#they know how rough surviving Gotham and Crime Alley could be

[bluerosefox]

Gothamites Never Really Rest

Small warning in this: very light swearing, light mentions of deaths, and tw light touching on the subject of abuse, like very light. But still an fyi.

Danny was used to his main Rogues (Boxy, Ember, Skulker, etc etc, you know those guys) showing up randomly and at odd hours, causing some chaos around town due to their own boredom or just wanting some fun (the more deadly ones were rare to show up and his main Rogues do at least respect him enough to give him the rest of the day off when they sense a ‘big bad’ fight), he fights them, wins, before he send them back to the portal. Then they rinse and repeat this for the next day.

So as he really wasn’t expecting, especially since he had just sent his ghostly quota for the day back to the portal a few hours ago (Boxy of course, and Youngblood (dressed as a Firefighter this time, though the ending for their fight actually ended on a good note. YB had been asking Danny about space, Danny kinda hoped YB will be an Astronaut next time cause that would be fun)), Johnny 13 (and Shadow) to phase into his room as he was heading to bed.

Honestly (he groaned when he realized who it was, dealing with Johnny, Kitty (and Shadow) during a ‘break up’ or ‘lovers spat’ always was a pain) he was expecting Johnny to just start attacking but before Danny could demanded to know what he was doing in his room Johnny hesitatingly asked if they could talk.

Now Danny, talking to his main Rogues, like legit talking was a very rare thing. But it has happened a few times.

With Johnny asking if they could talk, his face nervous but not in a 'I pissed off Kitty and idk where she ran off to again', Danny nodded and agreed.

"Hey, so like I know we all kinda agreed not to go roaming too far from Amity because of the whole government suits guys and bringing unwanted attention to us ghosts in the names of the Super Dorks but is it alright if Kitty and I head across the state for a few days? I promise we'll be back and stay under the radar..."

"What?! Why would you guys need to something like that?!"

"....."

"Johnny, look dude I know Amity can get boring sometimes but-"

"Someone killed Kitty's abusive waste of space father three weeks ago, you know that fucker that killed us in cold blood when he found out Kitty and I were enloping. Yeah him. We felt it, we felt him die and... kid I can tell you how our cores SANG about it when he croaked. Whoever ended him, they did so for us. It was a revenge kill... It felt amazing. Its why you havent seen us too, we... we needed time to process that." Johnny quickly explained and that shut any protest Danny had up, he knew a bit of the story how Johnny and Kitty died, and it was respectful to allow one's fellow ghost to talk about their deaths should they talk of it.

With a melancholy smile and a hand petting a chirping Shadow who sprung up to comfort his other half, Johnny then said "Kitty's been avoiding returning to Gotham for ages since we woke up in the Realms and whenever we found a natural portal back to it. She's always been terrified of running into him and even being a ghost she's still can't. But he's gone now, we felt his life end and he isn't a ghost either! Like legit, if he became a ghost we'd still be able to sense our murderer you know!... Anyways she wants to visits her old haunts and maybe see if we can find some old friends, see how they're doing you know. We won't mess with them or anything, just a small pop in..."

"We... We also kinda wanna find the guy who did it too... We could feel his emotions when he ended Kitty's old man and firstly let me tell you, rage. Like a lot of it. But also we felt his need for justice and... he felt familiar... like someone we knew and he knew us. That's how we know it's a revenge kill. Someone did that for us and well.... Kitty and I wanna thank him you know."

-x-x-

Meanwhile in Gotham about three week prior.

A budding Crime Lord had crossed out the face of a older man from a photograph pinned onto a corkboard, below and connected by red strings was two other papers as well. One held the newspaper clipping of two bodies being found in a ditch with the remains of a busted up motorcycle, a young male and female were reportedly found halfway buried in it. The male was reported to be a trouble maker from Crime Alley, knowen for stealing tires while the female was the daughter of a suspected mob boss.

The other string however, lead to a small, yellowed from age and tiny bit damaged photo of three people. The photo held two older, nearly out of their teens, male and female both looking like rough city street kids. A motorcycle could be seen behind them an it was missing a wheel. The young man with blonde hair was kneeling on the ground, his hands holding onto a tire iron and he looked rather proud, the young female was wearing red and had some dye in her hair and was smiling as she held the camera taking the picture in a selfie as best as she could.

In between the two was a young kid, blue eyes and black hair, a beaming smile on his face as his own hands were on top of a tire wheel. A wheel he had finally learned how to take off in record speed thanks to Johnny teaching him.

Green eyes that shifted for a second to teal stared at the photo for a moment before saying

"Hope you both are resting easily now. Kitty, Johnny."

[miscmonstro]

The Uno Reverse Adoption Saga 9

AO3 Link: here

First: Chapter 1

Previous: Chapter 8

Current Characters: Jason Todd, Sam Manson, Tucker Foley, Danny Fenton, Jazz Fenton

Summary: Forced to attend a gala by her parents as she is every year, Sam Manson was resigned to suffer through the stifling three-night gala until something pulled at her core. The something turned out to be a someone. Just who is Jason Todd and can the trio gain enough of his trust to help him before his struggling proto-core collapses?

JPGPV = Jazzy-Pants Ghost Proof Vehicle

Warnings: Cursing. Discussion and description of the death picture and the portal incident. And technically someone steals an organ?

👻 {Chapter 9 Below!)

Jason was perturbed.

A lot had happened over the past week or so and it could be summed up as goddamned history coming to haunt him.

His history with the pits, his history with Bruce. History repeating itself in the form of three undead teenagers.

Jason let his head fall and he clutched the glowing camera a little tighter.

He had no doubt the picture he’d found was of something sinister . Honestly, he wasn’t sure how they’d survived something so horrific. Manes’ hand was literally melting . Not to mention the boys…

(Halfa. Half human, half ghost. He had a suspicion and he prayed he was wrong. His nightmares were going to feature screaming kids, dying kids, for a while; he could already tell.)

Why were they in a lab? It had to be intentional. Why else had Phantom been in lab coveralls? Why else would Manes have been documenting it? Were they sent into that tube to test it, whatever it was?

And the green.

He’d know that green anywhere.

History, over and over.

Dramatic irony unfolding. 

Squeezing his eyes shut, he wondered if this was what Bruce had felt like, loath as he was to think it. Seeing those kids and knowing they could do better if he steered them right… knowing that they were going to get themselves killed (again?) without him.

He was despairing, he knew, about how unfair it all was. While their situations seemed too similar to be comfortable, their attitudes couldn’t have been more differed than his own. He didn’t see himself in them so much as he saw three versions of Dick. Optimist. Hopeful. Helpful. Unlike his dear older brother though, these kids were utterly alone.

Usually he wasn’t so doubtful. He’d always been a decisive person. Acting with impulse and anger wasn’t the best approach for everything, he knew, but not once had he been called hesitant. It was just that this would be a huge deviation from his norm, not to mention he would have to hide the ghost thing from the others on top of the kids. He’d have to change nearly everything; his schedule, his tactics, his habits, and the list went on. 

God damn it. He was lying to himself. He wasn’t still considering it. The minute he offered the gremlins advice in the attic some part of him knew that he’d already decided to take them under his wing until he cleaned up whatever the hell was going on.

He just didn’t want to accept it. How long had he raged at Bruce for taking on young sidekicks? How much of a hypocrite could he be? 

Then again, the situation was totally different, what with them having to fear for their safety in a way even he, a crime alley kid, never had to. Gotham was rough, but the dark city would be kinder to them than Amity. Even the government didn’t so much as breathe in Gotham without the damned Bat’s say so.

The problem, overwhelmingly, was that not only did he have no idea who they were as humans, but they seemed to take their haunting of Amity very seriously. Something told him that they would never compromise on defending their city.

He could admire that. 

Jason set the camera down on the empty couch next to him.

He could also despise it. 

He ignored the part of him that sneered at himself. What could he possibly teach them when he had so thoroughly failed to even keep himself alive? 

He wasn’t perfect- hell, nowhere close- but he’d be damned if he let the trio go off on their own unless he was completely, 100% positive they could handle themselves.

Glancing to the clock, he wondered when exactly said trio would appear. They’d hastily promised transport before they’d left but had denied to mention a time. He didn’t know if the waiting was making his apprehension worse.

He was about to go into a whole other dimension.

A canyon that ate people? A dark forest that claimed the lives of any who dared to approach? A series of shifting dunes that would swallow any hapless wanderers whole? All contained on crumbling, floating islands beneath a green sky?

A truce in that hellscape?

It was too surreal to picture. 

It was also surreal to think he had a ghost core, but considering the fucking circus that was his life, he shouldn’t have been surprised. He was still vainly hoping that there was some kind of a mistake. 

A line appeared in the air.

Jason stared at it.

It grew in size and light, eerie green light, began to spill from the forming cracks. Jason tensed as a bleached begloved hand reached out and then groped around the empty air for a moment before clasping onto the edge of the crack. It flexed and then a familiar head of pale wispy hair stuck through the growing hole that had materialized in the living room.

“Hi,” Phantom grinned toothily. 

Parts of the portal’s border crumbled and fell to the floor and the kid grimaced apologetically. “Sorry about that, I’m new to the whole portal thing.” 

“It’s fine,” Jason dismissed. He’d gotten worse than portal crumbs in the carpet.

“Well, come on. We have a few hours before we have to be anywhere but I figured you’d want to explore a little first.”

Jason hesitantly approached the giant crack hovering in the air and Phantom offered his hand. Jason wasn’t going to take it initially, but the kid seemed so serious. Hiding  his grin, he took the offered hand and Phantom nodded very solemnly.

It was kinda adorable. 

“Ok. We’re going through the zone to Amity, where you can hang out. Then later we’re going to go through either the fruitloop’s portal or the Fenton portal to the zone and meet the yetis. Hang on tight, I don’t think you’ll want to fly on your own here.”

Jason couldn’t fly, but he could grapple just fine. He wasn’t going to let the kid attempt to carry him. But Phantom didn’t try to. Instead, he held onto Jason’s hand and helped him up into the portal.

The first thing he saw, besides Phantom, was an endless expanse of an unnatural green. 

It was a world of Lazarus.

Ghouley had said as much, but seeing it was a whole other thing.

And as he looked around at the disembodied doors and isolated islands, Jason knew there was no way a grapple would do anything. Ghouley had made it sound like neighboring islands were a skip and a jump from one another.

Then again, maybe they were when flight was factored in.

“I can’t fly,” Jason admitted. He’d need Phantom’s help to get anywhere.

“Not yet,” Phantom said, eyes twinkling with mirth. He pulled Jason the rest of the way through the portal and it closed behind them. Instead of plummeting to the abyss below they hovered, suspended in the foreign air. 

“Anyone can fly in the zone, even humans. It takes some getting used to, but we have time.”

“Not worried about a ghost snatching me up?” Jason snarked.

Phantom hummed. “Not really. Manes and Ghouley are running interference.”

He tugged Jason, who realized the kid was still holding his hand. It didn’t feel like they were moving and Jason had no way to tell if they were.

“So firstly, the Ghost Zone, or the Infinite Realms, isn’t like space. In space there is microgravity because everything naturally produces a tiny amount of gravity. It’s because particles are like that and they have levels of attraction- eh hem. There’s also time in space and there is a connection between the gravitational field and the perception of time and- uh. Anyway, there is no microgravity here unless the object or person is from a living world, and there is no time.” 

“Seems simple enough,” Jason said sarcastically. “No gravity and no time. Got it.”

Phantom nodded. “Yes, you have to keep that in mind. And now the fun part, flight!”

It was not fun. Phantom, for all his enthusiasm, was dreadfully awful at giving instructions. 

