Archive of Our Own ^beta

Jason was not in a good mood.

Jason was very much not in a good mood, because an Arkham breakout had coincided with the drug bust he’d been planning for a full week, and somehow Scarecrow’s goons had gotten mixed up with his targets, and Jason had had to chase them to a secondary location, and one of them had shot directly at his head, managing to fracture his helmet.

Oh, and there was a Bat involved because there was always a Bat involved when everything went to shit.  It was practically a law in Gotham—when things were going wrong, look up, because chances were one of the flock was watching you.

Jason headed up another floor, following the sounds of a fight, and taking out everyone in his path.  Non-lethal, because contrary to popular belief, Jason did not kill everyone he laid eyes on, fuck you very much, Batman, but he ensured that they were left hurting.

He wasn’t sure which Bat had interfered in his case—the crack in his helmet had disabled several of its features, and Jason had used it as a bomb instead of continuing to wear the broken headpiece.  Not like the Bats would’ve ever let him on their comms, but Oracle was a neutral party, and he would’ve definitely gotten a heads-up from her.

If only to save whoever was in the path of his rage.

There was a bang of gunshots—one, two, three—before the sounds of the fight died.

Jason could feel the dread curdle in his stomach.

He reached the top of the stairs before anyone could make their way down, and shot the two thugs heading his way, kneecapping them both before disarming them and tying their wrists behind their back.

With that, the warehouse descended into silence.  Groans of pain filled the air, but no fights and no movement.  Jason kept his guns up, checking each corner as he headed deeper—the top floor was a pretty safe bet for a Bat infestation, and there was a window with glass shattered inwards.

He found the Bat.

Or, to be more accurate, he found the body.

Jason swore out loud, holstering his guns as he dropped to his knees.  Black cape, red uniform—Jason carefully eased Red Robin onto his back before taking stock of the injuries.

Pulse slow, but still present.  Nonresponsive, body limp.  Fingers stiff and wrong—the staff had disappeared somewhere—and a darker patch of red against the uniform, two of them, one a through and through, right below his ribs, the other going through his utility belt and unfortunately lodging in his hip.

“Red,” Jason hissed, tapping his fingers against the Replacement’s neck, “Red Robin.  Red, report.”

Silence.

Jason took a second to curse again, and rifled through his belt.  He was not going to play nursemaid to a Bat.  Unfortunately, none of the other idiots were in sight, and if the Replacement turned up dead of a bullet wound near Hood, well.

Jason was sure he wouldn’t be killed, but death had many painful alternatives.

He tilted the kid’s head to the side, and then the other way—there, the small comm nestled in his ear.  Jason pulled it out and pushed it into his own ear before pressing the newly opened wad of gauze to the first bullet hole.

The Replacement didn’t even twitch.

The comm line was full of people talking—apparently the Scarecrow had gone on a joyride through Gotham, and between everyone sounding off on position, location, and direction, no one seemed to have noticed that Red wasn’t talking.

“This is Hood,” Jason said, and the chatter cut out immediately.

“Hood,” Batman growled, “What do you want?”

“It’s not really about what I want,” Jason hummed, plastering another bandage to the exit wound, “It’s about what you may be missing.”  Jason allowed them the beat of silence.  “A baby bird, perhaps?”

The comm line exploded into chatter again—Jason winced at the shriek of feedback, readying the third bandage.

Which was when he smelled it.

Sharp, acidic—he was gagging before the realization fully formed in his head, and he immediately spun around to scan the room.

No visible canisters in sight.  No enemies in sight.  That—that was bad, that meant that someone had opened up a can of fear gas somewhere, and now it was seeping through the building.

Jason fumbled through his pockets for his rebreather as Batman growled for silence on the line.  He found it—but therein lay the problem.

Always carry a backup.  That was the motto, and Jason might’ve been years and a death away from Robin, but he still remembered the lessons.  So he always had a backup rebreather.  One backup rebreather, because usually, his helmet’s air filters did their job.

Jason attempted to check Red’s utility belt, but it shocked him before he could even touch the zipper.

“Hood,” Batman growled, “Where are you?”

“I’m sure our Oracle overlord could tell you exactly where your missing bird’s tracker is, Batman,” Jason said, trying to regulate his breathing as he weighed the rebreather in his hand.  “You really need me to be redundant?”

