#def not happy with the editing here so WILL ATTACK before a03 posting

[aoida-blue]

Death Debts (Jaydick) Part 1/2

For Jaydick week: day 7 Talons/Court of the Owls. Part 1/2. 

A/N: Think of this as a rougher first version, there are still some revisions to come before it gets posted to AO3 (so feel free to hang on till then) but this is me, diving in to hit jaydick week. This part is 15k. Theres is possibly another 5/6k more in the last part. Bloody hell this was supposed to be a oneshot.

Having his own prisoner was never in Jason’s plan to get the hell back to his own universe. Having that personal prisoner be a Dick Grayson, a screwed up Talon obsessed with his (un)death? 

Oh yeah, Jason was having so much fun. 

Helmet torn off, Jason scrubbed at his face, peering at the screen in front of him. No amount of blinking could ease the white screen light that burnt against his eyes. No amount of blinking could change the results on the stolen laptop screen either.

The data didn’t lie. Meteorology activity in the place Jason had woken up, electrical disturbances, blackouts… the whole package. And damn it all if Jason wasn't too familiar with what that meant.

He’d universe hopped again.

Jason shifted in his chair.

Fucking metas. Sure, for a couple of vain moments after the blast of green light, Jason had thought he’d just been knocked out. A hope that gutted out when Jason’s nearby safe house was occupied by a young family, then his second safe house was home to five cats and an old man. The final straw had been the disappearance of all his emergency stashes around town.

It was blind luck he'd found this apartment, an empty penthouse apartment, dust collecting on every surface, but a macbook hidden under the bed.

There were only two outcomes that could get him home. One, that the Batman here was just as crazy prepared as his and had worked with Zantana on the Bat Universe-Corrector (god damn Bruce and his naming abilities). or that two, someone from his universe noticed he was gone, linked it to the meta and then… somehow found their way to him.

Shit and fuck.

“Who are you?”

Jason jerked, falling off the chair and into an easy crouch, hands snapping up his guns by his sides and aiming them straight at the voice.

But only one person stood there and Jason breathed out a giddy laugh, relief knocking through him. For a second he thought it was the meta.

“Thank fuck its only you.” Jason said easily, eying his visitor up on reflex, “Nice getup.”

And it was.

Armour platted, ribbed in gold feather like patterns, high collar and weapons accessible from any angle he wanted to grab them. It wasn’t really what Jason had pegged as Dick’s style, way too cool for him and too many weapons, but hey, different universes, different Dicks. Jason might even like this one better.

But there was something about the armour…

“A bit too much like the Talons don’t you think Dickie?” Jason asked with a notched brow.

Dick stood there, half-wreathed in shadows, face pale and warping down in a frown. He paused, statue still, and Jason felt a prick of unease at the back of his neck, his warning signs kicking off as the blank staring continued.

“What, you don’t recognise me?” Jason tried with a grimace, great maybe in this universe Bruce had left him in the gutter-

Dick moved.

He whirled, spinning, a whistling metallic song as blades materialised in Dick’s grasp. Their sharpened points flashing straight at Jason’s jugular.

It was only instinct, moves drilled in Jason’s DNA, that saved him. Jason lunged backwards, feeling the brush of wind as a blade skimmed past, then grabbed forward as soon as he was able, seizing the armed hand. But Dick was fast, and already another knife from his other hand was slicing up and Jason had to release him to knock it off course. There a microscopic hole in Dick's attack and Jason used it, barreling forward and taking Dick to the ground.

Shit. Dick didn’t just look like a Talon.

Dick hit the ground hard, armour creaking as he didn’t stay down, twisting as if to push himself upright again. Jason didn’t let him, pressing his weight fully Dick, struggling to keep Dick’s rotating wrists from snapping free from his hands.

“Look I don’t want to fight you.” Jason spoke quickly because heck, maybe he was still Dick under that Talon garb, maybe he just needed proof, “Your name is Dick Grayson, you come from the Flying Graysons and-“

An inhuman screech tore its way out of Dick’s lungs, and Jason was bucked off, pushed to the side and Dick rolled on top of him, blades raised high. Death reflected in everyone of those glittering daggers, and Jason moved quickly, he jabbed forward, heel of the palm straight into Dick’s exposed stomach, and when Dick dived down with the blades he was off balanced. Off balanced enough, Jason could force his arms wide as they came hurtling down.

One blade imbedded into the floor beside Jason's ear, reverberating hard. The other almost caught his shoulder, and Jason could feel it pressing against his jacket. And fuck it all, if this continued, Jason was going to die again. He wasn’t a match for this Dick, and Jason knew it instantly. He needed Dick distracted. Luckily-

“When you were very young your parents died in an accident-“ Jason spoke light and fast, desperate to find the word that could be his opening.

There had to be some weakness, some similarity in Dick between Jason's universe and this one.

Dick’s face twisted like there wasn't, like nothing Jason could say would break him. In fact, they made him look more murderous.

“You’re dead.” Dick spat, back arching high like a hissing cat, hands still locked on the dagger handles either side of Jason’s head, “You’re dead-“

Arguably true, at least in the past tense.

But Jason didn’t really want to debate semantics when Dick was distracted.

Instead Jason took his distraction, cuffed Dick under the chin - it wasn’t a good move, Jason didn’t have any power from that angle- but it disorientated Dick enough, Jason could launch up, toppling Dick to the side. Jason went with him as Dick hit the ground, rolling so his legs locked against Dick’s and pressed an elbow tight down his windpipe.

Dick lashed out, jolting and jerking against the hold, but he was unsettled, unbalanced and quickly loosing air.

Jason clung on, ignoring the pain from Dick’s nails as he sunk them deep into Jason’s arm, but finally, finally, Dick went loose. His eyes rolled back in his skull as he passed out.

He held for a long breath, then Jason pulled back quickly, pressing two fingers to Dick’s pulse to check he was just out and not dead. Cause yeah, Jason didn’t want that on his conscience. Even if it wasn’t the Dick he knew. Even if this Dick was totally and utterly a Talon.

Who had certainly killed some one before if that attack was anything to go by.

A strong pulse beat under his fingers and Jason released a fearful breath. Then, aching all over Jason collapsed to the side, huffing out at the ceiling.

“I already hate this world.” Jason muttered to the ceiling.

-=-

Jason was nursing an icepack to his head, a bandaged arm and a hell of a grudge when Dick finally roused again. And when he woke up, it was freaky.

One moment Dick was shifting against the rope, small unconscious twitches, just enough noise Jason had time to look up when Dick’s eyes sprung open and his entire body tensed. It was as if some sort of live wire ran under his skin and it had just been flicked on.

Dick’s eyes snapped to him. Nothing in his gaze but wild instinct.

Jason glared at him, icepack pressed firmly to his head.

Dick’s eyes shot around the rest of the room, then his eyes slipped a bit, relaxed a bit, and Jason was met with the cool disinterested gaze that was so… talon like it made Jason flinch. It looked so out of place on Dick.

How he had ever thought this was His Dick.

And wow that sentence never sounded right.

“That was clever of you.” Dick spoke finally, words a manufactured drawl.

It was a spoken like a threat.Which was clever of him because yeah, Jason had ropes and chains and handcuffs on Dick so managing to sound threatening while bound like roasting hog? Impressive.

Not that Jason would give him the satisfaction of knowing that.

Dick flexed lightly, visibly testing the bonds, and tilted his head. Jason was dead confident in his tying skills, but seeing that movement didn’t stop a small fission of alarm to go chasing down his spine.

“Cloning or advanced mask…” Dick rolled the words in his mouth, “Doesn’t matter. Jason Todd were sentenced by the court. You will die.”

That was a good little information nugget. Jason in this reality had been sentenced by the court. Go this universe’s him. Jason hadn’t accomplished that back home, maybe he would have if the Joker hadn’t gotten to him. Also sounded like this universe’s Jason definitely did die with that death sentence. Which. Least the universes were consistent.

Fuck the universes.

“That’s nice.” Jason said, insincere as he could manage, “Charming really Dickie. Don’t really care.”

Dick twitched a bit in the ropes and a muscle in his jaw jumped.

“You have been sentenced to die by the Court.” Dick said again, like a terse reminder.

“But Mr Bird Fetish,” Jason rest his head in his hand, let his words drag like an unimpressed school kid, “I actually don’t give a fuck about your court right now? Like honest to god that is the last thing I care about at this moment.”

Seriously Jason had a list of Things He Cared About. Right now, Evil Talons Brainwashing Dickie was not even on the list. As far as Jason was concerned that was someone else’s problem. More important on the list were matters like, well, you know, getting back to his own freaking universe. Finding Batman before any other former family members wanted to reveal their own tragic universe counterparts.

Jason had to just remind himself: this wasn’t his shit.

Talon Dick just stared at him, narrowed eyes and creepy as all hell, “You were sentenced by the court. You will die.”

Jason sighed. Yup so not going down that route but-

“I thought I was already dead.” Jason reminded Dick.

Dick’s shoulders jerked, like a whipcord of tension had snapped across them, and then Dick’s head tilted and his eyes widened.

“You were.” Dick spoke clear and even, factual, “But the sentence still stands.”

Jason took a moment to process that. Definitely fuck the universes. Then he stood, dusting off his pants, and drawing the ice off his head with a wince.

“So I have to die twice. Wow that sucks. What did I do to piss you off?” He shrugged, brushing off the thought, he was not going to get bogged down, he wasn’t, “But don’t care, doesn’t matter, more important stuff to do.”

