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Watching Dick take a few, baby-giraffe style steps back, Jason has to resist the urge to kick the corpse behind him. And it's only because Dick is still up and moving -technically, anyway -that he manages to beat the temptation down.
He waits until Dick is out of the alley, before sighing, switching his com to Barb's private channel as he kneels down in front of the body.
"You there, O?"
Immediately, he gets a response. "Am I ever not? What's up? You two okay?"
"I'm… looking over a scene. Nightwing is on his way back to my safehouse. Pop in, keep him company, and make sure he gets there for me?"
There's a heavy, expectant pause. A pause where Oracle is clearly waiting for more, but Jason doesn't have anything to give her. Not yet, anyway.
But that's literally never an option with Barb. "And he needs company because…?" she prompts.
"Because I've got a dead body I've gotta run a full investigation on, and I figured he didn't need to see any bodies right now," Jason snaps, even as he starts looking over the scene. He doesn't wait for a response, reaching up and clicking the comm back to the private channel for him and Dick.
Stupid fucker. Jason isn't sure what the hell's going on with this case -if it even is a case -but one thing is for sure: if the guy hadn't killed himself, Jason probably would've done it for him. Because this was the last thing Dick needed. Not just seeing a body, but seeing someone kill himself.
Particularly given how goddamn bloody it is. Jason's gonna have to run a decon shower when he gets back, given that he's got the fucker's blood all over his suit, and on his face. The only reason it's not near his mouth and nose is because of his mask, which means he's not in as much of a rush to get it off.
Asshole had splattered it all over the goddamn place. Didn't even have the decency to move a few feet closer to Jason; Dick had been almost directly in the arterial spray pattern. Dick's gonna need a decon shower too, which definitely isn't gonna do anything to help pull him out of his spiral.
Fuck. This was supposed to be a non-case. Just… Probably nothing, a series of coincidental thefts. And if it was something more, it was supposed to be the normal bullshit smuggling case. No people involved, no blood beyond maybe some split lips, or broken noses.
Jason forces himself to breathe. To take a slow, steadying breath. He's gotta focus. He can't leave Dick alone too long, and he's gotta get something from this asshole. Something to make it all worth while.
Okay. Knife first. Jason's careful not to move it more than he has to, kneeling down a few feet away from the body where it feel. It's… just a basic pocket knife. Bit longer'n normal, with a five and a half inch blade on it, but it's not serrated, and it doesn't have any gang markings, or distinctive logos on it. It's just a normal pocket knife, aside from the length.
It doesn't seem to be anything other than what it is: a cheap knife, probably picked up from an outdoor store, meant for camping. Hell, it's not even really long enough for self-defense; sure, the guy managed to slit his own throat with it, but it's too thin to hit organs outside of a lucky shot, and it's too long to be sturdy enough for a prolonged fight. It's just a knife, like any other idiot civilian would carry on 'em, thinking size mattered.
The guy isn't all that special either; he looks like hundreds of other people on the docs that Jason's seen: early twenties, rough, almost calloused features, not all that different from Jason himself. Jason takes a picture of the guy's face -careful to leave the gaping, bloody mess of the guy's throat out of the shot -but he isn't sure if they'll even be able to match it to anything. There's absolutely nothing distinct about the guy at all; nothing to make him stand out of a crowd. The guy could've been any of the people they passed tonight, and there's not a lot…
Jason stops himself, mid-thought, as he catches sight of something on what's left of the guy's neck, right below his right ear. It… kinda looks like it might've been a tattoo, or part of one, anyway. There's a lot of blood, and the cut went straight through it, but from what Jason can see, it looks like it might've been… maybe circular?
He tugs his phone out of his pocket, and only just remembers to turn the flash back on before he takes a picture of the ruined ink. Oracle has a few programs that can try to piece it back together, or at least give him a list of things it might be. It doesn't look like any gang ink Jason knows, but it's also torn and jagged from the slit throat, so.
He pulls up the app Oracle put on his phone, and reaches out, grabbing the guy's hand, and uncurling his fingers enough that he can press his fingers against the screen of Jason's phone. He does each finger, knowing the data goes straight to Oracle in a file, and she'll run them for him. That done, he starts the unpleasant task of searching the guy's pockets.
It takes Jason a few seconds to turn the guy enough that he can get to his wallet. There's no ID, but there's two business cards, and a photo of the guy, holding…
Ah, fuck. Jason stares down at the picture, tucked into the clear space where a license should go. It's the guy, smiling, with a stupid party hat on, holding a little girl, who's grinning just as big as her daddy, and a different colored party hat.
