#jason is the brick shithouse

[lunallaa]

So potentially hot take....

Jason Todd doesn't need to or should be that much a pretty boy. Not saying he should be super ugly or something but I am a firm believer of the rough and really just average appearance Jason agenda.

I know we all love how Dexter Soy draws him but let Jason be just a lil ugly a lil beat up yknow?

This post is all in silly goofy fun pls don't get mad 🫣

[visionsofcarnality]

The urge to ride Jason Todd’s dick while we both embrace the fact that we’ve always been doomed and our lives have been cursed from the start no matter what we do or how many rules we follow…

In this story we’re both Icarus, so no one is urging us to come down.

We will crash and burn in each other’s arms.

[basalting]

bruharvey with jason: Thinking about how tiny robin jason was, Harvey and Bruce must have been like giants to him.

(this got long so i added a cut. sorry im incapable of shutting up <3) jason was sooooooo small. preteen small and malnourished small and late bloomer small all at once.

totally encapsulated by bruce's cloak and harvey's jacket, small and safe and secure.

how enraptured they must of been with him? dick was small too but dick didnt want them the way jason does, didnt NEED them the way jason does.

dick needed people to believe in him, to let him be useful, to burn through that tar pit of rage and hurt zucco left in him. dick didnt want or need new parents (the fact that bruce ended up considering him a son anyway was irrelevant to dick) and it meant that bruce and harvey didnt have to be there emotionally as much

jason was different, jason demanded care. not attention, dick needed attention. was born to have eyes on him watching in awe. jason hated attention, hard-eyed adults and cold alleys had taught jason that attention was dangerous. but he wanted to be taken care of. he wanted bruce to remember when he had a test due and to ask him about it without being reminded. he wanted harvey to remember what show he was watching and that he likes hot chocolate but not peppermint.

for all that they would hide it. behind snarls and gruffness. behind a blank face and quiet grunts. harvey and bruce loved jason, he was theirs. they were his. and then he was gone.

what a blessing, to be loved so dearly by a child

what a curse, to have to mourn the loss of that love

[mamawasatesttube]

thinking about him again... (robin kon...)

[clownmantis]

so sick of fanart trying to make vincents stupid limit breaks sexy. you draw that monster dumb as fuck and corny as hell or im hitting you with my car

[dandelions-could-never]

Jason Todd could shoot me in the gut and pull out my intestines and I would thank him.

[nonryenary]

“Jason’s a big boy he can take care of himself”

He’s 19.

vs

[kitkatscabinet]

SNUGGLE BUG

Summary: The boys try to get out of bed, their partner has other plans.

Pairing(s): Dick Grayson, Jason Todd, Tim Drake, x reader

A/N: unedited

DICK GRAYSON

Dick's always been a physically affectionate person, far more so than the rest of his family. It's why he'd been so ecstatic when he'd found you, a partner that was just as, if not more affectionate than him.

On more than one occasion his siblings had been given front-row seats to the snuggle show when they broke into his apartment, served them right really.

What Dick hadn't accounted for, was just how difficult it was to peel himself from your arms in the morning. Torture would hurt less he's sure.

"Ten more minutes," you whined childishly, burrowing your face into Dick's bare shoulder, tightening your arms around his torso.

"We've already said that three times." Your partner laughed, wriggling out of your hold but with far less strength than you knew he was capable of.

Both of you were fully aware just how quickly he could extracate himself from your arms should the neccessity rise. Technically speaking he did have to go to work, but surely it couldn't hurt to be a little late?

Though a quick glance at the hello kitty alarm clock on the bedside table confirmed he was already late.

"Dickie, can't you just call in? I wanna cuddle."

Fuck. How could he say no to that?

It wasn't like he really needed the money anyway.

His boss's ire is worth it to feel the way you smile into the skin of his neck, your warm breaths and little laughs as you lay tangled together.

So worth it.

JASON TODD

"You planning on letting me go anytime soon?" Jason grunted, though you know him well enough to hear the smile he's attempting to hide.

"Never," you mumble into the skin between his broad shoulder blades, the mattress slouching beneath the combined weight of you and your boyfriend.

Jason, undeterred by your attempts to drag him down, stands with a grunt. A cracking noise you know to be his knees rings out, and though you feel a little bad, you're unwilling to back down in your quest to get him back into bed.

Unfortunately for you, your boyfriend is built like a brick shithouse and is just as stubborn as you. Slowly, he manouevers around your small apartment all the while you hang off his back like a drunken Koala.

"Babyyyy," you whine petulantly into his ear, arms tightening around his neck in an attempt to only slightly choke him into submission.

Sighing, Jason starts to wander back into the bedroom. Just when you think you've won, he spins around, falling backwards onto the mattress and crushing you beneath his bulk.

In the minutes you spend winded, recovering, from being squished like an ant, Jason makes his escape. When you finally manage to come back to yourself you notice something incredibly distressing.

"Clothes! Why are you wearing clothes!" you wailed, sliding off the mattress and onto the floor in a pathetic slump.

Despite himself, Jason smiles at the sight, bundling you up in his arms before hopping back into bed with you. "Ok, you big dramatic baby."

Hey may have sounded put out, but the both of you knew he wanted to cuddle just as much. Besides, nothing was as important to him as you.

TIM DRAKE

He’d tried to be quiet. Truly, with years of training in the art of stealth Tim had intended to simply slip out of the bed and leave you to the sleep you needed.

He’d almost made it, both feet on the floor and the mattress no longer bearing most of his weight when all of a sudden a hand darted out, grasping his wrist.

Tim froze, slowly turning to look down at you with wide, guilty eyes. You're glaring up at him, sleep-addled face far more adorable than threatening, not that he'd ever tell you that, for fear of getting his ass beat.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing?" your voice is hoarse and gravelly from sleep but the threat is evident.

Mouth suddenly dry, Tim awkwardly chuckles, "Oh, babe, you're awake."

"Thanks to you," you grumbled sleepily, guilt and fear in equal measurements settling heavily in his chest.

"M'sorry, tried not to wake you but I gotta get to work on this case."

