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He's shaken up, much like the city itself.
Fires in the highrises, choppers in the sky, jagged-edged windows in every house. Sirens whine like gnats in his ears. The rest is static. His comms are silent. If they were smart, his militia would have fled after Deathstroke got the Bat treatment, too. If not, they're sharing the same square feet as the rioters and other lowlifes Gordon rounded up by the dozens.
It doesn't matter now. It stopped mattering the moment he ditched the one mission that had defined him for years. And for what?
Jason scrubs at the Batsymbol hastily scrawled on his armor.
An explosion that impacted the city more than Scarecrow's fear toxin did.
Its yellow dust still stains the half-deserted streets Jason's staggering through. Shards crunch beneath boot soles that drag him blindly onwards, as if the path they follow has been outlined long ago and they've been waiting to retread it ever since.
There's still somewhere he can go in this godforsaken place, somewhere he has to be. It's nowhere he wants to be, it's too close to the memories of pain, of defeat, of a bizarre hope he couldn't shake. But the rumors, his findings, they don't add up. He's pretty sure of what had happened and yet he has to hear it, the distorted truth.
***
He needs to get to the Manor, needs to see for himself, needs to turn over every stone, but reporters are swarming the place like flies around a rotting carcass. He doesn't need an audience.
Like hell he'd believe without evidence. Bruce couldn't just—he wouldn't just sacrifice his ancestral home, or Alfred, like this.
He couldn't just abandon Jason again.
That's not what happened.
He promised...
Look at you indulge in the illusions of hope. What are you? Stupid? Of course he'd abandon you again. He never cared about you. He never wanted to fix you. All he wanted was to save his hide, hound down the next enemy, end this nightmare.
His nightmare.
Not yours.
Rage froths beneath his skin. Nausea churns his insides. It's what has driven him all this time: the grand image of Batman's final defeat. Confronted with his greatest failure – the real face behind the Arkham Knight.
What a detective he was, not to see the mockery in this.
Kid's not yours anymore.
Jason wants to punch someone. Preferably Bruce.
Which is not an option anymore. (For now?)
The replacement would do. Punch him until his face is that of a ripe eggplant and his teeth come out.
Jason's tongue probes the back of his incisors, feeling for a hole that is not there.
Most of all he wants to punch himself.
It should have ended with a bullet. A bullet fraught with the very pain and blackness he'd wanted to exorcize. A bullet to take a life, not one to save it.
Years of planning, gathering resources, making alliances with scum he'd sooner put down than trust with his back. It all comes down to less than nothing. And why?
Because he said exactly what you wanted to hear.
Jason, I can help you.
And you believed him. How could you have listened to him even for a second? Were you so starved for his attention that you'd sabotage your own idea of justice? Look at where that's got you.
He's dead now, by his own hand, not yours.
No!
He's not dead. It's all an act. Bruce needed to protect his associates after his identity became known. Contingencies upon contingencies. He'd have made his exit through the cave, cunningly disguised as a sailor or something similarly inconspicuous, before blowing up the Manor. Jason doubts even Barbara knew of this, or Dick, his golden boy.
That's who Bruce is. He doesn't do confidantes, doesn't trust anyone with his plans.
Jason would know.
But does he think faking his own death is enough? That his enemies would just buy his sudden demise? That Cobblepot or Sionis wouldn't investigate the matter? Even if they cared little for the truth about what happened, that shouldn't stop them from inquiring after Batman's protégés, find out who they are and whom they hold dear.
They're no safer now than they were before his supposed death.
He's mine.
His fist connects with the wall beside him. He doesn't feel it. His gauntlet absorbed the shock. He doesn't feel anything. Plaster crackles from the point of impact.
The ramshackle building he's casing looks like it's been empty for years, but there are sentries on the rooftop and behind the gap-toothed windows. Heavy curtains are drawn against the chill. The corroded fire escape ends two stories above the grimy back alley.
Look at this rotten city. Falling apart where it stands. This is what he was trying to save? What you were trying to take away from him?
You thought you had escaped its gravity, that you were free, yet its hooks are still inside you, bearing you down. Your past is buried here, under the dirt floor of your parents' home, the abandoned wing at Arkham, Wayne Manor.
With Batman.
In the end, it's him who got away and you who were left behind, with hatred burning inside and nowhere to go.
It was supposed to be different. He should have killed Scarecrow the first chance he got instead of listening to him. Instead of calling a truce.
He had them in a room together, sitting ducks. He should have done the city a service and let Deathstroke end every one of these freaks.
