When Jason Todd opened his eyes, he woke up screaming.
There were only a few things he was immediately aware of. One, that this was wrong. Something was so inherently wrong about all of it. Secondly, pain erupted across his body the moment he gathered enough awareness to connect his thoughts with the everything else.
Fluid filled his lungs and burned his skin, and he thrashed, kicking and trying to force his body up to the surface. Hands pushed him down, holding his shoulders, chest, ankles… anywhere he could get leverage was held firmly in vice-like grips. It felt like an eternity that he was trapped before his heel connected with soft tissue and he was released.
The exertion took more out of him than he was able to give. Instead of rising up and taking in some much needed air, he was left to drift to the bottom. He closed his eyes, cutting off the sickly green tint to his vision that had overtaken him, and let himself be lifted out of the water by the same hands that forced him down.
He coughed and sputtered, finally keeling over to throw up what little he'd swallowed, before robed figures flanked him on either side. Both gripped under his arms and he was hoisted up and dragged forward. The tops of his feet scraped on hard stone, drawing blood from sensitive, raw skin. He stopped moving, and the cavern-like room fell totally silent.
To his left, old floorboards creaked loudly, masking the soft footfalls approaching cautiously.
No, that wasn't right.
Jason looked up, and the shadowed, vaulted ceiling looked much closer now. And decidedly less shapeless and cavern-like. There were water stains all over it, and cobwebs in the corner, but no hands. No water. The floor underneath him was old, dusty hardwood, and it was under his back not his feet.
He scanned the room, vaguely aware of the pain his his chest and the pungent stench of blood, and spotted his sword still lodged in the corner of a nearby wall, drenched in blood but holding firmly.
A shadow fell over the room, but Jason found he was too weak to move.
"Hell. Left a mess," a gruff, deep old voice grumbled. "Goddamn amateurs."
His sight line was obscured by a shoddy table set, but he could see the newcomer's boots, and the frayed hem of his jeans. The footsteps stopped, and the long, drawn out squeak from the old floorboards signaled that the person, probably heavy set, had paused.
Jason looked away from the sword and the unfamiliar legs, over to one of the decapitated bodies on the other side of the room. One of five.
Had he gotten them all?
The newcomer shifted a little, counting softly under his breath. Then, he turned, and started walking closer.
" - Six? Only s'posed to be five of 'em."
Oh. Shit.
Well, maybe not.
If Jason couldn't move, he was probably closer to being dead than he usually preferred to be. At least if he was found, still alive, preferably, he could recover and get on with his life.
When he focused again, this newcomer was standing almost directly over him, face contorted into concern and pity. The man knealt down to get a closer look at him, and that was the moment Jason realized that he'd forgotten to breath. This stranger thought he was dead. Cute.
He took in a sharp breath, grasping the man's wrist with all the strength he had left as soon as the hand descended toward his throat. Eyes wild.
The man cursed and caught Jason's other hand in his own. "Shit! Shit! Come on, kid, calm down!"
The more Jason moved,the more he felt the wound being disturbed, drawing more blood and sapping more energy.
His movements slowed, and finally, he relented.
"Fuck. You really did a number on this place, you know that?" the man shook his head, trying to assess the stab wound that had knocked Jason Todd on his ass. Possibly into his second grave. That was yet to be determined.
"I'm going to get you out of here," the man promised, lifting Jason carefully. The pain shifted again, but not much.
"Can you walk?"
His knees buckled under his weight, and the stranger caught him before he tumbled the floor again.
"Guess that's a no."
Jason was dragged out of the house and out to a car where he was laid out on the back seat. A bunched up cloth was pressed into his hand then laid over his chest. "Hold that there, boy. Won't be long."
The door shut, hard, rocking the car, and Jason shut his eyes. His breaths rattled in his chest, and he flinched when he heard the driver's door open and close again.
"You ain't dead yet. Keep pressure on that."
The old man's voice sounded far away, like the cave and the water had been. He couldn't determine whether or not it meant he was on the verge of death or unconsciousness, and at this point, he didn't care for the difference. He was vaguely aware of the car moving under him, and when he finally dragged his eyes open again, it was to the shadowy treeline giving way to highway lights. The car sped up, just over what was probably legal, and swerved around traffic.
