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sarahjtv · 4 years ago

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BNHA Chapter 310 Spoiler Thoughts: “The First and Second Holders”

Some fan translations are out and it’s time to flex some thoughts out again! I couldn’t do them last night because I didn’t have all the scan images with me and I didn’t want to jump the gun with only text descriptions. Anyway, this was mainly an exposition chapter that properly introduces us to the second and third OFA Holders, especially the 2nd and what his relationship to the 1st is. This might not be as long as others “Spoiler Thoughts” I’ve written, but let’s see:

First off, we have a colored cover page by Horikoshi-sensei himself! It’s a solo page featuring Vigilante Deku and he looks badass! Deku looks ready to kick ass and take names. And, his Mid-Gauntlet is colored red like a lot of us thought and it adds to the theory that Melissa Shield did create it like she did with Deku’s Full-Gauntlet back in Two Heroes.

The chapter starts in a dark and rainy night. A large woman (she’s like maybe 10ft tall; she’s taller than All Might who I think is 7ft) with a mutant-type quirk who’s getting attacked by some civilians because they think she’s a villain. Deku jumps in to stop the attacks and the woman explains that she was just trying to go to one of the evacuation centers at a hero school. Deku is kind enough to give her her umbrella back and reassure her that things will be ok.

I gotta say that this whole situation is scarily close to real life right now. I don’t like getting too political, but we live in a scary world where discrimination is, unfortunately, alive and well... If you are a POC, you can be attacked from anywhere with the only reason being that “you’re a danger because of the skin you were born with”. It’s horrific, it’s disgusting, and it’s been around for a long time. Even in the BNHA universe, there used to be cults solely dedicated to discriminating against mutant-type people (we learned this back in the My Villain Academia Arc). So, like in the real world, this problem has risen again. Thankfully, there are people like Deku and All Might who are more than willing to help someone in need regardless of who they are. BNHA hits too close to home sometimes.

Anyway, going back to the BNHA story. Before All Might leaves to help the woman in his Batmobile, he hands Deku some Pork Katsu in a cute bento box wrapped in a bunny cloth! Deku is visibly happy and thanks All Might for the meal. This is so cute! I’m so glad to see that All Might is making sure that Deku is being properly taken care of. Boy needs to eat if he’s going to save the world. I’m also glad that Deku can still show signs of happiness despite, well, everything. I swear, if All Might doesn’t legally adopt Deku as his son by the time this series is over, I’m going to jump into this manga and force him to sign those documents myself.

The next panel shows Deku standing on what looks like Tokyo’s famous Sky Tree (or Sky Egg if we’re going off what Vigilantes showed us). He’s back to talking to the OFA Holders like they’re angels on his shoulders. Banjo talks about how it’s like the world’s reverted back in time when things were worse and Deku responds that if he doesn’t use all of OFA’s power, he’ll never be able to defeat Shigaraki and AFO. I know we’re in the final act, so Deku’s gotta get to 100% fast if he wants to win this war. Last we checked, he was at 45%, but he might be at a higher percentage now since he’s unlocked En’s Smokescreen. Also, Deku’s looking more and more like Batman each chapter and I gotta say that it really suits him.

Back to the Vestige Dream back when Deku was still in a coma after the war. The 1st Holder begs the 2nd and 3rd to corporate with him so that they can provide their power to Deku. The 1st calls the 2nd and 3rd “My Heroes” which causes some awkward silence lol. Neither one is responding, so Banjo breaks the silence by suggesting that Deku learn everyone’s Quirks so that he’ll get used to them once he starts using them. We learn why the 2nd and 3rd are the 1st’s heroes soon, but it’s actually a good idea for Deku to learn about all these different Quirks while he’s sleeping so that he’ll get a good idea on how to execute them when he wakes up. It’s kind of a way of training for Deku just without actually using the Quirks themselves.

The 3rd Holder (the one with the spiky ponytail and headband) starts to talk. He says that the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd came from the “Harshest era of history”. It was a time where AFO ruled all and peaked in power and control. He was going to take over the whole world if the first 3 Holders didn’t step in to stop him. My guess is that after AFO was defeated for the first time, society started to calm down and become more or less the world we knew before the War Arc. So, things weren’t as bad during the 4th Holder’s era and so forth. This would explain why Shinomori was able to hide in the forest for so long without being detected.

And now the big part of the chapter: the 2nd Holder. Who does in fact look A LOT like Bakugo. Big difference is that he has a massive scar across his face. I am aware of the whole “time travel” theory that people have going on with Bakugo and this dude, but I’m not on that train. Instead, I think that the 2nd Holder is one of Bakugo’s ancestors. Like, a really, really-great-grandfather. Horikoshi doesn’t just design his characters for no reason. The fact that the 2nd user looks so much like Bakugo, has a costume similar to Bakugo’s, and that future panels in this chapter straight up parallel that iconic scene with young Bakugo and Deku in the river only add fuel to this fire. Unless Horikoshi says otherwise, this is the theory I’m sticking to: this “Ancestor” theory.

And we know of the 1st user’s real name now too, which is Yoichi! If Horikoshi is keeping up with the “numbers in names” theme, then I’m positive that Yochi has the kanji for “One” somewhere in it. And, if we’re going to believe AFO at all, then that means that the 1st user’s full name is Yoichi Shigaraki. We don’t know AFO’s full name yet. But, again, AFO could be lying with his last name, so I’m taking this one with a grain of salt.

Back to the 2nd Holder, he tells Yoichi that a lot of lives were sacrificed in order to stop AFO back then. He believes that there is only victory or defeat in battle; that there’s no hope of saving their archenemy. He has doubt about putting his faith in Deku because of this. Given how the 3rd Holder still has his back turned too, I’m lead to believe that he also thinks Deku is crazy for wanting to save Shigaraki. I don’t exactly blame them. Really, none of us know if Deku will be successful in saving Shigaraki. He might have to kill him in the end. I think they should offer Deku help, but I don’t blame them for being at least a little skeptical.

But, Yoichi reminds the 2nd and 3rd users that they saved Yoichi back when AFO locked him up to die. They found Yoichi with the intention to kill him it seems, but the 2nd Holder showed sympathy for Yoichi and lent him a helping hand despite Yoichi being AFO’s little brother. This is the parallel panel I was talking about. Yoichi is kneeling down on the floor and the 2nd user is standing up extending his hand to help Yoichi. I don’t even need to look back in the manga to know what inspired this. Hell, I don’t even need to tell you! We all know what Horikoshi was doing when he drew and wrote this.

Yoichi convinces him that he should believe in Deku as Yoichi does think Deku will save the day. If the 2nd user didn’t extend his hand to help Yoichi, OFA wouldn’t have begun. I think that the trust between these two is ultimately the reason why the 2nd user finally agreed to help Deku; the same with the 3rd user too. And, kind of a tangent, but I really like how Horikoshi draws Yoichi and the 2nd user’s hands as they’re reaching for each other. Horikoshi has always been really good with drawing hands like they’re facial expressions (something my ass could never do 😭) and this one shows kindness and empathy. It’s almost like what would’ve happened if Bakugo accepted Deku’s hand for help when they were young instead of letting his pride and ego get in the way. Oh, the parallels!

Finally, the 2nd user speaks in present day telling Deku that they’re going full speed ahead now. My guess is that Deku’s going to have to improve on OFA and the rest of his Quirks quickly in order to find and beat the LoV. We are in the Final Act after all. The chapter ends at a good place if we want to switch to the UA kids, which is honestly what I’m hoping for. Again, I love Deku and his Vigilante adventures, but I miss the rest of the kids. The new BNHA Exhibition in Japan apparently has a giant drawing of the main class, All Might, Aizawa, and Shinso in his new hero costume! Which tells me that 1. Shinso probably took Deku’s place in the class for the time being, and 2. We’re definitely going to see the other kids again. I’m hoping soon. But, I wouldn’t be surprised if Horikoshi decided to continue focusing on Deku’s Vigilanteism and have him practice with he 2nd and 3rd Holder’s Quirks now that they’re working with him. We’ll just have to see.

So, that’s it! Solid chapter overall. I’m glad we finally got to see the 3rd and 2nd Holder’s faces. I think the “Kirishima is the 3rd Holder” theroy has been debunked at this point, but I’m still on the “2nd Holder is Bakugo’s ancestor” train. The similarities and parallels are too strong for me to deny it. Horikoshi-sensei, please confirm or deny soon 🙏. We are getting break next week for Golden Week BTW! All of Shonen Jump is actually, so no One Piece or JJK either (I’m not sure about Jump+, so we might still be getting some Spy X Family for example). So, basically all our favorite mangakas are getting a well-deserved break as they should! I hope they enjoy their vacation! Waiting’s going to suck tho, I’m ngl about that... Oh well, I’m willing to take the sacrifice if it means having healthy mangka. Thankfully, we still have the anime and the new exhibition to tide us over until then.

Edit: OR NOT SINCE THE EXHIBITION IS TEMPORARILY CLOSED BECAUSE OF A CERTAIN PANDEMIC GOING NUTS IN JAPAN AFTER ONLY BEING OPEN FOR 2 DAYS 😭

Edit: I went back to re-read the chapter and I completely missed the date for the next chapter (chapter 311) which is set to release on May 9th! So, we’re actually getting a 2 week break instead. Damn... Sucks for us, but it’s good for mangaka to get breaks when they can especially considering their absolutely insane schedule.

Me reading this chapter:

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davidmann95 · 4 years ago

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How about those JL storyboards?

In case you haven’t heard, Zack Snyder is putting on display the ‘storyboards’ - i.e. a rough plot summary accompanied by some Jim Lee sketches - for what would have been Justice League 2 and 3, or as this puts it 2 and ‘2A’. You can see them here (I imagine better-quality versions will soon be released), and read a transcript here. This is evidently a very early version: this was apparently pitched prior to the release of BvS and Justice League being rewritten in the wake of it, with numerous plot details that now don’t line up with what we know about the Snyder Cut, plus it outright mentions it builds on the originally planned versions of the Batman and Flash movies. But it’s a broad outline of what was gonna go down, and while I initially thought it was Snyder throwing in the towel, the timing - paired with the ambiguity left by the necessity for changes, including that this doesn’t factor whatever that “massive cliffhanger” at the end of the Cut is - says to me he’s hoping this’ll be a force multiplier behind efforts to will sequel/s into existence. He’s probably right.

I’ll be discussing spoilers below, but in short: with this Zack Snyder has finally lived up to Alan Moore, in that like Twilight of the Superheroes I wouldn’t believe this was real as opposed to a shockingly on-point parody if not for direct, irrefutable evidence.

Doing some rapid-fire bullet points for this baby to kick us off:

* Folks who know the subject say a lot of this is a yet further continuation of Snyder doing Arthuriana fanfic with the League reskinned over those major players, and I’ll take their word for it.

* I don’t know whether I love or hate that in Justice League 2 the Justice League are only an extant thing for the first scene, and then it’s Snyder giving everybody their own mini-movies. It’s compressing the entire MCU “loosely interconnected solo stories leading to a single big movie later” strategy into a single movie!

* Funniest line in the whole thing: "Even Lantern has heard of the Kryptonian, worried that he's under the control of Darkseid. He heard his spirit was unbreakable." Hal what fuckin' Superman movie did YOU watch? Second funniest being “IT WILL GIVE HIM POWER OVER ALL LIVING LIFE”

* 90% of the plot I have nothing to say about, it’s generic stage-setting crap. That to be clear is the ‘shocked it’s Snyder’ element, it feels so crassly commercial in a way I can’t believe is coming from the BvS guy.

* Most of what I have to say is unsurprisingly gonna be about a handful of characters but Cyborg’s happy ending being “he isn’t visibly disabled anymore!” is not great!

* The Goddess of War battle with Superman...never pays off? No clue why it’s there.

* What I’d originally heard was that the Codex in Superman’s blood was the last key to the Anti-Life Equation and that’s why Darkseid was coming to Earth. It’s not like all of this wouldn’t have already been averted by Kal-El’s pod smacking into an asteroid on the way to Earth so it’s not as if this makes it any more Superman’s fault, and it would have at least tied all this back to the beginning of the movies, but I suppose that was either fake or from a later draft.

* I have NO idea how this was reimagined without the ‘love triangle’, it’s the central character thing and the entire climax flows directly out of it!

* Darkseid’s kinda a chump in this, huh

Anonymous said: So: Does Zack Snyder hate Superman?

Look: the hilarity of this when Cuck Kent has been a go-to Snyder cult insult towards ‘inferior’ takes on Superman for years cannot be understated, yet at the same time I can almost wrap my brain around where Snyder’s coming from with that as the end for his take on the character. He talked in that Variety piece on how his interest in Superman is informed by having adopted children himself, and Deborah Snyder is the stepmother to his kids by previous relationships, so I can see where he’d be coming from, and I can even imagine how he’d see this as ‘rhyming’ in the sense of “the series begins with Kal-El being adopted by Earth, it ends with him adopting a child of Earth!” In the same way as MARTHA, I can envision how he would put these pieces together in his head thematically without registering or caring what the end result would actually look like. In this case, Superman raising the kid of the man who beat the shit out of him who Batman had with Clark’s wife, who earlier told Bruce she was staying with Clark because he ‘needed her’, suggesting if inadvertently that this really honest to god was a “she’s only staying with Superman out of pity, she really loved Batman more” thing.

But Clark is nothing in this. He’s sad and existential because of coming back from the dead I guess, then he’s corrupted, then time’s undone and he woo-rah rallies the collective armies of the world (interesting angle for the ‘anti-military/anti-establishment’ Superman he’s talked up as) as his big heroic moment in the finale, and then he stops being sad because he’s adopting a kid. So his big much-ballyhooed, extremely necessary five-movie character arc towards truly becoming Superman was:

Sad weird kid -> sad weird kid learns he’s an alien, is still weird and sad, maybe he shouldn’t save people because things could go really wrong? -> his dad is so convinced it could go wrong he lets himself die -> ????? -> Clark is saving people anyway -> learns his origin, gets an inspiring speech about being a bridge between worlds and a costume -> becomes superman (not Superman, that’s later) to save the world, albeit a very property-damagey version, rejects his heritage he just learned about and space dad’s bridge idea -> folks hate him being superman and that sucks though at least he’s got a girlfriend now -> things go so wrong he considers not being superman but his ghost dad reminds him shit always goes wrong so he should be good anyway, which sorta feels like it contradicts his previous advice -> immediate renewed goodness is out the window as he’s blackmailed into having to try and kill a dude but the dude happens to coincidentally have some things in common so they don’t kill each other after all -> big monster now but superman keeps supermaning at it because he loves his girlfriend and he dies -> he’s brought back, wears black which apparently means now he likes Krypton again? -> he has work friends now but he’s still sad because he was dead -> evil now! -> wait nevermind time travel -> rallies the troops -> his wife’s having a kid so he’s not sad anymore -> Superman! Who gives way to more Batman.

Do I think Zack Snyder is lying when he says he likes Superman? No. I think he sincerely finds much of the basic conceits and imagery engaging. But I don’t think he meaningfully gives shit about Clark as a character, just a vessel for Big Iconic Beats he wants to hit. Whereas while for instance he’s critical of Batman as an idea (at least up to a point), he’s much more passionately, directly enamored with him as a presence and personality. So while Superman may be the character whose ostensible myth cycle or arc or however it’s spun might be propelling a lot of events here, it’s a distant appreciation - of course the other guy takes over and subsumes him into his own narrative. Of course Batman is the savior, the past and the future (though if he’s supposed to be Batman’s kid raised by Superman there’s no excuse for him not to be Nightwing), the tragic martyr to our potential. Admittedly the implication here is also that Batman can apparently only REALLY with his whole heart be willing to sacrifice his life to save an innocent, for that matter apparently his great love, once said innocent is a receptacle for his Bat-brood, but he and Clark are both already irredeemable pieces of shit by the end of BvS so it’s not like this even registers by comparison.

Anonymous said: That “plan” Snyder had was utter dogshit. Picture proof that DC & WB hate Superman. Also I love how you’re like Jor-El: Every single idealistic take you had about Snyder, his fandom, and BvS was wrong. Snyder’s an edgy hack, his fanbase just wants to jerk off to their edgy self-insert Batgod as he screams FUCK while mowing people down with machine guns, and the idea that BvS said Superman was better than Bats was completely wrong. You know what comes next SuperMann: Either you die or I do.

In the final analysis, beyond that mother of god is there sure no conceivable excuse for the treatment of Lois in this? The temptation is to join that anon and say as I originally tweeted that these were “built entirely to disabuse every single redemptive reading of the previous work and any notion of these movies as nuanced, artistic, self-reflective, or meaningful”.

...

...yeah, okay, that’s mostly right. Zack Snyder’s vision really was the vision of an edgelord idiot with bad ideas who was never going to build up to anything that would reframe it all as a sensible whole. He’s a sincere edgelord genuinely trying really hard with his bad ideas who put some of them together quite cleverly! But they’re fucking bad and the endgame was never anything more than ramping up into smashing the action figures together as big as he could, the political overtones and moral sketchiness of BvS while trying to say something in that movie reverberated through the grand scheme of his pentalogy in no way beyond giving his boys a big sad pit to rise out of so when they kicked ass later it’d rule harder, and all the gods among men questions and horror and trappings were only that: trappings. Apparently he’s really pleasant and well-meaning in person, but at his core his art as embodied in a couple weeks in his 4-hour R-rated Justice League movie meant to be seen in black-and-white all comes down to that time he yelled at someone on Twitter that he couldn’t appreciate Snyder’s work because it’s for grown-ups. He made half-clever, occasionally exciting shit cape movies for a bunch of corny pseudo-intellectual douchebags, folks latching onto and justifying blockbusters that at least acknowledge how horrifying the world is right now even if the superheroes are basically useless in the face of it if not outright part of the problem until a convenient alien invasion shows up to justify them, and a handful of non-asshole smart people who vibe with it but...well. ‘Suckered’ is a harsh word, and definitely doesn’t apply to all of them re: what they’ve gotten out of it up to this point and would (somehow) get out of this. But it doesn’t apply to none of them, either.