Jason hated fear toxin.  Hated it with a loathing he reserved for only a few things.  It was the stuff of literal nightmares.

“What are you doing to him?” Nightwing snapped over the line.

“Ah-ah, N, the question is what could I do to him,” Jason corrected, reaching out to slot the rebreather over the kid’s face.  The combination of fear and blood loss would send the kid into shock, which meant that the choice wasn’t a choice at all.

Jason readied the third bandage with shaking fingers.

“I could keep him, for example,” he said, pressing the gauze to the third wound, “Clip his wings and hide him in a cage.”  The sound of grinding teeth was near-audible.  “Maybe send some presents back.  A finger, week by week.”

“Hood,” Batman snarled as Nightwing shouted something inarticulate.

“That’d be two and half months before he runs out,” Jason said, struggling not to cough.  He was trying to keep pressure on the largest wound.  “Do you think you’d find him before then?  Or would I have to resort to something else to motivate you?”

They couldn’t be that far away.  They were still in Gotham somewhere, and the Bowery was near the center.

“Maybe the eyes,” Jason mused, “Those perfect, blue eyes.  I have to admit, it would be interesting to watch a blind bird try to learn how to fly.”

“If you’ve touched a hair on his head, Hood,” Nightwing snarled, sounding out of breath, and Jason laughed.

“Too late, Wing,” he said, twisting the words to be deliberately cruel.  The warehouse was wavering around him.  Dizzy.  He was getting dizzy.

His gloves were red and sticky.  Next time, Jason was going to remember to carry two backup rebreathers.  Or get the Bats to tell him how to fucking disable their ridiculous security features before their stupid paranoia got one of them killed.

And this was coming from the guy who kept a bomb in his helmet.

“Hood!” someone shouted, and the word echoed, overlapping around him.

Something caught ahold of his shoulder and wrenched him back.  Jason sucked in a sharp breath in lieu of a scream, and all he could see were the white eyes of a monster.

He was lying on something soft, his head throbbing unpleasantly.  It was aching in the particular way that always meant drugs, so Jason stifled the groan and instead tried to shift.

His hands moved two inches before snapping to a halt, restrained on either side of him.  Same with his ankles.

Which was about the time that Jason realized he’d been stripped of all his gear, armor, and weapons, left in a thin undershirt and sweatpants.

Fuck.

He opened his eyes to see Nightwing leaning over him—no, Dick, he was out of uniform, his face crinkled into tired lines, he was saying something but Jason couldn’t hear him, he could only see his lips moving.  Jason opened his mouth to ask what was wrong, just as Dick reached out to run fingers through his hair.

Fingers caught.  And held, twisting painfully, bringing stinging tears to Jason’s eyes as his head was forced still.

His breath died in his throat.

That wasn’t Dick.

“Hello, pumpkin.”  A too-wide smile.  “We have some unfinished business to work through.”

How could Jason have been so stupid?

He knew the Bats were coming, he knew they were pissed, he’d deliberately taunted them and then failed to get away.  He knew they wouldn’t give him the chance to explain himself, that they’d look at bullets and him and draw their own conclusions and he—he couldn’t believe he’d been foolish enough to get caught.

He hadn’t even heard them coming.

And the threat that had loomed over him like a guillotine—Bats didn’t kill, they just wrapped their enemies up with a pretty red bow and sent them straight to the torture den masquerading as an asylum.  The asylum that held the one person that sent Jason back to the screaming fifteen-year-old dying on the cold stone floor of a warehouse.

And after how he’d threatened Red, the Bats were probably patting themselves on the back for a job well done.

“You know,” the Joker hummed, twirling the crowbar in his hand, “We never did clear up the question.  Which hurts more?”

Jason promised himself he wouldn’t scream.  Promised himself he wouldn’t give the fucking clown the satisfaction.

He screamed.

He would—he would take anything over this—Blackgate or Belle Reve or solitary confinement in the worst prison in the country, but not Arkham.  Not the Joker.  Not being strapped to a bed while the clown waltzed in and out, cackling maniacally.

Not the needles.  Please, please, please no—

He didn’t know how long he’d been there before he got a visitor.  Before he opened his eyes and it wasn’t the Joker laughing with that lunatic smile.

Jason was surprised.  Scratch that, Jason was stunned—of all the people who might’ve visited him, including the Bat and his gang, Bruce Wayne was the last person on the list.