Maybe then he could have found peace – secure in the knowledge that no one would have come between him and Batman, that Batman would have been dead with a bullet between the eyes, a bullet Jason put there. No theatrics and no second hand video footage.
It could have been so easy.
If you'd wanted it that way.
Like all his carefully laid plans, he'd envisioned the encounters with Batman many times, to play out what he'd say to make Bruce suffer the most. He'd intended his reveal to be a dramatic gut punch, to make Bruce face up to the crime of not caring enough to rescue Jason, of leaving him at the hands of that insane clown, of dooming him to this tortured existence.
Joker got to you. I know what it's like.
The nerve of him!
To offer help at the end of the final act, after the play had been staged to its conclusion and the only thing left to do was wait for the curtain to drop. Did he think his open arms would somehow change anything? That they would undo the past somehow?
How could Jason have listened? How could he have let him alter the script?
Don't pretend, you coward. You never wanted to kill Batman. You wanted him to fall to his knees, beg your forgiveness, beg to be allowed to take you in again, make it right this time.
You wanted Batman to acknowledge you. To praise you for the hell you survived, for how strong you've become and what a formidable enemy you make.
What a vain dumbass you are. Still looking up to daddy. Did you forget he never thought of you as a son? That you were merely a foot soldier in his war against crime – that you were expendable? Remember how quickly he'd replaced you.
You meant nothing to him.
A vague sense of defeat prickles between his shoulder blades.
They'd been so close. Scarecrow had delivered; he had Batman where he said he'd get him, cornered and exposed. But not humiliated, as he'd anticipated. It shouldn't have mattered, the gun should have been satisfying enough.
And yet Jason couldn't let it happen. Couldn't let Scarecrow reap the final victory over the Bat.
He replays it over and over in his mind. One shot to knock the gun from Crane's hand, another to free Bruce. Crane subdued and knocked out.
Nothing has changed since he started the job. Creeps like Crane still go down easiest.
Pathetic.
Like your divine intervention. Couldn't make up your mind, huh?
It's not too late. If Bruce is still out there, Jason's going to find him, he's going to hunt him down.
First he's going to do what he should have done the moment he came back: clean up Gotham. There are still a couple of players unaccounted for. He'd flush out their hideouts, then he'd go after Bruce.
To finish what they started.
Mine, mine, mine.
Jason's foot snags. A trash can crashes to the ground, spilling its rotten guts into the alley.
"Huh?"
Jason curses, but he's already been spotted. His head's not in this.
"Over here! I found someone."
Bullets whiz through the air. Jason twists out of their way and conceals himself behind a smoke screen. His own aim is impeccable, even in a situation like this, when his attention is compromised, he needs no more than a shot each to drop the gunman and his backup.
You're Robin, Jason. You're not what he made you.
Bruce was wrong. Jason's stopped being Robin the day he gave up his sanity. Robins don't kill. Batman wouldn't allow it. Because Batman never understood. Not every restorative project is worth the time and the effort. Some people just couldn't be fixed anymore. All you could do is put them down to make sure they never hurt anyone else again.
If Bruce would've had the courage to end the life of at least one of them, the worst of them, so many tragedies could have been avoided. Barbara, those children, Jason himself...
Jason wonders if he's become one of those people, those who needed to be put down for the good of everyone else.
His train of thought ends abruptly when something heavy and hard hits the back of his head.
***
"Get the boss."
Slivers of conversation drift through to his conscious mind, wavering in and out of focus. Quiet, muffled, not like the incessant voices of memory or the verbal self-abuse.
He can't move, his body is heavy and uncooperative, both toward himself as to the persons dragging him.
He drifts off again, as though he has not a worry in the world.
***
To do with as I please.
His pulse slams him awake a moment before something blunt jabs his stomach.
"It's the Knight freak," a voice shrills, drowned out by dull knocking against his head. "Did ya think that new helmet would fool me?"
He's upright, suspended from the ceiling, arms tied overhead.
Please God, not again.
"And what's with the Batsymbol?" More prodding. "You on his side now?"
Jason's whole body trembles as he tries to cut himself loose.
Are you just going to stand around and take it, loser?
"Was it all just lies? Have you been planning this little shindig with your Batfreak friend all along?"
His head jerks up just as the figure in front of him takes a big swing. On instinct, he throws his body to the side.
"This is all your fault!"
Harley's bat misses him an inch. Where she fails to hit him, her henchmen are not far behind to compensate.
"Get him!" they cry and deal out blows like candy.
Jason moves without thinking, flooring goon after goon, trying to work the panic out of his system. He'd sworn to himself he'd never be caught again. Never. He'd kill everyone before he'd let that happen again.
