#jason has a gang of kids he protects okay
Note
So I was reading "Kidnapping Tim's dignity" by Sophie_Vers and "Suffer in Vogue" by InkpotSprite, which btw, mind the tags and content warnings in the endnotes before reading because holy fuck!
And while they aren't the first to depict Tim being the exception to Jason's 'Protect Kids' schtick, it got me thinking of the principle of "if one of us isn't safe, none of us are safe"
So here's some loosely connected ideas exploring that. Bending canon ahead
Also I fused that Mafia!Tim idea with this because it's fire
Feel free, but not pressured, to add on however you want
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Titans Tower occurs before Stephanie becomes Robin. It, + other incidents, convince Bruce to bench Tim for the foreseeable future
Steph becomes the Fourth Robin and has the help of Tim for training, the batcomputer + more
Stephanie's dies during her run as Robin and is buried, Bruce at least has the decency to pay off the bills for the funeral eve if she wasn't legally adopted
How does she get revived? Let's say Tim is experimenting with Lazarus Water. If it can bring back Jason, it can bring back his friend
And since he succeeded at reviving Stephanie, if anybody else (like say, Kon & Bart) dies, he can just whip out the pit juice
Since Stephanie died under Batman's tutelage, she makes the decision to hide her revival from Batman, and Tim helps set her up with a new identity
At some point between Tim trying to revive Stephanie and helping her get a new ID, Duke joins the fray. Idk how but they meet & he gets in the know about Steph's revival
Then his parents being Joker Gassed happens, and Bruce—thanks to a little red robin whispering in his ear—takes him in as his ward/foster/adopted kid
Fuck it, let's add in Cassandra as well, girl speedruns hopping into Gotham like another League runaway she's heard of and comes under Batman's wing in no time
And you don't hide shit from her so Cass and Duke are in on Stephanie's resurrection and are trusted Secret Keepers
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Despite all that's happened, Stephanie isn't going to let go of being a vigilante, but she doesn't want Batman looming over her either
Plus the others are up for some teenage rebellion so they copy after their Big Brother Jason and become crime lords
Introducing the gang; The Undying Carrion
(named them after Carrion Crow, which is very intelligent and a scavenger)
Works like Tim Gang in the Gang AU but with Tim, Steph, Cass and Duke as shared leaders
They need leader names, fuck
Lemme think . . .
Introducing, the Carrion Crows!
Stephanie / Carrion Violence
Tim / Carrion Thread
Duke / Carrion Light
Cassandra / Carrion Promise
Explanation Times!!
// (Violence - nce) + t = violet, which is purple!!
Hence why Stephanie calls herself violence! Okay that's a Canon Event but there's also other meanings to the name
Stephanie didn't just die, she was killed or murdered, an act of violence
Stephanie is on the field more than the rest of the Carrion, and knows how to rock your shit, she's well trained in—and expecting—violence
She's motivated partially by Jason's violence against Tim
Why call themselves Carrions? Stephanie started this all after being returned from death
// Tim became Robin because what little faith in Batman remained was a thin, fragile thread, and while he restored Gotham's into a tightknit spider web, his own faith degenerated into a thread that snapped with Stephanie's death
Likewise, his adoration for Jason, the Second Robin, is hanging by a thread, especially as the other three voice their disdain for Jason's more recent action in Titans Tower
Plus the logic Jason has for hating Tim, Batman has for abusing Tim, and he has for loving those two still, barely has a thread of logic to them
Like spider webs, he's able to take mere threads and weave them into inescapable traps, make unseen firewalls and find the thinnest threads of knowledge on the internet
He makes a secure spiderweb of safety nets and contingencies for the gang for countless possible situations
// Behind Stephanie, Duke is the most well-known of the Carrion Crows, he's like a lighthouse of directions for the gang
He is also able to lead mass swaths of people at once, while Stephanie is better with smaller groups, or doing it one-to-one
Because he leads a larger statistic of people at once, foes tend to be lured to him like moths to a flame, thinking if they take him down, the whole operation comes toppling
Even if they do put Duke out of action, they're in for a rude awakening when the rest of the Carrion Crows come to the rescue
He and Steph know how to put all eyes on themselves so that Tim and Cass's activities go unnoticed
Why think of mysteries with too little clues to wonder about, when you can look at this spectacle of a spotlight and galore of violence?
His name is also a nod to the fact that despite all the trauma he's went through, he has more childhood innocence compared to the rest of the four; more light in his eyes so to speak
// Cassandra, the renegade, the renegade . . .
She made a promise to herself even before she met The Bat; She will not kill, for it is wrong, all have the right to live, and none the right to revoke it
She does not kill for all deserve a sufficient judgement; all victims the ability to gain closure how they see fit (this sets up possible future arguments between Jason and her)
Where as the other Carrion may take the liberty to transform 'No Killing' into a fate worse than death?
She is the only one who's made this promise, and thus the only one you can trust to not make you beg for death due to it transforming into mercy
And if you make a promise to the Carrion? You better go through with it, because she'll know when you've broken it
==========
The gang starts off as basically welfare.
Here's free lessons of essential life skills, here's free nursing and doctor training, here's free education and shelter— legality? Who cares?
Eventually, however, they meet bottlenecks of lacking legal options as illegal gangs do
So Tim starts looking into ways to circumvent this. lo and behold, the Drake Industries he is set in inherit
Tim starts catching up on everything he'll need to know to be CEO as a fricking teenager and starts discussing the possibility of even doing so under eighteen
For plot convenience, Jack and Janet are ecstatic that he appears to be so passionate about this and help him speedrun inheritance
Badabing badaboom, with Tim weaving in the Undying Carrion and Drake Industries together, business is booming on both sides as they feed into eachothers growth and profits
The Drake's, in the dark, are wiping tears above their smiles. They're so proud of their boy!
Tim unfortunately has to play Loving Son™ more than ever, but hey, worth it
Fuck it, it's helping Gotham, so Tim even enlists Kon, Cassie and Bart as honorary and substitute leaders in case of emergencies, gets them up to speed
(hey maybe even have Bart info dump about the Undying Carrion when introduced to it be it due to history lessons or it's place in the future)
Idk what their Carrion Titles would be lol
Also how will they utilize their powers without giving themselves away? 🤔🤔🤔
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Oh yeah, what do they all do as the heads of their gang?
Well, they're very remote and hands off in practice due to civilian and bat-vigilante lives, so unless they can find the time;
Tim is the tech genius, encrypting and hacking like no tomorrow. Plus his ability to gather information is like no other
He can even double as an info broker when nessecery
He does most of the bureaucracy when it comes to working Drake Industries and Undying Carcasses both at once, but others help him shoulder the burden
Cassandra specializes in getting a read on people with her knowledge in body language
She can tell who works best where, who to trust, who to play, who to investigate, etc.
Duke does most of leadership possible remotely. He also utilizes his meta powers without outing himself as Signal
Stephanie—with an undone death—is able to act as a physically present leader for the gang, and is the one on the field if nessecery
In a nutshell, Tim does tech + organization and DI & UC, Cass passes judgements, Duke does remote leadership, and Stephanie does fieldwork and physical leadership
As the four leaders, they have meetings and discuss how to proceed with their gang
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So yeah, Batman + non-criminal allies and Red Hood are sniffing around the Undying Carrion because, hello? New gang? Who dis?
Especially if one of them catches a look at Stephanie's eyes as Violence and sees them flash Lazarus Green, giving the name 'Undying Carrion' a whole 'nother meaning
That also boosts their motivation to uncover what the fucking is going on here
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Anyways Jason slander because I'm a Hater™
Stephanie proposed becoming a crime lord since she didn't want to work under Batman, still wanted to help people, and crime is still a big fucking problem so "if you can't beat 'em, join em"
However, she is also aware of the mess that is Batman and Jason's relationship after the latter revived, plus Jason beating Tim up to high hell, and fills in Cass and Duke about this
And having never met Jason nor caring about his Robin days nearly as much as Tim Drake, she has a very low opinion of the Second Robin
Especially with Jason's audacity to claim he protects kids whilst doing the Titans Tower
And whatever the hell he was pulling didn't stop her from biting the dust
So yeah, she's a hater and she makes it KNOWN
She's super vocal about her criticism towards Batman and Red Hood
"Batman's second Robin died due to circumstances out of his control, so I won't grill him for that, but to allow Red Hood to break into Titans Tower and beat the Third Robin to near death and later allow the Fourth to die is something else entirely!"
"Speaking of Red Hood, what happened to 'protecting the children'? look at you! You beat Robin—a teenager—into the dirt for daring to care about his community! for feeling obligated for throwing away his childhood so he could play Therapist for Batman!"
"Shouldn't you be throwing hands with Batman instead? The Third Robin threw away so much for him and the Fourth Robin gave her own life!"
"Or is the problem that they do care for their communities, and have the power to fight for them and defend ourselves?"
"Was the Third Robin not only exempted from your rules, but actively targeted by you because he could defend himself? Do only protect children when they can't fight back? When they're utterly helpless? In Gotham?"
"Forget being an exception, why did you see fit to grant the idea that children should be protected from harm an exception? Are the kids in Crime Alley safe from you at all?"
"Argue all you want for yourself, but the fact remains that you've displayed not the power, but the willingness to torture those you claim to protect, and we won't stand for it, I least of all."
"If one of us isn't safe, none of us are safe."
Maybe Stephanie's slip for the tongue "one of us" can clue Red Hold in on Carrion Violence being a teenager, whoopsie daisies
But yeah, arguments for those under Red Hood or The Undying Carrion abound
Lord help you of you're under Red Hood, and The Undying Carrion
I'm thinking about the Twitter Wars . . .
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Hey maybe she even whispers the idea that Red Hood is infact a copycat of The Joker and is just playing the long con, building a reputation and trust so he can burn it all away and watch the improving community collapse and despair
It'd explain why he brutalized the Third Robin like how The Joker did the Second Robin but has yet to do the same with Batman and is obsessed like the Joker is, she's just saying . . . 👀👀👀👀
Not as Carrion Violence of course, that'd be the biggest target in her back yet!
It's small suggestions here and there only Tim would be able to trace back to her
I'm just saying, with the Carrion Crows being Waynes (not matter how unofficial) and Tim running Drake Industries they're experience with PR could be weaponized *handrub*
Jason has to throw in his own rustic abilities but it's gonna be tough, woof
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Is Cluemaster still isn't jailed yet, he's done for with the Carrion Crows on his ass
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The four are also gonna beat Jay's ass into the dirt when they find out he knew about Damian since he was under Talia's care and never brought him up
Or maybe not, Red Hood isn't on good terms with Batfam or Carrion, and if he did go single father he'd have assassin's on his undertrained ass
But also
That kid's in a fucking cult for fucks sake what the hell man?
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Oh yeah, the Batclan side of things.
Given the disastrous trend of Robins biting the dust or being brutalized by previous ones, Robin is benched indefinitely, especially with Tim admitting that he's going to focus more on his civilian life
Particularly getting that CEO status in Drake Industries and playing the Prodigy Image for PR
Also the Carrion stuff but Batman doesn't know that
Bruce sort of has his hands full simultaneously training daylight hero Signal and recent partner Batgirl
as do they but he doesn't need to know why
Batman is sweating bullets after learning about the rapidly growing Undying Carrion and realizing they have to investigate this. Especially if he knows about Carrion Violence's Lazarus eyes
Cassandra and Duke meanwhile are sweating because they have to investigate themselves without getting caught
Just because Tim is benched doesn't mean he's wholly out of the game
He does lots of duty on the batcomputer as he did during Stephanie's Robin time
Plus, since he's gone Computer Man, he spends more time with Barbara and learning technology with her
Which is later exploited by Carrion Thread
So yeah, with the Batfamily infested with three moles, It's gonna be rough not raising suspicion but slightly easier with each other to trust
Plus they can do some espionage for the Carrion side of things
==========
Suffice to say that the Carrion Crows and maybe even Young Justice become much closer thanks to this, so if something real bad happens like Tim's Sixteenth birthday, he'll trust them to have his back and to give a shoulder to cry on
And to think this started off as Jason Todd hate . . . And also Batman hating . . .
Oh yeah, I never established wtf Stephanie"s fake ID was, just that Tim helped her get one, should probably toss that in as well
Tim doing experiments until he can, in cases of emergency, revive his family with Pit water makes sense.
I do love that this AU focuses on Steph, Duke, and Cass because they can be overlooked by fandom and canon (I'm glad Tim is a focus as well, but he's not nearly as overlooked as the other three).
I'm always down for Bruce bashing, and I like the idea that they are slowly driving him nuts. He has no clue why this new gang is always ahead of him, and he just wants to figure it out. Fuck him, though.
The role for Steph in this is great. I think that Bruce is too limiting for her character. She should be able to make her own decisions with support, not dictations of lines. She's too used to making her own decisions for some random ass man to tell her what she can and can't do. It doesn't matter that Bruce is Batman and a billionaire. Steph deserves the respect to be a leading decision maker of her own life.
In this AU, she's able to shine as the brilliant, fierce, and strong person she is while being able to lean on Duke, Cass, and Tim.
Duke and Cass have it rough with two separate vigilante (ish) personas, but you did mention they kind if work not as frequently as Steph is able to.
As far as Jason, there's very few fics that address how his attack on Tim would affect his reputation in Crime Alley. That, more than anything, would devastate the man. The kids of Crime Alley, whose trust is hard earned, losing faith in him. I don't remember which fics address this, but even fewer actually have Crime Alley find out about Red Hood attacking Robin. That whole situation is tricky to navigate as a fan of both Tim and Jason.
Anyways, I love the amount of detail you put into this AU. What part of Gotham would they control? Would they be fighting with Red Hood for Crime Alley, or would they set up territory in another section? Or do they not have territory?
I'd be down to hear more about this AU. Stuff like what their outfits are like, what missions they tackle, how the public treats them, etc.
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My connection went off so idk if my ask just sent but. I was wondering your thoughts on post Robin Jason, because idk what his deal is at this point and writers don't seem to either. I don't think he's a heartless killer who should be hated and hunted by the entire family but I don't like this fanon "Jason is 100% right about everything and everyone else is the problem" idea either, when they put him in the family he feels really out of place and random and it's just.. one moment he's trying to kill Tim and the next he's the best guy ever with the softest heart?? I don't know there has to be a middle ground right?? I just can't get into Red Hood as a character due to this
Thank you for being so incredibly smart, reasonable, and intelligent.
You're exactly right. I think this is the same issue that's been affecting the Robin Dick vs Robin Jason mischaracterizations as well as the batgirls' that have been predominant in the fandom post 2020. Tim and Damian's motivations and personality have stayed the same from when they entered to now but Dick, Jason, Cass, and Steph have all grown as characters. Who they started out as, they've changed from then to now which has led to some confusion about their personality and motivations.