Shit. Jason scrubs a hand through his hair, even as he drops his head with a sigh. So much for his plan of just leaving the body, and waiting for somebody else to find and report it. He ain't about to do that to some kid, leave her wondering for a week where her daddy went. Bad enough the time it'll take to identify the guy, although maybe… maybe he can have Oracle run the picture through elementary schools, see if she can get a hit off a picture or something.
Jason slides the wallet into one of his cargo pockets, then snaps a photo of the guy's face. It's not much, but again: he wants this guy identified sooner rather than later, for his kid's sake, and anything helps.
He stands up, staring down at the body one last time. None of this makes any goddamn sense. Jason's seen a lot of people do a lot of things… But he's never seen someone actually kill themselves to avoid the Bats. Much less slit their own fucking throat.
Normally, he'd have Barb all it in. But she's most likely still busy keeping Dick grounded, guiding him back to the safehouse. So he'll have to call it in himself, once he's mostly clear of the docks.
He sighs again. This was supposed to be an easy mission.
Dick is… doing okay. Mostly. Sort of. His breathing has leveled out, and he's actually hearing things like he should now, instead of through a fishbowl. And he even managed to hold onto the crate; a banner achievement, honestly, given that Barbara had to guide him back to the safehouse.
He's back now. Changed out of his suit, dressed in a pair of his sweatpants, and one of Jason's hoodies. The box is sitting on the coffee table, and Dick is definitely waiting for Jason to get back before he even looks at it again.
Because Jason will be back soon. And if he's not… Well, Dick's going to go get him. Which is probably nine kinds of stupid, as Jason would say, but Dick doesn't like any of this, and not just because of his stupid 'trauma' or whatever.
Something isn't right here. Something about this case -aside from the guy being willing to kill himself rather than talk to them -doesn't add up. Because he didn't try to destroy the crate. Didn't try to get away. Didn't even try to keep the crate. He just… dropped the crate and slit his own throat. If what was in the crate was so important that he couldn't answer questions about it… why not try to destroy the crate too?
Dick putters around the kitchen, trying to fit the pieces of the puzzle together in his head, as he wills his hands to stop shaking. Jason will probably be hungry when he gets back, and while Dick is nowhere near the cook that Jason is, he can manage the frozen pizzas Jay keeps stocked in all his safehouses at least.
The pizzas are in, with eight minutes left on the timer, and he's mostly gotten himself under control when he hears the alarm on the front door being deactivated. He silently moves over towards the hallway, glancing towards the door, breathing a sigh of relief when he spots Jason.
"Hey. I… put pizza in the oven," he says, as Jason reactivates the alarm.
"Thank Christ; I'm starvin'," Jay says, bending over and untying his boots. "How're you doin'?"
He asks casually, like he's not trying to subtly stare at Dick even while he slides his boots off, followed by his jacket.
"Fine," Dick says, also trying for casual. Like he didn't just have a breakdown on a goddamn crime scene. "Find anything out?"
Jason shrugs as he walks by Dick, into the tiny living room. "Sent some identifying shit to Oracle; see what she can find out."
He stares at the box for a few seconds, eyes narrowed, before he shakes his head. "How long we got on that pizza?"
"About… six minutes, now," Dick says, looking into the kitchen, at the timer on the stove. "We probably got enough ti-"
"No. We're gonna eat first," Jason interrupts firmly. "Plus, that'll give Barbie time to see what she can find. 'Sides, it's probably already done, you just like yours burnt."
"Crispy," Dick corrects automatically, the argument an old and familiar one. He feels something in his chest settle as Jason rolls his eyes, and grabs a couple of plates.
"Which is a synonym for 'burnt'," Jay says, pulling open the oven door, and inspecting the pizza. "See? Plenty done. No black shit around the edges is a good thing. Don't take up Bruce's habit of using the smoke detector as a timer."
He grabs a potholder from a drawer, and pulls the pizza out, setting it on top of the stove before digging in a different drawer, presumably for a pizza cutter. And Dick is a little… not 'caught off guard', because he knows it, but it never ceases to amaze him just how domestic Jay is, even with his safehouses.
At least half of Dick's diet is usually made up of frozen pizza, and he doesn't own a pizza cutter in his apartment, forget one of his safehouses. Hell, he doesn't even have dishes, he just uses paper plates.
