Prologue part 1

Disclaimer: I own two things, Jack and shit…and Terry…and Zoot. So like four things, but Batman is owned by DC Comics. This an elseworlds or alternate universe in which Jason is given the cowl instead of Dick.

Gotham October 24, 2008

It always grips him right before he goes outside, climbing through the fire escape so he isn't seen leaving the rundown apartment building. The only reason it has running water is because someone forgot to bulldoze it down and Jason made sure that the water never got shut off in there. The electricity was only turned on when it needed to less someone randomly discover that an apartment complex that was supposed to be closed was still getting power and in only one apartment room. He wouldn't put it past Bruce to notice that detail. He reaches into his pocket to pull out something to ease the grip that's taken hold of him. Nicotine. Jason Todd, former Robin, former member of the dead, smoker. As far as Jason knew he was the only Robin that smoked, hell he was the only one in that family who ever did. Bruce was uptight about everything, Dick was Mr. Clean and Tim was a freackin' zombie following in their footsteps.

Even though his red helmet would probably attract unwanted attention from the family he was avoiding he would have to wear it because he didn't feel right walking around in civilian garb. It exposed him too much and he had taken his laundry to the dry cleaners as Red Hood, it wouldn't be proper to fudge up his secret identity even if he couldn't give a damn who knew he was Jason Todd. He doesn't want to admit that he does it partly because he didn't want anyone using that to figure out the identities of the others. Jason Todd doesn't want to admit that he still gives a damn about what happens to the family he's running away from, even if he's thought about killing some of them. Not serious thoughts, more of impulsive rage that tears through him with such a fury that it severs nerves in the tissue.

Gangbangers all line the street, waiting for a moment's weakness like vultures, but only the really stupid ones, like Gigante, one of the leftovers of when Bane ran Gotham. Even without Bane to watch his sorry ass he had somehow managed to live as long as he did, but he was getting too bold and Jason knew that Red Hood was going to have to feed the dogs he had. They were getting hungry and Gigante was a fat man, a fat little shit that barked louder than he could bite. He'd get fed his teeth soon enough. Jason took another intake of smoke, the nicotine rushing through him to wake him up, after all the night was still young and he had things he had to do. First thing was pick up dry cleaning and drop it off at one of the expendable safe houses, not the apartment he'd just left…that place was the safe house of safe houses, the one no one would go to. The one he'd never shown Bruce, the apartment he lived in with his mother, Catherine Todd, his real mother.

The dry cleaners has the same crappy lighting it had when it first opened up fifty years ago, around the time when black people were starting to realize they had taken enough shit. It was one of the first proudly black owned dry cleaners. Now it was owned by a balding Indian guy who smelled like he never showered. Sometimes change isn't for the best, but Jason didn't know all the facts. If a deeply disturbed individual like himself could solve the world's problems than the world was more screwed than he had thought…but then again.

"You're order was ready five days ago, we called," scolded the owners wife, a stern woman who Jason could tell was gonna get killed one of these days, but not by him…she was an innocent after all. Or as innocent as anyone can be in these parts. "I find that very unprofessional!"

"I find your sweatiness unprofessional," he replied as he picked up his laundry and left a 50 dollar bill on the table. "This place is rather cold, how do you remain sweaty and yet your husband seems to be quite cold. Anything to do with the illegal immigrant you have working for you two in the back? Don't be surprised, I know lots of things and I can do a lot of things, so be grateful that I'm not the type of man to take advantage of that or would you rather have to deal with people who expect you to pay for cleaning their laundry."

Protection rackets weren't Jason's style, neither was bank robbery. The only way he could think of making money that wouldn't give him a queasy feeling in his stomach was taken it from drug dealers. He had never liked them, especially the ones who deal to little kids and he could do anything he wanted to them and not feel bad about it. This came from growing up as a kid and having to see his mother destroy herself as those pushers pushed their filth into her veins taking everything from her, even her body while her son sat in the other room, pretending he couldn't hear what they were doing to her. Best and worst thing Jason had going for him was his memory. He could remember every single drug dealer who had forcefully pushed the needle in her vein even when she said no and he could remember each one that threw on her the floor to have his way with her. Those memories finally came in handy when he could track him down and kill them; all of them.

He turned his head down the street towards the old man with hot dog cart, the same one that had been there in his time with the same old man and the same punks harassing the vendor. The only thing that had changed was that Jason could do something about it and he wasn't about to let an opportunity like this slip by him, not when so many other opportunities had slipped through his fingers, things that he had regretted in the twilight before sleep finally took him. There never seemed to be an end to these dead men, men who ran throughout their life shouting kill me and someone was always ready to oblige them.

"Looks like someone forgot the rules of this part of the city," said Red hood as he slipped his hand into his coat and felt the familiar handles of his toys. "I said that the innocent were off limits in my territory, but apparently you're either deaf or retarded…probably both."

"Well if it isn't the Red Hood," said the leader of the punks, a large Italian teen, probably just turned 19 at the most with slicked back black hair, almost like a stereotypical thug. I knew the tattoos on his arms, one of Gigante's men. Fat piece of monkey crap was about to get his lodged in his toilet and things didn't look good for Jason letting him out in time. "The boss wanted to meet you tonight, said he had some big plans he wanted to discuss with ya, ya know just talk to ya."

