Chapter Text
It was late when Jason Todd stopped moving. The city still sang beyond his apartment's walls, the usual symphony of traffic and voices raised high in summer glee, but inside, everything felt frozen, suspended mid-air. He never took the time to figure out how to make a place feel lived-in. The room was too clean in some areas and too neglected in others. He flipped through channels, knowing what he'd find.
The headline stayed unchanged no matter where he went:
PARK ROW FAMILY GUNNED DOWN. ONLY SURVIVOR 16-YEAR-OLD SON.
The footage was ugly, grainy, underexposed, the color warped by police lights. The commentary was worse. Of course it was. Gotham was predictable like that.
“...possible dispute…”
“...an online trend…”
“...16-year-old son believed to be tied to gangs…”
He flipped to another channel. New face, same tired script. Beautiful women and handsome men, reporting the tragedy like a commercial break. Selling grief, selling fear, pretending to mourn while feeding Gotham its nightly blood meal. The camera panned to the neighbors on the street, a small vigil forming. And something in him snapped.
It was off the corner of Hill and Bloom.
He knew that street—He knew it far too well. Jason could still hear the laughter from the barber shop and feel the cracks in the pavement beneath his old sneakers. It was only three blocks from where he used to live; three blocks from the boy he used to be.
He slammed the remote harder than necessary. It clattered across the floor, bouncing near the wall where a framed photo leaned face-down behind a duffel bag. He hadn’t picked it up in months. Couldn’t.
The news droned on in the background:
“...delayed police response...”
“...community outraged...”
Jason snorted.
He could already see the city’s future unfolding. In a week, this tragedy would be old news. In a month, it would be forgotten. And in a year, those candles in Park Row would go cold.
According to the report, the youngest daughter, Azarah, was his age; a young lady returning home after deployment overseas. Maybe he’d stood behind her in Mr. Assad’s corner store, the old man who traded bruised fruit for nickels and looked the other way when Jason slipped an extra into his jacket for his mom. Maybe he’d passed the girl on the sidewalk as she sang double-dutch songs with her sisters. Maybe he’d seen her wince when her mother braided her hair too tightly on the front steps of her apartment, gospel music drifting from an upstairs window. Maybe she’d smiled at him once. Or perhaps she was a stranger. It didn’t matter. A family was dead, end of story.
And Gotham had already decided who to blame.
The news rehearsed the same tired lines—poverty, culture, bad neighborhood, wrong choices. Wrong people. Funny how the city always pointed the finger everywhere except where it belonged. Jason knew the script better than anyone.
“We tried,” the mayor and the commissioners would say. “And that was all we could do.”
And the killer was already fading into the background, still walking free, still breathing. Still lucky.
Bullshit.
By the time the anchors pivoted to mayoral soundbites, Jason was already pulling himself together:
Gloves.
Jacket.
Holsters.
Helmet.
Then he took off into the night.
A cat lingered nearby.
Jason almost missed it at first: a small black shape crouched at the edge of the police lights, paws muddy, eyes glowing the bright yellow of alley-lamps, as if it had shown up early and stayed too long, waiting for someone who wasn’t coming back.
He knew the look.
Strays always recognized strays.
The Red Hood kept to the shadows, slipping past uniformed officers with the same ease he once used to slip away from social workers. He was careful not to disturb the chalk outlines or the bullet holes in the walls—places where lives were lost.
‘Three bodies here,’ he thought, ‘and one survivor. The kids’ probably still shivering somewhere, surrounded by a crowd of cops who don’t care. He combed the scene, absorbing every footprint, every dropped shell, every busted latch, every bruised apple that had rolled from the mother’s grocery bag. And he listened. He listened to the Police chatter on radios, neighbors murmuring into shaky microphones, and detectives comparing notes over coffee that long had gone stale.
He stole the report beside an investigator’s cup and memorized the timeline: The daughter’s frantic 911 call, the delayed response. There was so much dead time that the killer might as well have had an escort out.
“Traffic delays,” the report said, signed by Officer S. Banks. Partner: Officer L. Lindsey.
Sure, and Jason was Santa Claus.
But so one would dig. No one ever dug.
