Chapter Text
Jason
“Jason, meditation will help you only if you want it to.” His mentor didn’t sound exasperated. He’d learned that Ducra rarely ever was. The Green whispered that she was.
“But why? Why is meditation so important? Why do I even need to learn this?” He understood, somewhat, but all he wanted to do was run back to Gotham and kill the goddamned Joker. Maybe even make Bruce do it for him, force him into it. The Green hummed gleefully in his chest at the thought. It made his gut coil with… something.
He wanted to know why Ducra was even trying with him. Everyone got tired of him eventually. Even Talia had given up on training him after one too many rages, as every time something akin to pity in her eyes seemed to set him off. Too violent, too broken, even for the assassins.
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Ducra
She could hear the thoughts and feel the pulsing green latch onto the fragmented splinters left behind. Jason had grown calmer after the first two weeks, learning that escape from these mountains was difficult, if not impossible. There was no doubt that he could escape. She was not a fool. Jason was stubborn in that respect. It was probably due to that single minded drive that he was even still alive. But something had tampered with his resurrection, almost seeming to rush the job. She shook her head nigh imperceptibly. Her curiosity could wait. Helping the boy in front of her should come first.
Ducra sat down, tapping her walking staff beside her. “Sit.”
Jason sat reluctantly. Ducra took a deep breath in, motioning for him to follow along. Once he was maintaining the breathing pattern she had established, she began to speak. “I do not normally take on apprentices from the outside. Tallia came to me, begged me, pleaded with me, to help. She realized it when she started to train you. Staying with the League of Assassins would not give you the help you needed.
Very rarely does a case like yours ever happen. You are, in fact, only the fourth that I have heard of and of those, I have only ever trained two. The third was executed by Ra's Al Gul himself. The Pit clings to your very essence, filling in the gaps of your soul that you have either chosen to, or have unwittingly forgotten.”
Jason's breath hitched at the mention of the Lazarus Pit. Ducra waited patiently for it to even out back into the pattern she had taught him before continuing on. “The first thing I teach those like you… Is how to meditate. Meditation is often difficult, especially for those who have been exposed to the Pit, since it likes to twist all good intentions into those that would harm. However, meditation helps with introspection, which will help you to remember and find the pieces that the Pit fills in for you.”
Jason growled slightly, tensing up. “You make it sound like I’m some broken puzzle that needs fixing.”
Ducra waited. Waiting was often the correct answer when dealing with the green rage. In the world, one wouldn’t be able to wait like this, but here, time wasn’t a luxury like on the outside. It was a given.
When the tension had eased out of his shoulders and his breathing was back in rhythm, she spoke again. “I think of my own soul as a puzzle, Jason. It is constantly building itself, adding new pieces, recording my thoughts, documenting my feelings, and carefully slotting my most precious and heinous moments into place. Even if my soul is shattered, I can still fit the pieces back where they go, as long as I find them first.”
“And meditation is how you find the pieces, isn’t it.” Jason sounded a bit resigned.
“Yes.” She confirmed with a smile. He was much cleverer than most, quick on the uptake. “Once you have started finding those pieces and slotting them into place, the Green will lose much of its hold over you. Granted, you did die, there is no arguing that point. There will always be missing pieces that you will not be able to recover. You will always have the influence of the Lazarus Pits because of that, but that is all it will ever be, just an influence. It will no longer have control.”
She could feel the Pit twisting her words, like every time it would when threatened, trying to desperately find some way to paint them in a negative light. She almost reached out with the fringes of her own magic to brush the green aside - to give him clarity to see her words as they were. She stopped herself at the last moment. It would lead into a self sabotaging cycle if she intervened. She would not always be beside him when the green tried to weave its way into his mind. All she could do was wait. Waiting was second nature, after all, to those whose souls were of the immortal kind.
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Jason
“Just an influence. It will no longer have control.” Ducra’s voice echoed into his mind. He could feel the green slip itself into the words.
She’ll have control though. She could do it, control you, force these words down your throat. Use you, just like the Bat.
He felt the air stutter into his lungs. The green, a haze in the back of his mind, slowly encroached forwards, steady in its pace.
It’s easy for us, no? We could destroy it for you, destroy the thing that wishes to control. If you want…
It would be so easy to listen. It was always easy to listen. He’d always listened to it. Why shouldn’t he do that now?
“Now, now, now. We both know that Daddy Bats isn’t going to get here in time.” The laugh caused a full body convulsion. He tried to get away. He couldn’t breathe. “I planned it that way, you see.” He could feel the gentle touch of the wiry pale fingers brush along his jaw, tilting his chin up and lifting his head. The Joker’s eyes were wild, fanatic, even. “I’m going to break him and I’m going to use you to do it!”