#Justice League #Zack Snyder #Superman #Batman #DCEU #Opinion

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batarella · 5 years ago

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I Don’t Hate You - Part 14 (Jason Todd x Reader)

Hi. this is batarella’s friend speaking. she said she’ll be in hiding for the next 24 hours until the next chapter is posted before an angry mob shows up outside her house.

WORDS: 7337 WARNINGS: THE AMOUNT OF ANGST IN THIS ONE IS ASTRONOMICAL. SO MUCH VIOLENCE. HEARTBREAK. FIGHTING. SELF HARM.

Masterlist

I DON’T HATE YOU - MASTERLIST

-----

At the back of his car, parked in the school’s driveway, he pulled you into the backseat before he was just about to take you home.

Your legs were over his lap, his arm around you leaning against the car door and his other hand resting comfortably over your breast, you sighed into his warmth. And because it was heated inside, the windows were too fogged up for anyone to see you.

Jason. Jason. Jason. Jason. Jason.

For one thing, the sex was phenomenal. He was getting so good at it.

So good at it. You could have all your filthy daydreams all day.

You just loved it when he takes careful notice of how you react to the million different ways he touches you, how he explores your body well enough to give you an even better orgasm than the last one. And how he handles you, so gentle, cherishing each part of you, making you feel so treasured and precious. If there was a book on how to love someone, this was an entirely new section you never found out about until now. Fucking was one thing. But doing it with someone you’d give up your own life for, someone you loved so tremendously, it was certainly the most beautiful thing in the world. He’d kiss every part of you, make you feel like you were made of gold by the way he holds you so delicately. But when it calls for it, your hips end up getting bruises and you’d barely be able to walk the next day. Fuck, you were obsessed with it. It had only been a few months, and still you could barely keep your grabby hands off him.

But that was just one thing. You haven’t had a fight in so long, you could barely remember the last time you were mad at him. And when you did, you wanted nothing more than to forget it. As far as you knew, each second you spent with Jason was the last, and it would all be a waste if you weren’t trying your best at being happy with him. He kisses you more. Tried better to make you feel like you were the world. Every Friday he stays over at your place for the night and you’d end up staying awake the whole time watching movies, talking, fucking, or sneaking out into the city.

And the urban exploring. There were so many places abandoned in Gotham it was a surprise the city was still up at all. From all the monstrous villain attacks that end up leaving some mall too destroyed, a church too unsafe to have people in, an old toy shop forgotten, carnivals, mansions, and most of all, asylums. You and Jason have gone through so many of these places, it was always going to be something special that only you and him shared. Even when the places were borderline haunted, you’d hold his hand, look around and up at the roofs about to fall in, and it would be the best things to remember.

But…

There was just one thing that held you back.

“Hey,” you whispered, and he went down to kiss your neck. “Can you take me home now?”

“Just a sec.”

You gasped when he took your earlobe in with his teeth.

“Let’s continue this at home.”

Jason smiled, then his phone rang. You kissed his cheek and neck while he answered, hand trailing down his crotch.

“Bruce?”

You kept going, straddling his lap while licking his neck. He held back a groan, but he grinded up to you.

“Shit. Can I take a pass?” he said. He held the back of your head and pulled you away before he’d moan, but you kept going.

“Fine.”

He hung up, then you felt him sigh. “What’s wrong?”

“I have to take you home now. I got to go…”

You stopped, then pulled away to look at him in the eye, then look down. “Hey,” he kissed you again. “I’ll call you tonight. I won't be out too late.”

You slid off him and forced yourself to smile.

“It’s fine.”

You hadn’t told him yet. And frankly, you didn’t want to. You weren’t sure you believed it yourself.

“What is it that he’s asking you to do, again?”

You watched every detail on his face.

“He wants me to work in his company. I’m his assistant. Some sort of sidekick,” he laughed.

You forced yourself to buy it.

So even with a thought at the back of your mind, something that had lingered for months since that night of your first time, you chose to ignore it, or just not believe it entirely. Whatever it was, it wasn’t true. What you saw wasn’t actually there. And if it was true, it would break everything you worked so hard to build for months. You weren’t going to let that happen. So as long as he was okay, alive, with you, nothing else should matter.

Should it?

-----

It would have been so easy.

Penguin. On his knees, unarmed and struggling to even get up. There were dozens of guns around the room left by his unconscious goons. And with Robin standing over him, having the liberty of doing whatever it was he wished onto this sick, corrupted little man, Robin had every reason to end this son of a bitch’s life. Just a few weeks ago he put Dick in a coma in Bludhaven. This was supposed to be when they bring him to justice, to bring everyone he’s ever killed to justice.

A pistol, sitting right in front of him. It was so easy to pick up, place right up against Cobblepot’s twisted skull, and pull the trigger.

But then…

Then…

He found himself doing that very same act, just when he thought it had only been a thing of his mind. Robin held a gun in his hand, pointed it right into the Penguin’s head. And in that split second, he realized what he was doing.

A batarang came flying in and pierced his hand. Robin dropped the gun, hissing and falling to his knees on the ground.

Batman never looked at him so furiously.

Brought into the cave, Robin started for the door.

“Good night.”

“Jason-“

“I said good night.”

“JASON.”

He knew what was about to happen. So many times, he’d been warned. Weeks and weeks have happened and still, Jason managed to do that. Any second longer, Cobblepot would be dead, and Jason would be a killer. He proved to everyone and himself that he was willing to take a life, something Robin wasn’t supposed to stand for.

Jason stopped, his hand injuring itself from gripping too hard.

“Take that suit off,” Batman said. “And leave it here. For good.”

“You’re kidding me-“

“FOR GOOD!”

He looked at Bruce dead in the eye. The larger man was unmoving, furious beyond belief, and had just about enough of his rebellious antics. Jason knew exactly what was going to happen and did it anyway. Did he do it on purpose? To show Bruce that despite being by his side for so many years, his beliefs never rubbed off on him? That after all those years taking care of himself, he, having twice as much street smarts as Bruce and Dick combined, knew that the only real way of ridding the world of a villain’s horrible doings was to rid the world of the villain entirely?

Bruce wouldn’t know. He’d been sheltered far too much in his life. But Jason’s life was a disaster enough for him to know Robin’s ideals just weren’t for him. That he was destined for something so entirely different, far from what Dick was doing, from anybody else. He was right. He was no Dick Grayson. He never will be.

So fine. Let Bruce take the suit.

“You know damn well keeping him alive kills hundreds more, Bruce. How do you live with that?”

“I live knowing I keep myself from being just as much of a killer as he is. You don’t know half the things I’d do if I fell into that hole.”

“Then you're a coward,” Jason fired back. “You can't control yourself. That’s on you. Think of all the people you could have saved.”

“And the people I’ll kill? So many more.”

Bruce left the cave.

Jason stormed into his room, ripped his suit off and threw it right across the hall.

Then he punched the wall hard enough to leave a small dent.

He didn’t scream or break anything more. He was lost. He knew he wasn’t going to find himself for a longer time than he’d think. He stayed against that wall, his fist in a hole, long enough to find any thought he could focus on, but it was true, no matter how much he tried to go with Bruce’s fucking morals, he ended up falling right back into his own.

He did kill that man. The one that fell four stories off a building. He killed him. The blood was on his hands. And all this? It was all just a way for him to justify what he did so he wouldn’t get eaten up by the guilt. Or the lack of guilt, thereof. That was what he feared of himself the most.

Because even after he’d realized he’d killed that man, he felt nothing. In fact, he was proud of it. And he’d do it again. Over and over. So long as it were the people who’d killed so many more, left so many families empty and broken, he’ll never feel a shred of regret. And that was what he was trying to make up for. He was afraid of himself, of what he’ll become.

Being Robin was the only thing holding him back from being what he was truly meant to be. That he had ideals to follow whether or not he agreed to them. He had something to tell him what was supposed to be. And now, without the suit, he knew he’d have to succumb. He’ll have to become someone he had always believed in. and even though he loved Bruce, Dick, Alfred, he was always going to fight for the people. Not justice. Not himself. For the people. No matter what it takes, that’s where he’s headed.

And good god, did it scare him. It scared him to death.

His phone rang. You. He forgot he promised to call you that night.

“Asshole.” He heard your voice, and he slid with his back against the wall, eyes shut close.

“Sorry. I was just about to call.”

“You sound beaten up. What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. I’m tired.”

“Are you sure-“

“Yes,” he sighed, running his wet palms over his scrunched-up face. He wanted to break everything he could get his hands on. His whole room. Everything he could touch. He really didn’t want to talk to anyone right now.

But everything with you was going so well...

“I can come over if you want. I have a movie I’ve been wanting us to watch.”

“It’s fine. You stay there.”

You were silent. For a while.

“Can we watch it this Friday?”

“I don’t think I can go there tomorrow. I’ll just see you in school.”

“Why not?”

He counted to ten. The last thing he wanted was to lash out on you.

“Just… I’ll try, okay?”

“Fine,” you grunted. “I’ll just go to bed, then.”

“Good night.”

He heard you scoff. “What is wrong with you?”

“You said you wanted to go to be-“

“Fine. Maybe I will.”

You hung up.

Months since your last fight. And just like that, you hated him again.

The dent in the wall turned into a hallowed-out hole he’d punched over and over.

-----

You had every right to be mad at him.

But, after knowing what you know now, you chose not to.

Jason kept his eyes on his food and tried his best not to look at you. Expecting you to ignore him, or possibly destroy your tray like you’d do when you fought, he looked up at you in surprised when you suddenly took his hand.

His eyes. They looked so sad, and yet so beautiful. You had changed. For him.

“I’m not mad at you…”

He swallowed his food, licked his lips, then with a long, deepening sigh he nodded at you. “Okay…”

“If there’s anything wrong, you can tell me.”

“Nothing. There’s nothing wrong.”

He rubbed his thumb over your hand, then slowly pulled away so he can go back to eating. You let it slide.

And this. It went on for days. You didn’t fight. But he wasn’t happy, either. He still kissed you, held you when he could. But he had so much in his mind you just knew he was never going to tell you. One thing you did notice, in fact, the bruises he came home with had almost completely disappeared. So with that, you were contented.

Until…

“Y/N and Brandon. You will be partners for this project.”

“Absolutely not,” you cried out in class. “I want another partner.”

Another jock stood up, “I’ll be your partner, hot stuff!!”

“DOWN!” You screamed, and he fell to his chair shivering.

“I want another partner,” you said to the teacher. He brushed you off, however. You wanted to choke him right at that second.

Brandon, on the other hand, looked amused. And when class ended, you went straight up to him.

“Football Freak. Tell Jerry we can't be partners.”

“Come on, Y/N. It’ll be fun. If you want I’ll take you over to my house-“

“I will tear out your eyes and step over them with my heels, you shit-headed troll.”

“There you go again with those petty little insults.” Brandon stood you off, and he’d gotten bigger now. “We both know you want thi-“

His body hitting the lockers was loud enough to turn everyone’s head. And they immediately looked at you.

But you hadn’t moved a muscle.

Jason, with the veins on his forehead looking so close to popping, grabbed Brandon by the collar once again and held him up against the wall.

“What the fuck is wrong with you, Todd?!”

He didn’t even respond. Jason started punching him mindlessly on the floor. Hit after hit, you saw how his knuckles bruised. You called out his name, but he didn’t listen. Brandon’s blood already spilled on the floor and he kicked him off, and Jason landed on the ground. Wiping the blood off his lips, he lunged after Jason.

One hit to the face, but again, Jason was far too skilled for him. Grabbing his foot, he stretched it all the way to his back, and smashed his face to the ground. The crowd erupted in cries, some cheering for Jason. Some for Brandon.

They rolled on the floor. No one was trying to stop them. Jason managed to stand back up, grab Brandon by the shirt and slammed him right against the concrete walls. You heard a loud grunt and a tooth might have fell out.

And just before he went after Brandon again, you stepped in.

You didn’t even hold him back, or grab his arms just to stop him. All you did, and the only thing you needed to do, was stand in front of him, hold your hand up to his chest, and look at him straight in the eye.

So many times, Jason held you back from doing the same. He’s stopped you from almost pulling a girl’s hair right out of her scalp, from slamming someone’s head right into a concrete pillar. He’s stopped you from ruining someone’s life just by the psychological twisting of your words. You had your own jealous rage that was so easy to lash out on. Even just talking to another girl made you all crabby. And you knew he had his own as well.

But his jealousy. His was so much worse.

Now. Just now, you hoped he’d listen to you just as you’ve always listened to him. He did stop. And you forced him to look at you in the eye.

You saw him try to calm himself.

“ASSHOLE,” Brandon cried out. “YOU JEALOUS I WAS TALKING TO YOUR BITCH OF A GIRLFRIEND?!”

Jason’s head boiled and he tried to push you away, but you didn’t let him. You stood your ground, grabbing his shoulders. “Jason, stop-“

“NEWSFLASH. WE USED TO DATE, JACKASS. ALL THE WAY BACK TO EIGHTH FUCKING GRADE.”

“SHUT UP!!!”

You never let go. You still held on to him. Grabbing his hand, you pulled him towards the door. “Jason, let’s go home.”

“HOPE YOU FEEL GREAT ABOUT GETTING TO TAP THAT ASS, JASON TODD-“

You grabbed a book from one student’s arms and slammed its spine right at Brandon’s already bruised face. He fell to the floor.

“Jason, take me home right now.”

He tried so hard to shrug you off, but eventually, he went with you, and you both stormed out of the school, went right to his car before any of the teachers would find him.

You felt his hand shaking. His whole body was at that point. And when you reached the car, you tried to grab hold of him.

And he pushed you away so forcibly you almost tumbled. “Jason-“

“Get in the fucking car.”

You watched him wipe the last of his blood from his busted lip, then walk over to the driver’s seat before slamming the door so hard you could have sword the window broke behind him. Swallowing, you went in the passenger seat.

He never drove out of that parking lot faster than he did.

The best thing you could have done was console him, speak in the lightest voice you could and make sure you let him know you didn’t think he did anything wrong. That was all he needed.

But you didn’t do that.

Instead, you looked straight forward, blocking out all the noises, and sat as still as you could.

“Jason, we were barely even talking-“

“I don’t want you anywhere near that guy.”

“I wasn’t-.”

“Is it true?”

You bit your lip. “What?”

“You and Brandon? Is it true?”

You desperately wanted to go back somehow and beat the crap out of Brandon yourself. You wanted him unconscious. Worse. Dead.

You wanted to put all the blame on him instead of admitting this time, that you were in the wrong. So wrong.

You gulped, took in the cold, stale air, then whispered. “Yes…”

He slammed his fist against the car horn and you flinched at the horrible, ear shattering noise.

“YOU SAID YOU NEVER DATED ANYONE BEFORE.”

“IT WAS IN EIGHTH FUCKING GRADE. IT LASTED A MONTH. IT WAS STUPID AND IT DIDN’T MEAN SHIT. I TELL THAT TO EVERYONE ’CUZ I WANT TO PRETEND IT NEVER HAPPENED WITH THAT ASSHOLE.”

“YOU FUCKING LIED.”

“IT WAS NOTHING. WE WERE KIDS. I WAS BEING STUPID. IT WASN’T EVEN A REAL RELATIONSHIP.”

“YOU KNOW HOW MUCH I FUCKING HATE HIM.”

You breathed. But nothing has felt so hard to do. Your visions became so much of a blur and nothing in front of you made much sense anymore.

“I remember. You told me in that fucking library. That he hit on you and you rejected him…”

You bit your lip. “How was I supposed to know we’d get together…”

“You could have told me anytime the past year, Y/N,” he faked a laugh. “Never once did you mention any of that.”

“You hated that guy to the bone. If I had told you, you’d have hated me, too.“

He violently stepped on the break, and your body was thrown back against the chair. He was an inch away from slamming into another car.

“You. Lied.”

“It wasn’t a big deal…”

“It is to me.”

“So this is what you mean when you get just as jealous as I do?” you scoffed. “You’re blowing this way out of proportion-“

“YOU ALMOST KILL PEOPLE WHEN THEY SIT NEXT TO ME.”

“AND YOU DIDN’T DO THE SAME THING JUST NOW?!”

“YOU-“ he slammed his fist against the window. “FUCK THIS.”

You weren’t crying, though you really fucking wanted to. You wanted to show him just how much he hurt you. And nothing came out. You sat there, an empty, dry-eyed idiot.

“I’m not going to apologize for this,” you said.

“You’re proud of what you did? That’s big. Even for you.”

“I told you. It was nothing.”

“That dickhead didn’t seem to think so.”

“If it weren’t him, would you still whack his brains out?”

“Y/N,” he growled. “If it were just about anyone-anyone-in the whole damn building, I’ll beat them to a bloody pulp.”

“How fucking romantic.”

“Like you're just so adorable when you get jealous.”

“GOD, YOU-“ you stuffed your head into your palm. When was this fucking car ride going to end?

“What other things are you keeping from me?”

“OH. SO WE’RE BACK TO THAT FUCKING CONVERSATION?”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”

“You don’t go out at night? You don’t get into fights? You’re not hiding anything from me at all?”

“I told you I-“

“That you’re what?”

“I get into fights! Exactly like this one!”

“At night?!”

A volcano just about to erupt. There was no way you can keep this down anymore. You couldn’t hold this in. Not for a second longer.

And when you watched Jason being silent, looking away from you with his whole face as red of anger as your own, you knew it was true. He was practically outrightly admitting it right now.

And your heart. It never once felt as heavy as it did now.

“I know you’re Robin.”

He reached your house, stopped just by the curb.

Silence.

Your heart was beating so frantically in your chest, yet you didn’t move. You stopped breathing. You looked right in front of you and he did the same.

You wanted desperately for him to say just about anything to contradict what you’d said, to tell you convincingly that it wasn’t true, that you were being insane. Perhaps even tell you another truth that would have been less believable but a lot better to take in. You wanted him to tell you he never hid anything from you, and you’ll happily take the fall for this one.

