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The Arkham Knight

jason todd x fem!reader

aka the arkham knight goes after the crevice in the red hoods armor

warnings: typical canon violence, threats to the reader including death & implied sa, nonconsensual touching for reader (not nsfw), reader gets cut with a knife, character death (not reader or jason), angst w comfort

**for the sake of this, we're going to pretend that the arkham knight isn't jason -- or that he's from an alternate universe or something if you prefer. in any case, red hood & the arkham knight co-exist in this fic

You wake up to a sensation that takes you a moment to place. Your eyes are still closed and the word conscious is barely even applicable to you, but still, you feel it.    

There’s a hand wrapped around your neck.

Given that it's about one in the morning at this point and it’s not uncommon for your boyfriend to get very touchy after coming home from patrol, you didn’t dwell much on it.

His thumb strokes across your skin delicately, applying no real force with his grip.

You don’t feel his arm, though. Usually, you’d expect to feel the weight of at least his arm on you, as he laid next to you, hand resting on your neck. But you just feel his hand. No other weight on the bed at all, actually. Like he’s standing next to it.

That is something to dwell on, you think. You open your eyes and almost scream, before the hand on your neck swiftly clamps down over your mouth.

“Shhh.” he hushes. 

You probably wouldn’t be too much less scared if it were some random burglar, but it’s not. You look at the helmet hovering above you and you recognize it instantly. That’s the Arkham Knight. Jason hadn’t said much about him but you know he’s been having altercations with him recently from the news.

Standard enough.

What’s not so standard is one of Red Hood’s enemies in your apartment, in your bedroom. That means he knows who Jason is. Not good. Not good at all.

The Knight uses his free hand to yank you up by your arm into a sitting position. Your thoughts are still going a mile a minute trying to process what the hell is happening when he hauls you over his shoulder.

You start to fight back, thrashing in his hold and hitting his back with as much force as you can muster, but you’re not surprised it doesn’t do much. This guy’s as big as Jason and it doesn’t take a vigilante to figure out that this is a fight you can’t win.

He jostles you on his shoulder a little bit, murmuring, “Easy, sweetheart. We’re just going on a little trip.”

You continue struggling against him and when you reach the apartment building hallway you start shouting, though you’re quickly shut up by him.

He plops you down on your feet, hands gripping your shoulders tightly. “Don’t make me hurt you.” He warns with venom. 

If you’re going to get away it could only be now. But you saw the gun holstered to his thigh and based on the little that you know about him, he will shoot anyone that tries to help you without hesitation. 

So you let him shove you outside and into the backseat of a black car without a fight, only starting to feel the consequences with the way he holds you incredibly close with a tight grip throughout the ride.

You end up at a warehouse at the edge of the city, filled with crates and storage containers that you’re assuming are stocked with weapons. Soldiers line the perimeters and block the exits, though you didn’t have much of a mind to try and run from the Arkham Knight anyways. The metallic glint off his gun from the lights warn you every time he moves.

He has you sat on a chair as he leans against a crate in front of you, not bothering to have tied your hands. He doesn’t seem to be in any rush to do anything with you, if anything, the way he idly lazes implies that he’s waiting for something. Waiting for Jason, you’d guess. A long fifteen or so minutes goes by—you know so because you counted the seconds in your head as an attempt to keep your mind away from the killer in front of you.

You’re dressed only in a loose t-shirt and sleep shorts, the Gotham night air bitter on your skin. It only gives you all the more reason to curl up into yourself, doing your best to cover your body. 

He tilts your face to the side with the barrel of his gun. “You are a pretty thing, aren’t you? I can see why he keeps you.”

You snap your head away, eyes down and looking to the concrete floor. The sleeve of your shirt slips from your shoulder and you quickly yank it back up, much to the amusement of the Knight.

His shoulders shake lightly as he relaxes the gun to his side, “So, what? S’he your boyfriend or r’you just fucking each other?”

You try to keep your face neutral, keeping your eyes glued on the ground. “I just help patch him up sometimes. I don’t even know who he is.”

He takes a deep breath. “I’m going to ignore the fact that you just lied to me, but only because I already know the answer.” He pulls you in close and kisses the side of your head with his helmet before whispering in your ear, “Don’t lie to me again.”

You try not to let your shoulders shake as bad as they want to, though you’re sure he knows exactly how frightened you are anyways.

You huff quietly, attempting to show more courage than you have. “So what, all this for ransom? Just to piss him off?”

He tilts his head at you wryly, “No, I’m going to put a bullet in his head.”

Your mouth snaps shut.

“Ah. Yeah, if you were just fucking you wouldn’t have that look on your face right now.” He tuts, patting your cheek.

A series of gunshots outside the warehouse has you jumping in your seat.

The Knight claps his hands together, “Oh, here we go!”

He stands abruptly and pulls you up with him roughly, wrapping his arms around you to pin you against his chest, resting the chin of his helmet on your shoulder. The few men scattered around the room drop one by one, quickly, though the Arkham Knight pays them no regard.