He was giggling as he tossed the crowbar aside, the hand coming up and stroking Jason’s hair almost lovingly. It was a mockery. He was a fucking mockery. He hated him so much. He hated him almost as much as he hated Sheila. She was supposed to love him. How could she do this to her own child, her flesh and blood? He could barely feel the pain now. Bruce wouldn’t have done this. Bruce wouldn’t sell him out and he wasn’t even related to him… Dad…
A spark flared, deep in his gut, running up his spine. He let it, even though it brought back the pain. He couldn’t form the words, his head was too muddled for it and his jaw far too bruised and broken. His aim was true, as the blood spattered across Joker’s cheek with all the contempt he could muster. Batman wouldn’t break from this. Never from this. So Jason, Robin, wouldn’t break. Not for the Joker. Not for Sheila. No one but his Dad would see him break.
The smile left Joker’s face as he examined him, blood slowly dripping from where it had been spat across his cheek. “Now, now. That’s rude of you, isn’t it? The first Boy Wonder at least had a bit of class to him. You’re just hanging onto his coat-tails.” The Joker turned away in disgust. “Bats should have stuck to the original. Harley, get the car!”
There was a squeak and flurry of movement. Harley brushed by him, quickly moving towards the back door of the warehouse. A heavy weight settled into his hand. His arm screamed as he forced his fingers to wrap around it. There was a roar of an engine as the Joker turned around from fiddling with something on a table. The bomb, his mind supplied to him.
The Joker was in a foul mood if Harley hadn’t said anything to him before starting the car. Which is probably why he didn’t even flinch at the gun that Joker pulled on him. Or maybe it was because he was going numb again. He hadn’t even felt his head dropping back onto the chair’s headrest. He stared down the barrel at the clown. If he was going, he was looking his murderer in the fucking eyes. Joker’s face twisted, murderous. The gun went off.
It almost could have been mistaken as a sigh as Sheila crumpled. Jason knew better. He’d heard it before. The clinical part of his brain told him it was just the lungs expelling air as she died.
“She gets the easy way out, Brat.” Joker hissed. “You won’t get any more mercy from me!” He left.
Jason could feel his broken arm scream as he cut the ropes on the chair. He felt something in his ribs grind and a sharp stabbing pain in his chest as he leaned down to cut his legs free. The knife skittered out of his grasp as the last fibers were severed. He used his non-broken arm to push himself upright. The deep rhythmic shudders didn’t even register as coughing until the sound scraped its way into his ears, wet and rasping. It didn’t last long.
Bones ground together as he tried to stand. Oh. He’d forgotten that they were the first things Joker broke… Something about clipping wings and not getting to fly away. The floor was cold. He didn’t know how long he’d been there, but he couldn’t stay. He had to leave. He had to go home. He had to get to his Dad. He had to get to Alfred. He had to get to Dick. The numbness helped a little as he pulled himself forward, inch by bloody inch towards the warehouse door.
It took far too much effort to sit up, back against the door, and try the door handle with his good arm. Locked. The numbness wasn’t helping him now. He couldn’t feel his arms anymore. The rhythmic jerking was back. He could hear the final minute slowly beeping over his own weak gurgling gasps. The world tilted sideways slowly. To his Dad. Make it to his Dad.
The numbness didn’t help the boiling heat. It hurt unbearably. Just for a moment. The warehouse hadn’t crushed him. The sky was black. Orange red clouds billowed into the sky. Black crowded, hazing over his vision, dimming everything.
“-son.” It was a whisper. His cowl was off. “Jason.” His face was shining. Tears. Crying. Why? He’d made it. He couldn’t see anymore. That was fine. “Jason, son, Please…” He could feel it. The sigh. The Final Breath. “Dad.”
It was disorienting - waking to find himself being choked half to death by one of Ducra’s monks. “Wha-” He wheezed. He went limp as black spots swam across his vision.
“That’s enough, Brother Matthias.” Ducra’s voice seemed to bring back his oxygen privileges and he blinked as his vision cleared. His head felt raw. He felt battered, bruised, somehow. Ducra leaned over him. “Awake now, are you?” She took the strangled sound that came out of his half crushed throat as an ascent. “I hope you found a piece, Jason, or I fear the desolation my garden will face when you actually do.”
Several other monks released their hold and stood up, leaving, as Jason turned his head to look around. Ducra’s garden looked like a goddamn tornado had woven a path of destruction through it. “Oops.”
Ducra snorted. “Oops indeed. Especially since all the flowers got caught in the mayhem.”
He wheezed again, curling into himself, laughter bubbling up. “Oopsie Daisies?” He offered before trying to asphyxiate himself with more laughter.
Ducra smiled wryly at the garden, before it settled into something more fond as she looked at him. After he stopped laughing, he lay back, looking at the sky. It was overcast today.
“I think I did. Find a piece, I mean.” Ducra hummed, settling down beside him. “I’m just… not sure where it goes.” He admitted.
Ducra sighed and the silence stretched. She tapped her cane. “That is how most puzzles start. Piece by piece. Not every part connects right away.”
“Yeah.”
The sharp sting of the cane against his skin made him jump, sitting upright. “You won’t be meditating tomorrow. You’ll be training with Brother Matthias and helping Sister Constance put the garden back into order.” She began to shoo him away. “Go get something in your belly and sleep for now.”
Jason nodded. Despite the horrible memory that dragged itself out of his subconscious earlier that day, he slept better than he had in a while.