Hell, sometimes he just uses paper towels.
And here Jason is with a damn pizza cutter in one of his safehouses.
"What the hell're you starin' at? I know you know what a pizza cutter is," Jason says, rolling his eyes.
Dick shakes his head a bit, pulling himself from his thoughts. "Nothing. Sorry. So is that uh… raw enough for you? Gonna be all mostly dough?" he asks, nodding towards the pizza.
Jason scoffs. "Whatever. Sit down, and let me introduce you to the concept of 'not burnt', Bruce."
Pulling out a chair, Dick sits down at the table, settling in while Jason goes about cutting the pizza, and dishing it up.
"So…" Jason starts, dropping three slices onto a plate. "Bake sale. We gonna do that, or nah?"
Dick thinks about that for a second. "I uh… I guess, yeah. I mean… Sure, Bruce is gonna do what he does, but… the rest of it sounds like… it could be fun, yeah. It'd be nice to see everybody. You know, not on patrol," he says slowly. "I haven't… I haven't seen Alfred since before…"
His voice trails off. Thankfully, Jason doesn't make him say it, doesn't point it out. But Jason does stare at him for a second, as he brings over the plate of pizza and a Gatorade, and sets it on the table in front of Dick.
And Dick doesn't know what Jason sees; hopes that his face shows how okay with it he is, because really, Dick doesn't not want to go. And it'll be nice to see Alfred, especially since he knows Alfred won't judge, even if he'll do his patented British thing of stuffing Dick full of food and hot chocolate. Which… maybe Dick can even work up an appetite for it.
Whatever Jason sees, it must convince him, because he doesn't push; doesn't needle Dick to explain, or justify, which… Dick didn't realize how much he was dreading it, until Jason doesn't. Instead, Jason just nods slowly. "Alright. I'll shoot Alfred a text, let him know. You should text Damian; I'm sure he'll be happier'n a pig in shit. Right up until he remembers you're gonna actually try helpin' in the kitchen. Hopefully you don't bake cookies like you bake pizza."
Dick can't help his snort, even if it hurts a little around a mouthful of pizza. At Jason's glare, he swallows his food, then retorts, "Yeah, like Alfred's gonna let me or B do anything other than put 'em in containers once they're baked."
"I dunno if he's gonna trust you with that." Jason sits down with his own plate, and a cup of water. "I remember the last time we did a cookie bake, man; you ate nearly as many as you put in the containers."
"Really," Dick says, raising an eyebrow. "You're gonna give me shit over eating as many cream cheese cookie cups as I could get my hands on."
"I -" Jason pauses. "Alright, that's fair."
"Mmhmm. What isn't fair is making me eat pizza dough instead of cooked pizza," Dick shoots back. He's starting to feel more settled into his own skin, the familiar back and forth soothing his nerves, even if he has to think about his responses, instead of just the natural quips he can usually pull out.
"Keep it up, and I'm puttin' fuckin' onions and olives on it next time," Jason threatens around a smirk.
"You bought it in a box, Jay. I don't think you know how frozen food works, you don't just -"
"Oh, I'm sorry, are you gonna lecture the poor kid on the finer points of cheap food?" It's Jason's turn to raise an eyebrow.
"It's amazing how you only pull that out when you want to be right, but you're wrong," Dick counters.
Jason snorts, but doesn't argue the point, taking another large bit of the pizza instead.
It doesn't take them long to finish; maybe five minutes, and then Jason is scooping up the plates, and setting them in the sink. Dick's a little surprised when Jason turns right back around, and starts towards the living room, instead of just washing them immediately like he usually does.
"I wanna know what's in this damn thing," Jason says by way of explanation, plopping himself down on the couch, and pulling the box to the edge of the coffee table.
"Jason, I… maybe we should open that at the cave," Dick says, scrambling out of the chair towards the living room. "We don't know what's in it, and -"
"Exactly. We don't know what's in it. It's not explosive, since the guy dropping it didn't set it off. And it can't be fragile for the same reason. So no reason not to just open it and see what's inside," Jason says with a shrug. He examines the box for a minute, before waving towards a cabinet. "Hey, open that up, should be a brown leather pouch like thing. Grab it for me."
Still not entirely sure if this is a good idea or not, Dick still obeys, getting in the large cabinet. There's three guns on a shelf in the back of it, and four different pouches, although only one is brown luckily. He grabs it out, and goes over to sit next to Jason, handing him the pouch.