“Back away from her.” The modulated voice of his helmet calls out sharply. You can’t quite tell where he is, but he sounds up high—maybe in the rafters or set up at one of the windows.

“Easy, Hood. Pays to be mindful of the stakes.” He pushes your chin up with the barrel of the gun.

You can’t see him but you have a feeling he’s got his gun trained on you, waiting for the Knight to give him a decent shot.

You can tell how incensed he is, even from the distance as he shouts, “Put the gun down. Now.”

The Knight tsks, “Don’t make me do something I’ll kind of regret. She’s got too pretty of a face to die so soon.” He squeezes your cheeks as you try to pull your head away from his hands, with no avail. “And so messy.”

His free hand travels down your neck and squeezes. You try not to look scared, both to spite the Knight and for the sake of Jason’s concentration.

He backs you up into a mess of crates, gun persistently pointed to your head, and he yanks you down with him to duck behind them. You’re both mostly obscured from view, though you think the tops of your heads might still be visible from the angle Jason’s at.

“I’m not asking twice.”

The Knight ignores his threat, continuing on, “No, no, don’t worry about it. I’ll take care of her for you, Hood. She won’t miss a thing.” His glove drifts down your side, squeezing your waist.

Jason fires again, hitting startlingly close to the Knight’s head.

You take the momentary distraction to knee him in the groin which only makes him tighten his grip on you. “Oh, you…” he grunts. “You are a fighter, aren’t you?”

You sneer at him, “Fuck—” he yanks your hair roughly, pulling you into a better angle for him to hold onto you. “You.”

He squeezes your arm very hard, calling out, “On second thought, Jace, I’m thinking about cutting her open and letting her bleed out right here.”

He puts his gun in the holster before one of his hands pulls the bottom of your shirt up, the other flipping out a blade that he presses flat against your stomach. The knife is cold against your skin and the sensation is what allows you to finally admit to yourself that you’re scared.

This is somehow a hell of a lot more terrifying than the gun and you can’t swallow the fact that you’re one unlucky move away from being gutted in an abandoned warehouse at the edge of Gotham. Jason’s quiet and you can’t be sure that he’s not injured or stuck dealing with more soldiers. You visibly shake at the thought of really being on your own now.

The Knight clicks his tongue, tilting his head down at you as he watches you tremble. “Aw, I’m sorry. Am I scaring you?” He knicks your skin, purring, “It’s not personal, sweetheart.” He lets the blade drag a bit, widening the size of the cut. “Well, not for you.”

You grimace at the feeling of being sliced open, trying your hardest not to give him any reaction. Your body involuntarily slides down to the ground until you’re on your back with him crouched above you. 

He pulls the knife back and you both take in the sight of your blood lining the side of it. Your eyes well with tears as he points the end of the knife down at your stomach, readying to pierce your skin in a far less superficial way.

A gunshot fires far closer than you were prepared for, making your entire body jump. The fear becomes visceral then, because your automatic reaction to the noise was to assume that you had just been shot by the Arkham Knight. But in actuality, the Knight himself gets knocked to the floor, the shot having hit the side of his helmet. A flash of red out of the corner of your eye has you flinching, though it darts right past you and onto the Knight.

Hood slams him fully onto the ground by the shoulders, trying to remove his helmet so he can fire a shot that's actually effective. The Knight fights against him, pushing him off of him and reaching to draw his own gun.

You’re dragging yourself backwards, crawling away to safety. You keep going until you can’t see them anymore; you’re too scared to see it play out, too scared to help, too scared to think.

The clamor of grunts and punches landing drowns your senses as you try to fold in on yourself into the smallest ball possible on pure instinct.

A shot fires, though the sounds of struggling persist. Another shot, followed by a curse that you can’t make out who it came from. You can see debris littering the air around one of the crates where one of the shots must have hit. A few seconds go by before a third shot echoes out and the scuffle slows to a halt.

It’s quiet for the longest few moments of your life and in the panic, you begin to lose all sense of what you’re waiting for. You forget to look up when you hear someone approaching you rapidly, only finding cessation to your concern when a pair of hands grabs your face, pulling your head up so he can see you.

You’re only barely able to process that it’s your boyfriend knelt in front of you, blood splattered on his armor. You know this is good, you’re grateful to see him, but you can’t feel anything but panic.

“Fuck,” he breathes out, taking in your emotional state. “Are you hurt?” His helmet scans over you frantically, hands trying their best to remain gentle on your face.

You try, but you can’t push the words out of your mouth.

Honestly, you just want to see him, see his face so you can start to feel safe again. But the sight of another inanimate helmet is doing nothing to calm you, in spite of you wholeheartedly trusting the person under it with your life.

His gaze finds the small pool of blood seeping through your shirt. He rushes to lift your shirt up, fussing over the laceration. It’s about two inches wide, but it’s shallow enough that it won’t need stitches. Once he determines that you don’t need immediate medical attention, he drops your shirt back down, leveling his face to yours.

