even if he can’t make out the specifics.

The winter sun sets early and the office is already starting to get dark.

Bruce is too focused on his work to notice.  Jason recognizes the little crease between his eyebrows he gets when he’s squinting.

Before he can think too much about it, Jason stands from his seat at the window and turns on Bruce’s desk lamp for him.  It floods the office with a warm light.  Bruce looks up at him and Jason stands in front of him

“Thank you, Jason.”

It was always easier to talk to Bruce when they were doing something.  Jason can’t have this conversation here.  “I want to go outside.”

Bruce raises his eyebrows.  “Okay, I’ll call Alfred up for you.”

“No,” Jason tells him.  “I want you to go with me.”

Jason doesn’t know what Bruce is working on for Wayne Enterprises or if it’s even important but he shuts his computer down and gets to his feet.  “Let’s find some coats.”

Jason gets on a coat, hat, and scarf.  Alfred can’t find his gloves and Jason is no help because he has no memory of the last time he used them, so he gets an old pair of Dick’s.  He purposefully does not watch Bruce get bundled up because the look of hope on his face makes him look stupid.

They go outside and Jason starts to walk the manor grounds.  The snow comes up to his ankle but his thick boots keep him warm.  Outside, the sky in beginning to get dark but in his head, Jason feels perfectly clear.

They follow a gravel trail around the grounds, their boots crunching through the snow in sync with each other.

“Are you going to send me away?” he asks Bruce.  He can’t do Arkham.  He won’t.

Bruce doesn’t seem startled by Jason’s line of questioning which means Alfred probably got to him already.  Jason is disappointed he missed that chewing out.

“No one is going to send you away,” Bruce says, steady as the falling snow.

“You have a new Robin,” Jason says.  One of the perks of his brain injury is no one chastises him for mentioning code names outside of the cave anymore.

Bruce sighs.  Jason doesn’t know for sure, but if Tim is already at the Manor working on cases, then it’s only a matter of time before he steps into the pixie boots.  If he hasn’t already.

“Robin or not, you will always be my son.”

“That’s not what you said before.”

Two versions of Bruce rattle around in Jason’s head.  There’s the one who told him I’m not your father, Jason.  I don’t need your teenage rebellion.  Then there’s the one who looked down on him on that rooftop and said This changes nothing.

Jason doesn’t turn to look at Bruce now, afraid of which one he’d see.

For a long moment, Bruce doesn’t say anything.  They reach the farthest point of the path where they begin to circle back to the Manor and Bruce stops.

“I was wrong to say that, Jason.”  Bruce looks back at the Manor.  Its gothic silhouette looms large in the distance but the lights from within give it a warm glow.  To Jason, it looks like home.

“You don’t mean that,” Jason says quietly.  “I’m awful to you all the time.  I broke your rules.  I killed.  I don’t even feel sorry about it.”

Bruce puts his hands on Jason’s shoulders and Jason looks away from him.  Bruce's voice breaks when he says, “None of that changes that you’re my son and I’m so, so grateful that you’re here.”

Jason looks up at Bruce then and sees the emotions written on his face.  “Why didn’t you kill the Joker, B?”

Bruce closes his eyes and exhales shakily.  “Is that what you need me to do?”

It’s everything Jason thought he wanted.  There’s no doubt in his mind that in this moment, if he asks Bruce to kill the Joker then he will.  It would destroy him, but he’d do it. But is that what Jason really wants?

“Don’t send me away, B.  Don’t replace me.”

Bruce pulls him into a rough embrace.  “Never, Jaylad.  No one’s could ever replace you.”  Jason grips Bruce back just as tightly.  No one is crying, the fog is out, and the moment seems to last forever.  He doesn’t know how long they stand there, but it’s long enough the sky goes dark and stars start to blink over them.

“Come on, old man.  Let’s go back in.”  Jason taps twice on Bruce’s shoulder like he’s ending a spar.

“Yeah, Jay.  Let’s go home.”

Jason’s mind drifts to thoughts of hot chocolate and an evening spent with Alfred.  He could sit with Alfred in the cave while Batman goes on patrol.  Or maybe Bruce will take the night off and join them for the evening.  Not everything between them is fixed but Jason cultivates a small hope of his own.

In the end, Jason will realize he didn’t have to worry about Bruce sending him away.

Because in the end, it’s the League of Assassins that comes for him.

Chapter Text

For months, Jason adjusts to his new normal.

He’s not always present, but his family is careful to rarely leave him alone.

The problem is that when he’s catatonic he likes to wander.  Jason isn’t sure if he’s looking for something or if he’s just bored.  He doesn't have much awareness of anything in that state.  But his family discovers if they give him something to do, they can keep him occupied in one place.  Jason surfaces polishing silver, helping Alfred shovel snow, and flipping blindly through the pages of a book.  Some nights he stays at Barbara’s place and listens to her run comms as Oracle while he mixes up her rubix cube.

Very rarely, Jason will surface in Tim’s company.  Tim is smaller than Jason remembers from his ill-advised assault on Titan’s Tower.  He’s more animated, and Jason is his captive audience.  He goes on about camera lenses and grapple cable and how he wants to add armored pants to the uniform.  Jason reluctantly acknowledges Tim is a capable Robin.

On his bad days, Jason’s frustrations rise to the surface.  Months go by and he still can’t piece together any words off a page.  Bright lights give him nearly debilitating headaches, forcing him to lie down for hours nauseous and miserable.  The nightmares.

It’s late summer, nearly autumn again.

Jason has physical therapy twice a week at a private clinic an hour away in New York.  Alfred normally drives him, runs some errands during the appointment, and picks him up afterward.

Jason’s body is doing better than expected.  The physical therapy appointments are more like supervised workout sessions with adaptive trainers.  His fine motor control is still pretty awful but he can do pushups and weighted squats.  It’s strange to think that ten pullups are easier for him than ten buttons now but it’s his new reality.

Jason thinks he might ask Dick to help him with tumbling soon.  He has a theory that some gymnastics will help him develop his missing sense of body position and Jason is tired of clipping into the side of doorways.

He’s standing on a balance board as his trainer counts to ten when several masked figures burst into the clinic.  They are cloaked in black uniforms with dark red sashes wound around their middles and tight masks on the lower half of their faces.  They might as well be carrying a banner as League of Assassins.

Jason hops off the board and throws a kettlebell at one of them, aiming for the head.  He sprints for the door.  A ninja darts into his path and tries to grab Jason in a sleeper hold while the others incapacitate the clinic staff.  Jason slams them to a weight rack and breaks the hold before scrambling back to his feet.

It’s all Red Hood, the brutality Jason reaches for in the fight.  He doesn’t know why the League is here or what they want with him.  Jason hits an emergency beacon in his watch and narrowly dodges a blow dart before crashing into his next attacker.

It’s four against one (the ninja Jason clocked with a kettlebell is out cold, possibly dead).  The other assassins finish neutralizing the clinic staff and once they coordinate their attack, they overwhelm him.

The next blow dart hits its mark.

--

When the fog clears, Jason realizes he’s lost time.  A lot of time.

His body hurts.  It isn’t the general soreness of a good workout at physical therapy.  It isn’t the ache of a hard day in the garden with Alfred.  No, his whole body throbs like someone’s taken a bamboo staff to it.  Rows of burns sting and pull at the inside of his arms.  His throat is sore like he’s been screaming.

Jason recognizes his injuries as League methods of interrogation.

What the hell do they want for him?  Jason doesn’t think he’s ever spoken in his catatonic state, but then again Bruce never held hot iron to his forearms.

Jason is curled up on a thin pallet and he catalogs his surroundings.

He’s in a League holding cell, probably underground, definitely in Nanda Parbat.

He shudders.  The cell is cold.  The thin window along one wall lets in little light.  His clothes are gone, replaced with nondescript League robes.  His emergency beacon has long since been removed and obviously Bruce didn’t get to him before the League spirited him away.

Bruce doesn’t exactly have the best track record for timely rescues.

Jason pulls himself into a sitting position as the solid wooden door to his cell swings open.  For a single moment he holds out hope it’s Bruce come to rescue him.

“Up,” a voice says coldly from the dark.  Not Bruce, then.

Jason is hauled to his feet by two League assassins and taken into a specialized chamber for questioning.

The good news is they haven’t even started and his interrogator is already bored with him.  Jason doesn’t know how long he’s been a prisoner of the League but it can’t be very interesting torturing someone who can’t barely understand you, let alone respond.  He still fails to muster any sort of professional sympathy.

They secure him to a chair by his wrists and ankles, his forearms twisted to face upward.

The assassins leave him in the company of two other League members.  Well, one and a half.  The lead is his interrogator—a man Jason vaguely recognizes but cannot confidently put a name to.  He’s isn't one of Talia’s men.  Then there is the assistant who passes him various implements of torture and looks to be a child.  They child wears a mask over his nose and mouth as well as a dark hood as is League custom, but the man regards Jason openly with a smile.

“Welcome back,” he says, cupping the side of Jason’s cheek in a mimicry of affection before delivering a loud smack.

The interrogator asks him about his resurrection.  Jason, ears ringing, does not respond.  Privately, he thinks they should really avoid adding to his head trauma if they want any answers out of him.  The young assistant brings a switch to beat him.  A familiar song and dance.

The chamber is a dark room with a low fire burning on a stove in the corner.  It’s far enough away that Jason can’t feel its warmth, but close enough it never leaves his field of view.

He chooses his moment carefully.

He waits for the assistant to escalate.  When he goes to the stove and pulls out an iron, Jason makes his move.

“The Joker,” he rasps.  The assistant startles, nearly dropping the iron, but Jason keeps his eyes on the interrogator.  The man’s eyes narrow at the boy in annoyance before turning his focus to Jason.  “He gave me something before he killed me—said he—he wanted to do it again and again.”

It’s a lie but it’s a lie to buy Jason time.  Let the League and the Joker hunt each other down.

The interrogator asks him more questions.  Jason buries two leads for him.  It won’t take a detective to figure out he’s alluding to the Joker getting his hands on some form of Lazarus water.

“He cut me open with a curved knife that glowed,” Jason says.  “That’s all I remember.”

“What do you mean it glowed?” the interrogator asks.  He turns the hot iron in his hands and Jason keeps his eyes locked on it.

“I don’t remember,” Jason pleads.  The interrogator brings it closer to him and Jason doesn’t have to fake his flinch.  “It was a curved blade with a dark stone handle that glowed green.  I think there was some writing on it but it wasn’t in English.  Sometimes he would dip it in the water before he cut me.”

Jason hopes the man recognizes the description as a mythical blade the League uses to cause injury while preserving life.

“How long was this blade?”

What, was Jason supposed to bust out a ruler when the Joker was supposedly murdering him with a legendary weapon?  “Longer than you,” he grumbles and the interrogator backhands him but chuckles and puts the iron away.

The assistant scurries from the room but the interrogator stays to watch Jason.  His scrutiny doesn’t leave Jason any room to slip his bonds.  Not for the first time, Jason wishes he was able to call for the All-Blades.  Two mythical flaming swords wouldn’t solve all his problems but they would be a good start.

The interrogator escorts Jason back to his cell eventually.  He doesn’t know how long his lucidity is going to last but he also knows that the League will never let him fully heal as a prisoner.  His best bet of escape is before they realize he’s more than Bruce Wayne’s zombie kid whose story is full of shit.  So convinced are they of Jason’s helplessness, he isn’t bound when he’s returned to his quarters.

Jason waits for the interrogator to open the door then he strikes, slamming the man’s head hard into the doorframe and then pulling the door closed over him.  Jason hears a sickening crack of his skull and the man stays down.  Jason doesn’t check if he’s breathing, just hauls the body into his cell and starts to strip it.

His fine motor control still sucks but League robes are easy to pull on.  He searches for the ring of keys the man used on the door and pulls it free, securing it to his own belt.  There’s a set of lockpicks and a small blade.  Jason leaves the picks but tucks away the knife.

He makes an approximation of a League face mask for his nose and mouth and dons the interrogator’s hood.  Then he shoves the man’s body into a corner and throws his dirty cell blanket over him.  That should buy him some time.

Jason could make his way around Nanda Parbat blindfolded.  It takes him a moment to figure out which set of holding cells he’s in and then he makes a bee-line to Talia’s rooms.  If he’s going to escape, he needs supplies and Talia supplies are the best.

The problem is finding a way into her rooms.

Jason sticks to the passages he knows will have the fewest people around midday.  He adopts the light-footed gait of the assassins, sticking what shadows he can find and ducking into alcoves.

Talia’s rooms are on the other side of the compound but the good news is the lowest security is during the middle of the day and Jason can use it as an avenue of escape.  After all, who would break into the Daughter of the Demon’s quarters in broad daylight?

Jason drops in through a window and listens for movement in the rooms.  This time of day, Talia will be conducting meetings or training in the salles.  When Jason’s doesn’t hear anything, he goes straight to her weapon-chest.

Talia really does have the best supplies.

Jason withdraws his sword and scabbard; the same one she gifted him in another life.  The weight is familiar when he fastens it to his hip.  Jason looks for money next.  He won’t have time to assemble any documents so he needs enough to bribe his way at least as far as—

A flutter of movement catches his eye and Jason draws his sword in time to block a knife attack.  Jason’s grip is still weak and the child almost gets past his guard.

The interrogator’s assistant snarls and launches himself forward.  Jason catches him with a kick to the chest and listens to the air leave his lungs.  He drops his sword and darts past the boy.  Jason doesn’t need grip strength to lock the child into a sleeper hold, using the bend of his elbow to squeeze the side of his neck until he passes out.  The child tries to stab the knife back into him but Jason has him in a blood choke and he’s out in a matter of seconds.

Jason holds the choke a few moments longer, just enough to make sure the child isn’t faking it but not long enough to cause brain damage.  Jason drops the boy’s body from the floor and pulls his mask down.

“Oh fuck me,” Jason mutters.

Damian was the interrogator’s assistant?  It must have been part of Ra’s training.  Talia would never allow it.

Jason’s brain doesn’t handle numbers well but Damian looks younger than Jason remembers from his time in the League.  Talia used to task him with watching over Damian, sometimes helping him train in hand to hand before he was sent to the Pit.  Jason purposefully does not process that Damian was the one to torture him.  If anything, he just passed the torture implements to the interrogator.  Barely torture if you think about it, which Jason does not.

Jason doesn’t know how long he has to figure out what to do with Damian but he knows the longer he stays in Nanda Parbat, the more dangerous things become.

“This is such a fucking bad idea,” Jason tells himself as he bends down to pick up Damian.  He is small.  Jason’s injuries protest but it would be possible…

He thinks about it for ten seconds then decides to grab all the money he can fit in a bag, several ration packs, and kidnaps Damian out the bedroom window.

--

Jason is running on pure adrenaline by the time he makes it past the walls of Nanda Parbat.

Which means of course Damian picks that moment to wake up and start fighting like a feral racoon.

“Unhand me!” the boy cries, scratching at Jason's face despite their very precarious position on the mountainside.

Jason needs more distance between them and the high towers before he can deal with this child.

“Damian, shut up.  I’m taking you to your father,” Jason says.  Damian stops struggling for a moment and regards Jason with suspicion.  “The Batman, you know he’s your dad?  I’m not too early on that, right?”

“The Batman of Gotham,” Damain says with reverence.  “He really sent you?”

Good to know the hero worship starts early.  “Something like that,” Jason says vaguely.  “Think of this as a training mission.  We need to get to Gotham but right now we getting as much distance from the League as possible.”

Damian’s eyes are wide.  “It’s a test.”

Jason winces.  Well, it’s not like this is going to be the worst emotional damage Damian gets.  “Yes, it’s a test.  The test is to see if you are fit to inherit the mantle of Robin but you're already behind from your attack on the rooms.”

A solemnity settles over Damian.  If he weren’t so young and Jason not currently running for his life, it would be funny.

Jason feels the fog gathering at the edge of his awareness.  “Oh fuck, not now,” he says, giving his head a hard shake.  He puts Damian on the ground.  It’s cold in the Himalayas but the thick snows of winter are all melted and the pass Jason angled them into gets good light.

“Damian, listen to me.  This is important,” Jason says.  “I get confused sometimes and I might not know where we are or what we’re doing.  When that happens, you’re in charge of the mission.  Understand?”

Damian looks up at him with wide eyes before nodding in determination.

“Okay, we probably only have a few more minutes until you’re in charge,” Jason says.  He can’t believe he’s going to trust their escape to a child.  But the fog is gathering fast.  “Right now we need distance.  I’ll follow your lead, just get us as far away from here as you can.”

--

Jason is… pleasantly surprised to find them still alive when he wakes.  They’re in a small outcropping of rocks, his League robes repurposed to block the entrance of their small cave.  Damian is chewing on a bar from the ration pack, looking surly.

“Damian, status report,” he says.

Damian startles and turns to him.  “It’s been two days,” he says with a hint of accusation.  “We are nearing a town and will need to find more supplies, specifically food.  You were very stupid in the things you grabbed.”

“We were in a time crunch,” Jason defends.  Damian gives him an update on their supplies as well as the distance gained from Nanda Parbat.  Jason is reluctantly impressed with the little assassin.

--

They make a week.

They swap clothes, resupply, and never stop moving.

It’s clearly taking a toll on Damian.  He’s still a child and Jason knows he’s pushing him too hard, but they have no other choice.

Jason ducks into the first internet café he sees and talks Damian through sending a message to Barbara.  He trusts she’ll decrypt the email enough to get a location but Jason knows better than to forward her their travel plans.

Damian starts to sniffle after a few days after the first town.  He’s never been out of Nanda Parbat and the long travel days and unfamiliar environment are putting too much strain on his underdeveloped immune system.  Jason feels his forehead and figures they have about a day until the fever sets in.

Loathe as he is to stop moving, he finds them a room for the night and forces Damian into bed.  He passes an uneasy night as his bedside.

“You should keep going,” Damian says the next day, eyes glassy and fever burning through him.

“You need to rest, Damian,” Jason says because if his fever doesn’t break soon, they will be in serious trouble.  Damian coughs miserably and Jason helps him sip some ginger tea.

“Why are you being nice to me?” Damian whines.  “I’m the reason we can’t keep moving.”

Jason knows it’s probably the fever talking, but it’s a valid question.  At first, Jason wants to say it’s because no child should be subjected to education at the hands of Ra’s Al-Ghul.  But Jason wouldn’t have taken a random child from the League.

“You’re my brother, Damian,” he says.  “I’m responsible for you.”

 Jason checks his temperature again.  Still high.  He leaves to try and find some medicine, grasping at threads of memory for enough language to communicate.  He exchanges cash for some dried roots and more tea.  It eats into the remainder of their savings but Jason can’t leave Damian to the League.  He’ll sell his sword in the morning.

“Shh, you’ll wake him.”

Jason freezes in the doorway.  Damian is still sweating out his fever where Jason tucked him in but Talia sits perched on his bedside, gently carding her fingers through his hair.

Jason sets the bag of medicine down on the table by the door.  He considers running but there’s no way Talia doesn’t have the building surrounded.  Sometimes you just know when you're beaten.

“Talia.”

“Jason.”

She says his name like a stranger.  In this lifetime, he is.

She stands from Damian’s bedside and stalks towards him.  When she’s a few footsteps away, she darts forward and buries a knife in Jason’s stomach.

“You think you can break into my home?  You think you can steal my son?” she hisses in his ear.

“You stole me first,” Jason says softly.  He looks down at the blade in his middle.  Huh, the handle really does glow green.  He thought Talia might have made it up as part of the legend.

Talia withdraws the curved blade and slams in into Jason again, higher.  The force of it staggers him back.

“My father thinks you cheated death,” she says.  She twists the blade and Jason groans.  “By the time I’m done with you, death will be a gift.”

--

When Talia kills him, she does not do it quickly.  She drags it out for days of agony.  Where the Joker was unhinged violence, Talia is control and suffering.

Jason tries to retreat into the fog.  She does not let him.

--

When Jason wakes in his casket, it’s with a sigh of relief.

He didn’t know if he would wake again.  But Talia was true to her word.  Jason welcomed death at the end.

He wakes with the same injuries he remembers from his previous resurrection but with none of the excruciation of Talia’s table.  He simply lays there a moment to luxuriate in the feeling.

Tie pin.  Belt buckle.

This time he’s careful to make the hole in the casket lower so less dirt gets on his face.  The casket is too large for him anyway so he can just shove his body down toward the bottom of it once he has enough room dug into the soil to climb out.

Jason discovers climbing out of his grave is not any easier the third time.

He lays in the dirt beneath his stone angel and lets the storm rage above him.

He has none of the damage Talia wrought on his body but also gone are the benefits of his year of extensive physical therapy.  Jason lays there exhausted.  He can already feel the fog beginning to gather.

He wants to go back to the Manor and crawl into Bruce’s bed and listen to his father tell him nothing will ever hurt him again.  He wants Alfred to make him a cup of hot chocolate, for Dick to reteach him summersaults, and for Tim to show him his new batarang design.  He wants to watch Damian spend an hour coaxing a bird to eat from his hand.

But what Jason needs is a Lazarus Pit.

The idea of going back to Talia is unconscionable, especially right after she killed him.  Then again, Bruce also killed Jason in one lifetime then nursed him back to health the next.  Talia was the one who originally put him in the Lazarus Pit, restoring his mind if not his sanity.

Jason didn’t realize the influence the Pit had over him until he resurrected with it gone.  Just like it was hard to see the progress of his physical therapy until he was sent to the past without it.  Jason thinks he could manage without the Lazarus Pit if he had a normal life.  His family looked after him.  But Ra’s is obsessed with immortality and once he gets word of Jason’s resurrection, the League will hunt him down again.  Could he really hide the rest of his life in the Manor?

Jason needs to get moving.  If he stays at his graveside, the groundskeeper will find him again and then Bruce will take him in at the hospital.  What did he do the first time?  Jason thinks he tried to find his old apartment in Crime Alley.

He pulls himself to his feet and starts walking.

The fog is close but with a destination in mind, his body should keep going.  Jason wonders what happened to the world in his last resurrection.  Did Damian recover from his fever?  Did Barbara ever find he was taken by the League?  Do they stop existing every time Jason wakes back up in the past or does the world keep turning without him?

Do they miss him when he’s gone?

Chapter Text

Jason wakes up in his casket and—wait, what?

He runs his hands over the silk fabric that overlays the wooden casket.  No, this isn’t right.

Jason tries to remember the last thing he was doing.  It was winter.  He was curled up in the dilapidated office building he sheltered in, settling in for the night.  It was snowing and he was thinking about how in another universe, he and Bruce were walking the grounds of the Manor.  He thought it was the memory keeping him warm.

“Did I… freeze to death?”

Like the 1978 version of the Oregon Trail?  Like the bad guy in The Shining?

Jason slams his head back in frustration before remembering fuck, head injury, he really shouldn’t be doing that.

Faced with the futility of crawling out of his grave, Jason feels so tired.  His casket is warm and dry and once he breaks out of it, he knows it’ll still be raining and he’ll be wet and miserable.  He just made it through half the winter on the streets.  He’s so tired of feeling cold.

Jason decides it can’t hurt if closes his eyes just this once.  He’s been down there too long anyway.  The lack of oxygen is already starting to make him feel sluggish.

So he goes back to sleep.

--

When he finishes climbing out of his grave, Jason starts the long trek back to Gotham City.

