Jason broods, Sabine freaks out.
Chapter 18 of What's Up, Danger?: Snap Back to Reality
Monday, 11:30 PM
Jason was relieved it wasn't a slow patrol night.
The loud popping of gunshots in quick succession filled the air followed by the screeching of tires. Pursuing the blasts and tire marks burned into the street, lead him past a smashed ATM, and into an abandoned apartment building where the smash-and-grab thieves were trying to lie low.
ATM thieves were typically considered low-level threats in Gotham City, something the police could handle, but these idiots senselessly fired into a crowd of people. They were lucky their bullets only hit a brick wall across the street, but it was still enough to piss Jason off.
There was something about the thrill of the chase that made him feel alive. From the sweat pooling on his brow under his helmet to the adrenaline pumping through his veins to the rush of wind as he grappled from rooftop to rooftop—he felt so alive.
He kicked in the planks that were loosely nailed into the window frame, meant to barricade the entrance. Breaking through the fractured wood and glass shards, he found himself face-to-face with a handful of thugs in ski masks desperately trying to consolidate the loose bills into one duffle bag.
The masks concealed every part of their faces but their eyes which bulged in fear when the shadow of the Red Hood eclipsed them.
Unfortunately for Jason, Roy, who had the habit of inviting himself along, was in an inappropriately timed chatty mood.
"Dude, what's eating you?" Arsenal pinched his eyebrows together as he barrelled into the dark room behind Jason.
Red Hood vaulted over an overturned sofa, charging at one of the men who was pulling a gun out of his waistband.
"You really wanna do this now?" Jason yelled as his right fist connected with the thug's face.
His opponent staggered back and the gun clattered on the hardwood floor. Quickly, Jason kicked the gun away before lunging forward and burying his left fist in the man's stomach. The impact from the combination of powerful blows sent the men staggering backward into the wall.
"Yes, now!" Roy declared, firing a blunt-tipped bolt from his crossbow at a man who was blazing toward him. He rolled forward and ducked behind the couch for cover.
The bolt whizzed past Jason's shoulder and hit its mark, knocking the man back. Roy would've preferred to use arrows tipped with something more piercing and sharp, maybe even one that exploded—but nooo, after the incident at the docks, he had to play by the Bats' rules in Gotham.
A split second later, another man was charging towards Red Hood, brandishing a switchblade in his hand. From his position behind the couch, Roy aimed with his bow and gritted his teeth, ready to defend his companion.
But Jason was fast. Sensing danger, he whirled around and grabbed the oncoming hand, wresting the knife away by painfully twisting the assailant's wrist.
Bones cracked. A scream of pain. The metal blade dropped to the ground, the dangerously sharp tip sticking into the wood.
Once disarmed, Red Hood's knee flew up to hit him in the stomach. The thug coughed as the wind was knocked out of him before he slumped to the floor with a loud thud.
They never stood a chance. It was pathetic.
The derelict room with broken windows and moth-eaten furniture was quiet as Jason and Roy took a few seconds to scan their surroundings, assessing if any more potential threats were on their way. They heard nothing but their ragged breathing from hauling their asses across the city and the squeaks of rats scurrying about in the dilapidated building.
Eventually, Roy lowered his weapon and made his way over to his friend. The floorboards creaked under his boots.
Roy slung his arm over Jason's shoulder. "You're giving me that look."
Jason snorted and slipped away from Roy. He pointed at his helmet. "What look? You can't even see my face."
"Well those are definitely your brooding shoulders," Roy countered, waving an arm at his friend to emphasize his point.
Jason scoffed and turned away with his hands on his hips. "I'm always brooding, it's what I do."
Unrelenting, Roy continued, "Something's bothering you."
His 'there's something up with Jaybird-sense' tingled and he couldn't just ignore it. Others would say that Jason was always moody, but Roy knew better.
Jason didn't respond as his gaze dragged over the dazed men on the ground.
He reached inside the inner pocket of his jacket for restraints and something in it crinkled. He pulled out the small packet of trail mix Sabine had presented him with the night before. The sight of it turned his insides into a jumbled mess. The memories of New York pricked him like the remaining splinters of a bad dream.
Roy squatted next to him, his brows raised over his domino mask suspiciously. "You're brooding over…trail mix?"