“Sweetheart,” he whispers desperately, “Baby. Talk to me,” he brushes hair out of your face gently and the contact makes you jump on instinct, your adrenaline nowhere near lowering. If you were in any real state of mind right now you’d feel awful for flinching like that when he touched you, you know exactly how sensitive that is for him. But right now, you didn’t even completely register that it was him that touched you.

Your eyes stay fixed on the concrete and the only response you can manage is a strangled hum and a shake of your head, no I can’t talk right now not right now not now

“Okay. Okay,” he lifts you up off the ground from your knees and holds you close, like he’s trying to prevent you from disappearing again. You’re staring blankly at his glove holding up your thigh, trying to center your focus on that instead of all the bodies in your peripheral or the memory of the blade pressed against your abdomen.

You don’t notice it, but he’s looking down at you constantly, scanning your face for anything, any signs of change.

The entire ride back to your apartment you’ve got a death grip around his torso and he’s thankful for it because he can’t have his hands on you while he’s driving the bike.

He gently helps you inside, handling you like your bones are made of float glass. His helmet finally comes off once you’re back home, but you’re a bit too out of it to even notice.

The wave of lucid emotions don’t kick in until he sets you gently on the bed and you realize you’re back in the place where you woke up to his hand around your throat. You can feel the bottom of your shirt sticking to your skin, the blood slowly starting to dry.

The tears fall before you could even realize that your eyes started watering and Jason could swear on his life that he physically felt his heart break. 

You feel like a little kid the way you cry, chin low and shoulders shaking. You don’t even know what you want, what could possibly help right now.

“Can I touch you?” He asks in a strangled whisper, desperate to try anything he can to make this better for you. He absolutely hates that you have to be in such distress because of something that he brought into your life, something that he should’ve been able to prevent. He’d rather relive all his worst days again and again than see you so pained ever again.

You give no response so he takes the chance and does it anyway because he can’t stand to see you hurting so badly and while he just sits here watching. He wraps his arms around you, pulling you onto his lap and into his chest. Thankfully, you respond in kind and squeeze your arms around him tightly, sobbing harder.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” He presses his mouth against your head, trying to keep it together as you shake in his hold.

He won’t tell you this, especially not right now, but he was absolutely terrified. He couldn’t have gotten home more than ten minutes after you’d left, being met with little things ever so slightly out of place. The bedroom door ajar, when you usually keep it closed. The lamp in the living room that you always leave on for him was off. The bolt on the door was broken, the turn locks unlocked.

He’s panicked plenty of times before in false alarms, thinking you were gone or dead when in reality you’d just been tired and skipped a few steps in your nightly routine. So he kept his thoughts at bay as he crept into the bedroom, opening the door to find the bed empty, sheets oddly messy. He booked it down the hall and checked the bathroom, checked the spare room. Nothing. He’d whipped his phone out immediately and could literally feel his stomach drop when he heard your phone ringing in the bedroom.

It didn’t take him long to piece together what had happened, who had taken you. He’d been having increasing altercations with the Arkham Knight lately and they were beginning to get very annoyed with each other. Occasional accidental run-ins had given way to full on ambushes and planned assaults, leading both of the men to lose their patience quickly.

A couple nights earlier, mid-shootout, The Knight had shouted out something that should’ve raised flags for Jason. “I’d hate to let this get personal,” he’d said.

But he was in the heat of the fight and barely even allowed himself to register the words, let alone sift through their implication. That’s no excuse though, is it? He’s supposed to keep you safe, that’s his job—that’s his only job. He should’ve seen the tail that was following him, he should’ve installed better security measures at your apartment, he should’ve checked on you, should’ve stayed with you, should’ve left you alone all together. But he was selfish and careless and now you’re bleeding and traumatized from being pulled from your bed in the middle of the night, having a gun pushed in your face, and being cut by a psychopath.

You sit on his lap, completely zeroed in on the feeling of his touch and how drastically different it resonates than the Knight’s burning hold on you. Jason’s hands on you don’t have that scorching fire sensation, but warm and comforting like an emergency blanket. You can feel his Red Hood armor pressing into you uncomfortably, but you want more of it. You need more. You can’t possibly get enough of it right now. 

“Please hold me tighter,” you pipe up for the first time in several minutes, your words are hushed and exerted. It makes you sound like you’re hiding, trying not to be caught.

He nearly squeezes the breath out of your lungs and it’s still not tight enough. The tears run out soon after and you sit lax against him. You focus on the feeling of his breath against you, his exhale wavering your hair a little. His breath is steadier than yours and you try to match up with him, but you’ve found that even in normal times, his breathing is always a little slower than yours.   

There’s a nearly imperceptible creak of a floorboard in your living room that has you jolting in Jason’s lap. His head snaps up, one of his hands immediately flying to your hair. His hold prevents you from turning your head, though you're not sure you even want to. You prepare yourself for the sound of gunshots, modulated voices, punches landing.  