He reflects on what went wrong during his last resurrection.  Jason remembers waking up, making it back to Crime Alley, and living on the streets there.  Most of his days were spent focused on finding enough food to get by.  He purposefully kept away from anyone else on the street, going so far as to avoid barrel fires and common squatting buildings.

The lack of connections was probably why he didn’t make it through the winter.  Jason is soaked with rain but he made it out of his grave with both his shoes on this time.  Learned that lesson on the last resurrection.  It’s a long walk back to Gotham.

He will have to swap out his clothes as soon as possible.  Even soaked through, the wet suit is a dead giveaway he doesn’t belong.  Then Jason will focus on building connections on the street, so he can survive the winter.

That’s fine.  When he’s not catatonic, Jason will be downright sociable--

He’s so distracted by the walk and the storm and his plans that he misses the car speeding around the corner, right up until he crashes into its windshield.

--

Jason wakes up not in his casket but in a hospital bed.

Someone is in the room with him.

“B?” he asks.

“Hey, buddy, you’re at Mercy Hospital,” a kind voice says.  Jason doesn’t recognize it but he knows something is wrong.  He was in Gotham General last time, not Mercy.  “Can you tell me your name?”

Jason’s head swims for the details.  Between the drugs and the injuries, he doesn’t last more than a few seconds.

--

It takes several more snippets of consciousness for Jason to piece together the hospital hasn’t contacted Bruce.  They haven’t contacted anyone.

No one from his family sits at his bedside and reads him books.  Instead, a rotating cast of nurses explains what they’re giving him and if his injuries are healing.

Jason slips into the fog when they realize he’s awake.  He’s careful not to ask for Bruce.

The fine medical staff at Mercy does their best to patch him up.  Jason is a John Doe to them.  They put up a helpful whiteboard at the foot of his bed that one of the nurses writes the date on every morning.  Jason’s brain can’t unscramble it but he appreciates the smiley face.

He doesn’t know if it’s weeks or months but he’s fading in and out of sleep when a nurse comes by to check his vitals.

“I’m going to miss having you around, Johnny,” the nurse says, his voice deep and soothing.  Marcel is one of Jason’s favorite nurses.  He always brings him an extra popsicle on his meal tray.  “My best patient by far.  You never complain about the food, you don’t cuss us out.  Patient of the Year, as far as I’m concerned.”

Jason wonders if there is some sort of certificate.  Does he walk across a stage to receive it like a diploma?

“But with your body mostly healed up, Sunnyside is a better fit for you,” Marcel goes on to say.  “Got some fancy grant money.  Plenty more space for you to heal your head up out there.”

Jason tries to remember the long evenings Alfred would spend with him at the kitchen table, quizzing him on the map of Gotham.  Before his Robin days, Bruce would go on patrol with Dick and Alfred would help him memorize the city map.

Sunnyside Assisted Living rings a very distant bell.  Jason figures it was only a matter of time before he’s moved to a different hospital.  But Sunnyside is located outside of Gotham’s borders which means it is time for Jason to make his next move.

Jason mapped his escape plan out weeks ago.  At least, he’s pretty sure it’s been weeks.  Every day, the nurses take him to walk a couple of laps around the hospital.  It means Jason has a solid idea of the layout.

He waits for a suitable distraction and gets one when a Fear Toxin attack has every hospital in Gotham overflowing.

Jason gets out of bed and gets to the locker room the nurses change in.  With all hands on deck for the influx of violent and hallucinating patients, the locker room is understandably empty.  Jason feels a little bad sifting through them until he can swap his paper gown out for a t-shirt, sweatpants, and jacket too big for him.  He grabs a pair of shoes and Jason slips out of the hospital during the chaos, dumping the paper gown in the trash on his way out.

He doesn’t take any money from the nurses.  He feels bad enough taking the jacket.  But Jason returns to the streets to face another winter.

--

The highest social currency for making friends with kids on the street is food.  Jason forages what he can and steals what he needs otherwise.  The jacket from the hospital is big enough Jason can shoplift full meals from the shitty gentrified grocery store that cropped up too close to the Alley.

He tries not to let his catatonia drive too often.  Jason is worried he might run into Batman on the streets, given how close he stays to the Alley.  He catches sight of him once, dispatching a gang offloading cargo near the docks.  Jason winces when Bruce kicks one in the chest hard enough to drop him off the top of a shipping container.  Batman’s fighting isn’t the controlled use of force Jason remembers.  He’s fighting to hurt.

The appearance of Tim’s Robin does a little to mitigate the issue.  Jason keeps his distance but he sees a flash of red and yellow leaping over a rooftop and he knows Tim is filling in.

But Batman and Robin can’t be everywhere and it’s a cold night that winter when Jason gets jumped.

He is standing by a barrel fire sharing some bread he got from the dumpster behind the Italian place that throws out all their food waste wrapped in tin foil.  Jason is pretty sure the restaurant is a front for the mob but hey, people contain depths, and the kitchen staff never mind him digging around their dumpster.

Three men enter the alley and Jason marks them as henchmen, past or future.  It normally wouldn’t be a problem but Jason’s been feeling foggy all day.  He shakes his head out and tries to focus.  Jason needs to know if these guys are a threat to his friends.

One of them says something to him but Jason doesn’t catch it.  The guy takes him by the shoulder and Jason roughly shrugs him off.

“Leave the kid alone,” someone by the barrel fire says.  Paulie?  Jason sometimes sits with her and her son.  “He’s a good kid.”

“I didn’t say he wasn’t good, just want to see what he’s got there,” the henchman says, grabbing Jason again.

Jason ducks his arm and snaps his fist forward into the guy’s nose.  He cries out and goes to grab Jason.  It’s a slow move and Jason grabs his arm and executes a Nightwing-perfect flip over him, giving him the opening to kick the guy’s legs out from behind and send him sprawling.

Jason dispatches the other two in a similar fashion, the whole gang turning to run out of the alley.

As they’re running away, Jason hears one of them tell the others, “I’m telling you, that was some Robin bullshit.”

Jason’s ears perk up.  Is this how Talia found him the first time?

He stays close to that alley for the next few weeks.  It’s a difficult game to play when half-catatonic, but Jason balances watching the alley without looking like he’s expecting someone.  It means he spends most of his time climbing questionable fire escapes.

When Talia’s sleek black car makes a turn around the corner, Jason grins.  He briefly considers following it and making a bid for her tires, but his fine motor control isn’t up for loosening lug nuts.  Instead, he drops down the fire escape and adopts an ambling path designed to take him into the route of Talia’s town car.

--

Nanda Parbat is different under Talia’s protection.  Jason wears robes in her colors and can go anywhere in the compound.  She even regifts him his sword.

It isn’t the same as his physical therapy sessions at the clinic, but Talia trains Jason in martial arts and swordsmanship.  She hires tutors for his other subjects.  Jason works his body harder than he’s worked in years but the muscle memory of it comes back to him.  Talia glows with pride when he throws a fully grown man over his back and slams him to the training mats.

On his foggier days, Jason shadows Damian.

He and Damian don’t have much time alone together during the day.  Damian’s education is managed by both his mother and his grandfather so he attends lessons Jason does not.  Damian is still young and most of Talia’s lessons for him have to do with balance and meditation.  He has private tutors for several academic pursuits followed by even more lessons in fencing and archery.  It’s enough to make Jason’s head spin.

Ra’s Al-Ghul’s lessons have a distinctly different focus.  Damian is training with a kukri which looks suspiciously like the knife Talia used to kill Jason in his last life.  Jason hovers at the back of the training salle and watches an instructor demonstrate proper form on a lunge.  Damian handles the curved knife beautifully.

The lesson progresses to a khanda which is a longer sword with two sharpened edges and a blunt square tip.  Jason recognizes it from his own lessons and frowns.  It’ll be too heavy for Damian.  The instructor demonstrates how to make a pommel strike with the sword but when Damian tries to replicate the motion, his movements are wobbly and the strike hits weakly.

Jason can see Damian’s frustration.  The instructor snaps at him and demonstrates it again.  Damian glowers and tries the move several times but can’t get enough power in the swing.  The instructor smacks him on the head.

It isn’t a hard strike but Jason is across the room in a heartbeat, his own sword drawn.

“Touch him again, I take your hand,” Jason says.  Damian looks at him in surprise.  Jason never interrupts his lessons with Talia.

The instructor lashes out with his khanda.  He uses a move he learned from Talia to sidestep the strike and slams the outer flat of his hand into his windpipe.  It sends the instructor to the ground wheezing.

“Lesson’s over, Damian,” Jason tells him, turning to the door.

Damian rushes to put his sword away and walks with Jason back to Talia’s quarters.

--

He’s in the fog for a while after that.

--

Jason surfaces from the Lazarus Pit gasping for air and choking on rage.

Everywhere he looks, the world is drowning in green.

Someone tries to grab Jason and he snaps their neck.  He doesn’t even register it.  One second someone is grabbing him and the next they’re a corpse on the ground.

Jason tears through the room until he’s the only one left standing.  Jason is soaked in blood from his elbows to his fingertips.  It coats the bottom of his robes.  Exhausted and horrified, with no one left to kill, Jason falls to his knees.  That’s when Talia comes for him.

Jason is shaking when she helps him up.

“Shh, I’ve got you,” she says softly, bringing him to her quarters.

“No,” he says and pulls away.  “I don’t want Damian to see me.”

“It’s all right, Jason,” she assures him, keeping a firm grip on his arm as she steers him down the darkened hallways.

There’s a bath already waiting for him and Talia leaves Jason to get cleaned up.  The Lazarus Pit wiped the scars from his body but Jason feels filthy under the gore of his fight.  He washes the blood from his hands and finds a piece of tooth in his hair.  He drains the filthy water from the tub and pulls on the red robes Talia left for him before venturing out.

He’s never been in this section of her quarters before.  He wanders around looking for Talia and comes upon a private sitting room.  It’s lit by a few red lamps scattered around the space, decorated with heavy carpets and low tables.  Jason picks up a book left on one of them.  The cover is green with golden filigree on the border.

Antigone, he reads from the cover.

Jason grips the edges of the book tightly.  He holds his breath and turns to a page marked by a piece of ribbon.

All these men would tell you they thought it well,
if you had not locked their tongues with fear.
But a tyrant says and does what he pleases.
That’s his great joy.

Lazarus green recedes from his vision.  Jason’s hands tremble as his eyes trace the words.  He can read again.

“You remind me of her,” Talia says.

Jason snaps the book closed and turns to face her.  Talia approaches slowly from the shadows.

“Antigone,” she continues.  “She wasn’t afraid to do what needed to be done.”

“She died for it,” Jason says because he remembers the story.

“She was killed for it,” Talia corrects.  “It was Creon’s duty to look after her.  But it was his orders that killed her.”  Talia takes a seat on the low carpet and gestures for Jason to do the same.  He carefully lowers himself down.  “Jason, what do you remember?”

Jason considers what to reveal.  “I remember the Joker killing me in the warehouse,” he says.  “The rest of it is hazy.  I remember you have a son.”

“Damian, yes,” she nods.  “You’re somewhat of a protector for him.  I would have liked to let you recover naturally, Jason, but unfortunately my father does not have my patience.  He issued me an ultimatum and you were to be sent away.”

Something in Jason’s chest seizes at the idea of being abandoned again.  Talia plays on that fear, winding a web of manipulation around him.  She probably left the book out for him on purpose.  The only reason Jason recognizes her tactics is because he’s seen it before.

“The sad truth is your death remains unavenged,” Talia tells him.  Jason stiffens as he feels the Lazarus rage well up inside him.  Unlike the steady rise of the fog, the Lazarus Pit hits him with a tsunami of emotion.  “A new Robin flies by your father’s side.”

Forgotten.  Replaced.  Unavenged.  The words all swirl around Jason’s head and he struggles to find himself and pull away from the Lazarus influence.

He looks down at the copy of Antigone.  He remembers Alfred explaining to him the history of the Theban plays.  He would perform scenes from them while Jason acted out the Chorus lines.  He played the Watchman when Alfred delivered Creon’s speech and Bruce applauded them after.

The memory helps keep the Lazarus haze at bay.  Jason thinks about the play’s plot.  Antigone buries her brother’s body and is sentenced to death by her adoptive father.  Creon realizes the errors of his ways and goes to save Antigone.  But he’s too late and she’s already dead.  Alfred explained it’s all part of a curse.

Jason doesn’t think his resurrections are a curse.  He thinks they’re a chance to get things right.

It all went wrong when he assumed the mantle of Red Hood.  Jason was consumed in his pursuit for revenge.  He obsessed over it, created the perfect plan, but in the end, Bruce killed him.  Then when he tried to return home after his resurrection, Jason tried making peace with his family and ended up killed by Talia.

He needs a different path.

“What is it you want, Jason?” Talia asks cloyingly.

Jason wants to try again.  Maybe he needs a life that isn’t defined by his relationship to Bruce.

Jason shifts to his knees.  He lowers his head to Talia and takes her hand.  It’s a League show of fealty.  “Train me instead.  Make me a weapon of the League or a shield for your son.  Just don’t send me back to Gotham.”

--

Talia takes Jason’s declaration in stride.

The League isn’t safe for him so she sends him to train with allies far from Nanda Parbat.  Damian isn’t permitted to see him since he emerged from the Lazarus Pit.  Jason wishes they could have said goodbye.  But when he unpacks at the first training site, he finds a familiar kukri slipped in his bag and smiles.

Jason spends a few weeks with every instructor training in fields from acrobatics to espionage.  He remembers some of the lessons from the last time Talia trained him, but most of the instructors are different.  She never sends him to learn the All-Blades.

The Lazarus Pit is still close.  After so long without its influence, sometimes it surges up and threatens to drown him.  One of Jason’s martial arts teachers tries to feed into it.  Jason accidentally kills him and calls Talia in the middle of a breakdown.  She talks him through disposing of the body.

Jason trains with a firearms instructor specialized in sniper rifles.  Guns come back to him faster than most of his other weaponry skills.  Jason matches them shot for shot in a contest that lasts for hours.  It only ends when they pull him into a rough kiss and ask, “How old are you?”

For the first time in years, the number readily comes to mind.  With his repeated resurrections, the answer is closer to twenty-one, but Jason says “Nineteen” and proceeds to enjoy demonstrating his new fine motor control.

Talia sends him across the world and this time Jason actually enjoys it because he isn’t drowning in rage.  The raw beauty of the Himalayas will always be unmatched, but Jason trains in horseback on the Mongolian steppe.  He practices shoplifting in Moroccan souks.  He pets the world’s friendliest cow in the Swiss Alps when he’s supposed to be learning how to paraglide.

Each lesson is a few weeks, then he checks in with Talia.  Sometimes she sends him a location where they meet up for tea and she gives him a book to read and discuss.  Meeting with her is also the only way to pass messages to Damian.

Turns out Talia loves poetry.  Jason knows this because Damian writes him long letters complaining about it constantly.  She believes in the importance of a creative outlet but Jason takes pity on Damian and picks him up some colored pastels when he passes through France.

Jason finishes a brutal two-week course on explosives when Talia sends him a meting point in London.  He boards a plane with a passport for Jason Rilke because Talia is making fun of Jason’s last poetry analysis.  He’s fully prepared for their Neruda discussion though.  His notes might smell like gunpowder but he’s ready.

They share tea at a private café.  It’s raining, which Jason thinks is apt for London, but it does nothing to diminish the view of the wide window in front of them.  They sit in high wing-back chairs and share a tray of sandwiches and pastries that remind Jason of the snacks Alfred prepared him after school.

“Do you think I’ll have time to take the train to Edinburgh?” Jason asks, turning over the collection of Scottish poetry Talia expects him to read by their next meeting.

“You can take as much time as you need,” Talia responds.  “Your last instructors deem you ready for graduation.  Next will be your… thesis defense.”

“Can I choose the topic?”

“I will entertain suggestions,” Talia says, leaning back in her chair.

“Chemo.”  Jason remembers the way he leveled Blüdhaven.  He isn’t ready to set foot back into Gotham yet, but he won’t let that happen again.

Talia frowns.  “Chemo is being scouted for the Society,” she says.  “Some might oppose.”

“Make it a tryout, then,” Jason says.  “Whoever survives can be inducted.”

Jason knows Talia is a member of the Secret Society of Supervillains, the community response to the Justice League.  Jason stands by the belief the Injustice League would’ve been a better name, but Talia doesn’t pay him for branding advice.

He can see Talia isn’t sold on the idea so Jason doesn’t press it.  “Just keep it in mind,” he requests, taking another sip of his tea.

Talia changes the subject.  “Damian is starting a new school as well.”

“That explains why he didn’t send a letter to me,” Jason says.  He’s surprised Talia would let Damian outside of the League, though.  Unless it was no longer safe for him.

“He’ll be studying with his father,” she tells him, carefully watching for Jason’s reaction.

Jason frowns.  He supposes the timeline makes sense.  In his first life, he was already consolidating the criminal element of Gotham as Red Hood which means Damian would have just been sent to live with Bruce.

“Gotham isn’t safe,” he says instead.  Look what happened to me, goes unspoken.

“The safest place for him now is by his father’s side.”  Talia doesn’t sound happy about it and neither is Jason.  “Communication with him will be easier for you now.  He has a phone.  I’m sure a call from you would be much appreciated.”

She passes Jason the information.  He brought a new sketchbook for Damian and he sighs but at least he knows where to send it.

Chapter Text

For his graduation, Talia doesn’t send him after Chemo.  She sends Jason after the owner of an illegal gold mine in Ghana.  As far as assassinations go, it's nothing to write home about.  It only takes Jason a week to scope out the location and finish the job.  Talia tells him there’s no shame in a clean kill.

She asks what he wants as a graduation present and Jason replies easily.  “A full-face helmet.”

When she asks what color to paint it, Jason can’t resist a dark red.

Jason continues to show no interest in revenge on Batman or returning to Gotham, so Talia points him outward.

He moves from contract to contract, steadily building a name for himself.  Talia occasionally integrates him into teams with other League affiliates so he gets experience working in groups.  It’s nothing like when Jason helped Dick out on the Titans.  Working with other thieves and hired killers doesn’t build an environment of trust, but it grows his professional reputation.

Between jobs, Jason devours books and travels to burn his ill-gotten commissions.  He sends Damian souvenirs from his travels once a month with varying degrees of thoughtfulness.  He gets a piece of nephrite jade carved in Aotearoa and Jason wraps it with a tracker in a sturdy leather cord that will fit easily under Damian’s clothes.  Then he finds the ugliest lucky-cat in a Tokyo junk shop and ships it to Damian too.

In exchange, Damian texts Jason’s array of burner phones.  Jason thinks Damian is trying too hard to sound unimpressed with his new life, but he seems to be settling in just fine.  For anything regarding vigilante work, Damian writes coded letters to him and passes them through Talia.

Damian is insulted Bruce won’t let him assume the mantle of Robin, insisting he’s too young and patrolling with Tim instead.  He does get to train in the cave and will probably be out on patrol soon.  But in the mean time, Damian brainstorms ways he can usurp Tim and Jason tries to warn him League methods of establishing dominance won’t impress his father.

To emphasize the point he sends Damian a text from his new burner that reads NO FRATRICIDE, DAMIAN.

--

Jason keeps tabs on the whole Bat family, ostensibly for Damian’s sake.  Highlights include Tim’s rise to power as one of Forbes’ 30 Under 30.  The magazine uses a photo of him after a truly heinous haircut and it is so bad Jason buys a physical copy to cut it out.  Barbara pioneers a biotech implant to redevelop mobility in paralyzed limbs.  Dick leaves his short-lived career as a cop and opens a gym in Blüdhaven to teach kids gymnastics.

Jason prints off articles at various libraries across the world.  He cuts them down to size and pastes them into a black notebook he keeps in his go-bag.

It’s hard to watch from afar but he can’t deny their lives are objectively better without him.

--

A year passes and Jason begins to hear grumblings among the Society about Nightwing.

Dick branched out to a new city and Nightwing’s made quite a name for himself.  Combined with his expanding role in the Justice League, it’s only a matter of time before the Society sends someone after him.

Jason remembers the devastation Chemo wrought on Blüdhaven.  He’s not going to let it happen again.

Luring Chemo into a meeting is half the battle.

While not officially a Society member himself, Jason has plenty of ties to the organization.  He works quickly, passing word through various channels that he’s making a team for a contract and needs some heavy hitters.  A ludicrously large payout gets Chemo in the door.

Jason chooses the location carefully.  With Chemo’s destructive radiation abilities, he needs to minimize any potential of civilian casualties.  He sets the meeting point in the Chernobyl exclusion zone.  The Lazarus Pit gave Jason a mild regenerative factor which means he’ll heal from the residual radiation in the zone as long as he stays out of the most heavily contaminated areas.

He checks his gear over before he hikes in.  The meeting point is a multi-level concrete parking garage.  Jason listens to the staticky clicks of a Geiger counter through his helmet as he wires in explosives on the building’s support struts.  He picks his perch.  Chemo is supposed to meet him on the second floor but Jason sets up on the roof of a building across the street.

All he needs to do is crack his shell.  Once Jason breaks it, Chemo should spill out and die.

Chemo can adjust his size at will.  Jason clocks his height through the augmented lenses in his helmet.  At 12 feet tall, the walking vat of nuclear waste makes his way into the parking garage.  Jason lines up his shot and pulls the trigger.

The rifle he dragged onto the roof is heavily modified and uses bullets large enough to drop an elephant.  The first shot catches Chemo in the shoulder and Jason curses when the monster turns.  His helmet picks up visual energy readings from him but none of them are affected by the bullets.  Jason empties several more rounds into Chemo’s neck and head, shattering his goggles but doing nothing to stagger him.  Jason slams the trigger on the explosives to collapse the parking garage.

The explosives fire together and the ground shakes as the building collapses.  Jason swaps the camera feed in his helmet and sees Chemo’s radiation signature at the center of the debris.  He isn’t moving and Jason begins to climb down from the rooftop and pick his way through the rubble.

Concrete dust still swirls in the air when Jason reaches Chemo.  Jason’s helmet runs a scan on his shell.

It isn’t broken.

An arm of toxic waste shoots out of the rubble, directly into Jason’s chest.  It launches him across the field of debris and slams him into a thick slab of concrete.  His helmet cracks against the stone hard enough Jason sees stars and the internal feed starts blaring warnings.

“You dare attack me?!” Chemo bellows, stomping over concrete slabs the size of cars.

He’s growing in size, up to 20 feet now.  The goo on Jason’s chest solidifies into a hand and begins to squeeze.  The Geiger counter in Jason’s helmet wails.

Chemo stomps closer to him.

Jason scans the debris for anything he can use.

Chemo tightens his hold and draws Jason to him, dragging him across what’s left of the garage.  Jagged rock and pieces of rebar find gaps in his body armor and scrap against him.  Chemo pulls him off the ground and lifts him close to his shell.

Jason reaches for the gun on his hip and empties a clip of piercing rounds directly into Chemo’s chest.  Through a haze of warnings, his helmet reads back no effect.

“Today you die,” Chemo snarls.

Jason drops his gun and reaches for his last weapon.  Blood runs down his arms and he hopes it’s enough.

The All-Blades flame to life in his hands.  Jason stabs them both into Chemos’s shell as hard as he can.

He feels it crack.

The blades disappear when he’s dropped to the ground.  Jason fumbles the landing and scrambles to get out of the way as Chemo starts to spill over the parking garage floor.

