Disclaimer: Anything recognizable such as Batman or Gotham City belongs to D.C. Comics or Bob Kane the original creators. In no way am I making any profit off of this.
This is merely written out of love and for leisure/fun as a fan nothing more.
However I do lay claim to my Original Characters such as Wendle AKA: Queen Jollie or Zoey, and the basic plot line idea direction.
Everything else belongs to some one else the lucky b..as…t (ahem.)
This is rated M or MA.
Material can get dark so if you are susceptible to triggers or cannot handle such material in fiction please find something else to read.
Also there will be no warnings of character deaths. If you do not like that fact please find another fanfic writer's stories to follow. There are plenty.
Lastly: Knowledge of D.C. Universe/Multi-verse is faulty at best. If characters deviate from cannon behavior into what is called OOC attitudes? It is for fanfiction purposes/character growth or it is because I am combining things in a mish mash of all the stuff I've seen or read plus forgotten into this…whatever this is.
Right. End of Disclaimer now for Quotes:
"Was that your best shot? I told you I'm immortal there's nothing that can kill me. I'm going to live till the end of time and beyond forever!"
"Beyond forever? You should know that's impossible. Everything in the universe starts somewhere and ends somewhere. There are no exceptions to the rule. There's no forever and you're not special. Your gonna go the way of all flesh. Now it's time I put you out of my misery."
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"You've killed him. Now will you help me bring my life to an end?
My nightmare is now over. Thank you for letting me rest in peace."
"Just relax. Now you'll have the sweetest of dreams."
"Yes. I'm going to dream of you."
-from the animated 3 part series: Cyber City Oedo 808.
One can watch via YouTube.
Chapter 9. One
Beep.
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Beep.
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Beep.
His alarm clock must be broken? It was so soft he could barely hear it this morning? He let out an internal sigh. Battery must be dying, huh, figures. Well nothing else for it, he would just have to pick a new one up at the store on the way home after work. Darn. That alarm clock had been a present from Barbara. Call him a sentimental old fool, but he had really loved that trusty little clock. He had kept it for? Gosh. How time flies. Seven years, just about?
Beep.
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'Hm. Funny how Barbara hasn't complained about it going off yet? Usually she's up before me, nowadays. I can picture her making us breakfast, it'll probably be the oatmeal, she wanted to use the blueberries up.….or maybe she went back to her dorm? I thought she wanted to stay home this weekend? I'm so tired.'
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Beep.
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'Barbara?
Why? Does everything feel wrong?'
He tried to start twisting himself out of bed, but found it impossible to move? It almost felt like he strapped down by restraints of a sort? Plus he was having a hard time moving his feet? Why couldn't he feel his legs? Where was he? What's going on?
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"Tell me straight Doc. How bad is it?" said a thick voice.
"I really shouldn't pass on any information without the consent of a relative present detective.." answered another softer feminine one.
"Listen I hear ya Doc, but the Commish and I, we've been partners now for well-over eighteen years. Please he's my best friend hell, t'me he is family. Maybe the only I really got left. So whatever it is, tell me cause I can handle it," retorted the first voice seriously.
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Beep.
'Harvey?
Why's Harvey Bullock talking to a Doctor? Wait. More importantly why am I overhearing Harvey and a Doctor talk? What's going on? Where am I?' he thought as he tried moving his head. Everything felt heavy and sort of fuzzy. He was relieved when his head wiggled a bit as he felt the pillows shift behind his skull. However, horror of horrors there was some sort of tube thing stuck in his nose! Plus some other machine was over his mouth, pushing air into him, 'God! That feels weird!' he thought as he began trying to open his eyes. 'Gotta figure out what in tarnation is going on?' he thought his frustration mounting.
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Beep. Beep.
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Beep. Beep.
"Doc! Doc! Yo Doc! Get in here! He's waken up! Oh Thank God! Yo Jim? Jim can ya hear me? Jim? Pal!?"
James Gordon slowly opened his eyes to the emotional mixed sight of a dull white spinning ceiling fan that needed some serious dusting, a room filled with far too much sunlight for an early morning in Gotham and a stray tear or two escaping his longtime partner detective Harvey Bullock's haggard face.
As the other man looked like he was ready to fall down on top of him in ecstatic joy, Jim's eyes finally took in the source of the beeping sound that he had assumed was his alarm clock to the left of him. It wasn't welcoming. Multiple hospital machines and an IV unit he was plugged too met his gaze, along with the unhappy sensation of a catheter in him and enough tubing to make him fear briefly in his slightly morphine induced state that he was to be the next Inspector Gadget?!
A most unpleasant wake up call indeed.
"H..ar.! Har!" he tried to say, but his voice was weak? Just how long had he been out? What had happened to him? What did he last remember? He stretched his mind let's see, he'd gone to work, no wait he'd taken a day off? Yeah that's right. He had needed the day to prepare for something? The department had even asked him to compose a small speech for the celebrat. . .ion…. 'OH GOD!'
'OH GOD!' he thought!
"OHhwahODD!" is what actually came out of his mouth as it all finally rushed back to him! The observatory burning! The mayor shot! The gunfire! The screams! Those monsters in black! The JOKER! The JOKER'S CANNON! BARBARA! WHERE WAS BARBARA!?
'WHAT THE HELL AM I DOING IN THIS BED!' Jim Gordon screamed at himself in his head, as his panic grew into hyperventilating hysteria. Oblivious to the sudden thrashing of his own arms and the rising sound of the heart monitor beeping in the room as his panic intensified all he thought were the words, 'Where is she? Where is she?' repeatedly as his agitation escalated especially because for the life of him he couldn't get his body to sit up?
'Something's wrong,' whispered a small voice.
He was about to really lose it when a pair of strong familiar callused hands grabbed his sporadically moving arms and gently but firmly pushed them back down to the hospital bed. Harvey's loud but gentle words slicing through the blind fog that had consumed his mind as if the other man were the beacon of a lighthouse, "Whoa! Whoa! Jim! Easy! Easy! She's okay man! S'okay! Were alive! Barbara's fine. She's alive. Ya hearing me? Your l'iddle girl is just fine. Easy Jim. Easy."