Jason blinked, slowly, tuning out the old man's rambling and tried to focus on holding the now soaked cloth against his chest. He blinked again, and when he focused, it was on a dark ceiling once more.
He didn't remember moving.
The pain in his chest had been reduced to a dull ache under tight bandages, and cool air brushed over his skin. It certainly hurt to breath, but it was so much easier now than it had been. The first deep breath hurt, but his lungs adjusted to the increase in capacity, so it faded after a few more.
He didn't remember getting patched up.
Or losing his shirt, for that matter..
The place was mostly silent, barring some muffled movement below the floor. The only indication of time was the light. Slivers of daylight peered through gaps in the covered windows on the other side of the room, illuminating just enough for him to make out a few details.
The place was dusty, but lived in. He turned his head to scan the other side of the room, spotting another narrow bed, and the old chest that stood between them. There were a few old books stacked next to a lamp, but nothing concerning. No culty stuff, at least.
Tired of laying still, and unsure how long he'd actually been there, Jason managed to pull himself up to sit while his eyes adjusted to the low lighting. It was weirdly familiar here. Uncomfortably so. Dusty, sure, but not like it was completely unused. Just old.
A chill wracked his spine, and he stilled, trying to make out whatever deep seated memory took place here. It was the kind of passing feeling like deja vu, only a lot heavier and a little bit nauseating. Suddenly, he felt like a trapped animal, and his heart rate picked up. Pounding in his chest. It would be better if the place was completely alien to him, but it wasn't, so it was definitely a problem.
This just wouldn't do. Not at all.
He got up, finding the clean, button up flannel - of all fucking things - waiting for him across the back of an old desk chair and shrugged it on. First he checked the dresser drawers for anything useful, and after finding nothing, moved on to the closet. Everything was useless, unless he decided strangling the old man with one of those ugly ass shirts was the best option, so he slipped out into the hallway to listen.
At one end was another covered window, and the other was the staircase. Before taking the first step down, Jason spotted a rusty old fire iron tucked discreetly into an out of place umbrella stand, so he took that and held it close to his side before descending the stairs. The boards creaked softly under his weight, and when he reached the bottom, he stopped and peered around through the doorway.
"Hard to sneak around in this old house, boy."
Jason's grip on the iron tightened and he scowled, coming into the room fully. It was indeed the same old man that pulled him out of the monster den.
And boy was Jason starting to realize why this place was so goddamned familiar.
"Nice autopsy scar. Couldn't take you to a hospital with that thing, had to stitch you back together here. You're welcome, by the way. Dean."
Jason adjusted the collar of his shirt, as if the scar itself was still exposed. Even thinking about it made his skin crawl. Now was no different. Hearing his old name didn't exactly help.
"Bobby Singer," Jason drawled, leaning against the door frame. "Almost forgot your ugly mug."
"Wouldn't be surprised," the man turned to face him, setting two glass bottles on the table and pulling out a chair for himself. "It's been a minute."
"Yeah, thought I put this life behind me," Jason took it slowly, crossing the room and dragging a second chair across the tile to sit down.
"Yeah? That why I found you half dead in the middle of a horror shack? If you left it behind, what brought you back?"
Jason's gaze leveled with his, dull and empty. "Practice."
Bobby took a long swig of his drink, leaning back in his chair while he processed the answer. Such a simple word, yet it carried so much. "With baggage like that," he gestured vaguely to Jason's torso, "Practice makes a lot of sense."
Jason didn't touch his bottle, but allowed himself to look away, watching condensation beading down the glass. He should have known that somehow, he'd always get dealt shit cards.
"Someone hadta make a deal to get you back from that. John swears he didn't do - "
Jason's eyes snapped back up to glare at Bobby, face twisting into fury before he jumped to his feet, pulling painfully at his stitches and knocking the chair backwards across the floor. All the betrayal he'd felt, every shit card, all of it came crashing back over him. "That fucker knows I'm here?"