All true. Jason had a fact finding mission to run. He needed a Batman, a Bat Universe Corrector. So Bruce Wayne was going to be his port of call and Jason didn’t need a fancy bat cave computer to find out details about Bruce Wayme. Jason dismissed Dick with a wave, grabbing his stolen laptop and setting up camp on the couch, legs chucked up on the table.

So if Jason Todd had died, and Dick Grayson was a Talon, it really made Jason curious to see what the hell had happened with Bruce. Probably more of a nutcase. Likely more of a nutcase.

Jason opened Google, but like a niggling fly, buzzing around his head, he could feel Dick’s stare drilling into the side of his head.

“What? I’m sure as hell not letting you go so you can grab some buddies and come back – also Dick, your buddies used to be Tim, Damian and Babs not Talons.” Jason played it light and glib, ignored the tiny pit of dread that had opened up his gut about what the heck had happened to them here if Jason and Dick…, “your standards have gone.”

“It doesn’t matter.” Dick said, “They will still find you and-“

“Kill me, wow you don’t say.”

Bruce Wayne. Plugged into Google. Enter and Jason was blinked at the billions of results that filled the screen, flicked over to News and-

Now, this universe was officially the worst.

Bruce Wayne had been missing for ten years since the Wayne Manor Fire. A fire that had started under ‘mysterious circumstances’. No body had been found.

Another quick search and. The Batman sightings were either very old or very odd. Given the existence of Talons… it wasn’t hard to work out what had probably happened.

Jason clenched his fists.

No. This wasn’t his universe. That wasn’t Bruce. Just like that wasn’t Dick tied up across the room. Just like he was still alive and not killed by the Court. Okay. He released his fists, found the cold rationality in him.

The Batcave had been fire proof. And Bruce’s equipment wouldn’t have just vanished with the old man’s death. Alfred was still listed in a sentence as still alive so he’d have them, and Jason would bet anything he’d have gone to the nearest ‘family’ member. So Jason just had to find out where who that was, if there was anyone, and if not, just had a track a unremarkable old man in Gotham’s swarming population.

So yes, maybe this bit would have been easier on a Bat computer. Damn it all.

-=-

Jason had a lead and a 3 am start didn’t seem so bad when he was getting out of apartment had thus far only had disappointments, computer work and near murder for him. He shut the computer with some vigour and turned his gaze on Dick.

“Stay.” Jason told him, setting his hood back over his head, and managed an extra dose of patronisation, “Good Talon.”

Dick narrowed his eyes, “You have been sentenc-“

Jason closed the door quickly, cutting out the inevitable and rolled his eyes. Imaginative this new Dick was not. But then no one had ever accused Court Brainwashing of being the secret to creativity.

Actually Jason didn’t know anyone who’d come back from brainwashing. The thought made Jason hesitate for a moment, pushed up on to the rail, grapple out.

No, Jason reminded himself harshly, this wasn’t his world.

Jason threw himself into the air, grabbing on to the next roof top and hauling himself up and started running again, jumping and leaping over the next roof.

He kept an eye on the streets below, in case different reality meant different street names. But fourth connected to Fifth connected to Old Donell’s to Grey’s, and it was all so familiar. Too Familiar, Jason faltered briefly when it came to make the turn, his feet urging him up toward Ghost’s Corner, near where his old old safe house was, but Jason hadn’t come for that, and his safe house wasn’t in this universe. Instead, Jason made the sharp turn.

Gradually the buildings started to grow higher. Sleeker looking structures took place from crumbling brownstones, and drunk stragglers thinned on the streets below.

It had taken thirty minutes on the sky high route Jason had taken, slower than the cars below, but it gave Jason a good lay of the land around one of the city’s tallest skyscrapers and his target.

Jason crouched a block from it, the tall financial building he was on required some scaling and it wasn’t even two thirds the height of the apartment block next to it. If he wanted to get up to the penthouse of that place Jason was going to have grapple that high balcony and even that was beyond risky. Through his magnifying lenses he could see that fine red line sensor barely noticeably under the edge of the windows and the railing.

Someone that paranoid in a penthouse would probably have pressure sensors.

Add to that, if this was the home of who Jason thought it was? There was bound to be fifty more terrifying surprises.

Jason swallowed.

He was going to have to do it anyway. Set off the sensors, try not killed and then bargain for the piece of equipment he needed. Hopefully, he had it. He was the most likely of everyone in this wretched universe.

Fucking screwed up timeline.

Jason readied himself, reposition himself to a proper crouch and getting ready to leap over the gap when something sharp and cold touched against his neck, finding the very bare crease between hood and neck armour.

Knife or sword, it hissed as it rubbed under the hood.

“Explain your presence.” A voice demanded, sharp and sudden.

Didn’t even need to jump, his meeting had come to him. Jason almost laughed, then quickly decided against as he felt the sword still. Placating, Jason raised his hands, and turned his head slightly, just so he could catch a glimpse of this universe’s Damian Wayne.

Something akin to revulsion and regret twisted in Jason’s stomach at the sight of him. Damian was wearing dark armour, complete with mask, that looked near identical to what Batman wore, but tailored so carefully, and so disturbingly to his small frame. It just made what Jason knew about this Damian feel all the more terrible.

“Speak or I’ll take your head.” Damian’s words were no mere threat.

This was an Assassin and Jason had to treat him as such if he wanted to survive.

“Not here to fight.” Jason said keeping his words light and damn him, quick, “Just to propose a trade.”

Because if he was right, then this world’s Damian had never known Jason before he was killed off - and even if he recognised Jason it wouldn’t be a great trust boost since Jason should have been dead. But, if Jason could get him to agree with a trade… Jason could get the device he needed, and he could trade on the information that was more common knowledge in his world than was here. Like, for instance, the Court of Owls.

Damian could be very business minded and Jason had placed his bets on that.

“A trade?” Damian asked, a touch of archness melded with the cold in his voice, and the sword wasn’t moving, “You were going to break into my home were you not?”

“Look…” Jason trailed off suddenly unsure, he didn’t know if Damian went as Batman or not, and if he used Damian… but surely he’d know that Jason would know his name considering the location… ugh, it was too much so Jason avoided the nouns all together, “I have information on the Court of Owls. Put up as many defences as you like, but you’d like to know what I’m going to say.”

There was a tiny breath from behind him and Jason knew that his hunch was right. He had him.

“And what did you want in return?” Damian’s voice did not give away anything.

Ah the tricky bit.

“To borrow some of your equipment.”

“Which equipment, and how do you know I have it?” Harder, more suspicious.

For all Damian knew, Jason sounded like he was probably looking to make a nuclear bomb.

Jason smiled tightly under his hood, well, the nuclear bomb would be easier than trying to dimension hop.

“You are wearing his old armour -almost,” Which was better than saying you probably inherited it from your dead father, “and I’m not looking for anything weaponizable. More. Scientific.”

“Odd request.” Damian said finally.

Right then Jason’s knees were really started to hurt from the constant crouch.

“You would not even believe my story.” Jason joked lowly, “But the info will be worth it and you can supervise me every step of the way with the device.”

“Assuming I have it.” Damian offered lightly.

This time Jason did move, twisting so he could face that creepy bat-like mask and stare up at him.

“Well.” Jason said dryly, “I’m gonna need to check that you do have what I’m looking for before I tell you anything.”

Damian hummed, a low mocking note.

“Tell me exactly what it is, and I will tell you if I have it then.”

Would Damian help a dimension stuck stranger or just his universe’s stranger? Would he even believe Jason if he’d never gotten to the wacky space-magic part of the Robin internship? What if Bruce didn’t even have it in this universe? Too risky.

“Not that I don’t trust you.” Jason couldn’t help but say, sarcasm dripping from each note, “But I’ll need to see it with my own eyes.”

“What?” Damian asked archly, “Let you wander through all my belongings? That’s not particularly tempting.”

“Yet… if you want the information.” Jason dangled.

Damian laughed, mirthlessly.

“You are in no position to bargain. I have what you want and you have, I’m assuming, no other way of getting it. You will tell me the info, and then and only then will I get you the item you are after and only if I approve of you having it.”

That succinctly put Jason well and truly in a bind. Fuck.

“That involves a lot of faith from my part.” Jason sniped.

Damian smiled, thin-lipped, “You’ll have to trust me won’t you?”

Son of a-

“I think not.” Jason returned dryly.

Damian shrugged.

“Come back at 8pm, and we’ll do this in more comfort in the apartment.” Damian looked at him with something disturbingly predatorily for someone who was half of Jason’s height, “I need to set up my defences.”

Why did it suddenly felt like Damian was going to kill him tomorrow?

Well, this Damian hadn’t had Dick’s or Bruce’s no-killing regime but according to Jason’s research he still had Alfred.

Military trained Alfred.

“Sure, sounds peachy.” Jason agreed, thinly, because there was no choice.

He was going to wear so much extra armour tomorrow. Which fuck- he didn’t actually have because it was all back in the wrong universe.

“Good.” Damian pulled his sword back with a flourish, “Now you were leaving.”

Damian jerked his head at the side, at the hundred foot drop and the closest grappling building out of range. Jason lips pursed, cause, yeah, Damian was so fucking funny.

“Yeah, I was.” Jason sneered, stretching upright, and god, he swore his knees creaked up on the way.

He wasn’t that old, but jeeze, did it feel it then.

Damian was smiling that awful half-smile like he knew how uncomfortable that had been and Jason really wanted to wipe that expression off his face.