"What are you thinking?" he asks quietly, as Jason unzips the pouch, and lays it out on the table next to the box. It looks like maybe a bomb defusing kit or something similar, with small thin knives, a tension wrench, a lockpick, and what kind of looks like a small dental mirror.
"No idea," Jason admits, grabbing the dental mirror thing. "S'why we're gonna be real careful opening it. Just because it's not explosive doesn't mean it's not booby trapped."
"Okay, but can I just point out, this is why we should take it -"
"No, you can't point out. Shut up and let me focus."
Dick watches nervously as Jason slides the mirror through one of the small, thin slates on the top of the crate, and leans closer.
"Doesn't look like there's any wires or anything that I can see," Jason says, after moving the mirror around a bit. "Go stand over by the door. Just to be on the safe side."
It's only a supreme amount of willpower that keeps Dick from sighing loudly, or rolling his eyes, as he gets up and moves as ordered. Jason waits until Dick is over by the door, before he grabs the top of the crate, and pulls it open. And honestly, Dick is waiting for something terrible; an explosion, toxic powder coming out in a puff, maybe a hiss of gas as gas is released.
He isn't prepared for… nothing. Nothing happens, and Jason sets the lid to the side, reaching into the crate as Dick moves closer again.
"Huh. Guess you were right," Jason says, reaching into the box. Before Dick can stop him, Jason pulls his hand back out, holding…
"What the hell is that?" Dick asks, sitting down, and looking at the small, box-shaped thing in Jason's hand.
"Dunno," Jason says slowly, turning it over a few times. "Looks like… well, you're not wrong, it's definitely something electronic at least."
Jason hands it over to Dick, who takes it gingerly. It's some sort of small black box, about the size of the Gameboy Dick had as a kid, with some sort of silver-ish lines running all over it in some sort of pattern. He can't make out what the pattern is supposed to be, or if if it's actually silver, or something silver colored, but it's giving off a faint sort of warmth. Not heat, but just… warmth.
There doesn't seem to be any way to open it though. Dick flips it over in his hands, looking at it from every angle, but it doesn't have any seams or anything that he can see. There aren't even any buttons to push.
He looks up at Jason pointedly. And Jason just sighs, running a hand through his hair.
"Yeah, yeah. I know. Cave. I'll let B know we're comin' over early on Sunday, I guess," Jason says dejectedly. "Fuck. Shit, he's never gonna -"
He's cut off by his phone ringing on the counter. Rather than try to step over Dick's legs, he just vaults over the back of the couch, grabbing the phone.
"Hey. You find anything? Wait, hold on, gonna put you on speaker. Gimme a minute."
"-ood idea?" comes Barbara's voice over the now-on-speaker phone. And Dick can feel himself curl in a little bit, can feel himself get small. Because Barbara had guided Dick to the safehouse, and talked him down until he was feeling like he was back in his own skin. She knows how broken and -
"You gave us the case, Barbie," Jason says, his voice showing his annoyance. "We're workin' it, and I trust Dick to back out if he needs to. So. Whaddya got?"
Dick stares at Jason, a little dumbfounded. Because Jason saw what happened, saw how quick Dick fell apart and broke down. But he's not wrong, Dick is working this now, and he can't just… let it go. That's not who he is, broken brain be damned.
Barbara is quiet for a few seconds, before she speaks. When she finally does, it's her 'Oracle' voice. "Alright. Well, what we 'got' is a lot of weirdness that I'm still digging into, but… I got a name for your dead guy. Christopher Michael Dupont, twenty-two years old, no criminal history other than a misdemeanor theft report when he was thirteen. Stole a loaf of bread and package of lunch meat from a convenience store. The owner declined to press charges."
"He wouldn't have been fingerprinted then," Dick says slowly. "How'd you find him?"
"That's where it gets weird. He was reported missing six months ago," Barbara says, and Dick can hear her fingers tapping away at the keyboard. "I'm still looking into it more, but at a quick glance… He told his grandma -who he lived with -that he was going to the pharmacy to get his daughter some Pedialyte because she was recovering from the flu; according to the grandmother, he took the car and left around nine o'clock that night. Never came back, and police never found their car."
Jason frowns. "How much investigating did the cops actually do?"