You’re confused when Jason remains stationary on the bed and he relaxes slightly. A few long seconds go by before he calls out lowly, “Go.” 

His posture loosens again a moment later and though you don’t hear the intruder retreat, you’ll later realize that was your biggest clue as to who it was. But for right now, you bury your face as deep into his neck as you can, letting him run his finger through your hair in an attempt to cancel out the brief adrenaline jump you just got.

His next words come at a volume so low you nearly miss them all together. “Did he touch you?” He sounds like he’s biting back nausea at the thought.

“No. Not like that.” you mumble back, just as quiet. Your voice is more detached than his, and while the words themselves are a relief, your tone makes him hurt inside.

His head drops against your shoulder for a second before he glances up at the door again, letting out a tense exhale. “I…fuck. Can I…I need to go in the living room for a second. Just a second.”  

The thought of being separated from him right now makes you literally want to throw up, but tonight has been nothing if not another reassurance that you trust him more than anything.

He pulls back from you and looks you in the eye, hand stroking along the side of your head as he checks for certainty. You do your best to let him find it and when he does he kisses your forehead softly. You slowly climb off of him and he makes sure to wrap you up nicely in the comforter before he goes.

He stands intentionally in the doorway, closing the door enough so that there’s only just enough room for him to stand.

“What happened?” you hear the gruff voice of the Batman, followed by Jason shushing him. You can’t quite make out what he mutters back, though you can tell the sentence is short. 

You think you can hear Batman ask if you’re hurt and you see Jason hesitate and then shake his head. You let yourself fall into a reclined position on the bed, consumed by your cocoon of blankets. Jason was really onto something with this.  

Batman sighs, “Alright. We’ll discuss this more tomorrow.”

“Not tomorrow.” Jason says shortly. His meaning is clear, he’s not leaving you again any time soon. Especially not to fill Batman in on something that’s done and over with. Something that he’s hoping to never have to talk about again. A few beats pass before Jason closes the door with a soft click and returns to you quickly.

He takes your hands in his as he sits, rubbing reassuring circles with his thumbs. 

“I need to get you bandaged up.” He whispers reluctantly, knowing that’s not what you want to hear right now. You drop your head on his shoulder wordlessly and he takes in the sight of your blood on your hands. Now it’s his turn to feel sick. “We can—” he pauses, “Do you want to shower first?”

Oh. That would be good, yeah. You nod slowly and languidly unwrap yourself from your blankets.

He wants to ask but he refrains, so you just take his hand and guide him into the bathroom with you. He’s very thankful you do.

He gets the shower started for you, letting it get warm how he knows you like. You watch the steam begin to fog up the mirror as he pulls his shirt off next to you.

He gets down to his boxers when he turns to you and sees that you’ve made no progress in removing any of your clothes. You just stand still, watching the water run.

“Sweetheart?” He calls out gently. “You need help?” He tries to hide the concern in his voice, though not to much avail.

You blink vacantly, “No, I just…” you waver for a moment before climbing into the shower, clothes on.

He stutters between stopping you and letting you go, ultimately deciding on the latter. He follows in after you, sitting side by side with you under the stream of hot water. He has to fold in on himself to fit like this but he doesn’t think twice about being here with you, however you need him. 

Your clothes darken quickly and adheres to your skin, and you find it difficult to tear your eyes away from that patch of your shirt that remains ever so slightly darker than the rest of the wetted fabric.

Jason picks your hand up from its resting place on your stomach and envelopes it in his. You close your eyes and let the water run over your face, sprinkling off your eyelashes.

“I’m sorry.” He whispers, sounding nearly in pain.

Your head falls to the side, coming to a rest on his shoulder. The water pounds against your ear, stray drops ricocheting against your cheek. You squeeze his hand and he returns the action, understanding the temporary sentiment. He kisses your head and keeps his lips there, eyes closed too. 

You’ll stay like that in the shower until the heat runs out. He’ll help you out of your soaked clothes and leave them in the tub for now before lifting you up and wrapping you in a towel. He’ll set you down on the bed and apply a bandage to your cut as delicately as he possibly can. Neither of you bother to get dressed again, simply enveloping yourselves in the covers and lying together like that until you’re ready to move.

He didn’t go out on patrol again for nearly two months.

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"Do you need help with your hair, Neuvillette?"

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Though usually by himself and poised, seemingly able to do everything by himself. With you, he shows the side of him that never surfaces for anyone else.

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La Vie en Rose

jason todd x fem!reader

aka jason wildly preferring you over everyone else

4 in 1 blurbs

warnings: standard batfam arguing etc.

You sit curled up embarrassingly close to Jason on the couch, head on his shoulder. The team is still in their gear as they filter into the living room, masks and helmets discarded in scattered locations between here and the cave. The mission had been fairly simple and with all of them together it only took a couple hours to finish up.

