#meanwhile jason here has cotard syndrome (psychotic depressive episode) btw

[glitter-stained]

"jason fucks with the family by pretending to be a ghost and haunting them" fics are fun but I would love love love there for there to be a fic where Jason instead of becoming red hood haunts his family and wages psychological warfare about being forgotten/unavenged because he is not aware that he's truly back to life. And why would he? He doesn't feel alive. He feels like a husk of his past self, his eyes have changed colours like a corpse possessed, all he can remember is pain and betrayal and all he can feel is the agony of being abandoned. His memories of coming back are blurry so he just remembers drowning, burning, a woman's eyes widening in terror and "you remained unavenged" then more falling and drowning-how does he know what is the afterlife, the haunting, the nightmare? AU where he was just a little better at getting away and Ra's was just a little too focused on Talia after she disobeyed him and Talia didn't find Jason to give him tutors so he comes back to Gotham on bleeding feet, numb to anything but his grief, 15 years old in a 18 years old corpse, unaware of his growth and terrified of mirrors. So what if slamming the doors or sending phone calls feels a little like elaborate pranks now that he's doing it? It's not like there's a manual for haunting 101. The point is, Jason remembers dying. He remembers his grave and the vague horror of crawling out of it. He doesn't really feel hungry or thirsty, and if he feels his consciousness or strength wither away at times it's probably the tether of his spirit on earth waxing and waning, and sometimes he'll steal tim's drink or bruce's coffee or the excess sandwich dick keeps making for him for some reason and if it gives him strength to stay awake then he's too numb to realize and he has flashbacks and nightmares and wakes up to make desperate phone calls begging his family to save him and then he gets angry and sends the place on fire and by the time bruce traces the phone call there's another burning warehouse or abandoned building and then he stands in the doorway in the dark as they flinch away from his silhouette and this is what it means to be a ghost, he thinks: something flinched away from but never seen.