Bobby was on his feet in a flash, shoulders squared like he was ready to defend himself. Even injured, Jason was an imposing figure. He'd trained for years since the incident, grown some too. He wasn't some skinny little kid in a multicolored tactical suit and cape anymore.
"You think I like it any more than you do? I was pissed - hell, I still am - but we all knew you were dead. Someone had to sell their soul to get you back, and I need to find out who did!"
A shrill squeak and a soft click resounded from the front of the house, and Jason tore his focus from the hunter to see another lone figure standing in the hall. Another familiar face that looked like it had seen a ghost.
Jason's breaths were deep, like he was collecting himself and trying to stay calm. Like. Body language wasn't always telling, not clearly anyway. But John was frozen in the doorway and Bobby's eyes darted between the pair.
"Move, John," he said, finally.
The younger hunter looked at him, torn between bewilderment and… something else. "What?"
Before Bobby could yell at him for being a jackass and not listening, Jason lunged. He saw red. And only red. Blinded by every negative emotion he'd felt since he was a little kid, sitting forgotten in that empty motel room. Getting escorted across town in a cop car. Seeing the car back in Gotham only months later.
Being beaten and blown up when he was only fifteen.
Opening his eyes in the Lazarus Pit.
Bobby tried to pull him off, but only got an elbow to the face as a reward for his efforts. John was only trying to block the blows instead of fighting back. That only made it worse.
In the next moment, Jason was tackled to the ground by a wiry frame of a kid, which sent the air from his lungs and with it, the resolve from his fists.
"Get the fuck off me, kid. I don't wanna hurt you," he hissed, trying to throw the boy off. Instead, he stayed pinned.
"You won't."
"Sam," John wiped blood from his lip with his sleeve and got up, tugging on the back of the kid's shirt, prompting him to let Jason up, which took him a solid minute to manage.
John offered a hand to help him, but he batted it away, opting instead to struggle to his feet on his own. "I didn't know."
"Bullshit!" Jason shouted, and John instinctively took a step back. "I saw you in Gotham. What, were you making sure I was good and lost? Making sure you got the job done?"
"I came back to find you," John snapped, "I swear to you, Dean. In my right mind I would never have done that. Any of it."
A likely story. He didn't care how John spun it, how much he'd manage to convince himself over the years. The damage was done. Jason was a grown man now, and there was no going back. No excuses. No atonement.
"Dean," Sam said softly, and Jason's head snapped around to look at him. Through the rage he realized that this was his little brother. This was Sam. It was a goddamn miracle the poor kid wasn't lost on the other side of the country somewhere too. Or dead. "We were cursed. A witch got the drop on dad and cursed us. He went back to look for you, but - "
"It had already been nearly a year." John interjected, putting a hand on Sam's shoulder to urge him to back up. Even Bobby was keeping his distance. "You were happy. You were in a good school. Had good grades. You had the kind of life I couldn't ever hope to give to the two of you."
He regretted everything that lead up to finding him back in Gotham, but he couldn't uproot Jason. Not after seeing how much he was thriving. He did the best to keep Sam away from hunting for a long time, too. Trying to stay in one place long enough for school, letting the boy study instead of research. Sometimes it didn't always work out for the best, but it was better than dragging another son into a life he'd never escape, and Sam had thrived too. That is, until a few years ago. Finding out his big brother was dead did a number on him, and he'd taken to hunting faster than John himself had.
He still went to school, still did well, but he wasn't very social anymore. But maybe that could change.
"You think it's going to be that easy?" Jason questioned, staring the man down. "You think it fixes anything?"
John shook his head, eyes suddenly looking glassy. "Nothing will. I know that. But we can't lose you again."
Bull. Shit.
Jason swiped the fire iron from where he'd left it and stormed past his father and brother, marching across the house. He threw the door open and disappeared into the salvage yard to blow off some steam. Sam sighed, hanging his head, and quietly left as well, heading upstairs to be by himself.
"I'll be downstairs," Bobby said, shortly, and left John standing there with his thoughts.