Archive of Our Own ^beta

It’s almost four in the morning when the gunshots ring out in Crime Alley, and Jason is tired. It’s been one of those nights, the kind where it seems like half the city has decided to get into some sort of trouble. The bats are off dealing with Penguin’s newest bullshit on the other side of the city, Jason’s already dealt with no less than three gang skirmishes on his fucking territory, what the fuck are they even thinking, and last he’d heard even Black Mask was up to something down by the harbor.

Gotham at its peak.

It was at that point Jason had turned off his comm entirely, the bats’ chatter rubbing irrationally at his rapidly fraying patience. Their relationships with each other have been improving, these past few months, slowly but surely. But Jason’s tired, and that means his tenuous-at-the-best-of-times grip on the green pit still swirling in the back of his mind is hanging by a thread, and having to listen to the Replacement’s voice pop in and out of his ear was going to snap it.

No point costing these months of progress with unnecessary bloodshed just because he needed a nap. He’s not a fucking toddler.

If there’s some sort of citywide threat coming his way, he’ll see it coming. Anything else, and the bats can handle the rest of the drama in their precious disgusting city, and he’ll just take care of his own damn territory.

And right now, his own damn territory has gunshots ringing out. They don’t call it Crime Alley for nothing.

Someone screams, and he grapples his way to the top of a building close to the sound, boots crunching down in the shadows of one of the city’s many gargoyles as he takes in the scene before him. Immediately, the pit rushes forward like water from behind a dam, coating his vision in a thin film of acidic green. He makes no real effort to stop it, only half-heartedly reminding himself that he can’t just start putting bullets in heads if he wants to avoid Bruce’s disappointed face.

Not that he minds that much. He has plenty of ways to slake the pit’s thirst that won’t prove fatal.

There are three men, weapons out and slowly drawing in on the cowering woman in their center. He recognizes her. Her name is Laurie, and she’s young, barely nineteen. He checked.

He’s seen the way the older girls on the corners watch out for her. Which is exactly what he’s been doing for them in turn, in his own way. In his opinion, he’s done plenty that should have tipped off these fuckers that the kids and sex workers of Crime Alley are under his protection.

If they’ve decided to test his rules anyway, well. On their heads be it.

He doesn’t bother to try to hide the heavy thud of his boots as he lands in the shadows behind them. Laurie sees him first, eyes widening, and she lets out a sharp, choked sob. “I’ve had a theory for a while now that Gotham smog is so toxic, it just eats away at people’s brains until they do really stupid shit,” he says, the helmet distorting his light tone into something ominous. The men spin around to face him. He tilts his head, baring his teeth in a grin, not caring that they can’t see it. “Seems like you guys are proving me right.”

They raise their guns as he stalks forward, but his are already raised. Two quick bangs, and the first two men’s kneecaps are wiped out in a spray of blood and bone. They drop with twin screams.

The third man gets a shot off, but Jason shifts his stance easily without breaking his steady stride forward, letting the bullet crack against the armor covering his chest, the swirling rage easily swallowing any pain the inevitable bruise might cause him in the moment. He reaches the first of the men he’s already shot, who’s now fumbling to pick up the gun he’s dropped. His fingers meet the hilt, and Jason’s steel-toed boot meets his hand. The pit purrs with satisfaction at the crunch of bone. He grabs the screaming man by the shoulder, twisting until he feels the joint give and wrench out of place. He flings the body out in front of him by the ruined limb like a shield, knocking the third man backwards as his panicked shots only serve to imbed themselves in the first man’s back. He staggers, and Jason takes the chance to lodge a bullet in one of his kidneys.

The last man is frantically trying to crawl away, not even trying to fight, though he’s kept a grip on the gun in his hand, unlike he’s equally weak-kneed friend. Jason fires off two shots rapid-fire, one in each shoulder, and then a third in his hand, knocking the gun off somewhere into the shadows.

The green is still swirling restlessly, unsatisfied with the lack of actual death, as all three of the men are still groaning faintly against the asphalt, but the edge has been taken off. It’s enough that he’s able to turn to the woman, still standing in shock at the edge of the bloodshed. He takes a few deep breaths to try and calm himself, forcing his body language into something a little less threatening.

