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Jason can count on one hand the number of his men that have access to his personal phone. He guards the number fiercely, and when it begins buzzing in his pocket mid-interrogation, he pauses in the act of pressing his gun against a man’s temple.
“This had better be fucking important, Matthew,” he growls into the microphone. Jason had finally gotten his hands on one of Black Mask’s head goons, and he’d had plans for tonight, plans that were being very rudely interrupted.
On the other side of the line, he hears Matthew curse, and there’s panic in every word as he says, “Boss, you need to get down here now. Scarecrow…he got Robin. The kid’s down, and it’s not good. If he dies here…it’s your territory, man. You remember what happened after the last one died.”
Jason doesn’t remember, actually, because he’d been a bit too busy clawing his way out of his grave and being dunked into a Lazarus Pit to really pay attention to any of that, but he’s heard the highlights.
He moves the gun away from the man’s temple and sighs. “You, sir, are one very lucky goon. I’ll be back for you, and while you wait, you can decide whether or not you’d like to keep your fingernails.” He points at his own men standing guard. “I don’t need to tell you what’ll happen if he escapes.”
And with that, he swings a leg over his bike and takes off towards Matthew’s location.
Scarecrow has been a pain in Jason’s side for weeks now, pushing a new strain of his Fear Toxin through Jason’s territory and using its vulnerable population as test subjects. There have been kids dying of overdoses left and right, and Jason has been exhausting his own resources synthesizing antidotes. He knows that Batman and Robin are tracking down Crane, so Jason focuses on damage control, on helping those that Batman deems unimportant.
But Batman is off-world right now, helping with some Justice League mission that Jason hears about every time he turns on the television, and Jason knows for a fact that Batman doesn’t let the kid patrol solo.
Which begs the question of why the hell the kid is out on his own in Crime Alley of all places.
Matthew is standing at the mouth of a back alley, gun out as he watches his surroundings. He’s a solid member of Jason’s crew, someone Jason knows he can trust almost without question, and the man nods his head in greeting as Jason approaches.
“One of the kids found him,” Matthew says quietly. “I tried to get closer, but I was worried his heart’d give out the way he was screaming. You got an antidote on you?”
“I’m not an amateur.” Jason pulls the vial from his inner coat pocket and draws up a dosage he hopes will be enough. The kid weighs about thirty pounds soaking wet, and the last thing he needs is to overdose on the antidote as well as the Toxin. “Watch my six. If he runs, drop him.”
He goes to approach the mouth of the alley, then pauses. The kid already looks scared to death of him when he’s not hopped up on Fear Toxin, and Jason knows if he tries to get any closer in his helmet, he’s only going to make things worse.
“You’re going to hold this for me,” Jason says as he unlatches his helmet. “You know that there’s a bomb inside it, right?”
“Yeah, yeah,” Matthew huffs. “Big, scary Hood’ll blow me to hell, I know. Go and get the fucking kid so I can go back home to my wife before sunrise, okay?”
Robin is curled up in a ball next to a dumpster, wedged in between the filthy metal and the crumbling brick wall behind it. Jason can hear him gasping for breath, and when Jason’s footsteps scuff against the pavement, he makes a high-pitched keening sound.
“Kid, are you with me?”
Robin curls in on himself even further, and Jason worries that he’s going to tear his dark hair out straight from the roots. “I’m sorry,” the kid whispers frantically. “I’m sorry. I won’t do it again, I promise, just please come back. Please, Bruce, I’ll be better.”
“Kid?” Jason crouches down low and keeps his voice soft. He prays to God that Matthew can’t hear them. “Tim, you gotta come out of there.”
“Jason,” the kid breathes. “Jason, Robin, please. I’m sorry. You have to believe me, okay? I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. I didn’t mean to!”
There’s a sickly green pallor to the kid’s skin, and dried blood sticks to one half of his face where he must have scratched himself. Half of his domino mask has been torn free, and his pupil is blown so wide that Jason can’t even see any trace of the kid’s icy blue iris. His lips have gone white and bloodless, and Jason knows if he doesn’t get the antidote in him soon, he’s going to have to explain to Batman how yet another Robin has met his end on Gotham’s streets.
