His cellphone buzzed, drawing Jason Todd's attention away from the woman tearing up the small stage at the back of the bar with her rendition of Joplin's "Try".
Only two people know I'm in Gotham, he mused as he reached inside his jacket to retrieve the intrusive device. One I told and one who knows everything going on in his city because he's a paranoid cynic.
Jason was ninety-nine percent confident Batman wasn't the one contacting him. The old man wouldn't reach out to him if the world was about to go to hell in a hand-basket. He'd wait until the last Bat was hung before asking me for help.
That left Kit as the one texting him.
She promised not to call or text unless it was an outright emergency.
Given Gotham, and his family's nocturnal career choices, there likely was.
Wonder which bird's in trouble.
Part of him hoped it was Dick who needed help just so he could hold it over his head.
Another part hoped it was Kit or Babs who needed a hand with something.
Preferably non-Bat related.
Jason freely admitted he had a strained relationship with his adoptive father and brothers. Timbo especially. However, his less than warm, fuzzy feelings for Bruce, Dickie, Timbo, and the Hellspawn dumped on the family by Talia a little over a year ago didn't extend to Kit, Cass, Barbara, Malcolm or his niece and nephews.
His phone buzzed again.
Kit wouldn't bug him unless it was an emergency.
Wonder what's going on? That thought was immediately followed by, And which of the freaks is the cause of it?
Carousing the rooftops of Gotham beside his dark mentor in search of bad guys — the average sorta scum and not creeps like that pasty-faced freak — had been his greatest joy when he was Robin.
Jason couldn't imagine anything topping the night Dickie passed him the mantle of Robin and told him it was now his duty to see Batman got home safe from patrols. Pride, elation, and a sense of belonging filled him as Dick placed that half-mask in his hand.
He wasn't that orphaned mongrel Bruce took pity on. He was a full-fledged member of the family. Equal to Dickie and Raya in importance to Bruce. Held to the same standards as them. Taught the same lessons. Given the same lectures. Suffered the same consequences when he broke the rules.
Being Robin had been the ultimate thrill. He had been excited to join Batman in his goal of cleaning up Gotham. For a time Jason believed they were making a difference. Helping people who couldn't defend themselves. Doing what the coppers couldn't. Putting a stop to the corruption and lawlessness.
Then the Joker came along and…
His phone buzzing interrupted his trip down memory lane. She wouldn't be so incessant if it wasn't important. Jason tapped the screen with his thumb. His eyebrows forked as he read Kit's short message: [M in trouble].
M was code for another member of their family: Malcolm.
A kid who Kit brought into their cartoon circus world after her douchebag father sent men to kill him.
One just as damaged as the rest of 'em. Jason never forgot the night Malcolm had a night terror. He hadn't seen someone meltdown quite like Malcolm had. Not without a hit of Scarecrow's fear toxin. Mal's terror, hurt, and desperation clawed open pockets and doors inside him. Jason swore to do whatever he could to get rid of the monster haunting Malcolm.
I haven't fulfilled that promise, he realized as he slid his phone back into his pocket. Maybe now is the time to make good on that vow.
Not that the old man would approve of him killing a killer.
No, Batman would spew more of his rhetoric.
Remind him that killing a killer doesn't change the number of killers in the world.
No, it just eliminates one who is hurting someone you love.
Jason pushed back his chair and stood, stretching back muscles a bit stiff after slouching for so long in a hard wooden chair. He dropped a five on the table, winked at the blonde tending bar and turned to stroll from the bar. Not a one of the regular drunks or beatniks who occupied this dive in the heart of Crime Alley made a move to hinder his exit from their watering hole. If anything, they looked only too happy to see the back of him.
A smirk twisted the corners of Jason's mouth as he shoved open the door and stepped out into the cold night air. He couldn't blame the bums for being on edge around him. He had red in his ledger.
A lotta red.
Bodies lined his wake.
The dozen or so mobsters he offed when he returned to Gotham.
The handful of Black Mask's men just for fun.
A few of Joker's just to get the clown's attention.
Penguin's because they got in the way.
Oh, and the eighty inmates I poisoned in Arkham just to cull the population.
He couldn't forget about them.
His one-man crusade succeeded in doing more than pissing off the old man.
It also got rid of a lot of bad seeds.
It wasn't like Bruce could claim any sort of shock at his actions. He hadn't played well with others before he became the next Wayne foundling. His proclivity for delivering street justice put him at odds with Bruce often over the years. I'm just doing what you won'tbecause of that antiquated sense of morality you have, he told his absent mentor as the neon sign above the door spluttered on and off. I'm simply taking the scum out.
Traffic in this part of the East End was non-existent. Jason's footsteps echoed off the grimy brick walls as he made his way from the Aces & Eights. Frightened rats scurried across the cobblestone to find safety beneath the boxes dumped outside the backdoor of a shop with its windows and doors boarded up.
Jason took a moment and breathed deep of the smells of the East End. For him, these streets were home. He had been born and raised on these streets, knew every twist, turn and dark hole by heart. He was more comfortable here then he had ever been roaming the Gotham Heights district. Those blue-blooded snobs saw me as one thing and one thing only: Bruce's charity case.
Not Kit, though.
