I am…. So evil… heh…. Let me know what you think in a review. I'm thinking only about another three or four chapters to go until the conclusion… maybe less depending on the homework load for the next couple of days…
Thanks so much!
Chapter 10
Bruce heard it. He heard it when his heart dropped to the floor before springing up with a heat and fire that had so long been absent. In a whirl of emotion, he caught the sound of Jason hitting the floor. He caught the agonizing sound of his son being beaten, being torn into by some stranger.
But above it all he kept hearing those words. "I'm scared".
Some cord had been struck, and Bruce heard it snap apart – like a stick first twisted then broken in two and it was as audible as the mechanical dial tone echoing in his ear.
Bruce felt the white-hot and obliterating rage boil to the surface, the hate that swore Ra's would pay for this. In a swerve of movement his fist came down hard on the surface of the table before him. The metal there closed around his fist and Bruce let out a battle cry of frustration and anger. Tim and Dick and even Damian flinched harshly, but he couldn't pay them any mind right now.
He removed his hand from the table, chucked the phone as far away as possible. It didn't do anything to remove the taint the mechanism had inflicted, but it helped ease some of the pain away. He just kept hearing it, the jarring of his son's body hitting the floor. He could still hear the fist of some unknown tormentor attacking his son. He could hear it.
I'm scared
Bruce let out a ragged breath and swallowed hard. This was too much. Too much like the last. Too much like failing a second time to protect his boy.
That was what he was supposed to be, as Batman and as Bruce Wayne: a protector, a father that took care of and kept safe all those under his charge.
Failing that he was nothing.
Absolutely nothing.
And the weight of that crushed him.
"Bruce?" His eldest asked, laying a tentative hand on his shoulder.
Bruce ignored him. "Did you get a trace?"
Tim stood from the Computer chair, worry and apprehension clear on his face. As a father, Bruce took a deep breath before repeating his question more civilly. Not calm, he could not be calm right now, but considerately.
"I know where he is. I was right, Jason is in Korea. I've forwarded the results to the jet, whenever you're ready, Bruce."
He nodded with a bit more ferocity than intended. Bruce turned up the cowl to cover his face, he would need the strength of the Dark Knight for this mission. He could only hope to temper the pain and paternalistic instinct with His cool logic.
Batman turned and walked to the Batjet, turning only momentarily to bark at his three boys to follow.
…
He was in the dark again, only this time his body was hitting the razor sharp edge of endurance. Each wheeze of air caught him in the chest and brought the labored process to a standstill until he could gain control of the agony. It was like being trapped underwater and trying to breathe through the clear fluid – of course, this fluid was more of a crimson shade…
He could try to move – oh gods – but it felt like knives being driven further under his skin. Twisting, turning, burying deep. Unable to breathe. And Jason shook, trembled with the nausea and pain, but he accepted both with open arms, more proof he had survived it – hadn't he? All delirium from fever had been forgotten long ago – or it seemed long ago.
He shuddered. Why was it so fucking cold?
Oh right. He was dying.
It felt like he was dying.
The darkness wasn't the familiar kind. It was the despair of being trapped in some godforsaken box…
Getting hard to think now. There has to be a way out. Some unforeseen latch, some mysterious weapon that would allow him to breathe…
Come on, Jaybird. Think.
But his mind was too fractured, every thought that passed did simply that: it passed. Each one was never coherent anyways, all just the broken musings of a broken boy. Another spike of pain left him gasping for air where there was none; his mind went blank again in a form of self-preservation.
In moments he could see flashes again. Flashes of some trauma from his past; the glint of an evil smile or the cold press of the floor on his sore muscles, it all whizzed by with nauseating speed. Then the earth, surrounding him on all sides…
Just like this box…
Don't think about it, Jay.
This was a memory – but it wasn't. He could see being trapped here and trying to get out, he could see his broken and bloody hands scratching, slamming, prying into dead wood in a frenzied attempt at freedom. But this was different, this box was made of metal. Impossible to escape. Impossible. The word kept echoing uselessly. Jason had tried, he had made his play and shown his hand too soon in the game. Now he was trapped here.
He still couldn't breathe.
That was important, wasn't it? Air was essential, always had been right? No way would the laws of physics suspend that rule for him. Maybe they had, his heart was still slamming into his broken ribs after all. If he could just find a way to calm down…
His mind didn't respond though, as per the usual. He couldn't think beyond the claustrophobic panic that kept him wild and unfocused. His heart beat riotously, willing Jason to fight against this inescapable fate but… he'd lost the will when his nails had come out, when his knuckles had snapped, when his wrists had fractured.
Hell, he'd probably lost the will right before he'd even been put in the damned four-cornered hole. Arif had laid into him with a brutality that was too familiar, and the pain had echoed through his mind to a place much darker that the one he was in now. He cried out, but no sound escaped his lips. Where was his costume? Where were the Batarangs? Where was the utility belt? Had he been buried without all of it? Why would Bruce do that…
No, this is different. A different time, a different place. That didn't make sense, though. How was it that the situation seemed like a song left on repeat if it had never happened before?
Blood pumped from his wounds and left a stinging aftertaste in his head, one that pounded and ricocheted off his skull. Too much pain. Too many memories swimming in my head.
All of a sudden his mind had decided for him.
He swallowed past the lump in his throat, sobbing weakly before curling in on himself as tightly as he could. He pressed his body against one side of the death-trap and pretended there was no other wall to hold him in. Jason shut his eyes, allowing the flood of agony, of hollow despair, of fearful isolation, let it all slip away as his eyes fell closed and he became dead to the world.