Eight months ago
The Red Hood is standing on the balcony of his safe house, smoking in the rain. He's only wearing sweats when his phone starts ringing. Since it's been a good night, and he thinks it might be one of his contacts, he answers.
"Hood." Nada. "Yello?"
"This… this is Superboy."
Jason's heart picks up immediately. "You found him."
The voice on the other end is strained, and Jason has a moment, a thrill of fear, an automatic panic that races up his spine. "Give it to me straight, kid."
"He's alive, functioning. Physically, he'll be okay. Otherwise, he's…different."
"Fuck. Two weeks. You'd be different, too."
"Well, not all of us have epic Bat-tech for person location or a group of adults that just believe and help out us when one of our own is missing." And the meta sounds a little more bitter than Jason would have thought him capable.
Movement inside the safe house draws his eyes, and through the shadows, he sees the bedroom door open. Dick, completely nude with scars on display and every muscle moving in a beautiful sync, wanders barefoot into the kitchen, opens the fridge, and takes out a bottle of water. Those cerulean blue eyes take in the shadows, seek Jason out, and find him through the glass door.
Jason gives him a wave to go back to bed, their own secret language that he would be back in soon. Dick cracks open the bottle and gives a suggestive shimmy of his hips as he walks back through the door. He pauses in the moonlight just long enough for Jason to see the muscles of his back and ass highlighted, his share of scars marring that perfect skin. All of it just a reminder that each of them have their own breaking points.
Maybe that's why he started coming back to the Bats, Tim may have started the process with his pain-in-the-ass tendency of the save and grab, but here with Dick, he has something more intimate, more grounding. He has a connection to his old life, and even a way to integrate his new one. It was finally time for him to start moving.
"…tortured." The clone's voice brings him back to the present, away from the svelte body going back to his bed.
"Baby Bird…" Jason lets out a breath.
"Yeah," and the clone sounds fucked, voice thick with tears. "Yeah. He's moving, says he's fine, he's dealing with it."
"He's a Bat. That's what we'd all say," but Jason still has the inclination to hop on his bike and start the drive.
No. He'd still been trying to kill his replacement not too long ago, had only recently started seeing the patterns of whatever Tim was trying to pull, showing up with the grab and save just fucking because. He'd be the last person Tim would want right now, hell any of the Bats would be the last thing he needed.
"Don't tell the others. He'll do it himself when he's ready. Please Jason. I'm not sure what he'll do. Hell, right now I'm not sure what he's going to do in the next ten minutes."
Jason is nodding, inhaling the last hit. "I got it, kid. Do me a favor and text me when he breaks from San Fran to come back to Gotham."
"No promises."
Jason barks a laugh. "Pain in the ass." Then quietly, "glad you let me know."
Kon sighs over the line, "I shouldn't because he's not part of the group anymore but you asked me to, so you know."
"Yeah. Thanks, kid. Keep an eye out."
"Will do."
Jason finally opens the sliding door and runs a hand down his face, considering what he should do before crossing the room and going back to bed.
Dick is sprawled on his side, still awake and still beautifully naked. Those eyes watch him strip back down, set his phone on the bedside table, and crawl under the covers.
Dick opens his arms without hesitating and Jason easily slides against him, pillowing himself against the Bat's cuddle buddy.
"Business?"
And here is the thing he will regret like fuck later, "yeah. Working one that ain't what it seems. Still gathering Intel."
Dick hums, arms already folding around Jason, fingertips mapping out the curve of muscle, the indent of scars, the fine and sensitive skin of throat and collar bone.
"You could talk to him about it if you're ready, you know."
And there it is, the elephant in the room. B.
"…I don't know, Big Wing." And he sighs, letting his body sink further against Dick's. "I know he's waiting, but I just need…"
"More time," and Dick gets it, still keeping up with the soothing motions. "I'm not trying to rush, just reminding you he's there."
And Jason stares at Dick through the darkness, eyes adjusted and his fingertips mapping the cut off the older man's cheekbone. He is better now, right?
Maybe, maybe soon…
Nine months later
He's got the dom on over his eyes, helmet on the roof next to him because he's all about a cig before the kid shows up. One foot is braced on the edge so he can rest a forearm on the knee while the other leg dangles off the ledge, and the cig is a good one, hitting the right places that he needs it to so his head isn't as fucked as it should be about this. But dammit, he keeps going back to that night, to the string of coulda, shoulda, woulda falling in rapid succession when it comes to that kid. Jason is pretty tight with how his life is now, more than the first time around when he was just a snot-nosed little shit in green panties; he's got people at his back, Dick and B, Roy and Kori, Tim and the Brat. Hell, he even some of the old school Titans have showed up along the way. So, yeah. Jason Todd is pretty tight now a days (he keeps one clip of the real thing along the small of his back at all times, rubber caps in the guns), and while it makes him this stupid side of content, he's waiting for the next thing, the next big bad because there would always be one, wouldn't there?
