If you're faint of heart, do not read this chapter!
What is in italics is the hallucination what is not is in reality.
*Warning: Explicit / Disturbing Content*
"Is there a reason why we're pumping him full of drugs, sir?"
"This is a psychological evaluation, Doctor Freidman. I only aim for accuracy." Hugo spoke to the medic. "Ibogaine is a psychoactive drug that allows the user to undergo psychological introspection. It unfolds their psyche, opens their minds to suggestion-to my suggestions. That way, the patient is incapable of dishonesty. Therefore, every secret -everything he has to hide -will brought to light."
Hugo faced his latest subject.
"So, Jason. I'll ask you again," Strange moved in a steady accord as he looked into his fearful eyes. "Tell me about your childhood..."
Gotham City
Park Row
Apartment, ro. 205
8:09pm
Willis Todd staggered his way into the rundown apartment-intoxicated of course. He'd been mumbling to himself, his slurred speech horribly obvious. But the six year old Jason Todd, who'd been quietly playing in the corner with an action figure he'd received from charity that Christmas evening, knew better.
The child's heart jumped upon seeing his father as it always did -a response mechanism he developed, knowing his father's erratic and abusive behavior. His bloodshot red eyes already proved to Jason he already cooked up some sinister intentions. That he'd find any excuse-any excuse to blow off some steam he'd accumulated throughout the day.
With no mental control, he twitched as the drunkard wobbled into the living room, using the wall that suffered quite a few tears and punch holes and sat at the torn up, mold infested seat across his son. The only thing separating them was the stale wooden furniture that'd been holding a flower vase. It was the only entity in the apartment that carried at least a bit of life.
Jason bowed his head in total fear as he nervously rotated the toy's arm. A heavy aura of unease captivated the ambiance.
"Where's your mother?" Todd managed to utter.
"I-I dunno."
"Don't lie to me, boy."
"She leff…" Jason told the man all he knew. "She saided that she was coming back."
"Oh really?" He laughed. "I'll teach that bitch a lesson when she gets back tonight."
The older man clutched his head with his palm, his pale forehead started blushing. He began swearing to himself. His tone became less and less personal and more for his son to hear.
The action figure trembled in the boy's small fingers.
"This is all your fault!" Willis Todd exploded and struck his arm against the flower vase, causing the glass to shatter into tiny bits of shards upon impact to the decrepit floor.
The child shrieked, as his father marched to him and backhanded him to the face.
"Shut the hell up! Fucking useless dog," He barked at his six year old son who instinctively curled into a ball. "Nobody cares about you, no one wants you. I don't want you. I never did! You were a fucking mistake! You are a mistake and you're nothing. You always will be. I should throw your ass in the fucking dumpster where you fucking belong you pathetic piece of shit! See? You're crying now. You fucking pussy. Shut up!" He picked him up, shaking him violently. "I said shut the fuck up!"
The son looked at his father, his eyes full of trepidation. Tears stained his cheeks.
"Dad. Please." Jason choked, yet spoke softly. "Dad please stop hurting me."
Hugo nodded his head. He stepped closer to his subject. "Tell me, Jason. How did he hurt you?"
Willis stared at him for a minute before smacking the boy across the face. His small body fell to the floor and began punching him with every word.
"Words."
"Can't."
"Describe."
"How."
"Much."
"I."
"Fucking." Blood covered his knuckles at this point, it splattered on the wall.
"Hate." He punched with all his might. The young boy felt something crack.
"You!"
He ended it with a kick to the groin. Jason swore he heard something crack.
He watched as his younger body lay there spiritless, blood ran from his nose and mouth, spilling on the tan carpet.
The scene changed. They were outside in the winter breeze as Willis carried his lithe body and threw him in the trash right beside the complex.
He accumulated as much saliva he could and spat at the kid.
"Fucking stay right there. You ugly shit." He slammed the lid before storming back to his accomodation.
Jason steadily walked over to the dumpster.
Opening the lid, he looked down only to see that the young child buried in trash bags…
wasn't him.
Jason turned over and vomited. He caught his mind for a moment.
Rather than being an abandoned six year old kid, there lied a mutilated body.
It was a girl. No less than the age of eight. A child? A fucking child?
Something lied beside the body. It looked like a note-a card. Curiosity got the better of him. Jason cursed himself for it as he dug in, shutting his eyes before he did so.
He felt its smooth texture and grabbed it. He rubbed his thumb across the surface before daring to open his eyes.
The note was covered in blood. But there was something underneath- two letters. Two letters he was able to make out.
'HA!'
Jason stumbled over on all fours and puked again. The yellow contents left a mark in the white snow. His head spun, his muscles weak.
"No..." Jason mumbled. "This can't be happening."
Flashes of those children the Joker brutally tortured came back to mind. Images he tried pushing in the back of his mind resurfaced. He remembered following that trail of blood, looking into their lifeless eyes. Their innocence taken from them too early...too soon.
Stabbing his fingers into his temples, he closed his eyes. What the hell was going on?
"This can't be happening again."