For Jason in particular - no, he shouldn't be hunted to the ends of the Earth for the things he did. He was hurting and acted out of pain. However it's irresponsible to refute those actions and blame other characters for them.
Jason was originally meant to be a villain. He was supposed to be like Freeze, a sympathetic villain - a character who despite their evil actions is understandable. All Freeze wants is his wife, Nora, back. He loves her and commits horrible acts that don't justify his actions but it makes sense. You're supposed to feel complicated about characters like him because they point out exactly why morality is grey. What Freeze does is wrong, but he does it for the right reasons. It's ultimately still wrong which is why he gets imprisoned.
That is Jason. Jason's actions were never supposed to okay. In what universe would creators who spent half a century working on and developing characters be okay with another character trying to kill them? What about that is acceptable? But it's not just trying to kill Tim (who only escaped by outsmarting Jason) or trying to kill Damian, the crimes he did are not acceptable.
He bombed Gotham just because despite knowing he didn't need to. He was willing to kill innocent children, men, women, and civilians for Dick and Damian were chasing him, after they helped him.
Batman and Robin (2009) Issue #25
In the Red Robin Comics, he was willing to use children as bait during a gang war.
Robin (1993) Issue #177
Not to mention Mia Dearden.
But at the same time, he killed people who hurt children
Red Hood: Lost Days Issue #3
Initially Jason's morality was a swinging pendulum. He was as likely to kill kids as he was to protect them. He didn't care about the lives of civilians if it meant getting away or completing his plans.
Batman/Superman (2013) Issue #26
Here Superman says he wants to save a kid so Jason argues that to save him, they need to poison the environment and wipe out several countries.
That's why Bruce struggles with Jason so much. Over his lack of care for people's lives. It's not the murdering of criminals that Batman is caught up on which is where I believe the misunderstanding in fanon comes from. It's his fear that by his own hands, Bruce created a deadlier version of the man who killed his parents.
Batman vs Robin Issue #3
So no it's not fair to blame everyone for Jason's mistakes and claim him innocent, but it's also not fair to say Bruce had nothing to do with Jason's mental state. If he had shown a little less hesitance at the reappearance of Jason in Under the Red Hood, if he had shown a little more love then Jason probably wouldn't have gone as crazy as he did after coming back.
Because he saw Jason killing everyone, Bruce fell into his worst possible explanation of Jason, knowing the pain he was going through but succumbing to selfish actions to protect himself.
Jason's tough to deal with for writers because even when the batfamily reaches out, Jason is the one that burns his own bridges. When Dick begged Jason to take his hand during the Battle for the Cowl, when Dick and Damian helped Jason save his friend during Batman and Robin (2009), when Bruce saved Jason and fought alongside him against a couple members of the Secret Society of Supervillains, Jason immediately turned around and killed people and bragged about it.
In Batman Urban Legends, Jason tells Bruce that he has given up guns to which Bruce is grateful but it's also not for him. It's a sign that Jason is turning a new leaf especially given how caring he was with the kid, calling him Blue Hoodie. That was so sweet of him. The current Batman family comics are a sign of things changing between Jason and the family. What has happened up until now is not the family's fault, especially when they've reached out for the sole purpose of extending an olive branch only to have it burned and tied to a person in return. But now things are slowly changing and writers are trying to show that.
Jason's story is story of growth. He didn't come back to save people, he came specifically for the sake of hurting Bruce. But over the years, the repeated attempts of the family (Dick and far less Bruce) of bringing Jason back into the fold has helped him move past his anger. To slowly become adjusted and settle down.
Writers have struggled to know what to do with a character that canonically wants to be included in the family but rebuffs their every attempt to include him. They finally figured out the problem was Bruce - hence his fight against Jason and his exit in Gotham War. I'm assuming now that Jason will become more involved in Batman comics.
As a character currently though, I think of him as a lone ranger. He works independently but he'll show up for family meetings and big events. He'll also join family dinners if he's coerced but for the most part he likes to run on his own or with his team.
#jason todd#red hood#bruce wayne#batman#dick grayson#batman dick grayson#cl anon asks#thanks for the ask!
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Old Enemies and Old Friends
Pairing: Jason Todd (version unspecified) x F!Reader
Warnings: kidnapping, injury, mentions of death, violent death
Word count: 3384
A/N: Here’s part 12 of castle of glass! This took a lot longer than I thought it would, but my ADHD has been playing hell all week. Hopefully the next one won’t take as long, and I hope you like it!!
Masterlist
Series masterlist
Ko-Fi
Thirty-two hours.
Jason glanced at the clock on his helmet dash before forcing him to look away again. Y/N had been with the Joker for thirty-two hours. He was trying really hard not to think about the fact that he had been with the clown for less than two before he got bored of beating him and set the bomb timer going.
He forced himself to breath and think logically. If she was dead, the Joker would have told them by now. He liked to rub that kind of thing in their faces. But if she wasn’t dead…
Stop it.
He took another deep breath and ticked the current warehouse off his list. He didn’t have many buildings left to check. Dick had temporarily run off to deal with a gang shootout, after insisting Jason keep searching without him for a while. Dick had told him he was planning on calling several of the titans in, but he’d been called away before Jason could ask who. Jason had mixed feelings about them getting involved because he hadn’t exactly had the best experiences with any of them, before and after his death. But he knew they were as protective over Y/N as Dick was, so he wasn’t going to say no if they wanted to help out.
A flash of movement caught his eye as he stepped out of the abandoned warehouse.
He flexed his fingers over the guns strapped to his thighs as he stepped forward. But he wrenched his hands away as he laid eyes on the small kid crammed into the gap between the wall and a dumpster, clearly trying to be as small as possible.
“Hey, kid. What’cha doing here?” He relaxed his posture and crouched down, trying to seem as non-threatening as possible given he was now taller than Bruce and almost as broad; sometimes he really missed being Robin.
“You’re Red Hood.” The kid was shaking slightly, but he kept his eyes on Jason as he nodded. “You help people.”
“I try to.” Jason said as softly as he could through the voice modulator. He watched as the kid chewed his lip but made no room to say anything else, so he spoke up instead. “Do you need my help?”
The kid nodded. “Some men hurt my friends. We sleep in the old theatre because it’s dry and the costumes are all still there for warmth. But the men found us and hurt some of my friends.”
The edge of Jason’s vision tinged green. He thought he had made himself clear a few months back when the police tried to bar the homeless kids in the Bowery from sleeping there. That was Red Hood’s turf and those particular kids were under his protection. The kid in front of him couldn’t have been older than twelve, and he deserved somewhere relatively safe and warm to sleep.
Jason really wanted to punch someone. “Did you get the officers names?”
“They weren’t police officers.” The kid said.
Jason felt as if someone had punched him in the stomach.
Could it…
No…
In the middle of his territory…
Surely not even the fucking clown was that suicidal…
He took a deep breath, ignoring the pit once again as it tried to take over. “Okay, kid, I’ll deal with it. There’s a shelter on Cross Street, you take your friends there and tell the woman behind the desk that Red Hood sent you.” He pulled a small red token out of his pocket and handed it over to the kid. “Just give her that and she’ll set you up.”
The kid nodded and scurried off.
Jason pulled out his phone and shot Dick a quick text before setting off in the direction of the theatre.
***
It was easier than he thought it would be for Jason to slip in through a hole in the theatres roof. That should have been his first indication that something was wrong. But green had started clawing its way to the front of his mind at the mere thought of getting his hands on the clown, making him more reckless than he would normally be.
He crept through the decaying attic and jumped down onto the first floor, his boots hitting the carpet with a dull thud. He had been to the theatre once before it shut with his mom. He didn’t know how Catherine had managed to scrape together the money, even if it was just a low budget version of A Midsomer’s Night Dream. It was still one of his best memories, just him and his mom before she got really bad. Before she finally gave up and chose the drugs over Jason.
He shook his head, choosing to focus on the green instead, and kept moving forward.
He could hear voices coming from the stage area and silently walked towards the stairs he remembered that should lead him to the backstage area. He stepped onto the carpet at the bottom of the stairs and knew something was wrong, the floor just felt off. But as he moved his other foot down nothing seemed to happen, so he put it down to rotten wood and he started moving forward.
He made it half way down the corridor before his head started feeling funny. Three more steps before he stumbled. One more before he fell to his knees and started realising something was really wrong.
Some form of gas was his first thought. But his helmet had a filtration system. Not if someone planned for that, his brain reminded him. He crawled forward another metre, trying to think of a plan.
Then the laughing started.
Manic, echoing laughter poured down the corridor and suddenly Jason was fifteen again and the carpet under him was actually concrete and the walls were further away.
“Poor excuse for the cavalry, aren’t you, birdie?” The voice that haunted his nightmares cackled. “I bet this was not what the other little birdie was hoping for when she sent that distress signal.”
Distress signal?
“Oh, well, she’ll find out soon enough.”
Before Jason could think about anything in more detail, the crowbar connected with his helmet.
***
Jason couldn’t supress the groan as he woke up. His entire body felt stiff and his head was throbbing in the dull way it did whenever someone hit him over the head while he was still wearing his helmet. But the fuzziness told him he had also been drugged with something, and that never boded well for what was to come.
“Finally back with us, birdie?”
Jason didn’t have time to answer before two sets of hands yanked him upright. It took him a solid minute to resist the urge to puke because he realised he was still wearing his helmet, even if it had shattered on one side.
Muffled, angry protests drew his attention and he finally managed to crack his eyes open to take in his surroundings. They were on the raised platform that used to be the stage, although now it was just rotting boards, and there were two guys on either side of him, still holding his arms. But that was not his priority when his eyes caught a flash of purple.
Y/N was on her knees about six feet in front of him with the Joker standing behind her. She was gagged and there was a piece of rope wound around her neck that he had a horrible feeling connected to where her hands were bound behind her back. The bruising starting to come out around her neck confirmed his theory. There was blood on the left side of her head and a bruise on her cheekbone that looked at least a day old so he knew those were from when she had been grabbed.
But it was the fresh blood running down her left leg from the middle of her thigh that worried him the most. Her jeans were missing and something had been carved into her thigh. From this distance he couldn’t make it out under the hem of the oversized shirt of his she had stolen yesterday morning, but he had a feeling he knew what it was and it made his vision tint green.
“Get away from her.” He rasped out, struggling to make his voice work as he looked up at the clown.
The Joker’s face split into his awful grimace of a smile and he stroked a hand through Y/N’s hair roughly, clearly not caring if it got caught. She flinched away and the hand clamped down, keeping her where she was. But she kept her eyes on Jason, looking concerned, like she wasn’t the one with the psycho murderer standing behind her.
The Joker laughed, tipping Y/N’s head back and Jason could tell by the choking sound she made that she had tried to move her hands without thinking about the rope around her throat. “Not much of a rescue team, is he, little bird?”
Distress signal.
The Joker’s words in the hall came back to him and he tried not to show the surprise on his face. He said Y/N sent out a distress signal. But it hadn’t been to him. Of course not, she had to have codes with Dick, ways of sending messages without anyone being able to tell what they said. Which meant Jason had walked into a trap that wasn’t meant for him, and Dick still had a chance. Knowing golden boy, he’d be a lot more careful than Jason had been, which meant he just had to keep the clown’s attention until then.
He took a deep breath, well aware of the implications of what he was about to say, but he just needed the Joker to let Y/N go.
“You know, I never did answer for which hurt more.”
Y/N’s eyes went wide and she started screaming something illegible through the gag, but the Joker’s smile grew and he let her go. She fell onto her side, her eyes focused on him, still shaking her head as the Joker stepped forward with the crowbar.
Jason closed his eyes and begged whoever might be watching over him that Nightwing wouldn’t be as late as Batman was.
***
As always, Dick didn’t disappoint.
The Joker only managed four hits before something exploded and they heard people shouting. The men holding him dropped his arms and drew their guns. Jason let himself slump and slipped the hidden knife out of his boot while none of them were looking.
“I wonder which birdie that is.” The Joker laughed and walked towards the edge of the stage.
Jason took his chance and stabbed the guy on his left in the calf as he swept the legs out from under the guy on the right. He dived over the guy on the floor, ignoring the horrible twinge in his most likely broken ribs, and used his body as a shield against the others gunshots before grabbing the now dead guys gun for himself. From there it took almost no effort to drop the other guy.
But when he turned in the direction of the clown, he found empty space.
“Fuck.” He croaked out, his voice sounding worse than before.
He turned back to Y/N as the shouts got closer; the clown could wait.
They were too exposed on the stage so he sliced through the rope connecting the one around her throat to her hands and ignored her muffled protests as he threw her over his shoulder. He kept the gun up as he moved towards the backstage area. Y/N went limp on his shoulder, clearly accepting this was how he was moving them somewhere safer.
He kicked open the first door he came across and strode into what looked like on old dressing room once he had made sure it was clear. He set Y/N down on the floor as gently as he could, trying not to jostle her leg too much, and then pulled off the shattered remains of his helmet before cutting her wrists free. He barely had time to pull the gag out of her mouth before she threw her arms around him.
“We’re okay.” He said, giving himself one minute to just hold her.
But she pulled back before he could, her hands immediately moving to his face. “You’re bleeding.”
“Not as much as you.” He said, catching her wrists below the skin the ropes had rubbed raw and bruised. But her leg was what was worrying him.
“I’m fine.” She said, moving to cover it with the oversized shirt before he could take a proper look at it.
“Sweetheart, nothing ‘fine’ bleeds that much.” He pulled a pressure bandage out of his utility belt, well aware he didn’t have enough for her leg, wrists and neck. “I need to wrap it so we can get out of here.”
She nodded and moved her hands away. “Okay.”
He shifted forward to get a better look and his entire vision went green in the way it hadn’t in a long time. He was aware his eyes had changed and his breathing was uneven, but it was hard to get it under control when the psycho had decided to carve a goddamn J deep enough in her leg that there was no way it wouldn’t scar.
“Jay.” Y/N said softly. “Jason, breathe.”
He forced a lungful of air into his chest and exhaled slowly, forcing the green back, but leaving it thrumming under the surface for when he got his hands on the clown.
“I’m okay.” He said once the green had retreated enough that he could see his surroundings again. Her hands were on his face again, her thumbs gently stroking over his cheekbones and he let it ground him before he turned back to the task at hand and started wrapping her leg up. “You got a message to Dick.”
“We have a code. That’s why he thought it was meant for you.” She said. “You didn’t come with him?”