He staggers out of the rubble and makes it across the street.  Jason scrambles for his helmet and gets it off just in time to puke over the sidewalk.  He feels awful and Lazarus green hovers at the edges of his vision.

He manages to get a call to Talia before he passes out.

--

Talia is livid.

No, livid is an understatement.  Jason isn’t sure there’s a word in all of Talia’s poetry to accurately describe her level of anger.

They’re in a hospital in Warsaw.  Jason doesn’t know what Talia paid to get the tests done so quickly but the doctor just finished telling them the radiation from Chemo is mutating Jason’s cells at a rate his Lazarus regeneration can’t outpace.

He’s dying.

Slowly, this time.  A year or two.  More, with the right treatment.

“I’ll give you a moment alone,” the doctor says as she steps outside the private room.

Jason is struck by the absurd urge to laugh.  All that work to stay away from Gotham and he’s going to die of cancer.

“I can’t believe you were so stupid,” Talia hisses at him.  Her hands shake slightly in her lap when she speaks to him.  Jason’s never seen her this mad.  “You weren’t ready for that fight.  You think just because you’ve done these things before you know everything but you don’t, Jason.”

Her voice sounds suspiciously tight.

She takes a deep breath and composes herself.  It gives Jason a moment to process her words.

“How long have you known?”

“Known what?” she asks.  She’s swapped from anger to condescension.  “That this isn’t your first resurrection?  I suspected it from the beginning when you were frustratingly difficult to manipulate.  What happens when you die, Jason?”

“I don’t know.”

“Tell me,” Talia snaps.  He’s never seen her so effected.  Talia is always in control.  When she killed him for kidnapping Damian, she was calm and intentional with every cut.  “I need to know what to do.  Do you revive in your body?”

“I wake up in my grave in Gotham back in the past.”

Jason has never told someone what happens to him.  He tries not to think about what happens between dying and reviving.  But the looming potential of having to do it all again makes him realize nothing else he does will matter.  He’s going to die and this lifetime will be burned with the rest of them.

“What about this timeline?” Talia presses.  “Does a version of you revive here?”

Jason realizes with a start that Talia is upset at the idea of losing him.

“I don’t know,” he admits.

Talia stands and begins to pace.  “There are other Lazarus Pits.  Guarded, but not impossible to access.”

“Absolutely not,” Jason says adamantly.

Talia looks ready to fight.  Jason digs in his heels.

“I’m serious, Talia,” he says, crossing his arms.  “If this happened, if this is how I die, then it means I did the loop wrong and I have to restart it.”

“Your life isn’t wrong.” Talia balls her hands into fist and releases them just as quickly.  She takes another deep breath before continuing, “How will you be certain you’ve gotten things right?”

Jason thinks about the black notebook in his bag with the exploits of his family and how much he misses them.  He thinks about Talia’s protective fury and how different it is from the first time she used him and the second time she killed him.

“I’ll know it when I see it.”

--

Jason and Talia are staying in connected rooms at the same fancy hotel in the historical part of the city.  Jason’s phone pings with a notification.  Jason is briefly struck with the fear Damian already knows he’s dying.

He reads the message and nearly drops the phone.

Father is dead.  Please come retrieve me.

Jason’s first reaction is denial.  Bruce must be enacting some sort of plan and not thought to tell the Robins.  Batman isn’t huge on communication.  Jason pulls up the news but there is no mention of Bruce Wayne’s untimely demise so it isn’t a play for the media.

I’m on my way.  Jason sends back to him.

Then he takes a deep breath and braces for another argument with Talia.

He knocks on the door conjoining their rooms before he enters.  Talia’s looks up from her desk with red-rimmed eyes.  It’s the only indication she’s been crying.  Her composure is firmly back in place.

“I’ve just heard from Damian,” she says, putting down her phone.  “… It’s not yet safe for him to return to the League.”

“Well, he doesn’t want to stay in Gotham.”

“It isn’t up to him.  So long as the world does not know Batman is dead, Damian is still protected in Gotham.”

“News this big won’t stay quiet forever,” Jason argues.

Jason doesn’t know how to begin to process the news.  His first lifetime, he wanted Bruce to suffer so much he wished he was dead.  He created the Red Hood personae to destroy his father.  Jason never considered what he would do if Bruce died.  It was never an option.

In many ways, Bruce’s sudden death is harder for Jason to process than his own impending demise.

So Jason latches on to the problem in front of him.  If he can protect Damian, he won’t have to think about Bruce being dead.

“I’m going to Gotham,” Jason announces.

Talia looks at him sharply.  “You would spend the rest of your days in Gotham?”

This is something Jason isn’t prepared for, the idea Talia wants to look after him while he dies a slow and likely very painful death.

“The doctor said two years,” he shrugs.  “Let me spend one with Damian making sure he’s safe.  Then I’ll explain the situation and spend the rest with you.”

Talia considers his offer.  Jason already told Damian he’s coming for him.  He will be going whether Talia wants him to or not, but it’ll be much easier with her support.

Then, miracle of miracles, she acquiesces.  “One year.  And I want daily check-ins.”

“Weekly.”  Jason wasn’t caught going after that last Batmobile tire because he wasn’t willing to push his luck.  “And I’ll contact you immediately for any injures resulting in medical care.”

“Will you be expecting many injuries resulting in medical care?” Talia queries.  “Swinging from the rooftops, perhaps?”

“Whatever it takes to protect Damian,” Jason says and Talia nods in agreement.

--

Jason returns to Gotham with a duffel bag and a memorized list of safe houses.  Talia organized a fully furnished condo for him and the first thing he does when he gets there is swap the plates on the sleek black motorcycle in the subterranean garage.

The second thing he does is check the refrigerator.  It’s fully stocked.

The apartment is modern in a soulless kind of way.  At least, that’s how it feels to Jason whose fondest memories of home involve a giant gothic manor.  But as far as New Town apartments go, it’s more than adequate.

It’s evening, he’s jetlagged, and he pulls on his helmet to find his brother.

--

Jason takes the bike.  His tactical gear camouflages well with the motorcycle.  His red helmet is distinctive but Jason wears a thick jacket to hide the holsters tucked under each arm.  He also packs an extra helmet for Damian in a backpack he wears while he rides.

Damian has a tracking beacon on the necklace Jason gave him.  Jason displays the location in his helmet while he works his way through the city.

In many ways, Gotham a place Jason will always love.  Some of the storefronts changed and plenty signs swapped out neon for LEDs, but the streets are the same layout Jason memorized.  He was born in Gotham and maybe one of these days he’ll get to die there.

Damian’s tracker beacon pings around the city for most of the night.  Jason doesn’t recognize it as a patrol pattern but maybe they changed the patterns up when Bruce died.  Someone new is in the Batsuit but no one’s been able to snag a photo yet.  Barbara is too good at scrubbing security camera footage for Jason to waste his time trying to hack a system either.

It’s just past one in the morning when Damian’s beacon stops moving.  It’s possible they could be on a stakeout but that close to Monolith Square, it isn’t likely.  Jason loops the bike around and heads uptown.

Jason parks the motorcycle in an alley and looks up at the building.  He pulls the grapple gun from his holster and aims for the ledge.

--

Jason catches three birds in the middle of an argument.  They’re so focused on each other they miss Jason slipping into the shadows behind a water tank.

“I’m telling you he did it on purpose!” Tim is shouting.  He’s… taller than Jason remembers.  His uniform is different as well, all reds and yellows and black.  His unfortunate haircut is grown out and he has a familiar bo staff in hand.

“Damian, is that true?”  Dick Grayson looks all grown up as well.  He’s modified the Batsuit so he isn’t swimming in it.  Jason wonders how he tucked all his hair into the cowl.

“What happened to no names in uniform?” Damian snarks, tone dripping distain.  “It’s not my fault he doesn’t know how to check over his own gear.”

“He tried to cut my line!” Tim readies his bo staff.

“I did not!” Damian reaches for his sword.

Jason decides it’s time to intervene.

“What do we have here?” he grandstands, stepping into the light of the rooftop.

All three figures snap around to face him.  Damian is the only one who relaxes when he clocks Jason’s helmet.

“Who the hell are you?” the way Dick drops his voice to impersonate Bruce’s raspy baritone is almost enough to make Jason laugh.

“Good to see you, Batman.  Not quite as tall as I remember,” he says, swaggering forward towards them.  Damian smirks at him but Jason clocks the way Dick reaches for a batarang.  Jason comes to a halt.  One to the neck was enough for every lifetime.  “The name is Red Hood.  I have a message for the brat,” he says, inclining his head towards Damian.

For his part, Damian just crosses his arms.  “Speak, interloper.”

“Damian,” he tuts.  “What is the golden rule?”

Dick and Tim both stiffen at the use of his name.  Too bad, they shouldn’t have been saying it on random rooftops where anyone with a grappling gun and enhanced helmet could hear them.

Damian furrows his brow.  “Helmets are cool?”

“No.”

“Treat every gun like it’s a loaded—”

“No fratricide, Damian.” Jason smacks his palm loudly into the front of his helmet.  “How many times do I have to tell you?”

“It’s not fratricide if he’s not my brother!” Damian snaps at him.

“What the hell is happening?!” Tim interrupts, bo staff oscillating between Jason and Damian.  “Do you know him?”

“Tell me what you’re doing here right now,” Dick says and if looks could kill, Jason would be waking up in his grave again.

“Mom sent me to check up on baby bird over here,” he says, gesturing widely at Damian.  “Think of this as a health and wellness check.  If you fail, I’ll whisk him away for good.  Come on, Dami, let’s blow this popsicle stand.”

“Gladly.”  Damian begins to cross the rooftop towards him but Dick stops him with a hand on his shoulder.

“You aren’t dismissed yet, Robin.”

“Looks like you have all the Robins you need,” Damian says with a glare at Tim before shaking the hand roughly off his shoulder.

--

Jason makes a sufficiently dramatic exit and shoves a motorcycle helmet onto Damian’s head.

He takes them down the edge of Robinson Park, across the bridge, and over the Narrows.  Damian holds his arms tightly around Jason’s waist.  He keeps the ride winding up and down the city even though he doubts Dick or Tim is following them.  It gives Damian a chance to let off some steam.

Jason swerves the bike back and forth in the lane a little and he feels Damian laugh and tighten his arms.  He hesitates for a moment and taps Jason’s leg.  It’s a signal he and Bruce used to mean go faster. So he’s feeling at least a little better.

He turns the bike back towards his safehouse and pulls it into the private garage of the New Town condo.

“Helmets off when we’re upstairs,” Jason says because Damian is still in his full Robin costume.

They look ridiculous in the elevator but the second Damian is inside the condo door, he pulls off his helmet and his domino mask.

“There are clothes for you in the spare bedroom,” Jason tells him, gesturing towards one of the doors.  “Get dressed and meet me back in the kitchen.”

Damian didn’t grow up eating ice cream but he does like fresh fruit.  Jason works on cutting up a red pear for him.  He organizes the slices on a plate before peeling an orange for himself.

Freshly showered and in a set of green pajamas, Damian huffs his way to the table.  He takes a bite of the pear and looks at Jason.  “Will we have time to go to the Manor to retrieve my things?”

Jason shakes his head.  “We’re not leaving.”

“I thought you were here to extract me,” he protests.

“Talia said it’s still not safe in the League so I’m going to help look after you here,” Jason explains and Damian slumps dramatically in his seat.  “Now what the hell was that on the rooftop?  Did you cut Tim’s grapple line?”

“He’s not really my brother,” Damian says, crossing his arms and looking away.  “Not like you are.”

“Yes, he is,” Jason says firmly.  “Bruce took him in just like he took me in.”

“Then why are you pretending you don’t know them?” he demands.  “Why do they think you’re still dead?”

“It’s better for them if I stay away,” Jason sighs.  It’s hard to put into words exactly what he means but he tries.  “And when I was in Gotham… my whole life revolved around being Robin.  It was everything to me.  And losing it felt like losing everything.  I needed to learn who I am away from this place.”

Damian is quiet for a long time.  He picks up another piece of his pear and offers it to Jason.  He trades him an orange slice in return.  “They miss you.  Alfred still puts a plate out for you.”

Jason wonders if he puts one out for Bruce now too.

“It’s better for them if I stay dead,” Jason repeats with a sigh.  “Now do you want to stay here tonight or go back to the Manor?”

Damian crosses his arms and glares.  It would be a lot more intimidating if Jason didn’t know he adopts the same expression when he doesn’t get the last candied date.  He already changed into his pajamas, Jason asking is just a formality at this point.

“…Here,” Damian says eventually.

“Then we both better get to bed.  We’re going to need all the rest we can get to brave the Manor tomorrow.”

Chapter Text

Damian holds on to Jason while they take the bike up to the Manor.  The Manor gates are closed and Jason is faced with the indignity of buzzing in on the comm panel.  He gives the security camera a jaunty wave and then salutes one-handed when the iron gates swing open.

Jason slept poorly.  He spent most of the night planning how to keep from revealing his identity to his family.  The good news is there are several factors on his side.  First off, he was very much a corpse the last time they saw him and they have absolutely no reason to suspect he is alive.  Also, he was around 10 inches shorter and 80 pounds lighter.  He looks nothing like the teenager who ran off and got himself blown up.  The Lazarus Pit wiped away any distinguishing marks down to the small scar under his eyebrow.  Hell, Jason’s eyes are a different color.

The problem is that he comes from a family of detectives.

Bruce’s death could push things in either direction.  On one hand, Jason would be shocked if anyone this house of grief cared to look twice at Damian’s suspicious older sibling.  On the other hand, a death in the family might have memories of Jason fresh in their minds.

He parks the bike off to the side of the gravel driveway and Damian passes him his helmet, raking his fingers through his hair until it stands on end.

“You’re not even going to wear a mask?” Damian questions.

“Masks make it look like you have something to hide,” Jason says.

“You do.”

Ultimately, he decided against a mask because it doesn’t really matter.  Jason is restarting the loop in a year whether Dick or Alfred recognizes him or not.  And if they do recognize him, it’ll be good to know for the next resurrection.

Damian huffs and storms off to the main doors, pushing them open before Alfred has a chance to open them.  But instead of Alfred, Jason is greeted at the door by a hulking beast of a dog.

“Titus!” Damian chides when the dog stands on its hind legs to licks at his face.  He holds up his hand in a fist.  “Sit.”

The large black dog sits, ears perked straight up.

“Good boy.  Now shake,” Damian says and Titus-the-dog holds out a giant paw.  Damian and Titus give him twin expectant looks.  “Shake.”

“I am not your pet, Damian,” Jason says, but he does shake Titus’ paw and the dog hops up and sniffs at his pockets for a treat.

Damian smirks at Jason.  “Good boy.”

“Master Damian,” Alfred’s even tenor carries across the entry hall.  He’s using his stern voice, which means Damian is definitely in trouble and doesn’t bode well for Jason either.  “You caused quite a stir with your disappearance last night.”

“That would be my fault,” Jason says with a wave.  “Had to interview the witness and all, I’m sure you understand.”

Alfred does a double-take when he sees Jason.  He blinks several times at him and Jason keeps a carefully guileless expression on his face.  But Alfred looks speechless.  The color drains from his face and Jason worries he might faint.

Luckily, Dick comes in a moment later.

“Damian, go upstairs.  I want to talk to you,” he says.

Despite their limited interactions, Jason has seen a lot of different sides of Dick.  He’s seen him screaming down the walls of the Batcave with Bruce.  But he also remembers Dick bailing him out of school early and taking him upstate for a long weekend skiing.  It’s one of his fondest memories.  Right before Dick went off with the Titans and Jason went to Ethiopia.

He’s never seen Dick stern.  His tone sounds borderline parental, but that may just be because he’s sending Damian to his room.

“Anything you say to him you can say in front of me,” Damian crosses his arms and stands his ground.  “He’s my brother.”

“Surely Brucie didn’t think he was Talia’s first love,” Jason says to the foyer with a smirk.  Dick narrows his eyes and Jason knows he needs to get Damian out of there before things escalate further.  “I’m fine, Damian.  I want to check out your room anyway so this is your last chance to hide anything you don’t want me finding.”

That has the desired effect and Damian’s face goes through a series of emotions before he scurries upstairs to the family wing.

Leaving Jason to square off with Dick and Alfred.

The butler still looks shell shocked to see him but Dick has no such reservations.

“It sounds like you and Damian don’t keep anything from each other, including secret identities,” Dick says with a glare.

Jason shrugs amicably.  “Of course he keeps things from me.  He’s thirteen.  Kids need secrets to feel safe.”  Jason makes a show of looking around the foyer of the Manor.  The grand staircase leading up to the landing is particularly impressive.  It’s easy to remember a time he could jump from the landing to the chandelier.  “But if you’re referring to your extra-curricular activities, then yes I am well aware what you get up to.”

“Then you have us at a disadvantage,” Alfred says, gathering himself.  “Master Damian never mentioned you, Mister…”

“James,” Jason lies easily.  When Barbara runs the background check on him, it’ll match the identity Talia set up.  “Like my father.  But you can call me Jay.”

Alfred frowns, still searching his features.  Jason is careful to school his expression, keeping most of his focus on Dick who is looking at him like something he scraped off the bottom of his shoe.

“So you’re here to take Damian back to the League.”  Dick says it like he’s not giving Damian up without a fight.

Jason shakes his head.  “No.  I want to make sure he’s being taken care of here.  It’s still not safe for him in the League.  But if he’s being mistreated here then I’ll take him somewhere you and the League won’t find him.  Talia won’t like it, but she wants what’s best for him.”

“And you think a life on the run is what’s best for him?”

Jason rolls his eyes.  “Yep, you caught me.  We’re going to live out of a boxcar and solve mysteries,” he says sardonically.  “No, dumbass, he asked me to leave.”

The look on Dick’s face tells Jason that Damian hadn’t exactly asked permission before he sent that text.  Dick looks stricken.  “He what?”

Alfred clears his throat.  “Perhaps I should go prepare some tea.”  He turns to leave before casting a look back at Jason.  “You are, of course, welcome to stay for lunch.”

Jason nods at Alfred then looks Dick over.  His older brother looks tired.  His sweater hides it well but Jason can tell he’s lost weight, isn’t sleeping.  He’s taking on every burden and he’s going to burn out.  “Listen, Dick… you seem like you’re dealing with a lot right now.”

Dick’s laugh sounds a little hysterical.  “You have no idea.”

“Damian’s upbringing in the League was different than mine.  He doesn’t get stuff like this,” Jason gestures to the Manor.  “It’s not my story to tell.  But if I had to take a guess, Damian probably worried he doesn’t have a place here without Bruce’s protection.  So he’s trying to protect himself.  Can’t get kicked out if you leave first, you know?”

Dick seems to process that for a moment.  “Of course he has a place here.  He’s family.  I would never kick him out.”

Jason ignores the way his chest aches at that statement.  “You need to tell him that.”  He glances at the top of the staircase and sighs.  “I can’t believe I’m about to say this, but let me help you out.”

The look of suspicion Dick shoots him would have made Bruce proud.  But things must truly be dire because he doesn’t reject the offer immediately.  “What kind of help.”

“A custody agreement,” Jason proposes.  “Let me take Damian on the weekends.  It’ll give you time to be a real adult and not chase after his royal highness.”

“And during the week you’ll be doing what?  Solving boxcar crimes?” Dick asks wryly.

“My business in Gotham is Damian,” Jason shrugs.  “You used to patrol Blüdhaven, right?  I’m guessing part of you is going crazy leaving it to swing around Gotham again.  During the week I can keep an eye on things in ‘Haven and you can call me in if you need extra hands in Gotham.”

Dick mulls it over.  “Let me think about it.”

“Damian knows how to reach me if you need me.”

--

Jason sneaks down the staircase after briefing Damian on the new custody situation and getting introduced to every single one of his rescue animals.  Damian argues that he should be able to spend the week with Jason and the weekends at the Manor because it would cut down on the commute to patrol.

Jason argues Damian has other commitments like school and the logistics make more sense for him to stay based out of the Manor.

Damian stays in his room to finish his homework before school on Monday and Jason heads downstairs.

He pauses at the door to the kitchen, hesitating when he hears voices on the other side.

“You must forgive me, Master Dick, I’m not sure what came over me,” Alfred says.  Jason hears the clink of ceramic dishes against each other.

“What’s wrong, Alfie?”

“Too much grief and too little rest, I fear,” Alfred sighs.  The silence stretches and Jason is about to knock on the door when he hears him continue.  “For a moment… I thought it was Master Bruce walking through the door.”

Jason freezes.

“Him?” Dick asked incredulously.

“I know.  It’s just that he looks so much like Bruce at that age.  Bravado and all, I’m afraid.”

Jason doesn’t know what to think.  Does he really look how Bruce did in his early twenties?  The Lazarus Pit gave him a growth spurt and Talia’s training filled him out.  If he went down to the Cave right now, would the suit fit?

“You should take the rest of the afternoon, Alfred.  I can handle lunch.”

“Yes, perhaps that is a good idea,” Alfred says tiredly. 

Jason can’t imagine.  Bruce is dead but Jason knows he’ll see him again when he resurrects.  But to Alfred, the boy he raised isn’t coming back.  Jason’s heart aches for his grandfather, but he remains silent on the other side of the door.

Surely, it would be the crueler thing.  To come back to this family only to make them mourn him again.

He couldn’t do that to Alfred.

When he does push the kitchen door open, it’s Dick who is moving a tray of sandwiches and a pitcher of juice onto the table.

Jason clears his throat.  “Just spoke to Damian.  He’s fine with the plan to stay with me on the weekends.  I left him working on his history homework.”

“Thanks, I’ll head up to talk to him,” Dick says.  “You’re free to have some food while you wait.”

Jason counts the plates at the kitchen table and frowns.  If Alfred still leaves a plate out for him, the number is still wrong.  “Where’s Tim?”

“What?”

“Timothy Drake?  I told Damian he needs to apologize for messing with his gear last night.  I figure he can talk to him after lunch,” Jason tells him.

Dick frowns.  “He’s… not staying here at the moment.”

That doesn’t sound right.  “I thought you guys are family,” Jason says, narrowing his eyes.  “Are you fighting or something?”

“We had a disagreement.  We’re working it out… he’s just staying at the penthouse in Gotham for a bit.”  Dick leans against the kitchen island will his arms crossed.

Sounds like there’s something there for Jason to investigate but he can tell Dick’s defenses are up and prodding him will just set him off.  “Okay.  Well make sure to tell Damian we’re going to swing by ‘the penthouse’ after lunch.  He’s not getting out of it.”

--

“If I didn’t know better, I would say you’re stalling,” Jason says with a smirk.

“Tt, I did not ask for your commentary, Jay,” Damian huffs at him.  He’s staring at the door to the penthouse apartment Tim commandeered for himself.

Jason gives it another second before he leans over Damian and bangs on the door for him.

“Jay!” Damian squawks at him but quickly tries to regain his composure when he hears a flurry of activity on the other side of the door.

Tim pulls the door open a crack.  It’s dark on the inside but Jason can still see the bags under his eyes.

“What do you want?” Tim asks, eyeing Damian with suspicion.

Let it never be said Damian Al-Ghul Wayne is a coward because he squares his shoulders and looks Tim in the eye through the gap in the door.  “I’ve come to apologize, Drake.”

Tim narrows his eyes at Damian.  “Not accepted.”

He goes to close the door but Jason catches it and jams a boot into the gap to keep it open.  “He’s not done.”

