The night was young, although it was already fiercely cold outside and pitch black. The only lights came from the Cauldron, where the city lived far past sunset. The Red Hood's mask did come with night vision, just in case she ever needed it, but on this particular night, she chose not to use it. She'd been jumping through the darkness that was Gotham City for years, and she'd been places which were significantly darker. Death was significantly darker.

The darkness in Gotham was just home at this point.

She was perched on top of Wayne Tower, the highest point in the city, just watching. Her feet swung over the edge, kicking the building beneath her boots. She'd left her hood in her apartment tonight, because she had felt just too lazy to put her hair inside it. Instead, she had put it in a lazy pony tail with the silver bangs hanging down in front of her face. A cigarette was loosely placed between her lips while she absentmindedly took a long drag. As she exhaled, she heard the crunch of a second pair of boots behind her.

"Are you sulking again?" an all too familiar voice asked.

Jaci stood up, taking another drag from her cigarette as she turned to look at her new company. "I'm always sulking, Batboy," she responded, smoke exiting her mouth with every syllable.

Short red hair and a domino mask faced her as she turned around. She wasn't even a little bit surprised, Brandon usually patrolled up here. Although, she could've sworn Alfred told her that Brandon had the night off. Otherwise she wouldn't have smoked up here. Brandon was always up her ass about smoking.

She could tell, even through the domino mask that he was eyeing the cigarette. "Yeah, I know," she said, exasperatedly. She threw the half-smoked cancer stick onto the ground and stomped it out. Brandon was still staring at her. "You wanna kiss?"

"If I wanted to make out with an ashtray, sure," Brandon said disapprovingly. "I thought you were gonna quit smoking, Jay," He said, crossing his arms across the yellow Bat across his chest.

Jaci laughed. "I got the rest of this pack, otherwise it'd be a waste of money." She said, waving her pack around before returning it safely to her utility belt. Some would argue she could store better things in there, like weapons or something. But Jaci found that she never needed a cigarette more than when she was on patrol. Nor was a cigarette ever more fun to smoke. Her favorite spot was right here, on top of Wayne Tower. Because once she was done, she'd just drop it. And then she liked to race it to the bottom and see what happened. She'd never won, but she was determined.

"Honestly, I was expecting Red Robin. She's way cooler about the smoking thing than you." Jaci said, fighting the urge to reach for another.

"I'll have to yell at her too, then," Brandon said. He moved towards Red Hood, walking past her and sitting down on the edge of the rooftop.

Jaci was confused. "Don't you have patrol or something to be doing?" She asked. The night was still young, there was much of the evening that hadn't happened yet.

Brandon waved his hand around, shoeing the idea away. "I've already been around once, so I'll take a break and go again in like half an hour." He leaned back on his hands, kicking his feet like Jaci was only moments before.

Poor little guy seemed bummed. Jaci felt the need to pry, and see what was bothering him so.

"You okay? You're less pissed about my cancer than you usually are." She walked over towards him and sat down next to him.

Brandon sighed. "Yeah," he said. "It's finals week, and I asked Bruce to make sure my patrols got covered so I could study but he was already covering Nightwing's and so here I am, right after my real job, right before my calculus final." Brandon swung his feet nonchalantly, staring down at the huge drop below.

Jaci was lucky. Death made her disqualified from going to school. And she was okay with that, she already had enough on her plate and she definitely didn't need to add calculus to the mix. Bruce had once told her that if she ever wanted to go back to school, she could and he'd have something arranged, and he'd even pay for it. But as of right now, Jaci had to pass because she had better ways to spend her time. Although, she did feel kind of guilty because the town was dead and there were two people on patrol tonight when honestly there only needed to be one.

She sighed, looking down at her hands and her own swinging feet. "Tell you what, little bat," she said. Brandon looked at her through the domino mask and Jaci knew that he had an eyebrow raised in slight irritation at the stupid nickname. "I'll finish up patrol, and if anything happens, I'll call you first so that Bruce doesn't know you skipped."

"That seems like a bad idea," Brandon said. "I mean, if something happens I'll have to be there instantly and what if I can't be?"

Jaci raised an eyebrow right back at him. "Something's going to happen? Look around Brandon." She gestured with one arm out over the town. There weren't even any police lights flashing through the streets. It was completely calm. Everyone had remarkably settled down. "Just go home and focus on school. I'll take care of this and call you if I need you."

Brandon looked unconvinced. "Fine. But call me before you need me, so I can get here in time," he said, using Jaci's shoulder as leverage to stand up. He walked backwards, holding out a hand for Jaci to stand as well.

Once she was up, she leaned forward and placed a kiss on his cheek. "You're too smart to stress about school, Batboy." She grinned, as did Brandon, before he sprinted forward and leaped off the building. Jaci watched as his body disappeared into the night, and resettled herself on the rooftop.

She grinned, reached into her belt and pulled out another cigarette. "Finally," she murmured around the cigarette in her mouth as she held a flame up to the other end and took a well-deserved, long drag.