So Red Hood left the way he came, soundless, unseen. Though when he rounded the corner toward his ride, he caught a glint of yellow, two bright eyes perched atop a dumpster like some judgmental gargoyle with its tail curled around its paws, watching him.
He tracked the killer through Park Row, speeding through alleyways he knew too well, old brownstones, rusted swing sets. He passed the tenements where he’d once slept, his head buried beneath his jacket for warmth, and the community center with old, sunbleached signs advertising after-school tumbling programs, food drives, and drug awareness programs. Then he turned south into the Bowery, one of Gotham’s oldest districts, no better off than the Narrows or Park Row. It was probably worse.
The Bowery was haunted, or so people said. And honestly? Jason didn’t doubt it. Gotham had enough dead to populate ten afterlives. He knew all the stories: Jon Logerquist, the so-called founder, wandering alleys in search of his missing ledger; the Drowned Lady crying for her children along the riverbanks at dawn—the Ghost Witch who avenged the fallen and afraid. The people in the Bowery believed in them more than most.
“Suspect spotted at the ATM at Robbin’s General.” The chatter crackled in his comms.
“Getting sloppy, are we?” Red Hood muttered, taking a sharp left turn. Good.
Jason found him quickly, a tall man with pale, ruddy skin, thick brows, and a full beard in the sketch. His face was stern, lips drawn up into a scowl. He had the type of dead-eyed stare of a man with no regret. So Jason adjusted his stance, muscles drawing as he prepared to intercept—all before a cape sliced across his vision.
He ducked back into the shadows without thinking, jaw clenching behind his helmet.
Of course, right on time. Batman swoops in to ruin it.
The killer didn’t stand a chance.
Batman tore into him, and within seconds, the man was down. Bruised. Broken. Whimpering. Yet still breathing, always breathing.
“Justice,” Batman would call it. Jason had called it that once, too, back before he knew better. He imagined stepping from the shadows, imagining demanding real, true justice, demanding an end. He imagined grabbing Bruce by the collar and asking if he honestly believed this counted. A whole family was dead, and a teenage boy was the only person left behind—something needed to be done.
But then Batman turned toward the alleyway, toward him. It was a warning, or maybe even a dare. Jason narrowed his eyes. Bruce thought this—this—was enough. A beating. An arrest. Some paperwork and a trial that would drag on for months. And the worst part? Batman knew. Bruce understood the flaws in the justice system and knew of the festering corruption it cradled. Yet he continues this over and over—the same criminals, the same crimes, over and over.
But Jason wanted better for Gotham, even if it meant meeting crime where it was at, directing its flow, and reducing harm to ordinary people. But the system? This? It would fail every time.
This was nowhere near enough.
Not for the dead.
Not for the living.
Not for him.
He stepped back into the deeper dark before Batman could say anything stupid. Before Jason could say something worse.
He sped off into the night, the city blurring past him.
Behind him, yellow eyes gleamed once more from a rooftop, watching him like it wasn’t done with him yet.
The headlines rolled in:
“Son Speaks: ‘They Called My Family Criminals Before They Buried Them’”
“Bodies Missing From Morgue? Inside Gotham’s Failing Infrastructure”
“Audio of 911 Call Sparks Fury Across City”
“Ghost of Park Row: Locals Claim Sightings of Murdered Girl”
“Protesters Clash with GCPD Over Delayed Response to Park Row Slayings”
The city shouted, voices and fists raised, as people took to the streets in protests and riots — the language of the unheard. Those days bled into weeks as the formal indictment stalled not just once, not twice, but three times. It was a Classic Gotham move: run the clock, wait until no one’s looking, wait until new tragedies roll in. And of course, the villains obliged.
Scarecrow gassed the subway.
Freeze iced over a vault and half a city block.
Some Joker-wannabe poisoned a nightclub.
The Riddler popped up, vanished, and popped up again.
Costumed freaks ran around the city like they were running shifts. He had his own mess to deal with, too. The less publicized, the less sensational: New dealers who thought they’d try the school yards, Black Mask creeping up again. He had to manage a mob that secretly paid him, preparing to wage war over turf with a gang that secretly paid him. He was spreading himself thin.
Then, on a grey, rain-slicked morning, the new District Attorney stepped up to the podium, flashbulbs whitening her face behind circular glasses. She looked polished, rehearsed, like she’d practiced her speech while tying her ponytail that morning. He didn't bother to learn her name--there would be a new D.A. by Tuesday.