As is, he takes him time, letting himself look down on one of the bad parts of Gotham that's become his territory. One of those yawning black holes in the city where criminals don't try funny shit. It's a good thing: don't fuck with the Hood's turf, and the Hood won't break your fucking face. Fair is fair.
"You good with this?"
The voice actually startles him, the cigarette falling from his hand because he has the .45 Glock in hand to swing around and hit the shadow with the laser site.
Fuck.
"Baby Bird, sorry," and holding that piece on the kid bring back a whole lot of 'you're dead,' 'you'll never be me,' 'he let me fucking die and then put another kid in harm's way.'
Red had a disc out, already moved to the shelter of an overhang because he was pretty fucking smart to remember why he's got too many scars that aren't from any bad guys on the Bat list.
Free hand in the air, Hood eases the gun back in his holster then raises them both up. "I didn't hear you at all, Red. Not lying."
It takes a few spans of a heartbeat, longer than it would with anyone else that knew him, before Red Robin straightens out of the shadows and fits the disc away. Hoods eyes pick out other shadowed movements, a discreet tap to a spot on the harness where some other trick or gadget is sure to have existed. Another move to the utility belt around his waist (not knock out pellets, what the hell is that?) and the glint off the retractable bo in the moonlight just remind him that regardless, this is the kid with the plan.
The guy finally steps out, "I'll be louder next time." And Red had a moment there where he thought it was all going to spiral back down the rabbit hole of the Replacement time period in his career, when he'd let Jason Todd use him as a personal therapy punching bag (complete with knives and bullets along with fists). He had a thrill of fear that the Pit was going to override months of hard work; that maybe he'd overestimated how amicable they'd become.
"Asshole. The point is not to be heard," Hood just stands with his hands on his hips and a smirk.
Red cracks a half a smile and crosses his arms over his chest, "so, like I was saying before you decided on target practice, which speaking from personal experience here, you don't really need, but anyway…You good with this?" the gloved, gauntleted hand waves between the two of them.
A brow over the domino goes up into his hair line. "Good with…?"
He's sure Red is giving him a patient look under that cowl. "Hood, you and I don't have the best track record. If the Bats are pushing you into this, just know it's not—"
"Whoa," one gloved hand stops this shit before it even starts, "kid. Red. Tim . If I didn't want to be here, then you can bet your ass I wouldn't be here. You know me well enough to know that."
Red gives a fraction of movement that could be a nod.
Hood starts ticking off with his fingers, "and second, you asshat, the demon brat already said it. This isn't just about B or N looking the other way for a minute too long. Nah, this is about the four of us just letting you get your teeth get kicked the fuck in without even giving you a hand up. No, we haven't had the best play, you and me. Yeah, I put some marks on you, and fuck yeah, it bothers me. You already know that shit, don't you? That's why the wicked scar on your neck is just suddenly harder to see, right?"
Red's mouth opens, soundless and closes again. He rubs the back of his neck, lenses averted. "It bothered you. You would fixate on it whenever I was putting you back together."
And Hood just throws his hands up with a what the fuck did I do to deserve such assholes as family motion, "Christ, Tim, yeah, it bothers me. It should because I fucked up an innocent kid, Robin or not doesn't matter. You were, what sixteen the first time I shot you, when I basically slit your throat?"
He sees the motion of Tim swallowing, the tension in his muscles younger. "Something like that."
"Then you get it. I got my lot to atone for."
And that, Red just stares, wondering if he's dreaming, hallucinating because this…he never imagined he'd hear this from the Red Hood, from Jason Peter Todd.
"Besides," the guy keeps going, arms crossed over his chest, jaw tight below the domino, "out of any of them, I'm probably the one that gets where you're at right now, where you been for a while. It's not a good place, sure as shit wasn't for me and I know it's not for you. 'Cause your team? Yeah, you aren't straight with them either, and I don't have to have ringside seats to tell."
"My team is good," Red defends without thought.
"Not saying they aren't," Hood cuts across, "but they don't have idea one about you. You have to be the leader and Mr. Badass, and I get that, but how much shit have you done under their noses, Baby Bird? How many risks? How many times have you hack those sensors so they don't know if you're dying or not?"
This…is very not where he expected tonight to start (and how did Jason know he's hacked the sensors before?), and Red is definitely floundering a little in the unfamiliar waters. Because this, this is Jason, Hood, the guy he makes ' don't kill me , don't die , don't stop breathing , kick that guy in the teeth extra hard for me ' kind of jokes while he's up to his elbows in gore and trying to keep the guy from bleeding out. They don't do this in their partnership. This isn't them.