"No." You grunted, wrapping your arms around Tim's waist with freakish speed, nuzzling your face into his side.

He can't help the way his heart skips several beats at your casual affection. Tim's always been starved for touch, for the soft loving touch that you've always provided as if its as natural as breathing.

He should be used to it but despite the years worth of love and affection you've poured into Tim in the time you've spent together he still hasn't acclimated.

Tim knows, that you know, just how weak to your touch he is. It still doesn't prevent his resolve from crumbling when you refuse to let him budge, tugging him back down into your warm embrace.

"Good boy," you murmur against the skin of his neck, wrapping around his back like an octopus and trapping him against the expanse of your chest.

His skin runs hot at your words, mind numb to anything that's not your touch as he's eventually lulled back to sleep to the soothing sounds of your breathing.

[bruciemilf]

Reverse de-aging AU where Damian goes from teeny tiny 8 year old assassination machine to 6’4 grown ass man.

He can throw Jason around like a rock and everyone’s sweating piss. Even better if he retains everything and he’s still regular Damian mentally.

Bruce has a Jason 2.0 except GRUMPIER. He’s not sure how he can explain pushing a giant brick shithouse on swings and carrying him around to the media.

“Damian, please let’s stay inside until we figure how to turn you back.”

“I’m legally not required to respect your parental guidelines and orders anymore, so, I’ll do what I want! And I want to drink alcoholic beverages!”

He tries one sip of Jason’s beer and chokes so hard he cries.

Jon is VERY concerned about this random man picking him up from school and demanding they have a playdate. He blasts him into a building, naturally.

[quenga-do-nordeste]

(♥´∀｀)／

happy friday everypony

[mxtantrights]

Omg on jason having twins, i think he’d be an utter mess on their first day of school. Like you got this massive brick shithouse of a man practically trembling while barely holding back tears as he drops off his babies at kindergarten or first grade.

a/n: thank you anon for sending this in! <333 I can't thank you enough and I hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoyed writing it!!!

You thought the hardest part of seeing you twins off to kindergarten would be the kids. But it's actually seeing Jason say goodbye to them that undoes you.

He's crouched down to be at their level. The both go them, Peter and Cassie, are looking at him intently. With their books bags on their bags and their lunch pails in their hands. Cassie let Jason do her hair today, two space buns with purple scrunchies. Peter let you pick his shirt, a fresh green graphic tee.

You sniffle as you take them in.

Jason holds onto Peter's hand and cups the side of Cassie's face.

"Now, you don't have to go today if you don't want to. You can stay at home and we can try again tomorrow. It's okay." Jason says.

"We wanna go." Peter says.

"Yeah daddy." Cassie agrees.

Jason nods his head, "Of course. You two are so smart. You're gonna do so good. You hardly get that from me."

"You're smart daddy!" Cassie says, throwing herself onto him.

Jason doesn't even move when she does that. He is kneeling there and his right arm at his side, the other in Peter's hand. Peter joins in on the hug too.

"I'm gonna miss you guys." Jason says.

Jason engulfs the both of them in a hug. You wanna go over there and join in but you know if you do then they might never actually go in. It's one thing to see Jason not wanting to let go, but if they see it from you they'll probably skip kindergarten altogether.

"Me too!" Peter says.

Jason lets go first. He pulls away from them and takes them in again. Then he gives them each a kiss on the top of their heads. Peter gets an extra one because Cassie turns around and runs through the front door.

Then Peter follows after her. Ever the little brother.

Jason stands up and turns to you. Now you can see his eyes that are red and brimmed with tears. You jog over and wrap your arms around him. He wraps his arms around you within hesitation and places his head into the crook of your neck.

"It's okay. We'll see them later." you say.

"Maybe we can pick them up early?" he asks, and you know he's half joking and half serious.

"No can do. We gotta let the little birds leave the nest." you answer.

[fryingpan1234567]

aaaaaanyways. pride month at Camp Half Blood?

if you remember that one post from a while ago (general hc’s about chb), I did say I would do a fully pride post eventually

so without further ado, I present to all my lovely gay demigods:

PRIDE MONTH AT CHB🗣️🗣️

SO we’ve already discussed the decorations of some of the cabins, like Percy putting rainbow hippocampi scales all over the walls, the Demeter and Persephone cabins growing colorful flowers all over their roofs, the Hecate cabin and its Sentient Gay Door

I like to think the Iris cabin is just fully blasting rainbows all the time it looks like a Minecraft beacon

they play capture the flag every June with a pride flag that has the CHB logo on it

limited edition CHB pride merch😭

Mr. D defending trans campers by driving bigots slightly insane long enough to slap themselves and then go back to normal

Y’ALL KNOW ABOUT THE PRONOUN CORRECTION AIR HORNS? THAT’S THE ENTIRE APOLLO CABIN + LEO AND PERCY

Some ignorant prick about a transmasc camper: “Oh yeah she—“

Percy: *AIR HORN* “IT’S HE, BITCH”

Ignorant prick: “Okay Jesus I’m sorry”

A different ignorant prick: *makes some dumb joke about “always being able to tell” and receives at least seven different air horns from all the Apollo campers in the vicinity*

Leo’s been following this one really irritating chick around all day because she can’t figure out one of his sibling’s genders and blasting her in the face every time she fucks up their pronouns😭😭😭

anyways yeah I like to imagine there’s a demigod pride festival somewhere, maybe in New York

or no there’s demigods everywhere I bet they have parade floats all the time in lots of cities and the Mist conceals the “fireworks” which are actually just godly light shows

Apollo rocks up to camp in a rainbow crop top and a pink drink from Starbucks just to sing Born This Way in the middle of the day and then dip again

Aphrodite blessing random queer couples with finding perfect date setups “conveniently” in their paths

all the gods physically restraining Hera when she tries to go fuck with Jason while he’s on a date w Leo

Percy and Annabeth in matching shirts that say ✨BEST BI✨ with the Best Buy price tag logo in the middle

Nico got glitterbombed on June 1st the second he stepped out of his cabin by the entire Apollo cabin (and Jason) and is still finding sparkles in his hair a week later