If he denied being Robin, you’ll apologize for what happened with Brandon. You’ll pour out you're entire fucking heart and soul to beg for his forgiveness. You’ll lose just about everything about yourself trying to prove to him that you’ll always, always be truthful and that you never once thought of lying to his face knowing it would hurt him in the end. All you needed was just a word of denial. Fuck it being so convincing. If he just said it wasn’t true, then you’ll willingly let this go.

But all you heard was the heartbreaking, bitter silence.

His head frozen in place, eyes locked onto the window. He didn’t say a word. He didn’t look at you.

And at that, your heart broke beyond repair.

And you knew nothing was going to get you out of this. Every fight. Every argument. It never felt like you’d never get through it and you always ended up forgetting what happened, move on, and be just as happy with him as the last day. No fight ever made you feel like you’d never want to go through it all again if it meant you didn’t get to lose him.

But now. There was no getting through this. There was no fixing this.

He got those bruises from fighting, alright. He didn’t lie about that. He just completely left out the part about him being a costumed vigilante, blatantly walking right into death’s door willingly every single night. And he had been for years. He never once hinted anything to you.

And even if you did fix this, would you want a boyfriend you’d have to worry about every night? That he wouldn’t come home at all? Would you marry him, have a family? Have your kids understand that their father died for people he didn’t even know? Would you survive that heartbreak?

Well, your heart was definitely broken now.

“We’re done…” Jason said.

It all didn’t seem so real.

“For good.”

But you understood. Entirely. What did he expect? That you’d object? That you’d beg for him to stay despite everything and apologize on his behalf?

He lost you the moment he admitted to it, despite him not saying anything at all. And now, you lost him. Forever.

“Goodbye, Jay.”

You slammed the door behind you and never looked back.

-----

Now

You were crying your heart out by now. And the therapist, well, she just watched with so much pity for you, you’d have been embarrassed if it wasn’t her job to watch you cry.

“I never once thought that thing with Brandon affected him so much…”

“I think,” she said. “It was amplified by all the other things he was dealing with at home. You said he was already in some kind of mood before all this happened?”

“Yes. He was. Days before. Something happened with him and Bruce. He was upset for a while.”

“It wasn’t just with Brandon, then. It just happened to coincide.”

She gave you a box of tissues, and you took it, taking three from the box and wiping your eyes.

“I guess… but it was after I told him about what I knew when he broke up with me.”

The therapist nodded. “I see. And do you regret letting him know that?”

You looked at the ground.

“If I’d have seen him in school, have the time to realize I should call him back, I don’t think it would have done us any good to keep it more of a secret…”

You gulped.

“But I had known that was the last time I was ever going to see him…”

There it was. Three years-worth of guilt, all put into words. It came crashing down like the shittiest story ever told and the therapist looked at you like she was about to cry as well.

But this was your story. Your shitty story. Everyone cried from this.

“If I had known, I would have happily kept it for the rest of my life…”

The therapist looked at the ground with you as well.

“I don’t think… that would do any good…”

“He died a few days after that,” you blurted out. “Our break up got him depressed, and he ran away from home one night, chased after some crime leader in his neighborhood to air out his anger and it cost him his life. That’s why I blame myself for all this. That’s why I’m gonna have to live with the fact that he died because of me. I let him go too soon. I shouldn’t have gotten out of that car. I should have told him how this was all going to work out. But no, I didn’t. I got out of that car and he died from it.”

Another lie. You knew exactly how he died. It wasn’t from a small-time thug in his neighborhood. It was from someone too utterly deranged to even mention.

“If I had just stayed behind, told him how much I loved him, that I never would have wanted to waste what we had for nothing, he would still be alive. None of this would have happened. I was a coward and I had an unbelievable amount of pride. He died because of that. Because of me.”

The therapist took her mug from the side table, sipped from it, and looked at you. You were covering your face with your hands. “Y/N…”

You looked up at her, your face a mess.

“You can't blame yourself-“

“I do. And I always will.”

She sighed, then gave you the moment you needed of silence.

“He didn’t die because you subjected him to it without his consent. He died because of the horrible way he dealt with it. He died from himself. He picked that fight because he was afraid he’ll lose you. And he did the same when he actually did lose you.”

You looked up.

“It was beyond your control.”

“I could have stopped it…”

“You wouldn’t have known…”

“And that’s why I’m always going to live with it. I didn’t know. I was stupid enough to think he was strong enough to keep himself alive. I have to live with the fact that the last time I ever got to see him was in a stupid fight…”

She stood up and went to her table, grabbing a mug and filling it with water. She gave it to you, and you took it. “Thank you,” you said with your nose filled.

She took her seat. You were silent now. You were giving her a chance to speak. Hopefully to change all this.

“Sometimes, we end up losing people too soon, and we most often regret what we said, or what we didn’t say, the last time we saw them.

“But what of the last few months? You said it was perfect. The best months of your relationship. You were happy with him. And that’s months compared to the one single day you fought. Sometimes, it isn’t about where you got to in the end. It’s about how you spend most of the days you did have. And you were happy. He was happy.”

You looked up from the floor and watched her kind eyes.

“And I think your boy had many issues with himself. At home. With a dysfunctional family. It wasn’t just you, Y/N. It was everything built up. You breaking up was just a symptom of it. All you did was make his life more bearable. Better. I think he would have said that right now if he were here.”

You sipped at your water, feeling the cold pour down your throat.

Better. Sure. Like you didn’t absolutely ruin his life right after that.

-----

Then

Love was never truly something to understand.

You never understood it at all. Neither did Jason. But you both knew it was something so beautiful, something you thought you could only ever have with each other.

They said love is just a type of sanity that society accepted. And it was true. Definitely. You fell so hard for him you were borderline insane. And love made you hurt in so many ways you never thought it could. It was never something to understand. It was just something to feel.

Love isn’t about light and darkness. It isn’t about how people are compatible. It is about depth. It is infinite.

And when it destroys, it hurts more than any kind of physical hurt there was. Love destroys so much; it has ruined so much of the world. The fucking Trojan War was caused by love. And how many died from that? Thousands, not including the civilians affected in battle. All because of a woman named Helen. Men fought over her, for love. And it ended up burning cities.

It’s both a beautiful and ugly being. It is, in fact, a being. An entire entity. And it goes around, striking so many in the heart and leave them helpless beyond fix. It chooses who to hurt. Some, just one sided, and it hurts like a bitch when it does. And when they’re lucky, two people fall for each other.

And when it ends, it hurts even more.

Wrecked beds. Walls filled with fist-shaped holes. Glass broken on the floor. Sheets thrown out. Books torn. Desks almost destroyed. Clothes thrown out in piles. Chairs thrown against the wall. Shelves falling to the ground. Mirrors broken in pieces.

Jason destroyed everything in his room. And you destroyed everything in yours.

Two people with equal darkness. Equal anger. Equal demons. In so many ways, you were perfect together. In some ways, it creates the kind of chaos no one could possibly interfere with.

Jason grabbed his desk chair, the one he’d just bought after he destroyed the last one, and slammed it on the floor repeatedly until it was in three separate pieces. And even then, he took a piece, and slammed it again.

You grabbed your brush. Your pencil holders. Your books. Your bags. Your fucking laptop. And you threw everything all the way to the other side of the room. Your mother probably heard you by now. But she didn’t think to knock.

Jason threw the chair pieces away and started for his desk. His fist was bruised by now, but he could barely feel the pain if it was even there at all. He threw everything off the surface, started balling his fist and slammed it right against the table. Over and over. He wanted it destroyed.

You still felt that rage. You wanted it gone. You took your clothes, started tearing them with their bare hands, then you let your tears fall as you took everything out from your closet. Nothing. Nothing worked. It was just as strong as it had been. It was always there.

His phone started to ring. He didn’t care who it was. He took his phone, threw it against the wall and heard the sparks burst out of it. It fell into pieces on the ground. He went over it, stepped on it with his foot repeatedly until it was broken beyond any kind of repair.

Your scissors. Your fucking scissors. You took your entire fucking drawer full of scissors and started hauling them right into the wall, one by one like you would with darts. They stuck on their sharp ends. You grabbed them, threw them at the door. And when your mother walked in, dodging a pair of scissors just before it landed near her head, you screamed for her to get out.

Bottles. From when he drank a boatload of booze the night before. He grabbed them, started throwing them against the window. Each time he did, it created a new crack, getting larger and larger the harder he threw the bottles. Finally, the window broke, and he shivered at the new rush of cold air.

You wanted to punch something. Anything. You started with the pillows but the lack of pain did nothing to ease your muscles. So you went for the wall. You punched it. Repeatedly. Then your hand broke by your own strength and you screamed immensely at the pain.

He tore his bed. The sheets. The pillows. The whole floor was filled with feathers by now and he couldn’t care less. He ripped everything with his bare hands, threw them across the room. The mattress was all that’s left. And even then, he started to tear it open.

You started hearing his voice. His damned voice. The one you’d hear when he’d console you, rub your back, places kisses on your head. You cursed at that voice and screamed your heart out just to block it out. But nothing worked. It was all you heard.

All he could see was your beautiful, untainted face. And he desperately wanted to forget it. He wanted to forget everything about you. He saw you in the mirror. And with his fist, he slammed it until it shattered around him.

You still couldn’t stop hearing his voice. This time it was screaming at you for what you did. It was all over the room. Echoing so loudly within the walls of your skull. You fell to the ground and started pulling your own hair. You screamed at the pain.

He closed his eyes. You. you. you. It was all he saw. Your face when you’d calm him down. The look in your eyes that always made his heart melt. He stopped punching. He stopped destroying. In the middle of his wrecked room, he sat down and leaned against the foot of his bed.

The tears that you unknowingly held back were here. And they wouldn’t stop pouring out of you. uncontrollably. They fell. You were crying, screaming into the cold, empty air, and still, you heard his voice screaming just as painfully.

Jason never cried so much in his life. Not when his father left. Not when his mother died. Not when he almost dies of hunger one night in the streets. Not when he was first told he was adopted. Never. Not once did he cry. And now, his head against the mattress so torn and destroyed, he sobbed, and your face was all he saw.

You pressed your face against the floor. You hated him so much. You hated how he made you fall in love with him so fucking hard and leave you hurting this much. You hated how he ruined your life, changed you when you never asked to be changed. You hated how you loved him. You hated how you still did.

He wished he was dead. He wished everything never happened. He never should’ve picked that fight, or accepted that detention sentence in the library. He wished he never met you, never fell in love with you, never hoped for something and lose himself so far off that he’d never climb out of it.

The anger was all too much. You hated him, but you hated yourself even more. You hated yourself for everything that happened, how you ruined it. How you ruined him. And you hated yourself most of all, because all you could think about right at that moment was how, despite everything, you still wished he wasn’t nearly as hurt as you. You still cared so deeply for him, enough that you wished he’d be okay.

Jason was never going to be okay. He’ll never get out of this. He threw his head against the hard mattress and sobbed his heart out. He screamed, gripped on his hair. And he swore, with all his life, he was never going to replace you. he was never going to find anyone else that could possibly fill in the hole you left him. Let that hole be. He didn’t want himself fixed. If he were to be hurt, he only wished that it were by you.

You gripped on the carpet and let the burn seep through your palm. You never needed him this much before. Ever. You never yearned for his hold, for his real voice to whisper in your ear as much as you did now. You never wanted his lips on you, his hand holding you up as much as you did now. You never wanted him to hold you so tight to make you believe this couldn’t possibly be over anymore… as much as you did now. And it was. It was over. You lost him.

Jason lost you. Over something he could’ve easily told you a long time ago. You would have understood. You would have taken cared of him. None of this would have happened if he’d just been less of a coward. He lost you. And he was going to hate himself for that for the rest of his life.

You just laid there, silently on the floor, and kept the tears flowing and the cries echoing. You let the hurt fill through you, and you made sure to punish yourself by letting you feel every inch of it. You let yourself realize that you were going to have to go through the next days of your life living through his hellish nightmare.

Jason gripped his hair again. What the fuck was he thinking? Of course, he won't expect you to understand. Of course, he didn’t want you to get hurt like that. Subjecting you into that life, forcing you to have a partner who was putting his life out on the table every night. You didn’t deserve that pain. You didn’t deserve him. He never should have met you. He never should have let you fall in love.

You crawled to lean against the wall, just to have something hold the weight of your body. You never felt so heavy. And when you looked up at the ceiling, you screamed into your palms. Jason would have been worth it. He would have been worth all those reckless nights. And even if you were to lose him to that lifestyle he had, it was better than a life without him at all. A life you were going to have now.

Jason threw one last punch on the floor, and nothing changed. Nothing eased up. There was still that pain in his chest. He looked up the ceiling, letting himself see your face again. He let himself cry over the fact that he was never going to hold you, touch you, kiss you, ever again. You were everything to him. And you were gone. He let you go.

You wanted him. You loved him. You were still undeniably in love with him. And it was the most painful thing in the world knowing he wasn’t yours anymore.

He was always going to love you. Always. And tomorrow, he was going to have to wake up without hearing the sound of your voice.

You swallowed, sobbing silently into your hands. You didn’t want this anymore. You wanted to wake up with all this being a dream.

He needed to talk to you. just once more. He needed to hear your voice. Maybe this was a mistake. Maybe he shouldn’t have thrown it all away.

You looked at your phone. Hoping he’d call. Hoping he’d try to reach out, telling you how much of an asshole he was and that this was all going to be okay.

He’d broken his phone, so he rushed to his drawers, rummaged through the piles he’d thrown on the floor to find the old, broken phone he stopped using after being locked in the library with you.

Maybe you should call him first. Apologize. Tell him you’d willingly go through all that just as long as he was yours. But your finger was stuck hovering over the black screen.

He took his phone, plugged it to the wall to charge. He was shaking so hard. And the minutes felt the longest waiting for the screen to light up.

You turned your phone on and his face stared back at you. Your wallpaper. A picture of you and him in bed. Your faces smiling. Your lips on his cheek. Him winking at the phone. Your heart broke all over again.

His phone finally turned on, and he forgot his sim card was still in his other broken phone. He raced to it, his fingers trembling, and put it in his old one. Without a moment of doubt, he called you.

Your heart stopped when his name popped up on the screen. He was calling you.

You weren’t answering. Five. Ten seconds passed. Nothing.

You wanted to answer. But you ended up staring at your phone with your heart blowing up all the way up your throat.

‘Please answer. Please, Y/N. I love you.’

You took too long. His name disappeared. And it ended up a missed call. You dropped your phone to the ground.

His heart shattered at the blank, empty sound at the other end of the phone. He sobbed on the floor, clutching his phone to his chest.

You looked away from the screen before his picture changed your mind. His beautiful face. You made the decision. You let him go.

Nothing mattered anymore.

Everything was going to change.

You were gone.

Jason is a memory.

You destroyed him.

Jason ruined your life.

It’s over.

It was done.

----

I DON’T HATE YOU - MASTERLIST

----

everyartistwas-firstanamateur @sarcasmismyfirstlove @damned-queen-of-gotham @idkmanicantenglish @wunderstell @birdy-bat-riya @get-loki@everyday-imfangirling @comic-nerd-dc @multifandoms916 @icequeen208@offendedfishnoises @egdolan @xemiefx @arkhamtoddler @elsenthal@mythicbitchx @supremehaunter @ burning-alive @lucy-roo roseangel013bf @ loxbbg reclusive-chicken-nuggethttp-cherries shadowsndaisiesriver9noble zphilophobiazannoylinglyaries @knightfall05x @l-horizon11

#jason todd #jason todd x reader #jason todd x reader angst #batboys #dc comics #batarella #batarella fluff #batarella angst #i don't hate you series #i don't hate you #jason todd x reader series #jason todd reader insert #batarella series

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peppersonironi · 5 years ago

Text

How I Picture a Batfam Age Reversal

I’m going to write this as a fic (And I want to go on into a young justice world where dick forms the team and his siblings are protective) but here is the outline in bullet points in case anyone is interested. Please note this is VERY first draft.

Ages (At end) & Order:

Damian- 24

Duke- 21

Stephanie- 20

Tim- 21

Cassandra- 19

Jason- 19

Barbara- 15

Dick- 13

Damian is Ten when he is sent to live w/ his father. Bruce is 30.

They don’t really work well together at first. But Selina, Alfred, and Clark somehow get it through Bruce’s thick skull that he has to care for this child.

Damian keeps sneaking out on patrol, against B’s wishes. Eventually, he let’s Damian join and tells him to choose a name (Not what we meant, Bruce!)

Damian wants to go for something like Shadow, or Demon, but Bruce puts his foot down. He says that Damian shouldn’t try to be darkness.

Damian is pouting in the gardens when he finds a wounded robin. It’s wing is broken. He demands that the animal should be taken to a shelter, and carries it in his hand the whole way there.

The bird makes it, and Damian demands to be called Robin. He designs his suit, going slightly more colorful. “I might be called Robin, but I am NOT wearing brown, Pennyworth.”

Bruce introduces him to Superboy (Jon, note: less age dif) and the pair are close friends.

He is Robin for a little over seven years before he begins to fight with Bruce about being allowed to patrol alone, and being his own hero. (basically what happened w/ Dick).

Damian leaves Gotham, opting to claim Bludhaven. Jon joins him. He suggests they call each other Nightwing and Flamebird. Damian thinks it’s a bit childish, but he can’t say no to Jon. They’re costumes are here. (done by @hyperactive-lectiophile! Fantastic job!)

They eventually realize they’re in love w/ each other, all while trying to figure their lives out. Damian briefly tries to join the police. He hates it. Eventually, he enrolls in BH college for a major in Art and a minor in business.

Later in Gotham, the We Are Robin/Robin War stuff happens. Long story short, Duke is adopted.

Damian is angry to find out he has a new brother, goes to Gotham to yell at Bruce, but then meets Duke. They bond, and are close siblings. Damian makes his father promise to not adopt any more strays.