Damian makes a low sound of frustration but continues.  He grinds out every word like they cause him physical pain and pushes through the rest of his apology.  “I am sorry for compromising your gear.  It was dangerous and could have led to your injury.  You are under no obligation to forgive me, but I assure you I will not do it again.”

Tim’s gaze shifts back and forth between Damian and Jason.  When he goes to close the door again, Jason lets him, only to hear the unlatching of several locks on the other side.

The door swings open the same time Tim hits an overhead light.

“You might as well come in.”

Jason takes the opportunity to take off his jacket and hang it up.  It rained on the ride over and it looks like a storm is starting outside.  Jason considers calling Alfred to pick Damian up so he doesn’t have to ride back to the Manor on his bike.

The penthouse isn’t familiar to Jason like the Manor.  He never spent any time seriously here.  Whoever designed it opted for a high contrast design, featuring heavily with blacks and whites.  The only real color in the place are the silver accents.

“You want some coffee?” Tim asks, drifting towards the kitchen.

“A little late for coffee, don’t you think?” Jason says, following behind him.

“I keep late hours,” Tim says with a hint of a smirk.

It’s strange to see Tim as an adult.  The last time Jason saw him, Tim was still chattering about the joys of being Robin to his semi-catatonic being.  Now he moves with the easy confidence of a young man, confident he’s the smartest person in the room.

Jason, still jetlagged, accepts a mug of coffee and takes a seat at the stools lined up on the kitchen island.  Damian trails him like a shadow, sitting on the stool to his right.

“Dick told me you’re sticking around for a few months, Jay,” Tim says by way of conversation, sipping at his coffee.

Jason takes a sip of it and makes a face like he just ingested pain stripper.  “Oh is that all Dick said?”

“He also asked me to run a background check on you.”

“Find anything good?” Jason asks.  It’s good Tim and Dick are still on speaking terms, even if Tim exiled himself from the Manor.  “Does my file make for an interesting read?”

“Yeah, definitely a page turner,” Tim raises an eyebrow at him.  “A real murder mystery.”

“It’s only murder if you don’t get paid.”

“That sounds inaccurate.”

Jason huffs a laugh and takes another sip of his coffee.  His face twists again.  “Damian, can you pass the sugar?” he asks and proceeded to dump several cubes into his mug.  Tim looks exceedingly smug about it.

“Jay is a skilled fighter,” Damian says in his brother’s defense.  “Richard says he’s to join patrols with us.”

“How magnanimous of him,” Tim says sarcastically.  “Especially after he grounded me and needs the extra help.”

“He grounded you?” Jason looks at Damian but he’s just as surprised to hear the news.

“He tried,” Tim says, gaze darkening.  “Short of dragging me back to the Manor and locking me in a holding cell, there’s not much he can do about it.  I’m an adult now.  I don’t need his permission.”

Jason makes a mental note that insisting you’re an adult really does make you sound like you’re still a child.  He’ll need that on his next resurrection.

Damian, however, is searching Tim’s face for something.  “This isn’t about patrol, is it?” he says, his own tone taking on a dangerous edge.

“Just because you think you can replace Bruce with Dick doesn’t mean he’s always right,” Tim says and Jason shoots out an arm to keep Damian from launching at him over the table.

“No, Drake,” Damian snaps, struggling against Jason’s grip.  “You need to give up this— this delusion!  He’s not coming back and nothing you do is going to change that!”

Damian storms out of the kitchen and slams the apartment door.  Tim takes another sip of his coffee.

He tilts his head at Jason, reminding him of a bird.  “Not going to run after him?”

“He’d just bite my head off.  I still have the motorcycle keys so it’s better to let him cool off,” Jason says, checking his pockets to make sure Damian didn’t swipe them.  It’s a testament to how angry he is that he didn’t think to grab them.

Jason sighs heavily.  “Come on then, let’s see it.”

Tim blinks at him.  “See what?”

“The murder board.”  When Tim tilts his head the other way Jason explains.  “Like on TV shows when they’re trying to find the killer?  Big whiteboard, lots of pictures tied together with red string?  Come on, if you think Bruce is alive then you definitely have a murder board.”

Tim pauses to refill his mug and turns to walk deeper into the apartment.  Jason reluctantly follows.

--

He must admit.  It’s one hell of a murder board.

For one, Tim’s forgone the whiteboard.  He pinned the photos directly on the wall like a sociopath.  Or at least like someone who’s never had to worry about a security deposit, which might be worse.

“You’ve put a lot of thought into this,” Jason says because it’s more neutral than this is what a psychotic break looks like-- trust me, I know.

“You think I’m crazy.”

“Crazy is subjective,” Jason hums, looking over the photos.  “Is that a cave painting?”

“He’s not dead.  He’s lost in time.  But I’m going to find him,” Tim says with all the devotion Jason once had for Batman and none of the anger.

“Fuck, you really are a better Robin,” Jason mutters to himself.  Louder, he adds, “I take it the others aren’t supportive of your theory.”

“You saw how Damian stormed off.  That’s nothing compared to Dick, let alone the Justice League.”

Jason reviews the photos on the wall.  There’s nothing borderline about it, Tim is fully obsessed.  And he’s clearly desperate to be believed by someone if he would trust Jay with this.

The murder board looms directly across from Tim’s bed.  But as much as Jason wants to dig into it further, he’s on limited time.  Damian is his priority.  And Jason knows with an uneasy certainty… he can’t pull Tim back from this.

“I can keep Dick off your back,” Jason offers after a long moment of consideration.  “And I can do my best to instill in Damian a semblance of morals so he leaves you alone.  But that’s all I’ve got.”

“I don’t expect any help from you, Jay,” Tim says dismissively.  He puts his mug of coffee on his desk to join the steadily growing family of dishes there.  “Everyone else might have, but I’m not giving up on him.”

Tim settles back in to work and Jason sees himself out.  Damian is still fuming but he’s no longer angrily pacing by Jason’s bike.  Jason hands him a helmet so they can go home.

--

Dick gives Jason exacting instructions on what is and is not allowed to do on his patrol of Blüdhaven.  He grills Jason on his abilities and insists on a spar to prove himself.  Damian observes and takes notes.

Jason levels him in hand-to-hand but the next round, Dick lays him out with his electrified escrima sticks.

“What are your weapon specialties?” Dick asks, extending a hand to pull Jason up from the mats.

“Firearms, explosives, and mystical dual swords,” Jason answers.  “Specifically blood magic if you’re a prude about that sort of thing.”

Dick has never looked more thankful he didn’t train with the League.  “If you’re going to use firearms, will you swap in rubber bullets?”

Jason shrugs.  “I mean, sure, but there’s not going to be any less lethal at close range.”

Dick hands him over a key to his apartment, an earpiece communicator to fit under his helmet, and a patrol plan for Blüdhaven.  In exchange, Jason promises to just report on activity for a week, using minimal intervention unless absolutely necessary.

--

Jason disassembles the earpiece and checks each piece individually for bugs.  He talks Damian through it and then Damian reassembles it.  As dubious as he is to accept any tech from Batman, Jason can’t lie.  It’s nice to hear Barbara’s voice in his ear when he steps out on his first patrol.

They don’t speak much.  Most nights, Oracle is busy running comms for Batman and Robin.  Gotham takes nearly all her focus.  And given that Jason is keeping to observations, he mainly only contacts her to check in and sign out at the end of the night.

“All quiet on the western front,” he tells Oracle, beginning his route back to Dick’s apartment where he crashes during the week.  “Hood signing off.”

“Nice work out there tonight.  Get home safe.”

Jason disconnects the comm and slips in through the apartment windows.

Blüdhaven is a smaller city than Gotham so it doesn’t take long for Jason to get a lay of the land.  Blüdhaven does, however, suck.  At least Gotham villains have panache.  In Blüdhaven, Jason watches two ominously glowing rats fight to the death over a pizza crust that a three-eyed pigeon swooped in to take while they were distracted.

He includes this in his observations which he types up on a laptop kept permanently disconnected from the internet.  He searches Dick’s apartment for a printer before just burning the file onto an old school USB drive.

--

On Saturday morning, Jason takes his motorcycle in his civilian clothes over to the Manor.  Damian’s helmet and a new jacket are tucked away safely in his backpack.

He knocks at the front door of the Manor and Damian pulls it open.

“Let’s go,” Damian says, pushing past him.

Jason grabs him by the shoulder and turns him back into the Manor.  “Whoa, not so fast.  I still need to brief Dick on Blüdhaven.”

Damian groans and drops his bag by the door.  Dick appears at the top of the stairs, looking rumpled in a robe even though Jason gave him plenty of time to sleep in after patrol.

“There’s a new kit in that bag.  Put it on,” Jason instructs Damian, handing over his own backpack.

“Do I really have to wear all this?” Damian groans, pulling out the padded jacket and overpants.

“It’s a motorcycle, Damian.  Out of uniform, of course you have to wear all of it,” Jason tells him.  Damian will be able to keep one set at the Manor and another at the New Town apartment this way.  Jason rolls his eyes at Damian and ruffles his hair.  “Put it on and I’ll let you drive down to the gates.”

Damian grins and starts to rip the tags off the new jacket.

“This is for you, Dick,” Jason says, reaching into his pocket for the USB while Damian gets dressed.  “It’s an overview of gang activity in Blüd.  Also, you don’t own a printer.  You bought the entire apartment block but you don’t own a printer?”

Dick cracks half a smile.  “It must’ve slipped my mind.”

“I’ll add it to the list of things you need along with ‘more than two metal forks’ and ‘dish soap for your two metals forks.’”

“Blüdhaven has a thriving culinary scene.”

“Yeah Detective Grayson, the pile of take-out boxes told me as much.”

Jason actually gets a laugh out of him.  It’s not much, but it’s eases some of the tension in Dick’s shoulders.  Jason passes him the USB.  “Not much to report, honestly.  Couple rival gangs, but they mostly keep out of each other’s business.  Only thing to watch out for is two of them were hired to help move something, sounds like it’s coming in through the docks.  But everything seems pretty stable right now.”

Dick gives him an incredulous look.  “You think Blüdhaven is stable?”

“I mean… yeah?”  Jason says and Dick looks at him like he’s insane.  He shoves his hands back into his jacket pockets.  “It’s only the three gangs and they balance each other.  I can, uh, destabilize it?  If that’s what you want?”  Ballpark estimate, it would take about seven assassinations but he could do it by next weekend.

“No, Jay, don’t do that.”

“Oh well, figured I’d offer,” he shrugs helplessly.  “I’ll keep an eye on the shipment situation at the docks and let you know if anything changes.”

“Sounds good,” Dick nods.  He looks over to Damian who is done pulling on his jacket and is fiddling with his motorcycle helmet.  “You got everything you need?  Your homework?  Chargers?”

“Yes, Richard, I have my homework,” Damian replies dismissively.

They stare each other down for a long moment, both wanting something but not knowing how to ask.  Jason breaks the silence when he can’t take it anymore.  “Damian, hug him so we can leave.”

Dick and Damian turn to him with matching looks of horror.

“He doesn’t have to—” Dick starts to say but Damian darts forward and gives Dick a quick embrace before stepping back.  The whole thing takes less than a second.

“Let’s go,” Damian says, putting his helmet on before anyone can comment on the heat rising on his cheeks.

True to his word, Jason lets Damian sit in front of him and drive the bike all the way to the Manor gates.  When the gates open and they switch so Jason can drive and he reaches an arm over his head to waves back at the Manor.  Jason doesn’t have his Red Hood helmet so he can’t be sure, but he thinks he sees a figure in the window wave back.

Chapter Text

Jason tries to come up with things to do with Damian on the weekend.  He’s careful to think back on Damian’s letters to avoid activities he did with Bruce.  Unfortunately, it means the zoo and the art museum are out.

He takes them to a basketball game and it’s so disastrous they leave at halftime before the other patrons decide they’re not above fighting a pre-teen.

Jason tries again with a hockey game the next day.  Damian is understandably dubious.

“I do not understand why you insist on these archaic displays,” Damian says loudly while they make their way to their seats.

Gotham’s local hockey team is called the Knights and they finished the last two seasons at the bottom of the league.  Jason is sort of hoping Damian’s predilection for helpless animals will endear him to the team.  Either way, the rink-side tickets were dirt cheap.

Damian is bundled in his motorcycle jacket and a thick sweater in deference to the chill of the hockey rink.  He looks decidedly unimpressed until midway through the first period when a player drops his shoulders crashes into the boards right in front of them, leveling his larger opponent.

Damian’s eyes light up and he’s on his feet pounding the glass and calling for retribution with the other fans.  His Knights drops gloves and the resulting fist fight leaves the ice bloody.

Jason grins the whole time.

“It’s not like other sports because the environment adds dimension to the game,” Damian says as they leave the stadium, a newly purchased Gotham Knights jersey thrown over his sweatshirt.

“Yeah, you mentioned,” Jason teases him.  He reaches over to ruffle Damian’s hair, laughing as his brother shoves him back.  “I’ll take you ice skating next weekend.”

Damian is sufficiently appeased and holds tightly to Jason when they ride to the Manor to drop him off.

--

Later that week, Jason takes the bridge from Blüdhaven to Gotham and rides the long elevator up to the penthouse.  He bangs on the door until Tim finally opens it.

It’s nine at night and it looks like he just rolled out of bed.

“What do you want?”

“Jeez, have you showered this week?” Jason says, pushing the door open.  “Are you even eating?”

“I’m eating,” Tim defends, squinting when Jason turns the apartment lights on.

“Oh my God, shower,” Jason says, shoving him towards a bathroom.  Tim’s hair is a greasy disarray and Jason is pretty sure he’s still wearing the clothes he had on when Jason visited with Damian last week.  “Then you’re going out with me on patrol.”

Tim pushes away from him.  “I am in the middle of important research—”

“If he’s stuck in time then he literally won’t notice if you take one night away from your computer to fight crime,” Jason argues and seriously considers grabbing Tim in a fireman’s carry and dragging him to the walk-in shower.

“Fine, Jay!  I’m going!” Tim grouses.

Jason rolls his eyes and sits down on the stiff living room couch to wait until he hears the spray of the shower.  He has his Red Hood helmet in his backpack and his tactical gear on under his jacket and he can’t believe they’re going to be late to a stakeout because Tim can’t get dressed in time.

Tim emerges from a cloud of steam in his uniform, hair still wet but no longer smelling like an abandoned gym locker.

“You gonna check your grapple line before we go or…?”

“You can go fuck yourself,” Tim tells him without heat as he puts on his domino mask.  “What’s this about a patrol?”

“We’re going to Blüdhaven to check out the docks.  A shipment is supposed to come in at midnight and I want to know what’s in it.”

“You want to go all the way to Blüdhaven?”

“I saw your bike downstairs,” Jason says, dangling his keys from one hand.  “Looks a little flashy to me.  Race you there?”

Tim smirks.  “You’re on.”

--

They race through the streets of Gotham and Jason swears under his breath because Tim really does know how to push his bike to the limits.  It takes all his skill just to keep up while not getting hit by traffic.  Eventually they cross the bridge into Blüdhaven and Jason pulls in front of Tim.  He gestures with a series of hand signals where they can store their bikes while they take to the rooftops.

Jason’s week-long probation as Red Hood is up and he’s cleared for “non-lethal intervention” if he encounters crime on patrol.  Tim wastes no time jumping in to stop a mugging.  There is something undeniably fun about vigilante work in Nightwing’s territory.  At least, it’s fun until the two muggers take off running only for the victim to pull a knife on them, leaving Jason to yank Tim back up onto the rooftops.

“Dude, Blüdhaven sucks,” Tim says, retracting his bo staff.

“Ugh, tell me about it.”

Tim might have sequestered himself away with his research in the penthouse but his skills are still sharp.  Jason never got to patrol with him, before.  He was either trying to hunt Tim down for vengeance or too catatonic to suit up.  But they work well together.  They take the long way to the docks and Jason can always anticipate which rooftop Tim will go for next.  He leaps after him, making their way steadily to the docks.

Jason picks the location for the stakeout—the cross beam of a cargo crane that hangs over the docks.  It would normally be a risky position but on a dark night with no wind, the two of them can easily dangle their legs over the side while they wait for the shipment to show.  And people rarely look up.

It does require quite a leap though, so Jason goes first.  He launches from his grapple and sticks the landing, careful to stay close to the shadows.  Tim follows and hits the landing a little fast, tucking into a roll which must hurt on the steel beams, but he pops up like it was part of his plan.

“Nightwing doesn’t mind me tagging along with you?” Tim asks, leaning back on the crane like his spine isn’t killing him from that dismount.

“Don’t know, didn’t ask,” Jason says.  His voice is modulated by his helmet and he can tell Tim wants to get a look at it.  If the patrol goes well, Jason will let him take a crack at the tech inside.  Tim can probably fix the weird feedback he gets on the IR lenses.

Tim laughs and Jason is happy they’re up high enough they don’t have to worry about being overheard.

“So what do you know about these guys?” Tim asks, dangling his legs over the side of the crane.  He’s backlit by the skyline of Blüdhaven and Jason suddenly wishes Tim brought his camera along.

“There are three main gangs in Blüdhaven and two of them were contacted to move something from the docks into the city.  Shipment must be pretty big if they need the extra manpower,” Jason says because he only started working the case last week.

“Any idea about the buyer?”

“Nothing yet,” Jason shakes his head.  “I’m thinking someone out of the city, though.  The gangs have the corner on drugs and gun running.  All the manifest said is ‘flat-packed cargo’ so at least we know it’s not human trafficking.”

Tim does his little head tilt thing again.  “You figured all this out in a week?”

“Yeah?”

“Huh,” Tim says.  Jason doesn’t need to see under his domino mask to know he doesn’t like the look on his face.  So he opts for a distraction.

“How’s your investigation coming?”

“I have plenty of evidence but now I have to find something to do with it,” Tim huffs in frustration.  Jason’s seen the evidence and he’d describe it as ‘circumstantial at best’ but he’s not telling Tim that next to a hundred-foot drop.  “I’m digging into some contacts now, though.  I can feel I’m getting close.”

--

Thirty minutes past midnight, a blacked-out ship pulls into harbor and several vans of men pull up to the docks.  Jason leans down low against the crane and pulls himself into a better position over them.

“Can you hear what they’re saying?” Tim asks, getting down next to him.

“I’m working on it,” Jason says, adjusting the settings of his helmet to focus on lipreading.  “They’re just talking about unloading the cargo.  The plan is to pack it in the vans and take it across town…”

They head up to the ship and the first team comes back carrying a long wooden crate.

“Drugs or weapons,” Tim confirms.

“Weapons,” Jason says because he recognizes the seal on the cargo from his own crime lord days.  “Those are stolen S.T.A.R. Lab crates.”

Tim grins and readies his grapple.  “Sounds like it’s time to crash the party.”

“You want the crates or the vans?”

“I’ll take the crates.”

They drop in together, grapples firmly attached to the cross bar on the crane.  Jason plummets straight-down to block the shipment from the vans.  Tim takes a running leap off the end of the crane, using the swing back to sweep into the henchmen and force them to drop the shipment.

Jason promised Dick he would try not to use lethal force, and it takes considerably more skill to do so.  He keeps his rubber bullet shots away from the head and body, aiming instead for the extremities.

One of the vans already has two crates loaded and Jason launches a tracker onto the back door of it as it speeds off.  Then he focuses on scattering the rest of the hired help.

Between the two of them, the fight is over quickly enough.  Jason watches Tim dance through three separate attackers, taking each of them out with a sweep of his staff.  He was good at Titan’s Tower, but Jason must admit by now Tim is a demon in close combat.

Jason switches from guns to his fists and brawls through the last few stranglers too stupid to flee.  One of them manages to get behind Tim and Jason get between them, kicking his boot out and knocking the man off the side of the dock.

“I think that’s all of them, Hood,” Tim says when the last man is incapacitated or swimming in the harbor.

“Blüdhaven PD is on the way,” he confirms with Oracle in his earpiece.

Jason and Tim walk over to inspect one of the fallen crates.

“What the hell?” Jason pries the top off the crate and brushes the packing straw off the gun inside.  It’s not like any weapon he trained with in the League.  It has a vacuum chamber on the top but the rest of it sits like a rifle against his shoulder

“Any idea what it is?”

“No…” he admits, testing the weight of it in his hands.  “They must be moving the ammo separately.”

“Hollow chamber up top, maybe for some sort of chemical solution?” Tim speculates out loud.  He digs through the rest of crate to see if there’s anything else.  “Could be acid.  Four guns to a crate and it looks like two crates made it into the van before it bailed.”

“I’ll have a location on them soon enough,” Jason says, checking the feed in his helmet.  The tracker blinks on a map of Blüdhaven.  “If they’re any smart, they won’t take the shipment to the buyer after they got busted.  They’ll offload at a second location and then head to the buyer after they’ve run damage control and when they think the coast is clear.”

Tim tilts his head again at him.  “Are we sticking around for BPD to show?”

“Fuck no, let’s get out of here.”

Tim readies his grapple and they wait until they can see police lights before launching back up to the rooftops.  Jason is ready to call it a night, one of the strange guns in tow for him to investigate back at Dick’s apartment.

They get their bikes from the place they stashed them before patrol.  It’s nearly 1am so Jason plans to spend the night at Dick’s apartment, meaning Tim will have to make the trek back to Gotham alone.

“You going to be good to head back by yourself?” Jason asks.

“Are you offering to walk me to my door?” Tim smirks and Jason takes a half step back so he doesn’t get the wrong idea.  “I’m just messing with you.  Yeah, I can ride back myself.”

“Thanks for the help tonight.”

“Yeah, it was… fun,” Tim says with half a smile.  He ducks as his puts his helmet on and swings a leg over his motorcycle.  “Thanks for the invite, Hood.”

“I’ll see you around,” Jason says, raising an arm in goodbye as Tim zooms off on his bike.

--

When Jason picks Damian up from the Manor on the weekends, he notices Alfred never lingers for long.  He tries to ignore the hurt in his chest but it just reaffirms his decision to keep his identity a secret.

Instead, Jason is ushered up to Bruce’s old office where he debriefs Dick on the weapons shipment.  He busted the warehouse the van fled to but didn’t find any information on the buyer.  He’s been tailing a few of the gang lieutenants to get a better idea of when the ammo is coming in but no news yet.

Dick looks over the information Jason printed out for him on his brand-new inkjet printer.

“This is really good work,” Dick says eventually, checking the photo from Jason’s helmet feed and the hand drawn diagram he marked up with weapon observations.

“Why does everyone always sound so surprised?” Jason rolls his eyes.  “It’s like planning an assassination, but you don’t get to do any of the fun parts.”

“Taking down twenty men at the docks with Robin was boring for you?”

Jason rubs the back of his neck.  “Hey, we didn’t kill anyone.  And it was nice to have a little back up.”

“What’s the plan for Damian this weekend?  Alfred and I have been regaled with the complete history of the Gotham Knights every dinner for the last week,” Dick says.

“Wow, that’s crazy.  Wait until I tell him about the women’s team,” Jason says and Dick chuckles.  “Hope you guys are ready for the history of the Gotham Blades next week.”

“I’m sure Damian will fill us in on the ‘complex dynamics of honor and revenge,” Dick says with a small smile.

He’s slowly getting used to seeing these half smiles on Dick’s face.  It’s not the wide grins Jason remembers from when Dick used to quip at villains in his Robin outfit.  But it’s better than nothing.