"Not a lot; twenty-two years old, goes missing with the car, dead-end job, single dad of a four year old… they asked his boss if he was having any problems at work, did a cursory check for the car, and that was it," Barbara says, sounding a bit… annoyed. "From what I can tell, Grandma threw up a lot of fuss just to get them to do that much. She insisted that Christopher wouldn't leave his daughter, no matter what, but the cops viewed it as just another stressor to cause him to run."
"Guy didn't have anything in his wallet except those business cards, and a picture of his kid," Jason says with a snort. "I doubt he left either. You check on the kid?"
"Yeah, she was in school today; still living with Grandma, who keeps putting up missing posters, and going to the police station once every other week to try and get the cops to do something."
"He didn't look homeless," Dick says slowly, thinking back to the confrontation. "His clothes were a bit worn, yeah, but… he was pretty clean, and so were his clothes. And he… I mean he wasn't a big guy, but he definitely wasn't 'eating out of dumpsters' thin either."
Barbara hums thoughtfully. "I've got my systems running a check on all the CCTV footage I have access too, running facial recognition. Gonna take a while though; I wouldn't expect anything solid for at least a week. I mean, I might have some hits before then, but six months of footage from over a thousand CCTV cameras is a lot."
"What about the tattoo?" Jason asks. Dick looks at him curiously, because Dick didn't see any tattoos, but then again, Jason had time to examine the body.
"Nothing yet; I've got a program working on it, but it's gonna take a while. It was…" She hesitates for a few seconds. "It's gonna take a while."
"Alright. We got the crate; gonna take it over to B's at some point, see what we can figure out."
"Any idea what's in it?"
Jason blinks. "Oh. Yeah, we opened it. Got a weird cube like thing. Dunno what it is, but it looks like it's electronic. Throwing off a bit of heat. Nothing we can open though, and nothing that says 'push here to activate', so."
"Hmm. Send me a pic?"
"Will do. Anything else for us?"
"Not yet. I'll get you the case file."
"Thanks. Hey," Jason says, not looking at Dick, or the phone. "Can you uh… get me the grandma's address?"
"Yeah. I can do that. Just… be careful, you two. Get me a picture of what was in the box, and then get it over to the cave," she recommends. "Don't wait, just… we don't know what it is, or what it does; I'd feel a helluva lot safer knowing if it decides to grow legs and go on a murderous rampage, it'll be locked up in a container. Everybody's out on patrol right now, so if you guys wanna just run it over, I can let B know, and -"
"Thanks, Barbie, we'll talk it over, let you know what we're gonna do. Get me that address when you can. Bye."
Jason nearly puts his finger through the phone screen, he hits the 'end call' button so hard. Then he just stares at the phone for a few seconds, before very carefully setting it down on the table.
"Jay… She's right," Dick says after nearly a minute of silence. "We can take it over to the cave, drop it off, and then we can stop and talk to Dupont's grandma, see what she knows. But we really… we don't know what it does, we don't know what it is, hell, we don't even know if it's actually electronic. We shouldn't leave it unsecured, and I'm not sure it's a great idea to just… leave it on the coffee table like a paperweight while we figure out what it does."
"I wouldn't just leave it on the table," Jason says bluntly, even as he moves around and grabs the box thing. "I've got Faraday boxes I could put it in. It'd be fine."
"Uh huh." Dick doesn't say anything else, following Jason down the hallway towards the front door. He doesn't fold his arms over his chest and smirk when Jason tucks the thing in his pocket, and starts getting his boots back on, but it's a near thing.
"It's fine. But this is just… It's a better option. I don't wanna stay the night here, and I don't wanna drag a box all the way back to the townhouse just for this shit. So we'll just… take it over to the manor. Maybe say hi to Alfred. Throw the box in a Faraday in the cave somewhere, then we'll head back to the townhouse," Jason says defensively. "In and out 'fore anybody knows better."
"So you're just gonna… what, shove it in your pocket? Then we're gonna get in your beat up car, and drive the unknown device that's giving off a natural heat source to the cave, without telling B what we're doing, or what we're leaving there?"
"Alright, listen, mom," Jason snaps, sliding his jacket on, device getting caught in one of the sleeves for a second. "It's fine. Thing's been tossed all over the place on a boat, then through the docks, then here, all without exploding. If you want? I'll drop you off at the townhouse first, 'fore I take it to the cave. If you don't want to see B or the brats, I can -"
"Christ, Jay, it's not about Bruce," Dick says, throwing his hands up in exasperation. "It's about Christopher Dupont going missing for six months, then showing up with an unknown device. And you wanting to treat that device like just a pack of cigarettes, and just… throwing it in your pocket."