“You gotta feel like you’re moving.”

“Maybe pretend everything is magnets?”

“Have you ever flown? It’s like a weightlessness. Picture that…”

“Think of a line graph.” 

“Tilt forward? I mean you don’t have to, it’s more about what you think moving is like.”

He’d pictured soaring through the air, he imagined free falling, he remembered the little moments of weightlessness he’d experienced throughout his life.

Phantom was stupidly earnest with his instructions and relaxed the longer Jason struggled. He even started smirking, the shithead, but at least he didn’t make any comments. 

After at least two hours of struggling, he still could not fly (much to his irritation). He couldn’t even vaguely float in the direction he wanted to go. Phantom assured him it was fine, that he’d learn in time. 

He would admit, he was pretty pissed he made absolutely no progress. There wasn’t time, the appointment was today . And if he couldn’t move, how the hell was he supposed to escape ghosts?

Phantom hovered, watching him with an unnervingly unblinking stare. “Let’s head to Amity. There’s plenty to do there,” he suggested.

Amity. Fuck, he forgot that’s where the kids were from. They probably had people they were ignoring while he tried and failed to get his ass in gear.

“Sure,” he agreed unhappily. He didn’t want to, not really, but he wasn’t going to make the kids miss out on Christmas. 

Phantom blinked slowly, “We don’t have to, you know. We can keep working on flying.”

“I think I’m done with flying for now.”

Phantom’s eyes lit up, literally, and he grabbed Jason’s arm. “Come on,” he said, pulling Jason, “we’ve got to stop by the Nasty Burger. It’s always open.”

“No holiday plans?” he asked carefully. 

Phantom shook his head with a sour expression. “Just avoiding my parents.”

“Damn.”

Interesting.

👻 {Boo!)

The ‘fruitloop’ portal was very different from Phantom’s portal. Where Phantom’s portal was more akin to going through a broken mirror the other portal was smooth and the rim was circular… it looked like a boom tube made out of Lazarus waters. 

“The fruitloop is very distracted,” Phantom said smugly. “So we’re free to go.”

They slipped through the portal and Jason was met with the visage of a lab. 

“Oh shiver me timbers,” Phantom spat not three steps in. “You need to hide- Shulker got away.”

He ushered Jason into a- very menacing- tube shaped pod and shut the side almost all the way before dashing back to the portal. And he wasn’t a moment too soon- a large figure walked through the wall and immediately locked eyes with Phantom.

“Whelp,” the robot with a fiery green mohawk said.

“Shulker,” Phantom returned. He seemed to glow brighter for a moment and then-

Something crashed over him, something cold and ridged and hefty. But… it felt good, even if he didn’t know what it was; it felt refreshing, not unlike a mint. 

It felt solid.

It felt strong.

It felt safe.

“Just passing through,” Shulker grumbled, glowing a bit brighter himself. 

Beneath the cold was another feeling, something cool and smooth and metallic with sharp edges. Belatedly, Jason realized that the two sets of impressions were from the two ghosts staring each other down.

Phantom squinted distrustfully at the other and then nodded. “It is truce day,” he said.

“Otherwise I’d have your pelt,” Shulker sneered in apparent agreement. He cast an equally suspicious look at Phantom before making his way to and through the fruitloop portal, the feel of sharp metal vanishing with him.

Phantom’s glow paled and the heavy cold vanished immediately. He flew back to the pod and opened the door. “I’m so sorry, I know it can be uncomfortable to be around heavy moods but I needed to make sure Shulker didn’t notice you and would leave,” he grimaced, biting his lip. 

“It’s fine,” Jason said, voice more strained than he would have liked. “The moods are…?”

“Oh. Like, uh, ghost auras. But we call them moods.”

That didn’t really explain anything but Phantom was more concerned with getting them out of the lab. He took Jason’s hand again. “Here, I’ll need to hang on to you just a bit longer, okay?” He didn’t wait for a response and the strangest feeling spread over him. Phantom summarily plunged them through the wall. It was disorienting, to say the least.

It made sense because ghosts, but come on .

They went through the wall, down into the floor, then through dirt before finally popping up on a grassy patch outside of the back of a mansion.

“Looks like our ride is here,” Phantom said cheerfully, motioning to a car (if it could be called that) which looked like it wasn’t legal to be on the road. A large acronym, JPGPV, was printed on the side, though it failed to hint at what exactly the vehicle was.

And were those tank treads ?

“Is that safe?” he asked dubiously. He’d been in a lot of vehicles and never had he felt so vaguely threatened by one before.

“Jazz is driving,” replied Phantom. That didn’t explain anything.

They approached the car (if one was being generous) and Jason ended up in the back seat next to Phantom. The driver’s seat was occupied by a young woman, presumably Jazz, who was probably at the tail end of her teens. The passenger’s side had a dark-skinned boy with glasses who was fiddling with a futuristic looking sci-fi gun.

Jason did a double take.

(He almost didn’t recognize the face he’d spent the morning studying without the pained contortions.)

“No trouble?” Jazz asked, looking at Jason through the rearview mirror.

“Nope,” Phantom said, popping the p. He buckled into his seat.

Jazz nodded. “Great. That’s good. Anyway, nice to meet you Jason. I hope the trip wasn’t too bad. The zone can be overwhelming the first few times.”

She started the ignition and began backing out of the mansion’s rear driveway.

From the pointed ears and fangs, he was going to guess she was a meta.

“Nice to meet you too,” he said awkwardly. “And the zone was fine.”

“He can’t fly,” Phantom butted in gleefully. 

The kid in front, who had to be Ghouley, snorted.

“Hey, it was his first time! And Danny, human,” Jazz said.

There was a flash as the rings manifested and the messy haired boy Jason had glimpsed the other day sat slouched in the seat next to his. 

(This kid might have died, a nauseous part of him whispered. If he was right then this kid had died. He’d died screaming .)

“Sorry, forgot,” Phantom, Danny said.

That was progress.

“Danny, huh?” Jason said.

“He didn’t even introduce himself?” Jazz grumbled. “He’s Danny, or Phantom as I believe he introduced himself as. I’m Jazz, his older sister. And this is Tucker.” 

“I’m Ghouley,” Tucker said, never looking up from the little output display on the gun. “Manes- er, Sam, can’t go human with the fear stuff or she’d be here too.”

Danny, Tucker, and Sam from Amity Park. Now he was getting places. 

They’d tried to lie about it at first, and now they were being so open about it. He wondered what had changed.

“What you got there?” he asked, motioning to Tucker.  

The kid grimaced. “An ecto gun. It’s specialized for tagging anything with a signature and doubles as a tracker. I’m trying to sabotage it but I need some more… stuff.”

Danny perked up. “I can take a crack at it.”

“Mom and Dad’ll be in and out of the lab all day,” Jazz reminded them. “You’ll have to distract them or steal the tools from Vlad’s.”

“Wait, no. I think you still have the emergency ghost tool repair kit from your birthday, right? There has to be a calibrator in there.”

“A calibrator would work but I was thinking of uploading an alternate signature directly to the gun, it would seem more like a mistake on their part…”

The three began chatting about the methods and logistics of sabotaging the gun and while Jason was no slouch, he couldn’t really follow along. 

“Why does this gun need to be sabotaged?” he asked during a lull in the conversation. “I’m birthday cake confused.”

The car burst into snickers. 

“You tried to curse, didn’t you?” Jazz asked, amusement dripping from every word.

Tucker twisted in his seat to see Jason. “Welcome to Amity, a nice place to live. You can’t curse, can’t say the ‘w’ word, and can’t live without ghost insurance.”

“The ‘w’ word is wish. Don’t say it, there’s a ghost genie named Desiree who grants the ‘w’ word monkey’s paw style,” Danny stage whispered.

“Wait, so I can’t strawberry curse? That’s rocky road!”

He was never letting anyone know about his time in Amity. The things coming out of his mouth were humiliating .

The snickering continued. 

He noted that they didn’t answer the question.

👻 {Boo!)

There was something wrong with Amity Park.

He grew up in Gotham, had died, was revived, got trained by assassins, and to this day spent his time running around with a mask to terrorize the city’s criminal underbelly like some kind of bad dream. Gotham had a lot on the daily, had seen a lot in her past, and so in theory he really shouldn’t have found something he wouldn’t have been able to handle. 

In theory.

They’d picked up some food from the Nasty Burger before sitting down on a little building overlooking a park. From this one vantage point there was more than enough to force him to reevaluate that theory. 

There were floating buildings. What the fuck was that about? Buildings didn’t float, not even the magic ones he’d seen. The sky was tinged green and the soil had purplish tints, not unlike the ghost realms or whatever the hell the Lazarus dimension was called, and there was an ambient lighting that didn’t seem to come from anywhere. And something was off. But… the grass was swaying gently, the sun was shining, and no matter how he looked about, something uncanny and just out of reach mocked him.

He set that aside and continued to observe. It seemed like Jazz wasn’t the only one with mutations- the people he saw at the park had mutations, all of them. Fangs and pointed ears and ash tinged skin, like they were teetering on the edge of oxygen deprivation. Glowing, sometimes flashing eyes. Pointy fingers. It was a city of vampires.

People would walk and flicker, as if they weren’t entirely there. The shadows moved on their own. There were a few cars without drivers. Ghost birds perched next to living ones on the power lines. 

Hence his conclusion: There was something wrong with Amity Park.

While at the end of the day he was categorized as a vigilante, he was also a detective.

“Amity is the most haunted place on earth,” Tucker shrugged when he asked what was going on with everything.

“How does haunting equate to all this?” Jason motioned to everything around him.

“In layman’s terms? Ghost juice.”

“Ghost juice,” he repeated flatly before casting his drink an overly suspicious glare.

It had the intended effect when Danny laughed lightly. “It’s everywhere. Food, water, air. Ectoplasm, I mean. It’s seeped into everything, not to mention that this world and the Ghost Zone kinda have joint custody of Amity? Everyone’s liminal at this point.”

Liminal. He’d read that word not too long ago when going over the Anti-Ecto Acts.

“Liminal? As in… ectocontaminated..?”

The whole damned city? That was sobering. 

Tucker sighed. “Pretty much. Ectocontaminated… no one calls it that except hunters. Speaking of, I don’t think I need to tell you that if you see the GIW, you need to run.”

“Sure, won’t make me look suspicious or anything.”

“Everyone runs now,” Danny commented morosely. “No one wants to risk being captured.”

Something tightened around his neck, something like a noose. “They just… take people?”

“We break them out,” Tucker supplied easily, like the government kidnapping people wasn’t a big deal. “They’ve never gotten too far. We won’t let them.”

We won’t let them. Firm. Unwavering. A statement that brooked no room for failure.

Fuck, he hoped the kids weren’t in over their heads.

The kids were very obviously in over their heads.

“I can feel the depression from here,” Manes said, phasing up through the roof. Jason couldn’t see her and made a show of looking around like a civilian.

“She’s staying invis. Can’t have Manes Phantom hanging out with Fenton and Foley,” Danny said, taking a bite of his burger.

He tucked away the names for later. “I thought you were Phantom?”

“And I thought you’d grab me something,” grumbled Sam.

Tucker, nose wrinkled, pulled out a burger, partially unwrapped it, and held it aloft as though it had personally slighted him. “One veggie burger,” he said with clear distaste.

Sam snatched it up.

“We’re sorta all Phantom?” shrugged Danny, answering his question. “We’ve got Danny Phantom, Manes Phantom, and Ghouley Phantom. It’s because no one knew our names at first and then we all kinda responded when people called for Phantom, so…”

“That’s not confusing at all,” Jason said dryly. 

