Chapter Text
Working with the Bats wasn't like a job where you could clock in, do your bit and clock out again. From the start of the case to the end, you lived and breathed the mission.
Normally that was fine by Jason. He was probably second only to the Batman himself when it came to devoting oneself to justice— albeit a very different brand of it.
But when you worked with the Bat Clan, played by the Bat Rules, and lived on the Bat Radar, it was never-ending.
Jason wasn't just forbidden from killing for this particular job, but firing lethal shots on any of the jobs he was working would at best mean getting booted from his own case, and like hell he was going to let that happen. So for now he just had to live with being unable to even draw his gun without feeling keen eyes on him from a dark, unidentified somewhere.
Which brought him to the surveillance: he was being watched constantly. Complaining got him the same terse response that everyone on the team was working under the same conditions. He'd have called bullshit if he didn't know it was true. Batman had become exponentially more paranoid in the time Jason was away: everyone under his shadowy metaphorical wing was tracked, expected to check in routinely, and grilled for details if they ever missed a rendezvous or went offline.
Jason did what he could to cope. He avoided the cave like his life depended on it, communicating his findings and movements almost exclusively through Oracle. Having Barbara in his ear wasn't a bad time. She never mentioned anything from the past and didn't let resentment or disappointment seep into her calm and clinical tone. She took his quips, even the most vitriolic, with a hum or a scoff and shouldered on. He also had to admit that having a team in the background was efficient, with something to be said about divvying the work load among people who were competent.
None of this made the overall ordeal worth it, however.
Jason's brow ticked from where he lay on the cold rooftop, his sniper rifle assembled and ready before him.
"Can I help you?"
He felt rather than heard two feet landing behind him.
"I heard you're working with us on the super drug case. Thought I'd come 'round. Say hi."
He adjusted the focus of the rifle. "Hi."
The irritable click of a tongue. "I heard you were a miserable bastard, not a boring one."
"Come back later and I'll be sure to act extra crazy for your amusement."
The girl— blonde, teenaged, decked in black and purple— snorted.
"I bet that guilt tripping B.S. works on the boys like a dream."
"Usually gets them off my back for a hot minute, yeah. Not that they're ever looking for excuses."
Batgirl rolled onto her stomach to lie beside him. "So. Whatcha doing?"
"Watching." Jason nodded to the building across the street. "The traffic and security cams out here are ancient, Oracle can't get a clear picture."
Batgirl mouthed an 'oh' and unlatched a set of fancy binoculars from her belt. They had a bat logo etched into the top.
"Cute."
She stuck her tongue out. "And where do you get your toys, huh? Steal 'em?"
"Stealing? That doesn't sound like me."
Batgirl laughed as she scanned the area. "So this is one of those warehouses that Black Mask is prepping, huh? I thought it was a li'l weird, all those kids wandering around. Figured another orphanage scandal had happened or something."
"Decent guess," Jason said. "And what are you doing?"
Batgirl looked at him innocently, giving her binoculars a little shake.
"I'm watching."
"I've got this handled. Find your own roof."
She made a noise mock offense. "Rude. I finished my patrol early and go through the trouble of seeking you out, and what do I get? Surliness. I swear, you and the little man are two peas in a pod when it comes to manners."
Jason grimaced. The mere idea that he and Talia's demonic princeling had anything in common made him feel vaguely unclean.
"Oh, don't get your bat-panties in a bunch. You have to admit, the way you two sulk is uncanny."
"I take it you're the new bird's unpaid babysitter now?"
"If by that you mean am I saving him from Dick's coddling and Bruce's poor communication skills? Then yes."
"We should all be so lucky," Jason said wryly. "Seriously though. Why are you here."
"Me? I'm just trying to cotton on to the current situation. Any other day I'd be booting you in the head for what you did to Tim—"
"Someone's optimistic."
"But instead I'm told, quite unceremoniously I might add, that you're working with us. And not on anything especially dire that involves imminent risk to civilian life, or the end of the world, but like… drug tech? And it's weird. Doubly so because of how cagey everyone is being about it. Red Robin's so deep in his head he's barely talking, Nightwing seems outright pissed, even Oracle's being vague and do not get me started on the big guy. Suffice to say that the rest of us are very confused. You seem straightforward enough, so. What gives?"