There’s tears streaming down her face, but she doesn’t flinch back when he looks directly at her. “I’m so sorry,” she whispers. “I’m… they made me.”

It’s startling enough that he blinks, the green haze receding even more in his bewilderment.

His helmet muffles the worst of the gunfire he so often subjects himself to, sparing him the hearing loss, but he still hears the sharp pop. Pain flares hot and bright in his calf, right below the joint in his armor. He curses, hand dropping instinctively to try and stem the flow of blood as his other hand comes up, finger already on the trigger as he swings around, scanning for the hidden shooter. The girl bolts, high heels clicking as she runs, but he pays her no attention. He spys the glint of a sniper rifle retreating into one of open windows of a rundown apartment complex, and he curses again. Things are clicking rapidly into place, and he’s really not liking the picture that’s forming. He steps forward, braced for the pain to flare, but it’s not pain he feels spreading through his leg.

It’s something far more ominous: numbness.

He crumples, unprepared. He can barely even feel the jarring impact of his kneecap against the asphalt, which would almost be a mercy if he didn’t know it was very, very bad.

It feels like someone has stabbed him with a full syringe of lidocaine, an icy, tingling numbness crawling up his limb as though he’d fallen asleep on it. And whatever godforsaken new nerve agent this is that’s spreading through his bloodstream, it’s spreading fast.

He’s in over his head, he realizes with sickening, irritating clarity. This was clearly a planned ambush, a trap set for him or one of the bats. His leg is already nearly useless, and he can tell he’s got very little time before the rest of him is too.

He’s lost sight of the sniper, which means either he’s being hunted, or he’s already dead and just doesn’t know it yet. Again. Panic begins to lick at his heels as he feels the creeping numbness reaching his diaphragm, and suddenly breathing is a lot more difficult than it was a few minutes ago. He tries to take a deep breath, but it’s like trying to blow up a balloon with a hole in it. His lungs inflate lazily, stretching far below their capacity and leaving him dizzy with the effort of fighting with the uncooperative organs for little reward.

He fumbles for the latch on his helmet, instinct demanding he get fresh air now. He forces his weak diaphragm to keep working, pushing his panic back in favor of making himself take the deepest, most even breaths he can manage at the moment. If he starts hyperventilating right now, he’s going to pass out, and then he really will be done for.

Shadows shift at the edge of his vision and he shoots, nevermind the lights that are bursting in front of his eyes. He hears a gurgle, and takes vicious, cornered pleasure in knowing that he’s taken someone else down with him.

It doesn’t matter much in the end, though. More shadows are moving, footsteps echoing against the concrete. He raises a heavy hand and arm again, firing blindly, but this time there’s no sign he’s hit anyone at all. A hand closes harshly on his wrist, wrenching the gun out of his grasp. He snarls, baring his teeth as hazy figures surround him. Someone laughs, and he tries to swing at whoever’s still got a grip on his arm. It’s as weak as a kitten.

“Aren’t you supposed to be the terror of Crime Alley?” a voice sneers. “I’ve seen starving stray dogs that scared me more than you.”

There’s no quip for him to make in response. There’s just a sense of vertigo, tilting, and then his face meets the dirty ground. The hands around his wrist twist, and he hears more than feels the bone snap. Pins and needles spark in his fingertips, but even those are quickly losing all sensation.

Someone laughs again, and the sound echoes in his head, amplifying and distorting, and he can feel the crowbar coming down again and again as the crunch of bone underlines every wild cackle. There’s nothing he can do to stop it, nothing, he’s as helpless as he ever was, the strength the costume lent him was only ever an illusion. He can’t breathe, his lungs must be punctured, the crowbar has shattered his ribs into porcelain shards, he’s sure he can feel them digging needle-like into his skin from underneath.

There’s an unfamiliar voice, breaking in through the horrific laughter. “Stick him with the fucking sedative already so I can give him the antidote, boss’ll fucking kill us both if he fucking suffocates before he gets a crack at ‘im.”

“Fucker should just be grateful to have his territory open,” someone else grumbles.

A hand grabs his chin and wrenches his neck to the side, and he can’t tell if he feels the prick of the needle or if he just imagines it, his brain hallucinating whatever stimulus it can in the empty space where his body should be. Maybe he has no body. Maybe the bomb already went off, wiped him away into nothing but atoms.