“We know who people are talking to, unless they don’t know,” Sam said.

Good awareness then, he noted. He’d have to see how much, if any, of that translated to spatial awareness in a fight.

“Huh.”

Yeah, they definitely weren’t going to leave their city. And he couldn’t leave Crime Alley…

He’d propose the idea of sparring later. Nothing fancy, just some hand to hand to gauge how much they knew. Danny could make portals so it wasn’t unreasonable to hope that they could swing by Gotham or that he could pop into Amity for a few lessons. 

He didn’t want to mimic the old bat, but it had become commonplace for mentors to do their patrols and cases with their protégés. It was a tried and tested method. Briefly, he contemplated setting something up. He was a known ‘contact’ of Red Hoof after all, but if he let them shadow him on patrol… they could ‘feel’ his core from what Sam had said and he had no clue how to hide it. They’d know he was Red Hood in a heartbeat so… he’d have to tell them who he was. 

Red Hood was an anti-hero for a reason. He killed people. He didn’t think what he was doing was wrong, harsh maybe, but justified. Never had he shied away from violence.

Never had he given a psychopath the opportunity to hurt people, over and over again.

How could he tell three half-dead, possibly murdered, kids that he thought killing was okay?

(How many ghosts had he created?)

Yeah, no. He couldn’t tell them. He’d just have to do as regular old Jason. Besides, he wasn’t planning on sticking around for more than a few months anyway. Just however long it took to clear up the acts and whatever was wrong with his ghost side. There was no point in breaking the big identity rule. 

Jason shuffled the thought away and went back to his mental notebook. He’d made a lot of progress. Now he had names to investigate and since he was inside Amity, well, a little visit to the public library was in order. 

He side eyed the kids. The three were completely silent and the boy’s faces were eerily blank as they stared out over the park.

Hm. Alright.

He had a few things he wanted to do. 

1- break into the library. Comb through the newspapers and then hit the computers

2- find out more about the kids. Preferably, who set their deaths up and where it happened

2.5- make sure the kids were competent; if not, give pointers

3- figure out if the lab from the picture was related to the League of Assassins and Ra’s. There was no way that much Lazarus was a coincidence

4- destroy the lab of whoever had the tunnel (again, no one should be messing around with Lazarus waters. No one.)

The list would not be accomplished in one visit but Jason was confident that he’d be able to work through it. 

He stuffed the rest of his burger into his mouth, grimacing on the inside. That was his unhealthy treat for the week. Still, Danny had been so excited to swing by the Nasty Burger he couldn’t really say no. 

It wasn’t as good as Bat Burger, but it wasn’t as bad as the name might have implied.

Swallowing, he looked at the still frozen kids. They were still occupied with whatever so he took the opportunity to stare a little.

Stemming from the fingers on Danny’s right hand, just barely visible, thin grey lines radiated out like vines.

He had never seen anything like it. 

(He’d seen the same pattern glowing in negative, sharp against the halo of white engulfing the boy.)

Jason sighed heavily. He needed to focus.

Step one: get to the library. The lie spilled from him too easily: “Hey. Uh, I figure I’ll wander a bit, you know, see the sights. You kids should go spend time with your families or whatever you do today.”

There was a pause, so slight that it would’ve ordinarily been dismissed. Then, the boy’s faces quickly adopted expressions. 

Jason wondered what that was about. He added it to his ever-growing list of ‘weird fucking ghost shit’. 

“I don’t celebrate Christmas,” Sam said blithely.

“I wish my parents didn’t,” Danny said miserably.

“You’re always welcome at my place,” Tucker offered. “My cousins are kinda annoying but hey, no ghost traps.”

Danny grimaced and bit a fry in half.

“How about this? It’s already three. Jason can explore till nine. We’ll meet back here and then head to the zone,” Sam strongly suggested.

No one objected.

Six hours was good enough for him.

👻 {Boo!)

The library was laughably easy to break into. 

Maybe it wasn’t wise, but with all the flight cancellations, who would expect Jason Todd to be in Amity Park when he’d been spotted less than three hours earlier in Gotham? 

He skimmed the layout and made a beeline for the periodicals. Depending on how far back he needed to go he might end up having to break into the archive too.

A green sticky note was slapped on the topmost paper. He was going to ignore it, at first, but something about it grabbed at his attention.

‘ It is not necessary to show others you have changed; the change will be obvious, ’ it read.

Clearly it wasn’t anything important. Maybe the librarian was into scavenger hunts. He put the note aside and out of his mind, turned to the complication of papers, pulled out the first one, and began to read. 

👻 {Boo!)

Five hours later Jason still hadn’t gotten to the computers. 

The papers were chock full of information. Ever so slowly he made his way backwards, watching as the eldritch city transformed from something inexplicable and alien to a scarred city that held wounded history in every crevice. 

The widespread liminality? An ongoing ectoplasm exposure issue that initially stemmed from an outbreak at the local high school three years ago.

The ‘don’t step on people’s shadows’ rule? There were shadow ghosts, notably the Halloween spirit, that you didn’t want to piss off.

The little shrine of new books in the library labeled ‘Do Not Touch’? Tales to entertain a ghost that liked to trap people in fantasy stories and read to the children on occasion.

The dreamcatchers hanging literally everywhere? A peace offering to the ghost god of dreams, or a warding away of the entity, but they prevented him from trapping you in an unwaking slumber in any case.

The frankly bizarre two mailbox system? A set up to prevent the box ghost from tampering with and or stealing packages en-masse. 

The greenish sky and purplish soil? After effects of the city being pulled into the mother fucking Lazarus dimension for a whole god damned month.

How the hell had something of this magnitude flown under the radar? 

And the kids.

Holy hell he had never been so right yet so wrong before.

They weren’t just in over their heads, they’d been drowning in a tsunami and somehow managing to stay afloat at the same time. And as much as the papers said, there was a whole lot they didn’t say. The sheer number of documented altercations put his number of confrontations to shame and he had no doubt there were plenty of fights the papers didn’t know about. Fights aside, so many pieces were still missing. How had the Phantoms been created in the first place? Had it been intentional? Where had the ghosts been four years ago, five, six, seven? Why only the past few years?  

It was like every time he set a timeline for associating with them something cropped up and pushed the deadline back further and further. It was going to be a quick association at first, then a commitment, and then a long-term commitment that just kept getting longer. 

He rested his head in his hands and closed his eyes. 

It wasn’t so much about his help being good or not, rather that he was going to help at all. They needed any help they could get. 

How could he sit here and plan to walk away?

(He was exactly like Bruce, wasn’t he?)

👻 {Boo!)

His despondence dawdled and did not help with his apprehension regarding the yeti visit. Deciding to leave the library early, Jason put everything back where it belonged and removed all traces of his presence before heading back to the rooftop overlooking the park.

He had a lot to chew on.

Around quarter to nine Danny as Phantom flew up to him, glowing in the dimming world around them.

“Hey Jason! How did the exploring go?” he greeted cheerfully.

Jason quirked a brow. “Well enough. You seem to be in a better mood.”

“Yeah,” he agreed. “So here’s the plan. We’re going to be going through the Fenton portal and then heading to the Great Star Bridge Sera- er, it’s basically a mansion. Super pretentious name, if you ask me.”

Jason couldn’t help but wonder why it had to be there. He didn’t really like the idea of going to a mansion but didn’t bother to say anything about it.

“Alright, let’s get going. Are Manes and Ghouley…?”

“They’re at the portal.”

Danny then took his arm, turning them invisible and flying up and towards some unknown place.

Flying like this was different. It should’ve been impossible, supporting his weight just with one arm. It was as though Danny had turned gravity off for just the two of them.

Their destination became apparent as they approached a building with a giant glowing sign labeled ‘Fenton Works’ alongside an arrow oh so helpfully pointing down to the building they were perched upon. He’d read about them in the papers.

He could only imagine the portal was nearby. 

Jazz had made it sound like she, and possibly the trio, frequented the other dimension. One of the newspapers had an interview with a ghost named Kitty, who claimed that the Phantoms took wayward ghosts back to the zone. It wasn’t unreasonable, given the amount of ghost fights he’d read about, that the Phantoms spent solid chunks of time in both dimensions. Jason didn’t like the idea of having to sneak by people who hunted him to get home every day on top of all the regular vigilante crap. It was exhausting for him and it could only have been the same for them.

The kids probably had been caught off guard before, trying to pass through.

How badly had they suffered?

“Nervous?” Danny asked, slowing to a stop.

Maybe he was wrong. Maybe it hadn’t happened. Maybe they were still…

“Are- did you die?” Jason asked in a rush. Immediately, he wanted to take the words and stuff them back in his mouth. 

Danny was quiet for a moment. “Why?”

Scrambling for an answer, he meekly offered a thought that had occurred to him yesterday on patrol.

“I mean- are they gonna ask me about my…?”

Would he have to explain his own demise?

He would if he had to, in the barest sense, but it wasn’t information he was going to volunteer.

“Ok. So, don’t do that. Ever,” Danny gently admonished. “Real quick lesson in ghost manners. You don’t ask about death. It’s a sensitive topic among ghosts. And to answer your question, yes, I did die. I can’t say what the yetis will ask but one of us will be right there at all times, okay?” 

Danny, even as Phantom, was dwarfed by Jason. He was sure that he could punt the kid pretty far, so small he was, and he still had baby fat clinging to his cheeks.

Would he ever get to grow up?

Or had that been ripped away from him?

Jason cleared his throat. “Right.”

Danny took them down to the street right in front of Fenton Works and then phased them through the floor and into a stairwell.

“Ready?” he asked.

Manes poked her head out of a doorframe at the bottom of the stairs.

“As I’ll ever be,” replied Jason. 

Danny floated them down the stairs and through the doorway. Tucker was inside with Sam and they split with Sam taking point and Tucker covering the rear.

The wall of the lab they directed to was shockingly familiar. If one took out the blast doors and the active portal, the setup was identical to that of the picture. 

Danny confirmed he had died.

Sam had referred to the boys as Fenton and Foley earlier. It didn’t matter that he didn’t know which was which; one of them was Fenton, and that was enough information.

With sick horror, it dawned on him that one of the boys’ families owned this lab. One of their families hunted ghosts. One of their families hated the Phantoms. One of their families had killed them. 

The Fentons had killed their own child and his two friends. 

They had died right here , in this very portal.

Why the hell were they here?

“Jason? Is something wrong?”

“No,” he said shortly.

What were the kids playing at?

The three seemed to silently agree on something. 

“Jason,” Tucker said, putting a hand on his shoulder, “we’ll be with you, alright? If something’s up we can handle it. We can help.”

“How can you be here?” he asked a little desperately. “This is-”

He couldn’t even think about the warehouse.

Danny hugged him slowly, and then Sam, and then Tucker joined them. 

It didn’t matter that they were pressed up so close he could feel their bones digging into his body because there wasn’t a single pulse among them.

The kids had died.

“You saw that picture, didn’t you?” Tucker said lowly. Jason didn’t deny it. 

“It’s mildly uncomfortable but we had to deal with it pretty early on,” Sam explained. “We’re largely used to it by now.”

Anger that had been silently simmering began to boil.

“You had to deal with it?” he repeated shrilly.

Of course, he thought bitterly. If the Fentons had killed the kids, likely with the intention of collecting their ghosts for some fucked up study, then the trio would’ve been forced into the lab at one, or several, points. But why come back at all?

The portal they died in. It was one of the only stable portals. They’d have to deal with it if they wanted to use the portal to herd the ghosts out of Amity.

Unwilling to dislodge the kids and possibly hurt them, he couldn’t move. Not with all three pairs of arms wrapped around him. But goddamn it, he was tempted to break something.