And yet here he was, out of the suit, sitting by Jason’s bed, looking…tired.  There were dark circles under his eyes, and his hair was sticking up funny, like he’d been running his hands through it.

Bruce finally realized that Jason was awake, and he turned towards him, blinking owlishly.  “Jason?” he asked quietly.

Jason’s voice was hoarse, barely a whisper after screaming day in and day out, but he had to speak, he had to try.  “I’m sorry,” he rasped, “Please, Bruce, I’m sorry—I wasn’t going to hurt Tim, I didn’t shoot him, I didn’t, please believe me, I’m sorry—”

“Jason,” Bruce tried to interrupt, but Jason didn’t let him.

“Please, please, I’ll do anything, just—just get me out of here, please, Bruce—”

“Jason, I can’t—”

“Please—I’ll go to Blackgate, I’ll go anywhere, I’m not crazy but this place will make me, please Bruce—”

“Jason, please calm down—”

“I can’t,” Jason’s voice cracked as he shook his head, “I can’t, B, please don’t leave me with that monster.”  There were tears slipping down his cheeks as he struggled for breath, “Please—please—”

“Jason, you need to calm down—”

“Bruce, please don’t leave me here,” Jason begged, desperate for any hint of protectiveness in the man’s gaze, taking breaths too shallow to help.  “Dad, please.”

Bruce’s breath caught audibly—he looked like Jason had reached out and punched him, and Jason knew he’d lost his chance.

“Please don’t leave me,” he tried one last time, his vision blurring, as his lungs wheezed helplessly, “I would rather die.”

The dark spots overwhelmed his field of view as he gasped for breath, and the last thing he saw was Bruce’s pale face.

The first thing he noticed was that the cuffs were gone.

That was a bad sign.  The cuffs had never been removed before, which meant that the Joker was trying something new.

The new things were the worst.  Jason didn’t have time to brace for the new things.  He could do nothing but watch in ever-increasing dread as the Joker laid out his latest surprise.

Jason cracked open his eyes.  He was still on the bed, and he wasn’t alone—Bruce was sitting at his bedside, looking ten years older than he’d seen him last.

Something cold curled in Jason’s stomach.

He—he didn’t like this.  The Joker wouldn’t leave him unchained in front of Bruce.  Did—did the Joker know who Bruce was?  Was this another trick?  Another warehouse door tauntingly closed behind him as Jason dragged himself forward—only to discover that it was bolted from the outside.

Jason’s breathing picked up, and Bruce raised his head, blinking at Jason.

“Jason,” Bruce said, and he sounded wrecked.  Like someone had died.

Maybe someone had died.  That was the Joker’s favorite trick, wasn’t it?  Kill a birdie, wait for it to pop right back up, and then cut it open to discover all its secrets.

What, Jason meant to ask.  Who.  What happened?  Why are you here?

But then he noticed where they were.  No cell.  No padded walls.  The ceiling was shrouded in darkness, and he could hear the fluttering of bats.

A trick.  A trap.

Jason jerked away from Bruce, instinctively curling as his heart rate kicked up.  “This isn’t real,” he said out loud, in the hopes that the words would dissolve the scene, “This isn’t real.”

It didn’t do anything.  Bruce’s face twisted further as he leaned forward, “This is real, Jason.”

No.  No, it couldn’t be.  “It’s not,” Jason rasped, his voice unable to rise above a whisper, “It’s—it’s a hallucination—a trick—” some unholy combination of drugs bringing him a long-lost memory.

Jason wanted it to end.  Now.  There were no limits to the Joker’s cruelty, Jason knew that, but he didn’t think he could withstand being tortured by someone wearing Bruce’s face.  He—he would break.

“Jay, it’s not a hallucination,” Bruce said softly.  Jason shook his head violently, but Bruce kept going, “You were hit with fear toxin.  You’ve been in the Cave this whole time.  This is real.”

Jason—Jason remembered inhaling fear toxin.  Remembered having only one rebreather, and fitting it over the Replacement’s face.  Remembered—remembered padded restraints and a bed and laughter—

“You’re lying,” Jason said, inching away from the illusion of Bruce, “You would never have brought me to the Cave.”

“Of course I would.  You inhaled fear toxin.  You needed a safe place to ride it out.”

Jason shook his head again, a lump growing in his throat, “You wouldn’t.  You—you would’ve just shipped me off to Arkham the first chance you got.  I’m—I’m a villain, remember?”