Because Jason was a truly an amazing human being, he didn’t. Instead, Jason pulled himself up to his full height and felt some sort of valediction in the fact that yeah, he was still taller than the brat. Damian’s smile dampened a bit like he noticed this too, and that right there, was a perfect farewell.

Jason gave him a jaunty salute, “See you tomorrow Mini Dark and Brooding.”

Damian frowned but Jason took a leap off the roof before he could respond.

He flew through the air, actually making use of his grapples of the way back, looping a long winding track around fourth and fifth until he was sure his black shadow was left behind before he dropped down onto an alley and waited a little more.

All clear and Jason finished his way back to his… stolen apartment. Or something. Whatever the owners hadn’t come home so either it was someone Dick had killed and… done something with the bodies, or they were on holidays. Either way the bills were overdue and everything in the fridges and cupboards was off. So until otherwise, home was were you left your bound Talon prisoners.

Jason cracked the door open, stifling a yawn beneath his fist and kicked it close behind him.

“You miss me Dickie?” Jason called through the apartment, “You’re probably hungry so I should bag a couple of mice for you and a hunk of piz-“

There was a creak and then something whistled through the air and Jason jerked to the ground, narrowly missing a kitchen knife. A kitchen knife currently imbedded dead into the door behind him.

Oh. Fucking-

Jason looked up and saw Dick come charging at him, hands still bound but another kitchen knife in his grip. How the heck-

Jason rolled onto his feet and and jumped back at the slash, then stepped quickly to the side at a stab, and grabbed the handle of the knife when Dick went to swing it a him again.

“You have been sentenced.” Dick gritted out, “And you will-.”

“How did you even get out??” Jason hissed between his teeth as he tried to overpower Dick for the knife.

Dick was strong though, too strong and that was leading nowhere, then Dick’s eyes flashed and there was a leg around Jason’s middle and he hit the ground hard with Dick right on top of him.

As if he was mocking Jason’s earlier take down of him. Fuck there was Dick’s warped sense of humour still in there.

The jerk had loosened Jason’s grip on the knife, and Dick yanked it totally out of his grasp, slashing the inside of Jason’s hand in the process and fuck that hurt- but Jason didn’t have the time to think because Dick had the knife raised in the air pointed right at Jason’s jugular.

“Die.” Dick whispered.

Dick started to bring the knife down and Jason’s eyes jerked wide and he reacted, whipping his forearm up to hit Dick’s chest and rolling them with a jerk of his hips.

“No thanks.” Jason bit out, insincere as he could.

Dick hissed, inhuman and terrifying as they rolled, the knife clattering out of his hands and rolling across the floor. Jason quickly gripped the handcuffs still locking Dick’s wrists together and held them pinned on the ground but Talon Dick played dirty and threw up a knee to hit right between Jason’s legs.

Jason bit hard down his lip and thanked god he had been wearing a cup that day. Still he’d been expecting a Damian sized hit, not a Dick sized one.

Before Dick could try that trick again, Jason knocked an elbow against Dick’s middle, winding him, and rolled them again so he could get a decent leg lock on him.

Dick thrashed against his hold but it was too tight, too strong for him to do anything but wiggle.

“You’re trapped-“ Jason started, going for the old logic route.

Dick cut that idea pretty fast.

“And you’re dead. You are dead.” Dick cursed, seeming more human than he had the entire time.

He was really hung on the idea.

“Yeah well, the court may have killed-“

“I killed you.” Dick spat out and all of Jason’s organs shrivelled up in his body, “I held your teenage body down as it stopped struggling in your pool of blood and they didn’t let me forget it. They made me kill you and they let me keep that memory so you are dead.”

Dick had-

In this universe Dick had killed him.

“People don’t always stay dead.” Jason said, but it was numb, a reflexive retort Jason had used in so many situations.

It felt numb. Jason felt numb. Trying to imagine the bundle of cheer and brooding Jason had known as the young Dick, the sweet Dick Grayson, killing him when Jason had still been a ungainly kid-

It was like a switch had been pulled somewhere in Dick’s head. The Talon froze, body stilling against Jason’s grip. Which was just as well because Jason couldn't feel his own hands too well at that moment.

“They do.” He breathed, and Jason had basically released his hold on Dick but Dick wasn’t moving, hadn’t used the extra space, “They do unless-”

Then Dick just went dead in his arms. Muscles loosing all their tension and relaxing sudden and hard, his head lolling back. Like he’d been switched off.

Jason reflexively checked his pulse, feeling it under his hand. It was like Dick had fainted but his eyes were wide open, still blinking slowly, and his chest was still moving.

Slowly Jason released him.

Dick stayed down.

“Are you…” Jason started.

Dick didn’t move.

This was his chance, the pragmatic side of Jason insisted and he moved.

Jason quickly got up, dragging him back over and tying him to the chair again, doubling the rope, tightening the handcuffs.

Dick just stared into space.

Jason sat back for a moment, staring at him. It was as if he had fallen into some sort of trance.

He had killed Jason. In this reality Dick had killed Jason.

Jason’s stomach flipped strangely and he felt cold and hot all at once, skin prickling.

-=-

Jason couldn’t sleep.

He sat staring wide awake, staring at ceiling, thinking of the boy that would probably try and kill him that night. About the the man across the room who apparently already had. Really made Jason wonder about what Tim, Steph and Cass had gotten up to. If they had plans to kill him too.

At the moment that wouldn’t surprise him.

Still it wasn’t him that Dick had killed, and he wasn’t the Dick that Jason knew.

Jason rolled over to his side , grabbing the pillow and clenching his fingers in to it.

It all wasn’t his problem, none of this was. It didn’t matter how much shit this universe had gotten into because it wasn’t Jason’s responsibility.

But-

But.

The wood floor creaked under Jason’s steps, echoing and making his presence known to about everyone in the apartment block as he made his way across the room.  

Jason didn’t know what drew him there, didn’t really think too much about it, but Dick was still bound, bells added on, still safely locked away.

Dic- no- The talon was staring at the ground, eyes blinking, eyes shifting across the floor boards like the most intense staring contest. Clearly he’d gotten back from… whatever the fuck kind of state he’d been in. The Talon’s fingers fluttered at his sides, not trying to escape, but just – moving. Like there was a keyboard Jason’ couldn’t see.

He must have heard Jason, how could he not with that noise and with his training, but Dick just continued.

“What happened to you.” Jason asked, blunt and point blank, falling back to lean against the wall.

Dick’s eyes shot up to him and there was a strange sort of caution in his expression.

“I am loyal to the Court.”

Jason arched a brow.

“Yeah, no, not what I asked.” Jason replied dryly.

Dick’s head titled, and he looked strangely lizard like in the low light. All dark shadows and narrowed eyes.

“Isn’t it?” Dick drawled, “I know what you are.”

Okay this was totally not the conversation Jason was trying to have. Jason frowned.

“You do.” Jason repeated, a little slowly.

For some reason, Jason doubted that he was going to say Dimension-hopper next.

Dick looked away back to the ground, but his gaze was still on the same spot in the middle of the room, and he looked oddly… subservient.

“I am loyal to the court.” Dick repeated, and this time it sounded almost prayer like, “I am their talon in the dark, their weapon in the night.”

Creepy.

Also unhelpful.

“Great.” Jason opined lightly, “So I guess then you are never getting out of those ropes.”

A muscle in Dick’s face twitched.

“If that is what the court requires of me.” Dick said, low, “I live and die at their leisure.”

Dick thought-

“Woa there.” Jason blurted, standing up, “I’m not with the court.”

Dick didn’t look up, kept his head down. Like he didn’t believe him.

“I’m not.” Jason repeated, “I mean no way in hell would I ever join that creepy gang of shadow elitists-“

Vaguely Jason thought he should have stopped talking, should be using this knowledge to his advantage and boy he needed some advantage in this world. But it was too many shades of wrong.

Dick looked up, slow as molasses, something strange in his expression.

“You’re alive.” Dick said like it was his own death sentence.

Jason raised his hands, “Yes but that was a different universe and had to do Ras Al Ghul and a secret society and a Lazarus pit and maybe the world or universe or something being punched but I don’t-“

Dick’s expression could have been the textbook definition of disbelief.

Jason sighed explosively, “It’s true!”

“Its what you remember?” Dick queried lightly, not outright denial, but there was something odd about the way he asked.

“Yes!” Jason agreed, and maybe, maybe they were getting somewhere.

Dick’s expression shuttered off and he looked away.

“They can change memories.” He said, and he sounded bitter.

Arguing with a wall had probably a better success rate.

“Look I don’t care,” Jason dusted his hands in the air, “Believe what you want.”

Jason turned on his heel and threw himself on the couch, rolling to show Dick his back. It was childish and a little foolish, he knew, but the act gave Jason the tiniest bit of satisfaction.

He remembered only when he hit his borrowed bed again what he had wanted to ask Dick in the first place.

Didn’t move.

-=-

Jason dropped an energy bar on Dick’s lap the evening, didn’t say a word and didn’t look when Dick bowed his head his direction. He had more important things to worry about, but Jason still hid the kitchen knives and locked the door from both sides.

It was stupid, because Jason now held no illusions that Dick was at all trapped in that apartment, but still. Just in case.

He felt distracted on the way to Damian’s penthouse, thoughts drifting back to Dick, regardless of what he did. That was dangerous, Jason knew, because he was about to enter a high stakes Poker game with one of this universe’s most dangerous kids.