Aphrodite kids are walking dictionaries of all the rainbow terms, somehow, and they also all know which days in June are for which awareness or pride or whatever flag

campers who transitioned over the school year and coming back to camp a different gender and their godly parent re-claims them as their true self

Percy “I can’t believe I used to think I was straight” Jackson educating some of the younger campers on bisexuality and how, no, you don’t always know right away

Annabeth “I had a crush on Thalia and Luke at the same time and it was horrible” Chase always reassuring the nervous kids that there’s nothing wrong with being queer (and that she’ll fight any homophobic family members they may have)

actually they kind of all do that

Some little kid: “Well……. I don’t wanna tell my stepdad, he might kick me out”

Percy, remembering that his dad kept Medusa’s head after it got sent to Olympus: “Give me your address, I have an idea”

Piper will verbally eviscerate anybody she catches being even remotely homophobic. I mean she will swipe phones out of her siblings’ hands to tell off some ignorant grandmother

Jason does NOT get into physical altercations outside of sparring and literal war, but the closest he ever got was after hearing someone call Nico a slur (Percy and Leo had to physically drag him away from the other guy)

William Solace has white cowboy boots. I Will Start Sobbing On The Spot

Percy and Jason wore matching skirts for the pride festival and it was great— these 6-foot-plus brick shithouses of heroes who have single-handedly won wars aggressively waving tiny pride flags at each other and dancing to IT GIRL on the quad

Cecil and Lou Ellen made these magic rainbow smoke bombs, crawled up on the roof of the Hermes cabin, and slingshotted them into the masses Just Because™️

(Will’s hair was blue and pink for weeks)

RAINBOW WAR PAINT FOR CAPTURE THE FLAG.

Clarisse fucking kicked someone into the lake because they made fun of one of her siblings’ dyed hair

Connor thought it would be funny to leave a mini pan flag on top of Mr. D’s Diet Coke stash, mostly as a harmless joke, but the next day he noticed Mr. D had tucked it into his horrible Hawaiian shirt pocket like a handkerchief😭

watching Love, Simon in the amphitheater for movie night and half the campers had to excuse themselves early for sobbing too hard

Malcolm and Annabeth reread Red White and Royal Blue every summer. They say they’re Henry and June, Connor is Alex, and Percy is Nora

(this is confirmed when the two of them start a foot fight in the dining pavilion with a Chipotle burrito)

Leo IMing Jo and Emmie to wish them a happy pride (and tell Georgina and Waystation I said hello)

Piper and Leo getting into a HEATED debate about whether Velma Dinkley is a lesbian or not

”YOU CANNOT LOOK AT HER OVERSIZED-SWEATER-OVER-MY-PROM-DRESS ASS AND TELL ME YOU THINK SHE’S TOTALLY STRAIGHT—“

”WHAT SHE AND SHAGGY HAD WAS REAL, BEAUTY QUEEN! HOT DOG WATER AIN’T GOT NOTHIN ON NORVILLE ROGERS—“

”LEO! HER NAME IS MARCIE! AND THEY ARE EACH OTHER’S W A L L P A P E R S .”

Jason, sitting in the middle of them, now deaf in both ears: Lupa give me strength

GUYS PLEASE SEND ME SPECIFIC SHIPS OR CHARACTERS TO WRITE PRIDE HC’S FOR I WOULD LOVE TO🙏🙏🙏🙏

[gaywineauntsstuff]

(This is all a joke)

I love the Dick is pushing thirty and all the Batkids tease him about it and he’s dramatic. But what’s infinitely funnier is in the Robin story (the one illustrated by piccolo) Dick looks young enough to go undercover as a student in highschool.

Which means that Dick with a little bit of effort can pass for 17-19

Which means Jason ‘drawn like a 40 year old whose doing 20 to life in prison built like a brick shithouse’ Todd

Definitely looks older at 23 than Dick does at 27

And so the boys get their licks in and Dick does his howls moving castle let me lie on a bed dramatically like an 18th century women fainting

Calls Kori like ‘babe be honest am I too old for you, do I need Botox? HAVE YOU SEEN A GRAY HAIR PLEASE’ on speaker in front of the Batkids because honestly it’s a funny joke.

And then they go to a bar

And Dick gets ID checked

At 27

He’s been a hero for 19 years

He just got fucking ID checked at the bar

And then when they get into the bar

Jason gets called sir

And he gets called Dude

Because he looks barley legal apparently

And that’s even fucking worse

How is it everyone can laugh at him for being old and HE DOESNT EVEN GET OLD MAN PERKS.

HE HAS OLD MAN BONES, THEY SOUND LIKE HE NEEDS WD-40 (what do you mean that because of the 23 years of intense acrobatics and the 19 years of punching People, and carpel tunnel inducing precision shut up)

And Jason finds it even funnier until dick desperately asks how old the barkeep thinks he is and the dude goes like “idk 21? Barely”

And Jay laughs until the dude went “yeah I mean you look like a kid whose uncle is taking him here for his first drink”

And Jason cuts the laugh mid HA and goes “excuse me?”

Anyway now Dick if finding it funny again

It stops being funny all together when he’s the only one to get ID’d on Tims 21st birthday

Because Tim is 4’0 (it’s only a 3 INCH HEIGHT DIFFERENCE dICK)

And has baby fat on his cheeks at 21 and he can still pitch his voice into an androgynous or fem voice.

(Tim paid the bar keep to do this, he’s stirring shit)

[visionsofcarnality]

bro the fact that this post got 400 notes- you guys i’m feeling bashful 🫶✨😊 tysm

Make-A-Wish

Summary: You ask your boyfriend to fuck you as his vigilante persona. Oh… and the helmet stays on. 🫵❤️

Warnings: Rough sex, Jaybird is a meanie in this one, degradation, name calling, use of slùt and whöre. Crude language, crying, ass slapping, piv sex, unprotected sex (wrap it b4 you tap it this is tumblr where people don’t get pregnant or STDs), cræmpie, slight overstim, Jason’s baby bird helmet hair.

a/n: i saw this pop up in my feed and i have to say this idea hijacked all common sense in my brain. I hope i did you justice- @smutinlove

(mdni below the cut, I am dead serious)

“Is this what you fucking wanted?” Was growled in your ear through the voice modulator installed in the helmet that you could currently feel pressing against the side of your head while the man wearing it pounded into you from behind. “You wanted the Red Hood? You fucking got it, bitch…” His sentence trailed off into a groan when you clenched around him from the harsh words.