“Kid, you need to come here.” He forces the tremor out of his voice and tries to think how Dick used to sound when he would comfort Jason when they were younger. “I’m not gonna hurt you. You just have to come out of there. I promise I’m not going to hurt you.”
“You are!” The kid’s borderline hysterical, and his words crack and break as he shrieks. “You can have Robin back. Just take it, please, I don’t want you to hurt me again. Please don’t hurt me again.”
Fuck it, Jason thinks. He refuses to let this kid die here.
He takes a deep breath before he wraps a hand around the kid’s ankle and yanks. Something breaks beneath his grasp, but Jason keeps pulling until he can wrestle the kid to the pavement. Robin throws back his head and screams as he slams his skull against the floor, bucking his hips in a desperate attempt to throw Jason’s weight off him. There are terrified cries tumbling from his lips, and Jason’s hands are shaking as he pins the kid down and readies the antidote.
It isn’t a well-administered injection, and Jason knows the kid’ll have a terrible bruise where the needle pierced his neck, but at least it’s in him.
There’s a sedative that kicks in before the antidote does, and Jason shakily climbs off the kid when he goes limp. He’d made sure to add the sedative after a little girl he’d been trying to save had screamed herself to death before the antidote had gotten a chance to work. He knows it won’t react with the Toxin, and he breathes a sigh of relief when he presses a finger to the kid’s pulse and feels it begin to slow beneath his touch.
He’s dead weight in Jason’s arms, head lolling as Jason carries him out of the alley.
“Fuck,” Matthew mutters. “I thought you were gonna lose him.”
“I need your car.” He adjusts his grip on the kid and throws the keys to his bike at Matthew. “Take my bike home. I’ll trade you when I’m done watching him.”
Matthew tosses Jason’s helmet in the passenger seat and helps him lay the kid down in the back. He pulls a blanket out of the trunk and drapes it over the kid before gently shutting the door.
“Boss,” Matthew says, unusually quiet. “The kid, he…he called you Robin.” The man doesn’t dare look Jason in the eye, and so he fiddles with Jason’s keys instead. “You’re him, aren’t you? The one we lost?”
“We?”
“Little spitfire with a Crime Alley accent?” Matthew does meet his eyes then, and he smiles. “Damn right you were ours, kid.”
Jason swallows the lump in his throat. “I’ve killed people for far less than this.”
“I know, I know.” The man sighs and climbs onto Jason’s bike. “You know, I’ve always wanted to drive this thing.”
“One piece!” Jason yells as Matthew revs the engine. “I want it back in one piece!” His words are drowned out by the noise, and Jason mutters curses as he climbs into the car.
The kid is still passed out in the backseat, and Jason cuts through Gotham traffic with ease despite the minivan he is weaving in between cars with. There’s even a diaper bag tucked under the passenger seats, and Jason rolls his eyes. The first words out of the kid’s mouth when he wakes up had better be “thank you” or Jason was going to leave him out on the fire escape.
His nearest safehouse happens to be his nicest, the one he goes to when he wants to feel like a person and not a hollowed out shell of himself. There are blankets and pillows thrown over the couch, fresh fruits and vegetables stocked in the fridge, and a shelf that is bending beneath the weight of the books it carries.
There’s also an armory, a guest bedroom turned med bay, and a computer that rivals the one Bruce had taught him to code on.
Aside from the ankle Jason had broken and the scratches on his face, the kid is relatively unharmed. Jason peels back the other half of the domino mask and wipes the scratches clean. After he slathers them in antiseptic cream, he takes off the kid’s boots and wraps his ankle. He doesn’t dare set it with a cast, not without a proper x-ray, but that can be Bruce’s problem. Wherever Bruce may be.