“… it’s not that bad. We’re fine. We’re not going to make you confront your death, alright?” Danny said.

“ My death? What about yours? This is cookies and cream awful. Who the hell made you deal with it? Chocolate Raspberry. Who ?”

“We did because it was the right thing to do. It’s a story for another time, okay?” Sam said a little desperately.

Danny lifted one arm and wrapped it around Sam.

Tucker pressed his head against Jason’s shoulder. “Jason. I know this kinda sucks but there’s nothing you can do. It’s in the past now.”

They had given up on themselves. 

It was all too common with heroes, wasn’t it? To save everyone else? But what about them?

Oh, how he wanted to rage. 

But he couldn’t. 

Keep it together for the kids, he scolded himself. He made progress. He had the lab. He discovered that the Lazarus water thing was actually the Fenton portal. He found out more about the kids.

He made progress. 

Inhaling quietly, he focused on the oscillating edges of the portal, moving in and out in a mockery of breathing.

His breath hitched.

The kids weren’t breathing . Their chests were still, their diaphragms didn’t move and never would again, up and down, in and out. Their lungs-

- were vibrating?

The pure confusion overrode everything for a moment. The kids were vibrating. And there was a sound quite similar to purring, though it felt as though it reached all the way down into his soul. 

“… are you kids purring at me?”

“No,” Danny said, continuing to purr. 

“Is it working?” grinned Sam.

“We’re ghosts, not cats,” Tucker scoffed. 

“We could be engines.”

Danny groaned and thunked his head against Jason’s arm. “One time.”

“One time’s all it takes,” snickered Tucker. 

“Danny overshadowed a car once,” Sam explained. “But he wasn’t really, he was in the engine and didn’t realize it. He was stuck as a car for almost a full day.”

“It was an anti-ghost vehicle too, mind you,” Tucker added.

“Stooop,” Danny complained. 

“It was his sister’s car.”

“Guys, I’m already half dead, please don’t kill me the rest of the way.”

“Jazz-”

Danny reached past Jason’s head to presumably clamp a hand over Tucker’s mouth. “Okay! That’s enough for today! We’re going to be late!”

👻 {Boo!)

Jason avoided the manor.

That wasn’t atypical, not really, but missing his phone call to Alfred was. Especially on a holiday; especially on Christmas.

He wasn’t at his official residence, nor his unofficial one, and so the only thing to do was to go through his safe houses. Easy enough. If there was one good thing about the whole mess with Dr. Crane, it was that they had more time now that their civilian identities were “hospitalized”.

One of the safe houses, located in an old apartment, showed signs of Jason being there recently. Why hadn’t he gone back to his actual apartment?

There were no real clues- nothing to hint at his home being compromised, nothing to indicate why he’d come to this particular apartment. The perishable food indicated Jason was residing here now, and had been for a few days as his suit from the gala was here, as was an assortment of gear Jason never left behind. Among them were his prized handguns. 

So why were they here when Jason wasn’t? 

There was only one other thing out of place. One clue that might lead to an answer instead of more questions.

Laying on the couch was an odd camera. It didn’t look like the kind of camera someone could buy at a store, no matter how high end. Some of the parts were standard, others looked custom, and none of them looked over a day old. Someone took good care of this camera, and if there was something he knew, it was cameras. 

Jason had never been interested in photography and there was no way he knew how to care for a camera. So, to whom did it belong? 

Well, if he left it here he’d never get answers. Jason might be bitchy for a while but the answers would be worth it. Besides, he’d get it back. Eventually.

Red Robin picked the strange camera up, tucked it into one of the dozen pockets on his person, and left the apartment. 

👻 {Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed it.)

Taglist time! If you want to be added, just say so!

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[pending-dope-username]

Dash got out of Amity Park. He moved in with his aunt, got a job, bought his own apartment, and eventually opened his own shop. It was a mechanics shop. The owner of the building was a polite old man who rented the apartments upstairs and let Dash buy the vacant storefront underneath. Of course, he had gone around the building first to ask the other tenants if they would mind the noise before actually purchasing the space, but they all waved him off, telling him they don't care as long as they've got a roof over their heads. It took a few months, but with the help of his aunt and some of her circle, as well as a few job-desperate individuals, he got his shop up and running.

Crime Alley had a new mechanics shop. He wasn't sure about opening it at first, but he had found that the old mechanic shops that were in the area all ended up running out of business. The cops always found something to arrest them for. It was Crime Alley, they didn't have much choice in what they had to do to survive. Dash understood. He worked well enough, got a good number of customers, and was happy. He found that he could do everything by himself pretty early on. He did get in contact with Jazz, who was in Gotham, to help with his finances from time to time. He even reached out to Tucker so he could encrypt his files, set up a website, and even make him his own database that no one but them had access to. Red Hood walks in a few months after his business venture went well. "Good afternoon. How can I assist you?" Dash immediately falls into professionalism. He's had several vigilantes and criminals alike in his store; he doesn't falter when seeing the man. "I need a few mods on my bike."

"I can do most modifications; what are you needing?""Speed." He seems to settle on. Dash perks up. "You can go ahead and bring the bike to the garage, and I'll get to work on it right away. I'll need to assess it before I can tell you when to pick it up." Hood nods before stepping back out. The blonde makes his way through the open wall to his garage. He meets Hood in the middle and directs him to the motorcycle area of his shop.

"Let's see what we're working with." He immediately gets to looking it over after the other gets off. Eventually, he moves to push the button to lift it. "Custom-made, I assume?" He glances over just in time to catch the stiff nod. "Well, I haven't worked with this kind before for obvious reasons, but I'm familiar with these parts, so I'd say I can have it done by noon tomorrow." Hood gives another stiff nod. "I will just need you to sign some paperwork, give me your budget, and then I'll let you get on your way." He smiles before leading the other back to the front desk.

They work out the payment method and budget before Hood leaves. Dash immediately gets to work on his bike. He spends hours tinkering with it, eventually figuring out how to add a Fenton Works Speed-O-Meter into it. He doesn't know why they picked that name, it doesn't track your speed, it only makes vehicles go faster. He's surprised the Fentons never figured out how to get it to work smoothly. When he had mentioned the Crime Alley Mechanic Shop to his old classmates, Danny was quick to provide him with Fenton Works Tech he modified and smoothed out himself, always happy to show Dash how they worked and how to make them himself.

By the time he had the addition in, another customer approached him. "That Hood's bike?" They asked, voice deep and rough.

"Sure is, give me one moment and I'll be right with you." He finishes tightening the bolt he was working on before standing up to greet the customer. He wipes his hands on a towel before tossing it over his shoulder. It's a regular who just needs his backlights fixed after a run-in with some of Joker's goons. Easy fix that doesn't take much and Dash only charges for the new bulb he had to install. He knows the residents won't accept free work so he at least makes sure he charges for one part, most of the time the cheapest part, when it comes to villain or hero damage. Once the customer is gone, he gets back to tinkering with the bike. He noticed a few parts needed replacements and some of them needed a tune-up.

He goes as far as some small paint touch-ups, mainly around the symbol that's been chipped away. He finishes the bike, closes for the night (he stays open until midnight, 24 hours on weekends), and heads upstairs. When he gets to his apartment he sees a tupperware of stew on his doormat. The note on it says it's from his right-side neighbor. She's a single mom who works double shifts and two jobs, he lets her leave the kids with him when she needs it. They love playing mechanics and he showed the older one, 13, how to change a tire. The note is thanking him for looking after the kids the previous day and says it's leftovers from the restaurant she waitresses in. He takes it inside and heats it up. He has it for dinner and then hops in the shower. Once his shower is done, he feels completely dead on his feet and faceplants into his bed.

The next morning, his alarm is blaring at 4:30AM telling him it's time to get ready. He easily changes into his 'uniform' before making breakfast. He makes enough pancakes and bacon for the mom and her kids, leaving it on their doorstep with the clean tupperware and a note thanking her for the stew. He opens his shop and is greeted by a few customers. Most of them are trying to squeeze in service work and checks before work. He's learned to work fast and efficiently since opening the shop.

By the time noon rolls around, a few of the kids in the apartments had stopped by to have lunch with him, some even bringing food from their families as payment for working on their vehicles that morning. He's ushering them out of the shop, telling them to make sure they get back to school by the time Red Hood shows up again. "You popular with the kids?" He asks, voice hesitant, suspicious. Dash isn't dumb, he knows what's being implied.

"They think the shop is pretty cool and they all live in the apartments. Plus their families made me lunch." He admits easily. "Your bike is done, I did some routine checks and changed a few parts as well. I will not be charging for the extra services so you will only have to pay for the speed enhancer and the time it took to install it." He smiles as he leads the way to the bike.

"You fixed the paint."

"Yeah, I figured it wouldn't hurt to fix up the symbol. It was looking a little rough. Could barely tell what it was." Dash smiles. Hood makes his way over to start looking over his bike, hopping on and revving the engine for a second. It sounded clearer than it had when he dropped it off. "There aren't any tracking devices, right?"

"None at all. You are more than welcome to check, scan it, bring someone else in, whatever you want." He responds easily. They make their way back to the counter and wait for the transaction to finish. Dash ignores the glaring name of Bruse Wayne on the card. "So why are you in Crime Alley? You don't seem the type." Hood breaks the silence.

"Well, I had to leave my hometown and had family in Gotham. Crime Alley was the only place that didn't run background checks and accepted cash once I got my own place." This gets an odd look from Hood, eyebrows scrunched and head tilted forward and a bit to the side.

"Got something to hide, blondie?"

"Don't we all?"

The payment takes, Dash gives him the receipt, and then Hood rides off with his bike. He's found his new mechanic.

Short DPXDC Prompts #234

Dash ends up making his own mechanics shop in Crime Alley and Red Hood comes into his shop to ask for modifications to his bike. He becomes Jason’s go to guy for car and bike repairs.

[roobylavender]

Everytime i see someone talking about how Jason should leave the vigilante life behind and be a doctor, im cheering on my seat because you're so right!! Idk is it a cultural difference or what since I'm not american, but if there's one thing that would help you during hard time, community is the answer. How they show Jason being alone after his mother death feel wrong to me, because the lack of community in crime alley despite it being one of Gotham bad side doesn't fit at all. Having a community is how you survive in poverty. I know today people make it that everything is a competition in society, that you have to do everything alone to survive but as someone whose family come from that rough place i could tell you that having people is important.

That's why the idea of Jason as a doctor is always appealing to me. Because it shows you a man who want to go back to his roots. This is the man who remember his youth struggle, who is it in other and want to help fix it. I would've love to read it.

Show me Jason who remember what he want to be before all this and choose to accept what happen and pick up what he left. Show me Jason who take his ged and apply to medical school because he remember his mom and see inspiration in Leslie. Show me Jason who look at Gotham situation and try to tackle it from the root because he use to be there too instead of throwing money at it or using fear to control it. Show me Jason who want to connect back with his community, who approach prostitutes, struggling single moms, and victims and listen to them in how to help. Show me Jason who do things for himself and not Bruce or other people.

I love Jason's tragedy. I do. I love his relationship with the narrative and how it becomes one of the appeal when it comes to his character. But it would be nice to see that even a character like him can have a hopeful ending. That against what people thought or said, he's not doomed from the start and refuse to be one.

THESIS STATEMENT!

[paperwayne]

steady.

50 Wordless Ways to Say “I Love You” ➡ 1. Holding their hands when they are shaking.

Pairing: Jason Todd x Reader

Word Count: 2,450 words

Warnings: None

I.

You’ve known Jason Todd long enough to know how sticky his fingers can be. It’s a talent, really, something to be admired in the slums of Gotham; an apple here, a wallet there, and more recently, tires right off of cars.

