A/N: It's. ALIVE.

His landing on the wooden floor of the Clocktower's loft barely made a sound. Jason wasn't too pleased to be here, but Barbara'd seemed urgent in her message. Either something serious was going on, or she was just very good at picking her words.

She was there at the terminal, and so was Tim. Jason would've groaned out loud but kept it to himself for Barbara's sake. He didn't exactly want to be around people right now. Reaching down to his belt, he opened a pouch and pulled out a small box.

When they had been kids, he'd told her that he would quit. But that promise didn't matter anymore now that she was gone, and goddammit, he wasn't going to deprive himself of this little joy when there was fuck all left.

He smacked one end of the box. From the other end, a cigarette popped out.

"Jason," Barbara greeted without turning. "Thanks for coming here."

Jason lifted his helmet and tucked the cigarette between his lips as he walked up to where Barbara and Tim stood. He brought a lighter up to its end and sparked the fire with a flick of his thumb. As he tucked the lighter away, he took a drag. He stopped next to Barbara, staring up at the screen and blowing a stream of smoke. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Tim staring.

"I'd appreciate it if you didn't do that in here," he heard Tim say. Jason finally looked at him. Without saying a word, he stuck the cigarette back into his mouth. The burning end glowed brightly as he took a pull. Then, still holding Tim's gaze, he blew out another cloud.

"I thought you dropped that a while ago," Barbara noted.

"Didn't come here to chat about my lifestyle," Jason replied curtly. "What'd you call me for?"

Barbara turned back to the screen. After a few tense seconds, Jason and Tim finally broke their tersely shared stare and did too. "Take a look at this," Barbara said, pulling up several images. "These are stills taken from CCTV's all over Gotham." Each image showed a recurring theme of heightened criminal activity. Thugs were going about in thick droves. Jason boredly blew out another plume of smoke.

"Looks like I have some more cleaning up to do," he noted. If Barbara and Tim had been bothered by his statement, they didn't show any signs.

"It's not just the peak in activity that's worrying," Barbara said. "Jason, there's collaboration going on."

"What makes you so sure?"

"Pattern," Barbara answered. "Uniformity. Something you don't see very often in the underworld." Behind her glasses, her eyes filled with worry as her brow furrowed. "There's a status quo being broken here. I know that happens in Gotham more than any place else, and whenever it does, it's nothing but bad news. I don't know…" Finally, she looked up at Jason. "Tim and I both think it's a bad sign, but I guess… I wanted to hear your opinion. You've been out on the streets. Seen anything like this? Anything strange?"

Jason scoffed lightly, pushing a puff of hazy smoke from his lips. "Have I seen anything strange? Barb, I've had front row seats to strange."

"Doesn't really mean much, considering that we're in Gotham."

"A few days ago," Tim spoke up, "you were having a pretty heated tango with Penguin, weren't you?"

"Wasn't anything I couldn't handle."

"Still no 'thank you,' huh?"

Ignoring Tim's remark, Jason took one last drag from the shortened cigarette before dropping it. As he grinded it into the ground, he continued, "When Cobblepot attacked me, he mentioned an 'Overseer.' Sounded like the little man was following orders from whoever that is."

"Overseer," Barbara repeated quietly. "Huh… that's the first time I'm hearing of them. Tim?"

"Same," Tim replied, crossing his arms. "What do you know about this Overseer?"

Jason was on the verge of answering, but suddenly hesitated at the realization that everything he knew about the Overseer was what Connor had told him. And right now, after what had happened, Jason sure as hell was questioning that prick's word.

No matter. Some information was better than none. "Apparently he—no, I'm not even sure if it's one man. Could be an organization operating under one alias. Whatever the Overseer is, 'he'…" Jason shrugged. "He's apparently gotten into contact with every nutcase in Gotham. Trying to build an army of chaos or something."

"Honestly, it feels like we've got someone trying to do that every time we turn around," Tim groaned. "This city gets plunged into doomsday every other Wednesday."

"Except Bruce isn't here to stop it."

Barbara's quiet statement made both men look her way. Her eyes were lowered to the keyboard, though her hands sat limply in her lap. The silence stretched on. Jason scowled as he looked away, placing his hands on his hips in a failed attempt to feign nonchalance.

