"You stay with me, Dickhead, I swear to god…" Jason snarled as he pushed down on Dick's abdomen, nearly gagging as he felt his brother's warm blood continue to seep through his clenched-white fingers and gush out over his shaking hands. He felt betrayed by his own body as his eyes began to sting.

"D- Don't you go crying on me n- now, little wing…." Dick whispered slowly. Jason swore under his breath as his eyes caught on the sight of blood staining his brother's teeth. He hadn't even considered internal injuries. Dick grunted and began to pant open-mouthed as he angrily tightened his grip. His eyes were wild as he chuckled breathlessly, a wolfish grin splitting his face. Jason really needed to stop unconsciously memorizing that smile as if it would be the last time he would ever see it.

he's conscious, which means he's got time… not a lot of it, but some - enough. he'll be fine, just keep pressure on it… That's all that was running through his head. Jason's not really sure when he began to think of Dick as his brother, or Tim and Damian for that matter, but he's not going to lose a family member to a bullet-welding asshole when he's only just reconciled with him.

Reminded of the guy, Jason snarled to Tim, who jumped. "Tie his ass down and get him out of my sight before I throw him over the fucking pier with a bullet in his head"

"Or a sword through his fucking heart"

Ignoring Damian, Jason reached up and pushed at his earpiece. "Hood to Agent A, get Big B on the line now"

It pained him to even ask Bruce for help with anything, after all these years, but - this was Dick. Jason has never appreciated Alfred's professionalism under pressure more than in this moment as the butler barely hesitated for half a second. "Certainly, sir"

The line clicked and Bruce's gruff voice filled his ear questioningly, "Red Hood?"

"B, big bird's hurt. Bullet to lower abdomen, other injuries-"

"I'm there. Keep him talking." The line clicked.

"Okay, okay.." Jason breathed, shifting on his knees. He turned to his brother, "Dickie? B says you gotta keep talking.."

Dick chuckled painfully, trying to curl in on himself. Jason doesn't let him. "Why is he always so d- difficult? Just- Just let me pass out.."

"Don't even think about it, birdbrain," Damian growled as he knelt on the other side of Dick, opposite Jason. The younger boy put his hands over Jason's and pushed down, drawing a strangled cry from Dick. Jason raised his head to look at Damian, checking in, and met an angrily clenched jaw and eyes blazing. Despite all that, Jason thought he heard a fierce sniffle.

"But his Kevlar.." Tim trailed off, fidgeting behind Damian, shifting nervously. Reminded of the younger boys, Jason took a deep breath and forced himself to calm down. He had to be in control – keep Dick from bleeding out and keep the boys from freaking out.

"Too close of a range," Jason said softly. Jason knew that Tim knew that the gun was too close to Dick for the protective vest to stop the bullet; he was just asking out of desperation. Knowing the boy was feeling useless, he gave him something to do, "Tim, go to the end of the pier and look for Bats, direct him to our position"

They all knew that Bruce had put GPS in their earpieces, for situations like this, but Tim nodded anyway. He reached into his belt and gave his brother a white bandage. Jason took it gratefully, slipping it under his hands to press against Dick, and he let his eyes follow the younger boy as he ran down the pier and felt worry - something that he hadn't felt in a while - crawl in his stomach.

Jason turned back as he heard Dick yelp. He caught Damian's raised hand as he went to slap Dick again, "What the hell are you doing?"

"He was falling asleep!" Damian protested, straining against Jason's hand around his wrist, "I was waking him up!"

Dick slowly moved his eyes to Damian and took in his face. He said slowly and earnestly, "J- Just resting my eyes.."

"Like hell," Damian snarled, his clenched teeth showing in his trademark scowl.

Jason shook the boy. "Damian, I know it's hard, but you've got to keep it together," he tugged Damian's suddenly shaking hand and pushed it to Dick's wound, trapping it beneath his own and pushing down. He caught and held the younger boys' gaze. "It'll be okay, alright?"

After a moment, Damian nodded hesitantly and his body loosened, his face losing its angry snarl and relaxing into something much more like what a 13 year-old who had just watched his big brother/father figure be shot looked like. Jason instantly hated it. He hoped to god, or whoever was up there, that he didn't just make an empty promise.

Jason looked out of the corner of his eye to Dick, who was, surprisingly, looking back. He had a soft kind of smile on his lips, his eyes glazed over. Jason felt cold, trembling fingers grasp weakly at his wrist. Jason read the look in his brother's eyes - look after them.

"Don't you do that, fuckface," Jason snarled angrily, defiantly. Damian looked up at him bewilderedly but he ignored him.

