#not set in to rhato timeline put picking and choosing some plot points from there so yeahhh

[varpusvaras]

If someone ever asked Roy what Jason reminded him of, he would've said a cat.

A big, black, fluffy cat that would pretend to not even notice you for half a day, but would then proceed to flop right on top of you when you least expected it and leave you coated in fur.

A very cute, big, black, fluffy cat, of course, if Roy was being precise.

Yeah, that was his boyfriend.

His boyfriend, who was currently curled up on the bed like he truly was the cat he so reminded Roy about, his face pressed against Roy's thigh. Combined with the dimness of the room, it was almost enough to hide the fact that there was a large, nasty bruise covering half of Jason's face at the moment.

Almost.

"How did you even manage to get this?" Roy asked. It was mostly a rhetorical question at that point, just whispered out loud, because it was in the middle of the night and Jason was definitely ninety percent asleep already and was not going to give Roy a coherent answer. That was what one got after finishing up a two-days long mission and then deciding to instantly drive to the other side of the country, instead of staying put and resting after said two-days mission.

To be fair, if Roy was being completely honest, he did like Jason being home sooner than later. It wasn't a particularly big secret that Roy didn't hold much love for Gotham, after all, even if Jason still called the city home as much as he called their house home. He just...felt better when Jason was with him, especially after more grueling missions, and he was pretty sure that Jason knew it, even if they had never outright discussed it out loud.

Jason made a noise under his breath that quite honestly sounded like a kitten whining, and Roy had to bite his lip a little to not laugh at it. It would've been an affectionate laugh, of course, but better not risk it.

"Yeah, yeah." Roy ran his fingers through Jason's hair. "Mister always wearing a helmet. I'm gonna fix it up for you."

Jason made another noise, a softer one this time, and he settled further into the mattress as Roy continued to stroke his hair. Roy waited for a moment, then two, and when he was positive that Jason had fallen asleep, he slowly got up and made his way to the garage.

Despite being probably already bone-tired by arrival, Jason had still meticulously gone through their agreed homecoming routine. Lian knew about their identities, of course, and she was a smart girl, but all of the gear still belonged outside the main house. It had been Jason making most of the rules when it came to his own gear. He hated the thought of others touching it without his permission, and he especially hated even the idea of Lian touching it and somehow getting hurt. Sometimes it was like Jason was convinced that even looking towards any part of his gear would hurt Lian, which was something Roy felt like needed a licenced therapist to fully unpack. He did appreciate the care Jason displayed towards Lian, though, so he wasn't going to complain about it to Jason's face.

Thinking about Lian and Jason's face made Roy grimace. Jason didn't like letting Lian see him hurt, no matter how big or small. A bruise that was covering half of Jason's face was going to be hard to hide, though Roy knew that Jason would somehow be able to manage it. Painfully and by gritting his teeth, but he would.

Roy knew what it was all about. He wasn't stupid.

Roy flicked the lights on in the garage, before making his way to the cabinet Jason had claimed for himself. By this point, Roy had an open invitation to Jason's armor and weapons, as he was the only other person who knew how everything worked precisely. Roy was also pretty sure that Jason knew that Roy liked fixing things up for him, and he let him do it because it was an easier way to accept a display of affection than having to listen someone promise him everything, once again, while holding all the power to take their words back without a warning.

Roy went through the plan of action in his head while he unlocked the cabinet. He would need to fire up the workbench and get the electrical tools out in order to get the helmet fixed. Maybe he could draw up some plans how to make the front more durable while keeping it absorbant enough that it would still be the helmet taking the brunt of the hits and not Jason's head underneath it. It would take some time to figure out, but Jason would probably let him make him a new one if Roy just managed it. It would mean that the times of Jason having hard to hide-injuries would be lessened, after all.

Maybe he could manage to adjust the color, too, just to make it a little less vibrant. Roy was starting to seriously think that the helmet was beginning to act like the red capes in bullfighting, inviting more and more hits directly towards it simply because it was there. He wouldn't have been surprised if it really was so. Gotham was messed up, and the rogues playing a game of "who manages to break in the Red Hood's helmet and face first" sounded entirely plausible. This wasn't the first time Jason had come back sporting similar injuries, though usually they were either a little smaller, or Jason had had to stay in Gotham for longer and they were already fading by the time he got back.

Jason would most likely say no, though. The red was part of his brand at this point, it was meant to make an impression to anyone seeing it. Just Roy's luck that he had fallen for the theather kid who had not yet left the phase behind.

Not that Roy was ever going to say that to Jason. He was fully aware of the fact that he was the one running around with a bow, after all.

What a pair they made.

Roy smiled. What a pair, indeed, he thought, as he pulled the cabinet door open and proceeded to have Jason's helmet stare right at him from the upper shelf.