“Mr. Ashton Sower has been indicted on the following counts: Second-degree murder. Voluntary manslaughter. Aggravated assault. Reckless endangerment..."
She paused, cleared her throat—fake, Jason could tell—and continued:
“We want to assure the community that this office is pursuing the case with the utmost seriousness. We encourage patience and trust in the judicial process as we seek justice for all involved.” Then she stepped back. No questions taken.
Yeah, that was the script. Jason felt the disgust rise.
He knew the next steps. The judge would talk about mitigating factors. The public defender would talk about fear responses, as if a group of rowdy teenagers playing ball could scare a grown man into opening fire. But that’s what happens when you nickname a place ‘Crime Alley,’ you begin to see everyone there as criminals. But the courts would talk about overcharged counts. Everyone would talk. No one would listen.
Had the youngest daughter, Azarah, not been an active servicewoman, they wouldn’t even have considered the greater charges. 3 Counts of voluntary manslaughter and aggravated assault, that is how it would end. No one would talk about his failed stint in the Blüdhaven Police Academy or the disgusting person Sower was. Jason only learned as he cracked into networks he wasn’t supposed to access through backdoors and browsed unprotected shared drives.
But it didn’t take much to assemble the picture.
One year ago, Nightwing had blown open a corruption ring for the Police Force there: evidence theft, drug-running, extortion. They brought in some agents from Metropois to help “clean house.” People were indicted, and the academy tightened its standards. Sower didn’t survive the purge. He quit or flunked out, didn’t matter which. What mattered was the chip he carried back to Gotham City.
The story was leaked to Gotham One News and The Daily Plane (Jason had little faith in the Gotham Gazette). Denise Harlowe led a special report, and Lois Lane shredded him in print, but it didn’t matter. Sower still had friends in high places—friends who owed him favors.
Weeks dragged into months; hearing dates were postponed; arguments were delayed.
The seasons turned.
More costumed villains rose and fell.
And soon a whole year slipped by.
Voices fell quiet. But Jason didn’t forget; he couldn’t. He carried the memory like a weight inside him, one that made his finger twitch whenever he stopped at the corner of Hill and Broom and saw the vigil on the doorstep.
'Fine,' he thought, passing kids playing double-dutch amongst the fallen autumn leaves. If the judges and courthouses wouldn’t bury Sower, then the Red Hood would.
The days went on as usual. Riddler teased a blackout, Scarecrow vanished from Arkham’s high-security wing, a priceless painting disappeared from a judge’s private collection, but it all barely registered. Not until one morning, a quiet report slid between weather updates and insurance ads.
“-suspect found collapsed…”
The chyron crawled beneath her headshot:
SUSPECT IN PARK ROW SHOOTING HOSPITALIZED AFTER INCIDENT. NO SIGNS OF FOUL PLAY.
Ninety seconds, less time than they gave traffic reports. It wasn’t until later that the updates trickled in: that morning, Sower was found sprawled on the concrete of his holding cell: No bruises, no wounds, no swelling, no poison, no contraband hidden in the vents. His eyes were shot wide open—too open—like he’d seen something he shouldn’t have. He’d been whispering to himself, “Judgment day… Day of wrath… day of wrath…” Over and over again.
Jason leaned back in his chair, mind racing.
CT scan: clear.
MRI: clean.
Toxicology: negative.
Cardiac: elevated to hell.
The news called it 'guilt-induced', others said it was 'psychosomatic', or whatever phrase they could come up with. But Jason knew better.
Scarecrow had escaped that same week. And Jason didn’t believe in coincidences, even if this wasn’t Crane’s usual style. Jonathan Crane liked crowds, chaos, the grand theater of it all. So what the hell was this? A new toxin? Something subtle? Targeted? Why Sower? Why only Sower? Jason felt the puzzle piece click; he’d always loved a mystery.
So he grabbed his jacket, holstered his guns, and snapped on his helmet.
It was time to pick up Crane’s trail.
Last known location.
Jason reached Arkham just after midnight.