Prove it.
Some of the guy left standing hesitate suddenly. It's not before he's felled two more that he hears it.
"Stop!" Harley's yelling, "stop it, all of you!"
She's clutching her striped bat in front of her, ineffectually, staring at him with wide, tear-stained eyes. The black smudges on her lids and cheeks twist her face into a grotesque mask of grief.
Jason is three feet from her when her bat clatters to the ground and she stretches out her fingers towards him, as if to claw at his face. His heart is hammering in his chest. Did she—did she recognize him?
He spots the laser sights too late. One bullet takes him in the leg, the other in the gut.
"What are you doing?" Harley screeches and rushes forward to support him. "I told you to stop."
Jason sinks to the ground. He tries to fight it, but gravity is stronger. The pain itself is not so bad. He's had far worse. It's more an all-encompassing weariness that grips him, as if the exertion of the past days is finally catching up with him, body and mind. He's been on high alert, monitoring Batman's moves and ordering his pawns about. As long as he had a purpose, he was a self-propelling engine.
Somehow, all the countless times he's pictured this day, he's failed to consider the implications of achieving his goal. Bringing down Batman had been the sole purpose of his life and now that he's gone, what is Jason supposed to do with the fact? Where is he to focus all the hate that's left?
Did you think it would just disappear the moment Batman's life winked out?
"No, no, no, please, no."
Harley's fingers are scrabbling over his helmet as if to drive away his worries. Then his visor opens to a breath of stale air and a gasp from Harley.
"Junior!" she breathes and her thumb strokes the letter branded into his cheek. "Junior, it's really you."
She takes off the helmet, smoothes back his sweat-soaked bangs and gathers him in her arms, kissing the 'J' over and over. He tries to grab her, get her to stop, but his arm feels like rubber.
"Oh God, I thought I'd lost you." She's babbling now, oblivious to her men that are crowding around, curious about the spectacle. "When they didn't let me see you anymore, I thought you didn't make it. After everything I did to save you. They kept me away, told me it was for my own good, told me they took care of you. That it wasn't my fault. You were—you were gone. I'm sorry, I should have kept looking, shouldn't have listened."
Jason wants to laugh at how familiar this sounds. At least she didn't replace him right away. That would have been funny.
Laughter rips from his throat after all, shaking him like electric fever. Harley holds him close, rocking him as though he were an infant.
"It's okay now. I've got you. I'll fix you up again. Just like old times, right? I'll make it right. Oh, my poor darling, it's all gonna be alright from now on. Nothing's gonna happen to you anymore. I promise."
It's not too late. We can fix this... Together.
Clutching her sleeve as if it were the last anchor left for him, he howls against her chest until the sobs – hers? his? – threaten to choke him.
Under different circumstances he might have been offended that everyone seems to think of him as something to be saved, but Harley, she's actually stitched him back together on numerous occasions. She was the only inmate who did not vent their anger on him. Instead, she patched up his wounds and talked to him like they'd been best friends forever.
If she didn't make fun of your loyalty to the Bat. Come to think of it, it was pretty ridiculous.
He never did figure out her agenda, but he knows he might not have survived Joker's treatment in one piece if it hadn't been for her. He has yet to decide whether to be thankful for that.
"What are you standing around here for?" she snaps at the onlookers. "Get me something to dress the wounds with. Pronto!"
Some of them shuffle into action reluctantly. He doesn't blame them. Suddenly the intruder who's killed two of their numbers and hurt a dozen more gets preferential treatment? Not someone he'd happily assist either.
Look at you, bawling like a jackass because someone seems to care whether you make it or not.
You'd forgive them anything if they cared enough, wouldn't you? Even if they loved the monster who did this to you, who hollowed you out and filled you back up with more hate than you know what to do with.
Why don't you just kill her? Sever all the ties to those hurtful memories. The goons who brought you in may have stripped you of the weapons they could see, but didn't search much further.
How easily you could slip a knife into her chest. She wouldn't even feel it.
Jason's no longer sure why exactly he dropped in, why his feet dragged him here in the first place – was he going to kill her? interrogate her? look for more lies to poison himself with? Whatever it was, it sure as hell didn't include being riddled with bullets because the temptation of an unguarded back was too hard to resist. Or did it?
He needed to get his head back on straight.
To think the place that rewards his sloppiness by putting him out of commission would also be where he'd feel most welcome. To think it'd be here, a place too close to the memories of pain, the memories of defeat, that he'd feel most wanted.
To think it'd be Harley, not Bruce, who'd receive him as the prodigal son.
God help him, he thinks as the world falls away, but it feels like coming home.