“Fuck… You like this shit?” His thrusts were punishing, driving your legs even farther apart than you’d already stretched them, back forced into an arch by one of his big, thick hands on your spine.

You had no response for him, mewling and babbling into the dark sheets that you tried to grip between your scrambling fingers, simultaneously trying to push back onto him and pull yourself off.

“Jay-“ You cried, and the word was cut off when he used his other gloved hand to grip your hair, pulling you up by the nape of your neck so your chest was flush against his back.

“I don’t know who you’re calling for, princess.” He teased cruelly into your ear while the hand that had previously taken residence on your back circled around your shaking thighs to the little spot between your legs that made you see stars. “Is that good? That feel good? Such a dirty fucking whore for me, yeah?” He panted through the helmet, hot metal replacing what would have been hot breath on your neck.

“You like fucking the Red Hood?” He jeered, a dark chuckle escaping the covered mouth behind you. “Yeah, you fucking love this shit. Get off on being treated like a slut?” You couldn’t even respond with the way he was fucking you, forcing the flesh between your thighs to part and your body to take more and more of his fat fucking cock. He wasn’t the longest you’d had, but he definitely was the thickest. No matter how he tried to prepare you you always felt him for days after he fucked you… Especially like this. Your poor cunt would no doubt be dripping, leaking, and bruised tomorrow morning.

The thought alone triggered your orgasm and you came with a high, keening cry. Pussy damn-near crushing his cock as he continued thrusting, working your exhausted body through the waves of ecstasy. The sound of skin on wet skin filled the room as your cunt gushed and creamed for him, creating a white ring around the base of his cock as evidence of his prowess. Through the helmet he looked down quickly to watch your spasming pussy continue to spread around his cock. Your pretty little lips sucking him in while your muscles tried to push him out.

“That’s it, baby, fucking soak it.” He encouraged, finally getting tired of the helmet and yanking it from his head with one gloved hand. Underneath he was damp with sweat and condensation from his ragged breathing as he fucked you. Still, he fucked you, wringing the last dregs of pleasure from your body and starting another race to the peak. “Thought i’d let you off that easy?” He spoke into your ear, finally feeling his lips instead of metal on your skin. He took your earlobe into his teeth, biting the flesh with a nip like a kitten.

“Not gonna stop until you’re fucking screaming.” And scream you did, especially when his teeth sank into the flesh of the top of your shoulder as he came. The hot, wet feeling of his orgasm inside you triggered the second orgasm and you stopped making sounds that could be described as human.

He rutted against you still, torturing you both with the pleasure until you were sure it was more pain than sensation. Still he ground his pelvis against yours, so you could feel his heavy balls against your pussy as he emptied himself for all he was worth, painting your insides with the evidence of your mutual depravity.

Finally, after what felt like years he let go of your hair, letting you collapse to the bed gently, his other arm lowering you gently so as to not hurt your nose.

When he was assured you were able to let your weight onto the mattress he finally pulled out, moaning under his breath at the cold air on his previously cozy cock that was now creamy and shiny with your mixed juices. With both hands he harshly gripped the globes of your ass and lifted gently, exposing your ruined and still-twitching hole to his hungry eyes. Especially when the first drop of milky white cum appeared at your entrance and slid down to your clit where it hung like a pearly stalactite before plummeting to the sheets. Jason loved to watch his cum pour out of your cunt after you’d been thoroughly fucked out on his cock, something about the sight made him almost ready to go again at that exact second.

Only your soft sounds of requested affection broke him from the trance and he abandoned his show to laze down beside you, grabbing a soft tissue from beside the bed and cleaning between your legs before more of him dripped onto the sheets.

“How you doing baby?” He crooned gently, so at odds with how he’d spoken to you during the act. He gently ran a hand over your head and waited for your words.

The laugh that came out of him was enough to shake the building when you held up a singular hand for a high five.

[galahadwilder]

Multiversal meeting of Jasons Todd and about half of them are 6’5” and Thicc as shit and the other half are 5’8” and weedy and they’re trying to figure out why the hell some of them are built like brick shithouses and others are built like accountants

Turns out that the big ones are the ones who died, because the Lazarus Pit fixed their childhood malnutrition

[batsycline69]

Chapter One: Head Above Ground, Feet in the Grave

Summary: You get a tattoo from Jason and realize your first impression may not have been spot on

Pairing: Jason Todd x GN!Reader

Words: 5,576

Warnings: needles, profanity, canon-typical violence, reader has tattoos but is otherwise not described, jason doesn’t know how to flirt.

SERIES MASTERPOST | NEXT

“So. Whatcha reading?” he asks over the buzz of his needle gun. Your confused look is enough get him talking again. “Saw you with a book out front.”

As soon as he stepped out into the front thirty-five minutes after your appointment was supposed to begin, as peeved as you were, you couldn’t deny he was attractive. One of his broad shoulders leaned into the wall, his thick, tattooed arms crossed over his chest. Dark curls with a patch of white at the front.

“Oh, it’s Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier,” you reply, a little surprised the guy built like a brick shithouse was asking about your reading. Then again, he’s probably just trying to make conversation.

Jason just nods.

Maybe he isn’t trying to make conversation.

The bad news is, up close, he’s even more handsome. Now you can see the little scar that angles through his eyebrow and another that curves up along his cheek. His eyes are intense as he works, his absurdly large hand has a firm grip on your forearm, guiding you as he works. He smells like cigarettes, but only just, and what you can assume is the lingering smell of the timeworn leather jacket sprawled across the chair in the corner. And all of this is bad news because this guy is obviously bad news. How can he not be, right?