Fun times ahead.

Damian was standing out on the balcony , arms crossed and mask pushed back. Jason stepped unevenly on the rooftop when he saw that, saw the blatant disregard for his identity but Damian didn’t flinch, didn’t rush to put it on when Jason landed.

Deliberate.

Damian smiled at him, and it was the sort of smile Jason thought crocodiles had.

“Good Morning.” Damian said with a all-encompassing gesture, “Come inside for refreshments.”

Jason hopped down from the balustrade, eyeing Damian.

“Sure why not,” Jason said with a shrug, and copied Damian’s gesture at the door with as much mockery as he could manage, “After all I hate to be murdered outside.”

Damian smirked, looked him up and down and hummed.

“Funny, I thought you were already dead.”

And Damian swept inside, without even a look behind him, showing Jason his back without any hesitation.

Jason froze, watching him go, because Damian couldn’t know, he couldn’t. Jason reached up and brushed his hood to be sure it was all still opague, but it was fine and… and Jason had dawdled out here too long. He swallowed hard and forced his legs to move.

Inside the Penthouse was just as lush as outside. Big marble spaces, with white furniture and gold trimmings everywhere. Damian sat at the head of the long wooden table in the centre of the space, files at his fingertips, a coffee at his elbow and one placed across at the seat to the left side.

Jason could read so much into that placing, but he inside decided to focus on the fact that the coffee was steaming. The Damian he knew, couldn’t boil water, couldn’t make coffee, so assuming this one was the same, meant Alfred was definitely around.

It was a bit silly, but that made Jason feel a little less like he was going to be murdered. Also made his heart feel a little bit lighter but Jason was ignoring that.

Only a little less. Damian was still here, in this room, unsupervised.

“If you are going to insist on standing there, doing nothing, then I think any future deal we will have will be off.” Damian offered dryly.

Jason grimaced under his hood.

“Call it healthy suspicion.” Jason opted, and strolled over the table, wanting to take his time in getting there, “I mean yesterday was swords at throats, today its coffee…”

“Yesterday you were a stranger.” And Damian looked far too smug.

“And today?”

“I…” Damian paused, for effect like the little drama queen he was, “know more.”

“Do you now.” Jason said, mouth on auto pilot.

The seat was pulled out to the left of Damian, and Jason slotted in easily, but instead of sitting on the chair like Damian obviously intended, he turned at the last moment, sat on the table instead, body angled toward Damian. Predictably Damian’s face twitched.

“I do. But if you want to be coy about it, by all means, we can come back to that later.” Damian stood up, no longer dwarfed up Jason, “What is your proposal.”

How did he know and what. Jason had no idea but-

“As I said, simple, info for the lending of some equipment.”

“How do you know I have this equipment?” Damian asked, and it wasn’t a question, Damian just wanted to confirm what Jason already knew.

Jason leant back a bit, hand on the table behind him and watched Damian closely.

“Because it was part of Batman’s old equipment.”

Damian didn’t so much as flinch.

He had to know Jason was connected somehow. Narrowed down the list of people he thought Jason was then.

“Not very specific.” Damian said simply.

“What I need is very specific. Scientific, you could say.” Jason rolled the last word, he couldn’t reveal his hand, not yet, caution was the wiser move.

“You mentioned. And assuming I had whatever it was,” Damian hand-waved lightly, “How am I supposed to find a scientific specific something, I’m sure there would be a great many items that would meet that description in such a collection.”

And here was the next part of the gamble.

“You’re not. I am.” Jason kept his voice level, “You take me to Batman’s old equipment and I’ll know it on sight.”

Damian arched a brow, took his coffee cup off the table and sipped at it. Taking the moments to ponder, to think, when really Jason was sure, so sure Damian had already made his mind up.

“You must be very sure of what information you have-“

“What I have will be worth it.” Jason injected lazily.

“-and it will require great deal of trust.” Damian continued easily, “Especially someone that’s seen me without my mask, and is still wearing theirs.”

Jason smiled thin-lipped, tapped the hood.

“Sorry, this stays on.”

Damian sighed, like he was such a bother.

“Well if that’s it-“ Damian said slowly, clearly looking to close this up.

He needed some bait.

“I know Batman, Bruce Wayne, was killed by a Talon and I know the Court.” Jason injected, stating what he thought Damian suspected.

Damian froze, and something twitched in his face. Quietly he pulled his hands together and met Jason’s eyes.

“Do you have proof.” Damian said, short, succinct.

But his face was white.

Shocked.

Jason knew it like a kick in the ribs, Damian hadn’t really known Bruce had been killed by the court. The news had made it seem like Damian had been searching for Bruce, but Jason had been so sure that Damian know he was already dead. Particularly if Alfred was here.

And yeah, Jason totally felt like the world’s biggest jerk right then. It hadn’t been hard to piece together that Damian had been looking for his father. Easy to find out about Bruce’s death as a second hand comment from Dick more focused on Jason’s own murder.

Damian however.

Hell, it hurt Jason to think of.

What Damian must be thinking-

He had to get home.

“If you want more, we need to have a deal.” Jason said, and god he was going to be the nicest person in the fucking world to make up to Damian for this (even if it wasn’t his Damian).

He was such an absolute shit right then.

Damian looked young, so young, face suddenly vacant and staring at the ground. It was obvious he trusted the words - but why-

Then Damian looked up, his face a mask of cold indifference that started to shatter the moment Damian put it on.

“Yes, now leave.” Damian demanded, voice trembling.

He felt like something awful, something rotting scrapped on the floor and not worthy of anything, but Jason left, pretended not hear the shattering of ceramic as he launched himself off the rails.

-=-

Dick was exactly where Jason left him that evening. Folded over his chair, staring emptily at the ground. The power bar left unopened on his lap. They both knew Dick could at least get one hand free. But he hadn’t even tried.

Jason rolled his eyes, dropping the hood on the table with more force than he probably should have considering the explosives Jason still had in it. But screw it, he felt like shit, if he blew himself up in his carelessness he probably would have deserved it.

And Jason had even less time for Dick’s dramatics.

“So that’s your plan now?” Jason asked, annoyed more than anything else, “Just starve yourself?”

“I live and die at the Court’s pleasure.” Dick said, low, and subservient.

“Well then, eat cause the Court hasn’t issued your death sentence recently.” Jason snipped and hit the crouch, slumping hard against the pillows.

Guilt kicked in when Jason landed, and he managed to ignore it for one sullen moment. Then he sighed, and rolled over and stared at Dick, still bound, still looking sadly at the ground.

Fuck him.

Jason stood up, with knowing he was going to regret every moment of this, grabbed his combat knife from its sheath and cut through Dick’s binds. Dick didn’t immediately jump up, or try to grabble the knife off him and shank him - which was good- but he didn’t really do anything else either. Instead he just sat there as the ropes fell to the ground around him.

Jason stepped back, hands on hips and waited.

“Well.”

Dick glanced up, blinking foggily.

Jason sighed harder.

“Go on, get up, I’m sure your bursting to pee I’ve had you tied up for a full day.”

Dick just continued to stare at him.

“I’m not holding your hand, get up.” Jason said and pushed at Dick’s shoulder.

Dick was blank.

And yeah, this was the bit Jason didn’t want to do.

“Okay, fine, the court brought me back, and they have instructed me to keep you alive and with me.” Jason said, insincere as possible and Jason knew no one in their right mind would believe him.

Then again, Dick clearly was not in his right mind. His gaze sharpened and he rose.

“I live and die at the court’s commands.” He said, almost sounding relieved.

Jason pointed him in the direction of the bathroom and Dick moved off, not shutting the door behind him of fucking course, but at least he washed his hands afterwards and came back. He didn’t even look at the window or door.

Then Dick stood at attention next to him, and Jason threw the power bar at him and grabbed the phone.

After the day he had, he needed pizza and beer. He had a card he’d pick pocketed off Damian, because Jason went full asshole, he went all the way, and was fully intending to use it.

Dick did and said nothing, waiting on Jason with a eerie sort of satisfaction on his face that Jason couldn’t bear to look at.

-=-

At some point after the beer and pizza and another draining circular conversation with Dick, Jason had fallen asleep. A fact that only became apparent when Jason was blinking sleep out of his eyes and the sunlight was sitting just right on his eyeballs.

“Eulfh” Jason said, unintelligently and sun blind as he pushed himself upright and swung his legs over the couch only to have them whack straight into Dick’s bended knees.

Dick? What was Dick?

Dick, Talon Dick, and Jason jolted back, recoiling his legs onto the couch, adrenaline pumping hard and fast. But Dick didn’t move after him, didn’t pull a knife, just tilted his head and watched him.

Or rather Jason thought, kept watching him.

With the same fascination he’d had last night.

Jason groaned, dragging a hand down his face because yeah, thats right.

“Please tell me you didn’t stand there watching me sleep all night.” Jason muttered into his palm.

“I…” Dick faltered, and Jason peaked out from behind his fingers because huh, that was different, and then Dick frown and shook himself, “No. I didn’t.”

It sounded like a lie. But it was an odd thing to lie about for someone that confessed to killing this universe’s younger Jason without a bead of sweat. Jason shut his eyes wearily.

God. It was too much five minutes after waking.

He chose to forgo breakfast in favour of two cups of instant coffee, and with a look at the clock with a clearer head, he knew Damian was expecting him sooner rather than later. He moved past Dick, who chosen to perch himself on the back of a ratty sofa watching Jason move about the kitchen, and stopped himself.