“We were looking together, then he got called away for a gang shootout. A street kid told me about some bad men here, thought I’d check it out. I walked into the trap he set for Dick.” He told her as he finished tying off the bandage.
Y/N opened her mouth to say something, but she cut off as they heard footsteps in the corridor. Jason met her eyes before wordless standing, placing himself firmly in between her and the door, and raising the gun in his hand.
The door was kicked open, slamming against the wall with a bang, and Jason found himself staring down the shaft of a military grade arrow.
“Speedy?” Y/N asked and Jason glanced down to see her peering around his legs.
“Well, you both look like shit.” Roy Harper said, dropping his bow and striding into the room before pulling Jason into a hug like everything that had happened since he ran away hadn’t happened.
Jason let himself relax into it and wrapped his free arm around Roy. “You got any bandages, Harper?”
“Who do you think I am? Course I’ve got bandages.” Roy pulled back and dropped down in front of Y/N. “How you doing, WarGames?”
“You know I’ve never actually hacked the military, right?” Y/N said, offering her wrists to Roy as the archer pulled several rolls of bandages out of his belt. “Dick got my message.”
“Of course he did. Him and Donna are handling the goon squad.” Roy moved to bandage her neck as Jason shrugged out of his leather jacket.
“The clown?” Jason asked, helping Y/N into the jacket as Roy stood back up.
“Dick went after him.” Roy said, his eyes dropping to the gun in Jason’s thigh holster.
Jason chose to ignore the look and turned back to Y/N. “Can you walk?”
“I think so.” She took his offered hand and let him pull her up. Her leg shook slightly, but she stayed standing.
Jason turned to Roy, keeping his hand in Y/N’s, and nodded. Roy drew his bow again and started walking back the way they had came. Jason drew his gun and followed, keeping one step ahead of Y/N in case anything decided to jump out at them.
“Nightwing! Stop! Nightwing!” Donna’s shouts were cut up with the sounds of gunfire and fighting. “Nightwing! Stop! Dick!”
Jason started running before he even realised what he was doing, but nothing could have prepared him for the scene that greeted him.
Donna was subduing the last of the Joker’s men in what used to be the dress circle, still calling for Dick to stop in between punches. Dick was on the floor at the edge of the stage, repeatedly punching the person on the floor underneath him. The sight of the purple suit was enough to stop Jason in his tracks. For some reason his brain was struggling to comprehend the sight of his brother with blood soaked gloves and his murderer lying on the floor with a broken face.
“Dick!” Y/N moved before Jason or Roy could stop her and caught Dick’s arm before he could throw another punch. “Dickie?” She said softly.
Dick looked up at her before turning to look at the bloody mess underneath him. Jason spotted the exact moment Dick realised what he’d done; his entire face crumpled and his breathing picked up. But Jason still couldn’t make his legs work, he just stared as Y/N pulled Dick away and wrapped her arms around him as he collapsed to the floor.
Roy shot him a look as he walked towards the Joker, but he didn’t seem to expect Jason to move. Dick’s face had gone blank and he didn’t give any indication he was hearing any of the soft reassurances Y/N was whispering in his ear as she ran her fingers through his hair. Roy took a shuddering breath as he stood back up and met Y/N’s eyes. The shake of Roy’s head broke the last of Jason’s composure and he dropped to his knees, unable to take his eyes off the bloody mess of the Joker’s face.
It was over.
The clown was never going to hurt anyone again.
But it shouldn’t have been Dick.
Jason didn’t even care that someone had got to the clown before him, the only thing he cared about was the fact that it was Dick. Bruce’s golden boy, the one of them who always believed in Bruce’s one rule more than anyone else.
“Jay. Jason. Jason!”
He snapped his head round to find Roy had gone to help Donna secure the Joker’s guys and Y/N was looking at him.
“Jay, he’s bleeding.” Y/N said, looking more panicked than before. It took him far too long to realise she wasn’t talking about the Joker, that the fresh blood on her hand was coming from Dick’s side.
“Shit.” He forced himself to move and dropped down next to her.
Dick was still staring blankly at the wall, Y/N being the only thing keeping him upright. He didn’t move as Jason started prodding at his side.
“What’s wrong?” Donna asked as her and Roy walked over, both of them pointedly ignoring the body on the floor.
“He’s been stabbed through one of his suit joins.” Jason said, taking the roll of gauze Roy offered and pressing it against Dick’s side.
“You two get him out of here. There’s a car outside and both of you clearly need medical attention as well.” Donna said.
“The bats-”
Donna cut Jason off. “We’ll handle it.”
Jason studied her for a moment and then nodded; he could tell she was thinking the same thing he was. None of them knew how Bruce was going to react. Roy passed him the car keys and he managed to get Dick standing as Y/N kept pressure on his side. He let himself take one last look at the bloody mess that used to be the Joker before leading them to the exit.
Part 13
Taglist: @fives-coffee-cup @xnorthstar3x @xx-all-purpose-nerd-xx @literally-a-ferret @thomaslefteyebrow @elleclairez @shimmeringgrim @throw-away-shifting-journal @egglantine23 @elleraelockwood @dcgoddess @snapchatisoverrated @elisa20beth @phoenixgurl030 @collaps3r @simonsbluee @pariahsparadise @lydiaisgeeky @ashyvillain @missdayytona @synoname-wordsmith @xxeiraxx @shadowmoonbeam @starlight-in-the-streets @marss-anonymous @jwhitefang @anthemabby @honeybee54321 @multi-simp-page @flowingzahra
(shoot me a message to be added/removed)
#jason todd#jason todd x reader#jason todd imagine#jason todd x fem!reader#jason todd x female reader#red hood#red hood imagine#red hood x reader#red hood x fem!reader#titans#dick grayson#roy harper#donna troy#nightwing#speedy#wonder girl#curran walters#the joker#dc#batman#castle of glass
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eddie my love
Summary: following the events in the upside down, the reader channels her grief into a letter to her beloved Eddie Munson. The first of possibly many.
Warnings: grief, language, nothing else really.
Dear Eds,
It's been a couple days since everything really went to shit. If we're completely honest, I don't remember much of the past few days. Maybe it's a trauma response, or maybe this is just how I'm processing everything, and eventually, I'll be able to look back, and it won't all be covered in such heavy fog. I haven't really been able to leave the house. But the gang doesn't really love the idea of me staying cooped up in my bed, in the dark, crying all day... so. Steve dragged me to the Wheeler's house this morning, trying to get me out into the world, around people. I think he just wanted me to be around Dustin, honestly. I think Steve thinks we can just grieve together, which in theory is great, except I'm right now, I'm crying about 22 out of the 24 hours in a day? It would be the full 24, but ya know, gotta cry myself two sleep for at least two hours? So, I really just suck the life out of literally everyone, and no one deserves to have to deal with that, especially not the kid.
But, I guess Dustin saw Wayne the other day at the school, the government, or the red cross, or I don't know, but someone has turned the gym into a help center for anyone in need after the "earthquake." There are missing posters, and gods bless Wayne. He's been switching yours out every chance he gets. Even when you're not around, the monsters of this town are still on the attack. Hunt the freak, right? Apparently, Dustin had your pick. That little shit didn't even tell me he had it, but he gave it to Wayne, and I'm not going to be a brat about it or cry about it... okay, that's a lie, I have been crying about it, but I know he deserved it. I know he shaped you into the man I called my best friend, that I fell in love with, and who loved me absolutely and irrecoverably. As absolutely fucked up as it is, I got to say goodbye; I got to see you one last time. He didn't. Wayne should have the silly little guitar pick. Sorry, I'm just being dramatic.
But um, anyway, Steve and Robin have been volunteering every chance they get; I don't know, maybe it helps soothe their damaged consciousness? Maybe helping those affected by our mistakes makes up for the fact that we failed in their minds. I know if you were here, you'd probably drag me out to the school. You'd be poking and prodding at my sides, trying to get me to smile even though things have quite literally gone to hell in a handbasket. We could've cleared your name. Jason really did a number on your image, babe. But according to Lucas, when the upside down split Hawkins in half like a god damn kit kat, it also fully consumed and ripped that pompous asshole in half, soooo... I know it's shitty...but yay? one less arrogant dick wandering the streets. That was really fucked up, my bad. I know if you were here, you'd be looking at me with those big stupid doe eyes, your mouth just barely open, trying to justify or maybe understand how I could say something so incredibly terrible and then shrug it off like it was nothing.
You know, I'm really mad at you. You didn't have to be the hero. We were so close. So so close to being out of there. I've been replaying that moment in my head. Watching you cut that sheet over and over and over again, watching you run like hell back into that hellscape. It was supposed to be your year, 86' baby. Your stupid heart of gold, paying the ultimate price, sacrificing yourself for a stupid town of judgmental assholes who hated you. You could've run, I wish you would've, but I know that is just me being painfully selfish.
I understand. I may not agree, but I know you did what was best. You were protecting Dustin and Steve and Robs and Nance...and me. I love you. I don't know if you heard me say it in those last moments, but I do. Edward Munson, I'm not sure what I'm going to do without you. You were my rock, the crazy spastic man who kept me on my toes, reminded me of my worth and made me feel loved and important every day. I don't know where I go from here. I'll check on Wayne, though; the thought of... I was going to say the thought of going by the trailer makes me ill, but I don't think there's much of it left. I think the "earthquake" consumed most of it, which means I really don't know how much of you is left for me and Wayne here. And we are at hour 23 for tears today. That is a new record, Munson. Thank you very much. Um, but I'll check on Wayne; maybe we can cry about life together. I know this is silly; I'm writing letters, yes, letters, plural, to a man who will never get to read them, but it's almost like you're still here, if only for a minute or two. Let me pretend.
all my love you,
y/n
p.s. I'll look after your sheep; I haven't talked to Gareth, but Jeff came to check on me yesterday morning. He said Corroded Coffin was meeting in your honor, asked if I wanted to stop by. I think they've assumed the worst, but little do they know just how bad it really is. I think I'll go; I might bring Dustin, might drag Wayne out. Who knows? I'll keep you posted, I guess. I love you.
#eddie munson#eddie munson fanfiction#eddie munson x reader#eddie munson x y/n#eddie munson fluff#eddie munson imagine#eddie munson x girly!reader#dustin henderson#steve harrington#wayne munson#eddie munson smut#eddie munson slow burn#eddie munson hurt/comfort#eddie munson self insert#eddie munson sad
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Kidcat AU? Who is the kid? are they a literal cat at any point?
KIDCAT AU KIDCAT AU this is mine and @lady-stormbraver's baby (Lady gets credit bc she's my brainstorming and plotting partner on it)!!!! the kid is Tim because I watched The Batman 2022, saw Bruce and Selina being weird stalkers (affectionate) and I went oh hey you know who else is a stalker and has a lot of love in his heart? TIMBERLY. and decided I wanted a Reevesverse Stray AU. this version of Selina sooooo needs a weird little nerd kid following in her shadow. also a big part of the premise is that 1) Jason and Tim hit it off, realize that they consider each other brothers, and decide they're going to Parent Trap(TM) Bruce and Selina, and 2) Dick is in his Hot Mess Era and is wearing a leather jacket with the Discowing suit and at one point ill-advisedly bleached his hair because he thought it would tick off Bruce and he's not great at being an older brother to one little sibling, let alone one (official) little sibling AND the cat-themed tagalong who's hanging around nowadays. this scene takes place a fair bit through the AU and is kind of a turning point in Dickie's character arc in this 'verse.
Batman is out of town, which means Nightwing is in town.
B isn't actually that far, just swapped cities for the night because a lead he'd been tailing ended up taking him to Blüd and he asked Dick, stiltedly and struggling, to cover his patrol route in Gotham tonight. Dick had agreed, because he's been on better terms with Bruce lately and is trying to keep it that way and not completely live up to his name, like Jason likes to say. Anyway, he's not patrolling alone. He's just babysitting, really, though he figures if Selina is out she's keeping her eyes on the kids as well, and possibly him, too.
Robin and Stray took a separate patrol route from his, and Dick had argued with Jason for ten minutes before they took it to Alfred, who cleared that they're allowed to split off like that. Dick does not really want to be babysitting, but he also really doesn't want to screw it up.
"Nightwing!" Comes a sudden, loud cry through his earpiece that almost makes Dick, even with a literal lifetime of practiced balance, miss his landing. "Dick, something's wrong," Jason says, voice tight. "Tim passed out and won't wake up and shit, I'm breaking the names rule, just- Dick, help."
Dick feels like someone's dumped a glass of ice water over his head and maybe broken the glass on his skull for good measure. The chill settles directly under his ribs. Jason never asks for help, not his help, at least. His mind plays a dozen scenarios of gas or gunshots or gang fights and he grapples to the top of the nearest building almost on instinct. When lost, climb to a high point. He deliberately stills at the top, takes a slow breath so his voice won't shake. That one momentary pause is better than the minutes he may have to spend calming Jason if he lets him hear the terror Dick is feeling. "What's your location, Robin?" He asks, sends the request to Alfred, back at the Manor, at the same time.
Jason replies immediately with two street names, the closest corner he remembers, at the same time Alfred pings with a precise coordinate. The running leap Dick takes off the building isn't as smooth as it would be otherwise, if he wasn't responsible for Jason and Tim tonight. If he wasn't freaking terrified thinking of things that could have happened to Sel's tiny little shadow who, yeah, okay, Dick is a bit fond of himself. What Jason could be dealing with, the goddamned protective instincts in that kid has for everyone but himself sometimes. No extra flips tonight, no wasting time on showing off or having fun. It wouldn't be fun, anyway, tonight.
Dick isn't Nightwing when he touches down, not really. He's just a teenager looking for another teenager and the little kid they've both claimed as brother. Sometimes he thinks that's all that holds him and Jason together, other than Bruce. He finds what he's looking for on a roof, tucked away in the nook formed between a high concrete railing and the roof access stairs to the building below.
Jason is a bright flare of red and green and Dick rushes toward him, only remembering too late that Jason flinches, and badly, and that he should have slowed down. Tim is slumped in Jason's arms, black cat-eared hood already pulled down away from his face, the older boy curled protectively around the little black form.
"Robin," Dick says, snapping himself back into Nightwing mode, "Report. What happened?"
"I don't know," Jason snaps, eyes flicking back and forth from Tim, who looks half-conscious, at least, to Dick like he thinks Dick is going to try and take Tim away from him. "He seemed off all night, kinda slow, I guess? We were patrolling like normal, nothing weird, but he just... collapsed. He's burning up."
"Okay," Dick says. "Okay." Slowly, this time, a lot like how he acts with victims — although he hates thinking of it like that, because this is, essentially, his brothers — he reaches towards Tim.