The helmet, which was very much not broken.

Roy stared at it for a good while. It was definitely the same helmet Jason had left with to Gotham. There was a small scratch on the paint, just unde the left lense, that Jason had meant to paint over but had not had the time yet. Roy had watched him pack it up with his own two eyes.

If Roy was anyone else, he would've been able to convince himself that there was probably a perfectly simple and harmless explanation. But Roy wasn't anyone else. Roy was who he was, and that was someone who had been fighting increasingly dangerous fights since he was a teenager, and who had seen harm being inflected over and over again and the marks it would leave behind.

Roy stared at the helmet. The helmet seemed to stare back at him, silently daring him to say it out loud.

Roy didn't say it. He closed the door and locked it back up, while something cold settled firmly at the bottom of his stomach.

He stood there for just a little longer, gathering himself, before he silently made his way out of the garage the exact same path he had walked in mere moments ago.

Lian was still asleep when Roy checked on her, and so was Jason when he slipped back into the bedroom. He stirred a bit when Roy laid down as well, not enough to wake up, but enough to turn towards Roy. Roy could see the bruise now in all of its glory, stretching across Jason's skin like a shadow.

Jason's hand was laying between them on the bed, and Roy laced their fingers together, gently and carefully.

Jason's hand was warm. It was enough to chase away some of the cold inside Roy, and he held onto it tightly.

[spiritsglade]

hello hello!!!! i'm so fascinated omg, i and p for suicide watch perchance?

[wip wednesday]

suicide watch is very rude. this fic fucking bit me. and then it did the gila monster thing of continuing to chew into my flesh instead of letting go. i am truly not on speaking terms with it right now.

okay okay. i think the first thing to be understood here is that this thing is a monster. i have the word count estimate tentatively at 75k but honestly i have no idea how accurate that is at this point and i'm scared to find out. like here's what we're trying to cover:

an adaptation of the all-caste arc from rhato v1, which by itself is already something that shows up across like... over 15 issues of that run

meetings with mia and dick that are loosely (very very loosely--jason's motivations, the circumstances of the meetings, what they talk about, etc. are all very different) inspired by seeing red and brothers in blood respectively

jason's emotional arc with regard to the suicidal ideation. steph/tim/robin in general, talia, and also bruce are very very relevant to this and why he's like that despite never making an appearance in the fic

essence also has her own issues. that i also want to deal with and address. jason may be the main character but i'm also forcing her to undergo growth

gold lazarus pit propaganda and fanony side effects (not pit rage) because i let myself indulge

this is in some ways a case fic-ish thing (essence and jason do have a thing they're trying to do) but it is also a lot of the way character drama and maybe some sort of weird exes-to-platonically-codependent-...friends(?) thing. it becomes a sickfic for like a chapter. jason alone goes through at least four distinct significant shifts/phases in his character development. at various points they end up in gotham, colorado, star city, nyc, the himalayas, guilin china, and some desert in the middle of fucking nowhere.

the outline is... done, in some sense of the word. i know the order of events, but with something of this scope i honestly don't know how long i should spend actually plotting out when they have individual conversations vs. just writing those conversations lol. we do have the timeline sorted out in nearly it's entirety!

sidenote i do need to read several comics to make sure i know what happened during this time canonically before i start picking and choosing how much i want to keep. i know i can just make shit up but i like knowing what i'm working off of before i start disregarding it. so there's that to worry about, also.

i have 10k words written. i need to go back and change some of these 10k because i'm not happy with them anymore. all 10k is literally just exposition and set-up. haha. i'm not entirely sure about chapter cuts yet but that 10k does sort of break itself into two chapters. ish.

this fic is hard because it is absolutely going to be the longest thing i've ever written and i am also trying to pre-plan it. lies of omission, for example, is gonna end up at like 65k probably, so similar in size, theoretically, but lies of omission is flexible in a way that suicide watch cannot be while i'm trying to achieve what i want to achieve and that makes this difficult!! every day i get a little closer to making it a series of interconnected oneshots instead but considering that i already have like 3 ongoing series of interconnected oneshots going already i am simply not allowing myself to do that.

but we do have a plan and i do have an unerring belief in my ability to do things as long as i put my mind to it. i will make this fic happen. i swear.

can you believe this fucking bitch started as a 1.3k oneshot for jason todd week (for the substitute prompt lifeline). i could have just posted essence showing up at his shitty ass safehouse as its own little thing and been done with it but noooooo. i get to experience horrors of trying to organize a massive project for 10 thousands years.

anyway here's a lil snippet :]

"The memory spheres came to me two days ago," Essence says. "I started looking for you soon after." "It took you two days?" "Gotham is a large city, and you've been quiet." She pauses for a moment, then, voice softening. "It's not as easy to sense you as it used to be."