Jason kneaded the bag between his fingers before shoving it back inside the pocket and finding the heavy-duty zip ties he kept in there. "It's complicated."
The tattered edges of his mind unraveled themselves further at the recollection of the previous night. He'd felt overwhelmed, suffocated, and then he'd left her there. Fleeing like a scared little boy.
He ran because it was easier than dealing with the vulnerability and rawness that had clawed their way to the surface.
Some hero, some friend, he turned out to be.
With a sharp inhale, he pulled himself back together.
Patting Red Hood on the shoulder, Roy said sympathetically, "If an itty bitty bag of trail mix has you feeling this messed up then we need to talk, man."
Jason tilted his head back and groaned, peeved that his friend wouldn't just freaking drop it. "We'll talk about it later, okay?"
"Later?" Roy pressed as he folded his arms, unflinchingly staring down at the bright red helmet and the white slits that glowered back at him.
Jason confirmed with a brisk nod. "Later."
"If you say so," Roy ground out with stubborn undertones. "We should probably head out before they all wake up for round two."
Jason tossed Roy a zip tie. "Cuff their hands. I'll let Oracle know where the police can pick them up once we're off the scene."
The men on the ground stirred, the shock and dizziness from the brutal beating wearing off as Arsenal and Red Hood roughly secured their hands behind their backs. Then they unceremoniously frisked them, much to men's unpleasant protests, relieving them of any other weapons they had on their bodies and tossing them to the side.
Satisfied, Jason motioned to Roy that it was time to leave. "Let's get out of here."
Roy followed his direction without complaint, carefully climbing out through the window to avoid the protruding shards of glass, with Jason right behind him.
And back out into the night they went, looking for more trouble.
10:50 AM, Tuesday
Jason could check another uneventful therapy session off his list for the week.
The building's elevator had a yellow maintenance sign in front of it and Jason didn't waste any time throwing open the door to the stairs. He hurried down with an anxious bounce in his step, one hand ghosting over the railing for balance. The pounding of his heavy footfall created a cacophony that filled the enclosed space.
If he was quick enough, he'd be able to avoid Sabine.
He needed some distance to regain his grasp on objectivity.
His anxiety ignited, reminding him of one of his fatal flaws: he cared too damn much. He always cared too much. His job necessitated secrecy and anonymity for a good reason, regardless of the wedges it drove between himself and others.
As if summoned by his very conflicted thoughts, Sabine's voice echoed off the walls.
"Jason?"
He paused, dazed by the sound of her calling his name, and looked up. Her head poked over the railing two floors above him and she waved. The way her face lit up when she saw him made his heart thrum under his ribs unexpectedly.
Jason forced a friendly smile and returned the greeting with an uncharacteristically tentative wave of his own. "Hey, you."
He stopped on the bottom landing, no longer able to avoid her now that he'd been caught red-handed making his speedy getaway and sure that the universe was laughing madly at him.
One of her shoelaces slipped out of the lazy knot she'd tied and whipped against the side of her boot as she made her way down to him.
Sabine slowed down, coming to a stop midway down the final staircase. Her cheeks glowed red from the exertion.
She noticed the way his right leg jiggled restlessly. "Oh, sorry, were you in a hurry?"
"No, not really," he lied and rubbed the back of his neck.
"I just wanted to say thank you for, umm, talking to me on the phone last week," Sabine said with a sobering smile, "I really appreciated it."
Jason hooked his thumbs into his jacket pockets and his shoulders sagged. He licked his dry lips and replied, "S'nothing. Glad it helped."
God, this was awkward.
His closed-off posture was easy enough to read. Sabine's teeth tugged over her bottom lip, realizing that Jason wasn't in a verbal mood.
Unsurely, she descended the last few steps. Sabine's concern behaved like gravity, drawing her towards him.
A consuming uneasiness filled her as her eyes raked over him. Jason usually appeared tired and rough, but he seemed particularly out of it this morning. Tormented, even. His lips closed and tight and the way he tried to make himself small by tucking himself inwards.
Clumsily, a loose shoelace caught under her boot as she stepped forward on the final stair to the landing. Jason's hand deftly grabbed her arm to keep her from stumbling forward.