The place always felt wrong to him, as if the air itself were sick. The gates loomed over the hillside, half-swallowed in shadows, bursting up through the stone like a living thing. He parked his motorcycle down the embankment, out of view of security cameras or anyone who happened by. Gravel crunched under his boots as he headed toward the gate that still leaned to the side. There was a hole busted in the center from the last Killer Croc escape, the poles jutting to the side like a cracked ribcage. That was when he saw it, the black cat. Small with glowing yellow eyes, like lanterns. It sat just outside the reach of the security light, watching him like it had a report to file. Jason stopped.
“You one of Kyle’s?” he muttered, feeling ridiculous for talking to an animal, then even more ridiculous when it seemed to tilt its head like it was answering. But before he could get closer, the cat darted away, its body swallowed by the dark. And then a voice cut through the fog.
“Jason.”
He didn’t turn right away, giving himself a full second to roll his eyes as hard as he wanted. He’d been hoping, praying, even, that Bruce would be busy breaking some supervillain’s kneecaps in the financial district or running one of his Gotham-wide sweeps. But no. He got Batman standing in the shadows, trying too hard to be dramatic.
“Look what the cat dragged in."
“I heard your engine from a mile away.” It was a neutral statement. Jason didn't trust neutrality.
“Congrats. Want a medal?”
“That isn’t what I meant.”
Jason braced for the lecture, the chastisement, the 'holier-than-thou' moral speech of the evening-
“I thought we could work this case together.”
Jason’s breath caught in the back of his throat, but he got himself together quickly.
“Oh, that’s rich. You’ve got to be kidding me.” As soon as the words left him, he regretted how sharp they sounded. But that was Jason’s curse--he felt everything too deeply.
“Crane escaped for seventy-two hours,” Batman said. “Then returned to his cell without being seen.” He paused, as if he were waiting for Jason to interrupt. Bruce continued when it was clear he was listening. “I knew you’d be following the case. I want to know what Scarecrow is up to.” He said it so plainly, like it was a fact of nature. Like Jason was predictable, like he still… knew him. Jason swallowed something bitter. He knew what this was supposed to be—an olive branch, an 'I’m reaching out' moment. Some ‘let’s-get-the-band-back-together’ moment that Jason didn’t want and certainly didn’t need.
But the case…
The case mattered, and Crane's return to his cell changed everything.
Jason sucked his teeth.
“Fine,” he muttered. “But only for now.”
Batman didn’t smile, but Jason saw the micro-shift in his shoulders, a drop of weight he hadn’t even realized Bruce had been carrying until it was gone. Jason looked away quickly. He didn’t want to see that, didn’t want to feel whatever stirred inside him.
They entered Arkham through a back entrance Jason knew wasn’t on any official blueprint, behind dead shrubs and an old maintenance shack with rusted hinges and a handle that hadn’t worked since the 80s.
“Check the security footage,” Batman said. “I’ll-”
“Yeah, yeah. I know what to do.” Jason was already turning down the opposite hall, boots silent on sterile white tile. He hated how natural this felt; This wordless choreography, this split-second division of labor, they hadn’t practiced in years but remembered perfectly. Worst of all? He hated not being in the room to watch Batman interrogate Crane, and he hated that he cared.
Jason forced the thoughts back, shoved them into the same internal cabinet to be locked away and never confronted. 'Focus,' he told himself. 'Footage. Crane.' He pushed into the security room, and the guard nearly dropped his coffee at the sight of him. Jason barely had to flash the pistol for the man to comply; the fear did most of the work.
“E–everything’s there,” the guard stammered. “Past seventy-two hours are archived locally.”
“Great,” Jason patted his shoulder before shoving him off the chair. “Move.” His fingers moved automatically, tapping keys, switching feeds, pulling files. He could almost hear Bruce’s voice in his head, like he was still a kid detective just starting out. He really hated that, too.
“Cross-reference timestamps first.”
“Don’t rush.”
“Patterns matter more than anomalies.”
Jason grit his teeth and shoved the echo aside. Again.
Static.
Hallway.
Guard rotation.
Static again.
He paged through the camera feeds until he found what he wanted:
Cell E 10
Dr. Jonathan Crane. Scarecrow.
Batman appeared in the grainy footage, standing before Scarecrow’s reinforced cell. Jason dialed up the audio, the static crackling like it was trying to warn him.