“We’re going ice skating today,” Jason tells him.  “Promised him last week we’d give it a try.  Don’t kill me if I bring him back with a couple of bruises.”

“Do you know how to ice skate?”

“No, but how hard could it be?” Jason shrugs.

--

Jason picks Damian up off the ice after a particularly bad fall.  Some of the parents at the open skate wince in sympathy but Damian is fuming so hard Jason is surprised he’s not steaming.

“You okay?” he asks, brushing a dusting of ice off Damian’s clothes.

“Why are you so good at this?” Damian accuses.

Jason can glide easily around the rink on his rented skates.  “I don’t know,” he admits.  “Someone must have taught me while I was catatonic.”

The Manor has a pool.  It’s not too far of a stretch to think the winter Jason spent at the Manor, someone from the family took him out on ice skates to stop him from wandering around the grounds.  He wonders if that’s why Dick gave him that look back in the office.

“You want to take a break?” Jason asks when Damian pulls himself up again using one of the boards lining the rink.

“No, I do not require a break,” Damian says, glaring at the ice as if it will make it more likely to cooperate.  He refused one of the skating aids because they look like giant penguins and Damian found it undignified.  “It is simply a matter of balance and control.”

“Lower your center of gravity,” Jason instructs.  Damian bends his knees, his hands hovering out to either side in case he falls.  Jason vaguely remembers someone coaching him through this once before.  Every resurrection, his memories get fainter.  “Now push off at an angle.”

Damian glides forward and he gives Jason a triumphant smile before repeating the move with his other leg.  He wobbles and comes to an abrupt stop, but Damian makes it all the way around the rink without touching the boards.

“Fuck yeah,” Jason says, cheering him on.  Some of the parents glare but Jason ignores them.

“I can go faster!”

Jason keeps pace with him as Damian hits his stride on the ice.  All of Talia’s balance and body control training paid off because Damian takes a couple more hard falls but he pops back up and keeps going.

He’s nowhere close to the girls in the center of the rink working on jumps and spins, but he’s miles ahead of anyone else who put on skates for the first time that day.

“Jay, look!  I’m going backwards,” he says, right before he crashes hard into the boards.

“Okay, I think that’s enough for today,” Jason says, rushing over to help him to his feet.  “Let’s save backward skating for next time.”

Damian is flushed with success as he unlaces his skates to return to the rental desk.  Jason figures he’ll probably take him to be fitted for his own pair soon.  It’s only a matter of time before Damian asks to join a team.  He’s still on the smaller side for his age but Jason knows he can hit harder than men twice his size.

He also thinks another outlet for his anger will keep Damian from chewing the legs of the Manor furniture like a feral raccoon, but that’s beside the point.

“Did you have fun today?” Jason asks as they walk back to the New Town condo.  The Gotham Blade’s ice rink is close enough to the apartment he didn’t want to bother taking the bike.

“Yes.  We will have to return next weekend so I can continue to improve my skills,” Damian tells him.  He falls into step beside Jason and shoves his hands deep into his pockets.  He tries to look nonchalant when he says, “Maybe next time, Richard can come.”

Jason hums while he pretends to consider the idea.

Damian quickly adds, “I know this is our time together.  But spending time with him is… not so bad.  And we’re so busy during the week we don’t get to do things like this.”

“Well if spending time with him is ‘not so bad’ then how could I refuse?” Jason teases and Damian hides his smile in the collar of his jacket.  “Dick finally wore you down into being his friend, huh?”

“He has a surprising amount of natural charisma,” Damian mumbles but Jason can tell he’s still smiling.

--

Jason goes to the penthouse to see if he can drag Tim out on another patrol.  He has a lead on the S.T.A.R. Lab guns and he wants to check it out.

But when he bangs on the penthouse door, no one answers.

Jason goes back down to the parking garage and sees Tim’s bike is still there, hidden under a tarp.  He rides the elevator back up and breaks out his lockpicks.  He calls Oracle while he works the door.

“Hood, you’re out early,” Barbara’s voice pipes in through the comm.

“I’m at the penthouse.  Any idea where T is?” he asks, popping the first lock open and working on the backup.

“He’s still grounded so nothing on my end,” Barbara says.  Jason hears her type something on her keyboard.  “I’m going to disable the alarm on the penthouse door.  Do you need backup?”

“Not yet,” Jason says, easing the second lock open.

The apartment is dark and he reaches for the entry way light.  He doesn’t have his helmet on but he draws a handgun from his holster and starts to clear the rooms.

The kitchen and living room are empty.  Jason turns instead to the master bedroom.

“Fuck,” he says once the door is open.  He flips the light on.

“Status report, Hood.”

“He’s not here,” Jason says.  “And I don’t think he’s coming back.”

The room is completely clean.  The wall where Tim’s murder board used to sprawl is completely bare.  Jason searches until he finds a metal trashcan filled with ashes.  His computer and all his notes are missing as well.  A quick search of the wardrobe reveals Tim’s suit is gone.

“Looks like he left a note,” Jason says into the comm when he’s done sweeping the desk.

It’s handwritten on a yellow legal pad Jason saw Tim using for notes.  All it says is:

J-

Following a lead.  Don’t look for me.

-T

At the bottom of the page, scrawled as an afterthought, is a final line.

Thanks for not calling me crazy.

Whatever lead Tim is after, he destroyed any evidence to help anyone trying to follow him.  Jason pinches the bridge of his nose and relays the information to Oracle.  She’ll pass it to Nightwing.

And Jason just knows Dick is going to blame himself.

--

Things go from bad to worse when Jason raids the club in Blüdhaven he planned to take on with Tim.  He’s angry and he feels the Lazarus Pit at the edge of his awareness.  It’s hard to tell if the green in his vision is from the club lights or the Pit egging him on.  The music in the club pounds and Jason’s head pounds with it as he approaches a door to the VIP section in the back of the club.

Jason keeps his helmet in the bottom of his backpack.  He filled the rest of it with money.  When it comes to gangs, stacks of cash are better than any lockpick.  When a bouncer stops him at the door, all Jason does is unzip the bag and he’s ushered in.  Amateurs.

The bouncer keeps a tight grip on his shoulder as he escorts Jason.  They push their way through the throngs of dancing clubbers.  Smoke machines cloud the air as bass heavy music shakes the floors.  The bouncer frisks him before they head in but Jason doesn’t need any guns for this.

When he closes the door to the back room, Jason feels like he can finally think.  Instead of artificial smoke, the room is heavy with burnt cigars.  He surreptitiously rolls his shoulders and cracks his neck.

Jason moves forward and dumps his backpack out on the table.  Stacks of unmarked hundred-dollar bills tumble onto the table, followed by his distinctive red helmet.

“Who the hell are you?” the mob boss asks.  Jason knows his name.  He has a whole file on him.  But none of it matters.

“I’m nobody,” Jason says, a joke that will no doubt go over the head of every goon in the room.  It’s six versus one but the odds don’t matter.  He’s spoiling for a fight.  Jason reaches forward and puts on the helmet.  “I just wanted someone to open the door.”

Then he drops a smoke grenade and the fight begins.

In a matter of seconds, the tight room fills with enough smoke no one can see three feet in front of them.  Jason doesn’t need the IR cameras in his helmet to orient himself.  The League taught him to fight blindfolded.

He grabs the bouncer by the neck and slams him into the table.  Jason kicks off and does a backflip over the desk to strike at the guy who tries to grab his back.  Even these goons know better than to start firing into the smoke, but one of them comes out swinging a bat.  Jason ducks it and sweep his legs under him.

There’s something satisfying about using his fists.  The Lazarus Pit cheers him on.  Jason lets it fuel him.  The Pit makes him faster, lets him hit harder.  He gets his hands around the back of a chair and swings it up through his attacker, splintering the wood on impact.

When the smoke clears, there are six bodies on the ground.  The Pit urges him on.

Finish it!  Finish them!

Christ, was he always this dramatic?  Jason yanks his helmet off and forces himself to take several deep breaths.  He chokes on the residual smoke and leans over the desk while he coughs it out.

The Pit ebbs away from his vision.  He got his fight.  Now it’s time to go to work.

He packs the rolls of bills into his backpack and opens the mob boss’s desk.  This is what he is really after.  There’s a safe in the bottom drawer.  Biometric.  The Pit tells him it’ll be easier to cut the hand off but Jason quiets it and drags over the boss to press his thumb against the scanner.

He pulls out the folder of documents and start skimming them.  He puts his helmet back on so the camera can capture every word for later.

Shipping manifest.  Jackpot.

“Oracle, come in,” Jason says into his comm once he comprehends what he’s reading.

“Hood, go for Oracle.”

“I know what the guns are for,” he says.  “Tell Batman and Robin I’m coming to them.  The Joker’s shipping the weapons in through Blüdhaven for an attack on Arkham.  He’s breaking out.”

--

Jason races to Gotham.  He wants Dick to move immediately while they still have the element of surprise.

The problem is, the Joker is still in Arkham.

There’s no base to raid or henchmen to take out.

“All we can do is shut down the weapon trade and increase his security in Arkham,” Dick tells him again.

Maybe it’s because the Lazarus Pit is still close to the surface or maybe it’s because Dick is still in the Bat suit but Jason feels his temper rising.

“So we just wait for him to escape?” Jason asks incredulously.  “We know where he is right now.  We can take the fight to him.”

Damian’s gaze bounces between the two of them.  Jason caught up to them on patrol in the Diamond District and they’re all having it out on a rooftop.

Dick’s eyes narrow beneath the cowl.  “I’m not going to let you go after him when he’s already in custody.”

“What are you waiting for?” Jason demands.  “Do you want him to escape so he can set you up?  I have proof he’s bringing in weapons and planning to escape.”

“And what are you going to do when you get there, Hood?  Shoot him in his cell?” Dick demands.

“Would you rather I wait around for him to kill another Robin?” Jason shouts.

Dick goes eerily still.  “You have no right—”

“I have every right!” Jason shouts through the modulator on his helmet.  “He is a deranged maniac.  How many times does he have to poison the water supply or release a deadly gas for you to see it?  How many brothers do you have to lose?”

Dick takes a swing at him and the only reason Jason dodges it is because he’s expecting it.  He isn’t expecting the following kick, which catches him in his ribs and knocks the air out of him.  Jason punches back reflexively before pulling a knife and lunging forward.

“Stop this behavior at once!” Damian shouts.  He pushes between the two of them before Jason can take a swipe at Dick.

“We don’t kill,” Dick says as he wipes a hand across his mouth.  Jason managed to split his lip but he’s pretty sure Dick’s last hit bruised his ribs.  When Dick speaks, it’s with the heavily solemnity Bruce used back when Jason was a teenager.  “We’re better than that.”

“You might be,” Jason says, sheathing his knife and turning his back to them.  “But I’m not.”

--

Jason doesn’t go straight to Arkham.  He goes to the New Town apartment to dump his gear and make his plan.

Damian texts him multiple times the next day, angling for a response.  Jason sends him a message to let him know he’s fine and that he will be out of reach for the next few days.  Then he goes to the Gotham Public Library and pulls up the building plans for Arkham Asylum.

Despite the millions of dollars the Wayne Foundation poured into the psychiatric hospital, decades of corruption and mismanagement shroud the building.

It storms the night Jason makes his move.  The thunder is loud enough to shake the walls of the apartment and rain pours down in sheets.  Jason only thinks of the additional cover the weather provides when he turns his bike off the main road and begins a winding path towards Arkham.

Breaking in is laughably easy.

Most of the security is set up to stopping patients from breaking out.  He starts with the roof because that’s how he gets access to their security system.  He’s nowhere as skilled as Tim with a computer, but Jason learned from Batman how to loop a security feed.  He cuts all the cameras and ensures that anyone watching will see footage from the night before.

Next, Jason makes his way through the cargo bay, scanning a forged ID badge to access the main building.  Form there, it’s only a matter of avoiding the night staff as he makes his way to the ward for the criminally insane.

Jason has a moment to wonder if in his first life, as Red Hood the crime lord, if Bruce would have tried to send him to Arkham.  Jason thinks he would have preferred Blackgate.  He appreciates the poetic symmetry of Jason ending up in the same prison as Willis Todd.

He shakes thoughts of the past from his mind as he walks down a long corridor.  The Joker is supposedly in a maximum-security section of Arkham.  Jason breaks open the keypad and connects a hand-held computer to it, scrambling the code until the program finds the right combination to open it.

“What’s a guy like you doing in a place like this?” Nightwing asks, leaning against the cell wall.  He isn’t wearing the cowl, instead clad in his bright blue and black vigilante getup.  He doesn’t look surprised to see Jason.

Other than Nightwing, the cell is empty.  The Joker is nowhere to be seen.

“You moved him,” Jason accuses.

Nightwing shrugs.  “I told you I wasn’t going to let you shoot him in his cell, Hood.”

“I wouldn’t waste the bullets,” Jason says, which is technically true.  He planned on slitting the Joker’s throat with Talia’s knife.

“You’re not a murderer, Jay.”

“I assure you, I am.”

“A contract killer isn’t the same thing,” Dick says.  Jason never thought he’d be standing in Arkham Asylum listening to Dick argue the finer points of morality with an assassin, but wonders never cease.  “Oracle and Robin both ran your file.  You don’t go after people and kill them of you own volition.”

He needs a different tactic.  Jason reaches up and Dick’s hands twitch towards his escrima sticks, but he doesn’t draw them when Jason pops the seals of his helmet and slides it off.  He wants Dick to see his face for this.

“I’m doing what you can’t,” Jason says.  “I won’t leave Damian in this city with that madman on the loose.  Not when I know what he’s capable of.”

Dick’s eyes flicker over Jason’s face.  He wonders if some part of him recognizes his brother.

“This isn’t about the law.  This isn’t about revenge.” Jason tells him, surprised to find he means every word.  “I’m not always going to be there to protect you, so let me do this.  Let me keep you safe.”

Dick searches him.  “What aren’t you saying, Jay?”

Jason wants to tell him so badly.  And maybe part of Dick already knows.  But the second Jason confirms his identity, he’ll force Dick to lose him again.

“I’m dying.  Cancer.  Some days I think I can already feel it,” Jason says, flexing his hand into a fist and releasing it.  “Damian doesn’t know yet.  He just lost Bruce… and I couldn’t tell him.  Doctor said a year, two if I’m lucky.”

“No,” Dick shakes his head, adamant in his denial.  His voice takes on a hard edge.  “We are not losing anyone else in this family.”

Jason manages a creaky laugh.  “It’s not up to you, Big Bird.  I feel like I’ve been dying for years.”

“You’re in the League!  Can’t you use a Lazarus—”

“I would rather die,” Jason interrupts before Dick can finish the thought.  He takes a step closer to his brother, closing the distance between them.

“Let me do this, Dick,” he says, quieter this time.  Jason puts his hands on Dick’s shoulders because he looks like he’ll shake apart if someone doesn’t.  Jason takes off his domino mask, lets Dick look into Lazarus-green eyes and draw his own conclusions.

“Tell me where the Joker is.”

--

Jason lies low the next couple of days in the New Town apartment.  There’s no need to patrol anymore so he spends most of his time in the apartment reading and waiting.

It’s done.  He feels a weight off his chest.  But he can’t shake the feeling he’s waiting for the other shoe to drop.

That’s when Damian storms in.

“What did you do?” his younger brother demands.

Jason sits up from where he was lounging on the couch with a book.  “What do you mean?”

“The Joker is dead,” Damian proclaims.  He crosses his arms and looks down at Jason in a way only a younger sibling could.  “By your hand, I assume.  But Grayson has been… weepy for days and it certainly is not over the Joker.  So what did you do?”

Jason sighs and puts his book to the side.  Talia made sure the office was stocked with classics but her tastes always tended toward the ancient Greek.  He was beginning to feel a certain kind of kinship with Odysseus in his journey.

“Damian, sit down,” Jason says.

“No.”

“Damian, please.”

He’s so fucking tired.  Jason had months to prepare what to say, but faced with Damian trying to hide his anxiety in anger, all his words fly out of his head.  Damian looks coiled for a fight.  He takes a seat in the arm chair across from the sofa, back straight, looking every inch like the Prince of the League.  Jason knows he falls back on this persona when he’s nervous.

Jason hates what he’s about to do.

“I’m leaving Gotham,” he says.

Damian can’t hide his expression fast enough.  “What?  Why?”

Before he can spin himself up into thinking it’s his fault, Jason holds up a hand.  “I’m going back to be with Talia because I’m sick, Damian.  And I’m not going to get better.”

Damian shakes his head.  “No.”

“I know this is hard to hear—”

“No!” Damian snaps, springing to his feet.  “You’re lying!  Or you missed something!  You’re not dying.”  His voice cracks on the last word.

Jason reaches out to him.  For a moment, he sees a younger version of Damian curled up on a cot, shaking with fever.  He goes to pull him into a hug but Damian shoves him away hard.

“If you’re sick than there are people who can help!  The Justice League or—or a doctor—"

Jason shakes his head.  “It’s not the kind of sick a doctor can fix.”

“Use a Lazarus Pit!” Damian yells at him because all his brothers want to save him.

“No.”

Damian goes from shoving him away to shaking Jason by the shoulders.  He’s small but his grip is strong and he locks on tight to Jason’s sweatshirt.  “Not you too, Jason!  Not you too!”

“I’m so sorry, Damian,” Jason says as he struggles to keep his voice even.

Damian pushes him away suddenly.  “Leave me alone!” he shouts and Jason stumbles back, holding his hands up to him.  “If you want to die for your pride then fine!  I don’t want to see you ever again!”

“Dami…”

His brother shakes his head furiously.  Jason can see he’s crying and aches to reach out.  But the second he moves, Damian bolts for the door.

“Damian!”

--

Jason tries for weeks to see him again, but Damian holes up in the Manor.

He vacillates between respecting Damian’s need for distance and breaking in to see his brother again.  In the end, Jason leaves Gotham.  Jason knows he’ll see Damian again, if only in his next life.  In this one, Damian knows how to find him if he wants to see him again.

--

In the end, he returns to Talia.

She’s been busy sowing chaos in the League.  Jason finds she worked with none other than Tim Drake to take down Ra’s Al-Ghul and become the sole leader of the League.  Part of him grates at the idea of Tim trying to wedge his way into Jason family again, but Talia makes it clear their arrangement was purely business.

He has no idea what she promised Tim, but a few months later, Bruce Wayne makes an appearance at the annual Gotham children’s charity gala after an extended vacation searching for polar bears in Antarctica.

Jason does a double take when he sees the article.  When he zooms in on the photo, he sees Tim sticking close to Bruce’s shadow.  Tim still looks a little crazed, eyes locked on Bruce like he’s afraid he’ll disappear the moment he looks away.

“Good for him,” Jason says to himself.  He hopes Tim antagonizes Dick so much about being right that he doesn’t have time to think about Jason being gone.

--

“Any word from Damian?” Jason asks Talia one day when she brings him a cup of tea.  He spends more days in bed, now.  They both act like he just needs the rest.

“He’s pleased his father is returned,” Talia says.

Jason hums and takes a sip of his tea.  He spends most of the day on a chaise near the window.  When the clouds clear, he has a beautiful view of the Himalayas, his first and favorite mountain range.

Talia spends every morning with Jason.  They spend a lot of time planning.  Talia gives him a comprehensive history of everything she was doing after Jason’s resurrection in his grave.  She makes him memorize secret phrases to prove his identity to her. 

In the afternoon, Jason swaps between reading and writing.  On days he feels well enough, he goes on a walk around the compound.  If he’s too tired, he naps on the chaise and waits for the stars to come out.

His bones begin to hurt.  It’s a feeling as novel as it is unwelcome.  Jason does stretches in the morning to ease his aching joints, but it takes a lot of energy out of him.  Soon, it’s easier to deal with the discomfort than the exhaustion.

Some days he’s so tired it feels impossible to walk from the chaise back to his bed so he sleeps there instead.

He gets cold, now, all the time.  Talia has a woodstove moved into his room and places it near the chaise.  A servant comes by at odd intervals to make sure it never burns out.  When Jason reaches out to it to warm up, he notes dispassionately how pale his hands look.  His veins have taken on a faint tinge of green as the Lazarus Pit works into overdrive fighting the decline of his body.

It gets harder to write.

Jason is reminded briefly on his struggles during catatonia but the problem isn’t holding a pen, it’s staying awake long enough to finish a page.  Then fold the paper.  Seal it.  And place it in the basket under the chaise.

Every step takes more and more from him, but Jason is committed to finishing his project.  It gives him something to do while he waits.

He knows he’s getting worse from the way Talia begins to hover.  She goes from spending the morning with him to dropping by in the afternoon as well.  Jason wakes once to Talia carding her fingers through his hair like she used to do with Damian.

She moves a desk into the space and sometimes when Jason wakes, he can hear her typing at a laptop or speaking on the phone in a nearby room.

He sleeps.  He wakes.  He writes.

--

“He looks so small.”

Jason stirs at the sound of a familiar voice.  He shifts under his thick blankets and opens his eyes.

“Damian.”

Talia stands to the side of the room as Damian makes his way forward.  He has on a dark backpack and looks worn from a long day of travel.  But all Jason can focus on is a familiar carved necklace dangling from a leather cord around his neck.  Damian pauses awkwardly a few feet away from him and reaches for his bag, rummaging around for something.

“I brought cookies from Alfred,” Damian says, holding out a container.

Jason reaches for it and catches the way Damian’s eyes lock onto the thinness of his arms.  Jason hasn’t had an appetite for weeks.  He carefully places the glass container on the side table near the woodstove.  “I’ll have some later,” Jason promises.

Damian regards him, trying to keep his composure.  Jason hasn’t looked in a mirror in a long time.  He wonders now what Damian sees.

“Are you cold?” his brother asks, gesturing to the heavy blankets at the foot of the chaise.

Jason nods and Damian goes to retrieve one for him, desperate for something to do.  Damian holds the blanket in both hands and hesitates.  Jason doesn’t need to be asked.  He braces himself and shifts closer to the back edge of the chaise so Damian can lay the blanket down, crawling under it to press to Jason’s side.

“I’m still mad at you,” Damian mutters, curling up against him the way he did as a child.

“That’s okay,” Jason replies softly.  He feels something in himself relax when Damian settles.  “I’m happy you're here.”

--

In the end, Jason wrote Damian a hundred letters.

He started simple, a birthday card for every year Jason would miss.  The first letters were easy to write.  He wishes Damian luck in school and reminds him to get along with his brothers.  He writes that he hopes Damian makes true friends who he can count on and they never into more trouble than they can get themselves out of.

Then comes the events.  He congratulates Damian on a future graduation from high school.  Another letter in case he breaks the family curse and manages to be the first person since Thomas Wayne to graduate university.  A letter if Damian ever gets married.  Has kids.

Jason spent days thinking about what he would tell a version of Damian who grows older than Jason ever gets to be.  He writes that he hopes Damian finds a way to show the kindness he hides.  He writes that no matter what, Jason is proud of the man he’ll become.

There is so much uncertainty in the future, so many ways Jason can’t anticipate the world turning.  He knows it’s impossible his words can prepare Damian for everything he’s going to experience.  But Jason hopes that when his brother tears open an envelope, it’s a source of comfort and not grief.

He signs every one of them Your brother, Jason.

Jason is so tired.  But he doesn’t feel as cold anymore.

--

The next time he wakes, it’s in his casket.

Chapter Text

Jason sits on the ground beneath his stone angel and catches his breath.