Sabine puffed out a short and embarrassed laugh. "Woah, good reflexes—"
The warm sensation of his strong fingers coiled around her skin was like being grabbed and pulled by an invisible force.
Suddenly, her vision distorted violently. The stairway and the walls melted away, dissolving into a shroud of mist.
Her eyes flooded with the image of a towering lichgate, columns of bricks held up either side with an iron arch bridging the gap between them and rusty gates that rattled in the wind.
One of the gates swung open and a low layer of ghost-grey fog blanketed the field of gravestones that came into view. The fog rolled ominously in the breeze, guiding her along a dark and twisty pathway. Past white granite mausoleums and trees with overhanging limbs towards an upright headstone, the words engraved on its front read:
HERE LIES
JASON TODD
She tried to tear her eyes away from the sight as the hairs on the back of her neck stood, but her eyes remained locked onto the grave, rereading the words in shock.
The smell of mulch and decay entered her nose. Even the spectral wind sent shivers up and down her body, finding its way underneath her layers of clothes.
The wind rustled the leaves on the tree branches, and carried the sound of her name as if someone was saying it over and over again…
"Sabine? Are you okay?" Jason asked slowly, his voice breaking through her zoned-out state. His eyes caught her vacant expression as it gradually turned to confusion then panic. "Sabine?"
Sabine let out a shaky breath that rattled her tongue and lips as she drifted back to reality. The visceral spell over her shattered into pieces as her surroundings shifted back into focus; the stairwell, the concrete walls, and Jason with his eyebrows squished together in concern as he stood in front of her with his hand clasped around her forearm to help her balance.
His proximity suddenly made her feel feverish. His touch against her skin throbbed like a heartbeat.
Fear spiderwebbed itself across her mind, reaching into every corner. Each of its delicate threads latched onto her overwhelmed nerves. Behind her eyelids, the apparition of the cemetery remained imprinted like an unholy burn.
She tried not to look at him, but in the low lighting in the stairwell, his green eyes burned brightly like two stars transfixed on only her.
Pulse racing wildly, she took her arm back from his grip and pulled on her jacket, bracing for the cold outside. "I'm…I'm gonna go."
Jason reeled back with his hands up as she brushed past him, mumbling a quiet "thanks" under her breath.
She shoved the exit door open and the pitter-patter of her footsteps quickly died out.
And just like that, she was gone; leaving Jason in a stupefied lurch at the bottom of the stairwell, his previous anxieties temporarily forgotten as he wondered what the hell just happened.
Roy was still snoring on the couch, passed out in his tactical gear from the previous night when Jason returned to his apartment. A little bit of drool seeped out of the corner of Roy's mouth, threatening to dribble onto the throw pillow that propped up his head.
Jason lazily shrugged off his jacket and draped it over his friend. With a thumb, he smudged away the tiny strand of saliva on Roy's dumb face before the gears in his brain kicked into overdrive analyzing Sabine's reaction.
The way her eyes widened, full of fright. The way her skin prickled with goosebumps and her face paled. The lump that visibly hardened in her throat before she found her voice again.
She looked at him like she saw a ghost.
2:55 PM, Gotham University
Sabine thoughtlessly chewed on her fingernails as she stared at her open laptop screen. The words in the open document blurred together and turned into gibberish as she found herself unable to concentrate. Half-listening to the hour-and-a-half long review lecture, she'd only managed to cobble together a handful of disjointed sentences in her notes document.
Jason Todd—the name repeated inside her head as Professor Steele, who'd taken over Storrison's classes, droned on and on behind a podium at the front of the lecture hall—what the hell kind of name was that?
The grisly image of the gravestone was still so clear in her mind; from the poignant words carved into its surface to the dead grass and weeds that swathed the area around it.
She flexed her hands above the keyboard and wiggled her fingers. Rosemary Delgado's name belonged to a real person, so who was she to say that someone by the name of Jason Todd didn't also exist?
Ignoring the growing soreness and sensitivity in the nail bed of her index and middle fingers from chewing them almost down to the quick, she hesitantly typed into the search bar at the top of her screen:
jason todd
Sabine paused for a beat before hitting the enter key because did she really want to know?