It’s just this feeling, one that you couldn’t shake as soon as he sauntered towards you, the smell of cigarette smoke lingering on his worn black t-shirt. Like he’s too cool for you. Even as he’s permanently etching a skeletal bird into your arm, there’s this air about him you can’t quite place.

Before he led you back to his station, you were so certain there was going to be some sort of bikini-clad model plastered to the wall. But yet, the space is surprisingly empty. There’s a little corkboard leaning against a small table with old designs thumb-tacked to the board and not much else.

“How long have you been working here?” you ask.

Despite asking, you already kind of know the answer.

You’ve been following the shop’s Instagram for a while now. You remember the post introducing Jason, the carousel of photos demonstrating his work. Not that you’d tell him right now, but you had fallen in love with his style as soon as you saw it. The sure, thick lines. The moody shading. Bones and knives and bugs. He had no Instagram of his own for his work that you could find; only the posts in the shop with the caption ‘by Jay.’

“Couple months,” Jason replies. “I was traveling around for a while before. This is the first steady place I’ve worked.”

“Oh, wow, that’s cool. Where were you before?” you ask. It’s small talk, and you hate it, but the lack of conversation is uncomfortable in a way that usually isn’t the case. Silence doesn’t bother you. His silence does.

You wonder if his home lacks as much personality as his station. You imagine his apartment is the kind with the mattress sitting on the floor, TV on top of a folding table, and a refrigerator full of cheap beer. Something that doesn’t feel completely moved into.

He gives a small shrug of his broad shoulders. “All around,” he replies.

Even small talk seems to be off the table.

You give a curt nod of your head. A couple minutes pass, and you can’t take it anymore. “Sorry, you mind if I grab my book real fast?”

Jason nods in return, pulling the gun away. “Go for it.”

God, you feel him watching you as you slip off the table, heading towards your bag on the little couch in the corner. Why is he watching? Why is this so awkward? Is it you? Is this guy just that standoffish? You pull out your worn bookand get back into position on the table.

“You good?” he asks, his intense eyes still trained on you.

“Yeah, all good,” you say, holding the book open with one hand as the buzzing starts back up again.

This is pathetic.

Jason has spent the last few years spending his time around the worst of the worst. He’s been with assassins, arms dealers, and soldiers so bad, even the U.S. Military didn’t want them, and yet, he’s fumbling just because someone cute is reading classic literature.

Fuck.

He’s supposed to be better than this. Ever since he got back into Gotham two months ago, he’s been making deals with the worst of the worst—as far as drug dealers go���without breaking a sweat, and yet holding a conversation with you turns him into Mr. Darcy. He’s blowing it, and he cares that he’s blowing it.

At least everyone thinks he’s dead. If this had gotten out to anyone, he’d die again.

It’s been five years since he was resurrected. A couple of weeks have passed since he flew back into Gotham with another one of Talia’s connections, this time intending to stay for good. He found a little tattoo shop near Crime Alley. Close enough to keep tabs on everything, but not so close that he’d be crossing paths with Batman regularly. The last thing he needs is to run into Bruce while trying to come up on top of Gotham’s underworld. Not until everything was ready.

That’s his world. Swept off the street and recruited for a war that wasn’t even his, not really. That’s just what he was sold: security to a kid fending for himself.

Bruce may have believed he had something to show Jason about Gotham, but this city raised him more than anything. Without a stable place to call home, the city’s streets were the substitute. What more did Bruce have to teach him when Jason had already huddled for warmth in these alleys? Ran from cops, knew all the hiding spots. What did Bruce have to offer when Jason already saught comfort in a place where comfort died? In a place where hope was trying to grow on salted earth. A place so haunted, it’s more ghost than city.

Jason was made for Gotham.

After he died, Gotham fell to ruins in the greatest earthquake she’s ever seen. An anomaly. The world wanted to watch Gotham burn, abandon the city and everyone remaining inside it. Leave her buried in the fate the world deemed appropriate for a city so infected that everyone around suffered.

He knows what it means to come back again, maybe when staying gone was what should have been done.

While he learned how to kill, he learned how to tattoo. Bruce always went on about the importance of keeping their identities safe; he chose his playboy routine, and Jason chose this.

It started before Bruce even took him in. One of the older kids he used to sell stolen car parts to gave him a stick ‘n poke in the back of his dad’s auto shop. It’d only been a few weeks after his mom died. Bruce saw it within a few days of living at the manor. He didn’t comment, but Jason saw the scowl when Bruce saw the shitty skull on his ankle. He didn’t approve, and that made his chosen path all the sweeter.

In London, the guys he was staying with tattooed each other to pass the time. That’s how it all really started. He watched their hands as they worked, watched the way the ink shot into the skin. He gave his first tattoo in the seedy back room of some haunt for scumbags. He had yet to feel at home within his body again, like it was just on loan. Like his reanimation was contingent on something that could be taken away at any time.

But he kept living. And he picked up tattooing fairly quickly. He gave plenty of shitty tattoos to men whose lives ran off of fucking over innocent people. Some of them wouldn’t even live to regret his uneven lines. A good number of them, Jason watched die.

None of that, however, negates the fact that he still can’t have a conversation with you.

Every so often, he spares a glance at you as you read. You’re holding the book with one hand, awkwardly turning the page with your pinky in a way that he knows won’t last long. He’s trying to rack his brain for something, anything, to talk to you about once you need a break from your position.

When his moment finally comes, he clears his throat.

“You ever read any Virginia Woolf?” he asks.

He’s going to spoil his whole ‘asshole tattoo artist’ persona because he’s not supposed to be reading tragic modernist writers, but he can’t bring himself to fall into his usual routine. He wants to hide behind the metaphorical mask he wears when he’s not wearing his literal mask, but he just fucking can’t with you.

He doesn’t know you. You’re just someone who booked with him a few months ago. You’re a civilian, and he is supposed to be getting ready for his Gotham takeover. Now isn’t the time. He’s got work to do.

Unsurprisingly, you seem caught off guard by his question when you look up from your book. You try to regain your composure. You seem like someone who wants to be polite like that. Jason’s eyes land on your finger as it slips into your book to hold your place.