He was relatively sure Dick was not going to kill him, yesterday had proven Dick was sure he was a court member or another Talon or something regardless of what Jason himself thought. He was less sure on if Dick would leave or not to get in contact with the actual Court. Cause Jason knew that regardless of what Dick thought, the Court would think Jason Todd, dead teen come back to life, would be more ‘actual risk we need to remove’ rather than ‘yay new team member’ like it was to Dick.

“You aren’t going to leave are you?” Jason asked, and winced because god, what a weak way of wording it.

Dick blinked slowly, “There is no need to.”

And it sounded honest. But.

“I’m going to have to tie you up. Er.” Jason said awkwardly, “Because I can’t risk-“

Dick didn’t even looked phased, which yeah more than a little disturbing, just got up, moved over to his chair and sat down, arms behind his back.

“Anything for the court.” Dick said, like a prayer, and Jason tied him up quickly thinking about the million the ways he was going to say sorry to his universe’s Dick when he got back.

Or maybe he’d just buy him an enormous chocolate butt and leave it on his doorstep. That might work too.

He left before he could think about it any further.

Of course, once he left Dick, Jason thoughts turned to Damian, and when they turned to Damian they turned to the way Jason had broke his heart at telling him his father that he had spent the majority of his life looking for was already in the ground.

Oh yeah, this universe was so fun.

Damian wasn’t waiting for him at the door this time, nor was he hovering on the adjacent rooftop with a sword waiting for Jason. No, instead Jason landed, unmet on Damian’s balcony and was forced to awkwardly knock on the balcony door.

Damian opened it.

He wasn’t in his semi-batman garb, he wasn’t dressed like a rich princeling with daggers up his sleeve. No. This time Damian was dressed in dark stealth like clothes, loose and made to blend in.

“Hi.” Jason said shortly, “Are you-“

Damian looked at him, blankly, turned leaving the door open, and walked inside. There wasn’t anything else to do, so Jason followed. Damian took them to the dinner room, and where yesterday had been clean surfaces was today organised chaos. Newspaper cuttings, hand-written letters, photos, all arranged across every inch of the long table.

It wasn’t the work of one night, Jason saw instantly, it was the work of years. Too much information, too many likely and different sources given away by the tells of all the varying forms, the fluctuating quality from a blood stained napkin to official police reports.

In the mess, Jason saw Bruce’s name repeated over and over, both in alias and in truth.

God.

“Explain.” Damian said, short and sharp and when Jason flinched up, Damian was staring at him, “I can work out of some it, but… I can’t grasp it all. You said you had information. Explain what happened.”

Damian had dark circles under his eyes, eyelashes were still clumped from tears, and Jason felt wretched all over again. Damian didn’t deserve this, not in any universe, but Jason? He couldn’t help him. Not long-term. He couldn’t stay.

“First.” Jason tasted the words, bitter in his mouth, “We need a deal. What I’m after, for the intel..” Jason said finally.

Damian’s expressed shuttered further and yes, Jason was a bastard, an utter bastard.

“We do not have time for that.” Damian said, slow and poisonous, “I’ve detected…an opening. What you need I have and I can guarantee that, your information is worth less the more time passes.”

An opening. Oh. Hell.

“You can’t go after the Court.” The words fell out before Jason could stop them, high with disbelief.

The corners of Damian’s eyes tightened, “That is none of your concern.”

Jason snorted, “Oh no of course not. Why should I care when it’ll be my information that gets you killed.”

“Exactly.” Damian agreed, the little snot nosed punk, “Now are you going to give me the intel or I am going to have cancel our deal.”

God. Damn It.

Jason pressed his hand against his hood, wishing for once he didn’t have it on so he could pinch the bridge of his nose because fuck his life.

“Look. I think you need to talk to someone.” Alfred, god, Alfred had better be the same in this universe ready to talk some sense into Damian, “If you go in there swinging, you are just going to get yourself and anyone remotely connected with you killed.”

Damian’s eyes were steel.

“Too much time has passed since his… death and in that time the Court has been growing, unchecked, wilder, more ambitious. More Talons roam the night, unmolested, and that cannot stand.” Damian swallowed, shoulders stiffening at his sides and grit out, “I will not let it stand.”

He spoke with an elegance all too familiar to Jason, one that was Talia all over, more so than his world’s Damian. But the stubborn pig headed ambition? Clearly there was a gene for that because that had to be from Bruce.

Damian was going after the Court. With or without Jason and without a Batclan behind him.

Fuck, this wasn’t Jason’s universe. It shouldn’t matter-

“Ok, new deal.” Jason said almost groaning, “I will provide you with intel and I will accompany you as a partner on your raids. Given that you will give me the device I want before the week is out, and that you will get the fucking Justice League when you see you are over your head.”

Damian smiled, and it felt like Jason had just fallen into the world’s biggest trap.

“I can tolerate that.” Damian told him, righteous all over, then without even pretending to seem unprepared for the situation, laughed right ahead, “Tomorrow we begin. The opening I have spotted is where I tracked a Talon to-“

Fuck it all, Jason was going to have get more info out of Dick wasn’t he?

-=-

Dick hadn’t untied himself, hadn’t done anything since Jason had left and Jason felt his insides jumble a bit at the way that Dick fucking didn’t even seem annoyed that he’d been tied up all morning. Everything was so darn wrong, and Jason tried to ignore that particular thought when Dick left to relieve himself.

When Dick returned, perching him absently on the sofa in the best vantage point of the room - which yeah Jason had noticed but he seemed more in wary alert than about to take out Jason - Jason decided pull another particular bandaid. He sat himself on the kitchen stool, swinging around to face Dick put his hands on his knees.

“Right, its time to talk Dickie.”

Dick blinked at him, unfazed, and god it made Jason want to see what he could do to phase him.

“What does the Court require?” Dick asked, easy as breathing.

“The Court,” Jason said with a grimace, and yeah Dick didn’t even seem to react to that either, “Needs to know what you know about the Court.”

Anyone with half a brain could figure out there was something wrong with that statement. But by the looks of Dick’s easy nod, he didn’t have half a brain left.

“Of course.” Dick said.

Well. Jason thought, that was easy. He’d almost thought that might have been the phrase that had triggered something in Dick, like, oh, say, Jason actually wasn’t the Court. Maybe that would have backed up the fifty times Jason had told him he wasn’t the court, and the insincere way he said he was now.

But apparently not.

How screwed was Dick’s head?

“Where is your base?” Jason asked.

Dick frowned, tilting his head, “My Base?”

Terminology maybe.

“Where do you go after to a mission, where do you sleep,” Jason waved a hand, when Dick’s face was still blank, “Er, where do you hang your claws at night?”

“After a mission I return to where I woke, there I either am given in a new mission or I am… stored.” Dick said the last word strangely and Jason stared.

“Stored.” Jason prompted, but he didn’t want to know, he really-

Dick looked at him, curiously head cocked as if seeing something Jason couldn’t, “A room, off a main corridor and I mostly wait. I’m not to be frozen, not yet, my missions are too successful, and the waking is too slow but sometimes it still happens. Between inactivity.”

They froze him. Or kept him locked up in a room. Jason glanced down having to shut his eyes for a moment, but Dick kept speaking.

“The Freezing tube is small, and the process quick, but its tight, and the waking is…” Dick trailed off.

Sweat broke out on Jason’s hands, his mind dancing on the image of a closed in tube, a tight box under the ground. Every breath he made sucking what little oxygen there was and-

Jason forced his eyes open. Dick was staring at him now, and Jason couldn’t shake the feeling that Dick looked… fascinated.

“Where.” Jason asked, voice rough.

“Past the main hall-“ Dick started but Jason broke in.

“No, where is this place, where is the compound?”

“I…” Dick frowned, “I know where but I can’t… The Court… I can’t…”

Dick’s hands were stretching out and back and Dick’s face was tightening, his frown deepening to sharp lines. Mental conditioning. Of course, Jason wasn’t surprised.

“Okay, don’t worry about that.” Jason dismissed quickly, and Dick’s face eased back into its expressionless resting face, “Could you lead me, a Court member, there?”

“Of course.” Dick said without hesitation.

Well. That was something.

Jason paused, as an idea hit him, he looked around the apartment.

“How long have you visited here?” Jason said slowly, because this place wasn’t just abandoned, not a top storey apartment even if it was a dodgy neighbourhood.

Dick actually smiled, looking over Jason’s shoulder.

“Sometimes after a mission I’d return here, store things.” His expression shuttered to something vacant again, “The owners had threatened the Court. They were sentenced to die.”

And die, they did. Jason had no doubt. It made sense why Dick had run into him that day. Still everything in the apartment was old, older than a couple of years. The papers on the coffee table were yellowed, and the old food in the fridge was puddles of mush.

“How long have you been working for them.” Jason asked.

“Time has no meaning.” Dick replied, back to eerily empty, “I live and die at the court’s command”

The question, Jason had already answered through his research, as scattered as he was. He picked up old papers that talked of a Robin before Jason, and the legal documents for Bruce Wayne looking after a ward named Dick Grayson, then the ward had vanished, unmentioned by papers except a sad missing child report. A year, at least on Jason’s timeline, before young Jason had entered the picture.

Then Talon Dick had killed Robin Jason at age fifteen and Bruce Wayne had gone ‘missing’ two years later.