“...Tell me what you did in those seventy-two hours.”
Crane was seated on the floor, burlap mask hanging beside him like shed skin. His real face was worse, sharp and hollow, skin-and-bones with opinions.
When he opened his mouth, his voice silthered out.
“Fear,” Crane murmured, “has many disciples.”
“You didn’t leave the building." Batman pressed on, "You didn’t trip sensors. You didn’t appear on any exit cameras. How?”
Crane tilted his head with unsettling gentleness.
“I did not leave Arkham. I was removed from it. There is a difference, Batman.” Batman didn’t react, not outwardly, but Jason knew that microscopic shift of his shoulders. He was waiting for more.
“Who took you?”
Crane’s smile sharpened.
“A student...A disciple,” Crane whispered, eyes glowing with manic pride.“Curious...determined...Terribly quiet...My disciple learned everything I could teach, then returned me here.” Crane went on, almost wistful. Jason leaned back on the chair, rubbing his knuckles against the underside of his jaw. Great. Just great. Just what Gotham needed, a fan, someone else inspired by Crane with a flair for theatrics.
“What did this 'disciple' want, exactly?” Bruce asked.
Crane gave a low, delighted hum.
“I was asked what fear can accomplish in a world that refuses to change. I merely shared my...expertise.”
“What did you tell them?” Batman demanded. Crane leaned forward, bones jutting under thin skin.
“What do I always tell my students?” he whispered. “Fear is a language. And this student... was fluent before they ever laid eyes on me.”
Batman’s fist curled at his side.
“Where are they now?” he asked. Crane leaned back, eyes half-lidded in satisfaction.
“I would very much like to know that as well.”
Jason hissed through his teeth. Crane had a way of letting you know when he was done talking. Jason knew what would happen next: Batman would ask for this 'disciple's' name, maybe what they looked like. But Crane wouldn't tell. If they were smart, and Jason thought they were to pull off a heist like this, they would have worn a mask, disguised their voice, and kept the room dark. He knew the type. So he rewound the footage.
8 hours, 24…48…72…Fast-forward, pause, enhance. Crane sat cross-legged in the center of the cell, staring at the wall. And then, a shadow slipped across the corner of the screen. Small. Quick. He slowed the playback to quarter-speed. Another shadow followed, bigger, maybe the size of a person, maybe not. The image warped at the edges, and Jason leaned in until his forehead almost touched the monitor.
“…Come on…” he muttered. “Give me something.”
The shadows circled Crane, once, twice, like animals testing boundaries. And then Crane simply… vanished. Gone. Just…gone.
“No. No way. Back it up.”
He dragged the slider again, frame by agonizing frame. There. A glint, barely anything at all. It might have been a glitch, or a refraction of light on the tray Crane may have had in his cell. But Jason enhanced it anyway.
Eyes? Two reflective eyes, he was sure. Animal eyes, staring straight up into the lens.
“…What the hell…” Jason sat back, heart pounding. He couldn't be sure, but when the figure passed over the light, it resembled the head of a cat...a little black cat.
Jason didn’t wait for Batman to finish the interrogation. He didn’t wait to regroup, or for the heavy silence Bruce always gave him when the puzzle pieces didn’t line up neatly. He yanked the drive from the console, pocketed it, and turned toward the service exit. He refused to look over his shoulder.
“Here, kitty, kitty,” he called, clicking his tongue, waving around some jerky in his pocket, but to no avail. There was no sign of the cat anymore. It was gone.
They found Officer Banks just before dawn, an ambulance that arrived too late, police tape flickering under streetlights. Banks lay sprawled out in the hallway of his apartment, badge glinting beside him. His eyes were wide open—too open—fixed on something skyward that no one else could see. His partner knelt beside him, shaking, trying to close the man’s eyelids, but they refused to stay shut.
Jason reached the scene before the sun did. He didn’t need confirmation; the radio chatter told him enough.
“Officer Banks… collapsed…”
“…muttering incoherently…”
“…eyes wide… unresponsive…”
'Same as Sower. ' Jason wasn’t naïve enough to pretend Bruce couldn’t pull the same data from Arkham’s servers that Jason now had in his pocket. Stolen drive or not, Bruce had his backdoors, his little “just in cases” Jason could practically hear him in that gravelly deep Batman voice he always put on:
“I anticipated this.”