Jason all but growls at him, holding the smaller boy tighter. "Don't touch him."
Dick sits back on his heels. "Jason," he says, "Jay, you've gotta let me check him out, okay?"
Jason eyes him from behind his mask, and it feels a lot like he's taking that one second that Dick took earlier to calm himself. It feels like Dick is becoming both a big brother and Nightwing at the same time. "Okay," he says, and visibly makes himself relax when Dick reaches out again.
"It's okay," Dick says, briefly placing a hand on Jason's head without even thinking about it as he checks Tim's pulse with the other. It's quick, fluttery but not uneven. "You're right, he's running a pretty high fever." Tim's eyelids flicker, and Dick brings a hand up to his face, taps his cheek gently with one gloved finger. "Heya, kitten, you with us?"
Tim blinks sluggishly, eyes half-lidded and clearly not totally lucid. "Nigh'wing?" He mumbles, body suddenly tensing like he's trying to sit up, but Jason holds him tight.
"Relax, baby cat, be still," Jason says, frowning down at him as Tim squirms momentarily. He glances up to make eye contact with Dick, but mostly they both stay fixated on the youngest of them.
Tim stills, his head resting against Jason's shoulder. "Jay..." he breathes, relaxing against this older boy, whose face goes softer than Dick even knew it could.
"We should get him home," Dick says quietly. Jason looks up at him, and Dick can see the but you only have a motorbike counter coming a mile away. "I'll call the 'Mobile."
"F...reakin' autopilot," Jason scoffs, but Dick can see some of the tension ease out of him. "Dick?"
"Hm?" Dick stands to watch for the headlights of the Batmobile. Hopefully Alfred has been on comms tonight and already sent a message to Selina, because Dick feels like he's juggling and not very smoothly.
Jason hesitates long enough to make Dick turn, catching the moment Jason turns his wide, greenish-blue eyes from staring after Dick back to focus on Tim. "Will you call B, too?" He asks, his voice just a little shaky.
Dick sighs. "Yeah, Jay. I'm calling him."
At the end of the day, or in this case, at the end of the night, he wants his dad too. Maybe that's another thing that holds them together.
#dickie thinks of selina as ''sel'' a lot bc he's known her almost as long as he's known bruce. she's like his mom#even if she and b aren't technically married.#which means that when she starts apprenticing tim dick is a little... hesitant to accept that??#but in a different way than how he's upset about b letting jason be robin#bc robin was his parents' legacy and jason is bruce's adopted kid but DICK was his parents' (all three) kid FIRST#whereas with tim it's more like... dick loved selina like that first and he was her little birdie so now that tim's around#dick is like.... do u still love me.... can u have a birdie(s) AND a kitten... why's everyone seemingly leaving me behind...#it's a whole mess all the dynamics are SO fun#jason isn't as close with selina as dick or tim are. he likes her and thinks she's awesome but she's... not a mom figure to him#anyway hey remember being 14/15 when you needlessly felt like you were on your own against the world and making up stupid#conflicts in your head just bc being 15 is Like That? no? just me?? yeah that's jason here#Lu writes#batfam#batpat kidcat au#OH WAIT ALSO. selina calls tim kitten. dick is accidentally mirroring her without meaning to.#ok i think I'm done#probably the last one for the night unless i REALLY can't sleep akdkfjdjfjsk
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very serious question - have you watched Titans? i feel like. they have massacred my boy. re: Dick. like the characterization of Every Single Character kills me. i’m lowkey hate watching it but i can’t stop
I'm in the middle of it right now - I just started season three, since I have no attention span for binging.
I actually don't hate large portions of its characterization. It kind of reminds me of a lot of the, like, 2000s-mid 2010s B shows that you'd see on Syfy or similar channels, where the characters are just fleshed out enough to make them feel watchable. They're not full on real people, but they're more like bas relief carvings than cardboard cutouts (It actually pairs nicely with the 2002 Birds of Prey, which was definitely a B show of that vein, and works from the same point of view that Titans does, as an Elseworld). So far the characterization for the most part doesn't feel bad so much as simple.
The characters aren't all that different from comics counterparts at their base, but the plot often demands that they act like idiots - often rude or cruel idiots - to make it work. The episode where all the Titans gang up on Jason, for instance - okay, one, not in the comics, but two, it makes no sense that they would all instantly blame Jason, who has no way of knowing about half their triggers and not, like. One of the empaths.
If anyone feels the most off to me it's Donna, which I think is a result of the Titans take on the Amazons being excessively 2000s B-show-esque. I'm also not personally a fan of Barbara being police commissioner, which ties into my issue with their portrayal of the police overall as a force that Dick doesn't really contend with as an enemy until the middle of season 2, and even then only pretty temporarily. How this relates to the whitewashing of Dick is another matter. The thing about Dick's characterization in Titans is that it's pulling a lot from a lot of very different sources to create a new Dick Grayson, rather than showing one that already exists in a specific continuity. Dick's anger and estrangement from Bruce is from the 70s-80s Bat comics. A lot of his characterization in relation to the other Titans feels very reminiscent of New Teen Titans, where he's the straitlaced serious leader who's too similar to Batman. In Titans these attributes have been adjusted accordingly from the source material they're pulled from to meet the more violent tone of the show. They also included something that's one of my favorite Dick-things in the comics, which is his hallucinations when he's having a Bad Time - instead of hallucinating Jason in prison, Dick hallucinates Bruce, the family who's currently lost to him.
Where Titans really falls down is that it doesn't want its characters to change. It's pretty decent at set up (the scene where Dick talks about burning the Robin suit) but then it doesn't necessarily follow through (he keeps being ultraviolent and killing people just in civilian clothes). This is really apparent in its Jason. In his initial introduction, even post-Crisis, Jason was a sweet, bookish, caring kid once he adjusted to life at the manor. His violence was (and even as an adult to some extent still is) a manifestation of his powerlessness at not being able to protect people, which included both his dad and random people on the street. After his death, flashbacks and retcons turned him into the angry brash kid a lot of people think of him as, which is the route Titans chose to use. And this doesn't work, because if you're writing Dick during one of his "Fuck Batman" moments, and you're also writing Jason in one of his "fuck Batman" moments, and you're trying to show that Jason is the Bad One, then you have to flanderize Jason to have contrast, and then there's nowhere for him to go when he grows into Red Hood. They had an opportunity to do a really heartbreaking tragedy where the sweet 15 year old who quotes Jane Austen turns into a villain, and they didn't do that, because they can't write actual growth.
This ask was about Dick but I do want to touch on a couple of the other Titans real quick - Raven is fine, Titans just pulls from her more modern portrayals, which is not the version of her I prefer. Gar, again, fine, and I really wish they would give the actor more to do. Kon does seem to be younger, but it feels like a deliberate choice, and one I can't bring myself to have issue with given some of the shit that was in his 90s book. The other character I really want to talk about though is Kory.
Titans gets a lot of flack for its portrayal of Kory and as far as I can tell it seems to break into two main categories, which are 1)"I don't like Kory's life not revolving around Dick Grayson" and 2)"I'm racist". I'm paraphrasing, and maybe doing so in bad faith, but it really does seem that I saw a lot of people complaining about Kory having another love interest for five minutes but nobody complaining about Dick having other love interests in the show. And obviously, there was the "this woman who shows less skin than she does in the comics looks like a hooker" from people who didn't like that she was played by a Black actress.
But I'll take this in good faith. You don't like Kory because she's not like she was in the comics. Okay. In that case, I'm simply going to pull out my comics and ask you to consider the baggage a comics-accurate Kory would have on a live action screen played by a dark skinned Black woman:
(From New Teen Titans (1980) #2 - context is the Titans are at the pool, Donna gave Kory a bikini)
I for one am pretty glad that Titans went with "princess used to the finer things in life who's fed up with being royalty" instead of "scantily clad woman who lets her emotions guide her and is extra violent compared to the fully clothed White characters". (more panels under the cut so as not to clog your dash)
If I'd read NTT before Titans came out, I would've been pretty damn skeptical of the casting, because without changing her characterization I think it would've been one of those times where raceblind casting just absolutely does not work. NTT Kory really falls into that intersection of Nubile Savage and Green Skinned Space Babe that you see in stuff like JC's Avatar and Star Trek: TOS, and which has some pretty racist undertones already. As much as I love Kory, I'm incredibly glad that this characterization has largely been left behind for her, even though I'm also not fond of the cartoon's characterization.*
also from New Teen Titans (1980) #2
Both from New Teen Titans (1980) #16
From New Teen Titans (1984) #11. I'm certain there's more instances before this of Dick and Donna referring to her as "savage" but I don't have them handy because I didn't mark them in my notes.
*I think the cartoon leans a little too much into "let's laugh at this woman experiencing culture clash!" for my taste, which is... understandable given it's a show from 2003 for ten year olds, but is very unappealing as an adult. The ideal Koriand'r characterization is actually Red Hood and the Outlaws issues 10-13 and I will not be taking criticism until you've read the story
#titans dc#titans tv#dick grayson#bouncing off the walls#starfire#koriandr#jason todd#team tag for the teen titans#arsonist's lullaby#firebird's child#meta#ntt#anti marv wolfman
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Adopted
Thought of this idea.
Summary: Nightwing hangs out with a teen in bludhaven. The teen lost his parents and ran away from CPS. Nightwing finds him and talks to him about how he was adopted.
Third person pov...
The night air was cool, 13 year old Simon sits on the roof of a building in Bludhaven his home, he has just lost his parents to a gang shootout.
Currently the boy was running from child protective services, he didn't want to be adopted he just wanted his parents back, curling up on roof he put his head in his arms and cried.
He hadn't had a chance tk cry since the police told him his parents are dead, CPS came straight away to take him to a orphanage, the boy didn't want that and ran away.
As he sits shivering, someone lands behind him, he doesn't look up only waits to see what the person does. Nightwing found the boy, He lands quietly behind the teen.
The blue dressed vigilante walks over and sits down beside the boy, swinging his legs of the building, after a couple minutes of silence the boy finally looks up.
Nightwing smiles at the boy, the boys eyes widened. "Nightwing!" He says shocked that the blue vigilante was next to him, Nightwing pats his shoulder. "Hey there, Simon right?" He asks, the boy nods.
"You're here to bring me back right?" Asks the boy, looking down at the sweets below. Nightwing sighs "I am, sorry Simon" he says, the boy only sighs.
Nightwing thinks. "I know how you feel" he starts off. Which was a bad start he realises, the boy looks up glaring at him. "Hiw could you know how I feel?" He glares.
Nightwing looks down in the streets. "Because I lost my parents when I was younger than you."He says which surprises the boy. "Really you did" he says.
Nightwing let's out a sad laugh. "I did, I was 9 when they were killed, the man who adopted me was amazing though, he lost his parents around my ages as well, we've had a rocky start but eventually got close and now I call him my dad, he can be a complete arsehole but he tries" Explains Nightwing, rambling ablut Bruce.
The boy looks up at the man. "Really he was nice" Nightwing smiles at the boy. "Is that what your worried about?" He gets a nod in return.
"What if they don't love me, what if they try and replace my parents?" Questions spill from his lips, seconds before he starts crying again.
Nightwing gives him a pitting look, before wrapping an arm around the boys shaking body and holds him close. The boy holds on to the hero as he cried.
Nightwing rocks the boy, when he stopped crying they talked more about it, Nightwing promised he would be happy and be safe at thr orphanage until he got adopted.
Later that night Dick couldn't sleep in his apartment, tossing a turning he eventually gave up, got dressed and swung out of his window and all the way to Gotham.
Once he arrived he went to Wayne manor, it was around 3am when he got there surprising his Dad who was sat in the cave.
Bruce turns around at the sound not expecting anyone to be there, Tim and Alfred sleeping upstairs. He was surprised to see his eldest standing there.
"Dick what ar-" he was cut off by the young man walking over and hugging him, Bruce froze for a second before hugging the boy back.
Feeling his shoulder shake Bruce began rocking the boy back and forth comforting him. He pulls of his cowl and mutters to the boy "It's okay Chum, I'm here don't worry" he says gently.
After a while Dick finally pulls away first. "Sorry Bruce, been a long night. Had this kid to lost hid parents didn't want to be adopted. Told him bout me and how you helped me" he explained.
Bruce listens to his son, he hugs the boy again. "You forget Chum, you saved me as well if not for you I would be different" he says making the tired man smile.
"Now come on your bed is ready go sleep, I'll see you tomorrow" Says the Black dressed Man, dick smiled and waved.
Bruce looked at the pictures he kept on his desk, one of him and Dick, one of him and Jason, one of him and Tim.
He touched thr glass of thr picture with him and dick in before calling it a night ans going upstairs to bed, his son is home.
The end!
Hope you liked this oneshot, most of these are Nightwing centric because I love him and I knkw more about him and his relationship with Bruce from the animated series.
Request are open!
Word count : 813
#batboys#batman#bruce wayne#dick grayson#oneshot#batman fanfiction#father son#family#fluff#comfort#adoption
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Okay. So let's talk about what Jason actually does with organized crime in utrh.
First, some context! Here's a snippet of a 2010 interview with Judd Winick about utrh & lost days:
I think this is very insightful of Winick: he realizes people aren't necessarily pro-Jason killing people, but that Jason is operating on this fascinating code of controlling rather than fighting.
And does that show up in the narrative? Yes!
Here's our first introduction to Red Hood. Takeaways from just two panels:
Jason says he'll be running the drug trade from now on
He's apparently giving them a better cut than Black Mask would/does
He'll protect them from both rival gangs (Black Mask) and capes (Batman)
In return, and on pain of death, there will be no selling to children
I don't really know how much more clear cut about what Jason is doing you can get. This is our introduction to him.
Later on we learn that:
He has been recruiting people from Black Mask's territory up until this point
He has an area he deem to be his own territory
And he is now ruthlessly expanding that
Again, I don't know how Winick could be any clearer about what Jason is doing.
Jason is trying to take over organized crime in Gotham. That is unquestionably what he is doing in Under the Red Hood. Winick certainly could've expanded on how he might actually control crime in a way to make a systemic impact better, "don't sell to kids" is very weak, but that doesn't change the clear motives on display.
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Okay okay- but can you even imagine and Eddie x reader during the guitar scene, she’s basically drooling over him? But she’s also playing the guitar!
Like omg sorry it would be such a badass scene of them playing together while Dustin is counting down until they need to run!
hi omg sorry it took me so long to write this! but yes i tried my best to put your thoughts into words, here ya go!!
Most Metal
summary: Eddie and Y/n kill it on the guitar in the Upside Down.
warnings: idk swearing? spoilers for v2
word count: 1211
You showed up at the clearing that your friends had parked the trailer they stole their trailer in and came out, slamming the door of your car.
