Chapter 13

Jason's POV

The darkness consumes me. I can smell the earth. Worms and insects are gnawing on the rotting flesh. The smell of the corpse is revolting. The body has already started to decompose.

It's not hard to see that the body lying beside me is mine. The rotting corpse is my own.

They say that the dead cannot rise. Yet, I watch as the Earth begins to move. There's a blinding flash of light. Then a scream follows.

The scream came from my own mouth. Well, my fifteen year old mouth that is.

The kid's scared. He's hyperventilating. He doesn't know what's going on. He hasn't realized that he's died. It doesn't take him long to realize that he's in a coffin. He does the only thing he can think of. He calls for his father to save him as he pounds on the coffin and claws at the lid of his prison.

He doesn't realize that help isn't coming. Bruce doesn't care. He's not coming.

He calms himself down a little as he tries to ignore the fact that maggots are consuming his flesh, that he's buried alive, that Batman isn't coming. He's alone. Taking a deep breath, he slips the buckle off of his belt as h trembles with fear.

I watch as he repeatedly drives the metal tip into the coffin lid until the wood begins to crack. He takes a final breath and kicks the already cracked lid of the coffin. The damp soil begins to rain down on him. Yet, he keeps trying. He's not going to give up.

He's clawing at the dirt and what's left of the wooden lid. Fingernails are torn from his fingers as they split open and begin to bleed. Tiny splinters imbed themselves into his skin. But, he doesn't care. He only wants to escape the darkness, this Hell he's been buried in.

Finally, his right hand breaks through the top layer of the soil as he begins to haul himself out. He's crawling on all fours until his body can't take the strain anymore. Tears pour from his half sunken and hollow eyes. He's dragging himself by his hands, while screaming for his father to help him. A trail of blood, maggots, and torn flesh extend from the grave to the boy. His body has finally had enough. The kid passes out from extreme exhaustion, with his father's name on his lips.

It isn't long until help arrives. Talia Al Ghul has come to save the boy. I watch as one of her guard picks up the corpse. They are headed for a Lazarus Pit.

The scene changes before me. I watch as the League of Shadows surrounds the pit of the ancient cave. The bubbling emerald liquid is dying to receive the naked corpse. I watch as the body ceremoniously offered to the pit. It isn't long until the body is enveloped by the emerald water.

Burning. His skin is on fire. He's never been in this amount of pain before. It hurts. He'd rather die than go through the pain.

He fights his way to the surface as the pit's affects began to take place. There's a white streak in his hair as his bare body clambers up onto the dry land. The rotting and torn flesh has been renewed. Broken bones have been healed. He is no longer a corpse. He has rejoined the world of the living.

Yet, the effects from the pit have driven him temporarily insane. He's laughing wildly as she comes forward. The need to kill flashes inside his mind as he thinks of nothing but slitting her throat and drinking her blood. His laughter fades away as she roughly strikes his cheek, bringing him back to reality.

It slowly comes back to the boy. Shelia. The warehouse. The Joker. The bomb. What happened? Why is he standing before her naked? Where's Bruce? What's going on?

I watch as he is given clothes and taken to a room. A mirror catches the boy's eye, but it's not him in the mirror. It can't be him... can it?

The once piercing blue eyes now hold a greenish tint. His raven hair now holds a streak of white. He's bigger too. Scars litter his finely sculpted body. He's always had scars, but they've never been as bad as these. Soon, his image his joined by Talia's.

The truth is finally revealed. He's been dead for three years. He's been replaced. And his murderer is still alive. He was never avenged. His so-called father replaced him.

No problem. He will have his revenge. First he'll deal with the replacement. Then he'll kill the clown. And finally, he will punish his father.

Jason Peter Todd is dead. But, the Red Hood will rise and Batman will fall... or so I thought.

Dick's POV

"Oh my God." I whispered as the horrifying image appeared on the monitor screen in the Batcave.

Jason was literally digging himself out of his grave. What is going on? Why are thy doing this to him?

"Grayson, I don't understand." Damian stated, coming to stand beside me.

"I don't know what's going on either, but I think they're making Jason relive his past. I'm positive that they've drugged him with something too."

"Why?"

"I don't know that either, Damian."

We watched as a couple of the masked men appeared. They grabbed Jason before the three of them disappeared.

Tim's POV

I strained against the ropes constricting me to the support beam. I stopped as footsteps approached me. My eyes grew wide as two of the skulls appeared dragging someone in-between them.

Jason.