He’s going to die here in this warehouse. Where’s Bruce? Bruce was supposed to come by now, wasn’t he?

He wants Bruce.

Someone is dragging him, vertigo swirling. Nothingness drags at his consciousness, and he doesn’t fight it, letting it pull him down down down, where there’s no more pain and fear, the dark pit where his body’s already gone.

Something hisses through the air above his head, and he recognizes it even through the blackness, would recognize the sound anywhere.

Batarang.

There’s fighting now, shouting. He tries to make his eyelids open, but they’re as heavy and useless as his lungs.

But it doesn’t matter, does it? He can let himself sleep, it’s okay, it’s safe.

Bruce is here.

…

When he wakes up, his head is pounding like someone took a hammer to it, and his mouth feels like they used that hammer to pack cotton down his throat. He can’t quite hold back the muted groan as he tries to pick his head up.

His helmet is gone, the first thing his hazy mind processes, and for a blessed moment he imagines that when he opens his eyes he’ll see the infirmary in the batcave. Bruce will be waiting at his bedside for him to wake up, Alfred will be at the ready with soup and soft blankets. He tries to raise his arm to rub the sleep from his eyes.

His wrist tugs sharply against the bindings around them, a deep and threatening ache flaring through the bones, and the daydream shatters.

He’s almost surprised by the bitterness that floods the back of his burning throat. Of course Bruce didn’t really come and save him.

He never did when it counted.

He’s alone in this, the same way he was before, and that’s okay. He’s not just Jason this time, not just a stupid, reckless kid in a brightly colored death shroud. He’s the fucking Red Hood.

“Jason?” a tiny voice croaks.

Ah, shit.

He forces gritty eyes open, dread pooling rapidly in his stomach. “Replacement?” he rasps.

There’s a faint rustle of fabric, a foot scraping against concrete, and he twists his head to look, zeroing in on a crumpled shadow in the corner.

A dark and mussed head lifts to look back at him. Tim’s still got the domino mask on, but there’s a nasty bruise spreading across his cheekbone, blood smeared around a split lip. His face is ghost-white where it’s not stained purple or red. He’s folded in on himself as tightly as his bound arms and ankles will allow, looking like he’s doing his best to collapse in on himself like a black hole. He sniffs. “Hey.”

“Replacement, what the fuck are you doing here?” Jason bites out with all the venom he can drum up. Anger is a reliable emotion, and he latches on to it like a life preserver.

The younger boy’s head drops back down to his knees. “I’m so sorry,” he says, and damn, the kid sure has a knack for making it hard to cling to anger, doesn’t he? “I was really stupid,” he continues before Jason can question why he’s apologizing for being tied up in some lunatic’s warehouse (and why the fuck does it always have to be a fucking warehouse anway) - “Something about Black Mask’s plan didn’t make any sense to me. I had a hunch, so I followed it, and I saw them take you down so I tried to stop them but there were too many and I - I fucked up,” his voice cracks painfully.

Jason tries to take a deep breath, pushing the green aside. It won’t help him right now, not when he needs to focus on getting him and the kid out of this. “Okay,” he says, voice as steady and calm as he can make it. “Did you get a message out to the rest of the bats?”

Tim’s shoulder’s hunch further, shuddering. “No,” he answers quietly. “Bruce sent me home for the night. I, um. It had been a really long night, and I was getting sloppy. He told me to go get some sleep, but. I had a hunch,” he says the last bit defensively, pleadingly, before his voice turns dull again. “No one knows I’m here. No one knows I kept patrolling. No one’s coming.”

Breathe. In, out. Laughter echoes, the crack of the crowbar. No one’s coming no one’s coming no one’s coming - breathe. “Okay,” Jason says again, in probably the gentlest tone he’s ever used on the other boy. “Okay. Do you have any of your gear left, and can you reach it?”

Tim picks his head up, and looks back at him for a long moment. Something in his face settles, a determined, mullish set to his jaw that makes Jason wary. It reminds him suspiciously of Dick’s ‘I have a plan and you can’t stop me’ expression. “There’s a knife,” he says. “It’s in your left boot. They didn’t find it when they checked you for weapons.”