Jason blinks at him, before waving his hand -the one still holding the device -around. "Well, Mary on a goddamn pogo stick, Dick, what do you want me to do? Wrap it in bubble wrap, put it back in the crate, and ship it to the cave by UPS?"
"No, I want you to put it in one of the Faraday boxes you said you have here," Dick says, unable to keep the annoyance out of his voice. "I don't… Jesus, I don't want us going missing for six months, just to show up long enough to slit our own damn throats."
With a groan, Jason undoes his bootlaces, and takes them off, before stomping down the hallway towards one of the bedrooms. Dick can hear him rooting around for nearly two minutes, before Jason comes stomping back down the hallway, a black box now in hand with -presumably -the device inside.
"There. Boxed up like a Christmas present," he grumbles, putting his boots back on. He tucks the box under his arm as he leans down to tie them up again, before pulling himself upright again. "Can we go now? I wanna get this to the cave, then get back home in time for an actual goddamn shower."
Usually, Jason takes a certain spiteful sort of joy from parking his beat up Honda Accord right in front of the steps to the manor. Tonight though, he's just looking to do this fast.
Get in, drop the box off in the cave, leave a note for B, and get back out before someone hightails it back early from patrol to try and corner Dick into a conversation.
Easy. Simple. No muss, no fuss, in, out, back to the townhouse. Maybe make some brownies or something, he thinks, as he climbs out of the car, and grabs the box from the backseat. Dick likes brownies, and he deserves some sort of… well, not reward, Jason doesn't use food as rewards, but an apology? Jason's apology for dragging him into this? As a thank you for going along with it? Being a good sport about the whole thing?
He glances over at Dick, walking next to him as they go up the stairs towards the front door, and Jason can't help but be a little miffed that Dick doesn't look nearly as angry or upset or nervous as Jason feels. And Jason isn't entirely sure if that's because Dick is still a little out of it, or if it's because he's lightning focused on the weird device thing, and how to keep everybody safe from said weird device thing, or if he genuinely isn't worried about this whole thing.
Doesn't really matter. Or at least, it doesn't matter at this exact moment. Jason can worry about it later, after he gets Dick bundled back off to the townhouse, and settled in for the night.
He raises his hand to open the door, when it swings open.
"Hello, boys," Alfred says, giving them a smile. "I thought I heard Master Jason's car coming up the road. Come in, come in. Mind your feet, I haven't swept yet."
"Hey, Alfred," Jason says, stepping inside, and untying his boots. "We ain't stayin' long, just gotta drop this off in the cave, then -"
"We can stay for a few minutes, Jay," Dick interrupts pointedly. When Jason stands up again -sliding his boots into the coat closet -he sees Dick giving him a frown. "Not in that big a rush."
Jason wants to glare right back. Wants to tell him that the whole point of doing this now is to avoid Bruce, and the inevitable fight that'll happen, and then get dragged into next Friday's bake sale. But when he opens his mouth to say… something, he's not even entirely sure what, he sees Alfred's face.
Because Alfred is staring between the two of them, and although Alfred's got a poker face that rivals Bruce's… the man looks… hopeful, maybe? Like… Like he wants them to stay.
He swallows down his angry retort to Dick; it's just occurring to him that Alfred hasn't seen Dick since… well, since before everything happened. This is the first time he's seeing his grandson since… it happened. Of course the guy just wants to make sure Dick is okay, and do his thing of stuffing Dick full of food and tea.
"I mean… a few minutes. That's it though," Jason says, unable to keep the resignation from his voice. "I'm gonna run this down to the cave, leave a note, all that." Which basically means he's going to try and play Defense, and keep anyone else from going up and harassing Dick.
With that, he hustles out of the foyer, and back towards Bruce's study, box in hand, leaving Alfred to mother-hen Dick.
He turns the clock mindlessly, not even really paying attention to the time. As he heads down the stairs into the cave, he can't help but think how it's funny, the little things the mind holds on to, what it remembers for years. There are days when he struggles to remember his own birthday, but he'll remember 10:47 probably until the day he dies.
Again.
He chuckles grimly at his own joke, as he enters the cave proper. And even before what happened with Dick, it'd been a while since he'd been here. He tends to avoid it unless everything's gone to shit, or he needs to use some of Bruce's admittedly far-more extensive testing equipment.