Relief.
Respite.
Gratitude.
Such anyone ever known such pure wonderful sweetness as one Jim Gordon, felt right now? It didn't seem possible. He highly doubted it. Maybe, that was why he didn't even register the sudden overly closeness of his big burly cigar smelling friend holding him as best he could in an awkward hug as gallons of tears just out of nowhere began pouring out of his eyeballs. Nothing but those sweet words delivered in his friends voice that Barbara; his baby girl was alive, ALIVE, mattering to him! Male pride be damned!
"Shhh. Easy their Jim. S'okay buddy," repeated Harvey as Jim felt himself completely let go, his joy so overwhelming that the sound of his sobs filled the whole hospital room as he wept into his friends shoulder, but he couldn't stop crying now even if he wanted too. All Jim could think was that his family was safe!
'Honey, I did it. I kept my promise. The baby's okay, our baby gal's okay,' thought Jim as he felt his one hand clench his friends broad shoulder as tightly as possible. For a split second he worried that maybe this was a dream? Maybe he was just really drugged up on morphine? For this felt too kind to be real. He had lived through a night in Hell only to awaken to the sweet taste of Eden; his most cherished person alive and according to his friends gentle repetitive assurances apparently doing extremely well, all things considered.
'Funny', he thought, right now his brain felt like a puddle of mush, he couldn't even think of anything else at the moment much less 'things' that had to be 'considered'. Well, save the fact his friend could do with a shower big time and needed to change that rustic brand of cigars but who the hell cares?!
Who cares!? Suddenly, Jim Gordon wanted to laugh! Lord did he want to laugh!
So that's what he did.
Jim Gordon laughed. He was crying an entire river, and he sounded like a strange mix between a choking frog because of the tubes still in his nose and the oxygen mask muffling him, crossed with a demented hyena but what did it matter!
All that mattered was that he was alive!
Barbara was alive!
His friend Harvey was!
He himself was!
'Oh sweet graceful Lord! Thank you! Thank you!' thought Jim as he took in the morning rays of sunlight that lit the room in again as best he could through watery vision. Giggling like a loon, he heard the simple happy sound of Harvey joining him, his longtime partners eyes equally shining, and so it was.
That was how the day after their night in Hell began. Tears, laughter and the sweetest brightest sense of relief echoing in the room for just the simple satisfied pleasure of being alive, unbeknownst to the two men it was echoed in nearly every other patient's room of Gotham's General Hospital.
Everyone who had been lucky enough to survive the disaster the night before was shouting out a thanks for Life. Families were uniting as fast as possible to reach other loved ones. The sound of mobile phones and pay phones chimed constantly. Friends reached out to friends and acquaintances alike. Open communication was the day's slogan! Such a far cry was the city from the destruction that it had shown before in even harder times, such as after the earthquake, long passed. One could feel the brotherly love, from beggar to star, when it came to the human compassion not just displayed in the hospital but on the streets as well.
Which is why perhaps Jim Gordon wasn't too far off in wondering briefly if he was dreaming?
For despite the overwhelming tide of bliss that the citizens of Gotham all over exuded, not all were swept away into the supposed "grace" that so many others were caught in.
Across the hospital room standing in the doorway watching and listening to the two men was a young Doctor holding to her breast a clipboard with the results of her most important patients diagnosis, but for the life of her she couldn't bring herself to interrupt them.
She could barely get herself to step into the room, like many of her fellow physicians, and champions of health she had been up the entire night relentlessly working to save as many lives as she could. Including the man known to her as Commissioner James Gordon.
Her tears unlike the other two people present were not due to joy but rather frustration. Though she hid it well. To her and many others in her shoes, it was far too soon or it had been too long of a night, to be filled with delight. Grateful, sure, but this was not a sunrise to mark the beginning of an everlasting peace to come, no matter what the survivors of the worst thought.
It was a taste.
This small morsel of relief was only a flicker of something greater that Gotham still desperately needed.
A momentary bliss, that's all this morning was.
'A compress,' she thought irritably, 'but not a stitch.'
It wasn't going to last.
This 'calm' wasn't going to last.
Those responsible were still out there anybody with half a brain knew that.
For true peace, something more powerful, something else she couldn't put words too was needed but what such a thing was, and what it would entail was beyond her.
She was just an average Doctor, existentialism wasn't her field specialty, and psychology hadn't been her strong suit.
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Shaking her head of thoughts, the young doctor stood there in the doorway waiting, while trying not to collapse from her own exhaustion and tried to savor the small tidbit of bittersweet happiness that her patient was for now doing well.
The clipboard felt so heavy, in her arms, but she wouldn't do it yet. She wouldn't spoil his obvious happiness at being alive so soon no matter how unprofessional her hesitation was.
How could she?
When in such ugly plain bold print on her clipboard was the word: PARAPLEGIA.
No. She would wait. Maybe she would come back later, go get some water first. 'Yes', she concluded to herself as she began to turn on her heal.
"Yo! Doc! Look! Isn't it great! The Commissioner's awake! Tell them news crews Commissioner James Gordon is alive and awake!" cried Detective Bullock with joyful gusto; "Gotham will be on its feet in no time! We'll chase down those bastard terrorists and kick em all outta town! Come on Doc! Get in here work yer magic and get my pal standing again!"
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"Doc?" asked Bullock.
As the Doctor stood frozen in the doorway, her arms tightly holding the clipboard, her shoulders ever so subtly shaking she gritted her teeth and tried her very best to keep her professional composure. Before she slowly turned back around to the room. Her eyes met her patients.
Slowly the huge smile on Jim Gordon's face began inch by inch to trickle away.
'My reality check, huh,' thought Jim as he felt a stone's worth of fear form in the pit of his stomach. Still his daughter was alive. His baby girl was good, so with great effort Jim Gordon brought a tiny reassuring smile back to his face and with the energy he had he lifted his left hand meekly to wave the struggling Doctor in.
Trying with all his might to ignore the small whispering in his head that, 'Yes something is permanently wrong.'