Jason knows there are failsafes built into the suit to keep anyone from removing it from an unsuspecting Robin, but he can’t be sure Bruce hasn’t upgraded them since Jason was wearing the red, green, and yellow, so he leaves the kid in his suit. He digs out a pair of pajamas that he hopes won’t swallow the kid whole and leaves them on the coffee table after he drapes the kid in blankets.
There’s a frustrating ache behind his eyes that Jason is refusing to ignore as he sets the kettle to boil and pulls a bowl of chili from the fridge. He will not allow himself to cry, not when he has done far worse to this boy with his own hands. So what if the kid’s cries had shaken him? He’s the goddamn Red Hood. He doesn’t let things like this phase him.
He’s about to pull the bowl of chili from the microwave when a hand grabs the back of his neck and pins him to the countertop. He’s face to face with a crackling escrima stick, and he yelps as Nightwing twists his arm up and behind him.
“You have ten seconds to explain,” Nightwing whispers, dangerously soft. “Ten seconds, Hood, or I fry your brains.”
“Oh please.” Jason knows he shouldn’t taunt the very angry vigilante, but he just can't help himself. “Everyone knows the Bats don’t kill.”
“Do I fucking look like Batman to you?” He presses Jason even harder against the counter. “What the hell have you done to him?”
“He got hit with Fear Toxin, you insufferable prick.” The edge of the countertop digging into his ribcage makes it hard to speak, and Jason gasps as the pressure increases. He knows better than to try and get out of this; Nightwing had never once lost a spar against him when they were kids, and Jason isn’t keen to test his luck again. “One of my guys found him screaming his head off in an alley on the edge of my turf. I gave him the antidote about thirty minutes ago. He’ll be awake within the hour. Now get the hell off me.”
He doesn’t expect Nightwing to actually listen to him, but the weight against his back vanishes, and he stands with a wince, pressing his hand against his ribs.
“You helped him?” Nightwing crosses his arms. “You. As in, you, Jason Todd, helped Tim Drake. You.”
“Are you having a stroke? Should I call an ambulance?” Jason turns his back to Nightwing and takes his chili out of the microwave. “Yes, Dickwing, I helped him. Which, by the way, what the hell was he doing out on his own in the first place? One dead Robin not enough for you?”
“I told him to wait for me.”
“Yeah, like telling any of us what to do has ever been a good idea.” He sets two mugs out on the counter and rifles through his cupboards. “You want chamomile or lemon verbena?”
“Do I…what?”
“Chamomile or lemon verbena?” Jason puts his own teabag in his mug and does not pay attention to how badly his hands are trembling. “I don’t remember how you take it.”
“What are you doing, Jason?”
“I’m making tea. Are you sure you’re not having a stroke?”
A gloved hand comes down to rest on top of his own, steady where Jason’s trembles. “Did you get hit?”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re shaking.”
“Yeah, ‘cause the last time I heard that kid scream like that, I was the one beating the shit out of him.” He bats Nightwing’s hand away and opens the fridge. He doesn’t need anything from it, but keeping his hands busy helps. Why is he still shaking? “Forgive me for not being the picture of calm right now.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Jason watches Nightwing remove his mask, and then it is Dick Grayson standing in his kitchen. Jason hasn’t seen this man without his mask on since before he died, and the sight of crow’s feet beginning to form next to Dick’s eyes makes his stomach flip.
“Thank you for helping him.”
“Not like I had a fucking choice.” Dick still hasn’t answered him about the tea, so Jason chooses for him, dropping a bag of lemon verbena into the second mug and filling it with boiling water. He checks the time on the clock above the oven and settles against the kitchen island. The granite is a comforting barrier between them. “You planning on doing anything about Scarecrow anytime soon? It’s been weeks of his bullshit, and I haven’t seen much progress.”
“Why don’t you have a go, then?” Dick snaps. “You can go be responsible for Gotham and Bludhaven and a teenager who never fucking listens, and I’ll go out and do whatever the hell I want for a change.”
Jason blinks. Dick stands there, furious, before all the fight leaves his body with a sigh.
“Sorry,” he says quietly. “I’m sorry. It’s been a long week.”
“Bruce giving you shit?”
