Work Text:
BlueJay
Do you ever hesitate to dig into a case?
CaffinatedAndCluedIn
jay
jay its 2 am
BlueJay
Sorry
But do you?
CaffinatedAndCluedIn
…
yeah
dude why are you awake
BlueJay
Why are you?
CaffinatedAndCluedIn
i asked first
why are you?
BlueJay
Touché
Guess I can’t sleep
CaffinatedAndCluedIn
new case?
assuming
but i guess the answer is yeah sure
course. pretty much every new case i get i have to take a pause at in the beginning
BlueJay
Really?
CaffinatedAndCluedIn
i get lost in cases pretty easily and i know it too
so if its one of our cold cases i gotta make sure i really wanna give it my time you know
BlueJay
Sure… But what if you had all the time in the world? If it wasn’t about the time, would you still wait?
CaffinatedAndCluedIn
what do you mean?
BlueJay
It’s just… I have time. It’s not about time.
Do you ever worry about what you’ll find?
Clue doesn’t answer right away. And why should he? It’s late, and Jay doesn’t actually know why his friend is up this late in the first place. He’s not going to look a gift horse in the mouth though, not when his head is as jumbled as it has been all week.
He stares at the screen of his laptop, open underneath the protective dome of his covers. The eerie glow lights up the space in a way that feels familiar, at its core, but he doesn’t want to think about why.
BlueJay
The thing is, I have a lead. I ran into someone and I’m pretty sure he’s the key to this whole case. Hell, I think he’d tell me everything too, if I bothered asking…
CaffinatedAndCluedIn
so why wont you?
BlueJay
Like I said, I guess. What if I don’t like what the answer is?
CaffinatedAndCluedIn
isnt that kinda part o it tho?
sometimes we dont like the truth in a case
doesnt mean it isnt still the truth
BlueJay
What if the case doesn’t actually need to be solved?
CaffinatedAndCluedIn
doesnt sound like you to leave a case cold
thats literally your whole deal isnt it?
Jay’s fingers hesitate over the keyboard for a second time. Clue isn’t wrong. Jay hates to leave stones unturned, and if he thinks objectively about it rather than emotionally, then this case should be no different.
It shouldn’t matter that he’s the subject of the case. The victim.
He’s the victim. He’s never thought about it that way before. He has Penelope, and Darcy, and the BAU team - they’re family. His family. So he’s not the victim, until he considers the fact that he must have left someone behind to get here.
Jay blinks away the blur of memories that clouds his vision at the thought. It isn’t fair, when he thinks about it like that. He doesn’t want to be anyone but Jay Garcia, but he’s not stupid. He knows he must have been someone else Before, and it’s only right to figure out who that someone was…
BlueJay
Yeah
I guess it is
CaffinatedAndCluedIn
thats what i thought
let me know how it goes
A smirk flickers on his face for a brief moment as he finally bids his friend goodnight and closes the laptop. It’s gone when he realizes the gravity of the phone call he knows must come in the morning.
—
He waits until Penelope leaves for work the next morning. It’s Saturday, and she’d normally be home but they’ve been called in for some case that Jay tried not to overhear too much of.
Darcy is stretched out on the bed while he sits at his desk, carefully turning a piece of paper in his hands. It’s folded in half, but it’s well-worn from being unfolded and refolded dozens of times in a very short period. There’s a number and an email, written clearly and concisely. He’s memorized them both, though he didn’t really mean to. There’s no real need for the paper at all, he supposes, but there’s something about it that makes the decision all the more…genuine. Weighty.
Jay unfolds the paper again and stares at the ten little numbers scratched across the line. Answers, just a dial away…
It’s easy to type the numbers into his phone, easy to hit Call, easy to listen to it ring.
But choosing not to hang up the very moment Dick Grayson answers is the hardest thing he’s ever done.
—
“Hello?”
Dick doesn’t bother looking at the screen before answering his phone, too sleepy to do much more than accept the call in the first place. It was probably Bruce anyway, and if it wasn’t him, it was Tim calling about whatever case they were working on last night. No one else would call him this early, except maybe Babs, but–
“Dick Grayson…?”
The voice is trepid, but it sends a rush of adrenaline through Dick like lightning. He’s wide awake in an instant. He’d recognize it anywhere, no matter how long it’s been and no matter how wrong it may sound over the phone.
“Jason?”
“It’s just Jay,” he corrects him, although Dick can hear the hesitation. Like he isn’t actually sure how accurate of a correction it is.