…...(Gotham City Streets)
"Goddamn," there just wasn't any other word for it. The town was a complete wreck and coming from him that was saying something. Jason Todd aka The Red Hood sipped his coffee as he surveyed what he could from one of the six coffee shops in town that was actually busting balls enough to be open today. He suspected it was the owner's own desperate need for normalcy after what was now being dubbed by the media the "STAR MASSACRE", but whatever the reasons were for the shop to be open Jason was appreciative. So thankful for his cup of good hot Joe that he had a brief thought to "donate" from a most "gracious party" legally or not a nice sum to show just how much, but after another sip decided against it. Today would be crazy enough as it was. Without adding any extra mud to his already dirty shoes.
'Although now would be the time to do it, wouldn't it?' he thought.
The ex-sidekick/hero, (emphasis on EX), was now a full term mercenary rogue and damn proud of it. Who had already found himself overloaded today with stopping scheming sadistic idiot plots since the wee happy hours of 5:00 am to oh about 20minutes ago this morning. Before he entered this fine establishment to get a nice small rejuvenating refreshment from breaking thug's fingers apart.
'Ah,' he thought as he sipped his drink, 'yeah, nothing like some good hot coffee after crippling morons and asses alike. Just about every sick F*&k without a heart is trying to pull a damn scam off today. Not that I entirely don't get it. Cause on the one hand it's not a bad idea seeing as how the GCPD & the military are up to their asses in shitsville with the 'Observatory Fall Out.' On the flipside though, the num nuts have forgotten about the rest of the CIA much less CADMUS, or any other 3rd party interest.' He scoffed sarcastically as his eyes ran around the room, scanning people just to be safe, it paid to be cautious, speaking of payment, 'At least Waller is paying me extra this time, otherwise I wouldn't even be in this hellhole of a city. Damn nostalgia,' he sighed as he relaxed a little more into his chair. The room was good, and so far the scanner in his right retna was reporting 'clear' in nice blue letters so he aloud himself to ease up a bit.
Just the thought of his 'current employer' and the scum he had to smother earlier was enough to sour his taste buds and make him feel like his coffee needed another packet of sugar, "Damn Vultures," he grumbled, "Damn manipulative woman.' For a moment he allowed himself to ponder how the hell he above all people had ended up willingly working for Amanda Waller out of the rest of the world, 'Waller for Christ's sake!' he internally shouted at himself, yet should it truly be that surprising?
His feelings on the woman who over the last four years he had spent half his time employed by were constantly shifting. Famous in her own social circles and now infamous from her work in the Agency to Task Force X, to her new Suicide Squad Activities were putting her on the map as down right dangerous, and making her without a doubt legendary in the years to come. She was a lethal force in her own manner, and had held her own not only with Batman, The Justice League, Superman, but villains like Lex Luthor who even Jason was nervous about tangoing with and he had been Bat-Trained as he preferred to put it.
Amanda Waller hadn't had any martial arts training that he knew of and even if she did she was too overweight to pull any punches. Weight aside that hadn't stopped the woman, if anything it added to her persona. Making her seem like some calm imposing mountain and not in the same scary way the Batman had been to him growing up, but still oddly intimidating?
'Maybe it's some sort of primordial matron figure thing?' he wondered before snorting a 'hn.'
'Bruce,' he reflected was at least when Jason had been young, more like a storm or the ocean, 'always brooding, calm for a little while and then next thing you know your being sucked in a giant whirlpool, yet predictable if you had spent enough time with him. Being with Bruce is like being a sailor, all hands on deck, so the boat doesn't tip!' he mused.
Amanda on the other hand was if anything else steady, like stone and tough as diamond. She was similar to Batman in that she was firm in her beliefs, nothing could really sway the black woman once she made up her mind but unlike Batman, perhaps the most important thing to Jason was that she wasn't an idealist, but a realist.
It had taken him quite awhile to figure & distinguish that difference out.
More directly, she got her hands dirty. She did her own foul dirty work when she could more than Batman ever had, without any regretful angst and without even having to lay one good punch, or receive one bloody jaw from anybody.
That was something that both secretly amazed him and bothered the hell out of him.
'Amanda, Amanda, bo banda, fe fie bo..' he hummed quietly.
Oh he had gotten to know her quite well now over the past four years. God forbid he ever admit too her, the very annoying, and very alarming fact that he had begun to deeply enjoy being her shadow, sharing in the dirty work she called him in on and being her eyes or more, in some cases. He wasn't even surprised when she dialed him anymore? Christ sometimes he even looked forward to her damn phone calls, strange feelings of a new sort of compadrid or comradeship stirred within him, and he didn't know what the f88k to do about it. Honestly he tried not to think about it, but hell he was 95% positive she already knew how he felt and that there was something mutual on her side, give or take, developing no matter how hard they both..well he at least, tried to keep the whole 'gig' between them objective.
He frowned as he admitted to himself that he never had been able to learn that 'objectivity' lesson from, 'Bruce'.
'Too much of a hothead' he could hear the old words multiple people had used to describe him for years repeating in his skull. Even dear 'bossy wossy' Amanda would tease him when she was in a good mood by calling him, 'Hot Shot' His code name under her was even: HS.
Mortification material at it's finest, but he just couldn't get angry about that part of himself anymore. Sometimes he wondered if he should have been? It seemed silly too now though, maybe it was because he was older? Or maybe it was because now after four years officially established in his new life out and far away from the Bat Cave or Gotham's Orphanage, free from so many others mighty, some near impossible, expectations he was able to really come to terms with the truth of his own persona.
He had come into his own. His own self-goals and individual personality; and to think that working for Amanda Waller, someone who was so at odds with his former father/mentor figure was the one to really help him fill his nice shiny new merc boots?
He expected he would be wondering about how the hell he had gotten to this point for the rest of his life. Oddly though he was okay with where things were, at least the majority of the time he was. What he wasn't okay with was being right here right now.
Back in godforsaken (why the hell isn't this city gone yet) Gotham was to him, Jason Todd in another life Robin, like drinking corn syrup that had been spiked with arsenic. It just wasn't good for him, end of story. All this city had done for him was bring him nothing but pain and a sea of broken dreams. Even now, when things had clearly gone the 100% awol the ex-robin couldn't find it in him to care even a smidgeon for the place. Okay. No that wasn't entirely true, he cared. He cared about the children who would now be orphans, he cared about the woman at another table grieving in the shoulder of a friend quietly across from him in this very coffee shop. He cared about everyone who had loss a family member thanks to the STAR MASSACRE or maybe it would be better to say that he could in a simple way deeply empathize with them.