Jason scowls at him ferociously. He wiggles his foot. The remnants of the nerve toxin they shot him with still linger, sending pins and needles shooting up his leg as soon as he moves it, but sure enough, he can feel the faint line of pressure that marks the hidden blade. “Still a little stalker,” he snorts, trying to hide the fact that he’s a tiny bit impressed.

Tim huffs. “Luckily. Can you get to it?”

“I was Robin first, Replacement, of course I can get to it.” And he can, he knows. He will be able to.

He just needs the last of the toxin to fade out a little bit more, to stop stiffening his joints and numbing his fingers so he can twist down and saw through the ropes binding him without dropping it.

“Good,” Tim sighs, and the sound is heavy with relief. “There’s too many of them through the main entrance, but there’s a window above us. If you can climb, you can get out, get B or Nightwing.”

Jason pauses, narrowing his eyes. “And you? Are you going to be able to climb, or am I hauling your sorry ass over my shoulder?”

Tim shakes his head. “I’m staying here.” He says it so calmly, like it’s not the stupidest, most insane thing Jason’s ever heard the brat say.

It startles a sound that’s almost a laugh out of him, though there’s no humor in it whatsoever. “Like hell you are.”

Tim sighs. “Yes, I am.” Firm, leaving no room for argument. Unnervingly resigned. Jason opens his mouth to argue anyway, but Tim interrupts him with a shake of his head. “Jason,” he says, like there’s something he’s pleading for him to understand.

And then he moves.

He unfolds from the space he’s tucked himself into, stretching his legs with a short, wheezing grunt before cutting himself off, and Jason’s heart plummets.

He’d suspected broken ribs when he saw the way the kid was guarding his torso. It’s not broken ribs.

Red blooms across his entire lower abdomen, two small holes the size of nickels at the center. The motion jostles them, triggering a fresh gush of iron red, and Jason can actually see the stain creeping further up the ruined costume. “Stop moving,” he says urgently, and Tim freezes for a second before obeying, slowly folding back up until his knees are pressed against his body once more. He lets out a low, quiet hiss as they make contact, the pressure hopefully doing some good at helping keep the kid’s blood inside his body where it belongs.

Jason shuts his eyes, trying desperately not to focus on the wheezing lilt the boy’s breathing has taken on. “Okay, okay. This makes things a little bit trickier, but we’ll figure it out.”

“I’ve already figured it out,” Tim says, like it’s obvious. “You can get out.”

“That’s not a fucking plan, Replacement,” he snarls. “What about B, huh? What the fuck’s he gonna say when I show up without his Robin? Christ, I’d rather face Black Mask while high on fear toxin.”

Tim meets his eyes with an intensity he’s never seen before from the kid, made all the more unsettling by the dark circles under his eyes and the pallor of his skin. “Bruce can’t lose you a second time, Jason,” he says. “He won’t survive it, not again.

He couldn’t have taken away Jason’s voice any more thoroughly if he’d stuck a knife in his chest.

“Well then, I’ll fucking carry you out, if that’s what we’ve gotta do, but I’m not fucking leaving you here,” he finally spits out.

“Oh, I would absolutely love to see the pair of you attempt that,” a delighted voice sounds out, and ice runs down Jason’s spine.

It’s the sound of a ticking clock running out.

“Watching the two of you crawl along on clipped wings? It’s almost enough to make me want to untie you and see what you do. Capture it on video, perhaps.” Black Mask steps into his line of vision, several henchmen trailing after him. “You know, this was really just supposed to be about you, Hood. Get you out of the way, put Crime Alley back on the market, nothing personal, just a particularly fun bit of business. Then the little Robin here had to stick his beak in my business once again.” He bends down to look at the kid, skeletal face contorted into a sneer, and Jason sees green. “But that’s always the issue with you vigilantes, isn’t it? You’re all too nosy for your own good.”

“Sounds to me like you’re just jealous that we’ve got noses to stick around,” Jason drawls. The crime lord’s head swivels around to focus on him instead, sneer distorting to a snarl, and the knot in Jason’s chest eases slightly as his attention is drawn away from Tim.