"What gives is that Batman hijacked my case," Jason said, watching a caravan of trucks pull up to the warehouse.
"Yeah, he does that. And?"
"And in the process it came out that he never told anyone about how I used to turn tricks."
A pause. The math was pretty plain and unforgiving for anyone with even the basest knowledge of when Jason had been adopted.
"Ah," Batgirl said. "That'd do it."
Jason drew back from the rifle to cast her a slightly bemused glance.
"Hey, I might not have been a street kid but I'm familiar with the wrong side of the tracks." Batgirl shrugged. "Better than the others, anyway."
He turned back with a grunt. "You would think they'd never even been to Gotham."
"Well, come on. Knowing that it happens and knowing it happened to someone in your life is pretty different."
"I'm not in their lives."
Batgirl huffed a sigh. "You batmen are painful to watch."
"I'm not—"
"Bruh you are wearing a bat symbol on your tits right now, don't even."
"You should see them when I turn the zapper on," Jason said as crates began to get unloaded in the shadows of the warehouse below. "And it's ironic, okay. A statement."
"Oho, well look at you." Batgirl scoffed. "I totally remember when I wore my dad's old mask as a 'statement'. Sure showed him, I did."
"Shut up." Jason shifted to watch armed men cycle around the perimeter. "Just give it a week for the shock and pity to roll off and everything will be back to normal. Maybe Nightwing'll fuck off back to Bludhaven for a brood about being left out of the loop, but before you know it it'll all be under the rug again."
"You think so."
"Oh yeah." Jason stood up and rummaged through his pockets. "Since you're here, make yourself useful and help me bug the place. "You see where they've started rigging up the lab space?"
"And their surveillance room. I'm on it." Batgirl jumped to her feet before a moment's hesitation. "And just so I know... that stuff. It's not a secret then?"
The simple question made Jason pause. Up until now no one had bothered to ask, always assuming that of course it was, of course he wanted this dark and filthy thing buried and hidden.
He could only imagine the tense silence and disjointed communication people were living in back at the cave. They were meant to be working a goddamn job for fuck's sake, not awkwardly navigating around one another on account of what should have been ancient history.
"No." Jason clasped his helmet on. "It's no secret."
"Hm." Batgirl jostled the devices in her hand as if weighing them. "I don't trust you, you know. I can only go by what I've heard so I dunno if you're crazy or what. But this is your case and I believe you'll see it through, by our rules if you have to. But once it's done… if you try to hurt Tim or Damian, I'll make you regret it."
"Not so worried about the others?" Jason asked with a tilt of his head. "At least you're open about playing favorites."
"It's not that," Batgirl said, a smirk teasing the edge of her lips. "I just know Nightwing's beyond your weight class. And Black Bat is out of all of ours. Robin has other skills and Red Robin is brilliant in his own way, but let's face it— in a straight fight you'd wreck them."
"This is the strangest threat I've ever received," Jason said. "more flattering than what I'm used to."
"Just making it clear where we stand is all."
Jason liked this one. He didn't doubt that Cain had been good at the job but also couldn't imagine she'd remind him this much of the original.
"Well fair enough." He withdrew his grapple. "And by the by, congrats on moving past the green tights. Batgirl's a way better gig."
"Oh trust me, I know."
The next few days were spent dutifully listening to the chatter that filtered through the bugs planted at the various outposts. It gave Jason the opportunity to shut himself in a safehouse away from the prying eyes he still couldn't shake, to sit at his computer rig and listen with some amount of smugness as drug-running lackeys bitched about Red Hood. It wasn't long before news came in about when Black Mask's equipment would be hitting the docks.
If it were up to him, he'd be there alone. Unfortunately it wasn't.
"This is ridiculously unnecessary," Jason said, crouched in the shadows atop one of walls of metal shipping crates. "You know what they say about too many chefs."
"This was our case too, you know." Red Robin groused through Jason's helmet.
"Yeah, and how was that going for you?"
"No fighting." Black Bat's voice was calm to the point of being toneless; frankly it was little eerie.
He hadn't even seen her or felt her presence all night.
"Uh huh. And what's your excuse for being here?"