So usually, he's only here if he's bleeding out, incapacitated, or sneaking in while B is out so he can use his lab. Meaning he's either unconscious, semi-conscious, or sneaking around in the dark with just a flashlight for light, and doesn't get to look around much. And honestly, he's a little surprised at some of the changes.
There's more lockers against the far wall, and another desk and computer set up over near the lab. The rack on the training mat has more weapons, and a greater variety, than Jason's ever seen.
There's a goddamn coffee maker sitting on a little end table thing against the wall. And Jason wonders how Tim manages to hide that when Alfred comes down, because there's no way Alfred just lets the two brats have unlimited access to coffee.
He might just mention it to Alfred, after he gets back upstairs. But for now… He moves over towards The Cage, where B keeps anything he's worried about doing something unexpected. He punches his code into the panel a few feet from the door, and steps inside, feeling the same instinctual shiver crawling down his spine as he does.
Which means that stupid mask that Bruce found when Jason was wearing the pixie boots is still in here somewhere. Jason forces himself to ignore that, as he goes to the clipboard hanging by the door. He grabs the pen tied to it with a string, and starts writing.
One (1) unknown box of unknown origins of unknown properties of unknown material. : )
Only because he knows it'll drive Bruce nuts, and make sure the old man doesn't let the kids in to mess around with anything.
Mission accomplished, he moves over to Bruce's big desk, and he can't help but roll his eyes. All the changes, but the 'Bat Computer' always stays the same. Plain white coffee mug sitting next to a bottle of water, a few inches from the keyboard. A few scattered files, probably information that Bruce is meticulously recording in the database. Nothing else. No color at all.
And originally… he just means to leave a note. That's all. He's not enough of an asshole to just put a strange device in the cage, and not even let Bruce know. But when he sits down, he can't help but see a folder on the monitor screen.
Dick
Jason freezes for a few seconds, hand on the mouse. And he's not sure what he should do, because honestly? There's at least a ninety percent chance that whatever is in that folder is just gonna piss him off. He doesn't even have the illusion that it might be Dick's personnel folder, because there's no 'Jason', 'Timothy', or 'Damian' folder sitting right there for anybody to see.
Best case scenario, it's Bruce going back through old events, trying to see if he can logic his way into a reason for what Dick did, trying to punish himself for not seeing it coming.
Worst case… It's all the reasons why Dick should be pulled from the roster, why he should stay at the manor under twenty-four seven surveillance.
Jason knows himself well enough to know that he can't not look. He probably shouldn't, since it'll do nothing but cause problems, but if he doesn't… he'll stew on it, and pick a fight with Bruce about it anyway. So really, he doesn't have a choice.
He double clicks on the folder and pulls it open.
Inside are three files. Dick Letter Draft (7), Dick Brothers, , and Dick Testimonials.
It's definitely not what Jason expected. He stares at the files for a second, before he clicks onto Dick Testimonials.
It's a word doc, over a hundred pages long. Jason scans through them, and realizes that these are from either the various Bat-watcher blogs, or people's personal blogs, and they're all people singing Nightwing's praises.
But not even the normal 'Nightwing saved me from a criminal' ones.
My car broke down on the freeway when we were on our way back from her gymnastics meet. Not only did he stay with us until the tow truck got there, but he spent the forty-five minutes practicing my daughter's front handspring with her.
There's a video link underneath it, and when Jason clicks it, it brings up a YouTube video of Jaqueline Marston, eleven years old, taking home the gold in her local gymnastics tournament, dated two months after the testimonial.
I was just… it'd been a lot of bad days, stacked on top of worse nights, and I was honestly just… I was done, you know? I was sitting on the edge of my apartment building, and thinking that, at a hundred foot up, it'd probably do the job. And just as I'm getting ready to push myself forward, there's a hand on my shoulder, and I look up, and it's Nightwing. He spent two hours sitting on that roof, listening to me go on about all my shit, and offering me advice, and some programs he knew about that might be able to help. Then he walked me back down to my apartment.
Underneath that one are two pictures. A wedding photo, of a middle-aged couple, smiling brightly, dated a year after the testimonial, and then a picture of the same couple, the woman in a hospital bed, the man leaning around it, smiling down at the baby in the woman's arms.