Stealing isn’t wrong if you’re trying to survive. But sometimes, you can’t resist doing it out of pleasure rather than necessity.

Jason’s hand is clean and warm as it curls firmly around your wrist – a habit that has now become a signal, back when you had been loose-lipped and jumpy whenever the two of you walked past the cashiers at stores – and you tear your gaze away from the crude caricature of Batman you had been scribbling onto an Etch A Sketch you had found, blinking as your friend glances at your artwork.

“Funny,” he compliments, and you crack a smile before he jerks his head slightly toward the exit. “C’mon, let’s go.”

You give the gummy Etch A Sketch a few vigorous shakes and slide it back onto the dusty shelf from whence it came. As you and Jason make your way to the door, the old man at the register stares suspiciously. You smile at him, innocent in your youth.

The door is just about to close completely before it swings open again, but by then you had crossed the street.

“You little brats, get back here!”

Jason’s grip on you tightens and that’s another signal.

Run.

You don’t have to look to know that Jason’s biting down a grin as you drag each other along the dirty, buckling sidewalk, evading indifferent passersby as the cashier shouts out a few expletives in vain. You keep your breathing in time with his, pumping your arms as you leap over cracks and clumps of yellowing grass. Jason’s hand slides down from your wrist to wrap around your own hand, vicelike and stubborn. It’s easier to run that way, you think.

Eventually, you find yourselves in an alleyway that’s mostly empty, save for a homeless woman dozing off next to the dumpster. Jason lets go of your hand to unzip his jacket while you do the same. The trash bag behind you crackles when you shuffle back to lean against the brick wall, panting.

“So,” he murmurs, blue eyes a steely shade of grey in the shadows of the alley, “Purple or green?”

“… Green.” You try to swallow and moisten your parched throat. “R-Red or orange?”

“Something wrong, [Y/n]?”

You pause when Jason asks that question, one of his eyebrows raised. His gaze darts down to the pairs of socks in your two hands. That’s when you realize that they are shaking, and it’s a split second later when you realize that it’s because your hands are shaking. Trembling, more like.

“Oh.” Immediately, you clench your fists, embarrassed as you try to still your jittery fingers. “I didn’t even – it’s nothing.” In the brief moment of skeptical silence, you say the only other thing that automatically comes to mind. “Sorry.”

Jason’s curious expression morphs into one of confusion. “The hell’re you saying ‘sorry’ for?” he asks. His tone is a little rough, but when you blurt out another ‘sorry,’ he has the sense to soften a bit. “’S’nothing to say sorry for. We didn’t get caught, so you don’t gotta be shaking.”

You nod, looking down, and he sighs.

“Here.”

He takes your red pair of socks and tucks it into his pocket, then unceremoniously presses the candy bar with the green wrapper into your hand and places your other hand over it. You think that he’ll pull away soon, but he doesn’t; his hands engulf both of yours like some sort of sandwich, and then they stay. His skin is no longer warm like it had been in the store, but his hold is just as firm as it had been when he gripped your wrist not ten minutes ago.

Jason stares intently at his hands and yours, and after a few minutes, he finally lets go, satisfied.

“It’s choco-caramel,” he says, as if nothing had just happened. “Lucky guess.”

You tuck the candy bar into your jacket pocket, hands steady.

II.

You’ve known Jason Todd long enough to know that sometimes, he feels too much.

There’s a whoosh of air as your bedroom door opens, and you think you hear yourself mumble a few protests as the door slams loudly behind Jason. Eyes squinting, you reach out to turn on the bedside lamp, flinching when you click it on.

Heavy, angry breaths heave from the boy’s chest when you fix your gaze upon his hunched-over figure. His mask is gone, but the rest of his uniform still displays its bright and cheerful colors, a stark contrast to the darkness rolling off Jason in waves. Your eyes trace downward from his hair, matted and sweaty from a night of patrolling, to his arms and his hands, straight and stiff at his sides.

Anger still bubbles beneath the surface of his skin, you can see; it escapes in the form of shaking arms and fists.

“Jay?” you murmur in the choking silence.

As if awakened, Jason whirls around to kick the wall. It’s enough to jolt the rest of the sleep out of you, and you blink as he continues to slam his foot against the plaster and concrete, cursing both under and over his breath.

“Dammit! Dammit! Dammit!”

“Jason!”

You throw the blankets off you and cross the room, grabbing his arm. He tears away just as quickly, jaw clenched as he shoots you a venomous glare that’s not quite all there.

“Why the hell are you in my room?!”

“This is my room!”

“No, it’s —” Jason cuts himself off as he finally registers the contents of your bedroom, gaze flitting across your stuffed animals and the Etch a Sketch on your bedside drawer. His mouth tightens, and his expression crumples back into one of irritation.

“No, you’re staying here until you tell me what’s wrong,” you state firmly when he moves to open the door again. Reaching out to touch his arm once more, you hold it as you lead him to your bed and sit down at the edge. “Did Bruce get mad at you again?”

Jason scoffs, high-pitched and loud. “He’s always mad at me during patrol. He’s got a stick up his ass.”

You examine the way he clenches and unclenches his hands in his lap. His breathing is still uneven. “… Something went wrong, didn’t it?”

“He got shot.”

“Bruce?” You frown. Though it’s obviously painful, you know that Bruce’s been shot before, and he gets over it pretty quickly every time.

“No. A – a kid. He was little. I wasn’t quick enough. It was in the leg, but Bruce said if I stayed back the bastard wouldn’t have fired the gun in the first place.” Jason spits out the words like they’re poison. “The hell does he know? He’s never used a gun in his life.”

You chew on your lip. You can picture the scene all too well, bits of memories of Crime Alley shootouts and family homicides filling in the gaps. You can imagine the scream of the child. You can imagine the argument in the Batcave afterwards, Batman glowering over Jason like the Gotham Clocktower, dark and disapproving, as Jason throws his mask down and stomps away.

“Did the kid get to the hospital?” you whisper.

“Yeah.”

“Okay.” You breathe out slowly, deliberately. “That’s good. I’m glad.”

Jason is quiet. You look at his hands again, and as if in a daze, you reach out to hold them.

The gloves are dirty. You pull them off as his hands unclench, blinking down at the pale skin mottled with purple bruises at the knuckles. You turn them over to inspect his palms and fingertips as if you’re about to read them, prophesy about his fate or something, but really you just mean to look at them for the sake of doing so. It brings you back in time, touching his hands. They’re still rough with callouses. Still shaking.

“As long as you’ve stopped them,” you mutter, relaxing your hold as the tremors slow, then fade from his muscles. “It doesn’t matter how you do it as long as they don’t do it again.”

“Thanks,” he says. It’s forced out, but it’s sincere. You meet his eyes when he extracts his hands from yours, fingers pulling away as slow as pulling taffy, and they’re tired but resolute.

You almost kiss him that night. But you don’t, thinking that a better time would probably come, when both of you are older and wiser and happier, and when Jason would perhaps not mind kissing you.

That chance is buried along with Jason a few months later, and with it, a part of yourself.

III.

You used to know Jason Todd.

Used to, because Jason is gone. You had been there at his funeral. You had watched his casket get lowered into the ground, and you had thrown a dumb flower at it like it would magically make a wooden box with a dead body prettier somehow. You had cried for him.

Jason Todd is dead. But then Uncle Alfred calls, and all of a sudden, you aren’t so sure anymore.

Although Bruce had initially objected, Alfred tells you about the empty casket and the Red Hood. He asks if any men had visited you lately, or if you feel like someone’s watching you. You tell him that you’d probably be dead if either of those things happened. He chuckles.

He tells you that Bruce sends his regards. You hang up.

It’s kind of ironic that you almost get killed that same night.

Your ears are still ringing and the frigid night air makes it hard to breathe; the ghost of a cold, hard pistol pressed against your temple renders you dizzy. The whole thing could have been avoided if you’d remembered to test the battery of your damn taser this month, but you hadn’t, and now three bodies are in the alleyway – yours; the man that had touched you, now deceased, lying on the asphalt; and a strange man with the gun that had won.

The rest of the smoke finally dissipates from the barrel. Your savior for the night spins the weapon in his hand before tucking it away at his hip, strolling over to crouch down at the thief’s side. With no great effort, he shoves a hand underneath the corpse to roll it over.

You stand, still quite in shock, as the man in the red helmet reaches into the dead man’s back pocket and plucks out a square, leather object. He stands up and holds it out to you, and you realize that it’s your wallet.

You take it. “Thanks … er …”

“Red Hood,” he says, looking down at you. It feels like he’s staring.

“Yeah,” your heart is in your throat and you will the next few words to come out smoothly, “I know. I’ve heard about you.”

“Well, shucks, I’m flattered. I bet the rumors are full of sunshine and rainbows.”

The words seem innocent, but the tone is familiar. You know this tone and manner of speaking. It’s baiting, a subtle prod to reveal yourself, and overwhelming curiosity leads you to reciprocate.

“There’s not many vigilantes out in Gotham who aren’t under the bat, you know.”

The Red Hood barks out a sharp laugh. “Don’t need the bat when I’ve got a gun.”

He’s right, though you know Batman certainly wouldn’t appreciate that reasoning. Your gaze darts down to the leather holster cradling that deadly weapon. You wet your lips, cautiously, as he leans against the wall opposite you and waits for you to talk again.

“You could’ve just knocked him out.”

“I also could’ve let him splatter your brains out. Life’s full of possibilities.” He uncrosses his arms, and you, for some insane reason, stay where you are as he suddenly pushes off the wall. His voice lowers. “So’s death.”

Your next words are exceptionally careful. He’s getting closer, the white eyes of his helmet washed in shadows as you meet them as solidly as you can. “I’ve heard about that too.”

(Despite your greatest efforts, you feel your hands begin to shake. No no no. You cross your arms to hide them and look more put together than you feel.)

“Really,” he says. “Do tell.”

“My uncle,” you begin slowly, “was just telling me today about a casket that was recently dug back up in the cemetery. They found that the person in it – who was supposed to be in it – was never there.”

“Wow. That’s wild.”

“Yeah. Wild.”

God, your hands won’t stop shaking. They tremble, suffocating in the crooks of your elbows, and you’re growing more and more frustrated as the Red Hood just stands there, infuriatingly silent as he watches your patience slowly unravel until the last thread snaps.

“Look,” you finally exclaim, taking a single step forward; your voice is hoarse and desperate and barely above a whisper. “Jason, if that’s you, tell me. It was just us for so long – you owe me a yes or no, goddammit!”

Your fingers are achingly, annoyingly stiff. Tremors wrack through each tendon and joint. Breathing heavily, you realize that you’re now gripping his biceps, blunt nails digging into the soft leather of his jacket, and that you’re standing much closer to him than you thought you were.

A solid minute passes. Then, slowly, the Red Hood reaches up to grasp your forearms, his hands dragging down to meet yours as they pull away from his jacket. You bite your tongue, glaring at the space between you.

Jason squeezes your hands tight, and then he lets go.

Your arms drop down to your sides, limp, as he pats your shoulder, looking to his left. “Your apartment’s just across the street, right? You’ll probably make it,” is all he says.

You just nod emptily and amble out of the alleyway, mind blurry while he trails close behind, leaving the corpse of your assailant where it had fallen. There’s no cars driving around right now so you just walk across the street without looking both ways, only stopping once you reach your apartment door and have your key out to unlock it. 

You turn around before opening the door; no one’s around, naturally, and you exhale and step inside.

As soon as the lock clicks, your legs give out underneath you. You crumple on the cold tile, hands folded and crushing against your mouth in some semblance of a prayer, and start to cry – and you can’t, for the life of you, figure out why.