As you waited, Alfred had kept your mind busy in the kitchen while he taught you how he makes his famous ice cream from scratch.

The clamor of the heroic party’s return had made itself known sooner than later, and you think your face must have displayed your emotions nicely because Alfred nodded you away with a small smile and no second thought.

You’d walked into the living room, weaving through the mess of siblings until a hand snuck out on your left and grabbed your wrist. You barely had time to look at him before Jason pulled you down to sit next him on the sofa. He wrapped an arm over your shoulder, pulling you in and leaving virtually no space between you. His armor sits heavy against you, but a welcome weight on your shoulders.

Tim plops down on the couch across from you and you can just make out a bit of blood on the side of his head, aptly accompanied by an irritated look sprawled across his face. It’s not enough blood to be concerned about—not for them—but you can venture a guess that whatever they were up to shouldn’t have called for any injuries and his pique is likely directly related to that.

Though Dick’s goading aura might have something to do with it too, as he comes crashing down next to him a second later, partially sitting on Tim’s cape and pulling him into an awkward angle. 

Nightwing doesn’t seem too perturbed by the younger vigilante’s agitation and curt manner of pushing him off.

The others are too caught up in chatter to pay much attention to you, and you can be certain that’s why Jason takes that moment to press a kiss to the side of your head. He lets his lips linger there for just a second as you lean into him.

Alfred’s own entrance is the only thing able to subside the flurry of conversations skirting around the room.

“A job well done,” he commends with a nod. “A selection of ice creams awaits you in the kitchen.”

He gives you a sly wink before retreating back through the swinging door, leaving Stephanie and Cass to practically trip over themselves trying to beat each other to the kitchen. Robin follows after unhurried, mask still on, with his hands behind his back.

Jason kneads your thigh before pushing himself up to stand. He turns back, looking down to you. “What do you want?” he asks softly.

You hum, "Just strawberry's good."

Tim sits up, "Can I—”

"No, you've got legs,” Jason grumbles, stalking off to the kitchen.

Dick barks out a laugh and you bite back a smile.

Tim looks absolutely aghast. 

“That’s such bullshit. You know, he used to be nice.”

“No he didn’t,” Dick laughs, shaking his head. “Not since you’ve known him.”

Stephanie stumbles out of the kitchen then, the door hitting her back on the way, as she mutters a curse behind her. You can vaguely makeout Jason grunting something back before she rolls her eyes.

Steph looks at you, shaking her head as she returns to her seat, “You live like this?”

You shrug, “He’s nice to me.”

“Yeah, I bet,” Tim grumbles.

Jason returns after Cass a minute later with a bowl of strawberry ice cream and two spoons. He expertly ignores Tim’s unwavering glare as he resituates himself beside you.

He scoops your legs up over his lap and positions the bowl in between you, wrapping the sleeve of his jacket around it so that the cold porcelain doesn’t make contact with your skin.

The others have set themselves up so that the four of them are stuffed up against each other on the sofa adjacent to you, very obviously examining you both. 

And while you’re willing to acknowledge the amused stares and singular glare, Jason only sighs heavily, rolling his eyes as he glares at the coffee table.

Only a few seconds of this are allowed to go by before he pulls over a throw pillow and sets it over your knees, so that it rests atop your heads like a mini-fort, successfully blocking out his siblings' view of the two of you.

You smile and press a light kiss to his shoulder as he simmers.

Regrettably, you miss the way Damian side-eyes the pillow above you as he re-enters the room, perching himself atop the back of the couch behind the others.

“This is so nice,” Dick preens. “He used to just leave the room when too many of us gathered in one place. Now he has to stay.”

Stephanie watches the makeshift fort with wary eyes, scooping ice cream into her mouth. “Yeah…I don’t wanna freak you guys out but, uh…”

It’s quiet for a moment and you guess Cass is speaking. 

You’re proven right when Stephanie starts up again, “My thoughts exactly.” Her voice drops into a raspy whisper that isn’t really meant to go unheard, “I don’t know who the hell that is, but it is not Jason.” 

“This is unprecedented,” Damian mumbles, dipping into his own chocolate cup.

“Do they always talk about you like you’re not here?” you ask Jason quietly. 

“Yes,” he grumbles with a scornful look directed at the bowl.

A low hiss can be heard immediately after, “I’ve never heard him whisper before, what the fuck?”

You can’t hide your laugh as well as you mean to, but you know Jason’s light swat to your thigh is nothing more than a rib.

Mumbles continue along the other couch, mostly going unacknowledged, until Tim busts out, “He doesn’t even like strawberry!”

Jason snaps the pillow out of the way, “The fuck do you know about what I like?”

Tim resets his posture with one hell of an attitude, snarking, “Well I can name one thing you really seem to fucking—”

Jason grabs the pillow harshly and chucks it at Tims head which connects with a loud thwack.

Damian swats it away before it can knock him off balance, though his scowl is only half worth what Tim’s is. 