“Yeah,” you reply. “I’ve read a couple of hers.”

Jason gives a single nod of his head. He breathes as if steadying his aim to shoot. “I’m reading Mrs. Dalloway right now,” he says.

If you were someone he had to threaten, it would be going better than this. He could get you to tell him all of your secrets in under a minute no problem. But he doesn’t actually have to know how to do any of this to know that’s the wrong way to go about it. Besides, how could he forgive himself if he brought you into Red Hood’s world? You don’t belong there.

“Are you much of a reader then?” you ask.

Jason recognizes it for what it is. You’re holding out a hand, practically guiding him into a conversation just like you’ve tried so many times. You notice he’s trying too.

His lip quirks up a bit at the corner. “Yeah, I am. But don’t tell anyone. If they figure out I’m not an idiot, they may ask me to help out more.”

You graciously laugh at his joke.

He likes your laugh. It’s soft, like your skin. He’s tried to not think about it, but he has noticed. He knows you’re going to take good care of the bird carcass he’s tattooing.

When you reached out and told him what you wanted, he knew he couldn’t possibly turn the idea down. He did always have a fucked up sense of humor.

You’ll never know what makes this funny. He can’t do that to you. Maybe you can know Jason the tattoo artist, but you can’t know Red Hood.

Jason looks at you with a softness you miss when you glance away for a minute. “I’ve got a Metamorphosis tattoo over here,” he says, briefly raising the arm holding yours down.

You turn your head, trying to get a look of his Kafka tattoo, and Jason feels a little bit of warmth growing in his chest, even if he desperately wishes he didn’t. He’s getting way ahead of himself like a kid. It’s going to hurt that much more when you realize all the reasons you shouldn’t get involved with him. He shouldn’t be drawing attention to himself. He shouldn’t be getting distracted. This job isn’t for him to make connections with avid readers; he’s here to know what’s happening and when.

For all he knows, you could be a spy, aware of the moves he’s trying to make. Could work for the Penguin. But he’s aware that’s a Bruce level paranoid thought, and he’s not proud to admit that. His ties to Bruce are supposed to be severed forever.

Two hours pass far less painfully than you were expecting. Not in the literal sense, because your arm has started to get sore, but in the sense that you and Jason are finally actually talking, more or less. You take a break, trying to get the blood flow back into your arm from being at an angle for so long.

Your stomach started rumbling half an hour ago, and now you’re scrolling through your phone, chatting with Jason on what you should order. He says by the time food would get here, he’d likely be finished up.

Jason’s already told you he doesn’t do a lot of delivery. He says it’s because things are always fresher at the restaurant.

After the last couple of hours spent talking literature, you know your first impression of him was wrong—there’s a joke about books and their covers somewhere in there—but be that as it may, you still haven’t quite figured him as the sort of guy that’s going to be overly snobby about food.

He says he cooks, and you believe him, more because you like to indulge in the thought of him knowing his way around a kitchen. You also just want to believe it for the sake of justifying the crush you feel creeping in every time he shifts your arm.

You’re not going to hold your breath hoping he opens up to you, but you can tell he’s someone with a story. Someone with history. And that’s something you can respect, because you’ve got your own past you’d rather not shell out just because your tattoo artist is hot. That doesn’t stop your mind from wandering though, trying to fill in the blanks.

Maybe he did some sort of stint in the military. That’s your first guess, at least. You didn’t get any more information on the tattoos he’d done ‘all over,’ and he doesn’t talk about it anymore, so you can’t really figure out anything more than that. You also consider the fact that it’s Gotham, and shit just happens. It’s not your right to meddle in whatever tragedy this city has doled out for him.

“One of the apprentices orders delivery here a lot,” Jason says, and you roll your eyes.

“That’s not helpful, nor does it answer my question,” you say. “Even if you don’t get things delivered, you still have to know what’s good around here, right? You’re not bringing a little brown bag lunch to work every day.”

“And what if I do?” Jason asks. His voice is low, almost like he’s daring you. The features on his handsome face are serious, but there’s a glimmer in his eyes that hints he’s teasing you. And damn those eyes. You’re thankful he’s been spending the majority of your appointment staring down at your arm, because you’re not sure you’d survive two hours of looking at him, seeing where the thin ring of blue around his iris before it bleeds into vivid green.

You laugh. “Then I’d admire your dedication.”

You think he’s mostly being difficult because you offered to buy him food, a perfectly normal thing to do. But explaining to him that you’ve offered to everyone you’ve gotten a tattoo from doesn’t seem to change his mind. He’s stubborn, that much you can tell.

As you continue to scroll your phone, silence settles between the two of you. The silence doesn’t feel so oppressive this time, not weighted by awkwardness and uncertainty. Now it feels like a surrender. Neither of you bring up the beginning of the appointment. Not how he was late, not the tension that seemed to linger between the two of you, not how convinced you were that he actually hated the fact that you were sitting in his session.

“The fries at Wally’s are the best in Gotham.”

His voice comes from behind you, and you jump, turning over your shoulder quickly. He’s peering over your shoulder, eyes fixed on the screen of your phone. You hadn’t even heard him get up from his stool. Last you’d looked his way, he was sitting across from you.

You spit out a curse. “When did you get back there?” you ask, clutching your chest with overdramatic flair.

“What, you didn’t see me get up?” he asks.

You scoff. “No, I didn’t see you get up. What are you, some kind of fucking ghost?”

And Jason laughs.

At the best of the times, you consider yourself a relatively dignified individual. Maybe it’s a bit of flattery, but regardless, that’s what you’d like to believe. And yet, there’s something so incredibly rare about the sound of Jason’s laughter, something that makes butterflies flutter in your stomach. It’s like hearing something long forgotten. Like catching the song of a bird long thought extinct. This isn’t the playful scoff of laughter like when you’d said maybe Northanger Abbey was your favorite Jane Austen book, and he’d said you seemed more like an Elizabeth Bennett than a Catherine Morland; this seems like something secret. Something reserved.