He stands abruptly, eyes fixed on Jason like a snake’s, and he braces for the inevitable pain that’s headed his way. But instead, he just beckons to one of his henchmen. “You have no idea how badly I wish I could stay to properly punish you for the damage you’ve done to my business ventures,” he says lowly. “But unfortunately, the bird has thrown a bit of a wrench in my original plans for you.” He looks back down at Tim, and Jason’s heart clenches at his grin. “Consider this your last heroic act, Robin. You’ve spared your fellow street vermin friend a few hours of suffering. I hope it was worth it.” He steps aside with a gesture to the henchman. “Get him tied, we won’t have much longer before Batman comes down on our heads. I’m sure he’s already on his way, so let’s make sure there’s a pretty display waiting for him when he gets here, shall we?”

The henchman reaches for Tim. Jason twists violently against his bindings, ignoring the white hot pain that shoots through his leg and broken arm. Just a little farther… Tim is hauled roughly upright, a strangled shriek clawing its way out through clenched teeth, and Jason snarls like a struck dog. The goon grabs something off the floor beside him, and when he sees what it is he almost dislocates his shoulder.

It’s a bundle of barbed wire.

“What the fuck?” he shouts at Black Mask. “He’s not going anywhere!”

One of the goons holds Tim upright as the other one begins winding the wire tightly around his arms. His face is paper-white under the mask, and he slumps heavily against the arms holding him up.

Black Mask waves a dismissive hand. “It’s more symbolic than anything. I don’t plan on leaving the bat much of his little bird to find, but I think the barbed wire will get his imagination running. No need for him to know our time together was too short to have any proper fun, right?” He gives Jason a grimace that might be a smile. “Any man that dresses up as a bat every night probably has an imagination for suffering to rival mine anyway. We’ll let him do the work for us.”

The third goon comes back in, carrying a large crate, which he sets down in the middle of the floor. The men holding Tim give the wire a last yank before dumping him carelessly back on the floor. He doesn’t even try to hold back the scream this time, as the wire’s metal teeth sink deep into his flesh, but Jason can’t tear his eyes away from the mass of tangled wires spilling haphazardly from the box in front of him. A fist has wrapped itself around his throat and is squeezing.

The henchman arms the device, and the beeping of the keypad echoes deafeningly in his ears. He can hear Black Mask’s next words, but they barely register as actual language. “Maybe Batman will learn to take better care of his canaries in the future, and to keep them from pecking at my things.”

The slam of the metal door echoes heavily in the concrete room. There’s green floating in front of Jason’s eyes, numbers counting down in a steady tick tick tick. Tim wheezes, somehow finding the strength to heave himself onto his side and off his horrifically bound arms.

The sound punctuates past the ticking, and Jason blinks hard. His hand squeezes the handle of the knife until the bones in his knuckles grind together. It brings him back to the present, just slightly.

He’s distantly aware, as he blindly hacks at the ropes around his wrists, that his clumsy slashes are opening fresh wounds in his hands and arms, but he can’t bring himself to care. The additional blood only makes it easier to wrench his numb hands out of what’s left of his ties.

There’s no point in going after the bomb, he knows as he tries to struggle to his feet and only succeeds in landing heavily on already-bruised knees. He wouldn’t be able to disable it in the time they’ve got left even if he could force his numb fingers to cooperate enough to handle the delicate wires without setting it off. He doesn’t bother trying a second time to stand. He just crawls over to Tim as quickly as he can, and he’s

dragging himself towards a door that won’t open, his own blood a gory smear behind him like a little red slug, ha, ha, ha ha ha ha ha

Tim keens, and he sucks in a deep, shuddering breath. “C’mon, baby bird, it’s going to be okay,” he hears himself saying. “Let me - fuck, let me get this off your arms.”

“Jason,” he says, faintly slurred but voice full of fear. “You’ve got to get out, Robin, you’ve got to get out right now.”

Jason’s shaking his head, only semi-present as he bends over the smaller body, trying to find a way to get his fingers under the barbed wire without hurting Tim even more. Fine tremors are running through his whole body, and the blood dripping from his hands mixes with the blood drawn with every shift of the wire’s awful points until he can’t tell where it’s all coming from. But he’s got to get the wire off, because Tim’s gonna need his hands to hold onto Jason’s shoulders so he can climb. That was the plan, right? He was going to climb out? Robin came up with it, so it must be a good plan.