"Tell me something, were you to escort me there," asked Jason his tone having the slightest hint of inquiry, not giving too much emotion to be easily read, just like Bruce.

"Naw, he didn't tell us nothin' else, just that we should be on our way," replied the thug as he reached into his pocket and pulled out his cigarette and fished his hands around in his pants as if he was looking for his lighter. Finding nothing the thug made the most bold and stupid move of the evening, he tapped the Red Hood on his shoulder. "You must got a lighter on ya, give it here."

"You touch me again and you won't get that hand back," warned Red Hood as he tightened his grip on the Kris that he kept with him at all times.

"Oh, look at mister scary, come on just give me ya lighter" said the thug as he reached to tap Red Hood on the shoulder again.

The instance his finger touched Red Hood's shoulder, Red hood's reflexes kicked in with a vengeance and in a second the thug was missing that hand. He let out a high pitched cry, as if he had just been kicked in the nuts and his buddies went for their guns like the idiots they were. It would be a crime to waste perfectly good bullets on them, but then again bloodying his Kris with their blood seemed like an even bigger crime. He decided to split the two, leaping forward to stab one in the shoulder blade, getting dangerously close to a major organ before whipping out his gun and shooting two other thugs in the lower stomach. Before the last one could react Red Hood had flipped him to the ground with the knife at his throat. Piss filled the air as the punk let himself go and Red Hood sneered in disgust behind the mask.

"Where did he want me to meet him," asked Jason as he held the Kris close to the neck, close enough to draw blood. The punk talks. That was never in question, it's how much he talks and how fast he does it that determines on how many pieces he leaves in, but this one is smarter than the rest. He knows when to talk because he knows that Gigante would not be a man to fear for long.

Detective Jack Rafferty looked at his watch as he waited for his partner to get back, wondering why it was taking so long for him to get a few slices of pizza. Jack had always been protective of his partner Terry ever since the two were in the academy together, training for the day they actually walked the beat together, though Rafferty was his senior of a year. They were as close as partners could be, each one had complete faith in the other. But still Jack was worried that one of the guys they were staking out might have gotten Terry and they were doing God knows what in there. There were a lot of dark thoughts running through his head as he sat there in the darkness mixed with red lights that bathed the car, bringing with it its own horrors to torment Rafferty. His grip tightened on his gun and the other hand gripped the wheel like a patient grips the handlebar on their beds in the throes of agony. Like a ticking time bomb Rafferty was going to burst.

"Hey Jack, could you open the car," asked his partner, Terry Dodson, a skinny guy with very minimal build and the eyes of a puppy dog. He was the antithesis of his partner, a wolf of a man with a greater physique.

"Jesus, Terry, where the hell were you," asked Rafferty as he unlocked and opened the door for Terry to get in the car. It would be the last time Terry was going anywhere without Rafferty. "Get in before someone sees you!"

"Wouldn't your shouting alert them more," replied Terry as he eased his way in the car, the shaking in his hands. "Besides, this thing is hot, I had to stop every now and then to give my palms sometime to heal. Hope nothing big happened while I was gone."

"No there was just two hookers going in there or I hope they were hookers, but both didn't seem to fight and both were older women trying to look young. I'm guessing the boss is getting a threesome or they're having a gang bang. Probably both in that order. You do realize I'm not going to let you go out alone from now on right rookie."

"Oh you have one year on me that's not even fair," pouted Terry as he hung his tail between his legs with his ears turned down. "I'm not a little kid you dick! I'm your partner not your kid, but you don't even treat me with an ounce of respect. Come on Jack, I'm a big boy now, and I'm a better shot than you are."

"Alright Terry, you're right, I have been treating you like a kid and I shouldn't have treated you as such," replied Rafferty as he opened the box to pull apart a slice of pizza. Terry was the more mature of the two, even though he was also the most sensitive. "I was just worried about you is all."

"I didn't know you had such strong feelings for me," joked Terry as he pulled out his own slice.

"Don't get misty eyed Francine, you had the pizza," replied Rafferty as he continued to eat his own slice with a shrug.

They both nearly choked on their pizza when an explosion happened in the building across the street that they were observing. Gunshots rang out in the night, booming like thunderclaps from hidden lightning. The pizza nearly splattered over the dashboard as the two rushed out from the car and ran towards the building. Terry was smart enough to call in the back-up S.W.A.T. Fire and smoke rose out fo the building like a beacon, forming something in the night sky that looked something like a bat, but Terry thought it was just wishful thinking on his part. Every cop knew that Gotham had another protector, a silent shadow in the night that was the ally that the Gotham City Police Department needed, the one that Gordon had told him he could always count on.

"Freeze, Gotham City Police department," shouted Rafferty as he kicked down the door and whipped out the shotgun that he carried in his car just for emergencies.

"Aw shit we got cops, waste em too," shouted a man, the big fish that they were trying to catch, Ricardo Gigante. "Kill em all!"