Stephanie Brown wants to stop her Father, so she sews up a costume and goes out as Batgirl. Bruce is apprehensive at first, but his family basically yells at him to train the poor girl before she gets hurt.

He does, and after Steph meets Damian, who she absolutely adores (He loves her too. The way she pisses his father off is legendary), Stephanie decides she wants to be Robin. Batgirl was good for dealing with her father, but she wants to belong to this new family, and, w/ Damian’s blessing, she makes a new costume.

Unfortunately, after a while, Stephanie is killed by Black Mask (her death is faked, like in the comics, but the Fam doesn’t know)

Enter Tim Drake. Batman has been going crazy over grief, and not even Nightwing, Catwoman (this is SOOOO batcat, btw) or The Signal can calm him down. Tim steps right up, and demands to be robin.

Damian and Bruce fight over this. Surprisingly, Damian is the one who thinks Tim should be given a chance. He sees how his father has been acting. Damian knows that Tim must be brilliant to figure out their identities, and thinks that should count for something. Duke takes his side, knowing that it takes guts to talk to batman, and be willing to join him. Bruce, meanwhile, is a constant chant of “no more dead robins”. After a while, and lots of arguing, Tim takes his place as Robin. They redesign the suit, and he takes his place as robin.

It’s little while after this that Stephanie comes back. Tim offers Robin back, but Stephanie declines. They talk and grow closer. At one point they talk about Stephanie’s new moniker. She says she doesn’t want to be Batgirl either. She wants something new. Tim suggests Spoiler (Bad pun turned brilliant idea?).

Cassandra Cain arrives on the scene next. She saves the commissioner’s life (like No Man’s Land, minus No Man’s Land), and Stephanie immediately imprints on this tiny assassin child (So do the rest of the family, but Steph claims the fourteen-year old first. She and Bruce fight over custody.). She offers Cass Batgirl. Gotham gained a new vigilante, and Bruce Wayne adopted a new child. (Faster than the comics, I KNOW. But Cass deserves happiness)

Everyone loves their new sister, and everyone spoils her. Duke is the one to take her to a ballet the first time. She immediately begs to be put into lessons.

Somewhere in here Tim’s mom dies and his dad is in a coma. Bruce takes him in.

Eventually, Bruce decides to offer Tim Red Robin, hoping to avoid the strife he had with Damian. (Like in the comics, Bruce was going to give Jason Red Robin)

Tim is unsure of this, and puts off deciding. Then little Jason Peter Todd decides to jack the tires of the batmobile and is immediately taken in.

Everyone is captivated by the tiniest addition to their family, but it's also at this time that Jack Drake finds out about Robin and forces Tim to quit. Tim gives Jason his blessing to become Robin.

Everyone pitches in on helping train the newest Robin. Damian teaches the kid things he learned from the league (non-lethal things, since Damian loves this kid), Duke teaches him escrima fighting, Stephanie (Much to Bruce’s dismay) has a full seminar of the delicacies of glitter bomb making. Tim teaches the kid hacking, when he can get away from his dad.

Unfortunately, when Jason has been Robin for almost a year, he is killed by the Joker.

The family is torn apart by greif. But this time around, Bruce has a much larger support system. All of them lean on each other.

The only time that Damian ever broke his no-kill rule while living with his father was to kill the Joker. He hunted and murdered the clown, sparing Harley. He had been friends with Quinzel since he was Robin, and knew how the Joker treated her. Harley became the batfam’s honorary aunt after this.

Bruce was too emotionally tired to fight with Damian over his actions, so no one said anything. Eventually, Bruce and Damian did argue. Damian refused to apologize,, though he did promise his father to never kill again. Their relationship was strained for a while, but they worked through it.

Less than a year later, Jack Drake dies, and Tim comes back onto the vigilante scene. He refuses to become Robin, however, choosing to take Bruce up on his offer and become Red Robin. He designs his own suit, and the world seems to slowly become normal. Or some semblance of it.

One night, the circus is in town and the whole family (except Alfred) is home. Duke, Tim, and Steph drag Bruce, Cass, and Damian to go see it.

It is on this night that Dick Grayson’s parents fall to their death. Dick is sent to live in juvi, meanwhile Bruce tries to adopt Dick. He succeeds, and the manor once again has a bright young child running through it’s halls.

Dick figures out the secret identities of his family and instantly demands to be allowed out. He wants to take down Zucko, and won’t settle for every single member hunting for him. Dick wants to take down his parent’s murdered himself. He tries to sneak out multiple times, but is always stopped.

Damian talks to Dick (They are extremely close) and explains the origins of Robin. He says that the mantle was born out of a want to distance himself from the revenge and violence of the league. Dick cries when he learns this and says that his own parents used to call him Robin. He suggests that the mantle is more than a personal need. Robin is Family.

Damian almost immediately demands that Dick be trained and help catch Zucko. Bruce is confused, as before, Damian was strongly against letting a nine-year-old fight crime. Damian explains (after much cajoling. He might be more emotionally open and healthy than when he first arrived in the manor, but the kid is still constipated) what Dick had said, and that Damian understands the kid’s need for direction. “When I first came here, I needed Robin. I might not have known it, but I did. Richard needs Robin now, as well.”

The family took sides on the issue, but eventually Dick (with the aid of his puppy-dog-eyes™) won everyone over. He got his own Robin costume, and they caught Zucko.

Dick refused to stop being Robin, and so Gotham gained a new bird.

Dick was Robin for almost two years when The Red Hood made his appearance in Gotham. No one knew what he wanted, as he didn’t seem to do much beyond killing criminals. They thought he was a vigilante at first, but then he began to take over the criminal underbelly of Gotham, regulating crime. On top of that, Red Hood targeted Robin. Attacking the boy wonder when no one else was around. After the red helmeted rogue let loose a few hints about the league of shadows, Damian interrogated his mother, who explained the identity of The Red Hood, and how she had set him on Gotham.

As soon as the family figured out the newcomer’s identity, and the reason he was alive Damian tracked him down. He knew how to deal with pit rage from his childhood, and brought the lost bird back to the nest.

The family was whole for the first time in years. Jason was still angry and resentful, but he had his family back. Jason was grateful for Damian taking revenge for him, and they were once again close.

Slowly, Jason let everyone back in, including Bruce. Dick is wary at first of this new older brother, but the little chicken nugget quickly warms up to Jason, and even convinces him to teach him how to shoot a gun (In secret, of course, Dami and Bruce would blow a gasket). Jason couldn’t resist the kid. It was physically impossible.

A year later, Cass decides to pursue dance as her career. She gets a job with the Hong Kong Ballet company. She moves there, and decides to take a new moniker: Black Bat. Her family is so proud of her, but they miss her dearly. Duke visits often, bringing new back to the family.

The absence of Batgirl is filled after a while by Barbara Gordan. She makes her own costume and starts going out. Once again, Stephanie Brown adopts a smol bean (Well, not legally. The commissioner is still alive) and outfits her with a more Gotham-friendly suit and weaponry (I.e. heavy kevlar and leather)

Babs is taken whole-heartedly into the fold, and is made an honorary sister.

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octalove · 5 years ago

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III: We Met

(Batgirl/Red Hood)

Description: Reader goes out, and finds herself in an alley with no one to call. An old memory is brought up. Part one and part two.

Who the fuck leaves a batarang lying around when they’re spying on a supervillain?

A week had gone by. A week where every day I tried to wake up and smile at my family and go to school and do calculus, but all I kept wondering was what kind of idiot leaves a batarang when they’re spying on a supervillain? I glanced over at it; I’d left it lying on my desk as a reminder. Every time I looked at it, I felt the sharp edges biting into my palm as his hands closed around mine. I smelled leather and the musty scent of unsettled dust in the warehouse. It was the same shape as the angry red bat on his chest- eye level with me.

How did he know who I was? How did he know I was there? How was it he just knew I’d show up to that same warehouse four days afterward in the middle of a school day?

“Tell Batman,” He’d said. If the secrets weren’t ringing around my head already- there it was. The line that kept echoing. Tell Batman, tell Batman. Telling Batman wasn’t an option. He’d lock me in the cave until I was thirty and growing liver spots. I’d never be Batgirl again. No way in hell was I standing before that black cowl and confessing two weeks worth of bad decisions.

That blue evening, Gotham was alive and breathing with the heat of something organic; rhythmic heart-beat in the muffled cars on the street, and the jazz clubs, eyes wide open in the bright, excited lights dotting the spiring skyline. The breeze bit subtly as the city shook the shackles of summer, and moved into early September.

I stuck close to Batman, almost apologetically obedient for the night as I tried to convey some sort of negotiation on my part; I’m sorry for acting weird, I’m on my best behavior tonight.

Robin didn’t so much appreciate that sentiment, because Batman’s side was his place, but patrol began civilly enough. Car theft on Nettleton (Red Robin dealt with), some questionable sex work in the Row (I oversaw and made sure the women were safe and willing), a robbery call (Batman and Robin checked it out- false alarm). By one in the morning, we were all mostly still in one piece, and lulled by the mildness and coolness of the night. I was dragging my gaze over Haytham Parkway when Oracle’s staticky voice came through the coms.

“Batman. There’s been a Red Hood sighting at the H&P in Gotham Village. It’s Falcone’s men.” Swiftly and gracefully, the three of us scaled rooftops, pillars and cell towers. We arrived within twelve minutes, and then planted ourselves like gargoyles. Listening. The Village was one of the more quiet parts of Gotham. It was all settled with blue collar, passive criminals, instead of outright violent ones. A few minutes passed. The building looked undisturbed.

“Do you think-“

Bang.

A gunshot followed by glass breaking. In a hair’s width span of time, Batman, Robin and I descended on the building and swung through through the shattered display window. Inside, broken glass littered the floor, along with disheveled items from the shop, stung around haphazardly. Two men were dead on the ground, blood around them like a premonitory chalk outline. They were unassuming men, but I recognized the patches on their matching shirts as Hadley’s Deli. They were Maroni’s men.

“Robin- the back rooms. Batgirl- check the perimeter. If he left the building, he won’t be far.”

I shot past them and into the dark, grappling to the roof for a better vantage point. From there I swept my gaze across the northern and eastern neighboring streets. Movement. Like a twitch in the darkness. I raced down a fire escape and into an alley adjacent east of the H&P. It was quiet. The sound of my own boots on the asphalt as I halted. It was small and enclosed- the shadows weren’t deep. If he was here, I’d know.

Click. And now I did.

“Easy,” He said, a rumbling, buzzing sound that was becoming familiar. “Easy.” The second order was much slower. I felt his presence as it drew closer, but I didn’t turn around. I was a damn good martial artist, but a gun would always be faster and deadlier than me.

“I just keep findin’ you, don’t I, little bird?” He stopped a couple feet away from my back. “Where’s Batman?” He asked. I scowled.

“He’s with the men you murdered.”

A deep chuckle. “You saw that? Maroni and I have been havin’ a… disagreement. He’s comin’ around.”

“What, he won’t submit to you?” I pressed, hoping since he was so keen on entertaining me, I might be able to probe for some information- figure out his long game.

“Something like that.”

“So all this. Is it just to get to Batman?” He didn’t answer. Instead, he stepped forward. I tried to look for something to catch his reflection in- a window or something. I felt the cool metal of his gun part my hair like a curtain and press against the nape of my neck. Then, slowly, his gloved hand ghosted lightly across the side of my face, slowly, slowly, upward toward my temple until he found the button. Click. And just like that, my coms were down. No Batman’s voice in my ear. No updates from Oracle. No calling for help. How did he know that was there?

“What do want? Who the hell are you?” I said, letting frustration and anger deep into my voice. I stood cemented to my place as he drug himself around to stand in front of me, until I was staring back at that angry red bat on his chest. He’d holstered his gun.

“Why don’t you find out?” It was one part threat, one part joke that I wasn’t in on, growled contemptuously in that electronic flare that masked his voice. Whether it was rhetorical, or a genuine invitation, I took the opportunity to cautiously raise my hands to his helmet, feeling along the edges of the jaw until I found a matching set of release triggers. The architecture of the helmet was oddly congruent with something Bruce would’ve cooked up. Another mockery- like the bat.

His passive stillness terrified me. Like he knew just what was under the mask and just how I would react. Like it was all part of his plan, and I was playing my dutiful role. I pressed. A hissing noise as the inner workings went slack and released, giving me the freedom to push it up and over. When I saw his skin, then his mouth, I stopped. I stopped because he was actually letting me- and there was no reason he should be letting me except if he planned to kill me afterward. There was a long strangulation of the air between us. Gotham City- the buildings and streetlamps and gaudy, glittering marquees- seemed to quiet just to watch in anticipation. In a very coy way, his lips battled a grin. I felt like saying something witty, but stayed silent for fear of pushing time back into motion. He leaned forward, and lightning leapt in my stomach, despite myself. The dusk had alleviated, leaving only black across the sky that was rather vapid in comparison to the shining city reflected on his helm, still covering his eyes and nose.

“Scared?” He asked; quite spitefully considering my hands were trembling. Of course I was scared. But his voice was so human- smooth, but a little raspy, like anyone who gave orders for a living might have. It was low and deep, and I preferred it to the voice scrambler.

A dog barked from somebody’s fenced balcony, and some passing car shook with jaunty bass. Loud engines, sirens, honking, distant voices. The sizzling of a street taco stand. And still, somehow I was close enough to hear his drawing breath as his chest rose and fell. I went to push my fingers along the bottom of the helmet, to remove it entirely, but he grabbed my wrist.

A tiny, pinpoint red light was flashing on the breast of my suit. Batman was trying to contact me- unable to reach my coms.

“Daddy’s calling.” He looked wolfish there in the dark; featureless but a mouth displaying a cheshire grin that was wickedly snide. In a fluid motion, he released his grip on me and replaced his helmet, turning on his heel into the shallow shadows.

6 years prior

I hated this. The music, the marble, the champagne- all of it. I caught Alfred’s eye as he exchanged formalities with some distant-cousin-twice-removed of Bruce’s. I knew what he was looking at me for. The glint in his eye said it all.

Please behave, was the message. I’d already heard it twice this evening; Bruce told me how important this party was for the investors (aka, please behave), and Dick gave me some casual line about how he’d been looking forward to tonight all month (aka, please, please fucking behave).

It’s not like I had anything better to do. I couldn’t drink (no, not even the wine), and the only thing I had in common with company investors was that I was under Bruce’s thumb, too. Occasionally, some sweetly overbearing lady would appear, pinch my cheeks and pat my head, then disappear just as quickly. Thirty minutes passed as I sipped my ginger-ale and counted untied shoelaces, until I decided to find my brother. It was easy, really- just follow the laughter.

Dick wasn’t born in Gotham- not like me- but his rearing in the city had no doubt left a strong imprint. Everything about him proposed Gothamite glamour- even his voice. Far removed from the expensive private grammar lessons Bruce had bought him, he swung his vowels, and let his ‘a’s hang in the air, leaving an irresistible air of cocky, laid-back swagger. Some equilibrium between wealthy socialite and ‘man of the people’ he seemed adept at finding.

I found him at the snack table. He wore a perfectly-fitting suit of all black with navy satin accents, dark hair slicked back, and a very beautiful woman (I would come to know as Maya. Or was it Moira? Mara?) on his arm. A couple of his academy friends stood around him- freshly graduated, and so much wiser for it. It all suited him well. Not as much could be said for me.

“Hey.” He said, throwing me a grin.

“Hey.”

Maya Moira Mara excused herself to freshen up for a moment, and Dick put his hands in his pockets.

“Make any friends?” That was always his first question. I rolled my eyes.

“No. But you have.” It was a pointed jab- he and Babs had just taken a “break” and Maya Moira Mara’s silky red hair marked her as a painfully obvious rebound.

He sighed, decidedly ignoring me. “What about uh... what’s her name?”

“Who?”

“Ah, I forget. Her parents are international law something or other. Bruce works with ‘em. They have a daughter about your age.”

I just grunted. No use in making it seem like I was desperate for company now, considering I’d spent the last hour alone.

“There-“ He pointed to a girl standing alone, apparently abandoned by her respective international lawyer parents. Before I could slap his hand down and tell him it was rude to point, she spotted us. Following that, I’d look even weirder if I didn’t say anything, so after a nudge from Dick, I walked over to her.

“Hi.” I said, immediately wishing I could take the monosyllabic word back and try again. “I’m Jason.”

The girl smiled at me. A small, bashful sort of smile that you give when you’re the only people your age at a christmas party, so you slam together like two magnets.

“I’m Y/N.” She replied.

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smokeybrand · 4 years ago

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The Cape and The Cowl

A friend of mine posted a meme questioning who would win a fight between Doctor Doom and Batman. My gut reaction is to say it’s real bad for Bruce but, as i thought about it more and more, i kind of feel like its not so cut-and-dry. There is a lot of nuance that needs to be considered between the two characters rather than just a “smash the action figured together” scenario. Of course, there is the surface stuff like how would they interact generally? What would the catalyst be in order to incite said conflict? Why would Doom even see Bruce as a threat? If you think about it objectively, an all things are even, to Vic, Batman is just a crazy person losing his are on crime in a raggedy ass city. Victor von Doom is a the reagent of an entire country with a GDP that rivals some superpowers in the MCU. Like, the USA has diplomatic relations with a blip in Eastern Europe, because Doom has the military power to wreck he US in open aggression. Latveria will lose in a prolonged conflict, that’s just a question of resources, but that little country would absolutely inflict upon the US in a slow bleed. Imagine the War on Terror but with competent leadership and actual, discipline, military strategy. Why the f*ck would Doom care what the f*ck is going on out in Jersey? More than that. the similarities between the two characters is staggering.