And Jason didn’t want to ask that question, didn’t want to go down that path. He’d already put together the most likely outcome but he didn’t want to-

It wasn’t his universe, he reminded himself harshly.

But none of that seemed to matter anymore.

“Did you…” Jason asked and stopped, swallowed, forced himself, “Did you-“

“I killed you.” Dick said, and Jason’s voice died again, despite the fact he knew this, hew knew this and it wasn’t the question Jason needed to ask-

Dick’s expression was soft around the edges, something torn about the way he slowly slipped to his feet. Jason couldn’t look away.

“Order of the Court was to kill Jason Todd and I did.” Dick said, voice caught in a whisper, looking like that day he’d thrashed and thrashed until he stilled and barely moved again.

“Why.” Jason asked, unable to stop.

Because he’d been a kid-

“Bruce Wayne was a threat. He needed…” Dick said with a breath and his eyes danced down, danced away and Jason knew guilt when he saw it, “And I needed a lesson.”

He’d said that before.

“What did you do?” Jason had stood, barely registering his stool toppling over behind him.

Dick shifted to his back foot, face creasing, and unlike the confusion before, the lines were deeper, the edges pulled, and Dick’s hands pressed hard into his legs either side.

“I failed the court.” Dick said, “I live and die by the Court’s commands and I failed the Court I must be taught, I must be improved. I failed the Court so I must learn-“

“Dick.” Jason interrupted.

“I live to serve the Court. I die by their wishes. But they did not wish me death for my failures, they wished me to learn-“

“Dick!” Jason yelled and he reached forward, grabbing Dick’s shoulders.

Instantly Dick spun, eyes wide, and grabbed Jason’s shoulders and pushed all his weight onto Jason. Jason wasn’t expecting it, and he toppled back, Dick’s not inconsiderable weight pushing him back but before he could hit the ground, Dick moved, and they twisted to land on their sides and the room echoed with a bang.

Jason gritted his teeth, instantly pulling his arms up to break Dick’s hold -

But Dick had let him go, was already crouching low, staring out the window that-

Yeah, that was a bullet hole through the glass that had definitely not been there this morning. Jason’s eyes tracked that trajectory and saw the wall which had been behind Jason’s head moments prior, with a single bullet hole.

Sniper. Shit.

Jason got quickly up to a crouch, reaching in to pull out his combat knife strapped to his thigh, found the holster empty, and saw the glint in Dick’s hand, and instead quickly pulled out his boot knife instead. Dick wasn’t actively attacking him at present so Jason had deemed it a worry-later problem.

Current problem was a sniper.

Jason kept low, moving to the kitchen, to his guns, when two consecutive shots rang out. There was a crack of wood breaking but Jason quickly glanced back to Dick saw Dick unharmed but tense, and Jason knew he was certainly not hit, so why-

Then the window in the kitchen smashed open and the living room window exploded inward.

Jason just managed to roll to the side, to avoid a knife swipe and a follow up jab and Jason sprung to his feet, swinging out, but his arm was blocked by a forearm to his forearm, so Jason grabbed that arm, and ducked the follow up swing and spun his attacker over his shoulder and on to the ground.

Jason had just enough time to appreciate that yes, yes that in fact was a Talon, and this time with a face Jason didn’t recognise, and also oh shit, that was a Talon, and now Dick was armed too, he would swap sides and join the living room Talon and this Talon, and this time Jason might actually die again.

Then his thoughts were back on the fight as the Talon surged to his feet and slashed fast and hard at Jason. Jason ducked and weaved, blocking what with arms, and let the Talon drive him back into the kitchen and away from the other two. There was a minute gap in the Talon’s defences and Jason drive his knife forward in his own upward slash. He only skimmed the armour, but his knife caught the edge the Goggles of the Talon leaving the woman temporarily half-blind and Jason took his chance, kicked at the Talon’s head, landing a decent blow and then kept his momentum going and spun and ducked into a sweeping kick that had the Talon falling down and actually landing hard this time.

Jason glanced up quickly ready for the next attack from someone else, but instead there was only Dick running toward him, glinting knife in hand and Jason swore.

He lurched back, bringing his knife to a good defensible position, but Dick was fast too fast and Jason had moment to truly appreciate what an idiot he’d been trusting Dick with that knife, when Dick swung down his blade and-

And stabbed it right into the rising Talon’s eye. The Talon who had a blade a whisper of breath over the artery in Jason’s leg.

The Talon gurgled, then collapsed, knife spinning out of his control and away from Jason’s leg, and it was just Jason, squatting in the kitchen splattered with blood, a dead Talon at his feet and Dick hovering close enough to touch.

Dick slowly pulled back and Jason saw the blood he didn’t see earlier, the dark sprays of it on Dick’s armour, and the hand just visible around the corner.

“Well that… was unexpected.” Jason said, as level as he could, and then cause apparently he had a death wish, “You said I was sentenced to die.”

Dick moved, slick and stable, pulling himself up in a loose easy stance, eyes flicking across the windows.

“And die you did.” Dick said, cool as a cucumber with blood dripping down his blade, “The courts orders were to stay with you.”

Well the court orders Jason had lied about.

“Yes.” Jason said, stupidly. Because fuck, he didn’t actually expect it to remain like that in a combat situation.

Dick’s gaze flicked back over Jason’s head, to the living room and back.

“We need to move. I have a couple of other places, not known by others.” Dick said, all business.

“Yeah. Okay.” Jason said pulling himself upright, brain buzzing, mouth moving on autopilot, “Shame this hole was really becoming home.”

The biggest lie he’d ever told, but Jason looked up to Dick’s face, because Jason hasn't been the one storing things here for years, not little knick-nacks, not coming back here again and again…

Dick was looking right at him, “There are more important things.”

It felt like double-speak, and Jason stared at him for a moment, a moment too long because Dick turned, back a shifting wall of armour between them.

“Right.” Jason said, and his throat felt dry.

He needed to get out of this universe.

-=-

Damian's lead was a block of abandoned apartments, scheduled for a demolition last year that had never came. It hardly screamed Court of Owls to Jason as he inspected it with a dry eye crouched next to the mini-batman. The Court of Owls he remembered from his universe were rich snobs, mansions were their sort of thing. Jason could even dimly recall Alfred mentioning an underground lair, a labyrinth where Bruce had been captive. This, with its crumbling brick work and shattered windows, boarded doors, didn’t really look that sort of establishment.

“You sure?” Jason asked, keeping to the shadows.

Damian finished typing on a small computer, folding it away in his back pocket. He glanced over at Jason, white lensed eyes narrowing.

“Its not the Court.” Damian said with a sniff, “There were only four guards inside. Hired guns running high end narcotics. Cops en route.”

Wait.

“What do you mean ‘were’.” Jason asked.

“Were.” Damian repeated like Jason was an idiot, “As in, there were four guards but since I’ve disabled them there are now no guards. I’ve already looked inside but since you are the resident expert-”

“Jesus fuck.” Jason hissed, standing up stiffly because god damn it, “And what if it hadn’t been just four guards.”

Damian blinked at him, a stupid smug smile curling to life on his lips and damn Jason just wanted to wipe that look off his face, “Then I would have dealt with it.”

“And what if it had been the entire court you had just dropped in it? How exactly were you planning to get out then huh? I wasn’t here!” Jason waved an arm down at Damian’s stupid outfit, “I’m sure your ‘good’ and all but these people killed Batman and you had no backup-“

“I had backup.” Damian interrupted, smile faltering a bit at the mention of Batman.

Cocky, brash, fuck that was all too familiar. Jason had almost had this exact conversation before, only from the other side.

God. Was he turning into Bruce then??

“Alfred does not count-“ Fuck. Jason cut himself off but it wasn’t fast enough.

Not fast enough at all, Jason should have swallowed the damn sentence down because Damian straightened, eyes too bright and smile stretching wide. Just like Jason had just confirmed a theory. Fuck it. Damian had to know now.

“You really are pathetic at this cloak and dagger stuff, Hood.” Damian’s voice dripped with success, “Just give it up already.”

“Look. Kid.” Jason gritted out, ignoring Damian’s last comment entirely, it was safer that way, “If we are working together, that means we are working together. We scout, we go in together, or I just don’t tell you shit.”

“This output was from my intel.” Damian crossed his arms, “And if you withhold on me, I withhold on you.”

Fucking. Hell.

Jason pushed out a breath, and paced an angry line across the roof. Fucking hell, how had Dick been partnered to Damian without going crazy??? How?? Jason forced himself to a stop and glowered as best as he could through his helmet. Sure Damian couldn’t see it but it did make Jason feel fractionally better.

“Ok. Look, maybe you don’t trust me-” Jason started.

“You are still hooded.” Damian interrupted with a lazy shrug.

“But I reiterate.” Jason raised his voice a little louder, “If we are working together, we work together. I can hold myself in a fight, I’ve lasted against Talons before and clearly I need what you have.”

Damian shifted, arms crossed, mask warping as he moved through emotions Jason couldn’t quite name.

“I am aware of your fighting prowess.” Damian said, as if it was some great allowance, “And I suppose because of your expertise in the Talons means I would have a greater advantage in the field.”

Yes, Damian would. And a bigger advantage than he knew. Because his universe of not Jason was personally invested in not adding Damian's death to his conscience. The kid was a jerk, but there was a heart in there somewhere. Perhaps buried deep underneath the condescension and the pig-headed arrogance.

"Thank you for that grand and great compliment." Jason couldn't help but respond, words drenched in sarcasm.  