"She's here for back up. This equipment is based off of leaked designs for instruments commissioned by Wayne Pharmaceuticals. It represents billions of investment into cutting edge advancements in medicinal chemistry—"
"Ah, so that's where you rich boys get your intel. I had wondered."
"— and you can bet that Black Mask is going to have arranged for significant security for its transport." Red Robin finished.
"I could take 'em."
And he was reasonably sure he could. It would involve rigging up a lot of bombs around the docks, probably taking a bullet or two and then sinking that boatload of shiny tech to the bottom of the bay, but if the goal was denying Blackie his new toys…
"Can you be serious for five minutes?" Nightwing snapped. "I want to get this job done, not worry about keeping you from getting yourself shot!"
Jason felt his brow rise. Batgirl hadn't been exaggerating about Nightwing's bad mood. He debated making a death quip because really, Dick walked right into it, but ultimately decided it wasn't worth taking a wingding (seriously?) to the face.
"Believe me, no one wants this to be over with more than I do," Jason said blandly, craning his neck to spy a caravan of vehicles rolling up to the docks. "And would you look at that. Right on time."
Conversation ceased as they watched the hired muscle pile out of their cars, loading their guns and grouching to one another about the cold. One man blinked a flashlight out into the black and across the bay another light winked in response.
"Everyone get into position."
The boat pulled up to dock, a small unlit freighter with peeling paint. The night vision setting on Jason's helmet picked out men from the jostling shadows on board.
"We've got about twenty armed goons, plus the fifteen by the cars. Submachine guns, mainly." Jason said, watching a group of men stand around something large and bulky. "What are we looking at, boys? … Mounted turret. Fun."
"Still think you could have taken them?" Red Robin asked.
"Yes."
"Do you see the shipment?" Nightwing said.
"Not from here. They must be keeping it below deck."
A few men from the cars were starting to break away, probably to establish a perimeter. Easy pickings.
"Black Bat?"
"On it."
"Wait until after they've given the all clear to unload. Red Robin will lay down cover and disable the turret, then he and I will take down the men on the boat. Red Hood, you handle the men on the ground and make sure no one calls for reinforcements."
"Roger dodger." Jason readied his guns and eyed the men by the cars.
He was only packing rubber bullets tonight, but he wasn't too torn up about it. Rubber bullets hurt like a son of a bitch, could even kill if he was careless. Or inspired.
Jason dropped soundlessly to the ground and waited in the darkness, watching as heavy wooden crates were finally lifted from the bowels of the freighter on a crane. Black Bat would now be systematically taking down the perimeter guard, and Jason only just caught the slip of movement that marked Red Robin scaling up the shadowed side of the boat.
The smoke bombs popped in perfect sequence, drowning the entire deck in a thick dusky cloud. The shouting started and men snapped their guns towards the disturbance, leaving themselves wide open.
"It's the bats! I fucking told you -"
Jason punched the nearest thug in the throat and broke another's nose with his own gun before firing two brisk shots into another two men's knees. The rubber slugs made a satisfying crack against breaking bones.
He rolled smoothly behind one of the cars as a barrage of submachine fire rang into the night. Bullets hit the splintered wood of the docks and clattered loudly into steel crates; over on the ship were more sounds of yelled orders and cursing, accompanied by the echoing gunshots and dull thuds of combat.
Beautiful.
He leaned out of cover to strategically fire a few shots, just enough to give him an opening to launch over the car and plant a boot right in some poor bastard's face. A pistol whip here, a punch to the temple there - it was the kind of fun that made the nights of tracking and eavesdropping worth it.
Glass shattered as bullets skimmed past and into the windshield of another car. One of them scraped paint off his helmet and Jason fired rubber into the shoulder of the goon responsible, causing him to drop his rifle with a scream.
The whole thing must have lasted maybe five minutes.
Men lay around him in varying states of agony, clutching injuries or just flat out unconscious. One good hit was usually all it took to make a normal person stop fighting. It wasn't like in movies where the bad guys could and would keep going with lead in their sides or blood streaming down their faces; it was a little disappointing, frankly.
So when Black Bat descended from literally nowhere to begin cuffing and zip-stripping people, Jason couldn't help but roll his eyes behind his mask. Over on the boat the smoke had mostly cleared, leaving Red Robin to putter around doing the same to the defeated men there. Nightwing was probably searching the boat for hiding runaways.