We all know the origin of Batman. We’ve seen that sh*t how many times now? It’s like getting a new Spider-Man joint and having to watch Uncle Ben die all over again. It’s trite at this point but so essential to the character, we need a refresher every time Bats shows up onscreen. That trauma informs everything he is, as it would if you watched your parents gunned down in cold blood as a child, and then laid with their still warm corpses for however long until the police came. What a lot of people don’t know is the origin of Doctor Doom. Being a villain, Doom rarely gets his motivations explored outside of some megalomaniac Dr. No type f*ckery. However, Victor von Doom is a person. He started out life as a happy kid and learned to be Doctor Doom, just like Bruce learned to be Batman. Doom is actually a refugee. True, Doom was born an aristocrat, but Latveria was overthrown when he was still young so he was never able to be raised in that level of opulence. His mom was also murdered before he was ten years old. Just like Bruce, Doom experienced a horrific truth that would color his world perspective for the rest of his life. Doom would eventually find his way to the US as he was brilliant. Like, unheard of intelligent and it would be his exposure to the US lifestyle, after years of conflict and struggle, which would make him realize how easy life could be if someone just did what was necessary. And then Reed happened.

Reed Richards was, is, a fulcrum in Vic’s life. They have a relationship similar to Batman an Superman but the opposite. Whereas Batman values Clark’s perspective because it helps him keep perspective, Vic finds Reed to be absurd. He sees Reed for who e is and doesn’t understand why no one else can. Reed Richards is a reckless, excitable, short-sighted, glory-hog. He is. If you read the character with any semblance of realism, you’d see that. Ho many times has Sue comments on how she and the rest of his family, take a backseat to science? How many times has Reed, himself, sacrificed a relationship or to, in service to the solution of an equation? Doom saw all of that in college. Reed represents the structural issues of the world and it frustrates Vic to no end. In some continuities, the genesis of Vic going full Doom rest on an accident Reed commits because of that shortsightedness. It goes a long way to checking Reeds ego and he does become a better person for it, but it was at the cost of scarring Vic for life, both physically and mentally. Yet another example of the system, ruining Doom’s life.

Bruce, after his trauma, has kept a strong support system. First and foremost, since day one, he had Alfred. Doom had no one. Bruce then built a family, adopting all of the children and surrounding himself with love. Doom’s one true love died and was dragged down to hell. We know this because he punches out Mephisto whenever he can. Also, his mom is down there, too. Bruce eventually met Diana and Kal, becoming fast friends and life long confidants. Outside of Catwoman, I think Diana makes for the perfect romantic partner of Bruce and that is shown in several continuities. Reed just reinforced Doom’s disgust with the machinations of the world, eventually further degrading Doom’s tenuous hold of his ability to trust in others, by psychically maiming him. The negative impact Reed had on Doom’s life is f*cking profound, man. I’m not saying Doom should have taken it as far as he did, but it’s hard to argue against trying to kill a dude who had ruined years of your work, destroyed you reputation, and physically maimed you forever. That doesn’t seem wholly outrageous to me. I think it’s called justifiable homicide? The only reason Doom stopped trying to murder Reed is because Valeria was born. Valeria became the first person Doom felt real affection for, since the death of his wife. I think Morgan le Fay could be another, but that might have just been a time-space booty call. Valeria Richards and her relationship with he Uncle Doom, is what gave Vic the strength to be better. Bruce had that love his entire life, even immediately after his darkest day. Doom went decades without it.

Up until Valeria was born, all Doom had was his time spent as a destitute street rat, struggling to survive, to inform him about life and the world at large. That brazen cruelty for sure emotionally crippled him in a lot of ways, I'm not even going to start to defend his arrogance or superiority complex, but trauma does that. That's why i think Bats would eventually come around. They've both seen the absolute worst of the world and, in a lot of ways, go about righting those wrongs in the same way. If you pay attention, and the writer is worth their salt, you'd see that Latveria is an autocratic socialist paradise. Latverians are among the most literate, healthy, and happy people in the 616. Jobs are plentiful and crime is almost non-existent. Mans even cured cancer, which he made available to the world, if those people choose to make the trip to Latveria for treatment. The world of 616, at large, likes to paint Vic as this evil despot but, if you interview a laymen of Latveria, they’ll sing his praises. Most people forget that, before Doom returned for his birthright, Latveria was a whole ass occupied state. Think the relationship between Israel and Palestine. Latveria was basically falling into doorknobs for Symkaria and pretending that they weren’t in an abusive relationship. Doom showed up and changed all that. It was a bloody f*cking conflict, for sure, and i am certain Vic committed war crimes, but the end result was a free Latveria with a strong international presence. Doom is a hero to those people but a villain to other nations because of how he rose to power and, more importantly, how independent he made hi country from the world system. Doom did what was necessary to free his people, a march too far for Bruce and that’s why Gotham is the way that it is.

People who don’t know the character like to paint Vic as ego-maniacal villain, and that was valid when comics were just "hero smash bad guy", but we've grown beyond that. Every pop culture interpretation of Doom, outside of the comics, has him as this stoic, arrogant, asshole, dictator bu that’s just not an accurate portrayal of how Doom is in a modern capacity. Vic is definitely an autocrat but he’s no dictator. He can be cruel at times to specific individuals but he is generally benevolent to his people. He doesn’t portray himself as a strongman but he does let it be known he’ll nuke anyone or anything if it means furthering his overall goals which, currently, is the safety and security of Latveria. His country isn’t a police state and his people are free to do as they please but their is a line, just like everywhere else in the world. Doom just has a shorter one and enforces that with extreme prejudice. I’m not going to sit here and say everything is great in Latveria, it’s definitely not, but it ain’t so hot in 616 America either. How many Civil Wars have they had? What about that whole tidbit with Hydra Cap? There is nuance and gray nowadays, areas that both Bats and Doom comfortably call home. Batman is, objectively, not a pure hero. He is, at best, a chivalric anti-hero and similarly, Doom is more of an anti-villain than the mustache twirling, boogeyman, mastermind pop media portrays him to be. Batman and Doom are basically the same person, with the same motivations, only Doom is willing to go much, much, further than Bruce; A difference in method you an attribute to their respective upbringings.

If Doom had the same support system as Bruce, he’d create miracles. We’ve seen glimpses of that throughout the years. Dooms last run culminated with him essentially obliterating an entire universe where he had the support necessary to build a proper utopia. Our Doom couldn’t fathom the choices made by this variant Doom because of how broken he is. If Bruce was alone in his formative years like Victor, he’d commit atrocities. We’ve seen glimpses of that over they years, too. There are various narratives that explore just such a tragic turn of events, explored in the Death Metal series of books. Dawnbreaker immediately comes to mind. Bruce and victor are the same side of the same coins. It's literally a crap shoot as to which side of the alignment chart either leans. And as if to inform my point further, we just recently had Joker War. That book went a long way to exposing the absolute necessity of raw force, in order to properly “save”Gotham. Joker was able to completely dismantle that entire city by attacking the machinery put in lace to make it run. He effectively proved that The Batman was part of the problem and would never be the solution because Bruce doesn’t go far enough. He puts out fires but never address the sparks which start those blazes. He doesn’t go far enough. He never will. His code won’t allow him to. But Doom can. Doom did. Honestly, if you really want to keep it real, what is Bruce's endgame? What does a healthy Gotham City look like? It looks a lot like f*cking Latveria.

So to answer this question outright, i don’t think they even fight. The way this hypothetical was set up had three rounds: the first being a standard donnybrook, the second being prep time, and the last being god mode. To be perfectly honest with you, it wouldn't make it past the first round. If i had to say, with pedestrian or normie level understanding of he characters, Doom sweeps all categories. For Round one, Doom’s armor trumps all of Batman’s gadgets. For Round Two, Doom has more resources at his fingertips for prep. For Round The God Emperor Doom exists. He created several realities and killed a few Beyonders. Batman sat in a chair which gave him access to all the wisdom in the multiverse, and realized there were three Jokers. Doom all the way. My informed opinion as someone who adores both these character more than most would have me think there wouldn’t even be a conflict to begin with. I think they’d investigate the inciting catalyst, meet in person with intent to attack if necessary, size each other up until one of them made the proposal to just talk, they'd converse, and the fight would end with both of them walking away from each other with begrudging respect. Doom would admire Bruce's will and Bruce would understand the necessity of Doom's position in the world because, if you can make it make sense, Bruce will usually agree. Batman, for all of his shortcomings, is not naive to the world. He’s seen the same darkness as Doom. Doom, for all of his pompous arrogance, understands the struggle to maintain faith in those around you, even if that noble aspiration is misplaced. Bruce is one bad day away from Doom and Doom is a decades worth of days from being Bruce. They mirror each other and i think they’d see that, taking each other as cautionary tales before becoming collaborators. I don’t see them ever really becoming friends but i don't think they’d ever be true enemies.

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mischiefandspirits · 5 years ago

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Colony of Gotham (3/7)

The Colony of Gotham is an urban legend that is whispered about in the dangerous city. It’s said the Colony is a family of demons and spirits that stalk the night, hunting for the souls of the guilty.

When Bruce became Batman, he’d never intended to be mistaken for a demon. He was happy to lean into it, though, and as he gained his partners – as his family grew – they all followed suit.

First Part ~ Previous Part ~ Next Part

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Duke Thomas lost his parents when Joker unleashed a new version of Joker Venom onto a crowd. While most of the infected were rounded up to be cured, some disappeared, Duke’s parents among them. The boy was determined to find them, no matter what it took, which landed him in trouble with both his foster parents and the law. Even when he was labeled a delinquent, though, he continued to search.

Meanwhile, a similar search came to its end.

Harper Row’s hunting had eventually led to her crossing paths with Batman. Despite her fear, she refused to back down under his warnings until her brother Cullen was attacked by some of his classmates while she was away on one of her searches.

Bruce, having been keeping an eye on the woman, stepped in to ensure they got justice for the attack and, in the process, helped her get custody of Cullen so they could both be free of their abusive father. In the face of all these changes and with Batman’s promise to find the other killer, Harper agreed to stand down.

However, Cass would find him first by taking a bullet for him after her father sent men to attack Harper and Cullen to draw her out.

Having expected a monster like Orphan, not this small child who stared up at her with the most apologetic eyes, Harper immediately forgave the girl and worked with Bruce and Batman to clear Cass’s name and take the girl under her wing. It was hard as Cass didn’t understand any language but body, but Harper and Cullen were willing to put in the work. In an effort to help, Bruce brought the Rows into the fold and promised any aid they could require.

Cullen was fascinated, but also happy to keep to the normal side of life. Bruce may have secretly wondered why the other children he found himself faced with couldn't be that level headed.

Harper, on the other hand, was more taken in, but also wary of getting too involved now that she had two people relying on her care. She went out sometimes in all black body armor with a full face mask and short hooded cloak, but she stayed out of sight enough that Black Bat remained an unknown myth.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A trip to Los Angeles had Tim declaring he was never going with Bruce on business trips ever again. The first two days had been nice enough, but then Bruce caught him pulling an all-nighter working on a case that he wasn’t supposed to be working on and banned him from coffee.

Which was how a half-awake, phone focused Tim found himself nearly stepping out in front of traffic. Thankfully someone not dead on their feet spotted him in time and she pulled him back onto the sidewalk. He tried to laugh it off as just being too focused on his phone. That failed when he turned to walk away and almost immediately walked into a newspaper rack. The girl insisted on walking him to his hotel. When he pointed out he was going to pick up something from his father, she declared she’d walk him there and back.

When he returned back to Gotham with a new number in his phone, he refused to look her up. No, she was just some random civilian. He didn’t care if Wonder Girl doesn’t even wear a mask! Obviously that was her! A hoodie doesn’t help hide anything, Cassie! You and Kon are terrible! How do you two even have secret identities? At least Superman had those stupid glasses!

No, she was an ordinary civilian.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Duke Thomas’s search eventually ended when he teamed up with Batman to free his parents and the other missing Joker Venom victims from the Court of Owls, his photokinetic vision helping them navigate the labyrinthine tunnels. Unfortunately the Court’s experiments paired with going so long without the antidote had left the victims catatonic. Even still, Duke was so grateful that he did what he could to help Batman with his cases in the future.

Bruce, giving in to the inevitable even if he was wary to have a meta vigilante in Gotham, brought Duke into the Colony. There was some debate over how he’d fit in until Duke made it known that he would prefer getting some actual training before he went into the field for real.

This doesn’t stop Tim and Bette from glaring eachother down over who got to move on from Robin first.

Cass suggested settling it with a Mario Kart race.

Tim won.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

One day Jinny “Hex” Woodson got fed up with all her friends discussing their Gotham friends -- ones she was pretty sure none of them were even allowed to have since no one was even supposed to go to Gotham -- so she packed a bag and headed out to find her own Gotham friend.

She decided the place was alright enough. It was actually kind of nice that no one questioned her for having a pair of pistols holstered on her hips. Someone even tried to mug her despite them.

It was hilarious.

She was having trouble finding her new Gotham friend, though. At least until a kid fell off a fire escape she’d been passing under and into her arms.

It was fate.

Apparently the kid had been trying to take a picture of a bird (aka Tim was scouting for a stakeout) and the railing hadn’t been quite as sturdy as he’d thought (it had only let him balance on it in a crouch for two hours before giving way). It was then that he noticed her guns.

“You’re not going to shoot me, right?”

“Angel, you’re so skinny, you can't even see your shadow. I don’t need my guns to whup you.”

“Angel?”

“Because you fell from heaven.”

Tim was not amused. He was even less amused when she declared they were friends now. No, he doesn’t get an opinion on the matter. Should have thought about that before throwing himself at unsuspecting women. She doesn’t even swing that way, Angel.

Around the same time that it hit the Young Justice team that they were all friends with the same Gothamite, it also hit the Colony that Tim had somehow managed to befriend the entire team.

Except no, Tim affirmed that they befriended him. He had no input in this whatsoever, thank you very much. It was probably Kon’s fault, really. He had probably set it all up. Tim was definitely going to give Kon the cold shoulder.

At least until his badgering got too annoying.

The worst part was that Stephanie stole his phone to get Cassie’s number when she found out she and Tim had been flirting. She stated it was so Stephanie could defend his honor if she tried something, but he caught both her and Bette in a group chat with not only Cassie, but Kara Danvers aka Supergirl and Suzanne “Cissie” King-Jones aka Arrowette.

Apparently, they didn’t get to be teased since the girls actively sought out their super friends.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

When Talia al Ghul personally informed her that the Heir to the Demon was now living with his biological father Bruce Wayne so she would be wise to keep her distance from Gotham, sister or not, Cheshire knew she’d made the right call keeping her nose out of the Waynes’ business.

It didn’t occur to her that when Talia al Ghul had met Bruce Wayne over ten years earlier at a party and decided to spend the night with him, the woman believed he’d given up his training to settle down for a life of luxury and frivolities. Cheshire didn’t know Ra’s had only allowed Talia to keep the child that had been an accidental result because he’d seen Bruce’s promise and believed, if raised properly, the child could become what he thought Bruce hadn’t.

That Talia had only brought her son to his father because she had no other choice.

The Demon’s Daughter fled to Gotham with Damian after her father was killed by Slade Wilson. She had hoped that between Bruce’s former training and the shadowy Colony of Gotham, Damian would be safe until Wilson could be dealt with.

Damian did not get along with his siblings. He made an attempt to pick a fight with Tim that failed when Tim refused to fight a child. Cass tried to fight him in Tim’s place, but Harper told her no. Damian tried to stab Dick when he hugged him and Dick disarmed him before he could without releasing the hug. He picked a fight with Jason and got his butt handed to him. Damian snuck out to prove himself, picked a fight with Nightwing, and got his butt kicked. Damian tried his hand with Tim again and the older boy, annoyed, agreed then used knockout gas on him the moment the fight began. Dick tried to talk with Damian and they ended up fighting. Damian, of course, got his butt kicked.

Stephanie was standing on the sidelines the entire time, encouraging everything.

Soon enough the Colony noticed Slade holed up near Gotham and launched an attack. Due to the danger, Bruce pulled in everyone, leaving the Robins and Alfred to keep an eye on Damian, Duke, Cullen, and Cass in the manor while Catwoman took guard outside. When Damian found out about the attack and tried to go after Slade, Tim sent him in the opposite direction then followed after him in the suit he’d been designing for post-Robin while the others took shelter in the cave.

Tim knocked Damian out and dragged him back to the cave where they locked him in a cell, to Bruce’s annoyance. Damian woke up and realized his father was Batman when he overheard Bruce reveal that Talia was likely coming back for Damian now that Slade was taken down. He also heard the family’s argument over it. None of them wanted him to go with her, but in the end they agreed that it was Damian’s choice.

When she did come, Damian remembered what the others said about him having a choice and some things about family Dick had said when the two had had their private conversation. He decided to stay with them, citing that there were things his father could teach him that he couldn’t learn while helping his mother rebuild the League.

She was obviously annoyed and disappointed, but didn’t fight him on it.

It wasn’t easy. Damian still fought with all his brothers as well as Stephanie, though Duke did his best to keep out of it. The youngest Wayne tried to challenge Tim and Bette for his place as Robin, but Dick and Bruce were able to get him to agree to training instead with the reminder that he was lacking the theatrical and teamwork skills that the Colony utilized and were mandatory as Robin.

Bruce didn’t mention that he wanted more reassurance the boy wouldn’t step over the line before ever letting him near the field.

Damian was not impressed when he discovered his father’s relationship with Selina Kyle and made it well known.

She thought it was adorable.

Damian would never admit that the kitten she gifted him was what calmed him. He simply didn’t see the point in wasting any energy on outwardly disliking the woman when his father clearly wouldn’t be changing his mind.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

When Duke took Tim’s place as Robin, he made sure to keep his own contributions to the role quiet. Robin was a legacy while his meta abilities were not. Tim was not quite so subtle in his new role.

No one was sure where the name Corvid came from since the new bird didn’t speak in words, only trills. He wore an armored suit that was blue on the chest and arms and black on his sides with white detailing. His legs, hands, and feet were all black as well except for the blue splashes on the outside of his thighs. A white belt draped over his hips while black bandoliers crossed over his chest, a silver and black bird logo covering the cross. The bandoliers connected to his cowl, which was open at the top unlike the Bats’ which allowed his feather-like hair to fall down around his face. It was shoulder length and faded from black at the roots to blue at the tips, much like the wings that formed from his feathered cape.