“Jason,” he sobs, and it’s such a desperate plea that Jason’s attention finally snaps to him completely. There are tear tracks running down his pale face as he stares up at him, eyes clouded with pain but still aware, and the shaking in Jason’s hands worsens where they grip the wire. “You have to let me go,” Tim whispers. “You’re not going to be able to get me out with you. You need to let me go and get out.”

“I’m not going to leave you here,” Jason says fiercely, though his voice shakes. “It’s not happening like this again. No more dead Robins, remember? I’m not -” his voice finally breaks. “I’m not going to let you die alone.”

Tim’s lips turn up bitterly. “You hate me anyway. ‘M not - I’m not really a Robin, ‘m just a placeholder.”

Jason presses his forehead against the younger boy’s. “I don’t hate you,” he whispers. “It just wasn’t fair.”

Tim’s breathing is shallow and rattling, his eyes drifting half-shut. His skin is waxy where it presses against Jason’s, but he doesn’t pull away. The countdown is close now. He knows it without even looking at the display. He curls closer, ignoring the spike of pain from the bullet still lodged in his calf, a vain attempt to shelter the smaller body with his own. Laughter rattles in the back of his skull, but he shoves it down in his consciousness.

If the only mercy he can grant this Robin is being here with him, in this warehouse in the present, then by god, he’ll be here.

Tick. Tick. Tick.

Crash.

Instinctively, he flattens further, protecting the boy from the shower of glass that rains down from above.

Boots land lightly behind him. “Jason.”
Hope flares, wild and bright and terrible, at the same time as agonizing fear fills him that when he turns to look, there won’t be anyone there.

He does it anyway.

“Dick,” he chokes out, and the shadow steps quickly towards him. He hears the sharp inhale as his brother sees the gore-covered figure he’s protecting.

“Shit, Tim.” His voice is shaken, almost surprised, but Jason doesn’t have the capability of analyzing it right now.

He feels almost dizzy with the knowledge that someone came.

Dick rushes forwards, hooking an arm around him and carefully trying to leverage him to his feet. Jason resists, bunching his fists stubbornly in an unbloodied chunk of Robin’s cape as though he can lift Tim with him. “He’s hurt, you’ve gotta - you’ve gotta get him out, there’s a bomb,” he says rapidly, as though maybe Dick hasn’t noticed the pool of blood surrounding them and the crate counting down mere feet away from them.

“I know, shh, it’s okay, - B?” Dick calls sharply.

“I’ve got him.” The black cape sweeps out of the shadows to crouch over Tim beside Jason. Bruces’s eyes meet his through the cowl. “I’ve got him,” he says again. “I’ve got him, Jaylad, I’ve got you both.” And that’s Bruce speaking, not Batman. That’s the same tight but gentle voice he’s always used when Jason or Dick were sick or injured, and it’s that voice that makes Jason finally relinquish his death grip on the cape and let himself be pulled to his feet.

Dick is murmuring reassurances in his ear as he draws his grappling hook and makes sure he’s got a solid grip on his brother. “It’s alright, little wing, it’s alright, we’re getting you out of here.”

Bruce carefully gathers Tim in his arms, wrapping his cape around him and murmuring his own reassurances that Jason can’t make out. He stiffens as he sees the barbed wire, fury clear in every line of his body, but his arms remain gentle and protective as he cradles the limp body.

Jason keeps his eyes on him even as he’s pulled into the air, out of the bloodstained warehouse and into the warm Gotham night.

They land hard on a nearby roof, and Dick practically tackles him to the ground, flattening him so thoroughly he feels like all the air has been crushed from his lungs.

The warehouse explodes.

For several long seconds, all the sound seems sucked out of existence, and his vision fills with fire. The building beneath them shudders with the force of the explosion, and he waits for the heat, the terrible scorching, searing agony to wash over him.

But the pain never comes. There’s just the steady throbbing in his leg and arm, the increasingly obvious stinging in his hands and the cotton in his head. And of course, the too-warm, too-heavy weight slowly crushing his ribcage.