“I backed it up elsewhere.”
“I knew you’d take it.”
"Blah blah blah blah."
Jason didn’t need to worry about him connecting the dots. He needed to worry about getting there first. And Officer Lindsey was next. Had to be.
He and Banks both arrived late; they filed the report together.
But there was another thread, one more urgent in Jason's mind--Cameron, the surviving brother. The poor kid's life was put under scrutiny, from the report of his supposed gang activity to Sower’s testimony about his friends tossing the basketball into the street to stop his truck so they could rob it. If Jason were a betting man — and he was — the kid would be suspect number one on everyone’s list. And Jason didn't want to see another tragedy, one where everyone would blame the wrong person. Not again. Not ever. The kid is living with grandparents in The Hill now, preparing to move to Chicago as soon as the trial wraps. If the trial wraps up. No one knows if Sower would ever shake whatever came over him.
He needed to find the real culprit to clear Cameron's name.
So Jason set some traps and perched on a fire escape across the street from Lindsey's squat apartment complex, a tired little building sandwiched between two slightly taller ones. And Jason waited. And waited. And waited. Nothing moved except the occasional drunk and the sway of a lonely plastic bag trying to escape the city.
He didn’t mind the waiting, except that waiting meant thinking, and his mind drifted back to the Outlaws, to the overturned photo near the wall. The quiet moments with Artemis, the fun he had with Bizarro, the nights they felt like something close to a family. But people always found their way out of Jason Todd’s orbit eventually.
By 2 a.m., something in the air shifted, a tiny, nearly imperceptible change that set his soul ablaze. What was that? Then, at 2:03 a.m., a ripple of movement caught his eye: a figure slipping down the alley beside the complex, a dark hood pulled over their head. And there, trotting just behind them, a cat. The cat. The figure ran toward the building, evading patrol cars as if they memorized their routes. Not an amateur, then, Jason realized. Someone trained. But then the cat paused mid-stride and turned its head upward, yellow eyes flashing like twin candles in the dark. Up toward him—no—right at him.
Jason’s breath hitched. The cat blinked once, then turned to follow its master. And then that's when Jason saw it, the thing that made his soul burn. The cloaked figure reached the wall of the apartment building and walked straight through it. Jason blinked once, twice, and leaned closer over the edge.
Magic.
“…Well, god damn.” Despite the shock, Jason didn’t hesitate. He vaulted off the roof, boots scraping brick as he aimed for Lindsey’s window. The officer snored loudly, his bedroom door locked tight, believing that would keep him safe. He lifted the frame and hit the floor of Lindsey’s living room silently, tucking into the shadows moments before the figure emerged through the doorway like mist. The figure glided across the floor, careful not to make a sound, before it paused. They stood without moving for a long time, as if trying to sense his presence. Jason remained quiet; however, he didn’t even dare to breathe. And the figure relented. They knelt and reached into their cloak. The suite beneath was dark, lined with gold, Kevlar, and dyed leather pouches. They brushed fingertips over the floorboards and lines followed, glowing lines, curling, arcing, intersecting. Definitely magic. He knew it with every fiber of his being, the extra senses that the All-Caste drilled into him. No wonder there had been nothing left behind. There was nothing to trace.
Jason slid his gun from its holster, then, finger steady on the frame. He could end this, apprehend the true culprit, get some answers, and clear Cameron’s name. Even if he agreed with going after these creeps, a kid's life was on the line. But life is never that easy. Just as it always does, the universe decided to spite him.
The cat, that damn cat, strutted toward him, tail curled high, paws silent on the floor.
“Don’t you dare,” he mouthed, but to no avail. The cat tilted its head, considered him for a moment, and then it meowed—treacherous little shit.
Across the room, the cloaked figure froze. Their head snapped up, face still obscured by the shadow of their hood, but their eyes were just like the cats, glowing like candles in the dark.
“…Son of a-” Jason hissed, moving before the words fully formed. He burst from cover in a single fluid motion, his gun raised. The cat darted aside as Jason lunged.
“Don’t move,” he warned. The figure straightened slowly, hand lifting, and a staff appeared in their grip as though summoned from nothing. Sigils crawled along the twisted wood. An amber gem sat like a crown atop it, between two branches that curled like crescent moons. It might have been a heart, had they reached closer.