"Your welcome." Damian, the brat, took it sincerely, "Now this was my lead. What are you going to add to this partnership?"

Partnership. The word gave Jason a terrifying vision of his future, playing the wayward Robin to Damian's mini Batman. And damn he needed to go home before that ever happened.

“I need to do some final confirmations." Jason said, "Be ready tomorrow night, midnight.”

Final confirmations being finding Dick’s hideout and checking there were enough Talons around to get Damian to admit they needed the Justice League. Then getting the device, and then getting the hell out of Dodge.

Hopefully.

-=-

Dick’s new safe-house was a cold, magazine-looking apartment in the Westend. Owned by a woman who worked more overseas than she did in Gotham and only came back, like clockwork at the end of each month. Dick had sworn it was unknown by the Court, found only by him on accident when he murdered a man nearby. Which was a another fun fact about Dick's terrible life.  

Jason was due to meet Dick there after his little catch up with Damian, but, four buildings away, Jason swung to a stop. His neck prickled.

Dick's apartment scraped into view around the office building. No lights, no movement, nothing obvious about Jason's location about life. Unsurpising as Dick did tend to live in one spot in the dark but...

Something in the very edge of Jason's vision moved and Jason ducked under the rooftop ledge. He held, still and steady as he could, his hands pressing tight over his guns, a kick of adrenaline surfing high in his veins. Then, gradual as a glacier, he edged up, risking a glance over the ledge.

A figure was leaping high in the air between buildings, caught for a breath in the glare of neon billboard. Then they landed on the office building, two across from Jason, and slipped like water off the edge, effortlessly disappearing down the fifty story height. The shadow glinted with a gold edging that was all too familiar.  

Talon.

Fuck. Dick.

Jason tensed, rising to his feet. Dick was in that apartment he-

A hand flattened over his mouth, yanking him backwards and Jason kicked off the ground, intending to tilt their weight backwards but the figure who grasped him just stumbled back, retreating until they fell under the shadow ventilation unit and Jason twisted-viciously, turning, gun raised close between them-

“Jason.” Dick breathed, goggled eyes over Jason’s shoulder, “Don’t. Move.”

Jason had listened to orders for years, and just like that, the old training came back and Jason froze. They were close, Jason’s gun between their chests the only thing in between them. So close Jason could see the flecks of grey in Dick’s irises as his eyes flicked behind him. So close Jason could see an old scar nicking across Dick’s jugular, so eerily similar to Jason’s own. So close Jason could feel Dick’s tension wind up, like a coiled spring mounting.

The city glare reflected on Dick’s goggles darkened for a short, heart stealing moment and Jason’s hand tightened around his gun.

Jason imagined being caught. Imagined a hundred Talons finding them. Imagined Dick finally turning.

But then the glare returned, and Dick’s eyes tracked over Jason’s other shoulder.

They stayed, pinned together for another eight breaths, each feeling longer and longer, until Dick nodded, a slight jerk of the head and slipped out between Jason and the shaft. Dick poised, head twitching each direction then darted out.

Jason followed, close to Dick’s heels as he dared, down from the rooftops and sticking close to the sides of the old buildings. They stayed close to fire escapes and stopped at any movement above them.

Twice they stopped for an stray cat. Once for a rat in an alley.

Twenty minutes later Dick stopped in a Church roof, ducking behind a gargoyle. A familiar gargoyle and Jason bit down a misplaced sense of relief. Familiarity was not safety. Not by a long shot. A lesson he’d learn a long time before Bruce.

“So. They have clearly marked out all your former kill spots.” Jason told him, because it was obvious that they would have, it was stupid mistake of Jason to assume they wouldn’t have.

First rule of decretive work, work out where the criminal knew, where they had been before.

Dick’s head tilted, and despite nearly twenty minutes of flat out parkour, his breaths were even, “The rebel faction is larger than I anticipated.”

Large enough to be the entire Court. Jesus fuck Jason was literally skating an inch from death with these lies.

“Yes.” Jason said, tried for once to put some sincerity into it, “We can trust no one.”

Dick’s eyes fixed on him, and for a moment Jason thought that this, after all the bald faced lies he had given, that the only lie he’d put effort into had backfired. Jason shifted his weight to hind foot.

“You can trust me.” Dick said, and bowed his head, “I live and die by the Court, I serve-“

Nup. Still skating an inch from death then.

“Dick. I know.” Jason broke in, not wanting to spend more time reliving those fun vows, changed the topic entirely. “You told me once that you could lead me, a Court Member, to the place where the Court was storing you?”

Those sort of sentences had been why Jason had been so blaze with lies before.

Dick’s head rose, and his face had stilled, the faint brushes of expression he’d had before, cleaned off. It was funny to realise just how much Dick expressed himself now, after a only a couple of days in Jason's company.

“Yes. I can.” Dick’s eyes dropped down Jason, to his guns, to Jason’s waist where his swords were still clipped, his mouth tightened, “We will not survive a confrontation.”

That could have been a subtle insult to Jason’s fighting skills, or a general comment about the number of Talons. Jason couldn’t help but think it was a combination of the two and he frowned.

“I don’t want a confrontation.” Jason heard the sour note in his voice and continued, rougher, “We need intel, I want to stake it out, and since we currently have no safe house and no place to be…”

Cause when fate closed a door, or when Jason fucking locked himself in, he broke a window out.

“You are too loud, too obvious.” Dick decided, the most forthright thing Jason had heard yet from him, “Stay behind me, follow my footsteps.”

Just like Jason had been doing for the first half of his life. Fuck. Also-

“Fuck you I’m-“ Jason started and Dick’s mouth did something, flicked out wide, like-

A smile. Dick, Talon Dick, was smiling. His face lighting up like Dick’s, like Jason’s universe Dick. And fuck it all, Dick looked-

“Fuck you.” Jason continued, had to continue, clip his mouth shut, before he said something stupid.

He turned away, a strange feeling in his chest, hollow and too full all at once, and didn’t even get the chance to push it down entirely until Dick’s hand was hitting his shoulder, thumb pressing into his muscle.

“Follow me.” Dick said, and there was now that mirth in his voice as he added, “Softly.”

Jason groaned to himself as he followed Dick off the Church. Because save him, Talon Dick had found his sense of Dickish humour.

-=-

Of all places, Dick lead them to a series of low office buildings, right on the edge of the Docks. Four large old squat buildings, pushed between two warehouses made with a flat roofs and clear, almost painfully clear, rooftop entrances. Certainly not the mansion with the underground labyrinth Jason had been expecting, but then again, that mansion had been for the Court. This was just where they dumped their playthings.

“Here?” Jason questioned, low in the apartment they’d broken into.

Dick glanced at him, and pulled something from his pocket, he straightened it, flicking it forth until it extended, like a telescope. He took a quick look through it, adjusted the view and offered it over, careful to keep the angle the same.

“Here.” Dick confirmed.

Jason glanced through the telescope, it was angled at the a section of wall just jutting out from the warehouse. However, that was not what Jason saw through the telescope. Instead of wall, there was a small series of ledges, leading up to a small landing and a door. At that current moment a Talon was climbing the ledge. Jason pulled the glass away, the Talon disappeared and Jason was back to looking at a boring old wall. It even managed to look brighter as the sunlight slipped across it from the East.

Clever.

“Any other entrances?” Jason asked, offering the scope back.

“Three.” Dick folded the scope away, “The storm water drain, the right warehouse has an entrance and grate on the centre roof. The warehouse is filled with workers loyal to court. The grate is techically an entrance, however its electrified and netted with lasers and I've never seen anyone come in that way. If you wanted to be the first you'd have to be a lot thinner.”

Humour. Again. Dick turned to him, as if waiting for the response his witty remark had got him. Jason pressed the corners of his mouth down flat.

“And I’m guessing the storm water drain…”

Dick sighed, like Jason was missing out on his wit the magnanimous gift it was, “fingerprint recognition before a guarded entrance.”

“They have their own power generator?” Jason asked, casting another eye over the offices.

Normally accessing a target meant sweeping around it, checking records and dates and times of people leaving. They didn’t have the time, not if every moment they spent out on the streets meant the Talons were closer to finding Dick, closer to working out who and what had happened and they couldn’t risk circling the building on foot. It had only been a gut instinct and Dick’s timely arrival that had saved Jason from another conflict before, Talons were too quiet, too subtle.

Even Dick, in this screwed up universe, was softer and faster than Jason could have ever remembered him. Perhaps not as physically strong. But knives never needed more strength to part flesh.

“I am…” Dick seemed to struggle, “A generator I don’t…”

Another one of those few unanswerable questions.

“All good Dick.” Jason brushed off, because they would if they were any good.

And the Court was.

And all Jason had to do now was show Damian that they needed the Justice League and then get the Universe Hopper and-

“Have you seen enough?” Dick asked.

Dick.

Jason forced a tight smile, “Not quite, we’ve gotta take the scenic route out.”

Dick arched a brow. But waved a hand to gesture Jason forward and followed him out.

-=-

Jason’s boots hit Damian’s apartment at 11:00pm, the balcony doors opened and Damian sitting at the long table, sipping at a drink. He glanced up at Jason, not a hint of surprise on his face and gestured to the seat beside him.

“Drink, Hood?” Damian offered, swiping at something on his tablet.

“You’re a bit young to be offering me that, don’t you think?” Jason snorted, and took the offered seat.