"I'm not their responsibility, Hood." I'm no one's responsibility anymore. He feels numb when he says it, easing down.
"But they can be yours and that's just how shit's gotta be?" Hood just shakes his head a little, "like I don't know you, like I didn't study you for a year while I was with Talia and after I got the hell out." Because in his head, Jason is right there in that moment again. A moment when he was too distracted with Dick and what was going on with him and Bruce to worry about the disappearance of an eighteen year old kid that kept coming into Gotham and picking Hood up when shit started getting bad.
"I have no idea what you want me to say," because this was supposed to be patrol not 'let's have a moment where we share our feelings and sing Kum-ba-ya and shit' (since he totally forgot his bongos at home). Because Red had his time patrolling with Hood before, and it never came down to what the fuck is happening right now.
"What I want you to say is, 'hey Hood. I'm going to start making an effort at not being a self-sacrificing pain-in-the-ass.' More than that, I want you to act like it. I'm not B and I'm not Dick. You and me? You and me have been on the up for a while now, which is good. Can't figure out why you've been trying with what I've done to you in the past, but I'm not that fucked up guy anymore, and I like you, kid. I do, I don't want to see you get screwed over anymore either. Me and Prince Brat agree on that."
Red throws his hands up, "dammit. Just, fuck, okay. You know, I get where you were coming from, Jay. I do. I get it. The Pit makes people just this side of insane ," both hands make a gesture that separates the line, "so you got a little messed up in the head about the whole replacement bullshit. I. Get. That. Coming back from the dead would make anyone a little testy, right? Right. I mean, it's not like you were necessarily wrong or anything and we're good now, so this whatever, I don't get."
Hood wags a finger almost in Red's face, "uh-uh. I call shenanigans on you, Baby Bird. We're not good and I was wrong. Like I said, I got my own shit to atone for, and this is where we're going to start. Because you know what? You're not the only Detective in the family. The Brat and I know we're just as responsible as B and N for you striking out, for you staying the hell gone . You think that little shit doesn't brood because you don't come back to the Cave without an air tight reason? That you won't be straight with your own damn team? You think he doesn't realize? That I don't? You had three moves ready if I started shooting at you."
"Five," Red counters quietly, more disturbed than he was comfortable admitting (it doesn't matter; Dami was right all along, Jason was right, so what the fuck is going on…).
Hood throws his hands up again, "always the guy with the plan. Always. But, look Red, that's the point here. You're conditioned and we did that, so it stands up that we break that conditioning if we've got any chance at getting trust from you. That's what we're going to do, and just like those other two assholes, me and the Brat have patience when it matters."
A little helplessly, Red just lets out a long breath, just wanting to get on with patrol and move on with the rest of his week (because really, Ra's gets antsy as fuck when his plots aren't foiled in the nick of fucking time). He throws up his hands, "okay. Okay. What do you want from me, Jay?"
The smirk isn't the usual half-evil baring of the teeth, but more…something that isn't the normal guy. "What I want, Baby Bird, you're far from ready to give. Not to me or B or N or even the kid. Here's hoping we'll eventually get there."
With that, Jason picks up the helmet and slides it on, making Red beyond relieved when he starts moving to the ledge. Finally, they can do what they do best.
After patrol sees the two sitting in the perch, laughing like dumbasses (Tim totally has an excuse because Mike is a terrible concussion, just a party pooper) over noob thief with a tire iron that actually pissed himself without getting a shot in. Seriously, isn't bladder control in the "How to be a Criminal in Three Easy Steps" Handbook?
Jason has his head in his hand, laughing so hard he snorted (I have cameras in here, asshole, I'm putting that shit on YouTube) while the pair of long necks sit empty by his elbow.
"No, dude. Not even the best one , okay?" And since he has to stay awake for a couple of hours anyway ( thanks, Mike ), he might as well tell the story about the time B slipped on ice and busted his ass right in front of Freeze and Poison Ivy, and those two were looking at each other and back to Batman like are we really seeing this? Did-did he just fall and shit because that's fucking Batman, right? Are we missing something? What the ever-loving hell? And B didn't even hesitate but slid right between them and threw gas pellets like a fucking boss. Best. Night. Ever.
"Stop, Jesus! Just stop!" Jason has tears in his eyes, one hand holding his side because he's getting a stitch or because that lead pipe hit the wrong spot, but whatever since the guy is laughing like a fool at Tim's kitchen table with dawn two hours away and they're both alive after a pretty solid night.
And now that he's kind of loopy, looking back on Jason's little 'talk' from earlier, and even though Tim just passes all that shit off as lip service, he's good sitting here just talking to the guy. It's almost like the comradery he and Dick used to have before life went to shit. Almost, but not quite.