—magic weapon, glowing magic circle on the floor, stepping through walls.
‘This is way above my pay grade,’ he thought. 'Oh wait,'
The figure stood their ground. Maybe stepping through walls drained them, Jason thought. The symbols probably mattered, or maybe they were just looking for a fight. Either way, Jason had a choice to make. They were magic; maybe it ran in their blood, or maybe they just had an old relic. He could summon the All-Blades and let things get ugly. Or he could try to figure this out. He was only here to clear a name, after all.
“Just listen,” he said, lower now. “I don’t want to shoot you. I’m trying to help.” The figure didn't move, and the sigil still glowed upon the wood of the staff.
“...who are you?” The figure (a girl?) tilted their head beneath the hood, as if she were considering more than his words.
“Hey, that’s what I came to ask you.” He speaks in a harsh whisper. “There are tons of people who want your head. I’m probably the only one who isn’t ready to throw you in a cell without getting answers first. But there's a kid's name I need to clear, and you're the only person who can do that.” If this is the same person who took Crane, this was also the person who put him back. Maybe they weren't a complete nut. “I can see what you're doing. I get it-”
“Is that so?” The figure stepped forward, into the faint halo of a streetlight beyond the window. She didn’t lower the staff, so his gun stayed trained. They were at a deadlock.
“Easy,” Jason said, though he knew how it sounded, controlled, not nearly as reassuring as he wanted it to be. “You take one more step, and this gets ugly.” The figure let out a scoff.
“You’ve already chosen ugly,” She said quietly, eyes flickering to the gun, back to his stance.
“Funny,” Jason shot back. “I was gonna say the same about the glowing stick.”
Something brushed his boot. Jason glanced down just in time to see the black cat curl around his ankle, tail flicking lazily like it wasn’t standing in the middle of a tense standoff. Its yellow eyes lifted to him, unblinking. The figure followed its movement and then she hummed, as if she’d found the answer to the daily crossword puzzle.
“Are you a witch?”
Jason blinked.
“A what?” The tension wavered for just a moment...and then the window exploded inward. The figure spun as Batman landed between them, boots cracking tile.
“Oh, hell no,” Jason growled. "What are you doing here?" The figure’s shoulders squared. Her stance shifted.
Jason knew what they were thinking. That Batman was his backup, that he set this up. She was now on the defensive.
The figure thrust the staff toward Lindsey’s bedroom door and slammed its base against the floor, and the magic circle spread outward. Light arced across the doorway like fractures in a glass, light spilling from the seams; the wall groaned. Jason dove backward as the blast ripped through the room, shredding drywall and sending splinters flying.
“ROBIN—” Batman shouted. And for a moment, Jason thought he meant him. But Bruce was already moving backward as a streak of red, black, and yellow burst onto the scene. Tim Drake, the third Robin, there to help Lindsey and ensure his safety. He knew how it went.
“Son of a—!” Jason rolled, hit his feet, and lunged for the window. Because the figure didn’t wait to see the damage, she vaulted for the window, cloak fluttering behind her like wings. Jason launched himself after her: out the window, across the fire escape, to the roof on the other side. Jason hit hard, rolled, and came up sprinting. Batman was already there, right behind him.
Of course he was.
“Stay out of this,” Jason snapped as they tore across the rooftops.
“They're escalating,” Batman shot back. “Two officers down. More endangered. This isn’t your call.”
“It’s my case.”
Batman didn’t slow.
“You’re too close to this.” The words weren’t sharp. He stated it as if it were a fact.
“You think I’m compromised." Batman didn’t answer, but that silence said enough. Jason’s teeth ground together. Fine. If Bruce wanted to play interference...
Jason reached for a switch in his pocket as he landed on the next roof. A snare line whipped out, arcing wide, not at the woman, but across Batman’s trajectory. Bruce twisted midair, cape snagging just enough to throw his momentum, but the bolas caught around his legs.
“What are you doing?” Batman demanded.
“Running my case,” Jason shot back.
Up ahead, the woman glanced over her shoulder, realized the chaos wasn’t aimed at her, and vaulted over another firescape, flipping onto the next rooftop with practiced ease.
