"What happened? Did you handle Red Hood?" Selina asked her husband as he and Oliver joined her and Thea at Helena's bedside.
"No, and things just got a lot more complicated." Bruce said.
"Complicated how?" Selina asked, wondering why her husband hadn't beat the shit out of the man who'd nearly killed their daughter when he'd nearly bashed the Joker's head in with a crowbar after Jason.
"Is Damien here?" Bruce asked, not wanting his son to hear this.
"Laurel took him to the mansion to nap with Alfred watching him." Thea said and Bruce nodded.
"The reason it's complicated is because the Red Hood is Jason Todd." Bruce said.
"What, that's impossible." Selina said.
"Why does that name sound familiar?" Thea asked, right as Helena woke up.
"Because he was, or I guess is, my foster brother. Jason was the second Robin after Dick. He started around the same time I started out as Huntress, we trained together, fought side by side for years. I recognized his fighting style the moment he attacked me. I guess that bastard finally got the jump on me." Helena said, since she'd always beat Jason when they sparred in training.
"This isn't a laughing matter. He nearly killed you, not to mention what he did to Tim and Stephanie, since they're both still recovering." Selina told her daughter.
"How is Jason alive? You told me you saw his body yourselves after the Joker killed him." Oliver said, changing the topic.
"A lazarus pit. It's the only thing that could've saved Jason, but that raises even more questions. Where's the pit, who brought Jason back, how long ago did they bring him back and most importantly, why did they bring him back." Bruce said.
"We can answer that question once we have him locked up at Argus, since I think that putting a guy who knows all your secrets, including your real name, in a place where all your worst enemies are locked up. At least the ones who haven't escaped yet. I'll call Gamble, see if he can set something up, since Sara's still on her honeymoon." Oliver said.
"I still don't understand why you keep sending your bad guys to Arkham when they always find ways to escape. From what I hear, the Joker might as well have his own private exit considering how frequently he escapes." Thea said.
"I've been asking that same question for years." Helena told her girlfriend.
"I know it's not ideal, but Arkham was designed to hold criminally insane individuals and none of my rogues are sane enough to risk being transferred to Belle Reve. Though I am constantly spending money trying to improve Arkham each time one of my rogues escapes." Bruce admitted.
"Still, we need to put the people who haven't been attacked yet on alert, since while Dick and Kate can defend themselves, they need to know that it's Jason they're fighting, so he might have more of an edge, since he worked with them both, he knows their fighting styles." Helena said.
"I still don't get why he went after the Joker alone. Considering he's your most notorious enemy, it seems like he'd know to wait for backup." Oliver said to Bruce.
"It all stems back to when I first recruited Jason." Bruce said.
"How did you find him?" Thea asked and Helena chuckled.
"Oh please let me tell it." Helena practically begged.
"Go for it." Bruce said.
"It was shortly after Dick went solo in Bludhaven and I was still training, since mom wouldn't let dad take me into the field until I'd finished my training and they were both very intense. But anyways, Dad had just finished patrol and when he was on his way back to his car, he found Jason trying to steal the hubcaps." Helena said.
"Wait, he tried to steal the Batmobile's hubcaps?" Oliver asked, honestly amused by that.
"Jason had a hard life. His parents were neglectful, leaving him with his relatively abusive uncle until his mom OD'd and his dad was killed by Two-Face and then his uncle OD'd, so he was left to fend for himself, due to how crappy Gotham's social services are. When I saw Jason, I saw myself in him, since the anger I saw him, it's the same anger I've carried inside since my own parents were murdered. He's been angry at the world for years and I thought that I could help him the same way I helped Dick and Kate deal with their own traumas, help them turn their pain into strength and commitment to help our home." Bruce said, since like most members of the bat family, both Dick and Kate's backstories were ones of trauma.
Dick had once been a member of his family's circus act before his parents had been killed in a circus accident that wasn't really an accident, but the result of mobsters while Kate's trauma came from the death of her mom and twin sister on her thirteenth birthday due to the Joker running them off the road on the way home from their birthday party, since Kate had been the only one to escape the car in time.
"But Jason was too angry. He was hot headed and arrogant. He kept trying to call me out, claiming that I should be answering to him since he was Robin while I was a nobody, despite the fact that I outranked him not only because I joined the team before he did, but I'm dad's child by blood. He kept rushing into fights and making them worse, leaving the rest of us to pick up the pieces afterwards." Helena added.
"Until it got to the point where I locked up his suit and suspended him from active duty until he proved to me that he was ready to fight for the right reasons, not just to hurt a world that had hurt him." Bruce said.
"But Jason never understood that, despite how many times we tried to explain it to him. Though he did seem to calm down a bit for awhile, his temper mellowed out and he began showing signs of maybe earning back his suit, especially since Dick was gone and I was planning on hanging up my mask for college, since at the time, mom was already retired to look after Damien, so after I left, it would've just been dad and Kate defending Gotham. But Jason got a little overeager." Helena said.
"What happened?" Thea asked, not sure she wanted to know.
"It happened while mom, dad and I were in Central City touring Hudson University. Jason didn't want to go, so dad decided to show him a gesture of goodwill by letting him stay home alone, since Alfred came with us to watch Damien during the tour. That turned out to be a mistake, since it was during that time that the Joker made one of his infamous escapes from Arkham. Jason thought that this was an opportunity to prove he was ready to go back to being Robin full time, so he stole his suit back and tracked the Joker down, only to get caught in a trap and have his head caved in by a crowbar. I can still remember coming home to find Barbara's dad at the door, telling us that Jason was dead." Helena said.
"Well clearly it didn't stick. We need to find Jason before he hurts anyone else. Do you think I need to worry about him coming after my team?" Oliver asked.
"No, the only ones really at risk would be you, Helena and Luke, since you all have some kind of direct link to me. Jason's vendetta seems to be against me particularly." Bruce said.
"Which in all likelihood means that he's just the weapon one of your enemies is using to attack you." Selina told her husband.
"Agreed, but we can focus on that later. We'll stay here a few more days to keep Helena company while she recovers and then, once she's discharged, we'll leave her in Thea's care and return home to Gotham." Bruce said and his wife nodded in agreement at that.