After all once upon a time, he too had loss family, more then once.
Loss was the one thing The Red Hood understood.
Loss is what made Jason Todd such an emotional loose cannon.
It was also his defining difference between him and Batman.
'Damn this city,' he thought. He just couldn't get himself to not think about the older man no matter how hard he tried, whenever he was here. F&&k he couldn't get himself to not think about "any" of "them" when he was here. 'It is distracting and cumbersome being back in this city that is what it is.' He stated in his head.
The worst part is that the city made old wounds resurface & reopen.
For example, one would think that if the concept of loss was so much a part of Bruce Wayne and Jason Todd that the two would get along swimmingly. It seemed like a no brainer to put them in the same box and yeah for a while it had been good. For a long while it had worked just fine.
'Once upon a time I wore the red & green with pride,' he thought sadly, 'Once, I really did believe in it. Once it was all true and seemed so simple'
The Batman and his plucky sidekick Robin that's what they had been.
"Two peas in a pod…chh," he mumbled as he took another sip of Joe.
Light blue eyes gazed out the window to the streets outside, as melancholy settled in. Things had started well at first, between the lonely billionaire who had loss his parents at the ripe old age of eight and the young ten year old who had suffered an equal pain. After members of Two-Face's gang had murdered his father, his mother had succumbed to drugs. It hadn't been a pretty ride, and even now years later he still struggled with nightmares. Bruce Wayne, Batman, in general had been like a guardian angel coming to swoop down and save his miserable ass after the tragedy that was his folks. And some part of him would he conceded always be forever grateful for that. No matter how hard he fought the Dark Knight currently. The child in him would always, always be thankful.
There in though, lie the very heart of the problem, betwixt him & Bruce. For children grow up, and Jason wasn't an exception to this rule.
In many ways the Batman was the pinnacle of what it means to be an adult. In many ways he would agree that out of all the members of The Justice League, Batman was the big brother of that crew, hands down, fair and square, sure enough. Plenty of times a young Jason had seen his fair share of wisdom from Bruce passed on to others as Batman and his advice for many had been excellent at least 80% of the time. There was a reason why Batman had been for many what some would call a 'guiding light' that had people like Commissioner Gordon, all but devoted to Bruce. That…'Justified Self-Righteous Leadership', that 'Unshakeable Faith' or whatever else to call it, was indeed hard to dispute, when so many committed too it and when it was executed correctly, and Bruce was the best in the biz next to 'Supy'. No question there.
The thing is. . .
It wasn't perfect.
There was a major flaw in Batman's Way of Life.
One giant error that was hard to even realize until you were hit with the worst of humanity. Then it became blaringly obvious at least it had to Jason Todd? Sure Batman put away criminals. Sure he saved the city, and hundreds of lives. Done a ton of wonderful heroic things against extraordinary odds. Was more than a philanthropic saint to the city, this was all true.
"Problem is," thought Jason harshly, "It NEVER STOPS!"
They would clean the city. Stop the bad guys and then one week later, those same bad guys would escape legally or otherwise. They would be out of Arkham, and where would that leave Batman and Robin, he'll tell you where! Right back at square one, that's where! Over and over and over again, as a teen he'd lost count of just how many times they had actually taken down Scarecrow. Hell it had gotten so routine he had done it once all by his lonesome self at the ripe old age of fourteen!
'FRIGGIN FOURTEEN!' he thought for God's sake!
Once upon a time before it had practically become a social status equivalent to twitter, if not a blossoming popularity contest, thanks to The Teen Titans and the oh so "secret" Young Justice Squad (yeah he knew all about that little shindig operation, "Nightwing" was running! HA. "Secret my Ass!" he thought scornfully) a kid beating up bad guys who had guns! GUNS! Had been frowned upon and you know what rightly so!
Back in his day he and Richard both had to not only avoid bad guys but concerned protestors who had wanted the government to snatch him away from what they called and he quotes, "A life of extreme violence."
'For damn good effing reason!' he reflected, well aware of his own hypocrisy, it couldn't be helped, though. Those protestors had been right. In their own naïve cautious and overly concerned way they had been absolutely correct. If he had been taken away from Bruce whose to say he wouldn't be living a gentler lifestyle? Whose to say that things really would have turned out so bad, if he had not in his youth picked up crime fighting as a hobby instead of something normal like collecting stamps? Older now and getting wiser by the day he wasn't always sure he wouldn't have chosen differently had he known what was to come in his future, but there in lie the way of madness. For constantly asking, "what if?" doesn't do anyone any good.
"One makes their choice and then you learn to live with it," that's what Amanda Waller had told him the day everything had really begun to change between them. It was those words that had made their relationship transform from just a business only shtick to something a little bit more personal. That philosophy of hers was also one more reason as to how he had come to respect her.
Amanda never looked back, she kept her eyes forward. Her past unlike Bruce's stayed past and she didn't waste time brooding on it, or mourn over it. Her eyes saw only the future, and she knew the importance of letting go.
Bruce didn't know how to do that, not really, not yet.
However that didn't have anything to do with how he had begun to fret over all these "new young heroes/heroines" popping up out of nowhere, head over heals foaming at the mouth "in love" with the whole "Hero Gig". Oh no. His own history be damned, it didn't stop him from not wanting to shoot somebody at all when it came to his frustration towards those idiotic kids. 'They should all be in school and I dunno building muther f&&king birdhouses!' he thought irritably, 'Or learning how to skateboard or I dunno camping! Yeah. I wonder how many actually know how to fish the traditional way?!' Watching the media on the day the "young uns" had been allowed to enter the so-called Hall of Justice beyond the "plate of glass" had been shear torture, because he knew the truth.