“When is he not?” The smile Dick offers him is tentative, a small thing that Jason returns as best he can. If he smiles too wide, scar tissue tugs at his lips and warps his grin into something monstrous, so he settles for an in-between that he hopes is enough. “I told Tim to wait for me. I had business in Blud that I needed to wrap up before I could get over here, but by the time I’d pulled into the Cave, the little shit was already gone. I panicked.”
“No, really? I couldn’t tell.”
“Thank you for taking care of him.”
Jason shoves the mug of tea at him with a little more force than necessary. “If I hadn’t gotten there when I did, he would have died. I’m not telling you this to be an asshole. I’m telling you this because I’ve had to bury about two dozen kids who’ve overdosed on this new Toxin. It’s bad, Dick, and it’s getting worse because the less you do to catch him, the more he thinks he can get away with. These kids…Dick, they don’t have anyone. My guys sent me there tonight because Robin’s important, but these Alley kids? They aren’t important. No one but me’s coming to save them, and you and I both know I’m not enough.” He meets Dick’s eyes. “You have to be enough for them.”
Dick opens his mouth to respond, but there’s a soft groan from the couch, and Dick whirls around so fast half of his tea spills onto the floor.
The kid sits up, and Jason is running, mixing bowl in hand as he vaults over the back of the couch and shoves it in front of the kid before he can empty his stomach all over Jason’s very nice rug.
“How’d you know that would happen?” Dick asks as he hurries over. He puts his hand on the kid’s back and rubs softly.
“Did you miss the part where I’ve given an antidote to half the kids in this city?” Jason resists the urge to gag as the kid continues to hurl. “No, by all means, Replacement, miss the bowl entirely. I love getting vomit all over my hands.”
The kid spits one last time. “Sorry,” he whispers, throat hoarse. “You saved me.” He narrows his eyes. “Why’d you do that?”
Jason sits back on his heels. “Explaining your corpse ending up in my territory would have been way more effort than you’re worth, kid. You’re gonna feel nauseous for the next few days.”
“Yippee,” the kid deadpans.
“I told you to wait for me.” Dick’s anger has returned in full force. “You should have waited.”
“I was following a lead.”
“You almost died!”
Jason leaves them to argue it out as he goes to wash his hands. He can hear their voices getting louder and louder over the sound of the tap, and although he would rather make sweet love to the Joker than get involved, he knows he has to.
“-stupid and reckless mistakes!” Dick’s red in the face as he paces back and forth, and Jason doesn’t envy the kid in the slightest. He’s still battling the last of the Toxin, and Jason knows exactly how it feels to be on the receiving end of a Dick Grayson tantrum. “If Jason hadn’t been there, I would have had to bury another kid wearing my colours, and this time, it would have been entirely my fault.”
“Pretty sure you weren’t there for the burying part last time, Dick,” Jason mutters as he tears a page out of the notebook on the coffee table. “This is my phone number,” he says to the kid, ignoring Dick entirely. “You use this in emergencies only. You hear me? You call this number, you better be bleeding out in a back alley somewhere.”
Tim’s mouth falls wide open. “Seriously? You’re just gonna give this to me?”
“Abuse it and lose it, Replacement.” Jason presses the folded up paper into his hand. “Bleeding out or worse, okay? You call me to talk about your day, and I’ll-”
“You’ll what? Cover him in blankets and give him a bedtime story?” Dick snickers as he finishes the rest of his tea. “Come on, Timbo, let’s get you home. Alfred’ll lose his mind if we don’t get back soon.”
Jason knows better than to expect them to stay. No matter how well he’d taken care of the kid, he knows Dick will want to double check his work in a place he trusts. Still, his chest is oddly tight when Tim gets up and folds the blankets neatly.
“Thank you,” he says quietly to Jason as Dick retrieves his mask from the kitchen. “I’m sorry I caused so much fuss.”
Jason shakes his head. “No problem, kid. Next time, and I know there’s gonna be a next time, you call, okay? No more dead Robins.”
“No more dead Robins,” the kid echoes. “I promise.”