__

[50 Wordless Ways to Say “I Love You” prompt list (requests using this prompt list are CLOSED)]

[flannelpunkcalum]

The Devil Wears Kevlar - Part 6

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 7

I’ve been excited to post this chapter for WEEKS you guys are hopefully gonna love it. also not to spoil it or anything but CONTENT WARNING: this chapter contains violence ok that is all. pls enjoy and let me know what you thought! 4k words

“Dick Grayson, you’re a brilliant actor.”

It had been all too easy to get into the kitchens. Aspen had pretended Dick was nervous something bad was waiting for him around the corner after his scare, and chefs are usually pretty kind-hearted, they melted. For their troubles, Aspen and Dick got a plate full of the edge pieces of brownies and cheesecake bites - not fit to serve to guests, but more than good enough for them.

They eat them in a stairwell in a hall just off the ballroom, where they’re close enough to the action and can keep from being late.

“That was the performance of a lifetime.” She continues, reaching for another brownie. Dick smiles quietly at her around a mouthful of dessert. He’s a bit of an oddball, if she’s honest, but then again so was she at that age. He’s good company, she’ll say that much. “You get dragged to a lot of these fundraisers?”

Dick nods. “D’you ever mind?” Aspen asks again. She knows she would have. She’d been a sullen fucking kid.

“No, it’s what’s right, for me to do this. It’s important work. There’s no point in catching - like, having the police catch criminals without making sure there are ways for people to survive without having to become criminals in the first place.”

Aspen’s surprise must show, because Dick glances away, like he’s embarrassed. “At least, that’s what Calum says.”

“Nah, man, that’s such an intelligent way to look at it. You’re very- see, I was going to say mature, but that makes it sound like all adults think like that, and we both know that’s not true. Dick Grayson, I’m honoured to be your partner in crime.”

Aspen had been joking, but he almost falls down the stairs laughing at that. She didn’t know it was that funny, but she’ll take it.

It’s not nearly long enough before she gets a text from Calum Hood telling her to bring Dick and come to the ballroom, the guests are showing up. He does not remember putting in his number under anything other than “Work”, so she’s confused immediately. “I didn’t know your dad had this number,” she frowns, and when Dick avoids her eyes she assumes it’s because of how she addressed Calum. “I mean your guardian, I guess. Your parental unit. Hey, look at me, need you to check me for crumbs.”

They make sure they have no chocolate in the corners of their mouths before they head back into the fray. The room looks a little less intimidating with a lower concentration of cops in, and what she can only imagine is Gotham’s hottest string quartet is playing something that sounds like Rachmaninoff. It’s not so bad.

As soon as she sees Dick head across the ballroom to Calum, she slides back to her table with the stoic police officer she met before. Officer Montoya, she remembers. “I miss anything good?” She asks cheerfully, and as Montoya shakes her head Aspen slides a bit of brownie wrapped in a napkin over to her.

They get along a lot better after that.

Donations start to trickle in. Well, not exactly trickle, since the men and women visiting her little table are giving money to the orders of thousands. Aspen had been prepared for that, she thought, but watching people put down a year’s rent in one go in making her lightheaded. Still, she nods and smiles, and no one looks too long at her, which is exactly what she wanted.

Still, it’s almost five thirty, and she’s getting antsy like this. The champagne being passed around looks more and more inviting each time a waiter passes by their table. Calum looks distracted, so she snags a flute off a tray while he’s talking to some other couple dripping with money, and after she takes a sip she places it on the floor by the leg of her chair. Just so none of the guests think they’re giving their money to some lush. Watever. Mr. Hood is drinking, so she’s probably allowed to have just a little, right?

Plus, Aspen never feels more extravagant than when she’s day drinking. She deserves to have a little fun at this thing, just a bit.

Things have been relatively quiet so far, but as Calum steps up to a podium to give his talk she sits up a little straighter. People are undoubtedly going to be inspired by whatever he has to say, so she’s got to be prepared. She takes a more substantial sip of bubbly as he starts to speak, since she’s sure she’ll have her hands full in just a second.

(Sidenote: Aspen loves champagne.)

It turns out that Calum is an eloquent guy, when he wants to be. Aspen’s about two minutes away from digging a five out of her own purse as he waxes poetic about the kids who have to go to school hungry, work to keep a roof over their family’s heads, or beg in alleys. She’s encouraged to see how many diamond earrings are bobbing along to this, how many people look pleased with how generous he’s says they could be. Everyone wants to be good, she thinks, somewhere deep down, even if it’s just to them and theirs. And these people, they’re powerful, they think Gotham is theirs.

Sometimes, when he snaps at her, Aspen forgets how smart Calum Hood is. Right now, as he’s gently wrapping Gotham’s one percent around his finger, she can’t forget it.

She really wants more champagne, as if that would help anything, but she resists as he starts to close his speech. “Gotham’s present may seem… brutal,” He says, with just the right amount of sorrow in his voice, “but together you and I can assure its bright future. When you have a moment, my assistant is waiting to take your donations right after she takes mine. Any amount is welcome, and please, for the kids’ sake, be generous. Enjoy the music!” He adds, and as he soon as he steps aside he makes a beeline for the table.

Aspen golf-claps politely for him as he comes over, and she sees him smile, like he’s bashful, as if he didn’t know he had the whole room in a bind. His guests are still applauding for him as he steps over to her, for fuck’s sake. “I’m truly moved, sir.” She says, starting to type his information into the tablet.

“You’re sweet,” He says, and Aspen misspells his last name just from that.

She corrects herself quickly enough. “I’m honest.” She shrugs, and fixes her eyes back on him. “And how much would you like to donate today, sir?”

“Match it.”

“What?”

“Whatever amount is there. Match it.”

Aspen can be a little dramatic, she says she’s going to go into convulsions or have a heart attack all the time, but this time she actually almost falls out of her chair. “That’s-”

“Match it.”

His look at her leaves no room for argument, so Aspen bites back her response. She knows he’ll see her look and that always seems to speak volumes, between them. “Cash or cheque?” She jokes- thankfully, since he pulls out a chequebook and not a bag of notes like some cartoon bank robber.

Aspen doesn’t watch as he writes out all the zeros on the cheque, she knows she’ll get nauseous. Montoya’s got a damn good poker face, she’ll say that much. When Calum’s done he draws back, but he doesn’t move to leave just yet. “You’re drinking?”

“What?” Aspen blinks. Calum taps his foot against the leg of the table, right next to her flute of champagne. Oh. Suppose she’s caught, then. “You’re drinking.” She says, instead, and fixes her gaze on him. She has to curl her hand into a fist under the desk to maintain it, but he doesn’t know it.

For once, for fucking once, he breaks first. “Fair enough.”

It’s better than champagne, this feeling, but Aspen tries not to show it. “I’m done for now, anyways, I just wanted to taste.” She shrugs. “Gotta stay sharp.”

Calum smiles. “I’ll check in before the dinner.” He says, but doesn’t sound like a warning. It doesn’t sound like just business, either. Aspen doesn’t think about what that leaves.

She focuses on her job, after that. I mean, she was focusing before, but now she’s- fuck. Whatever. She takes the money, she says thank you in her sweetest voice, she makes the donors feel good for what they’ve done. Maybe they deserve it. Aspen doesn’t know if she trusts the rich, not right now, but she can be kind for an afternoon.

She’s aching for another drink by the time guests start to filter out from the ballroom, but she keeps her hands on the table and her smile on her face while she puts down another Drake’s name. Some family, goddamn. When she finally finds time to look around, the room is almost empty. Thank god.

She stands up and stretches, arms about her head. Her back cracks, and Montoya jumps, swears beside her. “Sorry,” Aspen says, as she sits back down and they start to count up the cheques. Aspen has to make a note of someone who said they'd offer $5000 but only wrote a cheque for $500, but it still says “five thousand” on that one line, but that's all that's wrong and Aspen is elated. She expected a robbery or something, anything to justify the security, but this is good too. Now she's confident that the guests have all climbed into their limos and gone to the second leg of the gala, and she's almost - almost! - free to go.

“I'm gonna find Mr. Hood and tell him how much we made so we can go home.” She announces, standing up and trekking across the ballroom. He doesn’t seem to be anywhere, at first glance, and Aspen has to ask two waiters and some unrelated bodyguard until she gets directed towards an office. The door is open a crack and Calum’s there, he’s talking to T. Giordano (Aspen read the nameplate). When she explains that she’s only there to bring Mr. Hood up to speed, T. Giordano lets them use her office while she oversees the end of the event. Aspen’s so pleased about this; she hasn’t slouched in hours, her back feels all sort of wrong.

Calum’s had some rough days, but he looks genuinely happy as Aspen steps into the office. He’s not smiling, but there’s a lightness in his shoulders she hasn’t seen for days. “I think it’s good news, sir.” She says carefully, holding out the tablet in front of her. “I mean, it’s more than you raised last year, so that’s something.”

He takes the tablet from her and looks it over, smiling just a little. “What’s this category, the one just-”

She steps over to his side to look. “Oh, I did a column of all the amounts we actually got from the people, just to make sure there were no problems with the cheques - actually, if you see-”

“I’ll deal with it.” He says. “Thank you for your help today, Aspen, I couldn’t have pulled this off without you.”

He is sweet, but flattery isn’t something Aspen is likely to fall for. “I just watched people write cheques, sir. This was always your event,” and maybe it’s the champagne that’s made her brave but she bumps him with her hip - maybe it’s just because this is the first time she’d been close enough to do it.

Whatever the reason, that’s what sets it off.

Calum’s head snaps over to look at her. They’re leaning against the edge of T. Giordano’s desk, but when Aspen sees the look in his eyes she straightens up a little. Maybe she shouldn’t have done that. He’s putting down the tablet as she starts to apologize. “Sorry if that was inappropriate, it’s been a long day.” She shrugs.

He’s standing right in front of her. “Don’t worry about it.” He says, and when the absence of any scolding in his voice makes her look up he’s giving her this look she’s never seen, like he’s trying to set her soul on fire. His brows are creased, like it hurts, and he huffs out a little breath she doesn’t dare try to interpret. “Can I just-” He says, and reaches out and puts one hand on her waist.

Her eyes are locked on his, but she can feel her chest heave with shallow breaths, feels his hand shift a little with each one. “Yes,” is all she can say, even though there was no question.

Slowly, Calum uses his hold on her hip to drag himself in, and he lowers his head. Before Aspen can remember why she shouldn’t - he’s your boss he’s insane he’s a player and you’re just - he fits his mouth to hers and they are kissing.

There’s nothing rough about this. No teeth. Nothing tears. Just the soft press of his lips against hers and the deep sign he lets out against her cheek. He’s testing again, to see how where she’ll let this go. Yes, she thinks, yes, and she lets him pull himself so close she can feel the heat off his body, and cup her chin gently. He turns her head, just a little, as their lips move against each other like whispers.

Aspen isn’t usually pliant, but she moves with him. His lips are soft against hers, and the way he feels against her- she’d follow that fucking anywhere. This feels like everything she wanted, and she reaches out and finds the back of his neck, pulls him closer, to kiss him deeper, and-

It sounds like a gasp as he pulls away and grabs her wrist, tearing her hand off his skin before she’s even opened her eyes. They’re both panting, blinking in the light, and Aspen won’t be mad about this as long as he lets her kiss him again, she swears, just- “What?”

He’s not looking at her when he says “We can’t do this. You’re drunk.”

A different kind of burning settles into her chest. “I’ve had half a glass of champagne, I’m not-”

“Then I’m drunk.” He interrupts her, though his hand is still on her waist. Aspen tries to tug her wrist out of his grip, but he’s holding tight to that, too.