“Hey, how was buying illegal shit from The War Zone?” you called out, trekking toward where Eddie and Dustin were standing near a couple small crates and showing off their fancy new weapons.
“Uneventful, besides the fact that Jason and his gang of assholes were also looking to buy ‘illegal shit’, most likely to hunt down your boyfriend. Wait, remind me again why you weren’t there y/n?” Robin replied.
Had it been anyone else you would’ve felt a bit offended, but you brushed it off. You knew your friend didn’t mean any harm, you had gotten used to her bluntness and lack of social cues.
“Well, seeing as I’m the only one here who has access to their house and can run around Hawkins in a car without causing suspicion - also Jason isn’t actively hunting me down because he doesn’t know who the fuck I am - I figured it’d be best to get home and change and grab supplies and shit.”
“Y/n, when we said change we meant into something you can fight in. Yet here you show up in a pleated black skirt and 3 inch heels,” Dustin chided you playfully.
“Trust me, kid. I can fight in these shoes.”
He looked to Eddie, eyebrows raised. “She can, it’s crazy. That girl could run a marathon in those,” your boyfriend whispered back loudly.
“And for the record, these are only heeled boots. You should see me fight in real heels. Besides I’m going to be playing guitar in the fucking Upside Down. I’m not going to be wearing yellow Converse while I do that.”
“Hey, what’s wrong with yellow?”
“Nothing, but Eddie’s old guitar is red. Is it really so bad if I want to match my shoes with the guitar? I mean if I’m gonna die I wanna die looking hot.”
“Hey.” Eddie stood up, wrapping his arms protectively around your waist. “None of us are going to die during this, okay?”
“Eds,” you turned around to face him, holding his face in your hands. “I know we’re all getting out of this alive, it was just a joke.” You smiled up at him in the most reassuring way you could, surprised at his sudden seriousness.
“I- I know, it’s just… with everything that’s happened this past week, it’s too much to be making jokes about death.”
“Then, if I’m going to be performing a concert for bats that wanna eat me alive, I wanna be doing that looking hot. Better?”
“Much, and don’t worry darlin’. You look hot no matter what shoes you wear.” The two of you shared a kiss, ignoring Dustin’s fake and loud gagging.
Dustin, Eddie, and you had just finished boarding up the Upside Down version of Eddie’s trailer. The three of you stared at your work in awe for a few moments.
“Not bad,” you commented.
“Not bad at all,” Eddie and Dustin replied in unison, putting a smile on your face. The dynamic between the two warmed your heart. You could tell they both needed each other.
“Now for the fun part.” Eddie chuckled, eyes locked with yours, your determined smile mirroring his.
All of you burst into his room, Eddie stopped in his tracks. He slowly walked toward the guitar hanging on his wall. “It’s like she was destined for an alternate dimension…”
You and Dustin shared a knowing look.
“I swear he gets turned on more by instruments than me when I dress like a slut,” you joked, receiving an amused and slightly disgusted look from him.
“I heard that,” Eddie deadpanned, turning around to face you with his hands on his hips.
“It’s true, though. Now, let’s find the guitar I’ll be playing babe. Is it in Wayne’s room?”
“Uhhh… yeah I think my old guitar should be in his room. Y’know we’re pretty lucky that this place has time travelled to right before I broke my uncle’s guitar but right after I got this new one.”
“FUCK THIS LOOKS SO SICK!” you call out from Wayne’s room, walking back to Eddie and Dustin with a sleek electric guitar, similar to the one Eddie holds in his hands but in a dark shade of red with shiny black highlights.
“Hell, sweets, you made fun of me about getting excited over my guitar? Look at you,” your boyfriend quipped, but truly he was fawning over you fawning over his old guitar. One of the things he loves about you is that the two of you share so many mutual interests.
The three of you had just settled on top of Max’s house and set up when you got the message from Robin to move on to Phase 3.
“Copy that, initiating Phase 3.” Dustin plugged in the cords connecting your guitars to the amp. “Let’s hope they hear this.”
“Let’s,” you responded, both you and Eddie taking your picks off of your matching necklaces and preparing to start playing.
You had been slightly nervous when Eddie told you his song choice considering that although you both knew Master of Puppets by heart, you’d never once played it together. But when you strummed out a few heavy metal chords at the same time, you figured it’d work itself out.
As the two of you played, the loud squawks and screeches of demobats could be heard. You ignored it, focusing on playing in time with your boyfriend.
Honestly, of course you loved the song and absolutely jumped at the chance of playing a song you love in the Upside Down, you weren’t entirely sure why you had decided that playing guitar was the best way to gain the bats’ attention.
Your best guess was that, despite how sure Eddie had seemed of it earlier, there was a good chance that not all of you were going to leave this damned place alive. And you’re sure that your boyfriend would’ve wanted to play this song at least once before you guys die.
As you heard the song near what you assumed was Eddie’s favourite part, you paused, allowing him to play out the chorus as a solo.
You stood, almost drooling over how hot he looked right then and there, jamming out to a song you both loved and doing something he was passionate about.
Also the face he made while playing always awoke the butterflies in your stomach. God he was hot.
“Y/n, you gonna join me or is the rest of this song gonna be a solo, hmmm?” Eddie’s voice snapped you out of your, rather inappropriate, seeing as you were currently trying to save the world, train of thought.
“Sorry!” You continued playing.
“Guys!” Dustin screamed over both the music and the demobats’ cries, “We gotta lock down in T-minus 30 seconds!”
The two of you shared a look and then turned to Dustin and gave him a nod. The young boy was clearly counting down in his head and when he gave you the warning of 20 seconds, you immediately dished out a riff which led to the two of you shredding the electric guitar until time ran out.
#eddie munson x y/n#eddie munson x reader#eddie munson#eddie stranger things#stranger things finale#stranger things 4#stranger things#fanfiction#stranger things x reader#asks answered <3
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Sorry guys Character AI has me sobbing so I need to put my Dick and Alina Angst here!! This isn't meant to be a fanfic so sorry if it reads that way um. It's just me rambling.
Alina Shelley was the second youngest batkid, and the only one who didn't take up the mantle of Robin or Batgirl. Bruce thought it was too dangerous for her, he felt particularly protective over the little girl.
Dick was the first brother she met, and he really did love how passionate she was. Everyone noticed it, the fact Alina was special. Different from the other kids her age.
Ofcourse Bruce told everyone about Alinas connection with The Joker, but it didn't make them see her differently. Sure, Jason gave a few side glances when she was near him, maybe teased her a little, but other than that none of the batfamily minded.
Now, let's skip a little bit. Alina is 14, and still very set on becoming a police officer. She figured out at this point Bruce wasn't her real father, but nothing else. Alina Is top of her class, and she joins in on training sometimes so she can get a bit stronger.
Dicks relationship with his little sister is strong, he sees alot of Bruce in her which makes him feel oddly warm inside. Alina likes to hang out at his apartment occasionally, mostly because she has ome of those little kid crushes on Barbara. Barbara knows, obviously, she thinks it's super cute, and Dick thinks it's really funny.
The time they spend together Is savoured, they both have a mutual love and respect for eachother and Dick is genuinely proud of his little sister.
Everything goes well, until it doesn't.
An attack is set on Bludhaven (which we will say isn't destroyed for lore purposes) just after one of Alinas visits, one that Dick had no prior knowledge was happening. Usually big attacks like this are planned by multiple villains or gangs, and he gets Intel relatively quick so he can stop it before anything major happens. Not this time, though. Infact he was barely changed into his costume when he went jumping out of the back of his apartment building and climbed onto the rooftops.
He kept calm at first, the attack so far seemed to be in a specific targeted era, and there was no explosions or big machines in sight. This should've been easy. Ofcourse, it wasn't.
He realises where exactly the attack is happening, it was a street popular for having lines of taxis lined up. The street that Alina walked to so she could get a taxi home. This made Dick pick up his pace, as selfish as that was. He should've been going this fast even if she wasn't in danger, but he can't help his brotherly instincts.
Just as he reached the street, two explosions are set off simultaneously on either end of the road. One end was scattered with civilians who weren't too close to the explosion and survived, he scanned for Alina but to no avail. His attention goes to the other end when he sees a woman and a young child running past him, and the only thing he sees is a small body laying on the ground.
Dicks heart races as he skids over to the body, and his heart stops when he sees who it is. Alina, her eyes just barely open, a very big bleeding wound on her chest and burn marks all over her fragile body. Dick panics, immediately asking if she was okay and applying pressure to the wound. Alina coughs in reply as another explosion is set off on the other side and more screams of help. "Help them" is all Dick can make out of her gasps and mutters.
"I cant." He says, "I need to help you, I won't leave your side-"
Alina cuts him off by grabbing his wrist, to which he holds her trembling hand, staring as it looks so small and fragile in his own.
Alina was always brave. If she ever got hurt during training or just by tripping, she'd brush the worried "Are you okays" off. "I'm a strong girl." She would reply, and she was. It was fitting that she'd use the last remnants of air she can muster to beg Dick to help the civilians as they cry out.
Dick rubs his thumb along her dirty, bloody palms. He can't bring himself to move, but he knows he needs to. All he wants is for her to do what she always does, brush it off and get up. Tell him she's strong, smiling that polite way she always does around adults.
He kisses her on her head before getting up, using the adrenaline in his body to rush over to the other side of the street and grab as many people as he can. He doesn't bother turning to look behind him again. If he does, he's afraid he'll break.
Anyway! That's it hahaha! Yeah. That's it. Sorry guys.
#dc#batman#batfam#??? technically#dick grayson#alina shelley#yes she pushed the woman and her child away from the explosion#yes her wound was a gunshot#yes Joker hired people to kill her#dick is a good brother#Alina isnt a vigilante cause i kinda think it ruins her character??? idk#thats all#:3
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top characters for s4
(this isn’t based on my favourite characters just on which characters have been slaying for this half of the season)
p.s. made this before vol 2 came out i just left it in my drafts until now
1. nancy wheeler!! she’s just been hitting so differently this season,, her investigating and basically solving the entire plot,, every single interaction with robin is pure perfection whether you view it romantically or platonically,, she’s been contributing so much. best season by far for her.
2. max mayfield <3 had the fattest urge to place her first because she’s been such a huge part of this season with the portrayal of ptsd & depression,, the whole getting cursed by vecna,, lumax,, max has made me the most emotional this season and she’s been so so good in this volume. she’s 2nd just bc after e4 she lacked a bit (which was lowkey good,, girly needed a break)
3. robin buckley,, i swear i’m not being biased but robin once again absolutely carried another season. she brought so much of the humour to the show and was one of the main factors that contributed to give the series that true ‘stranger things vibe’ her interactions with everybody was flawless & yeah.
4. eddie munson,, OMG I DID NOT THINK I WOULD LIKE HIM THAT MUCH BUT. he is such a cool character and i’m obsessed with his vibe and what he brings to the season thus far. i really hope they don’t kill him off like they do with literally all new characters. but anyways yeah he’s such an intriguing character and he is carrying s4 vol 1 also>
5. erica sinclair,, OHHHHHH YEAH ERICA BEING IN THE MAIN GANG NOW>>>> i love love love erica she is absolutely going hard and slaying. her embracing the dnd nerd side of her is something i’m living for & her telling off jason !!! i’m loving how they are including her now and yeah <3
6. steve harrington,, could potentially be higher on this list if he wasn’t still pinning for nancy but that’s a topic for another day. steve delivered as he’s always had been since day1 and season 4 was no exception. his love for the kids shows so so well this season & when he’s protective over them it melts my heart. obviously brings the humour and stranger things honestly wouldn’t feel like stranger things without him.
7. lucas sinclair,, i want him to be higher lowkey but omg omg omg omg lucas loml i love him this season. i mean i love him every season but. i’m getting reminded of how much of a great person he is and how much he cares for max. he’s lower because of the other ppl i put above him. in no way was he lacking idc what anyone says he is amazing.
8. dustin henderson,, oh wow look at this the entire hawkins group rank the top 8 what a surprise. anyways DUSTIN MY LOOOOVE. he is great this season which is nothing new. like steve he brings the humour and stranger things without dustin wouldn’t be stranger things & that’s all i really have to say yeah!
9.will byers,, i am feeling so much for him it’s really pain hub for will this season AGAIN. boy needs a break seriously. he’s low just because he’s in the cali group but he’s definitely the best out of that group. he’s so in love with mike wheeler i cannot and him third wheeling is the saddest thing ever. hoping for positive things for him in volume 2.
10. jim hopper,, oh my goddess. hopper what in the hell have you been going through. idc i liked the russia storyline although i think at some stage it got dragged out. hopper made me so emotional most specifically the peanut butter scene + the one where he has that full on long talk about his past/time in the war and how he’s the curse and when he started talking about his daughters i. heart=break. i need a jopper kiss.
11. murray bauman,, the karate king!!!!!!!!!!! i love murray hope he doesn’t die but i feel like he will. he and joyce best pair love them freaking besties.
12. eleven hopper,, okay pls don’t hate me i love el and i don’t think she’s bad in this season at all! i like her plot and arc and her entire backstory never fails to make me gasp and feel for her. i just got sick of seeing her with papa all the time bc i hate that man sm.
13. joyce byers,, i need my jopper kiss btws. i loved joyce this season and i loved her and murray as a duo it was so entertaining.
14. argyle,, i like argyle. he’s low because i liked the others more. he’s a good character in terms of how he was designed but i don’t feel any deep feelings for him. he’s also low bc he likes pineapple on pizza.
15. jonathan byers. i am so sorry but what has he actually been doing. the cali group as a whole has been seriously lacking. high jonathan was funny for a sec but then it was kinda an eyeroll idk i need more from jonathan. loving him being protective over el and calling her his sister & regarding her as family. also he and argyle are cool>
16. mike wheeler,, um who is this imposter i want old mike back. you know the one from the first two seasons? anyways wtf. mike pls get ur act together bud. i don’t have anything else to say.
#stranger things#stranger things 4#max mayfield#nancy wheeler#robin buckley#erica sinclair#steve harrington#lucas sinclair#dustin henderson#eddie munson#will byers#eleven hopper#mike wheeler#jonathan byers#joyce byers#jim hopper#murray bauman#stranger things argyle
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Shadows We Know
request from everyone’s favorite fandom mom and queen of knowledge who i admire very much, @fuyunoakegata
I wanted to write more of this and I think I definitely will at one point, because I love all the boys in this fic and I feel like there’s a lot more for me explore in this story.
ANYWAY. without further ado: here’s dick, jason, and tim dealing (and struggling) with their father and losing someone else very important
Word count: 2133
He’s always had nightmares. They just got worse after his parents were killed. Then they were catastrophic after Bruce died.