"So much for Black Mask's heavy security, hm?" Jason asked, giving an unconscious brute a harsh nudge with his boot.
"It's the four of us," Black Bat said simply. "Different than if you had done it alone."
Jason snorted. She tilted her head at him and pointedly tapped the line scraped on the side of his helmet.
"One lucky shot. Big deal."
"Mm."
"The job got done, didn't it? Maybe now Nightwing can dislodge that escrima stick from his ass. Not that I'm one to hope for miracles."
"He's upset."
"No kidding."
Black Bat made an impatient-sounding huff. "You —"
Her words were cut off by the sudden sound of unrestrained screaming. The both of them whirled to see the incapacitated criminals were writhing and blubbering uncontrollably. Jason hadn't hurt them that bad, what in the hell?
A thin hiss of decompressing air was suddenly impossible to ignore as thick clouds of red smoke began to form all around the shipyard.
"Oh fuck."
"What's happening!?" Red Robin demanded.
Cars were roaring down the crate-lined gravel road to the harbor. Black Mask's muscle drove around in sleek black cars with reinforced paneling, but these looked like average Uptown clunkers. Unremarkable, but as they neared and Jason squinted past the glare of headlights, he could just make out the burlap masks the men were wearing.
"Scarecrow," Black Bat said coldly.
"Get out of there and regroup, now!"
From an unknown source a smoke grenade clattered across the rotted wood of the docks, stopping right between them. Time slowed and Jason didn't even pause to think before he was unbuckling his helmet. If what he'd heard about Cain was true, the absolute last thing they needed right now was for her to go fear-rabid two paces away from him.
The Red Hood helmet was comically too big for her as he forced it over her head, the airtight seal activating far lower on her neck than it did on his. Her eyes probably didn't even align with the visor holes, but whatever. She could get by without them.
The device burst a split second later, pluming a tower of red smoke at their feet.
Jason staggered backwards, but the familiar chemical scent of fear gas was already in his nose.
He didn't feel a thing when he hit the floor, didn't even know he had fallen until the world violently shuddered from impact. He vaguely grasped the sound of Cain's light and impossibly quick footsteps moving away from him, and could only distantly regret that he wouldn't get to witness Black Bat making a full-tilt charge while wearing what must've looked like a red jack-o-lantern.
But the sounds of combat and shouting were already fading away as the marina began to warp and melt. Blaring lights burned in his eyes, drowning everything else out in a wave of white.
Then the clip show started.
He was 6 and a beer bottle was shattering against the wall two feet to his left, the rain of brown glass sparkling.
He was 9 and getting beaten bloody by one of the bigger kids behind a dumpster.
8, his mom wasn't able to get out of bed.
15, or so he thought, and clawing through his own casket.
17, running through the woods with Talia's death grip on his hand.
9, huddled in a freezing alley and sure he wasn't going to see morning.
11, hiding from the cops as they beat and hauled away the kids who hadn't been fast enough.
15 for real and watching from a bloodstained floor as a rusted crowbar came down again.
18. Holding a gun to the Joker's head and desperate for Batman to pull the trigger.
The highlight reel went fast, not allowing Jason much reaction aside from a gasp or flinch as he seized on the floor. It was only when he felt hands on him, grasping at his shoulders and arms, that he actually started screaming.
He was 10 and on scuffed bloody knees in a dim alley.
"Get the fuck off!" He struck blindly with his fist and felt it connect with something he couldn't see, his consciousness splitting between the alley and the docks. "Don't touch me!"
There was another set of hands grabbing his shoulders trying to help restrain his flailing limbs and he didn't know what was real anymore. The pain in Jason's throat grew sharp but he couldn't stop screaming, kicking and twisting, trying to curl and shield himself.
He was drowning. Green, green everywhere and burning—
A needle was pricking him in the neck.
"Jason," Something in him recognized that voice, deep and vicious but resounding in his chest comfortingly.
He felt his body relax against his will, sinking against the cold asphalt. The sound of his own pulse was thunder in his ears and he could feel the vibration of it across his skin. Jason blinked once, twice, three times and the alley was gone. He was lying on the ground beside the unforgiving black of the Gotham Bay, the harsh light of a nearby lamp eclipsed by the familiar black cowl filling his vision.