“You’re unbelievable,” he says with a sneer. “This is why you don’t get invited to movie night anymore.”

Jason doubles back at him, “Sorry, is this not your own fucking house?”

Tim huffs, “Yes, which i—”

“Then get your own goddamn ice cream!”

Tim huffs as he stands, sending Jason a pointed look. “I’m going because I want to.”

Jason barely gives him a sardonic nod as he stomps off.

“Get me some too!” Dick calls back, only for the back of his head to be met with a sideways grimace from Tim.

As he leaves, the focus of the room seems to shift towards Damian dripping chocolate onto his cape and it fades away from there.

You turn to Jason, lowering your voice to just below a whisper, “If you don’t like strawberry—”

“I like it,” he tells you, leaving no room to argue as he takes a bite.

Voicemail. 

Voicemail.

Voicemail. 

Voicemail.

Declined.

Voicemail.

Declined.

Declined. 

“I swear to God, he better be dead,” Stephanie mutters to herself.

She shuts her phone off and tosses it into the passenger seat with a huff. Her fingers drum against the steering wheel as she scans the sidewalk across from her car.

The night before the majority of the team had been involved in a less-than-successful plan, which some have called “a display of complete idiocy and inability to circumspect.”

Then Tim had to go and make a joke about that word choice in what was apparently a bad moment. This gave way to a harsher punishment of the team being forced to clean the batcave foot by square foot—notably, an impossible task.

So naturally, they had to retaliate.

The plan was to dismantle the batmobile piece by piece and leave it a collection of parts for Bruce to find. Problem being, the group as it stood didn’t possess the capability to do so without doing a great deal of damage to the parts. Damage, that the family was not willing to face extra retribution for.

Fortunately, they knew just the man for the job. 

Unfortunately, said man has devoted his life to ignoring their messages, favoring to live peacefully and distantly from them. And because that peace and distance does come with an add-on of borderline complete secrecy from his family, no one had any idea where to look for him.

So, Stephanie decided to do the next most rational thing and track down your location. She’d hoped he would be with you like he always is, but for seemingly the first time in the last year—he’s nowhere to be found.

Now, was revenge for a minor-slight by Bruce so important that it required Stephanie to take all of these steps to get a hold of Jason? No, absolutely not. She’s pretty sure that the others have already given up on it by now and started cleaning. But it’s about the principal. And also, she does not want to clean the floors of a cave.

She jumps up in her seat when she spots you exiting a store, scurrying to unbuckle and pry the car door open.

She’s across the street in half a second, running directly into your line of sight. It actually would’ve been very difficult for her to miss your line of sight, considering she’d landed only a good six inches in front of your face. “Hey!”   

“Oh, fuck—” you jump, grabbing your chest. You take a breath when you realize who it is, less surprised now by the theatrics of the introduction. “Hey Steph.”

“Hey,” she smiles casually, like she didn’t do what she just did. “So Jason’s been ignoring us and I need to get a hold of him,” she tells you.

You nod, still collecting yourself. “Oh. I don’t know where he is—”

She shakes her head, “That’s fine. Can I use your phone to call him?”

You frown, “Is something wrong?”

“With him, yeah,” she snarks. “I called him, Tim called him, Dick called him, Cass called him, Damian called him, we used Bruce’s phone to call him—that was a bit of a long shot, but still. This is our last option. Well, not our last option, if this doesn’t work I could get really invasive, but—” She shakes the thought from her head, “Nevermind.”

You nod blankly, taking in the mountain of information she’d just handed you. “How’d you know I was here?”

She scans your eyes back and forth for a second before her own widen in realization and she’s shaking her head. “No, no, don’t worry we’re not tracking you! I just hacked into the traffic cameras to find you.”

“Oh!” you exclaim, nodding some more. “Okay.”

You hand her your phone without any further questions—for your own sake—and she happily accepts. 

“You know I texted him 115 times?” she tells you as she scrolls through your contacts.

You furrow your eyebrows, watching her click his name and press the phone to her ear. “Did you count?”

“Well, I had the time, di—you son of a bitch! One ring?” Stephanie scorns into the phone.

You can hear Jason groan on the other end of the line. 

He says something to Stephanie that she follows up with a firm shake of her head.

“No,” she says defiantly. “She let me use it.”

Stephanie rolls her eyes, not pleased with his response. “What if it was an emergency?”

She listens for a second, skeptical look on her face.

She gasps suddenly, “I am not overstepping, we thought you were dead!”

Over the course of about ten seconds the shock on her face drops into just-been-caught guilt. “Well, I mean we considered it.”

You imagine Jason’s telling her to give you your phone back as she stands her ground, pushing, “If you promise to text me back.”

A short response on his end.

“Promise to text me back!”

There’s a brief lull before she’s giving a self-satisfied nod and jostling your phone back into your hands. “Here ya go. Thanks, babe!” She smiles wide at you before jogging back across the street, not waiting for the cars.