Aspen wasn’t looking for this and she knows how it goes, when some secretary falls for their boss. She’s the one in danger, not him, and if he says he doesn’t want- if that’s what he wants, then… “If you say so.”

The room seems dead silent, now, so that every word she says almost echoes around the room. Calum feels it too. He shudders a little and lets go of her, all of her, and draws back.

They collect themselves. The kiss only lasted a few seconds, but they find things to adjust and fix so they don’t have to look at each other. Aspen straightens out her cardigan, moves away from the desk like it’s a trap. She watches Mr. Hood smooth imaginary wrinkles out of his jacket, and when he turns to face her again it’s like a door has closed somewhere inside of him. Whatever light had been in his face is gone.

She doesn’t want to let it scare her, but - her job, his kiss, there’s so much she needs from him.

She waits for him to speak.

“We should put this behind us.” He says, finally. Aspen didn’t expect anything less, but hearing it out loud - it stings. “This was a mistake.”

That’s worse. There’s a lot Aspen can take, but right now, while she’s still got the taste of him in her mouth… She feels white-hot angry, just for a second, and then she collects herself. “Don’t worry about it.” She says, in a voice that’s way too sweet. She turns to the tablet, so she doesn’t have to see how he reacts. “‘S only a mistake if you let it happen again, right?”

“What?”

She hates the idea of looking at him right now, so she stays facing the desk. “Like - it’s only a mistake if you don’t learn from it, if you let it happen again, so don’t worry about it, I’ll see you Monday, I’m gonna-”

He spins her around in one movement and this time when he kisses her it is rough, but she’s angry too and she tangles her fingers in his hair as soon as she knows what’s happening. He’s pressed his tongue into her mouth and his hands are tight around her hips, strong enough to hold her there. He’s pressed right up against her, crowding her against the desk, and she kisses him back like she wants the air out of his lungs. His teeth catch at her lower lip and she opens her mouth a little wider for him, just so he please won’t stop.

It’s so good, but it’s too intense, and after a long moment they break apart and rest their foreheads together, still panting into each other’s mouths. They’ve still got their nails dug into each other, but Aspen can feel something more than lust and chemicals between them, and as he meets her eyes-

He steps back, like he’s been shoved. “There.” He says, but his usual sureness has melted and she can see his eyes flicker, like he’s nervous. “Now it’s a mistake.”

He’s gone before she can reply.

Aspen doesn’t remember too much, after that. She knows what she did, mostly, to get herself out of the botanical gardens and into a cab, but it’s a blur of smiling and excuses when she tries to think back to who she talked to or what she said. It doesn’t matter, really. She doesn’t scream and she doesn’t cry and she gets in a taxi and really that’s all she needs.

When she has to tell the driver to take her to Hood Enterprises, she almost stutters over Calum’s last name. It hurts, a little, because she wanted this, even though she knew this would happen. Did she think she could handle it? She didn’t love this job, but she was good at it and it payed damn well, and- she might have to quit. Fuck, she hadn’t started this with the intention of leaving before a month was up, but-

Before she can finish that thought they’re at Hood Enterprises headquarters. All she wants is to go in, listen to a few phone calls, and go home, but as soon as she enters the lobby-

“Aspen!”

Shit.

“What do you want.” She says to Liam, too tired to hide her anger. She doesn’t need this right now.

“Is Mr. Hood coming back tonight?”

Aspen doesn’t flinch when she hears his name, but it’s a near thing. “No, he’s not. Now, please, get out of my way, Liam, I just want to go home.” When she tries to push past him, Liam moves to block her, and when she looks at him properly she sees that he’s got what are very near tears in his eyes. “Wait, what’s wrong? What’s going on?”

Liam runs a hand through his hair and doesn’t meet her gaze. “Aspen… I really, really fucked up. I dunno if I can fix it. In sales, I- can you come? Please? I need-” He breaks off, his voice about to crack.

“How’m I supposed to help you out with sales, Liam, I’m not-” She shakes her head. Liam just gave her his biggest saddest eyes he’s got.

Well, shit. Aspen is mad at Liam for everything he did, but that doesn’t mean she can just turn her back on him. She doesn’t want to be the reason he’s fired, after all. They used to be friends, and she guesses some part of her misses that. After a long moment she sighs and checks the time on her phone. “I can’t stay long.” She says quietly.

Liam almosts lifts off the ground, he’s so relieved. “Thank you so much.” He says, stepping aside so he can lead her towards the elevator.

“I don’t know what you expect me to be able to do, Liam, you know I’m useless when it comes to econ.” She’s been through enough today, she’s not gonna let herself get carried away.

“I can’t tell you how much this means to me. Really. Aspen, you’re - thanks.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Aspen mumbles as he presses the button and the doors close. They start moving down - wait, down? “Why are we headed to the parking garage?” She glances at him, reaching for the panel of buttons. “What floor do you work on aga-”

The attack is sudden, and it feels so brutal that years later it’s still one of her nightmares.

Liam grabs her arm before she can finish her sentence, sliding around her so it twists behind her back all in one move, pushing her front up against the wall of the elevator in one smooth move. She gasps, but before she can panic properly she remembers to fight back. Even as Liam’s weight crushes her lungs, she jerks back with her free elbow, hitting some soft part of Liam’s torso behind her. She feels his breath on her neck as she strikes out again, again.

There’s one thought running through her head; she’s not gonna die like this. She’s not.

Liam presses her arm further up her back, sending enough pain through her shoulder to make her whole body buckle. But he’s backed off a little, out of elbow range, so as soon as Aspen hears the door open she pushes off the wall with her whole body to get out of his grip.

She must surprise him, because it works. She pushes him off enough to shake out of his grip, runs for the grey concrete of the parking lot. Liam’s footsteps echo behind her, but she’s fast, she can-

Liam tackles her with his full weight. As Aspen hits the ground she skids, palms stinging. Shit. She tries to get her knees under herself, but Liam’s got her pinned and he flips her over to her back easy - he’s twice her fucking size! She tries to punch him, but he catches her wrist slams it to the grounds about her head. The other one follows.

Aspen’s gasping for air and trying to take stock. Liam is straddling her, he’s got her wrists pinned above her head and even now he moves so that he’s got both of them in one hand. He’s reaching into a pocket for something and she doesn’t want to know what. “Liam,” she says, “don’t, Liam, I- help!”

Liam swears, and she feels him ruck up one side of her cardigan, bunching it up past her elbow. Her blood goes cold. She screams again, but this time she can’t find any words for this.. She looks around as best she can, but the lot is empty of cars.

It’s just her. She’s alone.

A scraping sound catches her attention, and when she looks back at Liam he’s pulling the plastic cover off a syringe with his teeth. She struggles against his grip. What else can she do? “Fuck, Liam, don’t- what are you doing-”

“Please stay still, please, okay, I don’t want to hurt you.” He says.

Then he plunges the needle into her arm.

Aspen fucking wails, and yes, she knows its undignified, but she can feel whatever was in that syringe flow through her bicep and it’s a living horror. Liam throws the weapon away and rolls off her, but by the time she drags herself up on her elbows she can guess what he shot into her veins. Everything feels heavy - her head is too much for her neck, and she almost collapses before Liam gathers her into his arms.

She hates him.

He’s murmuring something - it takes effort to tune in, like the world is a radio. Something… he’s sorry? “Fuck you,” Aspen murmurs. She’s too tired for this. She just needs to- for a second- just-

She closes her eyes.

[lil-nest]

Summary: When Talia's young son loses his leg and she leaves him in an alley for his father to find, she doesn't expect the GCPD to find him first. When Officer Dick Grayson finds an amputated child in an alley, he doesn't expect Jason Todd's advice to be "foster him". Both those things happen anyway.

Notes: Written for Batfam Week 2018, Day 4:AU Warning for child abandonment, non-graphic amputation, League of shadow-typical ableism (which does not reflect the author’s opinion in any way, shape or form) and a little bit of swearing.

“I'm sorry, lady Talia, but there's only so much we can do. No one ever tried to transplant a whole leg before, and even though the leg matches his DNA perfectly, the procedure just failed.”

Talia grit her teeth at the memory. Oh how cathartic it had been to kill that scientist.

“I'm sorry, Lady Talia, but we can't try again. His body went through too much stress during the first few attempts, and we don't have anything new to try this time. We did all we could, but lord Damian will not get his leg back.”

She hadn't killed this one. Her father had stilled her hand before she could.

“Daughter, you know it is no use. It is time for you to let go of the boy. He will no longer be able to serve the League.”

“But father, he was shaping up to be a great heir. Making a new one will set back our plans...”

“We will not make a new one. The detective has been training his stray, and the boy has a lot of potential... he might even become a better detective than his mentor, and he seems more susceptible than Wayne ever was... It won't take much to say him to my side, and he'll make a perfect heir. Your son, on the other hand, is no more than a liability now. We can't even plant him in the Detective's house, now that he has a worthier heir. Kill him, or I will.”

Talia al Ghul did not cry. She had not cried since infancy. But the idea of killing her child...

Maybe he had become a liability. After all, she was risking everything to save his life.

She had taken him from the lab, claiming she wanted to give him a death worthy of a warrior. Instead, she had put him on plane headed to Gotham and had presented the corpse of a clone to her father.

She set him down in the shadows, where she knew Batman's patrol would take him. She didn't know if her Beloved would recognize him as his own – she somewhat hoped he wouldn't – but she knew he would make sure he was safe. It was all she could give her son now.

She forgot to take the police patrols into account.

Sometimes, when Dick worked overtime and Jason had nothing planned for evening, he'd let himself in the cop's apartment and cook him a nice warm meal. It was a mutually beneficial arrangement: He got both the pleasure of trying out new recipes and a free meal – sometimes two or three, when he let himself be talked into taking the leftovers home – and Dick could have something other than cereal after a long shift.

Dick would talk about paying him for those every once in a while, but Jason always called bullshit. They were at that point in their friendship when nobody knew exactly who owed who what favors and they just did things for each other – or, more accurately, they both knew exactly what the other did for them but they couldn't agree on which favor compensated which.

Of course, talking about such things was unthinkable between two emotionally constipated ex-foster kids, so Jason just claimed it was payment for the times his masked self showed up at the fire escape asking for a patch-up job.

This would inevitably get Dick to stutter and claim that if an illegal vigilante had ever presented themselves at his window – which they hadn't, thank you – then as an officer of police, of course he would have arrested them, and if, hypothetically, he had decided to break his vows and help said non-existent vigilante, then he certainly would not know their identity, but the point was moot, anyway, since Jason was not, in fact, stupid enough to be part of any hypothetical vigilante group picking up Batman's slack in Crime Alley.

The rant would then be followed by an abrupt change of subject, and Dick would swiftly send Jason home with all the leftovers instead of only half, and tell him to come by with laundry some time.

Jason would call it a win, and would even even be kind enough not to mention the fact that Dick said “Batman's slack” and not “the police's”, as though he had given up on the force ever setting foot there.

That particular evening, Jason was sitting in Dick's couch while his soup simmered, reading about his exploits in the paper – seriously, who put an article about his people struggling to survive next to crappy suppositions about Timothy Drake-Wayne's “secret life”? – when the man came home.

If Jason hadn't been so worried, he would have wondered what it said about him that he knew something was wrong just from the way he closed the door and the lack of greeting.

A moment passed, and he was just about to go check that Dick wasn't dead when the man walked up to him and threw himself on the couch.

“Rough day?”

He was treated to an empty look he hadn't seen since he had last seen his friend wake up from a nightmare back in the home.

“There was a kid...”, Dick eventually said.