“You’re my son,” Bruce said, something wounded and painful in his eyes, “And I would never put you in Arkham.”

“You’re lying,” Jason said desperately, unsure of who he was trying to convince.

“Everything you saw was the fear toxin,” Bruce said softly, “You haven’t left the Cave.  I’ve been right here the whole time.”

“You’re lying.”  Hoarse and weak and trembling.

“This is real, Jay,” Bruce extended a hand, palm up, and Jason stared at it.  At the choice.  Taking it—taking it would mean believing.

Falling for the trick.

Looking up in dread and despair as the Joker started laughing again, hysterical in victory.

Taking it would mean breaking, and trusting someone else to put him back together again.

“Jay-lad,” Bruce said softly.

Jason lunged.

Bruce’s eyes went wide in that split-second, reacting before the rest of him, but Jason didn’t see the resultant expression as he buried his head into a soft shirt, a heartbeat fluttering against his cheek as he wrapped his arms around corded, tense muscle.

Warm.  It was warm.  It was warm and a trick and Jason had fallen for it and the cackles would start any second now and his tears were being soaked by the shirt and his fingers were trembling and—

And there were arms wrapping around him, warm and safe and protective, drowning him in a hug he hadn’t had in four years.

“It was fear toxin,” Bruce murmured into his hair, “None of it was real, Jay.”

“Please,” Jason said, his voice cracking, “Please don’t send me to Arkham.”

“Never.”

Jason shuddered harder, but didn’t resist as Bruce pulled him closer, tucking him firmly in his embrace.  One part of him kept waiting for the other shoe to drop, for a door to swing open somewhere and a faux falsetto to echo around him as the pain and the screaming started again.  The other part of him registered the bruises at his wrists and ankles, and the lack of pain anywhere else.  The dryness of his ruined throat, because he’d spent god-knows-how-long screaming.  The comforting beat underneath his cheek, grounding him in the present.

Shuffling footsteps somewhere behind him, and Jason didn’t have the energy to tense up, only balling his fists into the shirt with full awareness that he currently had the grip strength of a kitten.

“Is he lucid?”  It sounded like Dick.

“Yes,” Bruce said.  The word rumbled through him.

“…Are you sure about that?”  Dick sounded extremely skeptical.

“Yes.”

“Okay, sheesh, you don’t need to try to murder me with your eyes.  I’ll go get Tim.”  The footsteps shuffled away.

Bruce—or the thing pretending to be Bruce—was rubbing gentle circles against Jason’s back.  It felt nice.

Maybe this was a dream.  Maybe he’d already lost his mind.  Maybe they were just waiting for him to sink deeper and deeper within the hallucination before they finally broke him.

It didn’t matter.  Jason was going to cling to every moment he had before he lost it.

The Cave elevator dinged, and the sound startled Jason into warily poking his head out of Bruce’s embrace.  Dick was carrying Tim, who had his arms loosely wrapped around Dick’s neck and was blinking languidly at all of them.

Jason straightened as they got closer, and Bruce’s embrace loosened enough that he could fully turn to face Dick and Tim and watch what they were doing.  Dick deposited Tim on the side of the bed, and Tim half-crawled a couple of inches forward before all-but-collapsing against Jason.

Jason instinctively caught him, tugging Tim against his chest, and the younger boy murmured happily as his arms slipped around Jason, holding him tight.

“You saved me,” Tim mumbled into his shirt, “Knew you were a good guy.”

“Am not,” Jason retorted automatically.

“Saved me,” Tim repeated teasingly, “Ruined all your street cred.”  He slumped further against Jason and attempted to growl, “I will cut out his eyes and eat them on skewers!  But first I will bandage his wounds because I am a giant softie.”

“I don’t sound like that,” Jason grumbled, and glared at Dick when he made a small, choked sound, clearly suppressing a laugh.  “How many painkillers did you give the kid, anyway?”

“Enough to lower his inhibitions,” Dick said, trying to keep a straight face, “Not enough for him to forget this in the morning.”

Jason kept glowering, even as he began drifting a hand through Tim’s hair.  The kid made a happy sigh and went limp in Jason’s grasp—Jason’s throat closed up and he furiously blinked his eyes.

This—this was a dream.  It had to be.  The disjointed fantasies of a broken mind.

But even if it was, there was nowhere else he’d rather be.