They said he was a fallen star stolen away by the Colony. He soared soundlessly through the air on wings that never flapped, leaving behind a trail of blue light. He was more migratory than the others. Sometimes he flew above Batman and Robin, sometimes Batwoman and Red Hood, and sometimes Batgirl and Nightwing. A criminal could only hope they got the warning of seeing one of the others first or he’d have them in his talons hundreds of feet in the air before they even realized he was there.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Time passed. Damian grew closer to the rest of the Colony under Dick’s instruction.

Jason and Kate bonded with him over their more aggressive styles (to Bruce’s consternation) while helping him learn ways to calm his temper.

Despite their rough start and continuing antagonism, Damian grew to respect Tim’s quick mind as he tutored him in strategy and the Colony’s language.

He also developed a respect that had nothing to do with fear -- not at all -- for Barbara after she repaid an insult he gave her by sharing with the entire family a video of him fawning over some stray kittens in the park. He never discovered how she got the footage as he had made sure there were no cameras in the vicinity before acting in such an undignified fashion. (It was Dick. He pouted for weeks when he realized the cute video he took of his adorable baby brother was used for such purposes.)

A similar kind of respect grew for Harper as he quickly learned to be noticeable when approaching her. She had far too much experience with bats and birds sneaking around and far too little concern over jabbing them with a stun gun in revenge, whether they meant to scare her or not.

He was not afraid to admit he was scared of Cass once he realized who she was, though. He knew her skills and knew she could take him down in seconds if it came to it.

He was skeptical of both Stephanie and Bette, who he believed to be vapid, but Stephanie’s pranks were amusing when they weren’t directed at him and Bette introduced him to social media revolving around animal rights (and cute animal pictures).

Although he was rather dull, Cullen was by far the best person to be with while working on his newfound appreciation for drawing and painting, especially if the older boy was doing his own artwork for the webcomics he and Duke collaborated on.

While not being the most mentally or physically skilled, Duke was the most patient of the lot and could be trusted to keep his mouth shut so he was the one Damian went to when he needed assistance with homework (a rare occurrence, but the American schooling system was so different from his League tutors, to the point that sometimes they even seemed to contradict one another) or wanted to practice his Trillic.

Though he would never admit it out loud, Dick was Damian’s favorite of the lot. While he didn’t have Duke’s patience, he was just as considerate and confidential. When something happened, Dick was always willing to hear him out and talk him through it until he understood. Or at least was on the path to understanding. Dick did not share Jason’s anger, his father’s suspicion, Tim’s caution, or Duke’s anxiety. He had only sympathy. Damian knew his mother would consider Dick weak, but he couldn’t bring himself to care.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

After a year in Gotham came and went, Dick went to Duke and Bette. The three talked, eventually bringing in Harper as an idea began to blossom.

Robin had a sword. They said he got it from his shadow.

The only thing not pitch black on the Black Bat was the thin golden outline of the Bat’s symbol on their chest. Their face was featureless, not even possessing eyes like Batgirl. They never made a sound. If you saw Robin, then his shadow was behind you.

There was no time to run.

On the other hand, those who believed themselves safe during the day proved to be foolish.

Bright spirits had come to Gotham.

They wore metal armor and carried their wings on their chests. They came and went in flashes of light bright enough to stun.

Bluebird was their guide and donned armor of blue. Her voice echoed with the voices of lost souls and lightning danced across her form.

Lark was their prophet and donned armor of gold. He could see the past, present, and future and fought with the strength of ages past.

Hawkfire was their messenger and donned armor of red. She spoke with the voices of everyone she passed and her armor blazed with the heat of the sun.

Though they walked the day and seemed to be creatures of light, it was nothing but a trick. They were will-o'-wisps, false lights. They were birds.

The Colony had invaded the day.

With the three working together, Bette offered to turn Duke and Harper. The two accepted. Afterwards Harper sought out Cullen and Cass to offer them the same. She wasn’t surprised with Cass’s easy agreement, though Cullen’s was a little more shocking as he’d never shown any interest in the Colony’s nightlife. Quite the opposite, in fact. He simply shrugged and told her vampirism had nothing to do with the nightlife. It was just how their family worked.

He and Cass were greatly amused, but unsurprised when Harper, Bette, and Duke forgot to mention the latest turnings. They decided to keep their own mouths shut to see how long it would last, though he did confide in Alfred. Not that it was necessary as the man seemed to put it together himself the moment he saw Cullen.

It took three months for Bruce, Tim, and Barbara to figure it out for themselves, then an additional two for the rest to find out when Duke casually mentioned it during a family meeting.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Damian blamed Tim when he found himself stuck in a room with Superman’s spawn Jonathan Kent while said superhero in disguise interviewed Damian’s father for the newspaper.

Clearly, Tim’s horrible curse had somehow rubbed off on Damian and the older boy would pay dearly once he returned home by way of Damian renaming all of Tim’s non-case related computer folders and creating a maze of invisible thread around his room.

At least the half-alien had good taste in video games. And his voice was nice enough that his incessant chatter was more like a soothing white noise than a nuisance. And Superman clearly would have trained Jon in discretion, even if not to Damian’s family’s standards.

For the record, the only reason Damian accepted Jon’s number was so that Dick would be so pleased Damian had finally acquired a friend that he wouldn’t allow the others to tease him over something that was clearly Tim’s fault to begin with. And when that plot fell through, he simply forgot to delete Jon’s number because he was busy expanding his revenge to include Jason and Stephanie.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Harper, as Black Bat, wore Cass's Orphan suit from Young Justice. I wanted something a little more lowkey from what she normally wears since she's not really supposed to be spotted.

Tim's suit got the most reworking because I like and dislike elements from all his Red Robin suits. The end result is one with the body armor from his Young Justice (TV) Robin suit, but with the New 52 wings paired with the bandoliers, logo, and cowl from the original Red Robin suit. Except I left the cowl open on top like the ones Kid Flash and Impulse use. From there you replace the red with blue and the yellow with white. I honestly wish I was better at drawing so that I could give a visual of what I'm going for here.

Cass's Black Bat suit is her Batgirl one, just with her belt black instead.

Haper, Bette, and Duke wear Signal's armor as Bluebird, Hawkfire, and Lark, just in blue, red, and gold instead of yellow. The bat logo is also replaced with their individualized bird logos.

Vampires’ animal forms:

Duke: Cape wild dog

Harper: Maned wolf

Cullen: Crab-eating fox

Cass: Northern bat

#batman #batfam #colony of gotham #fanfiction

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a-crimson-lion · 5 years ago

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I Need To Stop Reading Into Things…😂

Yet again for @kiricookie .

[Check out this post first.]

So… we’re here again. Lord forgive me, I’m back on my bulls***.

Okay, jokes aside, I really should stop doing these things, but I am a stubborn individual. Plus, I wanna see how our notes compare, and try to have more civil discussions on the internet than I see on average. I’d reblog, but again, your post is already long as is (not incredibly long, but still), and I’d rather not occupy dashboard space more than I need to.

Alright, I think I’ve said my piece. Let’s talk about your post…

Oof. Starting right in the heart of the issue, really.

I am aware that Izuku is… incredibly likeable. I am aware that some of his issues, while perceived by some as noble, are heavily problematic and probably need to get sorted out before the boy gets a close audience with death. I am also aware that some of his habits are less than courteous in some circumstances, though like you said, Izuku has the benefit of having no malicious intent when it comes to these actions, even if they can come off as annoying.

Now, regarding Katsuki’s snail pace development… I get what you’re trying to say, but that doesn’t make it come off as any less frustrating...

As much as I want to believe that Katsuki’s upbringing in society is what’s stunted his growth so badly, I wish the narrative was more willing to show it. All we’ve gotten of Katsuki’s past are flashbacks from Izuku, remarks during the visit to the Bakugo household, and the “raised with violence” line from the Remedial Course arc. Now this understandably paints a pretty terrible picture, but uh… what has Katsuki done to try to fix it? How has Katsuki tried to demonstrate that his upbringing wasn’t justified? Why is he imitating the behaviors he supposedly despises, that supposedly keep him held back, instead of trying to find a workaround? I’ve only seen a few growth/redemption arcs of antagonistic characters, but even if the arcs took long, there was always an ultimate reason for doing so. And Katsuki doesn’t have that. At least, not yet.

It’s been implicitly established that Katsuki’s growth will be the mother of all slowburns. I’ve mentioned it in this old post of mine, but this is doing Katsuki no favors, at least for me. Now don’t get me wrong, I love myself a flawed character, but there’s only so much I can stomach before a flawed character becomes less “flawed” and more “asshole.” I personally believe that his true growth doesn’t get started until “Deku vs. Kacchan 2” (Episode 61), but if we really wanna consider that “Bakugo’s Start Line” (Episode 8) is his… well, start line, then that only makes it worse. Because again, his character arc is, as we’ve established, slow. But the fact that it’s slow enough for several other character arcs to transpire (Shoto, Tenya), as well as slow enough to allow “background characters” some significant development and return to relevancy (Eijiro, Hitoshi), I start wanting to stop holding my breath for his arc’s supposedly inevitable conclusion. Now I know you personally consider the suspense a positive, but it’s the opposite for me. I’d chalk it up to impatience, but again, MULTIPLE character arcs have transpired, and a few have been far more believably gradual compared to Katsuki’s.

While it is impressive that Katsuki was willing to pour out his feelings to Izuku, I’d like to argue that it wasn’t as… well, sentimental. Remember that society and Izuku’s peers before UA regarded him as the lowest of the low. The weakest, the most worthless. “The pebble in the path.” Considering that Katsuki lost the Training Exercise AND technically got outsmarted by Izuku, who was considered this until VERY RECENTLY, I’d imagine that’d be one hell of a blow to his ego. It is still significant that he’s willing to talk to Izuku about this, but it’s not exactly because he’s humbling himself. It’s because he’s begrudgingly admitting that he’s not the best, and it’s been well established that he HATES not being the absolute best. And I don’t know about you, but suddenly getting your high expectations crushed after years of nothing but “positive reinforcement” should not be made as big of a deal as it is here. I’m not saying to get over it, because you’ll never get over it, you have to live with it and learn from it, but don’t make it seem like it’s the end of the world and a half like Katsuki did in that scene. Plus, didn’t he essentially reaffirm that he was going to do what he planned to do from the start of his tenure at UA? I mean, good on him for his dedication, but you’d think the guy would want to take a step back and actually try to learn from others if they were so impressive.

Now, the DC Superhero franchise falls in and out from my radar at times, but I don’t think Katsuki and Batman are a good comparison for the point you're trying to make. Yes they both use violence, and yes they’re both intimidating, but for entirely different reasons. Batman uses fear tactics because he finds them efficient; I don’t know what they’re doing with his character nowadays, but from what I can gather in his earlier incarnations, Batman’s not out for blood. Vengeace, sure, but he doesn’t waste time getting there beating the snot out of his enemies. He takes care of them, sends them off, and keeps on trucking. Before they tried making him even more edgy, he didn’t kill and he kept away from firearms because he was well aware of any issues he had. He may not be a goodie two-shoes like most heroes, but he does show definitive empathy in some of his earlier incarnations. Remember, Batman was the kid who lost his parents to injustice. That was his entire reason for taking up the cowl, for becoming more than Bruce Wayne. In the Justice League Unlimited Episode “Epilogue,” he has the option to kill Ace, a teen villain with dangerously growing psychic powers. He doesn’t do that. He takes the seat next to Ace as she begins to die. He offers his support as Ace has to confront the terrifying realization that she is dying. He’s helping another scared kid, because he knows what it’s like.

That’s heroism. That’s Batman.

Katsuki’s motivations and actions aren’t as sympathetic. Him lashing out isn’t for anything strategical; early on in the series and even after his “Start Line,” up until the Endeavor Agency Arc, I believe, Katsuki’s sole motivations are victory and bloodlust. Even if it seems like he’s growing more chivalrous with his resolve, he backslides so many times back into the angry loudmouth trope its hard to want to keep hope, because if he can backslide multiple times before, what’s to stop him from backsliding again? It ruins the suspense for some people. And people are intimidated by Katsuki, but that’s because he’s borderline unhinged. I’d be scared s***less too if a pyrokinetic powerhouse was gunning on me with his eyes glowing like the fires of Hell as he radiated killing intent (an exaggeration, but still). I have yet to see Katsuki use this intimidation “tactic” of his beyond the fact that he appears to be enjoying it, either.

Alright, enough of that, let’s analyze that penultimate question: why hate Katsuki? If you asked me early on, I would say that yes, I don’t like him because he hurts Izuku. But as I’ve continued looking throughout the series, I now say that I don’t like him because, contrary to what he says, virtually everything is handed to him. Most of the time, its people mistaking his battle thirst as chivalrous determination, whether it be against a villain or just a standard opponent. He never tries to make himself any more “likeable,” and while Class 1-A is quick to call him out for this in the USJ Arc, by the Sports Festival they’re all flocking to him, and I have yet to understand any proper reasoning for this. It’s less like Katsuki proving there’s more to him than meets the eye and earning the respect of his peers, and more so that people latch on to the abstract concept of Katsuki’s coolness and strength, and he just begrudgingly tolerates them from there.

I mean, Eijiro was wholeheartedly against Katsuki’s actions during the Battle Trial, yet by the USJ the difference is night and day, and it doesn’t help that he’s interpreting Katsuki’s desire to beat up villains as “faith in his classmates.” Shoto was abused by Endeavor, so the fact that he can’t at least draw some comparisons between Katsuki and his sperm donor is slightly concerning, and while I want to chalk it up to his stunted social skills, I feel like Hori and/or his editors trying to shove in a friendship to increase their overall likeability (especially Katsuki’s) is more likely. Don’t even get me started on the hoops they jump through in the Joint Training Arc. Not even gonna touch that…

Okay, finally made it to the last paragraph. So, here’s something about me you may or may not like: I don’t like people dying, good or bad. Unless their actions are comparable to that of Satan, or at least close, then they shouldn’t get the axe. Why?

Because a dead person can’t change… and a dead person can’t suffer.

Believe me, even though I’ve fallen off the bandwagon a long time ago, I want Katsuki to change for the better. And he can’t do that if he’s dead. The manga’s most recent arc has been hella frustrating because of that, and no spoilers, but the two deaths that did occur did not leave me in high spirits. Hawks, Shigaraki, you both are on thin f***ing ice I swear. So no, lucky for you, I do NOT want to see Katsuki dead just because he happens to be an ass. What I wanna see is proper repercussions that go beyond being a villain hostage and having everyone else’s potential trauma downplayed for the sake of giving Katsuki more sympathy points.

Also, I’m well aware Katsuki’s death would absolutely ruin Izuku. I am also well aware that it is one of the few concrete facts I hate with nearly every fiber of my body. Not because of what it says about Izuku…

...but because I am sick and tired of Katsuki continuing to be the arrogant s*** he is, whether it be his genuine feelings or merely a front. I am sick of the fact that for as smart and aware that someone like him is, he still insists on trying to act like a badass when there is no need or overall expectation to do so. I am sick that he continues to decide to put himself and others in jeopardy, all for the purpose of maintaining his ego. I am sick that he gets all this support, all this help, and yet his development is still worse than a snail’s pace, and the narrative continues to keep letting him off with love taps and leaving him unfairly unprepared for the kill shot.

...maybe Katsuki deserves to get better. But is this really the best way to do it? Really?

Thanks for listening. Hope you got something from all of that.

-Crimson Lion (24 August 2020)

#bnha #boku no hero academia #mha #my hero academia #don't really know if these count as anti baku anymore. still tagging just in case.#anti bakugo #anti bakugou #character analysis #charater comparissons #character meta #meta #rant #response #Word Count: 1906 #...why do I keep doing this to myself? :'-D #yo kiricookie #while you're waiting to see heroes rising have this to tide you over #hope you enjoy it

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mellazella · 5 years ago

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you’re under fire (i’ll cover you)

my fic for @batfam-big-bang is here!!!! i hope you enjoy the read and if you do go ahead and reblog or even leave a comment!!

summary:

When Tim is injured on patrol, he's ordered to bedrest. Instead he finds himself running straight to the doorstep of a man who tried to kill him--the Red Hood.

or: how tim drake finds common ground with jason todd--the ground of a warehouse, that is--and bonds over it.

words: 5,993

here’s a link to my fic on ao3!

and my post that talks more about the lovely people who made this possible!

As the sharp right hook lands on his cheekbone, Tim snaps out of focus for a few seconds and misses the uppercut aimed at his jaw. The hit knocks him back a few feet, but he manages to keep his legs steady enough to stay upright. He clenches his teeth from the burning in his shoulder, the bullet that struck it earlier shifting with every movement.

Apparently thugs don’t appreciate drop-ins, and throwing their guns out the window only aggravates them further. Tim learns something new everyday.

And his dad said putting on a cape wouldn’t be beneficial.

A voice in the back of Tim’s mind hisses that he won’t last much longer like this, but he shoves that thought further back. Tightening his hold on his bo staff, he feels a newfound determination that’s gathered in him purely out of spite.

This determination lasts for a solid five hits, with Tim landing some good licks on the thug, but then a lucky aim knocks the staff from his hands and breaks two of his fingers along with it. The adrenaline rushing through him numbs the pain so easily that Tim hardly even registers feeling them crack. That voice hisses more urgently, and it’s morphing uncomfortably close to Dick’s voice, but Tim continues to ignore it in favor of concentrating on the broad man in front of him.

Priorities and all that.

If he weren’t currently getting his ass handed to him, Tim would feel the frustration that comes with wrongfully underestimating an opponent. It’s a rookie mistake that would make Bruce look at him with his Disappointed Dad Look for a couple minutes until he relents and tells Tim to hit the showers.

Never assume a thug is an easy drop. It’s been drilled into his head and then some since he was thirteen and started this hero gig.

And yet he did.