My name is Julia and when I let my puppy Jasper out to go to the potty his collar wasn't tight enough and he got off the collar and he ran off down the road. And my mom says I'm not supposed to leave the front of the apartment without her but Jasper ran down the road and I chased after him. I was crying because I couldn't find him and I got a little lost and then Nightwing came down from the roof and he carried me and we walked until we found Jasper and then he took us back to our apartment. My mom was really mad at me but she gave Nightwing one of our cookies and said thank you and he said it was the best cookie he ever had. Nightwing is the best superhero. Better than Batman or Robin and I'm going to marry him some day.
The picture below it honestly melts even Jason's cynical heart. It's a picture of a girl, maybe fourteen or fifteen years old, hugging what is definitely not a puppy, but a very large German Shepherd, dated last month, almost five years after the testimonial is dated.
Jason looks at the photo again. Then he clicks on it, and opens the file for it, and… Jesus.
Bruce took the photo. The picture is logged into the system from Batman's crime scene camera, which means Bruce went, as Batman, to this girl's house, and asked if he could take her picture with her dog, for this file. Holy shit.
He closes out the picture, and the testimonial, and clicks on Dick Brothers. This one is a freaking PowerPoint file, of all things, and Jason can't stop himself from hitting 'play' on it.
Immediately, the screen fills up, pictures coming onto the slide with twirling animations before settling into place. And it's photos of Dick with Jason, Tim, and Damian. Jason watches the five minute presentation, and it's just…
Pictures of Dick with all of them. Pictures of them all smiling. There's even a couple of Dick and Jason when he lived at the manor, including one of the two of them, faces covered in ice cream, arms slung around each other's shoulders, standing in front of an ice cream truck at the park.
Pictures of Dick, smiling, his arm wrapped around Damian, at Damian's middle school graduation. Pictures of Dick and Tim playing a video game in the living room. Pictures of all of them in costume, rough housing on a roof.
The presentation ends, and Jason just stares at the screen for a few minutes, brain buzzing. This isn't what he expected when he clicked on the file, but… It's very Bruce. He's trying, in his own stilted way, to show Dick how loved he is, the impact he's had on people.
And he knows he shouldn't click on the last file. It's private, a letter from Bruce to Dick, not meant for anyone else. But Jason clicks on it anyway.
Dick,
We both know that I'm not very good with words. I struggle to say the right thing, and even when I do, it's usually at the wrong time. So I thought maybe with an email, I might be able to explain it better.
I didn't mean to imply that you had done what you did because you wanted attention. In retrospect, I can see how it was taken that way. Part of me was hoping that you would say 'yes', that it was, because if it wasn't, it meant that my son was hurting, and I never noticed. But if it wasn't, then we needed to get you help. Help that I will fully acknowledge I'm incapable of giving, due to my own flaws and short-comings.
What I need you to know, Dick, is this: while I love you and your brothers equally, you will always hold a special place in my heart. Before you came to live with me, I was losing myself. There wasn't much of Bruce left at that point, just Batman. I'd been alone for so long, just me and my never ending fight, and then you came to live with me.
You brought such joy, Dick. I know it sounds trite to say, but I don't just mean that you were a happy child. You were, obviously, but even when you were feeling down, there was always a certain amount of life to you. An infectious happiness that pulled me back from the brink of a chasm I didn't even know I was standing on. There you were, an orphan, like me, but instead of being dark and cold and distrusting… you opened your arms to me, every day, greeting me with a smile and a hug and a laugh.
I don't know if you remember, but a week after you'd moved in, you came into the cave where I was working on a case. And you looked at me and said, "Hey, B, what kind of dog does Dracula have? A bloodhound!"
Dick, I hadn't laughed -truly laughed, not a polite society laugh -in years. But for some reason, you laughing at that made me tear up laughing myself. I laughed so hard, my stomach hurt. And I knew, right then, that you were something precious, something I had to protect.
Obviously, I've failed on that front. And not just because of this, but for a multitude of reasons. I've failed you in so many ways, so many times, that I can't even remember them all. And I'll continue to fail, I know that, but that doesn't change that it's my failures, not yours. It doesn't change that, no matter how many times I say the wrong thing, or do the wrong thing, or don't say say or do the right thing… I will always love you. You will always be my son, the first person who made me laugh since my parents died.
I will always love you, Dick,
Sincerely,
Bruce
Jason stares at the letter. Reads it through a second time. And he can see the clear Bruce-isms in it, the way he never actually apologizes, and the way that it all revolves around what Dick means to Bruce.
But it's also more effort, more emotion than Jason thought the man was capable of. It's more close to acknowledging his fault in this mess than Jason thought he'd ever see.
And he's not sure what to do with it.