She couldn't shake the idea that this was an invasion of privacy, but every time she came into skin-to-skin contact with him—no matter how brief—she'd endured a vision. The first one was red and violent, the second one submerged under glowing water…and now this.
Yes, a voice in her head chimed in, you deserve to know about the person you've been spending time with. And if the name or grave isn't real, no harm no foul.
Taking in one more controlled breath…she pressed enter.
She needed to know, if anything, to sate the beast that was curiosity.
Her lips parted slightly in surprise and her pulse quickened as dozens of results populated the screen.
She exhaled with a soft whistle. Okay, here we go.
She slowly scrolled through the webpage, her eyes skimming the results which largely consisted of what looked like a plethora of true crime articles and conspiracy theories.
There were photos of him in the images tab; in one he was wearing a Gotham Academy uniform and smiling brightly—a school photo. In another, he was dressed in a well-fitted suit with tousled hair—a snapshot of him attending a gala or some other fancy event.
The similarity in features was startling; this Jason's face was rounder, more youthful, and unmarred by scars. His nose still had its characteristic hook but wasn't slightly crooked yet. He was noticeably shorter and less bulky, his frame resembling a normal athletic teenage boy.
The sight of green eyes under dark brows was the most telling giveaway that the photos of the boy on the screen were unmistakably the man she knew in the present. Even as a teenager, the viridian sheen of his irises carried the same silent intensity.
A stubborn and strange thought formed in her mind: his eyes were such a nice shade of green with blue tones, how had she not noticed how pretty his eyes were before? Pretty and haunting.
Her expression crumpled when she realized what all of this meant—the true crime articles, websites of outlandish theories, and the very first result, a dedicated obituary. The weight of the epiphany crashed down around her, her morbid curiosity morphing into a sudden downpour of sadness: this Jason was…dead.
Jason Todd was dead.
Jason Todd died.
The disturbing and surreal revelation led to a torrent of questions rapid-firing in her synapses, one after the other: then who was the man she'd met outside her therapist's office? Who was the man she'd gotten coffee with almost a dozen times? Who was the man that walked her to class every week?
Jason Todd died. The dreadful echo of those words scared her.
Cold anxiety seeped into her, chilling her to bones. Her intuition told her there was something askew with him and she hadn't been able to pinpoint it until now.
How was this even possible?
She lingered on the memory of the scars that littered his face and hands. The Jason she knew had a storied past he kept buried. He was careful to never reveal too much about himself and was guarded. Now, it all horrifyingly made sense.
Before she clicked on the top result, an obituary for Jason Peter Todd published in the Gotham Gazette, a hand touched her shoulder.
Alarmed, Sabine jerked in her seat as she snapped out of her train of thoughts.
"You're still coming to the study group at the library, right?" Paloma asked, using her other hand to tuck a curtain of dark hair behind her ear, revealing a glimpse of an undercut.
Sabine had been so lost in her head that she hadn't realized the lecture ended. Students were packing up their materials and filing out of the room.
She stared blankly at her classmate before nodding frantically. "Yeah, yeah," she stammered, trying to ground herself back in the present. "I'll meet you guys over there in a bit."
Paloma looked over Sabine's shoulder, squinting her eyes behind her cat-eyed glasses frames. Her face lit up in fascination as she recognized the name on the screen.
"Jason Todd?" Her eyes darted excitedly between the display and her bewildered classmate. "You don't know?"
Sabine blinked dumbly, sitting on the edge of her seat. "Know what?"
"I keep forgetting you're not from here," Paloma said, speaking in her usual quick cadence, barely pausing to take a breath. "Jason Todd was one of the kids Bruce adopted. And then a few years later he mysteriously died. It was huuuge news back then."
Agitated by Paloma's words, Sabine shifted in her chair. She leaned over the desk and sat her chin on her fist while her eyes glossed over the screen again. She knew of Bruce Wayne and heard that he adopted a few children over the years, though she never gave it much thought.
"You sure know a lot about this," Sabine finally said, closing her laptop and gathering her textbook. She vaguely wondered if she was doing a good job of hiding her shock.
Paloma smiled, pleased that her enthusiasm for true crime finally came up in casual conversation. "Well, as I said, it was pretty big news to us who've lived in Gotham all our lives. This podcast I listen to even did an episode recently on him," she explained.