That one-day, for one of them if not all of them, the rainbow hippie happy perfect world order glasses of the "Justice Superhero Clubhouse" would come ripping off! Hurting like hell on earth, it would happen. One of them would be beaten and broken down by the reality of human nature. It would hurt like a crowbar to the head for whichever unlucky child got the 'lottery ticket' and yet nothing could be done to prevent it.
It was only a matter of time.
Of this he knew for certain because it had happened to him.
One bad day, he had been woken up.
'In a weird way those little wannabe super-villains babes, those young badies in training are luckier, like that punk Klarion or that girl Jinx or that other Icicle Brat,' he thought moodily, ' Funny how nobody but us 'Rogue Types' see's it? The inevitable. Ha. I can hear both sides arguing, oh irony, but what the villains don't know is that where as we 'heroes' have to learn how to fall, and learn how to fail. They've already seenthe worst. If those troubled kids had just a bit more light. A bit more of a push in the right direction, like me, all they would have to do is go up and voila some nice effing stability. A healthy modicum of balance! Hard as effing hell for everyone involved to get there but it would work! It could effing work!"
He let out a heavy sigh in frustration.
It was true though, because he himself was a living example of that uncharted, and foolishly underestimated Grey territory in their world, so too was Amanda Waller, so too was Jim Gordon, albeit that guy was a lighter shade, but that wasn't the point. The point was that the 'Grey Power' of their world may be ignored but it was the only vital force of power making things real. Making things matter, cause it was the people in the grey area of their world who were really living full lives. Who were actually taking in knowledge from both sides and getting things done, making new medicines, new goals and reaching new understandings. They were the real entities keeping this little planet in the universe glued together, alive and safe.
Those quiet individuals not on either side of the black and white, hero, villain super-powered line were the ones truly carving this world's course and it never failed to drive him up a wall, with how blind all the so called Heroes and Misguided Villains like Luther, were to that single solitary truth? He didn't understand how they could all be so smart but so stupid. How the obvious was just being glossed over? All so that they could play a bigger version of friggin, 'battle ship or stratego!' Why he himself could have just as much become a full time ex- super-villain in his youth as much as an ex-hero.
He let out a small sigh, as he watched another ambulance drive past the shop.
Bruce's intervention had positively affected him, but it hadn't stopped Life from kicking his ass. He could recall it like yesterday.
The day it had ended.
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{((Optional music: watch?v=b9FbVSZdtfk))}
Her name had been Gloria.
He had met her at a bus stop out of uniform just by fates strange chance. It had been raining hard and she had been pretty. Close to his own age, young and silently crying in a way to echo the rain that only some woman can do.
Beautifully.
She had been so beautiful.
Perhaps it had been her youth? Or just the passion of his own?
That had made him care for her instantly, without even a word said between them?
Maybe it had just been a simple case of humanity? A sense of need for another or the sense that someone needed him, an instinctual ingrained empathy to stop someone else from suffering? He hadn't even fully registered the words, "Are you okay?" escaping his lips until after she had raised her pretty violet eyes to look at him.
Some nights he wished she never had.
He wished in the darkest corners of his heart that she had just kept her head down, and ignored him, but that's not life.
Besides they don't call it love at first sight for nothing.
In that moment, in that time and place he would have done whatever it took to gain her attention.
For she had been so broken and so beautiful like a china doll.
Utterly fragile
She had immediately apologized for her tears. Her small little hands madly swiping at her eyes to hide her broken heart, no doubt embarrassed. Repeatedly she apologized for troubling him. As if he had had troubles then? At that point he had been free boating with a bloody millionaire. Wayne Manor was pretty damn close to the Rittz!
Lord knows he hadn't had any problems.
Not like hers.
She hadn't spoken much. She hadn't told him what was going on or what was wrong.
Hadn't given anything away as to why she was crying.
Those details hadn't mattered to him, selfish as it may sound.
Not at that time.
All that he had wanted then was to stop her tears and hear her voice.
So.
After the smallest of conversations, when she couldn't seem to hold her tears back and the floodgates reopened, he had gently slowly brought a complete near stranger into a hug.
She had sobbed for hours in his arms, until near exhaustion. They had watched their bus come and go and they had sat together even after her tears had dried for hours.
Just one nice long hug.
When the last bus came, he had sat and watched as she had risen to her feet with great effort, her violet eyes indecipherable as she thanked him, and he had felt a part of his heart go with her.
Particularly when in a spur of the moment decision, right before she had left him.
She had bent down and given him a kiss.
One kiss.
One innocent perfect kiss.
One.
Then in a blink she was on the bus.
Then she was gone.
Words don't do that time at the bus stop justice nor those precious small moments they had spent together.
How he wished that was all there was to it.
No one knew that. He had never spoken of those moments with Gloria with anyone. Not even with the numerous counselors Alfred and Bruce had forced him to see after the next series of events.
No. That time with Gloria he had kept to himself.
It was his and hers.
Theirs alone.
Some things are just too sacred to share with anyone else.
.
.
.
A couple of weeks later after they had met, he and Bruce had gotten the call from Commissioner Gordon. About a man named Felipe Garzonas, a serial rapist who had escaped, that for whatever damn ass faulty accursed excuse of the system, had managed to get out of prison and back on the street.
Gloria had been his victim twice already.
If only….
.
.
Batman and Gordon had been talking, sharing facts as was their custom, while he had just stood there fooling around, being Robin, already irritated by the fact that the guy had escaped after multiple crimes. He hadn't immediately put it together, until Gordon had said her name and started describing her.
Her rare violet eye color in particular.
How to describe the fear he had felt for her at the moment of his realization?
Or the great need to go and save her from the beast?
He couldn't even really remember how he had found her so quickly. One minute he was on the roof listening to Gordon the next he was flying over rooftops, literally flying and then he was there.
Her home.
He had barged in like a Neanderthal and ..
And….
..
.
Gone.
Hung.
Dead.
Alone and Dead.
.
.
.
Taken away by her own justifiable fear & another's promise of pain.
With no one else in range to say soon enough, "Stop, it'll be okay."
Or
"I'm here to protect you."
Or Just
"I love you."
Tragedy.
.
.
Loss.
.
.
What do we all really know of any one else's pain?
One Kiss.
One Hug.