Tim running around the manor while he hunted for the ghost of their father didn’t help any.
Patrol had been quiet. Damian didn’t complain as much as he used to, even with Tim’s return to the manor. It had been months since Dick had fired Tim and started the youngest as Robin. But it was nice to have Tim back. Even if he was quickly and drastically reducing the amount of espresso in the house.
His mind was flying. Tim was back, but Jason had been spending nearly every waking hour in Crime Alley. Dick had gone there to bring him home. But the sight of Jay leaving sacks of Big Belly Burger on the fire escapes and at the entrances of the cardboard lean-tos, he left him alone. It didn’t feel right to ask him to come home then. Jason was still healing, and he didn’t want to force open those wounds.
He laid in his bed, aching to go across the hall and ask Bruce for help.
But that was what crazy people didn’t, wasn’t it? Ask the dead for advice. He wasn’t crazy, he rationalized as he slid his feet into the Superman slippers on the side of his bed. He was just out of options. Dick padded across the hall. Bruce’s door opened with its usual soft groan.
Lit only by the full moon outside, the massive master suite was spotless. There wasn’t a speck of dust on the desk, the bedside table, the dresser, or even in the bathroom. Finding the room to his liking, he sat on the bed and laid down. Bruce’s grey comforter was just as fluffy as the day he left it. The former acrobat wiggled underneath it after a beat, wrapping it around himself in a cocoon of warmth.
Dick fell asleep moments later.
He was standing under the big top, the spotlights aimed at the platforms above. His parents stood on the far right one, waving their hands as an invisible crowd cheered loudly. On the left, stood Bruce. He was shouting, Dick could tell from the way that one vein was straining on his forehead and how the tendons on his neck were taught. But he was making no sound.
He was trying to stop the Dick’s parents from leaping. He finally caught sight of Dick in the ring, and Bruce’s glacial eyes pinned him to that spot.
Over the roar of the crowd, Dick heard Bruce say four words.
“Crime Alley devours children.”
John and Mary’s bodies hit the ground with two wet thuds.
Dick shot awake in his father’s bed, his hair soaked with sweat and tears and snot covering his face. Songbirds were heralding the new day outside of the bay windows, and bile rose in his throat. Dick charged to the bathroom; his hands gripping the porcelain bowl as he vomited. Alfred had started knocking on the door. Dick was too busy dry-heaving over the puke to answer. Then he felt a gentle hand smoothing his hair away from his face.
“Master Dick,” Alfred said softly. “It’s alright, sir. You’re okay.”
“I saw him, Al,” Dick finally said. “in my dream.”
Alfred tried to muffle his groan as he joined Dick on the floor, but from the worried look Dick shot him, he hadn’t been successful.
“Should we move to the bed?”
“I’m old, Master Dick. Not an invalid. Do you want to tell me about the dream?”
“He said something really weird. He said, god, what was it?” Dick bit his lip as he thought. “Oh, that’s right. ‘Crime Alley devours children.’ That’s pretty off the wall, even for him.”
“He might be onto something,” a deep, smoke ruined voice said from the doorway. “Three of the kids under my protection have gone missing within the past three weeks.”
“I came to tell you Master Jason was home,” Alfred spoke.
They were in the cave after breakfast, with Damian sticking close to Dick’s side. Tim was in the evidence corner, muttering to himself as he putzed with various spoils of intergalactic battle. Jason’s hands kept going to the front right pocket where a pack of Camel blue cigarettes sat, his lighter just barely visible.
“A lot them move down there because they know it’s a favorite spot of ours. I tried scarin’ em off at first, didn’t want them running into any of the usual assholes who hang there. But that only encouraged them. Three weeks ago, 17 kids were living in that alley. As of this morning, there’s only 14. At first, I just thought they’d moved to a better place in the city. But there’s this one kid, Jules Adams. Told me all about how she saw a shadow with fangs take Colton Taylor. He was the first kid who vanished. Then told me that she heard Hank Giaccione yelling about fangs. She told me that, and when I brought her a coffee this morning--”
“You gave a kid coffee?” Tim asked.
“Quiet, Tim. The adults are talking,” Jason waved him off. “Anyway, I brought her coffee and donuts, but Jerome said she vanished just before sunrise. Jerome said he saw giant sharp teeth dragging her down the alley.”
“You’re like four years older than me,” Tim griped.
“We’re supposed to believe that shadows that have teeth are stealing street rats, Todd?”
“I came back from the dead, in case you forgot. I basically raised you.”
“You did not!” Damian shouted.
“Then who wiped your ass when the other ninjas wouldn’t?”
“The ninjas didn’t want to wipe his ass?” Tim asked as he emerged from the evidence corner with a time gun. “Jesus, how much did you poop?”
Dick intervened as Damian began turning beet red. “We’re getting off topic,” He wrapped an arm around Damian, drawing him fully against his side. “What do you think it is, Jay?”
“Sounds like some witchcraft stuff to me,” Tim interjected as a yellow blast of energy blew out of the barrel of the gun. A bat who had been unlucky enough to be downrange suddenly exploded into a giant bat, to which Tim noted: “Huh, guess they really are evolved from Megachiroptera. How ‘bout that.”
The next round fired was neon green, and a very startled and confused bat crashed into the nearest cave wall.
“Tim, stop shooting the bats.”
“I need to figure out how this thing works,” Tim muttered as he wandered back to the evidence corner.
Jason watched as Tim’s mop of messy hair vanished around the wall.
“Is he still looking for Bruce?” Jason asked once it was just the three of him.
“He’s still convinced that he’s not dead.”
“I mean, the boss man thought I was dead. So, did you, Dick. If there’s anything this family is really bad at, it’s staying dead. Anyway, I thought it was witchcraft like Tim did. I talked to Swamp Thing while I was down in Florida vising Roy and he said it didn’t sound like any magical being he’d ever heard of. Then I was thinking about it; the shadow only comes out at night. There’s no report of a shadow with fangs appearing during daylight. I don’t think it’s witchcraft. I think it’s just some psychopath.”
Dick’s dreams were worse that evening. He was back in the big top. His parents and Bruce were standing in the same spots they were the night before. But the crowd was a writhing mass of black, twisted shadows roaring for a jump. A whip of the black shadows rocketed from the nosebleeds, connecting with Bruce’s back. He was shoved off the platform, his face as stoic as ever as he plummeted down. Feet away from the dirt, he turned his head and looked Dick in the eyes.
“The shadow knows,” He said before his neck broke.
The next night found Red Hood, Robin, and Batman perched on the various run-down buildings that guarded Crime Alley. Beneath them, kids dressed in ratty old clothes both too large and too small for them scrounged about in the alley for scraps of food. They were all quiet as they watched. If the kids knew they were there, they didn’t acknowledge them. For that, the assembled bats were grateful. It helped them in their hunt. Hours passed. They switched buildings. Ate some Jokerized burgers. Damian beat Jason in four games of rock, paper, scissors. Jason gave Damian a noogie. Dick had to remove a shuriken from Jason’s side.
They did this for 6 days straight.
It had been a week since Jules disappeared. Jason was becoming frantic. The shadow would strike again tonight, he was sure of it. He could taste it like he could taste the staleness of the cigarette he was currently plowing through.
And Dick was nowhere to be found. He’d been trying to hail him all night on the comms, even going so far at one point as to send one of the kids to the police station to turn on the signal. There had been no response.
“Hood to cave,” he murmured. “Tonight’s the night. I could really use some backup. Or, whatever.”
“You know, you’re really bad at asking for help,” Tim responded, the sound of his grapple firing over his comm. “Bats can’t make it tonight. Robin said he had a bad night. He’s down for the count; or at least till the knock-out gas Agent A gave him wears off.”
“Jesus,” Jay breathed. “That bad?”
“He nearly clocked Robin. He’s in a bad way. Don’t worry about briefing me, I’m all caught up.”
Jay noticed one of the cardboard boxes was now leaning to the right, when it had been drifting left towards collapse at the beginning of the evening.
“For the record,” Jason said as Tim landed to his right. “I believe you. I don’t buy it that Bruce is dead.”
The white covered eyes of Tim’s cowl narrowed as he watched his older brother. “Do you really?”
“Speaking as a former dead person myself, yes. Now, I think our perp is down there. Let’s move.”
The next morning found Jay and Tim, sitting at the table covered in bandages and brooding. Dick joined them. He had dark circles under his eyes which only made the paleness of his face stand out. He sat in his usual spot, to the right of the head seat. None of the boys said anything. They just sat. Alfred entered quietly, serving each one their favorite breakfasts. Chicken and waffles for Dick. Pancakes buried underneath breakfast sausage, bacon, and hash browns. Eggs benedict with a side of yogurt and strawberries for Tim. Cheese stuffed kaek for Damian, with a nice cup of tea.
They ate in silence.
Damian’s plate remained untouched.
Alfred left the room to go retrieve Damian for his morning repast.
Jason sighed. He really wanted a fucking smoke.
Tim finished his yogurt. He needed to get back to finding his dad.
Dick swallowed a bite that was too big. He wanted his dad to be alive again, so he could get some sleep.
“Master Damian is missing.”
“There were 14 kids this morning,” Tim jolted in his seat.
Dick decided that he was going to fight off sleep until he could find his youngest brother. It didn’t feel right to see Bruce in his sleep while his son was missing. The bats tore apart Crime Alley, asking every kid for help, taking every piece of evidence. Any criminal unlucky enough to mouth off to Batman that night got a taste of their own teeth.
“It’s almost as if he’s back,” Red Robin whispered to Red hood.
“Heavy is the head that wears the crown,” Hood responded.
Eventually, they end up in the Iron District. The snarling of the Batmobile echoed through the derelict buildings. All the clues and evidence they’d collected in their fear and rage was leading them to the original Wayne Enterprises factory. Where their father’s wealth had been quintupled during the industrial revolution.
All the signs were pointing them to the smoke stacks that loomed higher than any others in that area.
The car drove through a loading dock, then straight to the center of the building where the stacks sat. They were out of the car before it was completely still, charging towards the man-sized opening at the bottom of the middle one. Dick charged in first, Tim right on his heels. Jason checked his guns, then stepped through.
A long haired, very bearded, Bruce Wayne was leaning against the wall with a regular tenant of Arkham Asylum unconscious at his feet. He held a bruise covered Damian in his arms. Those glacial blue eyes were filled with fire.
“He brought me back,” Bruce whispered.
#Bruce Wayne#Batman#Robin#Dick Grayson#Jason Todd#Tim Drake#Damian Wayne#Alfred Pennyworth#requests#cw violence#cw death#grief#denial#testing time travel weapons on bats and finding their prehistoric ancestors#jason has a gang of kids he protects okay#they all miss bruce#dick handles his ptsd pretty well until he cant anymore#i hope this is alright!!!
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batkids and their relationships with their siblings headcanons. under read more because this got fucking LONGGG
dick
dick is the eldest so he doesnt want to bog down his younger siblings with his problems, but if he DOES, he tends to talk to jason about it
dick and cass start to really begin to bond when Cass shows up to dicks gymnastics class for 3rd-6th graders and then cass shows up all the sixth graders and they get frozen yogurt after lmao
dick and tim are Very much thick as thieves. tim is very much like bruce on the Emotional Suppression scale, so dick just really wants to make sure his little brother is safe and happy ALL the time
Duke and Damian are the only two really permanently at the manor anymore, so when dick drops by he tries to do something with both of them. duke frantically zoom calls dick every other week to help him with his his trig homework. dick shows up to dukes high school graduation with literally the BIGGEST SIGN
everyone insists damian is dicks favorite but he does actually genuinely love all his siblings equally, his relationship with damian is just Very different from the others because of the age gap and being dami's primary caretaker for a year. dick babies dami every chance he gets
jason
would sell Dick to satan for One corn chip
him and cass don't have the greatest start to their relationship because cass is very much Against Killing so it takes a while for jason to warm up to her and earn her trust. now, though, jason is competing with steph by showing cass all the classic American Teenager things she missed out on. steph is currently winning but jason is like 98% positive a crunch wrap from taco bell is going to push him over the edge
tim and jason are currently competing over who can solve the most cases in a month. tim is winning. that won't last long.
jason Loves to Big Brother duke its so embarrassing. duke will get out of school and go to his car and jason is SITTING IN THE FRONT SEAT FRANTICALLY WAVING TO GET DUKES ATTENTION. JASON THAT IS MY CAR. signal has one (1) mission with arsenal and arsenal goes hey did you ask that girl to homecoming yet and duke is like I DON'T EVEN KNOW YOU.