"Gigante, you tubby bitch, you should have been smarter than this," said the most infamous vigilante in Gotham, the one who crossed so many lines he couldn't even probably remember what they even looked like, the Red Hood. Terry had never seen the Red Hood up close in his two years of work with the force, soon to be three, but he had seen enough photos and the vigilante had a reputation.

"You think you can take me, I've been running my business long before you ever came to this town," said Gigante as he fired a shotgun at where the vigilante had been, but he soon found himself on his back with a fist in his face.

"Too slow," said the Red Hood, there was a wicked smirk in his voice that almost seemed to bleed through the mask. "As a man you're nothing but a piece of shit. Soon you're going to be a piece of dog shit."

"Hold it right there," said Terry as he pointed his Beretta at the infamous vigilante, his hand calm, cool, like a rock, but inside he's afraid of what that vigilante could do and would do to him.

"Please, don't try it," said the vigilante as he put his left hand up, the Kris in the other. "I don't want to or like hurting cops; especially good ones and you look like typical good cop…mixed with a Labrador. You wanted this bastard off the street. I don't want him to ever get back on them. This is whole interaction right now is us meeting in the middle, getting what we want."

"I know you think what you're doing is right…sometimes this does seem like the only way," replied Terry, his gun still trained the Red Hood and out of the corner of his eye he could see Jack getting in position to take the vigilante down from behind.

"I can here you behind me, detective," said Red Hood, not even bothering to look back at Rafferty as he brought a grenade into his hand. "Please, why don't both of you just go right now. We can take a rain check on this whole arresting me business."

"Yeah so what, you can just go butchering crime bosses," asked Rafferty with his shotgun aimed at the vigilante's back.

"Well seeing as your empty, yes, that's exactly what I'll continue to do," replied Red Hood as he pulled the pin out of the grenade. "What you see is only the dim image in a mirror. When we meet face to face, you'll understand. You lock them up and they break out to kill again, the repetitive motions that can only be described as life support at best. This city is dying from its infections and our mothers are dying in front of their children. Maybe I am crazy, but what can I do, this city perpetuates psychos, churning out criminals, hungrier than the ones before them."

"Is that how you really see the world," asked Terry as he lowered his gun, his tone took a calming aspect to it as he tried to talk the now grenade toting Red Hood down. "You didn't always believe that this was a way, but something happened and now this seems to be the only path you find yourself with."

"Something did happen to me," said Red Hood as he dropped the grenade on the floor, the safety handle popping out. "I came back from the dead and to tell you the truth, I still haven't decided on what I believe in. I just do what my rage tells me to because it's the only way to keep my head clear."

Terry immediately jumped at Red hood to push him away from the blast as Jack went to try and save both men from the blast. There was a loud flash and the sound like thunder ripping through an erupting volcano.

"Sorry about this officer," said Red Hood as he used the disorientation of the two officers to take them both down, leaving only Gigante, who was clutching his ears in pain. The sounds of S.W.A.T. cars mixed with police sirens flooded the air outside, almost like a storm to which the building was shielding its occupants from. He had enough time to kill Gigante, but now…it just seemed unimportant. "You were right though, I was rough, but I never would have killed…I was a part of something that was everything Gotham needed. I had great respect for what the uniform I wore, but it wasn't for me, I couldn't be the one who wore that suit. The more I tried the more I seemed to suffer. Hell, I don't know if this mask is right for me, but I don't know anything else. All I can see is red."

The S.W.A.T. team burst into the building only to find that it was long abandoned, with Gigante handcuffed and two officers sitting next to each other, their slumped over heads identifying them as unconscious. The entire room looked chaotic with men injured with stab wounds, a few were dead with clean headshots right between the eyes or slit throats. The Red Hood had been there, but for some reason he hadn't carried out the final big fat kill. These officers would get the credit, probably well deserved with all the evidence that they had discovered and for doing something that not even Batman had done. Stop Red Hood from killing.

Criminals are a lot like wild animals, they look for anything that could be conceived as weakness, especially someone as big an opportunist as Penquin. He had already sent in trained assassins to kill him and they had been predictable enough as to set a bomb in the closest safe house. The fact that they had set bombs throughout the entire complex made things interesting. The explosion echoed out into the night, masking the gunfire as Jason fought for his life against the assassins. They were well trained, but they were far from League of Shadow material and Jason had already improved his skills to greater abilities. Ever since he nearly got busted by Dick, Jason went on another trip around the world to improve himself until he nearly killed himself. He was determined not to be the weakest Robin. He was determined not to be that helpless boy who was beaten with a crowbar.

The first one found his arms being pulled behind him until they tore from the sockets. The next one tried to do a high flying kick only to find himself choke-slammed into the ground before elbowed in the face. The third came at Jason with a knife, but Jason was twisted his wrists until the bone tore through skin and then head butted the assailant into unconsciousness. The last tried to run but had both of his knee caps blown apart from the back by a Desert Eagle. Then it happened, a sniper's bullet tore through his left shoulder and he was saved by the last person he wanted to be rescued by, Batman. The only thing more humiliating about the situation was that he passed out before he could get away.