Even if the sound makes your stomach flip, your foul language hardly seems funny enough to warrant such a laugh. Your silly off-handed joke doesn’t seem worthy of the burst of laughter that bubbles up from his wide chest.

“I think the hunger’s getting to you,” Jason replies finally when the laughter settles. He nudges his head back towards your phone to get back on topic. “Wally’s is good.”

You have to yank yourself from your thoughts and will yourself to nod. “Yeah, okay,” you say, feeling like such a loser for the way a single laugh could knock you off your track so quickly. You go back to scrolling through the menu to give yourself something other than gawk at him. “So fries. What else is good?” you ask, not daring to raise your eyes.

Jason crosses back over to his stool and sits. Your face gets hot as you feel self-consciousness creep up thinking maybe you’d been obvious, worried you’ll scare him off. But before you know it, he’s naming off his favorite things. And yeah, maybe you bought more than you alone could eat, and maybe you got the burger he spent a few minutes gushing about. If he doesn’t want it now, he can save it for later.

But nearly an hour later, you have a whole spread of junk food in Jason’s station and a finished bird skeleton plastic wrapped on your arm. Jason rolls his eyes at your generosity, and you threaten to eat everything you bought all by yourself, but he eats the burger and steals the fries you jokingly told him to keep his hands off of.

“So can I ask why you were so late?” you ask.

You’re toeing your boundaries. Maybe you’re intentionally trying to press your luck. Part of you knows you maybe shouldn’t ask. But you do it anyway.

Jason looks up from his burger, wiping a small smear of ketchup off his lip. “You’re gonna think I’m an asshole.” He smirks when he sees you quirk your eyebrow. He was thirty-five minutes late; of course you already think he’s an asshole. At least he’s a good sport about it. “I was out smoking.”

“Mm,” you say with a mockingly serious nod of your head. “Leaning up against a wall, cigarette in one hand, Mrs. Dalloway in the other. I guess you must be so cool I have to immediately forgive you,” you say sarcastically.

“Shut up.”

You smirk and go back to eating your food, unaware of Jason’s subtle gaze your way now that your attention has been diverted.

Jason’s used to a somewhat infrequent eating schedule, otherwise known as he rolls out of bed half an hour before he’s supposed to be at the shop, which doesn’t give him much time to eat. And by the time he’s done with his shift, he’s usually starved. He tries to eat an hour before kicking anyone’s ass so he doesn’t cramp up, so that involves him cramming whatever leftovers he has in the fridge into his mouth the second he gets back to his apartment. Then, he goes back out to work.

He’s become somewhat of a late night chef, putting together whatever he can make as quickly and easily as possible. The sort of skills he’d picked up when he was all on his own, trying to keep himself fed from whatever was available, doing whatever he could to make the best of a bad situation. Shoplifting butter and pasta, crushing up old Corn Flakes in a bag with a hammer to put on top. It was something his mom had done. Something he didn’t want to give up.

For the past two hours, he’s been hoping you’ll say something stupid, like how cool you think Batman is.Instead, he finds you kind in a way he doesn’t really see that often. You tolerate his shit to a certain point, and you push back when he goes too far.

People are scared of Jason, hood on or not. And they should be. They see his scars, his tattoos, his sheer size, and they cross the street. They turn their eyes as he buys bread at the grocery store. They can see him for what he is. But for some reason, you don’t. At least not now.

He’s mapping out his plan of how to take over the city, and you’re giving him shit for being late to an appointment for a job he only has for information. The fact that he met you is just a blip in the greater scheme of things, and yet that’s going to be what he walks away from today thinking about.

A guy came into the shop earlier. A local dealer. Jason played cool, pretended he didn’t have an idea who the guy was. This lowlife didn’t need to know Jason already knew where he picked up his supplies. He’d asked if the guy had any plans for the day, as if Jason didn’t already know about a shipment coming in late tonight. Jason’s plans for the evening had been clear. All he had to do was get through one more appointment.

Except that appointment had been yours.

The shop is closed now. A few stations away, one of Jason’s coworkers is still working. In the lull as you both eat, the faint buzzing of the needle and music playing from the speakers up front. Even if Jason wouldn’t go so far as to say he’s comfortable with you, there’s something of a surrender in the time you spend together.

You don’t know the things he’s going to do once you leave, and you wouldn’t assume them of him. What are you seeing in him because it’s sure as shit not something he’s ever seen himself.

At some point, Jason knows he’s going to fuck it all up. You’ll probably get ready to leave, and he’ll say something as you walk out the door that will make you question all of this. Make you second guess this good opinion of him you’ve managed to come up with. It’ll be for your own good.

His eyes drift over to your arm, your bicep still wrapped up in plastic. He can still feel the warmth of your skin lingering on his palm.

For so long, he’d been used to the dull cold of the apartment he squatted in, frigid air seeping in through neglected walls. As hard as he tries not to, he remembers arriving at Wayne Manor for the first time. He’d forgotten home could be so warm.

The warmth of your arm felt like that.

Since coming back in Gotham, he’d given plenty of tattoos, touched plenty of arms. Body heat is body heat, except when it’s yours.

“Where do you go from here?” Jason asks, looking up from his burger.

You shrug your shoulders. “Home, probably. Gonna get that good post-tattoo sleep.”

It’s cold out. You’re bundled up in your coat, aware of the tenderness of your arm where the fabric brushes up against the flesh.

You’re walking towards your train stop. The sounds of sirens echo somewhere in the distance. Purple light filters out through the blinds of one of the apartments you pass, loud bass temporarily overpowering the distant wail of emergency vehicles for a moment as you walk by, until it fizzles back out into quiet. As the music fades, you hear the sound of a couple arguing from an apartment somewhere up above you.

Across from the stairs up to the station is a bar, patrons hanging around outside smoking cigarettes and laughing. You can feel a huddle of men watching you as you move, but you don’t glance their way, just make your way up the stairs.

