Our Time in Reverse- What it Takes
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Chapter 73: Coming Off Our Disillusioned Futures
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The near epilogue!
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Batman searched the ends of the universe for one of them, one of his lost Robins. One had been lost, never found.
It wasn't until the report left Bruce scrambling to be a martyr, a way back impossible as Jason breathed his very last breath in the crying man's arms. He didn't cry for Richard, only Jason.
There was a reason Dick had run from him, and it was fully clear to him years later.
After the blast had shattered his hope at recovering the now burned up body of his second ward, the process meant that the Titans were leader – less, save a stand in ideal of Roy Harper, who was overcoming a heroin epidemic of his own.
Jhonn Jones met up with Bruce after the surgeons had released Jason to the manor. The doctor stated that the mental trauma would take some time and the grafting was the best ever to respond, meaning he wouldn't look too badly injured. Jason however, never even looked at his family. He asked about the Titans, his other family. Bruce almost was upset just because he couldn't fill that space that he himself had let get this big.
That Joker's stint wkth Jason's missing mother had led to a post episode after episode…until it was just too much.
"Bruce, you must not let this agony bring you so much pain. Today, I come with a question..."
JJohnn held out his hand as Bruce wondered what it could be like to block the pain. "For him, not Jason." Bruce managed to say grimly. "I have no time left to learn if he's still…."
"He is not why you suffer. Friend, you are kind and you cannot trust your own humanity if ever you were to forget for your own protection the mind will forget, store and overcome this difficult time."
"I…Dick is always the reason to me, he was the one I failed.." Bruce put his head in his hands as no one asked questions by the table they had, outside on a nice spring day.
"The weather is pleasant. Like the song birds of this particular weather, can you not hope a bit lojger?"
"Why?" Bruce raised his head, eyes burning from years if hurting himself through 'sticking it out."
"I can't handle being….so vulnerable. Was this how he did it? You told me Jason would live, though he won't be the same. We tried to preserve that part he wouldn't hate to lose. Joker took it." Bruce grumbled in a low snarl. "I can't do anything but find him behind the seediest curtain. Dick on the other hand…"
"You know that Renegade, has changed as well. To save himself."
"To forget." Bruce sighed, putting his hands to the table top. "To forget about what I made him lose, by pushing too hard. If I had –
"You cannot fix what has already occurred."
"I might." Bruce wondered, knowing time travel was as real as Raven's strongest spells.
"If I didn't lie to him, if I didn't let Deathstroke win…"
"It is too late for regretting your actions. Drink from your cup." Jones picked up his coffee mug as the sky didn't look too far off from another plane in this timeline. "This weather, could very well determine that outcome for us. Keep vigilant, and maybe you can speak to the old him one day more."
"I think…" Bruce took to looking deep into his cup, the wind not rustling his hair as kind as anyone else's. "That ship has set sail, and is never coming back."
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Jason hated being cooped up in bed, let alone in the manor where he had plenty of light, food. But no one's real attention.
Alfred was there, the new kid who kept poking around who had no common thought to ….
Wait second, a stalker!?
Jason wheeled his chair out to see what or who had climbed the hill to get a peek at their fancy ass lives in this crazy castle
The boy had green eyes, a school uniform and a camera –
Phone.
Jason tensed.
If he could, the manor's security would have gone off. The little brunette brat was what, fourteen? Dick would have…
He was seventeen that next time, and Dick would be going on to adulthood.
Slade's kind of miracle, Jason bit his cheek at the image.
"No way, kiddo." Kicking open the door, Jason shouted out the back at the little snoop.
"HEY! YOU?"
The brat bolted down the walk as Jason wheeled over to the driveway, the stones catching as he went out into the dust, his entire body going into a slight shock upon impact.
The troublemaker was not a kid who ran from the scene as he stood over Jason, offering a hand and to him, looking…
Why was he being such a wimp?
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Alfred served the young boy some tea and brought out a working phone. "You'll give your home phone number over, young man this instant. I do not know what possessed you yourself to trespass-
"You can't call my dad, or mom." The boy blurted out, fidgeting with his hands at his sides on the sofa. "I…I need the Batman's help."
The two, Jason and Alfred both looked at one another, before chuckling and seeming unfazed by the demand.
"W – what? Batman lives - oh! Thos is rich, aha! Ha, coming from you, kid? Who are you again??"
"I'M Timothy Drake. My father is a big name in Gotham, though not as big as Mr. Wayne, mind you." The kid picked up his cup daintily while Alfred admired how the child never dropped a spill whilst doing so. "The tea is wonderful, Mr. Pennyworth " Tim smiled up at the elder. "Your kindness shows with your placement of the fine china, young Mr. Drake Yet why are you asking for a mysterious vigilante in this neck if the words? Do explain yourself."
"Gladly." Tim went on about how as a child, he'd seen the flying Graysons and had seen a small pattern in the way the Robin in the Titans moved, versus when the costume had changed and the person with them. The red and the green were not the same. "There were two. Two Robins." He told the butter and Jason.
"You were that Robin, the other one. While the first…" Tim tapped a finger to the cup. "Had to be Richard Grayson. He was Bruce Wayne's unofficial adopted son until he…"
"We don't bring him up, sorry." Jason shook his head as he crossed those arms, even grown instead of lanky like Tim's.
"There was a dilemma in the recovery of Master Richard. His real family, the Haleys took him before the courts and he was returned to them. I'm very sorry, yet there is no such person or persons currently present. Could it be your calculations are not realistic-
"They have to be! Bruce Wayne is undeniable proof." Tim stood up, hands to his hips. "I think you know, and according to what I've learned, that was no accident. Robin a month ago went through a fight with the Joker. It was news in the international column I read. The explosion in Uganda and the likelihood that you know because…you went –
"That's enough, squirt!" Jason slammed a palm onto the arm of his wheelchair. "If your gonna take this out even longer than it has ta , then call your own butler and get the heck out of our house!"
Tim sniffed and took his phone out, showing it to Jason. "This is mine, if you take –
"Alfred." Jason didn't stop him as Alfred swiped the device up and in his light if things, dropped the phone into the teapot with a clank. Tim stood with a slouch, his evidence…
"You…you don't understand! I need the batman…my dad…my family is in trouble…why'd you do that??" The kid was near tears as Alfred fished out the device to wipe it, then proceeded to go fetch some rice from the pantry for an old trick. "The phone is not totaled, Master Drake." Alfred reassured the younger school boy. "Your father Jackson, is it?"
"Just, Jack." Tim wiped his nose as he looked for a napkin on the tray of goodies. "He got mixed up with some criminals. A man trying to exploit his knowledge. He…I had to leave, mom wasn't there. I know they still have my parents."
"Are you sure that he didn't sell off his family." Asked Jason. "You walked in and did he show up?"
"He was the one they were after –
"Then…Mr. Jack Drake… allowed his own child and life partner to take the fall for his wrongdoings with a criminal mastermind of sorts…oh, dear." Alfred shook his head. "Have you alerted the correct authorities?"
"No, because they'd know I was, running to anyone who'd listen." Tim explained. "I can't, if I tell anyone else…they'll think I ran away and then HE'LL get me too …" Tim started to shake as the image of that face in the glass had him choking back more tears. "He…he had this look, almost something really wrong with his face, it was…"
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Next is the third Robin, Harvey Dent's backstory and Bruce's last few run ins with Slade's new apprentice turned partner for the later epilogue. Find out! Jason also meets someone amidst the strife going on in his life. Awww…