You smile as you watch her go, putting the phone up to your ear, “Hey Jay.”

You can hear the relief on the other end of the line. “Hey sweetheart. You know if you see Steph in public, you can just walk away?”

“I’m not going to walk away from your family.” You look again across the street, “Also I don’t think that was an option for me this time.”

“That thing is fucking scary.”

Cass smiles fondly, signing, “I think he’s cute.”

Tim eyes the way Salem traipses around his feet, yellow eyes staring up at him. “Why’s it even here?”

Jason rolls his eyes, continuing to scroll on his phone. “He’s hers. Deal with it.”

Tim scrunches up his mouth. “She knows I hate it. And she, unlike you, wouldn’t subject me to this just for the hell of it. So again I ask: why is it here?”

Jason huffs, looking up from his phone. “What do you want me to say? He wants to be.”

Tim scoffs at that, “‘It wants to be’? You’re the one who put it in the car.”

“No, I didn’t,” Jason says factually.

Tim looks at him sideways as Salem leaps onto Jason’s lap and nudges his hand up. Jason follows along as requested, petting the top of Salem’s head with an open palm. 

Tim squirms to the other side of the couch with a look of disgust on his face. Salem watches him the whole time.  

A smile adorns Cass’ face as she signs, “She says he can read people’s energy.”

Tim huffs, resting his head against his fist. “What does that even mean?”

The conversation is cut off by the clatter of you and Dick stumbling into the room, carrying a freshly painted headboard. Blue paint coats both of your hands and has no doubt stained your clothes.

You’re clearly struggling a bit to keep your grip on your end, the weight of the wooden frame dragging your arms down.

Jason stands and Salem flows along with his movements easily, leaping down onto the hardwood. He comes over and helps you lift your end of the frame with a stupid amount of ease, to the point that you’re not even holding any of the weight up anymore. The three of you—less so you—move the headboard and lean it up against the wall. After it's set down Jason steps back and looks over it gingerly.

“It looks good,” he murmurs to you, quiet enough to not give his brother the satisfaction of his approval.

Dick had asked you over to help him paint Damian’s bed frame as a surprise for him for not getting in any “altercations” at school this semester. You’d decided on coating it with his favorite color first and then fill it in with a collection of what Dick has “on good authority” are his favorite animals. It’s a fairly random assortment that you’re not sure adds to or disproves Dick’s credibility. You’d spent the better half of the afternoon googling animals you’d never heard of just to make sure you projected their likenesses accurately. Dick had been very clear that you had to be precise on the details because Damian would know if he was really looking at a komodo dragon painting or if it was “some common lizard.”

You sigh, “I hope he likes it. I’m worried we did it too childish for him.”

“He is a child,” Jason says plainly.

“But he is not childish,” you counter. And he sure isn’t. You’d had a hard enough time convincing Damian to watch cartoons, adding a colorful animal mural to his bedroom might be one step too far. You’re still trying to figure him out.

“He’ll like it,” he says firmly.

You smile, slipping around under his arm and tucking yourself into his side.

Not a moment later, Dick slings an arm around Jason's shoulder, grinning as he pulls his brother in close.

Jason’s immediately louring. "No, get away from me."

Dick, unfazed and still smiling, removes his arm and takes a big step to the right. You do the same, figuring he needs his space, but you get caught by the wrist before you can do more than sway to the side. 

“Not you.” 

He pulls you back under his arm, wrapping it around the front of your shoulders. You hook your fingers around his forearm, letting your hand hang.

You hear a double-clap from the other side of the room that has you both turning around to face Cass. 

She signs something to Jason with a fond smile on her face. 

You look back and forth between them as Jason waves her off. “What?”

He shakes his head, “It’s nothing. She said—she said we’re cute.”

You smile up at him and he deflects—not so subtly—and starts nudging you back towards where the group is gathered, now all standing. 

Dick’s quick to start bragging off to the room about how great of a job the two of you did and how really complex and daunting it actually is painting animals for a child.

As he talks, your eyes find Jason, who’s definitely about to roll his eyes any second now. A bit subconsciously, your hand comes up to brush Jason’s white streak of hair back, away from tickling his forehead. 

On the other side of Jason, Tim does the same, sweeping Jason’s hair back in a much more mocking manner. 

This gives way to Jason smacking his hand away, harder than he needed to.

"Wha—You let her do it!" Tim protests, overplaying how much the slap hurt.

Jason scowls, "She can do whatever she wants."

Tim drops his shoulders, looking at Jason as if he’d been scandalized. “Oh but I can’t?”

“Not if it involves touching me,” Jason grumbles.

Tim steps closer, putting a finger to Jason’s chest. “You’re such a—”

From the floor, Salem hisses up at Tim, successfully startling the teenager. “Auahh—”

He stumbles backwards, grimacing at the cat. 

“Fucking demon,” he hisses, walking away.

When Tim’s far enough away and Salem’s seemingly satisfied, he brushes up against your leg, purring. 