'She’s trained.' Jason felt the pieces of the puzzle sliding together. But not trained enough. There’s another trap waiting, a wire at her feet. She tripped, but phased her body through the net that launched toward her. Yet that distraction was enough. Jason lunged forward, able to catch up with her, and they collided near the roof’s edge. Too close for spells. But she fought, and she moved like a soldier; tight strikes, knowing where to put her weight, how to break a grip. She swept his legs, and he jumped over it. He hooked her wrist, she twisted free, and slammed the butt of the conjured staff into his ribs. He grunted and closed the distance anyway, dodging an elbow to the throat as he grabbed her cloak and wrenched it back.
The hood tore back, and he saw half her face; young, sweat-slicked hair clinging to her temple. The bottom half hid behind a mask.
She gasped and slammed the staff into his ribs, creating distance enough to raise her staff again. Magic circles projected between them, and a streak of light blasted from the center, willed into being by the glowing script. But he was ready.
The All-Blades formed into existence in his hands, white-hot and burning. When he crossed them, the magic split apart like fabric under shears. The impact still threw him back a step, his boots skid along the gravel—but he stayed upright.
"What? How"
“Yeah,” Jason mocked, “you’re not the only one with tricks.”
“So you are a witch,” she grunted.
This again?
“What are you talking about?”
Her gaze flicked to the All-Blades, then back to him.
“…You’ve been dead before, too? What else could you be?” The city fell away. The noise. The chase. Everything narrowed to the space between them—the impossible glow in her eyes, the sheer audacity of what she’d said. He forced out a slow breath.
“Who are you?” He asked, but her eyes flicked past him. Batman was closing in quickly, so she turned to run. Her figure darted over the ledge, across to a ladder, and down into the alley below. Jason followed, but something scrawled across the wall pulsed, a shape rising in lines of gold. It shimmered, rippled, and bent the shadows around her; it was as if that darkness swallowed her whole. One moment she stood there, and the next she was gone.
“What happened?” Bruce moved closer. “What was that?”
Oh, he knew that tone. The 'You failed me tone.' The one that made his teeth grind. Jason turned slowly.
“Did you miss the part where she melted into fucking shadow realm?” Jason answered through clenched teeth. “What was the plan, huh? You got any advice there? Any Bat-tech for grabbing ghosts?” Batman’s cape rippled like a living thing, and the air grew thick. Jason felt the old fight rising.
“That isn’t what I mean.” He stated, and Jason understood then. He's seen Jason summon a flaming sword, saw him cut through a spell fired his way.
‘Magic is unpredictable and dangerous,’ Bruce said many years ago. He said the same thing about Jason. He'd say it again now.
“I don’t know what you mean.” He lied. The silence stretched on, growing tense. Then, mercifully, annoyingly, a blur of motion dropped between them. Of course. Of fucking course. Tim’s eyes were wide beneath his mask, already calculating the distance Jason would have to fly if Bruce decided to throw him out into the traffic.
“Okay,” Tim said, hands raised like a referee at a heavyweight match. “Time-out. Everybody take a breath before someone gets concussed.” Batman didn’t move. Jason didn’t blink. The tension sat between them like the loaded chamber of a gun.
But Jason was already done.
“You don’t get to run this,” His voice shook with restrained fury. “You don’t get to decide what I’m compromised by.”
“This situation has evolved-,” But Jason was already moving. He stalked past Tim, boots hitting pavement with deliberate, angry rhythm. He didn’t bother staying for the debrief. He didn’t need Bruce’s theories or his fears about magic or anything else. He had his own hunt now.
He walked off into the night. Sirens wailed somewhere distant, a drunken man yelled at a lamppost, a subway rattled under the pavement like a restless beast, the old Gotham symphony.
And perched atop a dented dumpster, framed in the weak glow of a flickering streetlight, sat the damn cat. It didn’t even try to hide.
Jason slowed as he passed, boots crunching over broken glass. Their eyes met as Jason stopped.
“Yeah,” he muttered. “I know your secret now.”
The cat tilted its head in a smooth, deliberate motion, almost like it was answering.
And I know yours.
Jason snorted.
“Yeah, well. Keep it to yourself.”
The cat began to follow him home.