Jason winced. Cases involving children were always hard, but Dick usually coped by crying on his shoulder. Whatever had shaken him enough to make him shut down his emotions must have been messed up – even by Gotham standards.

“A boy, four year old – five at the most. Found him in a gutter in a back alley. He was.. god, he was missing a leg.”

Jason's blood ran cold.

“Some new psycho killer, you think?”

“No, Jason, no, he was alive. And the leg... it was cut clean, “fresh surgical amputation” the medic said. Coated with antiseptic, properly bandaged, hell, they're making a blood work because they think he might have been given antibiotics. Jason, it's like this kid got in an accident, got amputated and treated in an hospital, and then just tossed out!”

There were the tears. It was progress, at least.

Jason didn't like where he thought this was going, but asked anyway:

“You think his parents abandoned him on the streets because he lost his leg, don't you?”

“I can't know that. Maybe the leg and his current situation have no link. Maybe he just got kidnapped while leaving the hospital and the kidnappers realized he would need treatment to stay alive and didn't want complications so they just threw him out. Maybe there is a psycho out there who gets off on cutting off kid's members, then pretending to save them by treating them and then leaving them to die in the streets, but...”

“But you know both these scenarios are less likely than assholes deciding their kid was not worth the inconvenience or the cost.”

Dick stayed silent. Jason decided to change the subject.

“Did you try talking to the kid?”

“I did. He wasn't coherent. It might have been shock, but... whatever he was trying to say, it didn't sound like it was even meant to be English.”

“Maybe that's it, maybe the parents are illegal immigrants and can neither earn enough money to take care of him nor benefit from healthcare.”

“But then how did they get him treated in an hospital? Their identity would have been controlled. No, Jason, whoever did this had enough money and rights to get this kid surgery and medicine, which means they also had enough money and rights to take care of him afterwards. They decided to leave him to either die or get thrown into the system. Jason, you know what's going to happen to him. No one will want to adopt or foster a disabled, potentially traumatized kid who can't even speak English, and GCPS has neither the means nor the willingness necessary to give him the help he'll need. He won't even end up like us, Jason, he'll end up worse!”

“Not if you do something about it” he countered.

Now, the thing with Jason was, he was a firm believer in taking things in his own hands. Always had been, really. His mom was too high to make them food? No problem, he could teach himself how to cook. No more food money? Well, hello there, Bat-tires, sitting there, prime for the jacking. The foster parents beat the smaller kids? Associate with eldest foster brother to beat them back. Now-ex foster brother wanted to give up on his dream to become a cop? Nothing was as easy as getting himself arrested at a strategic time so Dick could “accidentally” bump into his idol while bailing him out. Neither Batman nor the GCPD would protect the citizen of crime alley? Meet Red Hood and his Outlaws.

So of course Jason would suggest doing something – probably stupid – when someone complained something was unfair. It usually didn't matter how out there his ideas were, because Dick was always there to act as a voice of reason. He just forgot that said reason tended to disappear when Dick was upset, leaving him incredibly susceptible.

“And what exactly do you suggest I do about this?”

“Well, you're a registered foster parent, aren't you? Take him in.”

Dick startled.

“I'm sorry, what? I can't just take in a kid on a whim! Besides I only got registered so we could ensure children involved in a case didn't disappear into the ether before we were done like I almost did after my parents died.”

Ah, there was the voice of reason Jason knew and loved.

“With that being said, the kid is currently involved in a case. I could take him in just until we close it. It would give his social worker time to find a somewhat appropriate home for him. And maybe if he spends enough time with me it'll help him trust me and we might find a way to communicate...”

Never mind.

Dick deflated.

“We both know if I take him I'll end up getting attached and won't be able to bring myself to let him get lost in the system, though.” A dry, humorless laugh. “I'm pretty sure that's the kind of emotional investment the academy warned us about”

Dick's internal war would have been hilarious if the subject hadn't been so serious. Jason felt the need to intervene, since it was a little bit his fault, too.

“Eh, screw the academy anyway. You've always wanted to be a dad, and I'm pretty sure the only reason you haven't adopted yet is because you know you'll get attached to every kid you see and won't be able to chose. This might just be your chance!”

“I know, and it's very tempting, but... I'm a single man with a dangerous, time-sucking job, and my budget's not too tight, but it's not that loose.”

“You know you can work around all of those if you try. Look, I'm not saying you should up and adopt right now, but maybe give it a thought? The kid's due for a few more days in the hospital, right? Take that time to think about it, talk about it with his worker a bit, and if you find out you still want to after that, just foster the kid until the case is closed. It'll let you see if you can find a solution for the job and the money thing, and most importantly if you click with the kid. Then when the case is closed you'll know what to do. Hell, if you're worried you'll end up too attached to take a rational decision, I promise I'll be the devil's advocate.”

Dick snorted.

“Right. You haven't met him, Jay. He'll have you wrapped around his little fingers soon enough.”

“Hey, if he's able to melt my stone cold heart, then he'll deserve a place beside the only other person who did, right?”

Dick laughed.

“Alright. But you get to be the babysitter while I investigate.”

“I'm sorry, but you're supposed to find a workable arrangement, and I happen to have a job that I like and almost pays my bills. I'm not ready to become a full-time babysitter until the kid hits eighteen. I might, however, be willing to do emergency babysitting every once in a while.”

“It's a deal then.”

A week later, Jason's phone vibrated, startling the cat he was holding into fleeing. Once the animal had been safely caught and given to its new owner, he checked, silently promising retribution to the asshole who had almost ruined a perfect adoption.

It was a text from Dick.

“I'll be picking Damian at Gotham's General on Monday. I hope you're free this Saturday, because we're going shopping ;p”

Somehow, his stupid ideas always came back to bite him in the ass.

[dccomicsbookshelf]

Leverage Gotham Style: How it Began

I’m not sure if this qualifies as a fic or not. But I found it in my files, so here it is at @outshinethestars’ request! (More to follow)

Gotham is dark. Gotham is the pit of hopelessness gilded with gold that all the world knows to avoid. Gotham may be officially part of the US, but it is a law unto itself.

And no one knows this better than Gotham’s favorite son.

Orphaned by the city at the tender age of eight, the young Wayne grew up with a burning desire for justice and the bone-deep knowledge that none would offer it unless he took it for himself.

Nevertheless he tried. He tried to take the honest path and follow the formal laws of the land. He graduated with honors and finished his university time at the top of his class. He devoted himself to his studies, to the detriment of any friendships he might have made.

And yet it was not enough. The FBI put him behind a desk covered with paperwork and red tape, Gotham society relegated him to charity dinners and galas, Interpol was merely the FBI in a larger scale.

He returned home, dismayed and depressed, to an abandoned mansion, a neglected company that had been stolen from under his nose, and a butler he had not seen in a long time, but who mourned the loss of the hopeful young man of yesteryear. Bruce Wayne was well into his thirties and had nothing to show for it.

But Wayne Enterprises was perhaps the most tangible of his family’s legacy and he would regain it.

So he began to research.

The thing about Gotham is it has no shortage of criminals and the criminally inclined. What it does have a distinct lack of is those who have not had the conscience and compassion brutally beaten out of them.

That is what the last of the Waynes was looking for.

And, wonder of wonders he began to find it.

He first found it in a thief, slender and tall, clad in an old t-shirt and sweats, short black hair curled around her neck and drifting over sharp green eyes. Selina Kyle laughed him out of her battered apartment and told him she’d consider it. A week later she swept up to him at a gala, evening gown sparkling under the chandeliers, carrying herself as a queen, and, as they danced, said that she thought it might be fun. Over the course of the evening, he watched her turn herself into a half-dozen different people as she spoke with various personages and he followed her upstairs where she departed by a window with her clutch bag crammed full of documents.

Yes, it would be fun indeed.

Despite the strong, physical resemblance, Jason Todd could not have been more different from Selina Kyle. For one, Jason Todd was his real name, for another, where Selina could affect the speech of foreign royalty should she so choose, Jason Todd spoke only in the rough, broad brogue of the Gotham streets. He was hardened for one so young, not even quite eighteen, but already strong, physically and otherwise.

He had a reputation on the streets. Drug dealers and those who sought to exploit the inhabitants of Crime Alley knew to fear his wrath and retribution.

Bruce offered him a chance to make a real difference. To destroy the gangs at their sources. But no killing.

Todd looked him in the eye with a scowl, and agreed.

He hadn’t planned on another thief. Ms Kyle was quite gifted and filled the roles of grifter and thief adequately.

But then Alfred dragged a dark-clad figure into his study one evening by the ear, crisp disapproval in his voice, and said that he wasn’t aware they were running auditions for this planned team. (They weren’t. Bruce fished his mother’s pearls out of the thief’s pocket and asked his name.)

Richard Grayson was older than Todd but not by much. Formerly one of the world’s youngest professional acrobats, his family had died in Gotham and he had been delivered into the tender mercies of the Juvenile Detention system. He had survived by being small and fast and using the skills he had learned as part of an international circus to make himself invaluable to the Bratva branch he had fallen in with.

Until they pushed him too hard, tried to lock the cage, and he ran. And had been working solo ever since.

He watches Bruce with shadowed, suspicious eyes, on the very edge of the chair, bouncing his toes, ready to fly. Where to, Bruce doesn’t know. He wouldn’t get past Alfred or the door or Bruce at the window unless they let him. There is something in the boy’s eyes. A shadow of insanity, the manic rush of someone who has been too long deprived of something they so desperately need. It would be stupid to include him, an unknown quantity.

But Bruce knows the name Grayson. Knows that the final performance where the family died had been scheduled on his orders, for a charity event that he hadn’t even bothered to attend, busy filing his application to Interpol, where he had flown out first thing the next morning.

His fault. His responsibility.

Bruce looks at the team he has assembled, a grifter and burglar who blinks slowly like a cat and smiles with sharp teeth. A teenage street-ruffian, burning with righteous anger against the privileged overlords of the city (and he does not pretend that he himself is not included in that) and a thief who’s accent loudly proclaims him as a foreigner, who has somehow survived the worst the city could throw at him, though not unbattered. He needs a level head to back him up against the reckless elements. And he needs a hacker.

Barbara finds him.

Barbara Gordon, daughter of the police Captain who was kind to him all those years ago, crippled in a drive-by shooting outside the library where she worked, who got herself through physical therapy and recovery by teaching herself how to be the undisputed empress of technology.

Miss Gordon, who tracked his research and recruitment with amusement and rolls up to the manor the day after Grayson cautiously agrees to be part of the team and joins Bruce and the jumpy young man at the breakfast table and cheerfully inquires as to their plan of attack. (It’s unnecessary. She’s read all of Bruce’s files. She knows his plan to recover WE just as well as he does.)

Long after Grayson flees for whatever bolt-hole he is living in, she stays and helps Bruce and Alfred to hammer out the details and how best to use their resources. And she makes it clear that, like Selina, she will work with Bruce but she won’t work for him.

Bruce doesn’t like it, but he agrees.

Alfred, for the first time in a long time, smiles.

And the plan goes off like a dream.

Which is to say, with many surreal turns and bumps and bruises, but at the end they are left, standing in a circle (or sitting in Barbara’s case) beholding the fruits of their labor as the news channels announce the arrest of several members of the board and the reinstatement of the Wayne family as head of the company.

Todd observes roughly that the rich bastards won’t stay imprisoned for long with the police under their thumb. Barbara muses on the possibility of nailing them with more federal offenses. Grayson offers to plant evidence. Selina laughs at Alfred’s dry commentary over the comms.

And Bruce knows that whatever this is, it is only beginning.

–

Part One of At Least Three

[Part Two]