“Get off me,” he grits out, the sensation of being pinned fully too much for him to handle at this point. Dick obliges, rolling gracefully off of him while still keeping a firm grip on his armor as though Jason might suddenly disappear if he doesn’t.

Jason doesn’t have time to reassure him, though. He’s too busy scanning the rooftop around them for - there.

Bruce is hunched over the fallen Robin, his little brother, broad shoulders sheltering him from any falling rubble as he yanks pressure bandages from his belt with the efficiency only a panicked father can manage.

Jason tears away from his older brother, scrambling quickly across the rooftop until he’s kneeling right next to the other two. Tim’s head rolls lazily to look at him, eyes glassy but alive, alive alive alive, and Jason sucks in a tremulous breath. “Told you we’d get out,” he murmurs hoarsely.

Like a wraith, Dick appears on his other side and sets to work removing the barbed wire. A brief glance at the older boy reveals his face is a dark thundercloud, and his eyes are bright with moisture and barely restrained fury.

Generally, Jason would be right there with him, but right now the green is buried so far down under layers of shock and relief and terror and sheer exhaustion that he can barely even feel it. How can he be angry in the face of the knowledge that his family came for him? For them.

“No more dead Robins,” Tim whispers, barely there, lips cracking up in a tiny smile.

Bruce’s hands falter where they’re applying the bandages, only for a moment before pressing down again with purpose. Tim spasms slightly, and Jason has his hand in his before he even notices what he’s doing, making quiet, soothing noises. He looks up, meeting Bruce’s eyes once more.

His face is stoic, but Jason can read the terror and relief written in the lines around his eyes, the way his lips are pressed together tightly. He raises one hand, the other still pressing down on his other son’s stomach, and lays it gently on Jason’s cheek. And Jason, in a way he hasn’t since he was a much younger child, leans into the contact. “My boys,” he says, voice choked and tender. “My sons.”

Jason closes his eyes. Distantly, he knows that somewhere down the line, he’s in for the mother of all lectures from the man, because that’s how he says you scared the fuck out of me, but that’s for later.

For now, the sheer knowledge that there’s going to be a later might just be the greatest feeling he’s ever known.

…

Waking up is like trying to find his way through a heavy fog. There’s a headache beating at the back of his skull, but it feels muffled, restrained for the time being. His mouth tastes like he really wants to brush his teeth, or at least get some water down his dry throat.

He tries to lift a hand to wipe at the grit gluing his eyes shut, only to find it pinned, pins and needles running up his fingers when he tries to flex them.

Soft breath tickles his neck, and he wrinkles his nose as silky hair tickles him. He can smell the soft scent of the apple shampoo that Alfred keeps stocked in the infirmary. “He’s drooling on me, isn’t he?” he rasps, wincing as the words scrape at his throat like sandpaper.

Someone chuckles. There’s some soft rustling, and then a straw is being pressed to his lips. He sips at the cool water gratefully. “You should count yourself lucky you don’t have both of them using you as a pillow,” Bruce’s voice says, quietly enough to avoid waking the boy pressed up against Jason’s entire right side. “I made Dick go sleep in his own bed, but I think if I hadn’t had Alfred as backup he would have ignored me and crawled right in with the two of you.”

The water is pulled away, and Jason cracks his eyes open, relieved to find that the infirmary lights have been dimmed to their lowest level. Bruce sits back in the chair he’s pulled up beside the bed, setting the water aside. Beds, Jason mentally corrects. Two of the cots have been pushed together, probably so the little bird could cling to him like an octopus. He’s been spending too much time with Dick, clearly. He can’t find it in himself to be annoyed.

“How did you find us? You got a tracker embedded in the kid’s skin or something?”

Bruce shifts in his seat, glancing down at the boy with an uncomfortable expression, almost - is that guilt?

Jason’s eyes narrow. “Did you really implant a fucking tracker in the kid? Because if so, you and I are going to have to have a chat about boundaries, old man -”

“I didn’t,” Bruce cuts him off with a huff. “Though believe me, I’m considering the prospect at this point.” He looks down at his hands, and Jason lets him, sensing there’s still something he hasn’t admitted to. And sure enough - “We didn’t know he had been taken too until we found him in the warehouse,” he says hollowly.

Jason blinks in shock. Whatever he’d been expecting, that certainly wasn’t it.