One.
Some say makes a world of difference.
He prayed every day that it had.
He prayed that his Gloria
Had, had some comfort in her life.
Something good at least once.
At least…
From him.
If only he had stayed hugging her.
If only he had chased after her.
He had chased and stalked plenty of crooks?
So why hadn't he her?
Why hadn't he chased the one person who could have mattered most?
There is no answer to that question.
Instead, that ugly thing in a man's skin had appeared, the things that sinful walking taint had said in the presence of her body hanging there, about her, were too unclean to repeat. What was worse was the continued filth the thing had spewed and promised to inflict upon other innocent girls if he, Robin, didn't leave and finally the heinous act that monster had dared to commit in front of him.
Nothing could forgive or excuse such evil desecration.
That foul monstrosity had dared to touch and fondle her corpse.
Had laughed at his shock.
Mocked his pain and horror.
That swine gloated as he touched what he shouldn't.
That fiend who had repeated his crimes, would continue to repeat his crimes, was not human.
Did not deserve to be called such.
It deserved nothing.
Hate.
Fury.
Rage.
Madness.
Savagery.
That was what he remembered. That and as he pummeled the bastard's face in, Gloria crying, her head on his shoulder, the tremble of her shoulders, the scent of her hair, and her beautiful gentle violet eyes.
Her soft lips.
Her voice.
Her tears.
The worm had begun to beg him to stop, but how many Jason had wondered at the time had asked the very same of the worm? Never to be heard.
"Stop! I give up! Spare me! Stop please!" it had said.
"No."
He hadn't stopped, not until the F&&k bled a gallon at least, then as the worm stumbled back closer and closer to the window. A thought occurred to him. A terrible thought. He would admit he had been physically shaking at that point. Still high on anger, but even if Bruce had arrived then and there.
Nothing would have changed the fact that Robin had died.
The pure bloodless hero inside him, the naivety, died.
It had died with her.
The very second he had seen her hanging there.
Loss does strange things.
A few seconds and his mind had already chosen, there would be no courtroom, no jury, no therapy, no life-sentence, no prison sentence, no Arkham, and no escape. Not for the fiend that day.
There was only a worm and a Robin.
Killing isn't right.
It should always be a last resort.
A final option.
It is a barbaric trait in humanity though, a survival tool, more it is a nerve that exists in each human only for necessity.
It is a part of us.
It is also addictive, which is why it is so vital to understand it.
To acknowledge it.
When it is not respected or played with or overly used or done without correct cause, without necessity, that's when things can go too far.
When the innocent suffer at its hands.
That is when evil is born.
What he did that day was wrong but understandable.
It did not make him good.
It was not worthy of praise, and certainly hadn't made anything better.
Vengeful?
Perhaps.
It didn't bring Gloria back.
What it had been…was necessary.
He had pushed that thing violently out a 22-story window and had stopped its pathway of destruction.
Despite what Bruce had assumed.
It had not pleased him.
It had only granted him one small peace.
.
Just one.
That no other girl would ever suffer the way Gloria had by that thing.
He had not saved Gloria but maybe he had saved someone?
Maybe…he had at least given her soul closure?
Maybe that was why, as Bruce was shouting at the top of his lungs at him for disobeying, and not following procedure, he had felt the strangest sensation?
Only Bruce and himself were in that cold, splintered, bloody room.
But he would swear even now..
That as the tears had fallen down his face…
As his body had trembled with silent sobs…
A familiar pair of petite arms with the scent of rain and the smell of violets..
Had held him in a gentle loving hug and had given him on his cheek..
One
More
Soft
Ghostly
Kiss.
(Optional Music End)
.
.
He let out a long drawn out sigh.
Everything had changed after that day. Batman had forbidden him from ever donning the suit again until some undisclosed time. Richard hadn't known what to think, and after only about three times of trying to talk to him about the ordeal, had decided to go the old, 'We'll never speak of it again' route. Alfred had insisted upon him going to therapy, although how the hell can someone go talk to a therapist when half the conversation has to be blacked out cause, oh let's see, he was an underage vigilante's side kick at the time?!
Seriously Alfred?
Ah, but the old man's heart hadn't been in a bad place, out of all of them Alfred was the one he missed the most. Probably because he had spent more time with Alfred then he had with Bruce, frankly. Bruce had been completely rattled over the whole thing. Which coming from him was pretty ironic considering that it was he, Jason, who had done the damned deed. Who had lived in that moment of hell?! Bruce had just seen the "thing" become a pavement patty, but the way the older man had acted you would have thought he was the one that had pushed the bastard out the window? Jason shook his head still many years later in confusion over that? Why the hell had Bruce felt guilty? It had been Jason's choice, no ones fault but his own and he'd never even told Bruce the true account of events? Bruce had been so shaken up that he hadn't even questioned Jason about oh his bloody uniform? Instead Bruce had done what he did best, he had brooded, lectured and then brooded some more. His guilt and self-righteous opinions over the whole affair nearly choking and for Jason vomit inducing.
After that day, every nagging question Jason had ever had about Bruce's methodology had erupted over night into a series of unending 'cans of worms'. Both Bruce and Batman hated being questioned, deep down, though they would never admit it, 'it was their way or the highway'. Jason had known that, but…it had taken that final loss for him to really realize what that actually meant for him and the others.
One time about a week after, he had been sitting on the sofa reading the book Hannibal not because he had suddenly decided to go on a 'killing rampage' and not because he was going to develop some weird cannibalistic fetish, but rather for some comfort. He had begun to feel lost and alienated by the others, Alfred had kept staring at him like any minute he was going to break? Barbara when she had found out a so called version of the 'truth' had pretty much quit talking to him and behind his back had kept glaring at him scornfully. Richard found himself put on a pedestal as the prime prodaje and well it hadn't destroyed the brotherly relationship the two had formed but it had definitely tested it. Which was the understatement of the century. Compared to Bruce though Richard was great. The fatherly mentor relationship Bruce had begun with him had sunk and never fully recovered and time with the book was a perfect example.
Bruce had walked in, seen him reading it, saw the title and had flipped. He had grabbed the book right out of Jason's hands and thrown it across the room, then he had proceeded to lecture Jason on his morality and …Jason had lost his temper.