No, she welcomed him into the family the moment Bruce drug his sorry ass through the front door. Kit never once treated him as anything but her younger brother. She even defended him from that old crone who verbally attacked him during his first Wayne Christmas Ball. That's when I started calling her Kit, he recalled as he strolled over to where he left his bike. 'Cause Raya might look like a sleek black kitten but she has the ferocity of a jaguar.
And the single-minded tenacity of the man who also took her in and trained her, he mused as his phone buzzed again. Dickie might be the Golden Boybut Raya was Bruce's perfect little soldier.
Not that she agreed.
Jason unlocked his phone and dialed her number.
"What sorta trouble's Malcolm in?" he asked soon as the line connected. "And with who?"
"He's accused of murdering the man who killed his girlfriend." There was a weary sigh before Kit added, "Who also tried to kill his father in his cell at Claremont."
Well, that, Jason decided as the neon sign spluttered and went out, is not the trouble I anticipated Mal being in.
Though what trouble he expected the guy to have gotten into, he couldn't say. Murder, though? Definitely not. Malcolm upheld Bruce's no killing rule. Just not because of an antiquated sense of morality. No, Malcolm chose not to kill because he feared becoming a killer.
Like his father.
"He didn't do it."
"Of course not." There was another sigh. "Us knowing doesn't change the fact he's the primary suspect."
"How'd he end up accused of murder in the first place?"
"A man named Nicholas Endicott is behind the accusation." Kit's voice became hard as tempered steel. Another thing she acquired from their dark mentor. "He's a member of the Court of Owls." A pause. Never a good sign. Not in this family. "Endicott was involved with my father and Martin Whitly. He funded my father's operation and had Malcolm's father get rid of those the Court ordered killed."
He shouldn't have been surprised but he was.
"Why's the schmuck framing Malcolm?"
Not that he couldn't guess.
"Because he uncovered Endicott's secrets."
It didn't take a brainiac to figure out what Malcolm planned to do with that information. A burst of pride shot through Jason. Malcolm used his skills to bring down corrupt and dangerous men like this Endicott without needing a mask. He fought crime without having to hide in the shadows. Or resorting to lethal methods like me…
"You get Mal an attorney?"
"Dent has agreed to represent him, yes."
"Dent?" Jason almost choked on his spit. "You have Harvey Dent representin' Mal?"
"Can you think of anyone better to represent him?"
The helluvit was, Jason couldn't think of anybody better suited to defend Malcolm. Harvey Dent had been a top notch lawyer before he went berserk. The Falcones, Maroni's, and other criminal organizations operating in Gotham's seedy underbelly hated Dent. They couldn't buy him or threaten him into submission. He had been as incorruptible as Batman. Until Sal Maroni tossed acid in his face, permanently disfiguring him, and creating an alter-ego who adopted the moniker of Two-Face.
It was that side of Dent that concerned Jason most.
"You sure his volatile side won't make a sudden appearance during the trial and start shooting everyone for the sheer helluvit?"
"Two-Face is officially gone." Jason heard a Tt followed by something muffled. "Harvey went under Inceptive five months ago."
Surprise, anger, and dismay coursed through Jason at hearing Kit used her grandfather's neurological agent to rid Dent of his homicidal personality.
"You used Inceptive?" A GCPD helicopter flew overhead. Destination unknown. Not an unusual occurrence in Gotham. "After all the crap that freakazoid, Scarecrow put you and Gotham through to get it?"
"Jason…"
"Dammit, Kit, you swore never to use your grandfather's formula."
"Can we argue about this later?" A slight edge to her tone set Jason's nerves to tingling. "Malcolm's in trouble and we need all birds on deck."
"He's not the only one in trouble, is he, Kit?"
"What makes you think Malcolm's not the only one in trouble?"
A Batman-tactic.
Divert answering a question by asking the question in turn.
They were all Bat-trained.
Even Malcolm.
And some things, he realized as another helicopter swooped by, are engrained so deeply we can't shake 'em.
No matter how hard they tried.
"You wouldn't call me if Malcolm was the only one in trouble, Kit. You'd call Dickie or Timbo."
A harrumph. "They're already on deck."
"Then why do you need me?"
"He's going out to the hunting cabin." The soda in Jason's stomach bubbled and boiled as those words washed over him. "The one his father took him on their last hunting trip."
Jason could admit he was many things.
Bold, brash, volatile, and reckless, especially.
Stupid?
Absolutely not.
He knew what that cabin represented to Malcolm. He had seen how it haunted him. Awake or asleep didn't matter once the panic set in.
"Malcolm has night terrors, Jay-bean," Dick told him that night in the hallway.
The guy had more than that.
Martin Whitly was Malcolm's monster in the dark.
And I promised to get rid of him.
A deep pool of longing swirled to life inside Jason as he stared up at the smooth velvet sky. Even now, after everything that happened between the old man and him, there was nothing he'd like more than to rest his head on that broad shoulder and have that larger than life figure tell him in that velvety rasp, "We'll find another way."
Batman wasn't there, however.
And Kit was waiting for his answer.
"I'm on my way."
What else could he say?
A promise was a promise.
A/N: Hello, all! Hope this finds you well!
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