He suspects Bruce got ripped off and his grave isn’t really six feet deep, but slightly shallower.  It’s the kind of thing you notice after leveraging yourself out of it repeatedly.

He knows he can’t stay for long.  Jason needs to start walking so when the car comes around the corner, it’ll hit him and he’ll end up in Mercy Hospital.  Jason pushes himself to his feet.  He no longer feels the specific and agonizing bone pain of cancer, but his body still hurts.

It’s all so painfully familiar.

--

He warms his hands over the fire barrel Paulie started in an alley.  No matter how close he gets, he can never quite get warm.  The flames lick at his fingers and Jason barely feels it.

The problem with living his life over and over again is that he still has to live it one day at a time.

While recovering the hospital, Jason spent most of his time planning.  Talia believed he could find her earlier.  She spent days in his last lifetime giving him everything he needs to contact her, but Jason is reluctant to.

For one, it would be cheating.  If Jason is supposed to get things right, it means he must step through life in a way he could have conceivable done the first time.  He wouldn’t have known to contact Talia while catatonic and doing so now would be cheating.

And Talia has her own motivations.  While she genuinely cared for Jason in his last life, there’s no guarantee this version of her will support him.  No, it’s safer to wait her out.  Talia finding him is only a matter of time.

Bruce is a different challenge.  If Jason goes to him too early, no Lazarus Pit, and the League will kidnap him.  Not ideal.  But if he’s too late, Jason misses him entirely.

Jason thinks back to his very first resurrection, when he made himself a crime lord in the Alley.  Bruce was so jaded, so unyielding, in that timeline.  The same man who held him through every one of his nightmares in his second resurrection couldn’t stand to look at him in the first.

The fog in his head makes it difficult for Jason to work out all the details, but he has plenty of time to think up a plan.

He needs a Lazarus Pit, so he needs Talia.

But then he needs to get back to Gotham.

--

Jason stares down at the cover of a dark green book with gold lettering.  Antigone.

“You remind me of her,” Talia says, her hand a supportive weight on Jason’s arm.

He just finished scrubbing the blood off himself in the bath but Jason’s control of the Pit is still tenuous.  It’s so much stronger than he remembers.  It promises Jason strength and speed and lethality.  It sings of revenge and makes it sound so sweet.

Talia is still looking at him.  The world is tinted green.  Jason remembers dying in this room.

“What is it you want, Jason?”

He wants to take Damian to a hockey game.  He wants to race motorcycles with Tim until they run out of gas.  He wants to help Alfred plant the tulips before spring.

He wants Talia, but a version of her that doesn’t exist.

“Justice,” he says.

--

When Talia offers to send him overseas to continue his training, he changes things again.

“I’m staying here.”

Talia brushes away his refusal.  “I’ve arranged transportation on your behalf.  You’ll train for two weeks with Master Lee and then I will assess your progress.”

Jason knows when it comes to Talia, it’s better to stick to simple responses than give explanations she can twist her way.

“No.”

Talia regards Jason critically.  She sits in statuesque beauty on the carpets of her room.  A kettle of tea waits on a low table beside her, steam curling from the spout.

She pours herself a cup.  “Since your transformation, it is no longer safe for you to stay in the League.”

Jason remembers leaving last time.  Damian slipped a knife into his bag because they couldn’t say goodbye.

“What’s the danger?” he presses.  “Your son needs a protector.  I can train here.”

“My father will never allow it,” she shakes her head.  “Your memories of your time here are incomplete, Jason.  He had little patience for you before and using the Lazarus waters ignited his temper.  If you stay here, he will send people after you.”

“And I will defeat them,” Jason says with a steady confidence.  After two lifetimes training in the League and hopped up on Lazarus Rage, he likes his chances.  And if he dies, he’ll know to try something different in the next loop.

--

The first attack comes that evening.

Jason wakes and registers an unfamiliar presence in his bedroom.  The Lazarus Pit takes over immediately.  He’s on his feet and charging before the assailant even realizes he’s awake.

Jason tackles them to the ground and slams their head back into the stone floor.  He hears a crack and knows they're dazed.  From there, it’s quick work to crush their windpipe.  They get a few good hits in, but Jason ends them quickly.

The Lazarus Pit calls for greater violence.  It wants him to tear the body apart.  Display it so all others will know what he is capable of.

Jason struggles to reign in his emotions.  He pulls the mask off the assailant and feels a cold jolt of recognition.  They’re younger than Jason remembers, but familiar to him.  In his last life they worked together twice, slept together once, and bonded over a mutual love of explosives.

They were Talia’s contact, not Ra’s.

Another manipulation.  Another reminder that while Talia may care for him, she does not trust him.  She probably only meant to scare Jason into compliance, but now there is blood on his hands and a corpse in his bedroom.

Jason looks down at the body of someone who, while not a friend, was once friendly to him.  He wants to be more careful about killing, but violence is not optional in the League.  His only choice is to establish a reputation so undeniable, so definite, that no one will challenge it.

--

Jason slams the body down over Talia’s desk.  Papers scatter and blood pools on the dark wood.

Most of the mutilation came after the death, but Jason did his best to make it look bloody.  Talia raises a single eyebrow at him over the corpse.

“Tell Ra’s that if he wants to send assassins after me, they can meet me on the training grounds tomorrow at dawn,” Jason tells her, playing up the control the Lazarus Pit has over him.  “I’ll meet any challenger and show them what comes to those who cross me.”

Talia hums, assessing the damage to the body.  He sees the gears in her mind turning and can only hope for her approval.

“You’re too eager,” she says, tapping a finger against her chin as she thinks.  “It will take time to organize a sufficient showing.  Certainly the catacombs will be more apt.  Give me a week to spread the word and you’ll have your gladiator match.”

Jason wanted something public to make an impression, but he appreciates Talia’s flair for the dramatic.

“The catacombs it is.”

--

After two lifetimes training in the League, Jason is well versed in many manners of violence.  He stays in his quarters while he prepares for the fight.  The servants know better than to bother him and Talia somehow manages to keep Damian too occupied to sneak in.

He uses the space to swing a bo staff and then practices with escrima sticks, but neither weapon feels right in his hands.  He fastens the sword Talia gifted him to his waist and steps through some basic katas.  The sword is the same curved blade Jason envisions when he summons the All-Blades.  But unlike the All-Blades, the saif is a physical weight in his hands and he practices to refamiliarize himself with it.

One night of carnage, he tells himself as he rewraps the grip on his sword with the same leather cord he once used to make Damian a necklace.  One night to secure his reputation and buy his freedom in the League.

Ra’s accepts his challenge graciously and Talia organizes the bouts for exactly one week after he dropped the body across her desk.  A week should be enough for the worst of the Pit Rage to subside but Jason feels it just under his skin.  It whispers to him and curls around his spine.  Normally he would quiet it, but he keeps it close for the fight.

Letting the Lazarus Pit take over is nothing like falling into the fog of catatonia.  Instead of losing time, Jason is acutely aware of his actions.  But the Pit spurs him on, muddling morals as it calls for blood.  It makes it feel good.  He remembers every person he kills in the gladiator pits, all seventeen on them.  He strikes with his sword, their knives, and when he’s too bloody to hold a blade, he uses his bare hands.  Jason tears them apart.

He sustains injuries of his own, but the Pit coursing through his veins dulls the pain.  His robes are soaked to the knee in blood.  The floor of the catacombs is covered in so much viscera, Jason doubts the League attendants will be able to separate it back into his victims.

Talia and Ra’s watch the display from above.  When there’s no one left to kill, Jason turns his eyes to them.  Ra’s looks reluctantly impressed and very pissed off.

Talia beams with pride.

--

Jason is reinstated as Damian’s guard.  He follows his brother to his lessons and supervises his training sessions.  In his last life, Damian was decidedly a teenager and it’s an adjustment to see him as a child again.  More than his age, Damian’s attitude is the most jarring thing about this loop.

In his last life, Jason spent these years training with instructors outside of the League.  Then he traveled the world and sent letters and souvenirs home to Damian.

Now, Jason witnesses Damian’s lessons firsthand.

In the morning, he spends time with Talia’s tutors.  He learns language, history, and mathematics.  Jason waits silently in the back of these classrooms, picking up what he can.  Sometimes he brings along a book from Talia’s library.  Ever since he borrowed her copy of Leaves of Grass, she’s started a borderline militant campaign to get Jason reading more poetry.

The look of betrayal Damian gives him every time they bring it up over dinner is worth it.  Jason makes it up to him by swiping him a bottle of Ra’s special calligraphy ink from the supply room.

--

Damian’s has weekly lessons with Ra’s, who pointedly ignores Jason at the back of the training salle.

It’s strange to see this side of Damian.  He so desperately wants to be the perfect heir for his grandfather.  Ra’s trains him to fight with dual daggers but remains unarmed himself.  He needs no weapon for this demonstration.

“Get up,” Ra’s says when a kick to the chest sends Damian sprawling.

Damian pulls himself to his feet even as Jason tightens his grip on his sword handle.  The Lazarus Pit urges him forward but Jason tamps down the feeling.  Damian rushes again and strikes out at his grandfather only for Ra’s to step back, dodging his blades easily.

Damian presses forward and Ra’s grabs his wrist, twisting it behind his back until he cries out and drops his knife.

“Your weapon is your life,” Ra’s lectures, not releasing Damian from the hold even as he struggles.  “If you have no need for it, your enemy will make use of it.”

He picks up Damian’s knife and brings it close to his neck.  He stops struggling immediately, frozen in his grandfather’s grip.  “I yield,” Damian says softly.

“Disappointing,” Ra’s says before dropping Damian and his dagger to the ground.  The blade goes clattering off to the side as Damian regains his footing.  “Your mother’s coddling has made you no proper warrior.”

Damian bows to his grandfather and busies himself gathering his weapons and putting them away.  Ra’s turns to leave and his guards file out behind him until it’s only Jason and Damian left in the salle.

“Let me see it,” Jason says, parting from the shadows at the edge of the room.

“I’m fine.”

“Then why are you still holding your wrist?”

“I said I’m fine!” Damian snaps at him.

Jason can see his face is splotchy and it’s not from the fight.  As much as he wants to comfort Damian, physical affection still makes Damian skittish.  Jason pinches the bridge of his nose and tries to use his words instead.  “You are years ahead of the other students your age.”

“That’s not good enough,” Damian says adamantly.  “I need to be better.  We will increase my training regimen.”

“We increase it any more and you’re going to develop stress fractures,” Jason warns.  Part of him wonders if this is why Damian is always on the smaller side in the other loops.  “Now show me your wrist.”

Damian’s face twists but he holds out his wrist.  Jason runs his fingers along the joint, already swelling, and makes Damian hold his hand out unsupported.  “Sprained,” he decides.  “I’ll wrap it for you.”

--

Jason spends all week shadowing Damian with his combat instructors and every night Damian pesters him for extra lessons.  He knows Jason is feared among the assassins in the League, even if he doesn’t know all the details of the bodies Jason left in pieces in the catacombs.

The next week, instead of the training salles, Ra’s sends Damian a summons to his office.  Jason trails behind him, a hand on his sword.  He dislikes being so deep in Ra’s territory, surrounded by his personal guard, where any attack would spell certain death.  He’s careful to keep his unease off his face as he takes his place by the door and Damian approaches his grandfather’s desk, bowing to him in respect.

“Damian,” Ra’s says, inclining his head a fraction of an inch.  “Tell me.  What is the purpose of the League?”

Jason stands guard as Damian recites his response.  Ra’s is too relaxed.  He wants Damian here for something and it isn’t a philosophy lesson.

He listens to the old man drone on about the importance of balance and the legacy of the League of Assassins.  Then he reaches under his desk and draws out a rectangular box draped in cloth.  Jason takes a step forward, hackles rising.

“Do you know what this is?” Ra’s asks conversationally, lifting the cloth to reveal a cage.  A reddish-brown songbird hops within it, chirping up at Damian.

“It’s a rosefinch,” Damian answers.  Jason recognizes it as a bird common to the compound.  He’s seen Damian leave breadcrumbs on his windowsill for them.  He feels a sinking in his stomach when he realizes the purpose of this lesson.

“Yes,” Ra’s says, tone indulgent.  He retrieves the bird from the cage and passes it into Damian’s hands.  “Now kill it.”

Damian looks up sharply at his grandfather.  He hesitates.  “It’s just a bird,” he says, carefully holding the finch.  It chirps in his hands and he pulls it closer to his chest.  It’s the closest Damian’s come to disobeying his grandfather in his entire life.

Ra’s says nothing in response, regarding Damian with open distain.

Jason steps forward to intervene.  “That’s enough—” he begins to say but Damian makes a sudden move and the birdsong cuts out.

--

Jason hears Damian crying in his room later that night.

It late.  Much too late for Jason to be patrolling the corridors but he couldn’t sleep.  He knocks lightly on Damian’s door and the sound behind it abruptly cuts out.  He opens the door and slips inside.

“Go away,” Damian says, muffled by his blankets.

Jason takes a seat on the side of his bed.  Damian sniffles and tries to hide the sound in his pillow.

“It was just a stupid bird,” Damian mutters, breath hitching.  “I shouldn’t even be upset.”

“He shouldn’t have made you do that.”

“I’m supposed to be an assassin,” Damian whispers miserably.  “How am I supposed to kill a person if I can’t even kill a bird?”

“Damian, listen to me.  It’s okay if you never kill a single person.”

“You’ve killed people,” he argues.

Jason winces.  “Yes,” he says because there’s no beating that allegation.  “I’ve killed out of anger and fear.  But I’ve also killed because it was the right thing to do.  Some people can do it and walk away and never think of it again, but other people can never cross that line.”

Damian looks up at him with so much hope, like Jason will be able to flip a switch to take away what he’s feeling and make him into the killer he is destined to be.

“There’s no pride in killing someone,” Jason tells his brother and watches his face fall.  “And no shame in not being able to.”

--

Once Damian is back asleep, Jason goes to Talia.

The problem is, he doesn’t know exactly when in his past life Talia decided Damian was better off training with Bruce.  But he knows the longer Damian stays in the League, the worse things will get for him.

He finds Talia in her office, a ledger spread across her desk.

“Ra’s is escalating.”

She looks up at him.  “I know.”

“We need to get Damian out of here.”

Talia hums and runs her finger along the bottom edge of the ledger.  Jason isn’t used to seeing her indecisive.  “We cannot leave the League, Jason.”

“No, but he can,” he argues.  “Let me take him away from here, Talia.  Ra’s isn’t going to stop training him.  He’s going to cross a line soon, and Damian is going to suffer for it.”

She gives him that assessing look again, the one that seems to ask what do you know?  Jason knows by now she already suspects this isn’t his first resurrection but he won’t do anything to confirm it.

--

The tipping point comes sooner than any of them are ready for.  Ra’s waits until Jason is on an errand for Talia before he summons Damian.

Ra’s gives Damian a simple task—climb a mountain and retrieve a banner from the shrine at the peak.  He calls Damian weak and tells him this will teach him the fortitude he so clearly lacks.

Jason doesn’t find out about the task until late afternoon and by then, Damian’s already left.  He packs a bag frantically and takes off in the direction of the trail but Damian has a head start of hours.  Jason knows the mountain and he knows the shrine—it’s a three day, highly technical hike.  The last time he did it, he carried ropes and a harness to climb the nearly vertical rockface.

Damian departed with no such supplies.

Night falls rapidly and it becomes unsafe for Jason to continue.  He pushes on anyway, stumbling over loose rock.  When he loses his footing and nearly tumbles into a crevasse, he’s forced to camp for the night.

He takes off again at first light, cursing Ra’s under his breath the entire time.

Wind blows harshly along the ridgeline Jason follows, cutting through his robes.

Luckily, he intercepts Damian at the bottom of the cliff, banner clutched in his teeth as he downclimbs the last section.

Jason forces himself to hold back as Damian picks his way down the rockface.  Any distraction could prove fatal.  He holds his breath until Damian’s feet are on solid ground only to see his brother stagger forward.

“It’s okay, I’ve got you,” Jason says, rushing up to him.  Damian is frigid, his League robes not meant for mountaineering in the cold.

“I got it,” Damian says, showing him the banner.  “I did it, Jason.  The finches showed me the way, even though I hurt one of them.”

He’s too cold.  Jason wraps him in the sleeping bag from his pack and lifts him.

“I’m taking you home.”

“You’re not supposed to help me,” Damian mutters but he’s clearly exhausted, potentially delirious.  Jason has no idea how he survived this the first time or what shape he was in when he returned.  “Grandfather says you’re holding me back.”

“Yeah, well I say your grandfather is a bag of dicks,” Jason grumbles and Damian snorts.

He makes as much progress as he can but they’re forced to camp for another night.  Jason gets no sleep, checking Damian for signs of frost bite and altitude sickness.  He shivers through the night and when Jason feels his forehead, it’s hot to the touch.

He remembers another fever Damian once had, lifetimes ago.

Jason gets Damian back to Talia’s quarters and a frenzy of attendants begin fussing over him.  The doctor is called.  Even feverish, Damian won’t let anyone take the banner from him.

When he finally settles to sleep, Jason and Talia sit vigil at his bedside together.  She cards her fingers gently through Damian’s hair, dabbing a cool cloth along his forehead while he shivers.  Jason keeps a hold of Damian’s hand, two fingers pressed to his thready pulse.

“This ends here, Talia,” Jason says quietly.  He’s furious and he knows Talia is as well, but neither of them will disturb Damian’s rest.

She’s quiet for a long moment.  They can’t afford to strike at Ra’s, as much as Jason wants to tear him apart.  “Gotham,” she says eventually.  “If Bruce agrees to train him, Ra’s will respect Batman’s domain.”

Jason nods solemnly.  “Gotham it is.  I’m going with him.”

Talia turns that look on him again.  “What do you need?” she asks.

“A helmet.”

--

Jason departs for Gotham first.  It will take Damian weeks to recover from his mountaineering excursion and there are things he needs to do in Gotham before Damian gets there.

Also, Jason knows if he sees Ra’s, he’s not going to be able to hold back the Lazarus Pit.

Talia offers him an apartment in New Town but Jason turns it down this time.  He has plans and doesn’t want anyone interfering.  So he goes to the one place he knows Batman and Robin stay away from on patrol.

It’s strange to see how Crime Alley changed throughout the years.  It’s not any better or worse than Jason remembers, just a little different.  He finds the Italian place he used to dumpster dive for food behind.  It’s been replaced with an Indian restaurant.

He carries his take-out curry and naan to the apartment he purchased with his fake identity and very real money.  It’s a two-bedroom, one bath, “fixer upper” kind of place in a building where the neighbors won’t ask questions.  He starts turning the second bedroom into a base of operations, gathering intel on criminal activity and making his plan.

He’s not quite on Tim’s level, but he makes a pretty good murder board.

--

Jason is still in contact with Talia and she tells him when Bruce agrees to meet with her.  Damian is fully recovered and coming to Gotham.  If Jason remembers from Damian’s letters in the last loop, it was a difficult transition.  He struggled to understand power dynamics in the Manor, leading to multiple fights with Tim and Bruce.

Jason takes the opportunity to send a message to him through Talia, preemptively reminding Damian of the family stance on fratricide.

But Damian’s arrival means Batman and Robin are going to be distracted.  Which means it’s time for Jason to make his move.

--

When Jason makes his vigilante debut, it’s to an audience of one.

Turns out killing the Joker is just as satisfying the second time.

--

Jason doesn’t exactly lay low after that, but he keeps his activity restricted to Crime Alley.

When Talia sends along a helmet for him, he asks her to paint it black.  He won’t be Red Hood in this lifetime.

Besides, black blends in better with his tac gear.

It’ll probably take a while for anyone to find the Joker’s body and for the power vacuum to hit Gotham, so Jason takes his time to clean up the streets.  It’s harder this time around because he can’t just kill a handful of gang lieutenants and take over their industries.  Well, he could, but Jason wants to change things this time.

He starts by chipping away at Black Mask’s profit margins.  He’s been consolidating the gangs in Gotham and Jason starts targeting shipments of drugs being funneled through the gangs and onto the streets.  Whatever they’re cutting the drugs with is turning up bodies and Jason wants to shut it down.

--

Damian finds him before Bruce does.

He bangs on Jason’s door until he tumbles out of bed and yanks it open, only to find Damian standing there in a crisp new Gotham Academy uniform.

“How did you not get mugged on the way over here?” Jason asks, pulling him inside.

“Two ruffians tried and I dispatched them easily,” Damian scoffs.  He turns a critical eye on Jason’s apartment.  It doesn’t look like much compared to Talia’s staterooms in Nanda Parbat or the old-money opulence of the Manor, but Jason will not be castigated for his home décor before he’s made coffee.

“Aren’t you supposed to be in school?”

“Tt, if that puritanical institution can even be called a school.”

“Bruce is going to freak out.”

Damian scowls and slumps down dramatically into a chair at the kitchen table.  Jason rolls his eyes and goes to make a cup of coffee.  He also puts on a kettle of tea for Damian.

“Want some?” he asks, shaking the tin of loose-leaf tea Talia sent along from Nanda Parbat with his helmet.

Damian shrugs, acting aloof, but Jason knows better.  He pours him a large mug.

“You going to tell me what’s really bothering you?” Jason asks, taking the seat opposite from him at the table.

Damian sips his tea, stalling for time.  He looks away from Jason and grumbles, “Father isn’t what I thought he’d be.  He told me he doesn’t want to train me for the mantle of Robin.”

“He refused to train you?”

Damian shrugs.  “He’ll train me, but not for Robin.  He said it belongs to Drake.  I don’t know what he wants from me!  One moment he’s praising my initiative and the next he’s lecturing me for challenging Drake.”

Jason hums, considering his information.  “You’re not in the League anymore, Damian.  Bruce doesn’t want you to prove yourself by fighting Tim.”

“Then what am I supposed to do?” he asks in frustration.

Damian’s phone rings and he rejects the call, dropping the device on the table.  The screen lights up again immediately with another call request.

“Well, you can start by taking his call,” Jason suggests.

Damian rolls his eyes and rejects the call again.  “I don’t know what he wants.  And his lectures grow repetitive.”

“Ugh, fine.  I will do this for you one time,” Jason caves, holding out his hand for the phone.  Damian pushes it over to him and the next time it rings, Jason picks it up.

“Hello?  Damian?” he hears his father say on the other end of the line.  “I got a call that you missed your math class.”

While he was living on the streets, Jason spent plenty of time thinking about what to say when he finally spoke to Bruce again.  Somehow, he never imagined it would be covering for Damian playing hooky.

“Damian is fine,” he starts by saying.  He hears Bruce register an unfamiliar voice on the phone and his father’s sharp inhale.  Before he can start breaking out the cowl, Jason continues.  “This is his brother.  He heard Talia sent me to Gotham to check up on him and he skipped class to come to my apartment.  I’ll drop him off before his science lab this afternoon.”

“What?!” his brother squawks from his chair.

“You’re not getting out lab period, Damian.”

“…Did you say brother?”

“Adoptive brother, dumbass,” Jason says into the phone, standing and walking to the living room.

“I wasn’t aware Talia had any other children,” Bruce says and Jason can tell he’s probably pulling up a trace on the call.  Well, there goes using the apartment as his base of operations.  He’ll have to move the murder board.

