Roy doesn't know much, but he knows that he's pretty pathetic.
He says as much to Jason, offhandedly, trying to make it seem like he's joking. (He's not sure why, but he doesn't want anyone knowing how lame he feels, how much he wonders if he's just a joke.)
"You sure you want someone like me sticking around?" He asks, experience managing to keep his voice light and teasing, as though he doesn't really care either way.
Jason sticks a cigarette into his mouth, and with a flash later, a small curl of smoke is flickering from it. Jason cups his hand around it, ever so slightly just to make sure that his palm doesn't touch the fire. "'Course." Jason replies, voice dull as he pulls the cigarette from his mouth, eyes like iron as he looks at Roy. "What, you don't want to stick with me?"
"I never said that." Roy replies as lightly as he can manage, hating the way that it makes it seem as though it were supposed to be implied.
Jason eyes Roy for a moment, eyes cool as glass, before he closes his eyes and blows a puff of smoke from his mouth. It comes out like a cloud, and Roy watches it in odd fascination. It drifts up, curling, wisps dancing in the air, then vanishes, as though it were never there. If he had blinked, he would have missed it. For a moment, Jason looks at though he wants to say something (Roy's not sure what, but the dark look swimming in his eyes and the locked way that his jaw's set gives Jason away) but merely agrees, "No, you didn't."
They sit there for a while, silence like smog in the air, Roy playing idly with a knife that he picked up from some goon, Jason smoking and watching the smoke dance with a distant type of interest, as though he's thinking but isn't quite sure how to collect his thoughts properly.
Then Jason speaks, voice hesitant, "Do you need to say it for me to know?"
His voice sounds so childish, uncertain, and Roy wonders if Jason's really asking Roy, or asking himself. Roy answers anyways, replying, "Depends. How well do you know me?" It's an old game that they play, tossing questions back and forth, avoiding answering it. Back then, it was dumb stuff, like 'What's your favorite color?'. Back then, the goal of the game was to keep from answering.
He supposes that it's still the goal. The thought makes his stomach churn, remembering the time when he refused to answer any questions. Refused to speak, period, really. It had nearly killed him.
Jason takes a long drag from his cigarette, and is deliberately slow as he lets out a small, even stream of smoke from his mouth. Roy can tell that he's thinking, the way that he carefully rolls around the cigarette between his fingers.
Well enough. Roy expects Jason to say... voice curt, clipped, as though he doesn't really care one way or another.
"I don't know." Jason finally grounds out, wounded pride obviously lining his voice, sour and possibly humiliated. "How well do I know you?"
Roy tosses the knife that he's been playing with into the air. Some light catches onto it, and it flashes for a moment, blindingly, before it falls... blade and handle flipping over another, mesmerizingly slow to an archer's eyes, but fast enough that it seems a blur. He sticks out his arm, and the knife flips around it, the edge of the blade barely touching him as it snakes around his arms and curls into his waiting fingers.
He stares at the knife for a moment, before glancing at Jason and casually tossing the knife at his head.
Jason doesn't flinch, just raises an eyebrow at Roy's antics, taking another long drag from his cigarette as he waits for Roy to answer. His hair sways slightly as the knife slides smoothly just next to his ear, but Roy hasn't cut anything, not even a single hair.
"You know me well enough that you trusted my not to cut you." Roy replies evenly, unsure if that's an answer or not, but saying it anyways, because he's not sure how to deal with the disconcerting silence.
Jason pulls the knife from the wall and casually tosses it at Roy, who catches it easily, fingers brushing ever so slightly against the blunt side before grasping the hilt. "I know your battle prowess." He replies, "But I'm no Batman. I can't analyze your every thought and action."
"Does it matter?" Roy asks casually, though his throat feels tight, like maybe it does matter if he cares about Roy beyond his ability to fight.
"'Course." Jason repeats, raising an eyebrow at Roy, a slight smirk tugging at the edges of his lips. "I suppose it depends on what we are."
Roy leans back at that, arms tucked behind his head. A teasing smile quirks up his lips as he swoons dramatically, purring, "Is this a breakup? My, my, Jacy, I thought that we were together!"
Jason rolls his eyes at that, but there seems to be some sort of relief in the way that his shoulders slump back down, like some tenseness that Roy hadn't noticed before had been drained away. "Seriously," He laughs, and Roy feels a odd sense of pride. Jason's come a long way from the uptight boy thirsting after blood. "What is this?"
Roy's smile slips away, and he wonders (then, and for a long time afterwards) what this all is. What they all are. Mere insects? Part of a greater picture? Protagonists, antagonists?
"We're Jason and Roy." He replies, his voice a lot more confident than he feels as he straightens his back, thoughtfully tucking his knees up against his chin. "You're Red Hood, and I'm Arsenal. Simple as that."
Jason seems uncertain, his fingers crumpling the cigarette, smoke gasping for breath as it escapes between his fingers. "Is it that simple?" He wonders, his fist unraveling, fingers like a spider's legs, and the cigarette falls to the ground, light ashes drifting after it.
Roy stares at Jason's hand, sharp eyes catching onto the burn scraping across the palm of his hand. "Why can't it be?" He asks, hands tightening into fists, fingers turning pasty white from the pressure.
"Because it never is." Jason stares at the crumpled cigarette on the ground, eyes unfaltering, cool and even, hands shoved into his pockets.
Roy tears his eyes away from the cigarette on the ground, and steps forwards, one foot ahead of another, like a Native American, "So you're saying that I can't just be Roy? Am I less than that, or more than that? Aren't I just Roy?"
Jason's still staring at the ground, eyes flickering to the ash on his shoes, refusing to look at Roy. His jaw's locked, like he isn't sure.
Roy's right up next to Jason now, toes practically touching. "What am I, Jay?" He asks, voice tired and soft, curious and yet too weary to care.
"You're more than 'just' Roy." Jason turns to meet Roy in the eyes.
"How?" Roy demands, his voice rising, fists unfurling. "How am I more than just this? How are we any more than this?" Late, too late, he realizes that he's included Jason, which is wrong, because Jason is more than he'll ever be. Kori and Jason are more than Roy could ever hope to be.
"I'm nothing much," Jason snaps, voice also rising, posture straightening like it does whenever he's around Bruce. "But you and Kori are so much, you two have always been there, and you keep saying stuff like you'll always be there which is so dumb, because then how am I supposed to react when you are gone? You're my friend, you're family, I don't know what the..." He cusses, foot stomping on the cigarette and grounding it harshly onto the floor. "I don't know what you are, but you're something that's fucking important, so there!"
Jason swears again, hands snapping up as he pulls out another cigarette, and Roy steps back, suddenly realizing that Jason's never thought of him as pathetic.
Roy doesn't know much.
But if Jason thinks so highly of him, then he must be something.
A/N: So, an Outlaws fic... I know, nobody's even really in this fandom anymore, but I really love how Kori is comfortable with her own skin, how Jason's more than just a vengence, Batman-hating dunce, how Roy was suicidal, and I just had to write something. I didn't write Kori because I knew that I couldn't do her justice, but I just love Roy so much and I needed Jason to bounce Roy off of. SO, I hope that it was okay?