"… Bruce?"
Maybe someone had called him when shit hit the fan or he'd been tracking Scarecrow. Or he had been there the whole time, lurking in the background. All were equally possible.
Batman's hold on Jason's wrists loosened somewhat.
"I'm here."
The second set of hands was still on his shoulders and Jason realized that his head was actually resting on someone else's lap— probably to keep him from braining himself on the floor in his struggle. He tilted back and saw Black Bat, hoodless but with the pointed tips of her domino slightly crumpled.
Jason's arms were heavy and uncoordinated in a way characteristic of the drugged or very drunk, and reaching up to wipe his face turned into basically slapping himself. His hand came away wet.
His head lolled to the side, making him belatedly realize that area had gone quiet. It felt like he'd only been down for a few minutes, but clearly it'd been much longer.
He cleared his swollen throat. "Crane."
"Scarecrow wanted the synthesis equipment for his own purposes. Nightwing is handling him now. Red Robin is taking care of Black Mask's men."
Jason nodded numbly even though the words were barely making it past the cotton that seemed to be clogging his brain. Everything was a dull hum around him, his head heavy with the nausea of the half-lucid. Right now nothing felt real, not the ground beneath his back or the living shadows holding him.
"B… why did you redact my file?" His voice was small and hoarse and didn't sound like him at all.
Batman was silent.
"Did you… did you think I was ashamed?" Jason swallowed against the pain in his throat. "Were you ash—"
"No."
The fierceness of the denial was enough to make Jason flinch, and Black Bat's hands held even more firm on his shoulders.
"No, Jason." Batman said, more gently. "I have never thought less of you for where you came from. I only wanted to protect you."
Jason huffed a weak laugh. As if protecting him hadn't long since been proved an exercise in futility.
Maybe Mike had been right after all. Jason was a Gotham kid. A real one, assembled and built with dirt and blood and dark alleyways, and he couldn't be washed clean of what made him. Was that why Batman took him in? To prove that if this ragged boy could be saved, so could the shadowed city he loved so much?
"You wanted it to be like it never happened." Jason sounded as tired as he felt. "But it did."
Batman's grip on Jason's hands tightened almost painfully for a brief moment before going slack.
"… I know, son."
For a moment they sat there in the silence.
"Are you," Batman hesitated. "Are you cold?"
Jason gave a shaky shrug. He was trembling but whether it was from the temperature or the lingering effect of the fear toxin was hard to say.
Black Bat helped roll Jason upright and he slumped against the symbol on Batman's chest, the cape draping around his shoulders. It was both jarring and comforting to be reminded that he wasn't the tiny underfed prepubescent of his hallucination, but 21 and just two inches shy of rivaling Bruce in height.
The suit was thermally regulated and Jason could feel some of that warmth seeping through. The adrenaline that had been keeping him awake began to fade as the Batmobile's engine roared closer.
Waking up in the Batcave's medical room with a throbbing headache and no sense of time wasn't an experience Jason wanted to have, but the universe always had a nice way of telling him to go fuck himself. The lights in the med bay had been dimmed and no alarms or sirens went off when he slid the IV needle from his arm, so he took that as a good sign. If they'd wanted him to stick around they should've cuffed him to something.
The job was done now and Jason wasn't on his way to a cell so it had all gone as well as could be expected, preceding drama not withstanding. Dick and Drake would probably knuckle down to find their leak; the one responsible for getting Black Mask those prototype blueprints from Wayne Pharmaceuticals, but Red Hood wasn't here for that white-collar corporate espionage crap. His bit in this game was done.
He slipped out of the cave to get on with his life.
Days passed and Jason was confident he could put the whole thing behind him. Nothing had really changed between him and the Bats, after all. Despite the heart-to-heart that he already knew would never be spoken of again by anyone, no opinions had been altered, no rules rewritten, no forgiveness given or asked for. Red Hood could walk away this time but there weren't any delusions that his next encounter with the flock would be friendly.
It was little over a week after the shipyard incident when his burner phone buzzed with a new message. It was the number he gave to his underlings— the gang leaders and dealers he'd forced under his control— so Jason's first thought was that a subordinate needed a word. He had been a little too busy to give them his usual level of attention, after all.
Unknown number.