Tim is a bit preoccupied to really dwell on this. There’s always later to really drown in everything he’s done wrong tonight, when he’s home and the thug is dealt with.

The thug pulls something out of his pocket, metal glinting in the harsh light of the warehouse. Tim chances a look over at his bo staff, several feet away.

Okay. There might not be a later.

“Killing a Robin won’t be as original as you think,” Tim says dryly, eying the knife to try gauging the thug’s next move from subtle body language.

His right shoulder is tensed, and his legs are bending at the knees—oh shit. Stabby springs forward, knife ready to run Tim through. The bullet slows him down considerably, but Stabby doesn’t seem to be as adept with his knife as he is with his gun and fists.

Tim dodges sloppily, his shoulder twitching in pain at the sharp movement. His jagged motions match Stabby’s wild swings in time as well as he can through the agony. They move like dancers with two left feet until Tim slips up and doesn’t escape the distance quick enough. The knife slides smoothly between his armor plates, the luckiest shot Stabby has probably ever gotten in his criminal life.

Tim staggers back. He uses the momentum of the thrust to knock Stabby away from him in an attempt to make space to catch his breath for a moment. A bullet in your shoulder and a knife sticking out of your side really take a lot out of you, apparently.

That proves to be a mistake when Stabby’s friend, Trigger Happy, rouses from the corner Tim had dragged him to earlier after disarming him and knocking him out. His shoulder throbs at the reminder of the bullet wedged next to his shoulder blade, and he’s relieved that he had the sense to take the guns out of the equation.

That relief is sucked away when Trigger Happy lunges himself at Tim, who isn’t prepared for a two-on-one in his condition.

Bruce would be fine in these odds. Tim knows this. Dick would even have a high chance of coming out of this relatively fine, with a few extra flips and kicks. If Damian could see him now, he can only imagine how he would lose the dregs of respect he’s managed to earn from the kid.

A small “Fuck,” escapes him, and he can’t tell if it’s from the sudden weight on his gunshot wound or the deep cut of feelings that hit him when he thinks of the capabilities of the other bats; the disappointment he can feel from just the image of Bruce in his mind.

Tim’s thoughts linger on Bruce in subconscious desperation, but he clears that away quickly and puts his attention back to the fight at hand.

It seems gravity is betting against Tim in this fight, pulling the floor from under him as he starts to feel dangerously dizzy, crumpling under Trigger Happy like a paper bag. Stabby may not be adept with the blade, but Trigger Happy is a triple threat with his fists, gun, and knife. His hands are on the knife for mere seconds—seconds—before Tim manages to wrestle away from his grip, and yet he could still feel the knife twist ever so slightly, carving through his flesh.

His nerves scream bloody murder.

Out of pure survival instinct, Tim pulls a batarang from a pocket and shoves it into Trigger Happy’s arm, causing him to cry out in pain and scramble to let go of him. Tim lands hard on the ground, his stomach meeting the concrete, but hardly feels anything but the knife settling uncomfortably into its new position in his side.

Trigger Happy runs out of the warehouse, blood flowing from his arm. Tim relaxes minutely—one-on-one is more doable—and throws a second batarang at Stabby when Tim notices him advancing toward him. It hits Stabby in the abdomen shallowly, his karma running out along with the puff of air escaping his lips at the shock of being stabbed.

Or, at least, that’s the reason Tim’s mind, addled by blood loss, supplies for him. His body slumps against the ground despite every instinct screaming at him to get back up. Stabby laughs slightly at Tim’s limp body and steps over him, boot pressing into the steadily growing puddle of blood.

“The Bat’s kids aren’t as invulnerable as they say they are, huh, Red Robin?”

Tim’s eyes remain trained on each bloody boot print that trails behind Stabby as he walks out of the warehouse, presumably feeling triumphant over killing another Robin. After his eyes start to water from staying open too long he blinks and comes back to the world abruptly, the sensations his mind had been blocking returning to his wounds.

His comm lies about ten feet away from him, he notices suddenly, and he feels dread seep through every inch of his body. Tim tries to move closer to reach for it, but his side and shoulder protest wildly and he stops moving with a grunt.

Hesitation forces his finger to pause over the button hidden at the nape of his neck where his cape rests. Before he can put too much thought behind it, though, he presses down and sets off the silent emergency alarm. Tim relaxes down against the concrete, letting the blood loss blur his vision for the moment.

With the adrenaline from the fight draining out of him along with the blood in his body, Tim is becoming more and more aware of the pain pulsing with his every heartbeat.

He’s painstakingly aware of his surroundings suddenly: the dim high rises of the warehouse with the hanging lights that beam down severely, the stacks of crates along the walls and in the occasional heap where Tim and Trigger Happy had knocked them over before Tim subdued him.

The trail of blood from the ever-widening puddle that far too closely resembled what he imagined to be Jason’s last view before the ticking came to a stop with a bang.

Somewhere, in the back of his mind, a stopwatch had started with the press of his emergency button. The hand hits the forty-five second mark as Tim feels almost hypnotized by those bloody boot prints leading from his body to the exit.

This could be his end, and he’s stuck looking at the footprints left by his murderer imprinted with his own blood. It’s better than watching a timer tick down, he supposes, but just as lonely.

The warehouse closes around him, suffocating him all of a sudden, and all he can think about as he struggles to breathe is Bruce. Bruce, who’s already lost a Robin in a warehouse. Bruce, who can’t handle losing another soldier in his war against Gotham’s crime. Bruce, who became a father figure for Tim when he’d needed one most, just as Tim became the partner Batman had needed after Jason.

He sees the stopwatch hit a minute and a half in his mind’s eye. It seems that his penchant for keeping track of time for patrol reports isn’t failing him, even at his end.

The time it had taken Bruce to make it to the warehouse Jason had been tricked into going to in Ethiopia was hidden deep in the Batcomputer’s files, but Tim had found it within his first month as Robin.

Two minutes and twenty-three seconds.

Tim reckons he’ll be too far gone by then. He’s not willing to bet money—the blood loss isn’t helping his brain any—but he likes to think it’s not affecting him too much.

He’s forced to reconsider that as the room starts spinning, and he bites back a curse. The stopwatch is nearing two minutes and Tim’s chances of making it out of this warehouse alive are dwindling.

This is how Red Robin goes out? In a fight with a couple rookies and their bad aim? Out of sheer incredulity, Tim laughs. He can survive Gotham’s streets at age nine but nineteen year old Tim can’t take on thugs he’s been trained to beat. The irony cuts as deep as the knife in his side.

His eyes are closing on the sight of his blood spreading around him as the pain encompasses him. In his mind’s eye, the stopwatch hits two minutes and fifteen seconds. Tim is ready to lay here for whatever is left of his life, ready for Gotham to finally see the end of another Robin, ready to let his blood drain out so the pain can numb—he hears the rev of an engine and his eyes snap open.

Bruce. He made it.

Two minutes and seventeen seconds.

Tim almost sobs in relief. He has to stop himself when the movement twitches the blade in his side. He grunts at the sudden pain, but all he can think is Bruce as he tries to sit up anyway. His palm slides on the slick ground, his body crashing back down and he cries out.

Hands are pulling him up suddenly, and Tim stammers out Bruce’s name, his own hands scrambling for purchase on the Batsuit.

But it’s not the Batsuit. It’s Nightwing’s suit.

“Dick?” His voice is hoarse and so small. Tim’s watery eyes meet Dick’s through both their domino masks.

Dick tightens his grip on Tim, securing his hold on him. “Hey there, Baby Bird, I got ya.”

“Where’s—” Tim’s voice breaks, and he hates it. He looks away from Dick, putting his head on his shoulder instead. “Where’s Bruce?” His voice still wavers, but he doesn’t let himself dwell on it.

“He, uh—” Dick cuts himself off, and Tim realizes he’s listening to his comm. A hand leaves Tim for a split second as Dick turns it off. “He wasn’t as close as I was, so he sent me.”

Tim nods absentmindedly, vaguely processing his answer. Before he can really finish processing, Dick is talking again.

“But he’s almost here, so we need to wait for him, okay, Baby Bird? I need you to stay awake for me. Don’t fall asleep on me, you know you drool,” he tries to joke, but Tim can’t feel the normal rise that would get out of him.

In fact, he can’t feel much right now. That’s mildly concerning.

He tries to tell Dick as much, but his mouth won’t cooperate enough to form the words. Dick keeps sending him worried looks, and deep down he knows why, he knows he knows why, but at this point he really just wants to sleep.

Has he ever been this tired before? He’s stayed awake for a solid 33 hours before, and he doesn’t remember it feeling quite like this.

“Hey! Hey, stay awake.”

Tim’s eyes open slowly, and he feels Dick relax. “Wha...?”

He registers another rev of an engine, and he’s confirmed that it’s really Bruce when he sees him hurry into the warehouse.

“You were supposed to stake out the warehouse.”

Bruce is right. He was. Crashing in through the window and fighting the thugs was not on tonight’s to-do list. He should apologize. Or sort through files for the next month. Or give up the cape—

And yet. “Bruce?” is all he can say.

The set of Batman’s mouth softens the slightest bit, but his voice remains firm as he turns his intense stare to Dick. “Get him in the car. I need to look around.”

Next thing Tim knows Dick is adjusting his grip on him to carry him to the Batmobile, and pain is flaring through him. He tries to protest, to stop Dick from doing whatever it is he’s doing—it hurts, stop, please—but it’s all in vain.

“I know, Timmy,” Dick says lowly, his voice straining as he walks to the sleek car, and Tim lets himself go limp.

Getting in the car happens within a blink, limbs being maneuvered this way and that. Somewhere between his legs being pushed into the right position and his head being placed against Dick, Bruce has taken his place in the driver’s seat and the Batmobile is rumbling beneath him.

The ride back to the cave is a blur of pain and incoherent sights and sounds, streetlights blinding him for fleeting seconds like his own personal rave from hell. Tim thinks Dick is saying words but they fall flat against his eardrums.

He vaguely registers Dick removing his cape and harness, but Tim’s head is stuffed with cotton and he just feels nothing for the first time in...whatever. The seat beneath him is familiar and foreign at once. With his mind in a fog and his body feeling ethereal, his hand drops onto the seat, the leather feeling cool against his burning skin.

It’s been months since he’s been in this car, since he’s been with Bruce in this car. Since he’s been with Bruce in any car, really. He spent more time on planes and buses and in cabs than in personal cars.

His eyes, though glazed over, look up at Dick. He’s talking still, but not to Tim. Dick was in this car every night with Damian for almost a year, but Tim couldn’t go near it until he found Bruce. He couldn’t taint those memories of chasing the robbery of the night or driving home with his Batman, the Robin cape weighing his shoulders down, but his chest puffed out in pride.

Tim’s brought back momentarily when he feels the Batmobile stop rumbling and he’s being pulled from the car, from his memories of the good and the hectic and the Batman and Robin of his past. For a second he tries to fight, to stay in that lost time, but then Tim hisses out the remaining breath from his lungs as his side is jostled. He shrinks back from something cold against his now bare back—when was his suit pulled down?

When the floor starts moving away from him—or is he moving?—Tim stops struggling against the cold and rests against it fully. He sees Dick pushing his gurney toward the medbay, saying something about a wake, and he finally lets himself close his eyes and pass the fuck out.

It’s late evening when Tim comes to. He feels the pull of the IV in his hand and the crook of his elbow, grimacing as he tries to sit up. He feels a hand immediately push him back down, the unexpected pressure forcing him to sober up and actually look around him. Dick’s face is suddenly all he can see, and Tim jerks and falls back against the pillow.

“How are you feeling, Timbo?” Dick asks from his left, sitting in a chair and looking like he’s been there for a long time. His earnest eyes give Tim’s body a once over to make sure nothing came out of place when he sat up.

“Like shit,” Tim mumbles. He rubs his palms over his eyes, ignoring the prick of pain from the IV needle jostling in his arm. “How long was I out?”

“19 hours.”

Bruce’s deep voice from his right startles Tim enough to jump. The needle tugs sharply and he winces, letting out a soft, “Fuck,” which earns him a stern grunt from Bruce.

Dick takes Tim’s arm, tugging it to pull Tim’s hand from his face, sympathy lining every worried crease between his eyebrows. “I’m gonna go get Alfie, you stay here and rest.” He pats Tim’s shoulder twice before he leaves the medbay.

Bruce’s stare burns Tim’s forehead to a crisp. Tim refuses to move his gaze from the bandages wrapped around his torso. The man may be a solid eight feet away from him but Tim can feel the imposing presence as if he’s directly next to him.

Counting to 5 in his mind, Tim waits Bruce out. He hits 5 just as Bruce says, “You were supposed to be watching the building.”

He rolls his eyes, finally meeting Bruce’s eyes for the first time since he’s woken up. “Yeah, well, that one thug was just so ugly I had to punch him, you know?” When Bruce’s expression doesn’t change, Tim sighs. “I couldn’t get a good view from outside, so I went up into the rafters instead. That’s when I saw it was an active deal.” He decidedly leaves out the part about the bird flying in his face, and the part where he tripped on his cape, and the part of him falling right behind the two thugs dealing. Tim shrugs. “I guess they got spooked and my cover was blown.”

Bruce narrows his eyes but doesn’t question him immediately. Taking the small win, Tim tries to move on from what happened in the warehouse last night. Before he can get a word out to change the subject, Alfred sweeps into the room.

Tim waits patiently as he checks him over, not quite registering as Alfred goes through the usual procedures. He notices Damian hovering at the entranceway, but through the haze of morphine he doesn’t think much of it.

He zones out, but is brought back by Bruce’s deep voice. “Until Alfred can clear you, you’ll be benched from patrol.” Tim goes to protest, arguing how he isn’t too injured to go back out tomorrow, but Bruce won’t hear any of it.

Before the argument can progress, the alarm on the computer blares. Bruce turns and goes to the computer, tapping at the keyboard for a moment before calling to Damian. Tim blinks and Damian has changed into his uniform and the two are off in the Batmobile.

Tim sits there for a moment. He feels more than sees Alfred shuffle around him, putting away the medical supplies.

His fingers tap against his thigh. The rhythm speeds up with every moment he sits on the cot, his heartbeat pulsing beneath his bandages. His stitches feel like they’re crawling over his wounds over and over and he resists the urge to scratch at them until he can’t feel them anymore.

Feeling the sudden need to be anywhere but this medbay, Tim stands up from the cot and barely says anything beyond a simple, “I’m going to bed,” to Alfred.

His face is carefully blank as he says this, not meaning a damn word.

The halls blend together slightly as Tim goes toward his room. He turns right at the last moment, heading for the manor’s garage. The garage has air that won’t suffocate him and a way out with no one to stop him.

Or so he thought.

Just as Tim sees the door to the garage, he stops short when Cass comes in from the garage herself. They stand opposite each other for a few moments. She eyes the bandages poking out from the collar of Tim’s shirt before smiling and making the first move.

“Be safe.” She pats his uninjured shoulder as she passes him, her steps making no sound as she goes.

The air trapped in his lungs suddenly pushes out, leaving him breathless. Trying to shake it off, he pushes forward into the garage. It’s dark but he doesn’t bother with the light switch. Tim’s hand finds the keypad and the garage door slides open in front of him.

For the first time since he woke up he can breathe. Truly breathe. So that’s all he does, leaning against the cold cement wall of the garage. Once the world stops shaking around him, he pushes off the wall. Before Tim can stop and go back inside to sleep for another day he’s climbing onto his motorcycle, kicking off to leave the garage behind him.

Tim glides through the streets, letting the sharp wind prickle his skin. He turns randomly, feeling the endless possibilities with no destination in mind.

He hits a turn a bit too sharply and pays for it immediately. The bandages feel wet, clinging to his skin, and a glance down confirms that blood is seeping through. In a split second panic he recognizes the street name to his right and he follows the route he has memorized in case of emergencies.

Even if he never thought he would need to use it.

His motorcycle is parked in front of Jason’s main safe house and he’s in the elevator heading to the fourth floor within three blinks of Tim’s eyes.

They were pretty long blinks, to be fair.

He doesn’t know if he’s hoping Jason is in there or not, but he crosses the old stained carpet to apartment 4C all the same. Tim knocks on the faded door as soon as he reaches it.

It takes a long moment, but then the door opens to reveal a disheveled Jason Todd rubbing one hand over his face, the other bracing his weight on the top of the door. He looks at Tim before asking flatly, “The fuck are you doing here.”

Without having thought he’d get this far, Tim flounders before blurting out, “Oh hi.”

Jason stares Tim down, very bemused. “Oh hi?” He rolls his eyes, shutting the door and grumbling, “Can’t deal with this shit.”

Before the door can close completely, Tim starts to tip and catches himself on the doorframe. That gives Jason pause, and Jason looks Tim up and down as if really seeing him for the first time tonight. Tim feels the blood seeping through his bandages and soaking into his shirt.

Jason sighs, his eyes glancing upwardly before he opens the door wider, looking like he ate a sour piece of fruit. “Fine. Before I change my mind.” He turns away to walk to the hall bathroom, calling over his shoulder, “Don’t get blood on my couch.”

Tim can’t stop looking at the Wonder Woman logo printed on Jason’s pajama pants over and over, a large embroidered logo in the center of his ass. Figures this is what the all-fearing Red Hood wears on his night off.

“Nice pants.” Tim grimaces. He’s not doing great at this whole ‘hey I’m at your apartment, no I don’t really know why, but hey could you help me while I’m here?’ “I mean—”

“Stop talking, kid.” Jason emerges from the bathroom with a banged up first aid kit. “At least they’re not blood-soaked,” he snipes.There’s really no heat behind the words as his hands maneuver the bandages away from Tim’s torso. Tim hisses in pain when the cut is shifted in a movement, and Jason winces. “Fuck, who did you piss off?”

“I called them Stabby and Trigger Happy.” Tim forces out a chuckle. “A couple thugs from Two-Face’s gang.”

Jason inspects the damage, letting out a low whistle. “Well, Stabby got pretty friendly with your kidney.”