Dick kept staring up at him with a brotherly – loving – look that Jason had never really appreciated or addressed until now. God, he didn't want to lose that look. He didn't want to go back to Bruce's stony silence after the tentative truce they had at the minute; he didn't want to go back to Alfred's hesitancy. He didn't want to go back to Tim's almost frightened look that he had had when Jason had only ever referred to him as 'Replacement'. He definitely – definitely – didn't want to go back to Damian's angry glare, knowing that, this time, it was because of his broken promise.

Damian looked up, over Jason's shoulder, and tensed up. Before Jason could look himself, Damian wiggled his hand out from under his and wiped his slightly watering eyes – that Jason or Dick had noticed, but tactfully ignored – through the mask with the back of his wrist, managing to get blood smeared over his forehead. Jason winced.

"Bat's here," the boy explained and, for some reason, Jason found himself relaxing when he normally would have tensed up. He ignored Dick's drowsy, knowing grin.

After arriving at the pier in the Batmobile, Batman took over. He pushed a willing Jason towards Damian and Tim as he knelt beside his eldest son, cape billowing dramatically behind him as he took over Jason's job of keeping pressure on the wound.

They had a small conversation with quiet voices, but Jason, at that moment, didn't have the energy to eavesdrop. He turned his back to the scene and roughly grasped Tim and Damian by the shoulder, ripping their gazes from Batman and Nightwing. "Go check the perimeter. Robin, go left; Red Robin, go right. Meet and come straight back here to this pier, okay?"

"But-"

Jason interrupted Tim's protest and asked, "You want Batman caught unawares with an injured Nightwing?"

Damian hesitated, obviously unhappy. "…No"

"Then go," Jason ordered with no give in his voice, kind of hating himself as, with matching accusing glares, the Robins left. He thought he heard an almost Batman-growl in his voice.

Speak of the devil. "I know you hated sending the boys away, but it's what I would've done"

Looking over, Jason watched Batman withdraw a small syringe from Nightwing's arm, knowing, from experience, that it was a mild pain-killer. The pain must have been bad if Dick had allowed him to be injected with it – the guy hated needles almost as much as he hated being benched from patrol, or Alfred's disapproving, disappointed stare.

"And you're always right?" Jason asked as he crossed his arms defensively at Dick's feet. He had meant the comment to be sarcastic and biting, but it came out more as a genuine question. To his surprise, it was Bruce that replied, not Batman.

"No," he admitted, his voice softening, "Not nearly enough.."

Jason took the apology for what it was. He nodded.

"You're just a man, B" Dick rasped from his place on the ground beneath Batman's hands.

Simultaneously, both Jason and Bruce snapped, "Shut up"

Dick chuckled before choking, wincing as he moved painfully. Jason started forward and stopped, snapping sharply, "Should we be waiting this long?"

"He's stable, for now," Bruce added, "But you're right, we should go before the Robins return - they don't need to see this. Help me lift him"

"Oh, shit-" Dick started as Batman lifted his shoulders up and Jason took his feet. The acrobat was heavier than he looked, muscles built up from his stint as Batman, but, somehow, he still managed to be lithe and agile. Jason didn't know where he put it all.

By the time they had reached the Batmobile, he was passed out. Batman pressed a button on his gauntlet and Jason started as the Batmobile opened up like a flower opening in the spring, reaching out with dark, metal claw-like arms to cradle Dick before retracting, encasing Dick its protective embrace.

"…Impressive" Jason finally said, slightly uncomfortable. It reminded him of a book that Bruce used to read to him, about exotic flowers around the world. Dionaea muscipula, his mind tells him. Jason had never told Bruce, but the fact that there were carnivorous plants out there had terrified him when he was younger. Maybe even more so now, with people like Poison Ivy out there, it was a legitimate question – who could stop them if they weaponized meat-eating plants?

Almost as if he were reading his mind, Bruce smirked amusedly. He turned, walking towards the driver's seat. "Get the Robins home, let them run off the excess adrenaline - give them time to cool off. They've been through a lot.."

He climbed in the Batmobile and turned to meet his son's set jaw and clenched fists and saw the concern there. His voice softened, "Jason, he'll be fine… he's a tough kid - he's had worse"

Jason wasn't as reassured by that as he probably should have been. It wasn't until he had watched Batman scorch his tires as he skidded away that he realized that Bruce had used his name while in the field.

/

"Bruce, I can-"

Bruce gave Jason a pointed look that cut him off as effectively as it did when he was Robin. He bristled as he watched the older man flick his eyes over his shoulder. Jason followed with his own, landing on the two Robins. The birds were, for lack of a better word, huddled, their eyes watching Alfred's every move as he bent over Dick's unconscious, bloody body, their elbows brushing against each other's sides. Jason thought he saw Damian's little finger pushed into a clasp in Tim's belt and Tim's hand tangled in Damian's cape.

Taking in the two Robins, he turned back and nodded to Bruce, who grimaced in reply. Jason read the look on his face – good luck, glad it's not me..