“Yeah, well you weren’t exactly aware of your own kid’s existence, so I’m not surprised,” Jason says dryly.  “Listen, Bruce, Damian is going to be fine here.  I’m going to take him to lunch, let him vent a little, and then drop him off at school.  If you try to charge in here before that, I will shoot you.”

“What did you say your name was again?”

“I didn’t say, actually,” he answers.  He glances back at the kitchen before he sighs and lowers his voice so his brother won’t overhear.  “And a little free advice on Damian?  He likes art museums and animals.  He hates training with daggers because they’re what Ra’s made him use.”

Bruce is quiet on the other end of the line.  “…Why are you telling me this?”

“He’s a good kid, he just doesn’t know how to show it,” Jason says softly.  “Take him to a hockey game sometime.  He’ll love it.  Just don’t get some rich person box seats.  Bring him way down to the boards where he can see the players hit.”  Jason sighs heavily.  “Okay, I’m going to hang up now.”

“Wait a second—”

“Damian isn’t kidnapped!  Don’t freak out!” Jason says over him, ending the call before Bruce can respond.  He walks back to the kitchen and tosses the phone to Damian who catches it easily.  “He’s going to grill you when you get back to the Manor but I bought you some time.”

He pockets the phone and gives Jason half a smile.  “Thank you.”

“Come on, I’m not taking you out to lunch wearing that.  We’re going to get chased by a truancy officer.”

--

Jason gets a flurry of texts from Damian a week later asking him if he’s even been to a Gotham Knights game.  He smiles to himself but it’s bittersweet because in another life, he was the one who took Damian to his first game.

--

His plan to maintain a carefully curated distance from his family is foiled one night after Jason busts another one of Black Mask’s shipments and is in the middle of disposing of it.

“Freeze!  Put your hands up!” he hears a voice call out from the top of the warehouse Jason stashes the cargo in.

Tim’s cowl hides his atrocious haircut but Jason knows it’s still there.  Jason tilts his helmet up towards him and relaxes when he realizes it’s just Robin.  But where Robin is, Batman won’t be far behind.

“Well, which one do you want me to do?  Freeze or put up my hands?  Kind of getting mixed messages here,” Jason says, still holding the shipment.

“Put the crate down then put up your hands up,” Robin says, rolling his eyes.

“Hey you’re the one giving out conflicting instructions,” Jason says in his defense, walking over to the stack of crates that makes up the past month of missing shipments he’s pilfered from Black Mask.  His first time as Red Hood, he took over sales and distribution to fund his criminal enterprise.  Now, he just wants the stuff off the street.

“Okay, now step away from the crates,” Robin says.  “Gotham PD is on the way.”

Jason keeps his hands up and takes several steps back.  “You’re probably going to want to call the fire department too!” he calls up to him.  “I have the whole thing rigged with incendiaries.  I destroy the stockpile at the end of every month and it’s burn day.”

Robin drops down from the rafters.  He has his bo staff in one hand and a grapple gun in the other.  Jason can tell he came expecting more resistance.  He keeps his body relaxed and doesn’t make any sudden movements.

“Detonator is in my back right pocket,” Jason says.

Tim approaches him slowly.  Jason knows for a fact Batman’s protocol is for him to hold the scene until he gets there.  Which means Robin is going a little rogue right now, a thought that makes Jason smirk beneath his helmet.

“Who are you working for?” Tim asks, putting the grapple away to free up a hand for the detonator.

“Nobody,” Jason answers.  Tim misses the joke the same way the goons did at the club in Blüdhaven.  Jeez, does nobody read the Odyssey anymore?  Maybe Talia is on to something with the poetry curriculum.

Come on, Timbo, just a little closer.

Tim reaches for his pocket and Jason spins, cracking his elbow back towards Tim’s face.  Tim jerks at the last second so Jason catches him across the jaw instead of breaking his nose and he scrambles back.  At such close range, Jason doesn’t bother drawing a gun from his holster.

The last time he went hand to hand with Tim was in Titans Tower with the Lazarus Pit surging in him.  Jason quiets the rage and focuses on disarming Robin.

Tim is a demon with the bo staff and Jason take a hard hit to the stomach before dodging his following strike at his head.  Jason catches his next blow against the armor on his forearm and uses the movement to redirect Tim’s momentum.

He gets him off balance enough to close the distance between them, tackling Tim to the ground.  Tim tries to tuck and roll to push Jason off but Jason uses his heavier weight to pin him and twist his arm forward until Tim drops his staff.  Jason tosses it across the warehouse floor and out of range.

Tim braces his feet on the floor and tries to throw Jason off, which would be laughable in different circumstance.

“Calm down.  I’m not going to hurt you,” Jason scoffs, withdrawing the detonator from his back pocket so Tim doesn’t accidentally set it off.

Tim’s gaze slides to the left and Jason’s eyes widen.  He throws himself off, rolling to the right just in time to avoid Bruce dropping out of the shadows.

“I feel like this is all a misunderstanding,” Jason tries to say but Bruce throw a batarang and Jason dodges again.  He draws his gun and fires several shots, careful to aim wide of both Batman and Robin but close enough to keep them from charging.

Having no desire to die by batarang to the neck again, Jason presses the detonator and triggers the incendiaries to set the drug cache ablaze.

Batman and Robin whip around at small explosion and Jason uses the split-second distraction to bolt for the exit.

He’s on his bike in seconds, racing away from the scene.

Several glances to the rooftops behind him show no one is following but it takes several turns for Jason’s heart to slow back down.  Chances are, Bruce and Tim stayed behind to investigate the scene instead of chasing after him.

Jason turns his bike back towards Crime Alley, careful to dodge any cameras Oracle is undoubtably tracking him on.

--

With Batman and Robin investigating him, Jason decides to lay low for the next few days.  It gives him the opportunity to ice his ribs where Tim caught him with the bo staff.  Even with his body armor, Tim hit hard enough to cause some serious bruising.

He spends the meantime mapping out the security camera presence in his neighborhood and strategically disabling several of them to help hide his movements.  It helps that most of the cameras in Crime Alley were painted over long before Jason ever moved back.

Unfortunately, Black Mask takes Jason’s absence as an excuse to ramp up his imports.

Jason finds out Black Mask cut a deal with the Sixty-Eight Kings to bring the drugs in through Cherry Hill.  He weighs the risks and rewards of busting the shipment even though it’s not technically coming through Crime Alley anymore.  He ultimately decides to stake it out, making the decision to intervene based on whether the shipment shows.

--

Jason settles on a rooftop with a thermos of coffee.  Cherry Hill is an old enough part of Gotham he can hide in the shadow of a gargoyle, but the lights from Kane Towers give him good visibility over the city.

Stakeouts are a lot lonelier without Oracle on the comms or Tim around to keep him company.

Jason feels the boredom starting to set in when he catches a blur of darkness out in the corner of his eye.  He braces for an attack, but none comes.

“Are you just going to stand there all night and loom?” Jason eventually asks.

“That depends.  Are you going to tell me who you are?” Batman’s gravely voice responds, the shadow skulking closer.

“I already told you.  I’m Nobody,” Jason says, bringing a knee up to the ledge of the building in case he needs to make a quick escape.

He looks up at Bruce.  The corner of his mouth quirks up in the barest hint of a smile.  If Jason didn’t know him, he wouldn’t have spotted it.  “Nobody, huh?  Talia always did have a thing for the Odyssey.”

“She really, really does,” Jason says with a put-upon sigh.  He tries to look relaxed as Bruce approaches but he’s mentally mapping the best escape route.  “I’m not doing anything illegal, you know.  Sitting up here isn’t technically a crime.”

“Trespassing.”

“No one owns the building.”

“Loitering.”  There’s that little smile again.

“Wow, officer, you gonna book me on jaywalking too?” Jason asks, rolling his eyes under his helmet.

“That depends, did you jaywalk on the way here?”

Jason chuckles softly and relaxes despite himself.  After all, it’s just Bruce.

“What are you really doing up here?” Bruce asks.  Jason feels his stare even if he doesn’t look at Bruce directly.

Jason nods to the alley below them.  “Stakeout.  The drugs Black Mask are bringing in are laced with something nasty and it’s killing users.  Intel says the shipment should being coming through here tonight.”

To Jason’s surprise, Bruce simply sits down on the ledge next to him.  His silhouette makes him look like another gargoyle.  They pass the rest of the hour in silence, but time goes faster with someone just sitting beside him.

Jason remembers being a teenager and passing nights like this with Bruce before Ethiopia, even before Garzonas.  The memories are hazy after all his resurrections, but Bruce sitting next to him brings them back to the surface.

--

Eventually, a boxy shipping van turns into the alley and shuts off its headlights.  Then it flashes them three times.

“You take the driver and I’ll get the cargo?” Jason offers.

Batman gives a sharp nod and drops silently into the alley below.  Jason watches as he yanks a gunman out of the passenger seat and slams him to the ground before going after the driver.

Jason makes his way to the back of the van and opens the doors, expecting to see another stash of drugs.

Instead, he comes face to face with a turret-mounted machine gun.  Black Mask stands behind it at the ready.

Oh shit—is all Jason has time to think before Black Mask pulls the trigger and he feels the rounds slam into his tac gear.

Jason’s body armor is good but it’s not machine-gun-at-three-feet good.  He drops to the pavement.  A mixture of adrenaline and the Lazarus Pit surge to the surface and Jason manages to fire off several shots into the van, emptying his gun.

It’s a fucking set up.  He harassed Black Mask's operation for weeks.  Jason feels like an idiot for not realizing it.

Black Mask might have been expecting Jason but he certainly wasn’t expecting Batman and Bruce finishes the fight while Jason struggles to breathe on the ground.

His helmet internal feed is a string of warnings Jason ignores.  Shattered ribs, blood loss… how is he not dead yet?

“Fuck me, I thought I had it this time,” he mumbles.

Then hands are pressing against his chest and someone is struggling to get his helmet off.

“Jason?  Jason, stay with me!”

Bruce puts pressure on his chest and Jason lets out a strangled cry.  He feels his broken ribs shift.  He reaches a hand up and holds onto Bruce’s wrist while his father tries to stop the bleeding.

“It’s okay,” Jason gasps at the pain.  Bruce’s hands are shaking and Jason can feel it through his chest.  “I come back, Bruce.  It’s okay.”

Jason has never died in Gotham before.  Even if it is in Cherry Hill.

The blood loss catches up to him and Jason passes out as he hears sirens wail in the distance.

--

Jason expects to wake in his casket.  But instead he hears the gentle beeps of a heartrate monitor and the steady cadence of someone reading aloud.

“Is that The Golden Compass?” Jason tries to ask but instead what comes out is a cross between a whimper and a groan.

The reading stops.

“Jaylad?”

His eyes focus on Bruce sitting beside him.  He’s in a hospital but he doesn’t recognize which one.  Not Mercy, that’s for sure.  Jason spent so long staring at those walls, he’d recognize the shade of white paint in his dreams.

“Who told you?” he rasps out.  “Damian or Talia?”

“Neither of them,” Bruce frowns.  “I figured it out on the rooftop.  I didn’t understand it at the time...  I still don’t.”

Of course he figured it out.  World’s Greatest Detective and Jason thought a helmet would protect his identity.

Jason shifts on the bed and groans at the sharp stab of pain.  “Fucking ow… am I dying?”  It definitely still feels like he’s dying.

“You have another surgery in a few hours,” Bruce says which isn’t an answer so he must still be touch and go.

Jason gives a thumbs up and tries to catch his breath from the pain.  Bruce reaches out and presses a small remote tied into his IV and Jason pressed the button several times to start the flow of pain medication.  It has the added benefit of making him drowsy.

“If I die, bury me with a trowel next time,” Jason mumbles before he passes out.

--

The next time he wakes up, he’s at the Manor.  He’s in a spare bedroom that’s been hastily converted into a full medical suite.  His chest is a mess of pain and when he looks down, he sees fresh bandages layered across his torso.

Bruce is sleeping in a chair next to his bed and Dick is seated by the door, typing on his phone.  Jason clears his throat and Dick’s eyes snap to him.

“Water?” he asks and Dick springs up, pouring a cup from the glass pitcher on the side table.

Jason drinks it eagerly, spilling some on his chest and stabbing himself with the IV line at the bend of his elbow.  He holds the cup back out to Dick who fills it for him again, eyes never leaving Jason.

“Easy on the water, Jay,” Bruce says when he finishes the second glass.  “How are you feeling?”

“Like I got shot,” he says now that his throat no longer feels like sandpaper.

Dick hovers at the edge of the bed.  “You’re not like… a clone or something, right?  It’s really you?”

Didn’t they have tests for that sort of thing?  Unless they haven’t run them yet?  Jason manages to look at Dick incredulously from the bed.

“It’s me,” he confirms.

Bruce clears his throat and Jason shifts his gaze to him.  He looks… older than Jason remembers but not the oldest he’s seen him.  He was older when his batarang inadvertently killed him.

“Jason… in the alley when you were bleeding out… you said something,” Bruce prompts.  Jason can never recall seeing Bruce nervous but he sounds unsure now.

“I told you I’d be okay,” Jason says.

“Why did you say that?”

Jason looks at his father.  He takes in the thin lines at the edge of his eyes, the grey hairs he doesn’t remember.  “Because you called me by my name.  And I didn’t want you to think you were watching me die again.”

Bruce reaches out to cup his cheek.  “I knew it was you,” he says quietly, almost to himself.  “I knew it.”

“Damian said you used a Lazarus Pit,” Dick interrupts.  “Is that how you came back?”

Jason shakes his head.  He’s tired of secrets.  “No, the Lazarus Pit came after.  Every time I die, I wake up in my grave about six months after the Joker killed me.  But I come back injured, so Talia uses the Lazarus Pit to heal me and then tries to brainwash me with ancient Greek playwrights.”

“You wake up in your grave and what?  Dig yourself out of your coffin?” Dick looks like he’s going to be ill.

“Casket.”

“What?”

“I’m buried in a casket.  It’s the wrong shape for a coffin,” he corrects.  “You’d know this if you went to the funeral.”

“Jason!”

“What?  Too soon?” he asks innocently at Bruce who huffs a laugh.  He tries to return the smile but his expression twists with pain.

“Get some rest, Jason,” Bruce says before adding quietly, “It’s good to see you.”

--

Jason wakes up several times over the next few days.  He’s on a schedule to reduce the amount of pain medications he’s on and he can honestly say he’s had less painful deaths than this recovery.

He wakes once to the soft scratch of a pencil over paper.

“You getting my good side?” he asks, keeping his eyes closed.

“Tt, presumptuous to imply you have a good side to get,” Damian snarks from the seat by the window.

“I want to see it when it’s done.”

“But I haven’t finished capturing your oversized head,” Damian says with false sincerity.

Jason laughs and regrets it immediately when the motion jars his ribs.

--

Jason wants to believe that things are going to get better, but he keeps himself at arm’s length from the family.  When he wakes with someone in the room, he often pretends he’s still asleep, a move tried and tested from his time catatonic.

Tim sneaks in and draws a vial of his blood while Jason pretends to be asleep.  It’s definitely the weirdest way he’s met his younger brother, but Jason is happy someone in the family possesses enough common sense to test his identity.

On the rare occasions when he wakes alone, Jason works on leveraging himself into a sitting position.  The pain threatens to white out his vision but he learns to wait it out.  He goes from sitting to standing to taking careful steps across the carpeted floor, dragging his IV pole beside him.

He makes it to the door of his bedroom and opens it, taking his first tentative steps into the hallway when he’s startled by the loud clearing of a throat.

“Master Jason,” he hears a familiar voice and even more familiar tone.  “I must be seeing things in my old age.  Because I know you’re not walking around when the doctors were explicit about your bedrest.”

Jason, knowing he’s caught, gives Alfred his best smile.  “What can I say, Alfred?  I just wanted some fresh air.”

Alfred unearths a wheelchair from somewhere in the Manor, possibly a spare for Barbara, and pushes Jason out into the garden.  It’s a warm day and Jason tilts his head up to the sun.  He sits there while Alfred goes back into the house, only opening his eyes when he hears him return with a tray of tea.

Alfred sets the tray on the garden table and pours a cup for Jason.  He doesn’t know why he’s surprised, but of course Alfred remembers the way he takes it.  He stirs the sugar cube in for Jason before setting the porcelain cup on a saucer and repeating the ritual with his own cuppa.

They sit in silence, staring out at the garden.

“I like the tulips,” Jason says eventually.

“Thank you.  I planted them quite late last year and was worried they wouldn’t bloom.”

He hums in sympathy.

“Master Jason,” Alfred begins before pausing.  “If it wouldn’t be too impertinent, may I ask you a question?”

“I don’t believe you’ve been impertinent a day in your life, Alfred.”

“Then perhaps this will be a first for both of us,” he says with a small smile.  “Master Bruce filled me in on some of the details of your return.  How many times is this for you then?”

Jason takes a moment to consider the question.  He eventually decides not to count the times he didn’t bother to climb out of his casket.  “Five.”

“Five,” Alfred repeats quietly.  “My goodness.”

Jason thinks back on his many past lives.  “It wasn’t all bad.”

“Is that why you didn’t return home?” Alfred asks softly.

“It’s not that simple,” Jason sighs.  He briefly considers how much to reveal before deciding he doesn’t want to lie, even if by omission.  “I made a lot of mistakes the first time, Alfred.  I hurt people indiscriminately.  I did… truly unforgivable things.  And then I got this insane second chance.”

Jason runs his finger along the rim of the teacup.  “But things weren’t the same as the first time.  People weren’t the same.  And it all went wrong again.”

“You’ve grown up, Master Jason,” Alfred tells him but he sounds sad when he says it.  “And it seems we’ve all missed it.”

Jason stares at his hands.  They’ve been covered in so much blood over the years.  How can they not see it?  “I can’t stay here, Alfred.  If I do then you’ll realize I’m still the person who made all those mistakes and did those terrible things.  I can fix things, but no matter how much I change them for other people, I’m still me.  Do you get it?”

“Oh my boy.  Come here.”  Jason looks up in time to see Alfred pull him into a tight hug.  Jason grips him back tightly.  He can’t remember the last time Alfred hugged him like this.  It’s a memory too hazy to recall.

Part of him think he doesn’t deserve it, that Alfred would never embrace him like this if he knew the things Jason did.  But he’s selfish and he holds his grandfather close.

“I really missed you, Alfred.”

“We missed you too, Jason,” Alfred says, letting Jason turn his head into his shoulder.  “Quite terribly, I’m afraid.  And forgive for saying this, but I believe you to be incorrect.”

“I don’t think Bruce is gonna see it that way,” Jason sniffles when he pulls away.

“I think he may surprise you,” Alfred says, nodding behind Jason.

Jason turns and sees his father standing at the entrance to the garden.  Jason doesn’t know how much he overheard and he looks up at Bruce with wide eyes, feeling every inch the teenager he claims he barely remembers.

“I know you killed the Joker, Jason,” Bruce says.

Jason sighs and waits for him to pass the sentence.  “What’s it going to be?  Arkham or Blackgate?”

“Jay,” Bruce steps towards him.  Jason doesn’t want to fight him.  He’s so tired of fighting.  Arkham won’t be so bad with the Joker gone.  “I’m not going to… send you away.”

“Oh,” Jason says.  Bruce forgave him once, but he was still a kid back them.  He didn’t really know what Jason was confessing to.  But now there’s no ambiguity.  Jason puts his cards on the table.  “He’s not the only one I’ve killed, Bruce.  And I will kill again.”  Chemo is still out there and Jason is sure there will be others.

“I don’t… agree with it,” Bruce says with a scowl.  “And I don’t want you to kill indiscriminately.  But it’s like Alfred said.  You’ve grown up, Jason.  You make your own decisions now.”

“And you’re okay with that?”

Bruce struggles to choose his words because the answer is so obviously no but he clearly does not want to say it.  “I want you to make choices you can live with.  I don’t fully understand this… version of you.  But I hope I can get to know the man you are now.”

Bruce killed him in one lifetime and cared for him in the next.  So did Talia.  He loves them both even though they’ve shown themselves capable of both great kindness and great cruelty.  He doesn’t hold the actions of their past lives against them.

Maybe the same can be true for himself.

“Okay,” Jason whispers.  He holds out his hand.  “Truce?”

Bruce reaches forward and shakes it firmly before leaning down and pulling Jason into an embrace to rival Alfred’s moments earlier.

“Truce,” his father says.  “Welcome home, Jason.”

Chapter Text

Bruce knows something is wrong when he steps into the Cave.

His colleagues in the Justice League made the case for him to stay at the Watchtower but Bruce claimed he needed to return to Gotham to refamiliarize himself with the state of his city.

The truth is Bruce just wants to sleep in his own damn bed.

But as he makes his way through the cave, Robin close at his heels, he can already see things are changed.

Tim informed him Dick assumed the mantle of Batman while Bruce was trapped in the Time Stream, presumed dead.  It stands to reason the Cave wouldn’t be as he left it.  Bruce identifies some small changes immediately— a new Batsuit on display, a monitor replaced on the Bat Computer, a grapple gun left half-disassembled on a work table.

But Bruce can feel something larger off.

Maybe it’s in the way Tim won’t let him out of his sight.  Maybe it’s the way Dick gives him a tight nod and says “we’ll talk later” instead of embracing him at his return.

Maybe it’s the way Damian is nowhere to be seen.

That first night, Bruce is too exhausted to look any closer.  Whatever it is that changed in the months he was lost in time will have to wait until morning.

--

It’s Dick who breaks the news of the Joker to him.

Bruce was gone just under a year.  But approximately six months after his disappearance, the Joker went missing from Arkham.  With no signs of a breakout, investigators were stumped, and the only thing police could do was wait for the next Joker attack.  Then, an anonymous tip led officers to an abandoned building in Amusement Mile where they recovered the Joker’s body.

Bruce reads the investigation report while Dick talks through the timeline of events.  For a moment, he considers if Dick was the one to kill him, but then Bruce sees the crime scene photos.  A single cut across the neck, determined by the coroner as the cause of death.  Whoever held the knife cut so deep the laceration nearly severed the spine.

Bruce may have missed plenty in the last year, but he can still recognize an execution.

--

Weeks pass and Batman returns to the streets of Gotham.

But Bruce still sees the cracks in his household.

Dick practically throws the Batsuit at him before returning to Blüdhaven.  Tim goes by Red Robin now.  He still sticks closely to Bruce, especially on patrol.  Bruce begins easing him into solo missions, giving him greater responsibility to investigate cases.  Tim is a brilliant detective, Bruce’s return is a testament to that, and he carefully uses those skills to encourage Tim’s independence.

He sends Tim to Blüdhaven to help Nightwing with an investigation on missing organ donations.  The relationship between Dick and Tim is still strained, but it’s a step in the right direction.

While Tim is in Blüdhaven, Bruce patrols with Damian.  His youngest is the one who most visibly changed during Bruce’s absence.  Damian shot up three inches in the past year and spent most of it as Robin to Dick’s Batman.  His combat skills are as sharp as Bruce remembers but Dick clearly worked with him on acrobatics and his grappling is much improved.

During an apartment fire, Batman coordinates with first responders while Robin keeps the civilians a safe distance from the blaze.  When all the residents are finally accounted for, Bruce finds a moment to catch his breath.  He sees Robin holding a giant orange house cat nearly half his size.  He keeps the animal still while one of the evacuated children carefully pets it.  It’s the kind of civilian interaction that was beyond Damian a year ago and Bruce is surprised to see how naturally it comes to him now.