You peer down at him with a furrowed brow. 

“What’s Salem doing here?”

“I’m not doing this shit with you.”

“No, come on, 9 out of 10 times is what you said. How ‘bout just once? Beat me one time at anything, Jaybird.”

“Anything?” Jason asks like he knows damn well Dick can’t swear on that word.

Rightly so, Dick backtracks. “Something agreed upon.”

Jason throws his hands up, partially in exasperation, partially relenting.

Dick smoothly turns his back to him, announcing, “Opening up the room for ideas.”

Damian’s eye roll is almost audible from the corner armchair, where his attention is unmoved from intently sharpening a blade he’d recently come into possession of.

Bruce similarly remains unbothered in his seat, trying to read despite the distractions. 

“Ooh, okay. Okay.” Stephanie wiggles up a little on the couch. “You could race!”

Dick shakes his head negatively, “I literally just busted my knee up two days ago, Steph.”

“Convenient,” Jason mumbles.

“You were there!” Dick exclaims with an open mouth.

Steph continues, “Um…”

Cass waves to the room from her position upside down on the couch, head hanging down next to Stephanie’s legs. Attention successfully acquired, she signs, “Staring contest.”

Jason grimaces, “That sounds like a nightmare.”

Dick gives him a faux-smile.

“You should play chicken,” Damian chimes in, holding up his knife.

“No,” Bruce drones monotonously as he flips a page. 

“Tic tac toe?” Steph suggests.

Cass is already shaking her head as she scrunches up her mouth in thought.  

Jason rolls his eyes, “What are we, five?”

Dick nods, cracking his knuckles as he thinks. “No, we need something that really proves our worth.”

Bruce looks up from his book, staring numbly through his brow, but remains silent.

“You could arm wrestle,” Steph suggests.

The elder brother twitches at that, “Uh, no.”

Cass moves past that before a joke has the chance to be made. “Handstand contest?” she suggests.

Jason shrugs, “Yeah, sure.”

The elder brother looks at him incredulously. “You’ll do a handstand contest with me?”

“That’s what I just said.”

Dick scoffs, “Jaybird, I’m an acrobat, you’re just some guy.”

Jason, not giving him the courtesy of eye contact, pulls his sweatshirt off from his back. “Well, you’re a lot of things, aren’t you?”

Dick throws his head back with a squint.

Jason fishes his phone out of his pocket and Dick follows suit, offended stare maintaining all the while. 

No exchange is required as they both toss their phones across the room, landing together with a rough clatter on Damian’s lap. Damian’s resulting glare is borderline disgusted.

Dick starts them off, “Alright, go. One…two…”

Both men push up onto their hands, muscles flexing as they find their balance. Dick’s form is better, of course, but Jason looks to have a stronger foundation.   

They both hold strong as several minutes go by with the brothers only maintaining the attention of some of the room, and the interest of none of it.

Stephanie huffs and tilts her head, thoroughly unentertained with the consistency they’re both managing. 

“Starting to wish they’d picked something that moved along a little faster,” she murmurs to Cass.

Dick glances over at the younger brother, clearly displeased with his lack of trouble keeping up with him. He shuffles closer one hand at a time, using the decreased distance to poke at Jason with his foot, trying to knock him over.

Jason kicks him back harder, “Hey! Don’t be a dick—”

“Very funny,” Dick leers.

They both end up finding a struggle to keep balance and are forced to mind their own.  

A chime rings out from the corner that has heads turning briefly in his direction before coming back to the competition. 

“Whose was that?” Dick calls out.

Damian leans over and inspects the screens with disinterest. “Todd’s.”

Jason adjusts his position, “Who is it?”

Damian responds with your name. 

“And?”

He picks up the phone shrugging like he couldn’t care less, “She wants to know if you want to go see some movie.”

There’s a brief silence before Jason drops out of the handstand, standing up. 

Dick’s blood-flushed face peers up at him, bewildered. “Wait, what?”

The family watches with wide eyes as Jason picks his sweatshirt up off the floor and tugs it back on.

Stephanie gawks, bordering on laughing. “Are you serious?”

“Yeah,” he says simply.

Dick lets himself fall into a kneeling position with a huff, “You would rather go to some movie you don’t even know the name of than win a bet?”

Jason moues at him, “Uh, yeah.”

He tosses a twenty at Dick, and plucks his phone from Damian’s hand as he strolls past him, typing out a reply.

Cass sits up a bit and signs up to Stephanie, “Does he even like movies?” 

Bruce, now attention now fully removed from his book, watches Jason exit with the slightest hint of a smile. Dick sits dumbly on the floor, staring after him with an open-mouth. 

Damian twists the knife in his hands around contemplatively before rising to stand. 

“I will go,” he announces, dropping his blade onto the seat of the chair. Jason grumbles a no but Damian follows after him just the same.

you know what happened to the last guy that didn’t reblog? … 🔪🧨💥😵⚰️🪦