But this wasn't Jason's first rodeo dealing with frightened birds. He had had to deal with the younger boys on the way home and he was never letting Dick get shot again. Quietly distraught and worried, both boys were reckless, throwing out their grapples and swinging before they had even checked their line was secure. Jason had watched Tim slip down a few feet before he caught himself and Damian had nearly lost his footing on the edge of a roof when his line didn't swing him as far as he needed it to.

If it was any other time, Jason would have stopped them and ripped into them for being so stupid; but it wasn't any other mission. To be honest, Jason doesn't think they would have stopped if he had told them to anyway. Visions of falling birds had filled his head, so Jason had kept a careful eye out, frantically following behind them so he would be able to catch them if one of them went down.

By the time they had reached the cave, Jason's heart was permanently stuck in his throat, he had a pounding headache and he had wanted to shove Dick off the medical bed so that he could just go lie down and bring his blood pressure back down from where it had been through the roof.

Slightly less frazzled than before, Jason turned to the boys after Bruce had given him a smile that could only be described as encouraging. Damn that man.

"Right, ladies," Jason said with more enthusiasm than he felt, "We've had an… eventful night, so let's-"

"You are not sending us away again," Domain scowled, "Not again"

Meeting an impenetrable wall of solid anger and worry, Jason sighed and dropped his overly-eager tone. "Okay. But listen, kids, Bruce said he'll be fine. When has he ever lied?"

Both boys glared at him.

"-when it mattered?"

Damian snorted and Tim chuckled darkly. Jason sighed heavily, "Okay, so if you don't trust Bruce quite like that, who will you trust?"

"…You"

"What?"

Tim nodded in agreement, ignoring Jason's startled outburst. "Yeah, you promise us he'll be fine and we'll go"

Jason's eyes widened as he crossed his arms across his chest. "Why me?"

"You're our big brother, if we can't trust you then we can't trust anybody"

"And Grayson obviously can't tell us, so you'll have to"

Jason cleared his throat and shifted uncomfortably, suddenly choked up. Good god, the Robins had him good. When had they started relying on him for anything - apart from trying to kill them?

"I promise," Jason breathed, stepping forward and kneeling to Damian's height, keeping his eyes on Tim's face, "Dick Grayson will be fine, alright?"

It was quiet for a moment before Tim nodded, after searching his brother's face for something. What, Jason couldn't tell you – that he was lying, he guessed. "Okay. Let's go, Dami"

Jason looked back at Alfred and Bruce who were leaning over Dick and made an executive decision. "I'll come with you"

/

Tim had gotten his shirt after he bashfully admitted how smitten he was with the Amazonian after he met her at a Justice League meeting, and Dick pounced on the chance to tease him, recruiting Damian to find the best source of shame he could. Instead of being embarrassed, the boy wore the shirt with pride, parading around in it for a month before Bruce enlisted Alfred to get him to stop wearing it constantly. As a result, the shirt is worn and faded due to years of loving and Tim once admitted to Dick that it was the best present he had ever gotten the younger boy.

Meanwhile, in sharp contrast, Damian's shirt is torn, and has a suspicious hole through the middle of the 'S'. Dick had bought it as a joke, meant to irritate Bruce to see his own biological son wear the shirt of his ally – the one that he had an uneasy companionship with and the one that Dick called 'Uncle Clark'. The relationship between the Bat and the Kyptonian was complex and complicated - it was fucked up, to be honest, but Jason secretly thought the simile of them being brothers fitted perfectly. After Damian refused to take it off, much like Tim and his shirt, Dick swore he saw Bruce take a knife to the shirt one night when it was his turn to do the washing, but has never been able to prove it.

Jason's shirt was also bought by Dick, who thought it was hilarious, and for that fact – and only that fact – Jason wore it to bed anytime he can. He liked the beaming smile that lit up Dick's face every time, and that is all. It's definitely not because he still has some lingering sense of awe regarding Bruce after all these years – it's not. Despite how frequently he wore the shirt, it was still in pristine condition.

After Tim had donned his 'Wonder Woman' shirt, Jason his 'Batman' shirt and Damian his 'Superman' shirt, they climbed into bed. It was an unspoken but unanimous decision to sleep in Dick's room, his dirty 'Flash' shirt thrown over the chair in the corner.

Damian and Tim are out like a light before their heads even hit the pillow. Trapped between them, Jason rests up against the headboard. He grunted when Tim curled around his thigh in his sleep and when Damian kicked his leg, his small hand reaching up and weakly grasping the shirt over his stomach. Sighing, he closed his eyes for a moment.

Jason isn't sure where he is when he's woken up, but it doesn't matter, because the door is slowly opening. He sat up quickly, pushing a tense Damian and a quiet Tim down as they try to follow his lead, indicating that he wants them to pretend to be asleep. He has his jaw set, eyes focused as he glared at the doorway, only to see -

- Dick.