There was another tablet on the table and Jason picked it, up, gratified to see it was all ready unlocked, and a map of Gotham lay at his fingertips, he zoomed in on the docks, and icons over each building popped up. Jason resisted the urge to snort, it was a mobile friendly batcomputer for the discerning Gen Z Batling. Good to see Damian was typical regardless of the universe.

“The drink offer was for tea or coffee, not any alcoholic beverages Mr… Hood.”

Alfred. Jason tore his eyes up, to the now open door on the right, and there was Alfred. He looked older in this universe, grief wearing deep circles under his eyes, a hunch in his normally straight back and the bones in hands were pronounced as he held his own cup, sipping from it slowly.

“Hi…” Jason darted a quick look at Damian, who cocked a brow at him, sitting back, and since Jason had already stuffed that secret, “Alfred.”

Alfred’s mouth thinned, and he eyed Jason steadily, as if attempting to peer through Jason’s hood from half a room away.

“I do not believe we are acquainted?” Alfred’s voice was all distrust curled in British indifference.

“We aren’t.” Jason turned back, pointed as he could, to his tablet.

The silence road in the room, high and uncomfortable as Jason pulled up the specs, playing oblivious to the looks Damian and Alfred clearly passed between each other. Then, abruptly, Damian snorted, pulling his own tablet to him, the same office blocks that Jason was looking at already on them.

“So then, I guess your research was successful. This is their hideout?”

The specs on the screen were the blueprints from the council, the latest one, renovations done in 97, had a layout that was as labrinyth-esque as office blocks could go. And a layout that completely contracted the blue prints dated two years earlier, and an exterior that hadn’t matched up visually with what Jason had seen.

“This is more of a Talon storage point. Their weapon hanger really.” Jason cast his eyes up, found them meeting Alfred’s, “If you go after the court, I want you to see all the resources brought down upon you.”

“Yes, yes and so I’d give up, you’d call the Justice League, and you get out with your device.” Damian rolled his eyes, “Your plan is terribly transparent. But there is a flaw with your plan, I’m assuming to test their resources you were planning to get them to react to something, which would inevitably increase their awareness and ruin any surprise we would have had when we go for the Court itself.”

Damian would have been correct. Had Jason not appeared in this bloody universe.

“You are not going to get them by surprise.” Jason winced, thankful his expression was hidden, “The Court is already on alert.”

“Oh really?” Damian’s voice was flat, “Did a Talon go AWOL?”

Jason had known Damian would hear of the scuffle with the Talons. They’d left the bodies in the floor of the apartment after a loud  fight that the neighbours would have called in. But Damian had said AWOL, not dead, and there was no way, no way at all that he could have known about Dick.

Still Damian looked too confident, too knowing.

“The point is,” avoiding the question was as good as admitting it, but there were no good options left to Jason, “That the Court is alert and checking their strength and now is the only time we can blame some one else.”

That was what surprised Damian.

“Blame the AWOL Talon?” Damian shot a fire quick glance to the tablet and then to the Jason, eyes narrowing, “Explain your plan.”

“You’ve still got the motorcycles?” Jason pulled back to the larger layout of the Docks, “I'm going to need to borrow them and a couple of other gadgets.”

"To do what exactly?" Damian pressed again.

-=-

Dick’s armour was on the smaller side, but a cache of hidden buckles and straps meant that it still fit. It was tight, breathing in deep was hard, but the ensemble was light, easy to move in. Too light, Jason had doubts about the armoured nature of the outfit but. Hopefully he wouldn’t need that.

According to Dick the storm water drain was recorded for five miles either direction before the hidden entrance. So, by now, surely, they would have picked up on him, coming from the East.

But Jason’s only company in the tunnel remained the sloshing of his own footsteps, and the squeaking of distant rats.

Jason pressed on, shoulders back stiff and soldier like as he’d seen Dick do. Mimicking Dick’s movements were easy, Talon Dick had Dick’s liquid grace, one that Jason studied for years, that was broken up with a military stiffness that wasn’t unlike the SAS training Jason had endured in his rebirth training sessions.

The tunnel sloped around a corner, and the entrance came into sight. It was innocuous, a bit like a service door, round, vault-like door with a rusty looking keypad beside it. No obvious cameras, no high tech gadgets sticking out, just a very smooth looking job.

Jason went up to the key, and scraped his fingers carefully around the outside of the lock. The lock came up, like a flap, just like Dick had said, and the fingerprint pad stuck out.

Pulling a glove, Jason pressed his finger down. The silicone fingerprint over the top read quick and clean, flashing green and the door popped softly, and Jason flipped his gloves back on.

He cracked the door, glancing inside, hand pressing to the inside rim of the entrance.  

There was a corridor, dark and long leading to a staircase, lit by warehouse styled long lights. Doors bracketed the corridor, every five metres or so, keypads and folders outside each one.

A shadow peeled off near the wall, and Jason held still as a tall, willow-like Talon prowled for him.

“Who do you serve?”

Jason ducked his head, held his hand to his chest, “The Court, I live and die by the Court’s-“

A finger ended with a savage looking metal claw, pressed under his chin and Jason’s hands dropped to his sides as he let the Talon bring his head up. He grasped the knife hilts at his side, and held perfectly still.

The Talon’s goggles were clear, and Jason saw the grey dead looking eyes inside.

“Who are you?”

“A Talon, a weapon in the night, a whisperer following the Court’s commands.”

The claw pressed deeper, pricking with pain.

“Who are you?” The Talon asked again, and there was a flicker of movement down the hallway.

Well. Jason had been expecting to get farther, but…

“A talon.” Jason breathed, hand firming around the handle of his dagger, “A weapon-“

With one hand he grasped the Talon’s arm, yanking down from his neck. The other plunged up, slotting in deep between the Talon’s ribs, just deep enough to risk a puncture of a lung if he pulled it out.

Then Jason shoved him back and it might have been shock, or may have been Jason had nicked something else but the Talon fell like a stone, hands at the dagger, mouth still open. Jason did not have the time to see him land, the darkness was moving, Talons materialising, glittering with blades.

Jason ran. He skidded to the door, ducking low, four blades flying over head, and dropped the flash bang and sprinted.

For a moment the drain lit up behind him, bright as daylight, every scrum line obvious on the wall, the rats scuttling away, and Jason’s exit two metres away and the next it was pitch dark.

And in the darkness, the sounds of boots moving in the water filled the air.

It was a blind grab to find the ladder, and Jason scrambled up, shoving up and driving right into comparatively bright street. He hauled himself up, nearly clearing it when his leg spasmed.

There was no time to think, Jason hauled the rest of himself out, saw the knife imbedded in his calf, pulled it out, tossed it to the side and slid the manhole cover back over.

He hurried to his feet, each step awaking the injury in a fissure of iron-hot pain, but he made the corner before he heard the manhole cover clatter open. Another corner, leading to a small alley and there, in glorious metal was Damian’s bike.

Jason flicked out the key, and hit the gas as soon as he was able. He rocketed out of the alley, three Talon divings for him at the entrance, their fingers scraping ineffectually across Jason’s back and the motorbike’s case, and Jason hit the street hard, skidding around to the major street in view.

His right arm jerked forward and a starburst of pain bloomed in his shoulder, radiating down his entire arm like a hot poker shoving through his veins, shocks vibrating through his hand.

“God damn Talons” Jason hissed out, barely seeing the road under him, the turn and traffic coming up, “Fuck.”

The bike wobbled beneath him but Jason clung on hard with his left, pushing the turn to right and breaking neatly between two oncoming cars. The cleaner, two cars in Jason’s sight and he pressed down as hard as he could, hearing the bike turbo’s whine high and thready underneath him.

“I’m fine. Totally fucking fine.” Jason tried to steady his breaths, but in each inhale it felt as it something was punching him down, pushing the air out.

He needed to access the damage. Fuck.

He pushed south, until the buildings were larger, flasher. Then with a flick in the mirrors he pulled hard into a alley.

As soon as he’d slowed enough, Jason glanced over his shoulder

There was a knife in his shoulder, almost in his armpit, blood trickling down in steady waves. Jason plucked his right hand from the motorbike, and attempted to curl his hands. His right hand twitched, and the fiery breath of pain licked right up his arm localised in a tight ball at the knife.

“Just Fantastic. Exactly what I needed.” Jason squeezed his eyes out.

The knife had hit a nerve. Jason needed to pull it out before it severed it. But. He needed to pull it out in a way that also wouldn’t server it.

Fuck.

“Right. This is fine.” Jason pulled out his empty knife sheath, unclipping it, and sticking the rubber in his mouth.

He bit down hard, the bitter taste of grease hanging in his mouth, and curved his right shoulder in as far as he could manage, and reached with his left hand. He touched the knife, a firm a hold as he could manage.

It flared, deep down to his bones and Jason bit down into the sheath hard. He imagined for a tenuous moment his arm sliced off, and surely, surely, that would be less painful. But the pain didn't stop, didn't end, and Jason's grip tightened.

“Right.” Jason muttered, blurred words with the sheath.

And he pulled.

The whiteness flooded back in, pain like fire igniting in his shoulder and his arm and then the ground raced towards him, the heavy motorcycle bearing him down.

Great, Jason thought, absent and foolish as he slipped, dying in alley, his life was so glamorous.

He was out before he hit the ground, the knife clattering from his hand.

#jaydick #jaydick week #jason todd #dick grayson #aoida fic #dear lord i tried so hard to finish this and I nearly did #four-ish more scenes to write #def not happy with the editing here so WILL ATTACK before a03 posting #talon!dick #fanfic