Yellow-tinged lights line the station, a lamp every fifteen feet or so. From what you can see in the beams of light weakly dispersing from the streetlamps, you’re alone. You find a spot under a nice shelter, though nice is relative considering the lingering smell of piss and obscene graffiti on the walls, but it’s not out in the open where anyone stumbling onto the stop will find you.

The light above you flickers sporadically. You wish there was somewhere else you could wait.

Jason hadn’t seemed thrilled that you were going out to wait for the train all on your own, but you assured him, somewhat indignant, you could handle yourself.

“You sat really well,” he’d said, and you couldn’t help but entertain the idea of inviting him along on the train with you, but you were not going to stoop to that level.

The sounds of approaching footsteps reminds you to keep your focus. You can kick your feet about Jason once you get back to your apartment.

Three guys stumble up the stairs. And just your fucking luck, you’re pretty sure they’re the guys from outside the bar. They’re laughing, and their voices carry from the opposite side of the tracks. You hope they’re going northbound, that they’ll have no reason to cross the tracks. You keep your eyes fixed away from them, down the tracks, now feeling even more impatient for the arrival your train, hoping somehow it will turn you invisible.

But their boisterous conversation suddenly turns much quieter.

Your shoulders tense, and as subtly as you can, you try to slip your hand into your bag for your pepper spray. Blindly, you feel around, trying to move as little as possible so as to not draw any more attention to yourself, because you have no doubts you’re the reason their conversation has become so hushed. If this doesn’t end horribly, you’ll have to try to remember to clear out all of the junk you have stashed away.

One of the men laughs, and then their conversation stops all together.

Your fingers curl around the tube of spray in your purse.

Without looking, you know they’re moving towards you now. Their shuffled, stumbling footsteps are growing louder. They’re drunk and not looking for their night to be over just yet. Unfortunately, you just happened to be in their way while they were looking for the next phase of the evening.

“Hey!” one yells.

You don’t acknowledge him. Maybe they’ll be drunk enough to think you genuinely can’t hear them and give up. It’s wishful thinking, but what does that matter?

Now you’re regretting pretending you were so tough for Jason because these guys sure as shit wouldn’t even give you a second glance if you were standing next to him.

They’ve crossed the tracks now, and there’s still no sign of train headlights. Your grip on the pepper spray tightens, not wanting it to slip now that your heart is starting to race.

“Hey! You!”

You don’t look.

One of them grabs your arm and tugs you out from the shelter. You wince at the contact against the fresh tattoo. “We’re talking to you,” he laughs.

You’re about to use your pepper spray when it clatters to the ground.

All three men look down at it.

“What’s this?” the second man says, bending down and picking it up.

But before any of them can say anything else, a figure just outside of the ring of light the four of you are standing under. You can’t make out any details about him besides the sheer size of him.

“Walk away while you still can,” he growls. The sound of his voice isn’t quite right. It sounds distorted. Your skin prickles with nerves from the sound of it.

The man who picked up your pepper spray turns it towards the figure, threatening to spray.

The figure just chuckles. It sounds cold, metallic. The sound of a gun cocking follows as the figure steps just into the light. The pepper spray wouldn’t do the man any good.

A man wearing a red helmet walks into sight, gun trained on the man holding my arm, but his grip drops instantaneously as he knocks through his other two friends to run, but the other two follow behind almost immediately.

And that leaves you and the guy in the helmet alone.

Gotham has its fill of guys in mask, and sure, there seems to be a new one popping up all the time, but you don’t know this one.

You look up at him, eyes wide with fright. The second the men are gone, he puts the gun back in one of the holsters on his thick thighs, but that doesn’t change the fact that he has them. You don’t know who this guy is, who he works with, whether he’s any better than that group of men or just more armed.

“You alright?” he asks when you don’t say anything. He has a voice modifier, you realize now, though you piece that together slowly.

After a beat, you nod your head. Your hand curls over your throbbing arm. You don’t like that you can’t see where he’s looking. Just two unblinking white voids where his eyes must be. “Yeah,” you breathe. Your eyes fall on your pepper spray. The man holding it must have dropped it when he ran.

When it’s clear you’re not moving to pick it up, the man bends down and grabs it. He holds out a gloved hand, offering it back to you.

Your trembling hand raises and you take it from him, offering a barely audible thanks as you slip it back into your bag.

He nods.

There’s still no sign of a train, and he’s not moving.

“I can give you a ride someplace. If you want.”

Don’t take rides from strangers. You’d heard it just as much as anyone, and the man standing before you is the definition of a stranger. You can’t even see his face; you have no idea who he is beneath that helmet. The one thing you do know is he has a gun, and he’s built like a fridge.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” he adds, but his modulated reassurances don’t ease your concern. He senses your hesitation and takes a step back. “Do you want me to leave?”

A few more seconds pass as you consider the question. What if those guys come back? What if some other group comes along? But is giving your home address to the guy with a gun a better idea? And would him standing beside you as you wait for your train make you feel any safer? Could you so willingly accept he wasn’t going to just wait for the moment your guard is down to do something, just the way this city works?

Finally, you shake your head. Neither decision seems like the right one to make. But he did help you. Now you just have to hope to god he’s not going to take advantage of your vulnerability.

You want to ask if he’s one of Batman’s friends, but you don’t find the words.

Instead, you two fall into a silence. For you, it’s tense. You wonder if he feels the same, or if this is just a regular night for him. He stands near you but keeps his distance, like he’s aware how intimidating he could be.

The train is so late. There must be some hold up. One of Gotham’s usuals causing a delay in public transit. Go fucking figure.

“Are you new?” you ask finally. If the train never comes, you might end up taking him up on his offer for a ride, so you may as well try and figure something out about him. Any sort of indication of if you can trust him or not.

There’s another distorted chuckle, though somehow, this one seems less malicious than earlier when threatened with your pepper spray. “You could say that.”

You have no idea how to respond to that, so you don’t.

Silence settles between you again. You can see the lights of the train in the distance. You’re hoping that nothing happens on the train. All you want is to crash into your bed.

The man in the red helmet stands beside you, not pushing any further to make conversation. He waits with you. As it screeches to a halt in front of you, you turn to thank him, but you notice he’s already gone.

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