Damian is proof that Actually, Little Brothers are Pests. Jason fully believes that he was brought back from the dead PURELY to torment damian and he will fulfill this mission at any cost
cassandra
it actually really upset her when Dick didn't accept her at first. she knows her other siblings really adore dick so his lack of trust was really disheartening. it takes dick a while but once he Actually Accepts that cass is going to be a permanent part of their life and oh, wow, dick you really hurt her feelings he really hyperfocuses on bonding with cass for a couple of months which definitely improves their relationship
she really likes jason!! their relationship doesn't start well but because he's close with steph and tim who are cass's top two favorite people to exist ever, cass is like well i GUESS ill hang out with him more. jason is fun to talk to because he always tries his best to explain jokes and give context to what people are talking about (also tim took her to taco bell already but she didn't tell jason she just wanted to hang out)
cass LOVES tim. they just click okay. tim always seems to know when to give her space and when to push and come closer. Tim's "guest room" is just her room lets be real. tim and cass occasionally get mistaken for twins and Cass Loves it.
duke makes cass listen to metal once and cass loses. her. damn. mind. they bond over music a lot because they both Love Music to a degree the others in their family don't.
damian!! damian is her little brother!!! dami isn't As Hostile to cass at first because he is 100% aware cass has the edge in fighting and respects her. cass likes all of his instagram posts and they have a snapchat streak going
tim
tim Loves dick, dick was his first sibling!! he had Very strong hero worship when he first met dick but it mellowed out when tim got older because wow 17 is really not that cool and mature lol. tim has an open invitation to dick's apartment which he does occasionally take advantage of. tim has more than once scared the shit out of wally when wally comes over and wally is convinced they're being robbed (HA) for half a second. i mean. he's not wrong.
listen. tim understands that forgiving the guy who tried to kill you would be a Struggle for some people and it was! definitely! but also at least he can trust jason to, uh, be open about if he doesn't like tim. which is not an assurance he has with other people. so if the guy who tried to kill him tells him tim is cool now then like. maybe tim isn't that bad or annoying a person? also jason arrested a whole gang and won the cases competition but then it created a power vacuum that the whole batfam had to clean up the rest of the month. thanks, jason.
tim LOVES cass. you know how most of the time theres this empty feeling inside you and you just kind of ignore it because you don't know what will fix it or if you do, you know you can't fix it? cass makes that empty feeling feel a little less empty. they just click. tim always tries to travel with cass whenever she leaves gotham.
tim and duke. Tim is actually the sibling who duke goes to whenever he has questions he doesn't want to ask bruce or alfred about, like, life or vigilante-ing or school or college or whatever and Tim is always like yes!! i love Giving Advice and Solving Problems!! tim and duke and jason fill out their college applications together.
tim and damian. LMAO. ROUGH START THAT'S ALL ILL SAY. at some point alfred goes like fuck it. family therapy. and tim and dami are PISSED. tim and damian get along best when they have a common enemy to work against. their relationship gets much better when damian is older and they actually talk about their feelings like emotionally stunted bats. despite how bad their relationship was, tim will ALWAYS protect damian
duke
very much intimidated by dick at first. dick is so much older and has his own job and friends and life and is very much AN ADULT. dick likes to take duke out to do lots of cool stuff (paintball, lasertag, tech exhibitions, concerts, etc). also, dick PERSONALLY introduced duke to superman and is dating THE FLASH. 10/10 awesome big brother.
was intimidated by jason for 0.5 seconds before jason actually opened his mouth and started speaking. jason is literally. So Embarrassing. which is weird because nobody else really seems to feel that way about jason but duke knows he's 100% in the right here. like yeah jason is also An Adult and does Adult Stuff but he's also at the manor like every other weekend???? and he always complains about bruce but always seems to be in the same room bruce is in????? like okay jason. they bond over literature!! jason and duke and alfred will spend literal hours talking about books and duke loves it. duke is the only one who doesn't think jason is funny and jason gets so upset about it lmao.
cass has this one week where she gets really into photography and by virtue of being nearby (and also not nocturnal), duke becomes her victim subject. duke prints out all the pictures and hangs them up in his room (his favorite is one he took when he stole the camera and took a really bad selfie of them together).
tim is closest in age to duke so duke tends to hang around with him a lot. tim introduced duke to his young justice friends and duke is like yes!!! meta-friends!!!! tim really helps duke out with his powers because tim is always like wow i wonder if your powers would work if we did This? can you see farther than other people? is your visible spectrum of light different than other humans? Bruce does the same thing but bruce is boring about it lol.
damian and duke live in the same house and will be in the same room and just send each other social media posts back and forth. they follow each other on instagram and will, OCCASIONALLY, make tik toks together because they're tik tok fiends. each of his siblings have visited his parents once or twice but damian routinely comes with him.
damian
damian gets a special bullet point to say that it took him. forever to come around to the idea of having siblings. he very much believed that he was Bruce's Blood Son and everyone else were just tagalongs or allies. it took him ages to acknowledge that dick, jason, tim, and cass were his siblings, so when duke came and like a week later damian was like Ah, Yes, this is my brother Thomas everyone else was like dude wtf
listen. LISTEN. Obviously. Richard is very highly skilled. and also Father values him highly. and also Richard will listen to Damian complain about his schoolmates. and also Richard is much more patient with Damian than other members of his family. listen....,,, (all this to say damian kind of fucking adores dick lmaooooo this kid).
Todd is kind of unbearable but damian has been informed this is both a normal feeling when it comes to Todd and also big brothers. damian was an only child for ten years so yes, Father, if Todd attempts to tickle me I WILL break his fucking nose. yes i WILL put money in the swear jar but I want you to know i don't regret it. they always try to sneak up on each other but mostly fail.
DRAKE!!! but no lol once damian grows up and is like I Apologize for attempting to murder you it was wrong and you are just as much a son to Father as I am tim is like UGH i guess its cool since ur being so emotionally mature and all. also im 2 for 5 on siblings trying to murder me so im definitely going to win trauma bingo and damian is like i take it back you are insufferable. When Will My Older Siblings Stop Joking About Their Trauma.
CASS!!! listen. cass is cool. Cass Gets It. They have a special Bond. also damian really likes it whenever cass is home because 1) he gets to hang out and do something cool with cass and 2) he feels significantly safer with cass in the house because Nobody will be able to hurt any of their family if Cass is there. ALSO he tries to call her cain but everyone is like DONT DO THAT and he doesn't want to call her wayne bcus theyre ALL wayne (dick adds it on as a middle name but also Richard John Wayne West-Grayson is just. the lamest name ever so dick needs to reconsider it before his upcoming nuptials)((dick will not reconsider it except maybe whether grayson-west would work better)) and so he tries cassandra but cass is like :) call me cass and damian is like cassandra is more formal and respectful and cass is like :) and finally damian just has to give in.
Duke! him and duke actually live together so they get the Most Bonding Time and have a bunch of inside jokes as a result. (is it bad i wanted to laugh because inside jokes... joker... i'll see myself out). they're eating breakfast together (and also alfred sits with them IM NOT A MONSTER ALFIE'S LIKE 70 NOW OKAY) and duke laughs and bruce is like what are you laughing at, son? and duke is like oh damian just showed me this funny meme and then he shows the phone to bruce and bruce grabs it (both the boys groan) and after WAY TOO LONG is like "i don't get it" and so now duke and damian have to try and explain the comedic intricacy of bob's burgers
#this took. two fucking hours#batfam#batman#bruce wayne#dick grayson#jason todd#cassandra cain#cassandra wayne#not sure which one to commit to yet#tim drake#duke thomas#damian wayne#dc#the burd squawks#birdflash#birdflash was like. one of my first ships lmao
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Damirae Batfamily headcanons
Tim:
He’d find any opportunity bring Damian and Raven together. He’d go out of his way to bring the two together, by planning a lunch with him, Damian and Raven and bail on them last second so they could be alone. If he wasn’t doing that, he’d be dropping these annoying hints in Damian’s direction about Raven.
“So you want to choose the bird character on this video game, huh? Well, that’s funny.” “Why is it funny?” “I don’t know, it just fits you, you know? You’ve got the whole robin gig going on, you clearly love Ravens, you-” “Tim, ENOUGH.”
Jason:
Whenever he was around, he’d probably try to wind him up by getting him jealous. Like telling him how she’s a lovely gal and that that one new kid on his team was asking about her. Genuinely just winding him up instead of being subtle so that flustered mess could maybe get the courage to speak to her and realize that he really likes her. He’s just get annoyed and pretend like he doesn’t care but both him and Jason knew he was pissed.
I think that whenever Raven and Jason hang out without Damian, he actually tries to be very sweet to her, first out of a genuine curiosity to know her and then because he begins to think she’s precious, like a little sister. On her side, she starts their relationship a little hesitant but grows to really appreciate how he checks in and talks books with her and eventually, when they’re fully brother and sister (in this universe) when he cuddles her or how protective he can get. It’s a belief of mine that Raven tries to offer her healing talents to doctors and the injured at the end of every fight (with an added bonus in that she can avoid the crowd/fans). When she hears how Jason is protecting Crime alley, she starts exclusively focusing her efforts there, as I don’t think many residents can afford medical care (timidly at first as she doesn’t want to step on anyone’s toes). Jason is (secretly) extremely grateful for this. Before with her help tending the injured, big gang fights that involve crime alley more than any other part of Gotham used to overwork him so much he felt like he couldn’t breathe. Being healed as well so quickly is definitely a plus although he watches her closely to make sure she doesn’t hurt herself. Damian might be a teeny bit jealous about this as he wants to fight side by side with her and look after her after the battle.
Dick:
Since Damian is basically his little brother and he thinks of Raven as a little sister/daughter type similar to the whole Bruce/Dick situation, I think he’d be much more on the supportive side then the teasing. He’d swiftly bring up the topic casually so it wasn’t weird but he had his moments. Sometimes he would drop a comment that would get Damian not annoyed but beet red. I think Kori would be more on the smirky smug type always giving Damian these knowing looks haha.
Barbara:
- I’m not sure about Duke, but I think Stephanie could be skeptical. Mostly cause she’s the one who holds a fondness for Damian and she probably felt just slightly protective of him.. okay, maybe a lot protective. She would definitely be slightly wary of the demonic side of Raven cause she doesn’t want Damian mingling with more demons than he already has.
I don’t think she’d tease him because she was more on the neutral but cautious side. I think it wouldn’t be until after they got together and she witnessed RAven being selfless to save Damian from danger that she’d truly understand. Maybe then she’d properly teas Damian about how totally in love and taken he is and even in the beginning few months she’d ask him “So... when’s the wedding?” before disappearing as quickly as possible to avoid Damian going from flustered to pissed.
As for Bruce, oof:
Definitely wary and not a fan. Alfred tries to communicate with him about how the two make sense and it’s understandable why they feel a connection but Bruce is very protective of his son (protective of all the robins x10 after what happened to Todd). He doesn’t want another one trusting someone blindly and then ending up hurt one way or another. And he doesn’t trust Raven either, doesn’t trust the empath part of her at all. It’d take years and he’d discourage it all the way through but at one point he’d realize that she makes her son happy and goes out of her way to save him. So very very slowly, he’d start to accept her more and eventually it’d become a sweet relationship. Though the start would totally be messy.
The other robins and batgirls would be protective of her at the beginning of Bruce’s dislike. Jason would not really care for Bruce’s opinion, Cass would’ve been bummed by his reluctance as would Steph, Tim would’ve been rather stubborn with him and tell Bruce that he’s wrong to his face, but I think it would’ve been Dick who’d be most vocal about her and being protective over her. Like, not trying to push it with Bruce and get really annoyed but if it came up, he was more than willing to argue.
Me and bluescove/@soulselfs talked headcanons a bunch and she encouraged me to post these before she left. I hope @poiitisinstone enjoys them, I really like their headcanons.
#damirae#jason todd#red hood#damian wayne#robin#tim drake#red robin#dick grayson#nightwing#bruce wayne#batman#raven#rachel roth#barbara gordon#oracle#batgirl#batfam#headcanons#damirae headcanons#batfam headcanons#lunar crow#been a while#see you soon
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Can we stop for a sec to appreciate how wild Jason is. Like that time he got turned into an octopus, or that time where he immediately tried to square up with a version of him who was Batman. Lets also appreciate the variety of his alternate selves (ex. Preacher, Tire Salesman, Mercanary, Batman) Shame what happened to Earth 15 where he was Batman
Sure we can.
And I know you're thinking about Catholic Priest!Jason and the asshole businessman whose tires security invention literally killed kids who just like him back in the day stole tires!Jason (no idea about the mercenary!Jason tho) but what I am now imagining, is:
A) Jason went undercover in a church in a little desert town, where he suspects Church of Blood has its claws in. He is struck by a beam of lighting and the next day turns out he has god-like superpowers. It also turns out that Church of Blood is really involved here. It end with him, Rose Wilson and Eddie Bloomberg next town over, in a diner, when they hear the first town to be raised to the ground.
I don't remember Preacher (comics)TV series) enough to say what happened in between, or after. But if I wrote a team-up between them, it would have been like that.
B) Really a tire salesman! Jason, with his own dealership and auto shops, where ex-cons and drug addicts can find a job, especially if their experise is with stealing cars or car parts. It's all above the ground, this Jason has zero connection with vigilantism or organized crime. There were people who tried to pressure him into paying up for protection? A lot of them: Black Mask (especially since it would be useful for Black Mask to have a shop that could install secret compartments into his gang's cars to traffic drugs or people), Penguin (actually, the man mainly wanted to pressure him into allowing Penguin to use his business to launder money), Two-Face (especially since some car parts are have to be shipped and so have to go through the docks which he controls, and wouldn't it be a shame if his shipment was lost or damaged? Think about the insurance premiums you are going to be racking, Todd).
There are a few ways this could go:
- Jason and his people take care of it themselves.
They maybe got their act together, cleaned up, but they ain't pushovers and know their way with a tire iron. It's the closest Jason gets to actually have his own gang and he is not all that comfortable about the implications, especially when kids of a high school or even middle school age start to show up and ask to be accepted. If they are sixteen or older, he says that he can allow them to work part-time. He has no fucking idea about what to do with the youngest ones, but he can't make them go away either. Literally - they don't listen. So he installs in every garage something like a bigger employee lounge, with a canteen, and bookshelves.
CPS raids his business several times but can't actually find anything suspicious. Then Bruce fucking Wayne shows up and Jason is like, on one hand, I need to get the kids out of here because this is not free child care facilities, damn it, we're still being bothered by assholes from time to time, and the idea of kids getting caught up in that keeps me awake at night! On another, this is the dude who sponsored Ma Gunn's school for young criminals, where she actually made them all into the worse criminals. So Jason naturally doesn't trust him or expects much. But Bruce instead just offers his money and connection for him to use, in whatever way he thinks best, because Jason actually is the one who knows these kids and what is the best for them - he was one of these kids, at a time when there were no Jasons around. So Jason is like, fuck it, okay, let's build a learning center where kids could study mechanics. And radio tech. And robotics. And there's eventually also a youth racing team.
One of Bruce Wayne's kids actually competes - the second youngest, Duke. Though he started to race even before he was adopted. The youngest Wayne child comes to every competition and a good third of training meets, but roots for his friend Colin instead.
Waynes come there pretty often, in fact. The oldest was okay to talk to, even if he did confess to being a cop back in the day (youthful folly, he called it). He shared how he has experience with volunteering, too - he runs a gym that offers free self-defense classes for those who need it, and gymnastics for kids from families that are struggling. He was the one who had the idea of Redline's youth center to have some too - self-defense, not gymnastics. Said there was someone who would be interested in teaching. It's two girls that couldn't be more different in terms of temperament but who get along like a house on fire. Jason prefers Cass, actually, because she's nice to talk to, as in, she won't talk your ears off - Jason can't believe she is actually related to Dick and the rest, she is too awesome to be a Wayne, and she could break him in half and not sweat, as proved during one and only sparring (Cass is too bored to do it more than once, which, fair). And Steph just makes him - drop things sometimes, or run into a wall, or blush. She also can break him in half and will also cackle gleefully all the way. He never spares with her.
Eventually, he meets the middle child. Tim looks around the new computer lab with wistfulness in his eyes. Would it be, he says, if something like this was around when I was younger. Jason does the double-take. From all of them, he is pretty sure Tim's first parents were wealthy enough that actually hiring tutors to help him learn programming wouldn't have been a problem. Tim shrugs and says that his parents were never around and he was left to himself a lot, which made some things harder for him, and having a place to be around other kids and trusty adults while also learning new and useful skills might have made a difference. Jason is curious now: so what did he do instead? Tim talks about skateboarding and photography class. Jason doesn't draw a budget on a new skate park, instead suggesting it to Tim himself. There's a new skate park the next summer. Jason doesn't visit because he doesn't have time, not because skating always seemed very cool and very unapproachable to him, and now he has money for equipment, but, come on. He is pushing thirty. It would be ridiculous if he tried to start now.