"DAMNIT JASON CONFESS! DID YOU PUSH THAT MAN OR NOT?"
"MAN? THAT THING WAS A MONSTER! WHY DOES IT MATTER!?"
"IT MATTERS CAUSE IT'S A LIFE JASON! A LIFE!"
"LIFE!? LIFE!? HOW DARE YOU DEFEND HIM! WHAT OF HER LIFE?!"
"…What do you mean of her life? What else aren't you telling me?"
"…."
"DAMNIT JASON. TELL ME!"
"No."
"NO? LISTEN I TRAINED YOU. I WELCOMED YOU IN, YOU OWE ME JASON TODD AND I HAVE HAD ENOUGH OF YOUR SILENCE. YOU WILL TELL ME EVERYTHING. YOU WILL CONFESS TO ME THE TRUTH AND THEN WE ARE GOING TO SEND YOU TO YET ANOTHER THERAPIST, JUST IN CASE. I WILL NOT HARBOR A SERIAL KILLER IN MY HOUSE."
"SCREW YOU BRUCE! ORDERING ME TO TALK ABOUT THE PAST WHEN YOU CAN'T EVEN TALK ABOUT YOUR OWN! YOU AND ALFRED FORCING ME INTO THERAPY WHEN YOU YOURSELF NEVER WENT! If you want to talk so bad then you go first why don't you talk about your parents and how you clutch onto them like some pathetic parasite! SOME EXCUSE! I HAD PARENTS THAT DIED TOO YA KNOW. WORSE EVEN. MINE DIDN'T EVEN CARE ABOUT ME YOU SPOILED RICH BOY! YOUR NOT THE ONLY ONE WHO KNOWS WHAT IT'S ALL LIKE AND MAYBE, MABYE YOUR WAY DOESN'T ALWAYS WORK!" he had screamed.
"GET OUT"
Those were the last words Bruce and he had exchanged on the subject. Alfred bless his soul had tried to patch them back together, but three months later of nothing but silent glaring, hurt feelings, uncomfortable dinners and deep distrust and it was done.
Jason Todd vanished.
He took only enough of Bruce's money via cash to survive, packed what he needed, borrowed some of Bruce's gadgets from the BatCave and left.
At 2:00 in the morning before Bruce returned from patrol, while Alfred was busy with Richard, Jason had walked out the front door and never looked back until he was on a train to Oregon.
Without a single word of goodbye, he left his second family, often on the road he had tried to write a letter multiple times, to explain, to share the truth, more then once he had broken down, and yeah it hadn't been easy, but eventually he had found his way in the world.
He had found his foothold in the world and was who he was.
The mercenary called Red Hood.
Was it possible to make a record for melodramatic thoughts down memory lane?
It was definitely this place he concluded as he went to take another sip of his coffee and, "Aw shit. I drank it all, let's see what I got left on me?" he said as he checked his wallet then his watch. Waller had "asked" that he maintain a discreet presence in the city until she could get a firmer handle on things, right now she had about twenty other operatives in the city roaming around, and more then a few stationed at both Gotham General and with the military units working around the clock. 'Poor sods,' he thought the shit they had seen today, 'Anyone, ever heard of the Mutter Museum? That place is rated G compared to what the river dished up this morning.'
The entire city needed one serious clean up. Thus it was in a small state of lock down, shops and businesses were allowed to run until about six this evening then it was "Bedtime" and everybody save the military in command had to go back into their rabbit holes.
Well everyone but the BatPack and his Super Friends that is.
Alright, yes he would admit to a touch of bitterness, that had developed over the years, but that's what this place did to you. It made one second guess, it made one doubt. It tried to make him regret that he couldn't of succeeded as Robin? At the same time it helped him further appreciate why he was Red Hood. It was confusing is what it was.
Seeing as he had enough cash on him he went ahead and got himself another cup of coffee before he returned to his seat. Glancing again at his watch, in about ten more minutes he would leave and return to skulking around his old town tracks. Until Amanda, eventually called and gave him an update on the situation, so far as he knew the Observatory had been blown sky high, the tech that the enemy had employed had been surprisingly simple, more disturbing was the fact that so far save a few dead bodies still under the microscope, the enemy had vanished without a trace! The forensic team was still running laps around them, so he would have to wait longer for more on that front. Still whoever these butchers were, they were experts at the old disappearing act, he himself hadn't ruled out the use of magic just yet, and he wasn't going too for a long while. These terrorists had come packing and prepared, with about a trillion dollars worth of Kryptonite. Both he and Amanda had agreed that whoever they were, if they were packing for Superman then what's to say they weren't packing for Doctor Fate or the Martian ManHunter?
Everything had to be considered, at this point staying open to the enemies possibilities and maintaining a vigilant guard was probably the best course of action.
His phone rang.
"About time," he muttered as he pulled out his cell.
Unknown Contact. Said the screen in nice bold green print, what…the?
Jason quickly scanned the area again, and thanks to some 'cybernetic magic', gave the little machine in his brain connected to his eye a few commands so that he could also do both an x-ray scan and a thermal one into the other two buildings nearby.
Scan Complete.
'10% threat level found,' flashed the words in his cybernetic eye.
Which was good, 10% was pretty much your every day-unarmed civilian. So nobody in the shop on ground level was armed well that's nice. What about upstairs, he subtle leaned back in his chair, stretching his arms casual as his head tilted to the ceiling.
'Nobody dropping in from up top, so who's calling?' he wondered as his phone rang again.
Perhaps Waller was doing another security test?
He decided to answer, while hitting the record feature just in case, he'd need to replay this conversation.
"Yo, this is H?" he said smoothly as he sipped his coffee.
"H? huh? (a sad little chuckle) That's not the letter I woulda pegged you with but okay. So sorry bout ..ah hacking my way to your number like this. I just…It's... It's been a long time and well…I wasn't' sure if you would have answered, if you knew it was me," said a Richard Grayson.
Shit.
"Shit. . .Dick?" he nearly spat out his coffee, "God."
'Real smooth Todd' he thought to himself sarcastically.