Dick is kind enough to adjust nonetheless, even with his heart beating out of his chest. “Sorry, Jay. Hey! I wasn’t sure if you’d call.”
Dick has to bite his tongue before he says something presumptuous. After all, he’d told Jason - Jay - to call him if he needed to talk after the fear gas incident. This was probably because of that, not…well, anything else.
“I wasn’t sure either,” Jay says after a pause. “You, um. You said I could though? I mean, are you busy? I can call later, or—”
Dick sits up straight, throwing the covers off himself and scrambling to get to his feet as though he has somewhere to be. “What? No, no, you’re all good! I’m not busy at all, just haven’t had my morning coffee.”
A laugh escapes him, betraying his nerves, but he’s quick to silence it. He distracts himself with the walk to his little kitchen where he intends to actually make said coffee. Something tells him he’s going to need it.
“Oh. Cool.” Jay trails off again and Dick has to try not to just dump everything out in the silence. It stretches on for a beat too long - two beats, three beats - before Jay speaks up again.
“Have we met before? Before you came to Quantico for that case, I mean?”
Dick squeezes the phone a little tighter, hoping it’ll stop his other hand from trembling as he tries to fill the coffee pot with water. He doesn’t get a chance to answer before Jay plows on, and all assumptions about the purpose of this phone call fly right out Dick’s window.
“Because there’s a lot I don’t really remember, you know? I-I don’t know if Penny told you about me, but I have amnesia. There’s, like, years that I don’t remember. So if I knew you before, like when I was a kid or something, I don’t know. But you’re familiar. I should know you, I’m sure of it.”
Dick’s heart feels like it may explode as he listens to his brother - and there’s no doubt in his mind that Jay is Jason, not anymore. But then that brings up an entirely different question.
“How did you end up with Penelope, Jay?” He does his best to keep the question soft and non-accusatory but it still causes a long stretch of silence.
Eventually, he finds his words again. Somehow, his voice is even softer, and Dick wonders if he’s ever told anyone before now. He doubts anyone has ever even questioned his relationship with Penelope. “A couple years ago, she found me wandering the streets near the edge of Gotham. She said I was covered in dirt and blood and was pretty much unresponsive… I don’t remember any of it, but she said she took me to the hospital and even though I was there for days and days, no one ever came looking for me. They couldn’t find me in the system, either, so she just…” He takes a deep breath before continuing, completely matter-of-fact. “She kind of hacked into official records so she could check me out of the hospital. And now she’s my sister.”
Dick doesn’t know how to respond to that. To say he’s stunned would be an understatement, and yet at the same time, there’s a not small part of him that is incredibly grateful that it was Penelope Garcia of all people that found him that day.
Jay must take the silence the wrong way though, because he’s suddenly scrambling to add,
“You can’t tell anyone. Please, I’m begging. I-I don’t know where I’d be without her. I’d probably be dead. But she’s family, even if it didn’t happen, you know, legally, she’s my sister, you can’t—”
“I won’t.” Dick’s voice is barely a whisper but he finds that it’s sincere. He means it. He won’t report it, he won’t take this away from Jason. He wouldn’t dream of hurting him like that. “I promise.”
That doesn’t mean he won’t dig into it all himself. He needs to know how this happened, how Jason Todd came back from the dead, how he’s here today… But more than that, in this moment, he needs to know what exactly he’s supposed to say next.
It’s like tug-o-war, the way he weighs the options in his head. How much to tell him, how much to keep to himself. In the end though, he knows that Jay called him for a reason.
He wants to know.
So he tells the truth.
“I know you,” he says simply, and waits for it to sink in.
It takes a solid minute before Jay responds, yet another silence echoing between them.
“If I ask you to tell me my name…” He pauses, and Dick can hear him take a deep breath as he rephrases the question in his head. “If I ask, will you tell me who I was?”
There’s something about the wording that’s strange, but Dick understands. Who he was - because if one thing is clear, it’s that he is Jay Garcia, no matter who else he was first. And Dick isn’t sure how to accept that but he also has a feeling he has to.
“Are you?” Dick says gently. “Asking, I mean?”
Another hesitation, and then, “Yeah. Yeah, I am.”
Dick swallows and takes a slow breath in and out. His hand trembles around the phone, and he finds that he’s practically perched over his countertop, coffee long forgotten.
“Your name is Jason Todd,” he finally answers. “And you’re my little brother.”