Sabine remained quiet and scrunched her brows, still absorbing the troubling information.
"There's a waitress at this diner my family likes to go to who swears that he's a regular there. And my cousin says she's seen him in the bookstore she works at," Paloma rambled on with a chuckle. "I've never seen him though."
Sabine frowned. "You make him sound like he's some sort of cryptid," she muttered as she gently slipped her laptop into her backpack.
Paloma gave her a one-shoulder shrug. "I can send you links to some discussion threads and the podcast if you're interested. Some of the stuff people came with is wild, though." She lowered her voice and cupped a hand around her mouth, "Some think Bruce Wayne himself did it. There was an investigation and everything. Nothing came of it though. Guess when you're rich you can do anything, get away with anything."
Sabine looked down, already regretting the question she was about to ask, and swallowed apprehensively. "How did…how did he die?"
Paloma used air quotes. "The official story is that it was an accident overseas."
It took every ounce of Sabine's willpower to keep her voice from cracking when she uttered pitifully in response a depressed, "Oh."
With that, the conversation petered out. Paloma tapped her fingers on the desk, eager energy radiating off her.
"You coming?" Paloma asked again as she headed towards the double doors at the top of the lecture hall stairs.
"Yeah, umm…" Sabine trailed off, trying her best to hold back the dam of emotion threatening to burst inside her. Her jaw quivered as she thought up an excuse to buy herself a few more minutes alone. "I'm gonna stop by the cafe in the student union first and I'll meet you over there."
"All right," Paloma called over her shoulder, halfway out the door, "see ya in a bit. I'll tell Theo and Avery we're waiting for you. Library, second floor, usual spot."
Silently, Sabine bobbed her head in affirmation.
The doors swung shut behind Paloma and she was alone in the enormous lecture hall.
Good, she needed silence to digest this…whatever this was.
Heavy-hearted and weary, Sabine sank back into the hard plastic chair, sliding down until her legs were sprawled in front of her. She suppressed a distressed sniffle, pushing it down deep inside of her.
Sabine pushed her hands through her hair and down her head to her neck, cradling her shoulders. "Holy shit," she said to herself, quiet and strained, "holy shit."
Now, what was she going to do? There wasn't exactly a manual detailing what to do when you found out your new friend might be a zombie.
Roy was scooping the last few globs of beef and broccoli out of a takeout container when Jason sighed in frustration from his position on the couch, dropping the game controller dramatically on the coffee table.
"I think I fucked up."
The admittance lingered in the air, heavier than Jason intended. He hoped the confession would alleviate the weight on his shoulders, instead, it made him feel worse. His stomach was in anxious knots.
Roy stopped mid-bite to stare, a floret of broccoli hanging from his lips. "It's just a game, Jay-bird. You can always start over at your last save point."
Jason threw himself back against the cushions. "I'm not talking about the game."
Roy wiped his mouth with his hand. "Is this about the trail mix?"
Morosely, Jason rubbed a calloused hand over his forehead. "No," then he changed his answer to a dejected, "yes."
His chest felt hollow like someone had taken a spoon and shoveled out his insides.
Sitting up, Roy inclined his head towards Jason. "We don't have to talk about it, ya know?" Then he smiled. "I just want you to know that I'm here for you."
Sometimes Jason needed to be reminded that he wasn't alone, even when Roy was right next to him. It was too easy for him to fall into that pit of solidarity.
It surprised Jason that it was Roy's reminder that relieved the tension coiled up inside him.
Jason returned the smile with an appreciative upward quirk of his lips. "Thanks, I know."
After a few seconds of thought, Roy sighed and knocked his knee against Jason's, "Now if only I could write your emotional codependency off on my taxes…"
Any appreciation Jason felt for Roy dried up and withered on the vine.
Jason snorted before making a face. "Do you even pay taxes?"
Roy's response was a noncommittal hum before he shot back, "Do you?"
With a wry laugh, Jason picked up the game controller again. "Fair enough."
A/N: Inching closer to that Red Hood reveal! How do you think Sabine will handle it?
Not super happy with the pacing in this chapter, but the plan was always for Sabine to find out this way.
Thanks for reading! Catch ya'll next update! :)