"Shocking I know, but yeah it's me Jason. Its Dick," laughed Nightwing, "So how are you?"
"I almost spilt my goddamn coffee, until now today has been one flim flam of a mess and now my adopted brother I haven't spoken too in seven years is talking to me outta nowhere via my shitty ass non-now absolutely hackable cellphone! Christ you know what this means?!" blurted Jason before his tone switched to a more teasing one, 'I can't believe I'm talking to Richard? Frigging Richard!' he thought.
"What?" queried Grayson, just like in the days of yore.
"I wasted my entire tax refund on this piece of junk!" he exclaimed indignant.
"Ha' went a meek little laugh, 'That settles it then can't let a tax refund go to waste! You'll have to stop by and let me fix it for you," Richard replied.
'Now there is a loaded sentence,' Jason thought suddenly taking in a deep breath, 'Dick wants my company all of a sudden? He missed me that much?..No. no Toddster…something's happened? Something big. Something's wrong?'
Headlines from the STAR MASSACRE flashed across his mind.
"Sure Dick, it'd be nice to see you, Alfred and Barbara again. About time for a visit, although call me colorfully curious, I admit I'm surprised you asked? Also you don't still live at Wayne Manor do you because I'm not sure Bruce would allow me across the threshold, what with what I am.." he said as diplomatically as he could.
He counted ten seconds of silence before Dick started speaking again and for the first time in a long time felt a pang of fear, "…Jason…Jason ..I'm…(gulp) No. No I'm not living with Bruce anymore. Got an apartment on the south side of town. Small but it's mine, for when I'm not in Bludhaven or at Happy Harbor…I'll send you the co-ordinates. (Another gulp) I'm ….Jason…"
"What is it Dick?" Jason asked as gently as he could, 'Is? Is Richard crying?'
"Jason…I'm quitting," whispered Dick.
"What?" okay, now he was confused?
"Jason…Nightwing…is gone," croaked his bat brother.
The words in his ear rippled in front of him. He blinked once, twice, he felt the heat of his coffee cup, his eyes closed, 'only a matter of time' his mind viciously hissed, 'Nope not a dream, holy muther flipping flying f&&king hell!?'
Batman's greatest success, his ideal student, his would be perfect older brother, had just spoken the unimaginable. A thousand emotions from vindication to validation to sorrow suddenly ran their course, but when he heard Richard sadly almost meekly call his name again only one word flashed in his skull, Gloria.
"Richard," commanded Jason, "where exactly are you right now?"
"Home. My apartment…Jason…I…please you're the only one…I know who .."
'Oh shit,' he thought before he abruptly stood up there was no time to waste, "Yo. Hang in there bro, I'm coming. Tell you what instead of wasting time, why don't you just guide me over the phone," he calmly ordered as he swiftly made his way out the shop across the street.
"What about your mission with Waller?" asked Richard.
"How the hell? You know what, never mind, don't worry about 'Manda, she and I have an understanding and besides I'm on standby right now anyways, so start with those directions," today was just full of surprises. He wondered how long exactly Richard had known he was working for Waller and who else amongst his old BatFamily Associates & Co.
"Wait. Jason, I..I have to tell you…" whispered Richard his voice detached?
Jason tilted his head curious as he tapped into his watch's GPS, "Yeah?"
"Bruce…. Is unwell," began his brother. Jason stopped walking, his ear pressed to his cell as he listened, "Unwell?" he responded.
"Yes….Jason. He….The Joker is dead."
The Joker is dead.
THE. JOKER. IS. DEAD!
.
Alleluia. At last!
.
Wait.
Hold on a second?
.
"How?" he asked, his grip so tight he swore the phone cracked.
"Jason, I think…I think, b.. ...I don't know exactly," stuttered Dick.
"Do I turn left or right Richard?"
"Left. Jason?"
"I'm on my way Grayson. I'm coming."
"Thank you," Richard said with clear relief.
Jason allowed himself a small smirk, "Oh. Don't thank me yet, you and I are in for a long night."
"That didn't sound right," his brother teased.
"Or did it?" snarked Jason back instigating a little laugh to bring up the mood a bit, "Seriously though, we have a lot of catching up to do and a lot to discuss. It's not all gonna be pretty."
"I know," came the reply.
An hour later for the first time in seven years Jason stood within the same room as his adopted brother, the two of them both unmasked and found their roles reversed. Once upon time he was the one struggling and Richard was the one guiding and comforting. Now it looked like fate was handing the reins over to him.
As Richard welcomed him in, he gave the apartment a good once over, then he turned back to pin the other man with the most serious look he could muster, before he asked the million dollar question of the day…
"So, does Batman know?"
"Know what?"
"Don't be a dick, Dick. You know what."
Disheartened blue eyes turned around to meet his steely own.
"He has no idea. That Nightwing is finished."
******************************************************************************************************************(End of Chapter)
Second Disclaimer:
So I originally didn't intend, to bring Jason into this fanfic at all. He was completely excluded but, well I realized that I was really missing out on a potentially great character for later on and one that I could refashion a little. Many people have mixed feelings about the character, myself included, however, I didn't want to deal with the Joker having murdered him.
At least not in this fic.
So in my fanfic, which is already A.U. I decided that, that event never happened, thus I gave Jason a slightly alternative back-story based on facts about the character that I found on Wikipedia!
Which was my reference source.
All in all I don't own anything Batman/D.C. related. That would be Bob Kane & Co.
Not me at all.
I just write for fun and to get out some inner demons. Now this chapter is shorter then I planned and went a little bit differently then I originally pictured but it's 1:30 am. I gotta get some serious sleep.
Anyway, thanks to anyone reading this or reading anything I write!
Special Note: SEXUAL CRIMES, MURDER, AND RAPE ARE ALL VARIOUS SERIOUS CRIMES AND DIFFICULT THINGS. THAT IN REAL LIFE SHOULD NEVER BE CONDONED, MISHANDLED OR JOKED ABOUT. AGAIN THIS FANFIC IS RATED M-MA FOR ADULT MATERIAL AND IS A WORK OF FICTION.
And with that I now bid you all goodnight! Until next time- Love Stella.