“I thought he was home safe. When he didn’t check in with Alfred, I just assumed he’d headed straight home. I was happy that he was finally getting some rest. The whole time, he was - and I just assumed -” his voice breaks, and he drags a hand across his face.

Now that he’s really looking, Jason can see that he looks truly worn. There’s more grey in his hair than he remembers there being, more lines around his eyes.

He looks exhausted, and startlingly human.

“What were you doing at the warehouse then, if you weren’t looking for Tim?”

There’s an answer that part of him aches to hear, even though he knows it’s a stupid, childlike thing to want, and he should really just be happy about the fact that he and Tim are both alive without worrying about the why, but he asks anyway, and braces for the answer.

Bruce’s face turns confused, before some sort of understanding passes across it, and he smiles at Jason, sad and loving all at once. “We were looking for you, Jason,” he says softly, and something in Jason’s heart just crumbles. Bruce must see it, because he lets out a quiet breath, reaching out to touch Jason’s face the same way he remembers him doing last night. “Oh baby,” he whispers, and Jason can’t look at him anymore, he has to focus on the mop of black hair in front of him, concentrating on evening out his breathing so that the sharp sobs threatening to break free don’t jar the boy awake.

Bruce swallows once before continuing. “A very distressed young lady flagged down Nightwing. I believe her name was Laurie?” Jason nods in startled recognition. “Apparently, she was...hired, by a man who put a gun to her head once she climbed in his car, and informed her that she was going to be bait.” Distaste rolls off his tongue, and Jason feels the green stir lazily, agreeing with the older man’s assessment, though it’s more or less what he’d suspected had happened. “She was able to tell us where it happened. We were on the scene no more than ten minutes after you were taken. Jason,” he stresses, and Jason meets his eyes at last, forever unable to ignore such a clear request from his father. When he manages to blink away enough of the moisture that’s gathered in his eyes to be able to see clearly, the other man’s eyes are equally damp. “We came for you the moment we knew you were in trouble. We will always come for you, we will always look for you. I will always, always look for you, no matter how long it takes, no matter what you do to push me away, or if I don’t always agree with your tactics. You will always, always be my son.”

Jason shudders, the words unraveling some deep, frightened knot in his chest that he had never fully acknowledged was coiled behind his ribs until it’s gone. He buries his nose in the mop of tousled hair in front of him to hide his uneven breaths, not that he thinks it really does much to disguise them. He lets the scent of apples ground him. “I was so helpless,” he murmurs. “It’s different when it’s not just your life at stake. I was right there, I was in the warehouse with him, I had him in my fucking arms, and I still couldn’t do a damn thing.” He breathes a laugh. “At least if he had died, I wouldn’t have had to live with my failure.”

Bruce makes a quiet, wounded sound, gently picking up the hand of Jason’s that isn’t pinned under a sleeping bat, and squeezes it, mindful of the cast on his arm and the bandages wrapped around his palm. Jason doesn’t pull away. “I am so sorry you had to go through that, both of you. And I cannot express enough how - relieved doesn’t begin to cover it, that you’re both okay.”

Tim snuffles against Jason’s shoulder in the ensuing moment of silence, and Jason thinks, well, almost okay. Drowsiness is threatening to drag him under once more, and he’s happy enough to let it, but this needs to be said first.

“You need to tell him everything you just told me,” he mumbles, even as his eyes drift shut. “He doesn’t - he doesn’t know.”

Bruce’s fingers tighten around his briefly, before relaxing again. “I suppose I’m not the best at saying it before it’s almost too late, am I?” he murmurs, and Jason snorts.

“No, old man, you’re really not.”

Bruce hums softly, and Jason feels fingers card gently through his hair, brushing his bangs back. “Well, I’ll just have to work harder on remedying that, won’t I?”

Jason might make a quiet sound of acknowledgement as he gives in, letting himself slip into the comfortable darkness, secure in the knowledge that he’ll wake up just as safe as he is now. The last thing he feels before drifting off is his father pressing a kiss to his forehead. “I love you, Jaylad,” Bruce says from somewhere beyond the peaceful void.

“Mm. Love you too, dad,” he mumbles sleepily back, before letting sleep take him.