Somehow, Steph wiggles to truth out of him, and she, Tim, and Cass (betrayer! Jason trusted at least Cass, but that just shows that you cannot trust a Wayne) kidnap Jason in the middle of the night and take him into the skate park. Jason was right, he is ridiculous on the board, and they laugh at him and film him and he is getting pissed until Steph also tries to skate and falls - she always preferred roller blades, she says. Cass fires back that it's not an excuse for getting clumsy and proves it by riding on the board with a perfectly good balance. It's ruined when she tries to do a kickflip and fails. So Jason now kinda gets that they were laughing with him and not him.
If only Numbers, Max, Chris, and the others could see him now, he thinks; they would have made so much fun of him for 'making friends with rich kids'. But they would have been happy for him, would make friends of their own.
Unfortunately, they are not around anymore.
"Yeah," he says, where he lied back on the ground and stares at the ceiling. "Shame a place like this wasn't around when we were growing up."
But it is around now, and it matters.
(surprisingly, after Wayne started to give him money, there were fewer assholes sniffing around Redline, instead of more; Jason chalks it up to the fact that crime rates are going down overall)
- Jason dons the Red Hood because there's little in this city people fear like Joker, and so he uses that fear to intimidate the lot of them, and when it fails (because fear never works), kill the problem at its root.
He never involves his guys but the word goes around that Jason paid off the new player in town, Red Hood, for protection, or maybe he is fucking him (because he was very adamant that he is not going to pay anyone for protection, so it has to be personal, and Red Hood isn't his family, seeing as Jason has none, and all his friends are either his co-workers or something like grandpas and grandmas of the neighborhood; that's the ridiculous assumption that was made of him, Jason thinks. He is not friends with old people - he eats their cookies and plays mahjong and listens to them rant about how baseball is not as good as it was back in the day anymore. He likes to know what they're doing because old people, unassumingly frail, put his teeth on edge - he likes to know what they're doing, to make sure they're not up to no good).
Or maybe Red Hood just likes what they have created for themselves here at Redline. Anyhow, they like Red Hood back and start wearing his colors. Up until they are starting to get arrested and questioned about what Red Hood had done, so Jason bans red clothes entirely. He is very upset by it himself, after green, it's his favorite color.
All goes well until there are literally hitmen after Red Hood. And killing his way through a Gotham gang is one thing, you need just to pay attention and pick a moment, preferably when Bats are distracted by Joker escaping Arkham or something.
He is still okay until there is literally an alien robot after him that packs a punch of Superman, and the rest of his superpowers too. Batman and Nightwing show up to the rescue, surprisingly. And then another time, just Batman, when it's Count Vertigo and Captain Nazi and someone else Jason didn't catch the name of. They work so well together, Jason thinks in another life they could have been soulmates.
It ends with assailants incapacitated (in Nazi's case, dead).
"What," asks Jason. "He is a Nazi! I am pretty sure it's not a crime."
"I know you think you're helping the city," Batman says. "I know people like you. But you're not. It's not the right way. I can help."
"Baby," Jason wants to call him 'old man' at first, but he is going for most infuriating instead. Batman doesn't look insulted, actually, and that's food for thought. "There's no one like me."
"Huntress. Azrael..." Batman literally starts counting on his fingers.
"Come on," Jason scoffs. "I don't have mile-wide daddy issues, and I wouldn't be caught dead in a cult."
"Reaper."
Jason heard about that one - crazy old man driven mad by grief over losing his wife in a random robbery.
"I am not doing vengeance - or justice," he says slowly, in case he really can make Batman understand. "It's self-defense."
"You're attacking, unprovoked. You decimating them."
"Attack is the secret of the defense. Read a book, jeez."
It goes even worse when Joker catches up on what is he doing. At first, Jason thought the clown knew and it fit with his brand of chaos and destruction - which didn't sit well with Jason, but he really didn't allow himself to go after people that weren't after him first. So he let him live and tried not to let it bother him, a potential of being someone Joker approved of. But no, the clown just didn't notice.
But then one time, Joker kidnapped him - and not only him. Holy shit, it's a lot of other vigilantes, there's Batgirl - the first one, and two Robins, and Nightwing, and Batman. Jason feels better about walking into a trap already. Still.
"I have a feeling that this is a theme party," he says to Joker. "But I don't exactly fit in."
"Oh no, you're just fine," Joker says. "After all, you do what the Bats do, only you actually succeed."
"Well, no," Jason says. He is drawing the notice of the psychopath by design because he notices that the others started steering too. He hopes a few of them are also trying to get out of their zip ties. Jason can't do it unless he is allowed to bang his hands against the corner of the wall or something - he hopes that the kids have better training than YouTube videos and some unfortunate youth experience. "They are saving people, I kill people. I would say we're the opposite."
Batman gives him a sharp look. Who knows if he believed Jason before, or he thinks Red Hood is showing his true colors now. Jason ignores it. He never looked for validation in random older buff men since he tried to jack Bruce Wayne's tires, got caught, returned the tires and even screwed them back in, and got thrown into Ma Gunn's school for his trouble (he would add 'god rest her soul' but he was the one who killed her and he's not a hypocrite).
"If anything," Jason continues looking up at Joker who is now perched on the table next to him. "I am more like you. I mean, there's the helmet - an obvious tell. I also murder people, just like you. And, I was told I am pretty hilarious. When I invited a cheerleader to a prom, no less. Isn't that enough likeness for you?"
Joker pretends to contemplate.
"I don't know, it seems like you're leaving yourself open for a "your mama" joke but that would be crass even for me. Still, I had a flame back in the day - don't worry, Batsy, it was before your time - so let's take this helmet off and check, shall we?"
If Joker thinks that Jason will panic that his secret identity will be revealed in a room full of people who want to throw him in jail or kill him - well, he already knows Joker knows who he is, seeing as he tailored a trap for him. Besides, Joker taking his helmet off won't give him the results he expects.
"Huh," Joker says, looking down at the domino mask Jason wears. "Are you sure you're not one of them?"
"Take it off and find out," Jason goads. "Might want to put the helmet down first, though, I don't want you to get even more smudges on its surface."
Joker, unsurprisingly, doesn't put the helmet down.
"It's rather pretty," he says. "And you did steal the name and the costume design from me."
"Improved, you mean," Jason shoots back and that's all he needs for Joker to get the helmet on.
"I don't know," Joker says in a goading tone. "They all say that remakes are never as good as the original. Now, let's see the man behind the mask!"
He pulls the mask off - someone from the other side of the table gasps.
"I give up," Joker says after a short beat of silence. "I was expecting a familiar face. But who are you supposed to be?"
He tilts his head to look at Jason's make-up - which is a lot of black eye shadow. He looks like a raccoon, and that's intentional, not because YouTube tutorials are harder than they look (though Jason still has mad respect for all the girls with beauty channels he is now subscribed to; he will never be able to pull it off but watching them do it is more satisfying than watching sports, for him).
"Don't you remember me?" Jason grins, and braces himself. "Jason Todd."
The helmet blows up, taking Joker's head off his shoulder. See, Jason knew voice-activated explosives were a perfectly reasonable failsafe. It's too easy to lose a detonator.
Debris of the helmet, and of Joker (Jason tries very hard not to think about it but he still hurls) hit him harder than the rest.
Bats do take him into custody. They help with the cuts. Then, when they are alone, Batman asks.
"You knew that we would get free eventually. We would have fought the Joker, and we would have freed you too. You didn't have to blow him up - didn't have to disclose your name either. Why didn't you wait?"
Jason hums in agreement. He didn't have to. He pretty much fucked himself over by doing that.
"If you did that before he asked my name, I would have. But there's only so much I have in my repertoire to keep him interested. I am not a man of the world, and nobody actually said I was hilarious, ever. I lied: I never went to a prom."
"I find you laughable!" A kid's voice, full of derision. It's muffled the next second. Probably, baby Robin and whoever is babysitting him were not supposed to listen in to the interrogation.
"Aw, your kids already approve of me," Jason smirks. "Do you want to go steady?"
There's a murmur, "I swear, B, why all the crazies go after you?". There's a sound of something hitting flesh and a sharp intake of breath. "No, D, I didn't mean your mom!"
Jason raises an eyebrow at Batman. Batman, by the aborted movement, probably wanted to cover his face with a hand or something like that. Instead, he asks Jason:
"You took out Two-Face, Penguin, Black Mask, now, Joker. When does it end, for you?"
"I am not hearing a no!" Jason sing-songs.
A girl's voice this time: "Well, he is right, it wasn't a no."
Batman's face twitches. Jason sighs and takes pity on him.
"Better question, Bruce, is when it ends for them. I told you already, I have only gone after people who were after my people. They were through a lot already, okay? And nobody was offering them chances. Not like you were, for your Rogue Gallery, handing out chances upon chances for the big names, with real blood on their hands, worse reasons, and no signs of stopping. Redline was their chance. I am not letting anyone take it away from them."
Jason sees how it kills Batman inside a little, not to ask about how Jason knows his name (which, easy; he met Bruce Wayne, he's not stupid). Still, acknowledging it would be as good as a confession. Batman presses forward instead.
"You mean, you won't let anyone take it away from you?"
Jason chuckles.
"Oh no, baby, you're a little behind the news. Do you think I have enough time in the day to be a CEO and Red Hood? Suzie Su is running things now there. Joker could have killed me, you could arrest me, and Redline will keep standing. People need that place, but they don't necessarily need me, anymore. I figure I combed through the city pretty well, nobody will actually believe Red Hood worked alone. Nobody will be crazy enough to check."
"And if they do, Suzie Su will replace you as the Red Hood as well?"
"Nah, she's retired. Red Hood died tonight."
It's true, even if Jason sees that Batman doesn't believe him. It's fine. The helmet blew up, and there won't be another like it. After all, when people realize that Joker, too, was just as mortal as the rest, his old moniker won't pack the same punch.
Besides, Miguel never appreciated Jason's fashion choices or talent at naming things. But what does he know? He spent who knows how long sleeping in some really disturbing aquarium, swimming in a greenish liquid, and he's likely from another reality altogether. They don't even have the right memes there.
"I can't let you go," Batman says.
"But throwing me in jail is really just asking for someone to die, you realize that, don't you? I didn't exactly make friends among criminals. Your best bet is if they shank me the first day in custody, while I am still injured. That's the only way to keep the body count down."
"Did Red Hood really die tonight?" Batman asks unexpectedly.
"Bruce, no," a groan is heard. Then, "Ow! What? He said he already knew - and that's not so hard to figure out! Cass figured it out - I did when I was nine, for fuck's sake!"
"Swearing, Red Robin."
"Sorry, Agent A."
"Not all of my kids approve of you," Batman adds, even more unexpectedly. "So let's give it a trial run. I will report that Joker killed Red Hood and threw his body off the waterfall - that ought to be an as plausible an explanation of the lack of the body as any. But if the Red Hood shows up again..."
"Scout honor," Jason raises his hand.
"You weren't a scout."
"Okay," Jason spits on his hand and offers it to Batman for a shake. "That's what we did on the streets. Gross but supposed to show you have both the trust in the other party, and that you're not a wuss."
"Not surprised you didn't go to prom," Batman deadpans. "With wooing technics like this."
He does repeat the gesture, so Jason doesn't know what he is complaining about: it obviously worked on him.
Before they let go, Batman tightens to grip.
"If someone new shows up to make trouble at Redline, nor you, neither anyone in your employ, is to take care of it yourselves. You will come to find me."
Someone to take care of Jason's issues for him? In this economy? Too good to be true, but then again, Bruce Wayne could afford it.
The question was, will he? His solution, the last time they met, was to throw Jason in some Death Class-knock off boarding school, where kids got brainwashed, tortured, exploited, and killed. Where do you think Jason learned that shit?
But Batman seems to give Jason exactly the chance he just said he always lacked. He will give it a try. And if it works?
Jason will never say anything bad about how Batman does things ever again.
#asks#jason todd#fic ideas#my writing#jason was never robin and ma gunn's is a school from hell: an au in two unconnected parts#also known as tire salesman!jason
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Bakugou random Headcanon #1
Okay, so a while back I read this Red Hood fanfic where Jason kind of get adopted by all the kids in gotham. And now the only thing I can think about is Katsuki, in the worst part of Musutafu, saving a girl during a night patrol (because unlike a lot of heroes, he knows most people are threaten by creeps and random people, not villains) from a sexual assault. The girl is understandably shaken and Katsuki (while not having lived this particular situation, still knows trauma. Nobody helped him when he needed them to, so you better bet he's gonna help her) gives her one of his phone number (yes he has two, no he won't tell why), tell her to call him if she needs his help or just want to talk. A week later, she does. She keeps having nightmare so Katsuki spend two hours talking with her. Their call become weekly.
Then she asks if she can give his number to a friend who went through something similar. Katsuki agrees. And somehow, his number keep circulating among the kids of the neighbourhood (and then later, the enter city). One day a kid calls because his abusive mother locks him up in the attic, another day a little girl calls because her father is always drunk and not the happy kind, then a teenage girl calls because she joined a gang, and want to get out. This keeps happening for a few months. Then Katsuki recieves another call. He is like « What's the situation ? », already grabbing grenades. Except, it's not one of this calls. A sixteen-year-old girl is freaking out, « I have a maths test in five hours and I know shit ! Please help ! » Katsuki blinks, then sighs. « What's your adress ? » And he spends two hours explaining equations and cosine, before dragging her to bed. A few days later, he received a selfie. The girl is proudly holding her test, a bright A written in red. And that's how Katsuki find himself receiving more and more casual calls. A boy calls for help with his english, a small girl calls because « Mr. Noodles the Bear lost his arm. Can you fix him ? », a boy, whose mother can't afford to buy new clothes, asks how to fix them, so Katsuki teaches him how to sew. Twin girls call for help to make their overworked mother a birthday cake, Katsuki made sure to bake the best damn cake of his life.
Somehow he adopted a hoard of ducklings throughout the city.
And they fiercely loyals. When the medias talk shit about him, a hoard of vengeful kids unleash their fury on the internet. Defending, protecting their unofficial big brother.
Katsuki is so proud.
#katsukibakugou#bakugou#katsuki#my hero academy oc#I might write a fanfic#headcanon#pro hero bakugou#after UA#kids#Big brother Bakugou#He's so proud of his brats
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