"But it is," Professor Strange remarked. "It looks as though you have been abused by an important figure in your life, Jason. And it has left a great deal of trauma on you. Does anyone else in your life trigger that same feeling of betrayal?"
"No," Jason whispered. "No, no, no, no."
"Hey, Jaybird, you okay?" Dick called out to his younger brother who had been on all fours in the middle of the hallway seemingly confused and unsteady.
Jason jumped at the sound of his voice. He turned to see the first Robin, the one and only golden boy standing behind him. The setting changed. He wasn't where he was before.
Rather, he was outside of his room in the Manor.
"Dick?"
"The one and only."
"Wh-why am I here?"
"I see you really did take a beating from Two-Face's thug last night." Dick said approaching his little brother who although was younger still had been taller and more muscular compared to his thin, acrobatic figure. "Come on," He made that stupid grin he always hated. "Alfred made pancakes. And I know how you love Alfred's pancakes."
They continued down the hallway. Nothing was out of the ordinary. A red carpet led the way down the narrow pathway, past the archaic furnishings and paintings of the Wayne ancestry that dated back to the nineteenth century.
Grayson abruptly stopped and sniffed with an incredulous look on his face.
"Do you," Dick inhaled. "Do you smell something burning?"
A thick mist of grey emerged from downstairs as it crept up the steps.
"…Alfred." They synchronously spoke.
Dick scurried as Jason followed. There was going to be no way in hell they'd leave the man to die.
They fearlessly jumped over the railing, given that hopping off of sixty foot buildings were the norm of their nightly escapades.
Explosive coughs erupted from Grayson once they made it down. Marvelous pigments of orange ate away at the tapestries, indulged in the expensive antique furniture, chewed away at all the small memories of the Wayne legacy that constituted the Manor.
They searched for their faithful butler through all of it. Going behind every chair, flipping over every piece of furniture.
It wasn't long until Dick stumbled over the old man's body.
"Alfred?"
Todd shifted his attention from a table he just flipped over to across the room where the two men stood. Dick had him in his arms, the butler slumped against his body. "Is he alright?"
Dick's eyes widened, his mouth opened in shock.
"Jason, move!"
A large plank of wood came dashing from the ceiling, pinning the second sidekick's back to the floor. While a blockade of fire stretched from wall to wall, separating the three.
"Jason!"
He gritted through his teeth while trying to lift the obstruction but to no avail. His fingers shrilled in pain, the pressure of the heavy object crushing his chest.
"Jason!" The oldest charge screamed.
"Dick, get Alfred and yourself out of here." An assertive baritone voice presented itself as the source pushed the two out of the front door.
"But Jason-"
"I know." He replied. "Go!"
Jason made out a figure on the other side. He squinted his eyes.
It was Bruce.
"Bruce," Jason called out to his second father figure. "Bruce, I need your help. I-I can't move this on my own."
Past the transparent walls of fire, he made out his mentor. He just stood there. Watching. His face was expressionless.
"Bruce, please…" Jason, in reality, muttered under his breath. "Bruce. Don't leave me. You can't leave me here to burn…"
"What's going on, sir?" The medic said to the psychologist. "There were no records of the Wayne Manor burning down recently."
"No. There weren't." Hugo began as he turned to the man beside him. "Ibogaine tends to cause the subject to create…projections of their thoughts and feelings. It may manifest as made up scenarios, false realities that have great meaning. Think of Sigmund Freud's theory of latent content. Dreams, no matter how frantic, all have a significant purpose to the dreamer."
Professor Strange focused back to Jason. His blue eyes stared blankly at the ceiling, mumbling to himself-totally unaware of reality-his mind was at the mercy and under total subjection to the psychedelic.
"There's a whole other world going on in his mind right now…"
Wayne turned around and walked towards the front door.
"Bruce, please…" Jason spoke, through the crackles of the flames.
He gazed at his ward once more. And with absolutely no evidence of remorse, he finally spoke.
"You were never a son to me, Jason."
Those words pierced him. Sharper than anything could. Todd froze, completely unresponsive. No longer was it only the smoke hindering him from breathing.
Bruce turned his back to him, opened the door and was gone.
"Damn you!" He screamed through smoke induced tears-or at least that's what he wanted to think. "Damn you you son of a bitch!"
Thick clouds of the black gas intruded his air pathways as the furious conflagration consumed everything around him.
Something creaked above him. Jason glanced to its respective position and when he saw it…
…he knew this was it.
He accepted it was coming. He embraced it. He pleaded for it to come. To take this away. To end this.
It rasped once more, louder, it dangled from the wall, swinging left and right like a pendulum, counting his final seconds, teasing his selfish urge.
"Come on," The pain was too unbearable to the point he felt numb. "Come on!"
The axe fell at a blurring speed. The former Robin closed his eyes...He inhaled...
And accepted it.
A/N: This isn't the end of Jason's hallucination. More in the next chapter. I figured it was too long to all be in one chapter so I broke it down. Anyway, thanks for reading! I hope this is good enough so far!