With a wry grin, Tim retorts, “Actually he missed it by half an inch.” He lets out another hiss when Jason removes a bandage a little too quickly. “Ouch.”

“Don’t be such a baby,” Jason says with a roll of his eyes. His fingers thread a needle. After he cleans away stray blood stains from Tim’s stomach, he starts restitching the wound. Tim makes small grunts of pain with every other push of the needle, and Jason grimaces with each noise.

Tim watches as Jason ties off the last stitch. As soon as Jason kneels back on his heels Tim is flopping back away from him, leaning against the base of the couch. While Jason cleans up the various threads and the needle, Tim stares down at the stitches lining his side.

They’re not badly done, like he’d been half-expecting. For a guy who didn’t go into the medical field they’re actually pretty damn even. Tim’s vision goes black for a split second, and he lets his head fall back against the couch cushion.

Okay, maybe he isn’t as healed up as he originally thought.

He feels Jason’s gaze on him every few seconds, but he’s more focused on rubbing the dizziness from his eyes.

The next time he opens his eyes a bowl of pasta is being thrust into his hands with a glass of apple juice set at his side. He stares at the bowl blankly, the image he’s seeing not processing with where he is.

Jason pushes the bowl so it’s cradled in the dip of Tim’s lap and isn’t at risk of spilling over. “Eat.”

Tim looks away from the bowl to Jason, hoping to hide the confusion on his face. From the look Jason is giving him, it’s not very successful.

“Just eat the fucking pasta.” Jason moves past him to settle heavily on the couch next to Tim’s shoulder.

Tim takes a small bite, sighing after he swallows. “It’s cold.”

“You’ll live.”

Pouting, Tim takes a few more bites. It’s, admittedly, not the worst he’s ever eaten. Better than the pancakes Dick attempted to make for Father’s Day last year. He drinks the apple juice in three gulps.

He feels the cushion shift behind him as Jason fidgets, and Tim stuffs his face with more pasta to look anywhere but Jason.

The silence is palpable for a few minutes until Jason finally breaks it by saying, “So why are you bleeding on my doorstep in the middle of the night?”

“Uhhh.” A pasta noodle falls back into the bowl, dropping from Tim’s open mouth after he’d been shoveling a forkful in, not expecting the loaded question Jason just dropped on him. “You know, just passing by.”

He hears Jason scoff and shrinks around the bowl in his hands. “Passing by,” Jason repeats, his voice slightly incredulous. “Passing by a building two and a half miles from your apartment? And even further from the manor?”

Tim carefully shrugs with his good shoulder, contemplating his answer. He rolls possible excuses around his tongue, but eventually he comes out with, “I needed a change of scenery.” Internally he screams at himself, because what kind of vague bullshit is that? But it’s the hole he’s dug for himself, time to lie in it. “And I figured, uh, this was a pretty big change, y’know?”

He chances a glance over his shoulder at Jason, and sighs at the narrowed eyes looking back at him. “It is a change of scenery,” he mutters, looking away. A little more loudly, he says, “I just needed to get out of the manor for a while.”

“You were at the manor?”

Tim half-shrugs again. “I was a bit too out of it to tell them to take me to my apartment.”

Not expecting the blunt response, whatever Jason plans to retort falls flat, and Tim eats more pasta.

They sit in silence once more, the only sounds around them being Tim’s fork scraping against the bowl and Jason’s near-silent-but-definitely-still-happening breakdown as he processes Tim’s statement.

Tim shrinks even further around his bowl, the cold pasta getting more bearable with each bite as long as it keeps his mouth busy. He’s just finishing the last of the noodles when Jason breaks their silence for the second time.

“How’s dear old dad?”

His head snapping back, Tim grimaces, setting the bowl down next to his empty glass. He forces himself to relax and face Jason. As he leans his good side against the base of the couch, his shoulders slump under what feels like the weight of the world. “Fine.” Jason raises an eyebrow, and Tim sighs. “He benched me,” he says shortly.

Jason whistles, crossing his arms and resting his ankle against his knee. Tim can feel the nonchalance of Jason’s presence calm him down slightly, and takes a breath.

“Tough break, kid. How long is he cockblocking you?”

Tim’s nose wrinkles and he leans away from Jason slightly. “Why are you like this?”

Smirking, Jason says, “I don’t know what you’re talking about, I’m a fucking delight.”

“Whatever you wanna believe, I guess,” Tim snarks back, a hint of a smile pulling at his mouth.

“That’s all you got, rookie?”

“Well, I’m not exactly on my A-game.”

Jason shrugs. “Sucks to suck.”

Tim scoffs and rests his elbow on the couch cushion next to him to hold his head up. God, he really is getting tired but he feels too exposed, too vulnerable on the floor of Jason Todd’s apartment. The blood loss must be getting to his head because he finds himself blurting, “You know, I didn’t think I was gonna make it out of that warehouse last night.”

Jason doesn’t say anything, just watches Tim warily.

Tim looks down at his hand, the bruised knuckles throbbing from the burning stare. “It seemed fitting, when I was…there…that I met a similar end to the Robin I’d idolized more than any other. Real poetic irony, huh?”

He sees Jason shift out of the corner of his eye and shuts his mouth abruptly, wishing he’d never said anything in the first place. Jason is still watching him, but it feels like a more analytical stare than judgement.

“I always saw you as my replacement, Bruce’s do-over,” Jason starts slowly. “But you were really just a kid. A kid who needed a purpose.”

And a family hangs in the air, unsaid but heavily present nonetheless.

Jason is quick to move on, saying, “You really idolized me? Some kid from the streets of Crime Alley?” The incredulous note in his voice makes Tim laugh in surprise.

“Robin was my hero—you were my hero.” Tim grins. “I would sneak out to follow you every night I could to take photos. Yeah, sure, Batman was there and he was cool: the man, the myth, the legend, and all that. But Robin? No one really believed the rumors about a younger Robin. But I knew you were out and kicking ass. So I set out to get the clearest shot I could.” Tim’s grin grows softer and more wistful. “It felt like I was a part of something, a part of a secret, even if you guys didn’t know I was. I felt like I…” (like I belonged).

He trailed off, and he could see Jason sit back further into the cushions in slight disbelief.

“You mean you risked your skinny ass every night to see me in my scalies?”

Tim barked out a laugh, dropping his arm to swipe the air. “No—well, I mean, I guess?” He shakes his head, chuckling nervously. “Your fashion sense wasn’t exactly the draw for me,” he finishes dryly.

“Hey, you had the right idea when you took up the pixie boots,” Jason says with a finger pointed at Tim. Tim’s face contorts in confusion, not seeing where this is going. “You put on some goddamn pants.”

Clearing his throat, Jason stands from the couch and leans down to grab the empty bowl and glass from beside Tim. He gives Tim’s thigh a little kick as he passes. “You can sit on the couch, loser.”

The kick jars Tim into sliding up to curl slightly into the corner of the couch, reflecting on the heart-to-heart he just had with the Red fucking Hood.

Before Tim can fully process the meltdown he’s currently having, he hears Jason turn off the water in the kitchen and head back to the couch. Tim hears him mutter, “His fucking hero,” but Jason cuts off whatever else he was going to say.

Jason is just plopping back down on the couch beside Tim when the door bursts open, and Jason’s gun is aimed at the doorway in a blink.

Steph stands frozen in the doorway, a six-pack of Coke dangling from one hand and two pizza boxes balanced on the other, a book sliding precariously down the top of the boxes. A moment passes where none of them move.

Then Steph waltzes in as if she’d never paused and Jason puts his gun away with a string of curses.

“What the fuck are you doing here, Blondie?”

Steph drops the boxes on the kitchen counter, turning back to look at Jason with an offended scoff. “It’s Book Night, jackass.”

Tim looks between Steph, standing with her hands on her hips, and Jason running a hand down his face. He hears a muffled, “Right, fuck,” escape through Jason’s fingers.

Turning back to the pizza, Steph calls out, “I’m not sharing my pizza with Tim, so I hope you learned your kindergarten manners, Bucket Boy.”

Tim shrugs at Jason’s exasperation, trying to hide a smile. “I hope you got the good toppings.”

“He didn’t.” Steph hands a box of pizza to Jason, who immediately shoves half a slice into his mouth. She scrunches her nose and walks to grab the second pizza box from the counter.

As she’s settling down next to the coffee table, pizza box within reaching distance, Steph subtly looks Tim over. She realizes that Tim noticed her looking, so she shoots him a wink with a small side smile before telling Jason, “Is it possible to drown in pizza? Because I think you’re trying to, and succeeding.”

Jason rolls his eyes, but doesn’t stop until the slice is gone. Once he’s swallowed, he says, “Oh, look. I’m alive. Again.”

Steph snorts. “Yeah, unlike Jacques Saunière.”

Jason sobers, scowling. “That guy died honorably, yeah, but God why did he have to leave it as a code? He couldn’t have just left a note?”

“It’s called The Da Vinci Code, not The Da Vinci Note, Jay,” Steph retorts.

“Discount Riddler, that’s what he is,” Jason grumbles.

Tim laughs, and Steph nudges her pizza box closer to him with a wink.

He grabs a slice of her pizza—finally, some good fucking food—and sits while they argue over their differing interpretations of a fictional crime scene instead of questioning every move he makes, unlike at the manor.

Tim’s muscles relax, and he lets himself laugh at the outrageous comment Steph makes and Jason’s exaggerated groans as he eats his ridiculously greasy pizza.

“The code is NOT his booty call’s number, Steph!”

Steph’s cackle rings through Tim’s ears and he chuckles.

Yeah, he belongs. Took him a few years, but he’s made it.

#batfam big bang #batfam big bang 2020 #tim drake #jason todd #stephanie brown #mel writes #you're under fire (i'll cover you)#hurt/comfort #batfam #dc

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m00nslippers · 6 years ago

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Just a few of Jason Todd’s feats (Part 1)

So...in the recent Event Leviathan #3, Jason is shown to have more or less outsmarted/strategized/fought the group of “detectives” that included Robin (Damian), Batman, Green Arrow, Manhunter and Plastic Man. Many people were quite skeptical of Jason’s ability to do this. I do understand that skepticism on some level but I also want to remind everyone of some of this stuff we’ve actually seen Jason do.

I’m listing the major fights that I can remember Jason having against meta-humans and skilled vigilantes, basically people skilled/important enough that you can use to rank his ability, so I’m discounting fights with nobodies and goons and low tier vigilantes/criminals. This is just, ya know, in case you’ve forgotten how badass Jay has shown himself to be. Some of this may not be canon anymore because I’m going all the way back. I’m not including Lost Days because none of the people he fights ever show up again so you can’t compare his skill/strength with them.

Sometimes it’s kind of hard to rate who wins in Jason’s fights because...he is often in a position to kill his opponents (usually by shooting or slitting their throat), so technically he could win at any point, but he chooses not to. Also, Jason’s goal often isn’t to beat up vigilantes trying to fight him, it’s to accomplish a goal and get out unscathed, so he commonly just leaves a fight before a victor is decided because he’s just not interested in playing king of the hill. You can take his running either as a win, since he got away after accomplishing his goals, or a loss since he fled the match, but I’m just going to call it a ‘tie’. I’m going to rate the outcome of matches as such:

Win - Jason kills, incapacitates, checkmates or otherwise defeats his opponent.

Tie with an advantage - Jason escapes the fight with less damage than his opponent or having achieved more goals.

Tie - More or less an equal amount of damage, or goal achievement on both sides.

Tie with a disadvantage - Jason escapes the fight with more damage than his opponent or not having achieved his goal.

Loss - Jason is captured, incapacitated, checkmated or otherwise defeated.

Batman: Hush

Jason Todd vs. Batman

Tie - Jason is fighting on even ground with Bruce through this fight. It’s difficult to tell when exactly Jason gets replaced by Clayface, but it’s probably right before Jason runs off and then reappears, starts losing and calls him ‘Batman’ instead.

Batman: Under the Red Hood

Red Hood vs Nightwing and Batman vs. Mister Freeze and Goons

Tie with an advantage- A three way fight between Jason, Bruce AND Dick, and an upgraded Freeze and some generic goons. Jason killed a bunch of goons, engaged Dick on an even footing, took no damage and escaped handily.

Red Hood vs Batman

Tie with an advantage - Directly after fighting a huge group of goons as well as Onyx, a trained assassin, fights which he won without issue, Jason is attacked by Bruce. Jason arguably had the upper hand through most of the fight (took no damage from Bruce, but electrocuted, headbutted and punched Bruce in the face and removed his cowl) but it ends in Jason detonating his helmet and escaping.

Red Hood vs Batman vs Captain Nazi, Hyena and Count Vertigo

Tie with an advantage - Bruce is the main strategist here, to be fair, but Jason beats three meta humans working together with Batman’s help and manages to kill one of them under Bruce’s nose and escape easily.

Red Hood vs. Batman

Loss - Jason is winning at first but Bruce manages to turn the tables on him significantly. This is the fight which ends in the iconic stand-off between Jason with the Joker and Bruce where Bruce has to decide ‘who to kill’. I suppose you could call this a loss, but Jason still escapes and Bruce nearly killed him trying to stop him so it’s really a loss on Bruce’s part too.

Teen Titans (2003) Issue #29

Robin (Jason Todd) vs Robin (Tim Drake)

Win - Jason breaks into the Titans’ Tower, incapacitates Cyborg, Beast Boy and Raven and picks a fight with Tim. Tim gets some licks in but Jason beats him up, stabs him and leaves him for dead.

Green Arrow (2001) Issues #70-72

Red Hood vs Brick

Win - Jason takes some knocks and has his helmet broken, but in the end he checkmates Brick.

Red Hood vs Green Arrow

Tie with an advantage - Jason had Ollie on the ropes the entire fight, anticipates everything he does, even the moments when it seems like Ollie is about to win end up being part of Jason’s plan. Jason accomplishes everything he intended to do and gets away.

Red Hood vs Speedy (Mia Dearden)

Win - Jason is solidly winning and in control of the fight. Mia gets some hits in but in the end Jason incapacitates her and delivers a fancy speech trying to get her to turn to his side. And when he’s done, he just leaves.

Outsiders (2003) Issue #44

Red Hood vs Nightwing

Tie with an advantage - Jason contacts Nightwing to give him some information but Dick just immediately jumps into a fight. Their fight is more or less even but it still ends with Jason checkmating Dick. The only reason I don’t count this as a ‘win’ is because...let’s be honest, Jason doesn’t want to kill Dick so it’s more of a bluff.

Batman: Battle For The Cowl

Batman (Jason Todd) vs. Nightwing, Batman (Damian Wayne), Black Canary and Huntress

Tie with an advantage - This battle doesn’t go especially far, Jason is schooling Damian through the fight and he is holding out against Dick, but when the Birds of Prey show up too, it’s clear he’s too outnumbered, and he shoots Damian and escapes.

Batman (Jason Todd) vs Batman (Tim Drake)

Win - Tim gets some good hits in, even hits Jason in the mouth plate with a crowbar, but Jason is dominating through most of the fight and stabs Tim in the chest and leaves him for dead. Again.

Batman (Jason Todd) vs. Nightwing

Loss - Jason has a pretty clear advantage from the opening but as soon as Dick plays Bruce’s dying message, Jason loses his mind and is unable to form strategies or counter anything Dick does and is pretty thoroughly defeated. He gets away, but it’s more of a suicide ploy than anything.

Batman and Robin (2009) Issues #4-6

Red Hood and Scarlet vs Batman (Dick Grayson) and Robin (Damian Wayne)

Tie - Jason takes out Damian quickly but Dick manages to get Jason in an arm lock, but the fight ends with Jason escaping as Scarlet threatens Damian’s life and puts them at a stalemate.

Red Hood and Scarlet vs Batman (Dick Grayson) and Robin (Damian Wayne)

Win - We don’t get to see much of Jason’s fight with Dick, but when Scarlet manages to stab Damian, Dick becomes distracted allowing Jason to get the upper hand. Jason shoots him in the chest plate and knocks him out, allowing both Damian and Dick to be captured by him and Scarlet.

Red Hood and Scarlet vs Eduardo Flamingo vs Batman (Dick Grayson) and Robin (Damian Wayne)

Loss - Jason gets many hits in on Flamingo but the guy is seemingly immune to pain and shrugs off the massive damage done to him. Jason takes extensive damage but with the help of Scarlet and Damian he’s ultimately able to kill Flamingo. Nightwing honestly didn’t do much in the fight, he doesn’t land any hits on Jason, he was just around at the end to cart Jason off to prison after he collapsed. Jason accomplished his goal but the amount of damage he received was such that he couldn’t secure his escape from Nightwing after the fact.

Conclusions

Jason utilizes a variety of tools to fight including martial arts, guns, knives, swords, bombs and electrified devices.

His skills include trickery and strategy, using his surroundings and opponents tools or teammates against them.

Jason is extremely skilled in fighting multiple opponents, he often manages to hold his own even against two or more people including other vigilantes, meta criminals and armed goons, all gunning for him at the same time.

When he is in a real bind, a strategy Jason will often employ is to incapacitate one opponent (shooting someone) or threaten another target (like blowing up a building) forcing his opponents to disengage and deal with that issue, allowing him to escape.

His reputation for killing serves him well, as he’s often able to turn stalemates into checkmates, since he is willing to kill but his opponents are not.

Jason is more concerned about accomplishing his goals and avoiding capture than he is winning fights, so he rarely finishes fights even when he’s winning, preferring to escape.

Jason’s weakness is that when he is confronted by his trauma, he becomes emotional, loses his mind and stops fighting smart. He lashes out and refuses to disengage from fights even when he’s losing.

Tim and Damian get curb stomped by Jason. They have no chance and have never beaten him, even when he’s at his worst.

Jason often ties with Bruce and Dick, but they have difficulty securing clear wins over Jason. Dick is the only opponent that Jason seems to consistently lose too, but it’s not a given. While skill is probably at play as well, Jason also just seems to have a hard time keeping it together whenever he fights Dick.

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