Jason frowned as he checked his texts and image after image was sent to his inbox. It was a series of grainy screenshots, the kind that came from old surveillance cameras that recorded in black and white and took no audio.
Shot after shot of him having a seizure on the ground by the docks, Black Bat pinning him down as Batman stuck a needle in his neck.
Black Bat cupping Jason's masked face on her lap as a lingering Nightwing and Red Robin were ordered away.
Batman pulling him close in a way that could not be mistaken for anything but affectionate.
His phone began to ring, and Jason swallowed dryly as he hit the green button.
"I know the quality's not very good, but I think we got your good side," Black Mask's voice drawled over the line. "That bitch on Batman's payroll snatched the recording, but luckily I was viewing live and managed to save the good bits for myself."
Jason tightened his grip on the phone.
"You know it's all making sense now. Why Bats never took you down or fed you to the wolves like he should've. Why he's let you screw me over these past few years. You're his boy aren't you?" A rough chuckle. "Only it's pretty clear you and him aren't seeing eye to eye anymore. Isn't that interesting."
"Sounds like that mask is restricting some flow to your brain, big guy."
Mask gave a cruel laugh. "You can give up the act, Robin. It's over."
Jason was pretty sure the glass of his screen was cracking under his fingertips.
"You seem to be confusing me for a five-foot imp in tights."
"Oh, no no. Batman's always had an endless supply of you brats, everyone knows that."
"Personally I think the girl was the only one worth a damn."
"Really? I wasn't impressed."
Jason ground his teeth behind his helmet.
"It took some digging, but I'm looking at footage of a little bird with that kids' club right now, and it's dated just after Nightwing graduated past the pixie boots."
Jason let himself wince at that. Most people either mixed him and Dick up thanks to the matching uniform, or him and Drake due to the quick replacement, mistakenly thinking there had only ever been four Robins. His stint on the Teen Titans had been short and only done to make Dick happy but nothing much had come of it - he hadn't acknowledged his existence any more than usual, the team only saw him as the awkward little brother wearing the original's legacy, and to top it off him being with the Titans made Batman moody.
Out of all the Robins, Jason had definitely been kept on the shortest leash.
"It was harder than pulling teeth to dig up any info on what the hell happened to you. So I rang up Freeze; paid through the nose just so he could tell me that everyone in the super special Bat-hate club thinks the Joker offed you years ago. Would have saved me some trouble, that's for sure."
Profanity streamed through Jason's mind. Of course the Rogues Gallery would know. They'd been up close and personal with every kid that ever clung to Batman's cape, and it figured the Joker would brag about what he'd done to that little inner circle of crazy.
"Well it's been real fun taking this ride into lunacy with you, but now I've got work to do. And my work generally involves ruining your work, so."
"Not sure how easy that's going to be once word starts spreading of who you really are, Robin. Can I call you Robin? I mean I gotta say that the current look's good, but not as flattering as the boyshorts."
"Keep talking like that and you'll owe me dinner."
"Oh I think I owe you a lot more than that, but it'll be more fun to watch as your men and every other goon in this city with a bone to pick with your old man comes at you first. Off the top of my head I can think of a good few."
"Even if you were right, just because the Bat doesn't come to my birthday parties anymore doesn't mean he'll let you take me out in his city."
"Of course not. But what's he gonna do when every scumbag in Gotham starts wriggling out of the woodworks? He couldn't protect you before. And even if you don't get offed at the very least you'll be ruined and unable to play crime boss anymore in my town. Win-win for me," Mask said with a low laugh. "You brought this on yourself kid, and your old man knows it too."
Jason's phone was shattering across the street before the screen even registered that the call had ended.
For a long minute his head swum in a tide of anger and panic. This could get bad very fast. He had to think damage control, but at the moment his thoughts were just a mess of garbled swears because fuck, how did Black Mask of all people figure this out just from a single under-the-influence hug?
But there was no reason for Batman to be holding Red Hood. There was no reason for Red Hood to be back on the streets and not in Blackgate after clearly having been carried off in the Batmobile a mere week ago. And as much as Jason hated to admit it, Batman had always gone easy on him in the field and there was no good reason for that, either.
Except for one.
You brought this on yourself your old man knows it. A dark voice echoed in his mind. Just like last time.