But while Damian seems to have found his footing with the people of Gotham, he mainly keeps clear of Bruce in the Manor.  He spends most of his days cloistered in his own room, only emerging for meals and classes.  He’s taken to wearing a motorcycle jacket of all things over his Gotham Academy blazer.

Damian’s tendency toward isolation is so great, Bruce is surprised one afternoon when Damian knocks on his office door.

It’s still several hours before patrol and Damian must have just returned from school.  Bruce looks up from the Wayne Enterprises quarterly earnings report to see his son standing opposite his desk, looking like he’s facing down a firing squad.

“Damian.  Is something the matter?”

“I must return to Nanda Parbat,” he says and something in Bruce’s chest freezes.  “You need to sign a leave of absence request for my instructors.”  Damian produces a permission slip with Gotham Academy letterhead and Bruce feels his panic subside.  Damian’s already filled it out and he reads the dates requested on the form.

“Three weeks?” Bruce reads.  It’s a significant amount of class for Damian to miss in the middle of the semester.

“I was informed three weeks will be sufficient,” Damian says, voice tight.

Bruce considers what he knows.  Tim informed him that Talia is now in charge of the League.  If Damian wanted to return to Nanda Parbat permanently, he would have left after she consolidated her takeover.  His return now is likely at her behest, but the question is why.

“You’ve never made a request like this before,” Bruce points out.  “Is there a reason for this visit?”

“Yes.”

“And it’s time sensitive,” Bruce infers given the date Damian wants to begin his absence at school is tomorrow.

“Yes.”

“Then we can leave tomorrow.”

“We?” Damian asks, looking suddenly concerned.

“Three weeks is not an unreasonable request,” Bruce says consideringly.  If Damian falls behind in his classes, he will hire a tutor.  His son makes so few requests, Bruce sees no reason to deny him this.  “I’ll have Alfred find our passports.”

“What?  No!” Damian blurts out.  He gathers himself and clears his throat.  “I mean to say, Father, I can go by myself.”

“Damian, you are a very capable young man,” Bruce says, watching how the tips of Damian’s ears turn red at the praise.  “But you are still fourteen.  I’m not sending you halfway around the world alone.”

Bruce pointedly does not bring up what happened the last time one of his sons went halfway around the world alone.

“You can’t come!” Damian snaps at him.  His eyes go wide, surprised at his own outburst, before he turns his back and flees Bruce’s office.

Bruce sits there wondering what the hell just happened.

--

“Richard, I am going with or without your help,” Damian says over the phone.  Dick has never heard him sound so desperate.

Talia would have only called him home for one thing.  Jay must be dying.

“I’ll talk to B,” Dick promises, phone pressed to his ear.  “But don’t call a taxi for the airport just yet.  The private jet will get you there faster, just give me a chance to talk to him.

Damian is silent on his end of the phone for a long moment.  “I cannot delay beyond morning,” he says finally.

“I’ll talk to him tonight then, before patrol,” Dick says with a heavy sigh.  “And if he has a problem with it, I’ll drive you to the airport myself.”

Dick hangs up the phone and feels a headache building.  Tim looks up at him from where he’s perched on the couch with a case file spread out on the coffee table, spilling onto the floor.  Tim is visiting ostensibly to help Dick with an organ harvesting operation in Blüdhaven.  But Dick knows part of why Tim is here is because his obsession finding Bruce took over every aspect of his life and he needs to relearn how to have some distance.

“What’s going on?” Tim asks, flipping to another page of the file.

Dick doesn’t know how much time Jason spent with Tim.  He knows they patrolled together and busted an illegal weapons shipment at the docks, but were they friends?  Did they have time to be before Tim disappeared chasing down a lead in the League of Assassins?

“I’m going to say something that sounds crazy and I just need you to hear me out,” Dick says.

Tim closes the file and glares at him.  “Well doesn’t that sound familiar,” he accuses.

“Fair enough, I deserve that,” Dick says, putting his hands up.  “Just give me a chance to explain.”

Tim rolls his eyes and flops back on the couch.  “Fine.”

“Do you remember Damian’s older brother from the League?  Jay?” Dick asks.  “This is going to sound crazy.  I think there’s a chance he might be Jason Todd, the second Robin.  But I know that’s impossible because Jason died years ago—”

Dick cuts off when he registers the look of confusion on Tim's face.  His brother tilts his head at him.  “What?” Dick demands.

“I thought we all knew Damian’s brother is Jason Todd.”

“What do you mean you thought we all knew!”

Tim gives an exaggerated shrug.  “I thought it was obvious!”

Dick thinks back on the Jason Todd he last knew—a scrawny fifteen-year-old kid with a permanent smirk and mild acne.  He tries to reconcile that image with Jay, the international hitman who bullied Damian into doing his science homework.  “How was it obvious?  You just… figured it out?!”

“How did you not figure it out?!” Tim throws his hands up.  “He looks just like him!”

“His eyes are the wrong color!”

“He literally moves the same!” Tim argues.  “When we patrolled together, he stuck his dismount on a crane crossbeam the same way he did as Robin.  How many people do you know who use a reverse grip on a grapple gun?  He gave you hand-written mission notes and you didn’t think they looked familiar?  I thought you knew and didn’t want to make it a big deal.”

“Tim, did you honestly think that our dead brother magically came back and I just didn’t mention that to you?” Dick asks in disbelief.  He knows they have some work to do on their relationship but he didn't think it was that serious.

“It didn’t matter, Dick,” Tim sighs in frustration.  “I thought maybe you sent him uncover in the League or something.  But it wasn’t important because I was still searching for Bruce and that was the priority.”

Dick stares at him in a moment of stunned silence.

Tim crosses his arms and falls back onto the couch again.  “Talia let me stay in his room at Nanda Parbat while I was helping her reorganize the League.  He has a murder board of us.”

“A what?”

“A murder board,” Tim repeats, his mouth quirking up in a smile.  “That’s what he called it, anyway.  But it’s like a collage of all the stuff we’ve been doing.  He had a flyer of the gymnastics center opening in Blüdhaven.”

“Huh,” Dick says, trying to imagine Jason keeping track of their lives from afar and how Tim is the only person in the world who would not find it even remotely disturbing.

“Why are you bringing Jay up anyway?” Tim asks.  “Last I heard, he went back to the League once Talia finally killed Ra’s.”

Dick looks away.  He doesn’t know how much of the situation he should explain to Tim.  He doesn’t know how to explain Jason is dying.

“I need to go to Gotham to speak to Bruce,” Dick says instead.  The hard change of subject makes Tim raise an eyebrow and tilt his head at Dick like he’s a puzzle to solve.  “I think you should head out on patrol by yourself tonight.  I don’t want us to miss this meeting and I’ll try to rush back when I’m done with Bruce.”

Tim narrows his eyes at him.  But they’ve been working the case for days and Dick knows he doesn’t want to miss the scheduled organ auction in all its macabre glory.

“Fine.  But afterward you’re going to tell me what’s going on.  I deserve to know what’s happening.”

“That’s fair,” Dick agrees wearily.  He doesn’t have a clue what he’ll tell Tim but it’s just another problem to figure out later.

--

Dick lets himself into the Manor quietly.  He checks his watch.  At this hour, Alfred is normally preparing a light dinner for Bruce and Damian before they head out on patrol.  Which means Damian is probably finishing up homework and Bruce will be in his office doing Wayne Enterprise work.

Dick hesitates for a moment at the door to the study.  He spent the drive from Blüdhaven trying to come up with a remotely plausibly story.  Bruce already suspects Dick is hiding something about the Joker’s death.  Or, more accurately, the Joker’s execution.  Jason might not have tortured him or drawn out the death like Dick feared, but his chosen method still feels extremely personal.  And Dick feels pulled between protecting Jason’s secrets and keeping his family from tearing itself apart.

He knocks lightly at the door before pushing it open.

Bruce is writing in an old-school ledger.  He keeps paper records for some of Wayne Enterprises’ works—a skill he inherited from his own father and tried in vain to pass down to Dick.

“B, do you have a minute?”

“Of course.  Alfred told me you were coming by for dinner tonight.”

Dick takes the seat by the window and Bruce waits for him to gather his thoughts.  “I can go with Damian to Nanda Parbat,” he says finally.

Bruce raises his eyebrows at the offer.  He gives Dick an assessing look.  “Damian sent you to speak with me?”

“He didn’t.  I’m here to warn you Damian is going whether or not you send him on the private jet,” Dick says, well aware there isn’t a force in the Manor that can stop his little brother.

Bruce considers the information an chooses his next question carefully.  “Why is it so important he goes alone?”

“Because he doesn’t want anyone to see him upset,” Dick responds.  It’s the same reason why, ever since Jason left, Damian spends so much time in his room.  Dick looks at Bruce.  He wants to let Damian go, agreed to support him, but he doesn’t understand the reasoning.  “It’s his brother.”

Bruce raises his eyebrows.  “Talia has another son?”

“James,” Dick says because if Bruce checks his story with Alfred, he’ll be able to corroborate Jason’s fake name.  “He came to visit while you were… gone.  Damian thought he wasn’t wanted and tried to go back to the League.”  Bruce gives him a harsh look and Dick puts his hands up in defense.  “Don’t worry, I told Damian no one way going to kick him out, but Jay was already here.”

“You let Damian spend extended time with a League Assassin.”

“It wasn’t like that,” Dick glares.  “Jay wasn’t just some assassin who showed up on contract.  He was Damian’s brother.”

Dick remembers how Jason looked in the Manor foyer, hands shoved in the pockets of his motorcycle jacket and hair mussed from his helmet.  He remembers how he would always wave at the Manor while he waited for the gates to open as he left.

“He stayed for a few months to make sure Damian was okay and… he helped.  I think Damian needed someone to vent to and I needed some space from Damian,” Dick admits.  Going from his own life in Blüdhaven to a permanent caretaker for a teenager was a rough adjustment.  Dick loves Damian but he can admit he needed the breathing room Jason gave him by taking custody a few days a week.

“But he left,” Bruce says.  “Even before I returned, Damian was living in the Manor full time.”

Dick nods.  “He’s sick.  Part of why he came to Gotham was to tell Damian.  He returned to the League a few months before you came back, but he was on borrowed time before he left.”

He watched Bruce do the mental math.  “So if Damian is asking to return to Nanda Parbat now…”

“It’s because his brother is dying,” Dick finishes, voice tight.  “Which is why he’ll go with or without your permission.”

Bruce considers the new information and stands from the desk to join Dick by the large office windows.  On a clear day, they can see out to Drake Manor.  But the sky is overcast and the grounds foggy beyond the tree line.

“I’ll speak with Damian,” Bruce says quietly.  “He’ll want to leave tonight.”

--

Damian leaves for Nanda Parbat with a backpack of clothes and a glass container of cookies still warm from the oven.  Bruce accompanies him to the private airport and Damian fidgets uncharacteristically with a strap of his backpack.

Before he gets out of the car, Bruce clasps him by the shoulder and tells him to text him when he lands, as if he won’t be tracking the flight the entire time it’s airborne.  It takes nearly a full day for Damian to arrive, but when he thinks back on it, he won’t remember anything from the town car until he walks into Jason’s room in Nanda Parbat.

They bury him in the catacombs.  Eventually, he’ll be moved to the ossuary.

When Damian returns from Nanda Parbat, it’s with a box full of letters.  He left his clothes so there would be space in his backpack for Jason’s leather jacket.  Damian unzips his bag every few hours during the flight to check it’s still there.

Bruce arrives to collect him from the airport.  He doesn’t say anything, for which Damian is grateful.  No sooner is the car stopped at the Manor than is Damian out the door and on his way to his bedroom.

Damian locks the door and slides down against it.  He unzips his bag and checks for the jacket, this time drawing it out and pressing it to his nose.

There’s a gentle knock at his door.

“Go away,” Damian shouts, voice loud enough to carry through the heavy wood.

“Dames, it’s me,” Dick says.  Damian is surprised to hear him still at the Manor.  When Bruce returned, Dick ran back to Blüdhaven quickly enough.

“Go away,” he repeats quieter but just as firmly.

He feels a gentle thud against the door at his back.  Grayson must be leaning against it.

“We don’t have to talk about anything,” Dick tries again.  “I just want to see you.”

Damian doesn’t respond.  He just sits there and waits for long minutes until he hears the retreat of Dick’s footsteps.

He stays there with his back against the door, eyes unfocused.  He keeps waiting to cry.  He's been waiting for days.

Damian remembers sobbing himself to sleep when Ra’s made him kill a rosefinch as part of his training.  So why can’t he summon any tears for his brother?

--

The day passes.  It seems he’s been granted extended leave from his lessons.  Damian permits himself one entire day in bed before he drags himself into the shower and puts on his school uniform.  The knowledge that Jason loved school and wouldn’t want Damian missing classes sits heavily in his chest until the guilt spurs him to action.

His Gotham Academy blazer is snug inside the arms of his motorcycle jacket but Damian won’t waste Jason’s leather jacket on something as pedestrian as school.

He takes his seat at the breakfast table while Dick and Bruce stare at him.

Damian returns their gaze.  “I have a chemistry lab today,” he says by way of explanation.

Dick looks conflicted.  “Damian… you don’t have to return to school if you’re not ready—”

“Why wouldn’t I be ready?” Damian challenges, hackles rising.

Dick looks at Bruce for help and Bruce regards Damian carefully.  Damian stares back at his father.  Eventually, Bruce nods.  “I’ll drive you.”

It’s a silent car ride.  Damian remembers the way Jason would drive him on his motorcycle, swerving in the lanes back and forth until Damian tightened his hold on him and tapped his leg to go faster.  The air-conditioned town car can’t compare.

Instead of the road to the Academy, Bruce turns them up a road that carries them to an overlook of Gotham.  He parks the car facing out towards the view.

If Bruce is waiting for him to crack open and pour his heart out, he’ll be waiting all day.  Damian stares placidly out of the front window as if this is a typical stop on his way to school.

“I’m going to miss chemistry lab,” Damian says.

“You hate chemistry lab.”

It’s true and he’s not surprised a great detective like his father figured it out.  Damian finds his science classes lacking.  The subject holds no answers on topics like the Lazarus Pit, resurrection, or the All-Blades.  And what use is science when medicine couldn’t save his brother?

Still, Jason would have wanted him to go.

Damian moves to unbuckle his seatbelt and begin walking when Bruce reaches out an arm to stop him.

“I know you’re hurting,” his father says.  The words come out halting and awkward.  Damian itches to get out of the car.  He can’t sit through a heart to heart with his father.  “The question is, what are you going to do with it?”

Damian freezes mid-escape attempt.  He looks at Bruce’s eyes.  “What do you mean?”

“I won’t claim to know your brother, but I am familiar with loss,” Bruce says.  “Grief can be a paralytic or a motivator, Damian.  But it cannot be ignored.  So if you want to go to school this week or if you want to crawl back into bed, you’re allowed.  But if you want to memorialize your brother, that is also an option.”

Jason was his protector in the League.  A piece of home when he was adrift in Gotham.  Their relationship was private…. sacred.  The idea of parading it out for anyone to see makes him physically ill.

“I don’t want some gaudy statue—”

“Not a statue, a program,” Bruce stresses.  He looks vaguely embarrassed at the misunderstanding.  “Not so much a monument as a memorial.”

Damian stops and considers it.  The idea has merit.  “… I need some time to think about it.”

Bruce nods and turns the key in the ignition.  “Let me know what you’re thinking at the end of the week.”  He shifts the car back into drive and begins to trip back to Gotham Academy.

Damian looks at the clock and realizes he’ll miss his chemistry lab but will be on time to the rest of his classes.  The corner of his mouth ticks up in a smile.

He thinks about what kind of program Jason would appreciate being established in his honor.  Perhaps something with the library.

--

Alfred is washing dishes after breakfast when the doorbell chimes through the Manor.

It’s rare for anyone to make it to the door without first setting off one of the alarms on the gates, but it’s not unheard of.  The last person to succeed in making it to the door was an enterprising young reporter and rock-climbing hobbyist.  No matter, Alfred will send away whoever managed it this time.

He wipes his hands on a tea towel and sets aside his apron, rolling down his shirtsleeves and sliding his arms back into his jacket.  His oxfords click across the marble floor of the foyer as he reaches the front door.

“Master James,” he says with mild surprise.  Mostly because he was recently informed of James’ death.

James, albeit very much alive, looks much changed from the last time Alfred saw him swaggering through the Manor.  He no longer looks so much like Bruce it nearly knocked the breath from him.  The most obvious change is James lost a significant amount of weight.  He is gaunt, with a greenish tint to his skin that looks near cadaverous.  He is also dressed more formally than Alfred remembers.  Instead of leather jackets and motorcycle boots, Jay wears a dress shirt and bespoke trousers.

“Good morning, Alfred,” he says pleasantly enough.  “Is Damian or Bruce home?”

“Damian is at school, I’m afraid,” Alfred answers.  James looks sheepish, as if embarrassed he didn’t consider the option.  “And Master Bruce is taking meetings from the study this morning.”

“Ah.  Well, I can come back some other time,” he says.

“No, please allow me to escort you to the sitting room.  Master Bruce may have time in his schedule for a meeting.”

In all honesty, Alfred is worried for young Master Damian.  The boy has been withdrawn since his return from Nanda Parbat.  As he leads them to a sitting room, he hopes maybe Jay can bring out the animated and opinionated teen Alfred remembers.

He then climbs the stairs to Thomas’ study and knocks at the door.  Bruce sits at his father’s desk, work spread out in front of him.  A glance tells Alfred it’s budgeting for the new project Damian proposed to him last week.  The whole affair is shrouded in secrecy but Bruce treats it with the utmost care.

“You have a visitor downstairs.”

“Yes, I heard the bell,” Bruce says with half a smile, no doubt recalling the last unexpected guest and how Alfred sent them on their way.  “Another reporter with a penchant for climbing?”

“Not quite,” Alfred tells him.  “It’s Damian’s brother, James.  He asked if you have time for a meeting today.”

The shift from businessman to investigator is instantaneous.  Bruce’s eyes snap up from his work and he frowns.  “Damian’s… brother.”

“I’ll prepare some tea for you,” Alfred says as Bruce stands.  “I do hope you can convince him to stay for dinner, if only for Master Damian’s sake.”

--

Alfred gathers a basic tray with an assortment of teas.  He’s not quite sure what the social protocol is for a faked death and return to the living so best to offer a variety.

James is still in the study when Alfred reappears, tray in hand.  He bounces a knee nervously and runs a hand through his hair while he waits for Bruce to arrive.

“How do you take your tea?” Alfred asks.

“Black tea with one sugar, please,” he replies, eyes shifting back to the door.

Alfred prepares the cup and passes it to him.  James takes a sip and places the cup and saucer on a side table.

The door to the sitting room opens and Jay gets to his feet.  Alfred turns to prepare a cup of tea for Bruce when he notices him frozen in the doorway.

“Jay?” Bruce says, voice strained.

The young man stands awkwardly and wipes his palms against his trousers.  “Hey, B.”

“Jason,” Bruce whispers.  He rushes forward but stops just short of him, hands hovering midair between them, halfway to an embrace.

Alfred feels a wave of dread that Bruce mistakes Talia’s son for his own, that he’s confused James with Jason.  But when Alfred looks at them standing beside each other, something slots into place in his mind.

“My goodness,” he says faintly, reaching out a hand to stabilize himself on the table.  He very well might faint.

Jason was just a child when Bruce returned from abroad with his body in tow.  Alfred remembers picking out the suit they buried him in—how he was careful to pick a warm pair of socks because Jason so hated the cold.  He remembers how small the funeral was, how inadequate given how much the boy was loved.

The man who stands before them is not the child they buried.  But he is.  The way Jason holds himself reminds Alfred of a boy who stood uncertainly in the foyer of the Manor when Bruce brought him home a lifetime ago.  He even takes his tea the same way.

“How…?” Bruce begins to ask, snapping Alfred back to the present.

Jason winces and rubs the back of his neck.  “It’s kind of a long story.”

--

“…You really should’ve seen Talia’s face when I climbed out of the ossuary,” Jason says long after the three of them have exhausted the teapot.  “Now that I think about it, it kind of looked like your faces right now.”

Alfred gives him a quelling look but to his surprise, Bruce chuckles.

“I’ve been racking my brain to think of some reason why this resurrection is different than the others,” Jason sighs.  “Talia reached out to her contacts but they haven’t been able to determine any reason for the resurrections either.  She’s able to pass is off as Lazarus Pit research for now, but she’s wary of letting too many people know about my ability.  And she’s adamant I don’t take any League contracts while I’m still healing.”

Jason’s reveal of his time in the League of Assassins is certainly a surprise.  Alfred can see by the set of Bruce’s shoulders that he isn’t pleased with it.  But Bruce hasn’t brought it up again.  Perhaps the shock of Jason’s return is putting off that particular argument.

“I have contacts in the Justice League who might be able to offer insight, if this is something you want to pursue,” Bruce offers.

Jason shakes his head.  “You tried that already.  No answers that way either.”

He lifts a hand and inspects the green tint to his veins.  “I have my own theory.  The other times I died, it was because of something—exsanguination, suffocation, or even exposure.  None of them were natural deaths.”

“You think cancer mimicked a natural death?”

“I think it might’ve fooled my biology into believing it,” Jason shrugs.  “At least until the Lazarus Pit’s regenerative factor took over.  I just remember dying and wishing I could stay.  I don’t think I need to be sure about the why.”

Bruce looks pensive.  Alfred knows eventually he’ll insist on tests, something to prove Jason’s identity more than a story.  But he seems content with Jason’s company for now.

Alfred clears his throat.  “Have you thought about what you’re going to do now?”

Jason looks over at Bruce.  “I’m hoping to stay in Gotham,” he says tentatively.  “Talia owns an apartment in New Town.  I want to stay close by for Damian… and for the rest of the family.”

“New Town,” Bruce repeats, eyes narrowing.

“Yeah, but it beats Cherry Hill by a mile and comes with free parking,” Jason shrugs.  “I don’t know how long it’s going to take for the Lazarus Pit to finish healing me, so I’m thinking of taking it easy for a while.  Maybe start a degree or something.”

He says it nonchalantly, but Alfred recognizes the way Jason breaks eye contact and looks at the carpet.  He had the same habit as a boy.  There’s something he wants, but he feels afraid to ask for it.  Alfred realizes he wants Bruce's permission to stay in Gotham.

“You could stay here.”

Bruce surprises them all with the offer.  He clears his throat.  “If… that’s something you want.”

Jason is taken aback and does his best not to show it.  “Maybe a few days a week,” he says eventually.

The grandfather clock chimes in the foyer and Alfred gets to his feet.  “I should be starting dinner,” he says when he realizes how much of the day has passed.  “Master Damian will be home from school soon.  I imagine the two of you have plenty to discuss as well.”

“You should stay for dinner,” Bruce interjects, just remembering Alfred’s suggestion from the study.

“Oh, okay.  I mean.  Yeah, dinner would be great.”  Jason gets to his feet at the same time as Bruce.

This time, Bruce reaches out and settles a hand on his shoulder.  Jason rolls his eyes at the gesture and Bruce begins to withdraw when Jason darts forward and pulls him into a hug.  He mutters something to Bruce too softly for Alfred to hear.

The embrace only lasts a moment before he’s withdrawing.  Jason looks over to Alfred and smiles.  “Need a hand with anything in the kitchen?”

“Your company would be most welcome, Master Jason.”