"Sorry," Barbara piped up meekly. "Didn't meant to… I shouldn't have brought up…"

"No, you're right," Tim told her gently. "It's true. We've got to step up to the mantle now."

'We're all Gotham has left,' Jason thought, his eyes still focused on the window at the other side of the room. He could just barely see the darkened city skyline beyond. 'Why does that thought just depress the hell out of me?'

"No time for brooding," Jason said aloud. "If we really are the only thing standing between Gotham and the Overseer, we better kick our asses into gear."

"We can't do that unless we know at least something about them," Barbara replied. "I've been monitoring the airwaves as thoroughly as I can. I've never even picked up a blip of the Overseer's communications. If they really are mobilizing Gotham's underground, they have to be relaying messages all over the city."

"Seems real tech-y, this fucker," Jason said. "Even Connor wasn't able to track them d—." Fuck. There it went.

And the rest came crashing down. "Connor?"

Jason let out an irate sigh. He reached for the cigarette carton and popped another one out. "Just some guy," he mumbled, "that arrived at Gotham about two weeks ago." Had it really been just two weeks? Felt more like two years. "Told me he had been tracking the Overseer for months, and that the trail led him straight to Gotham."

A thought came to Jason as soon as he'd finish talking. Come to think of it… there hadn't been a hide nor hair of this Overseer until after Connor's arrival. First there was that attack by Croc under the bridge. Jo had only gone to the river's edge after being called by…

Then there was Zsasz right after. Probably sent by a disappointed Overseer who saw his first attempt fail.

This is my first time in Gotham. Gonna do a little sightseeing. Go on. Jason should have never let that fucker out of his sight.

He knew that if Jocelyn had known his thoughts, she would object. Take his side again. And the thought of that hurt him just as much as it pissed him off. 'After all this time… I know we argued, but I thought we had something.'

Fucking hell. Not another rebound. He slipped the cigarette between his lips and took another deep drag to snap him out of his wallowing. "I think I might know who the Overseer is, actually," he said aloud, puffing smoke out with every word.

"Pull the other one," Tim replied.

Still grouchy over his melancholy thoughts, Jason scowled. "You really want to do this right now? 'Cause I got no problems—not even in front of Barb."

"Put that attitude away," Tim said, not the least bit fazed. "A few minutes ago, you weren't even sure what the Overseer was. We can't go chasing every lead we think up—that's time we don't have."

"I'm more than sure about this," Jason protested. "It all just adds up and points to him." Suddenly, he felt himself turn cold. A fear unlike anything he'd ever known forced his next words down into nothing more than a horrified whisper. "And Jo's with him right now."

"Jo?" Barbara repeated. "She's with wh—?"

Suddenly the screen, the only source of light in the Clocktower loft, shut off. The three were plunged into darkness. And then as quickly as it had come, it was gone. The screen lit back up, though it returned as a black backdrop that provided meager lighting.

And then, gliding across the screen as if someone were typing them in real time, appeared the white text.

Funny. It seems the passing of the Batman saw Gotham lose its last competent detective. That explosion really was a shame, wasn't it?

"Who is that?" Tim demanded hotly. He glanced down at Barbara, who was already furiously typing at the keyboard.

"I don't know," she replied, her panic showing through her voice. "And they've locked me out. I-I can't do anything!"

"Hang on," Tim assured. He turned away, hurrying towards the second computer. "Let me try something." Only Jason remained where he stood, immobile while he watched the words manifest against that black background.

Are you there, Red Hood? Are you reading this?

"They're talking to you? You know who it is?" Barbara asked.

"Yeah," Jason replied grimly. "I know."

Tonight, I will destroy you. And with this death, I mark the end of this so-called era of vigilantes.

"Just you try, asshole," Jason growled under his breath. He'd turned on his heel when Barbara called for him to stop.

"They're just trying to get to you," she said. "Don't play their game."

"You don't understand," Jason shot back. "Jo's with him!" The grapple shot out and latched onto the edge of the Clocktower's rooftop entrance. The cord whizzed loudly, pulling the Red Hood up with it.

The air was cooling with the setting of the sun. The waning light reflected off of his helmet as he looked towards the horizon. If the Overseer was coming after him at night, he didn't have much time left.

And, though he hated himself every time he did, the Red Hood reached to his earpiece and turned the bug back on.