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[prodigaljaybird]

He lost him.

Didn't he?

Does anyone ever really lose the goddamn Batman?

Pale and shaky, Jason casts another look over his shoulder. There's no one there, but then, that's what Bruce might want him to think. Perhaps he's slunk back into the shadows, perhaps he's watching, waiting for Jason to show his hand.

Well, here it is. He hasn't fucking got one, left his apartment like an idiot in minimal gear so he could meet Allison, a half dozen weapons and his gauntlets all that he has on him - a handful of nothing all that might stand between Jason and a deeper cut.

Lifting a trembling hand, he palms at the scar on his throat, only to rip his hand away again. If Bruce is watching, Jason doesn't mean to let him see him suffer. Darting down the next corner and then another, Jason doubles back, takes a second and third rooftop, then darts down another alley. His route is spinning, and Jason's spinning with it, eyes half to crossing and his cheeks green when he rounds another corner, barking in surprise when he runs into -

"Allison." Fuck. Bruce can't see her, can't know what she means, but she's here and if he's watching there's no escaping it. Jason tries and fails to school his expression into something less nauseated, croaking her name again. "Allison."

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[prodigaljaybird]

Jason makes a soft, despairing sound, and for the moment, her faith in him is the only thing he has to cling to. Everything he's been through, everything he's suffered and still suffers, every day, it has to mean something. Looking at her wild, dark eyes, Jason has to believe that what it means to Allison is enough.

He covers her hands in his own, letting his knees give and cushioning her descent with the bracket of his own body. "Do you know how many Robins there've been?" he asks, fighting a sudden urge to laugh. "We're so fucking replaceable, it'd blow your mind."

[theresalwayshope]

Allison slid to the floor with him, settling herself between his legs to finally curl against his chest the way she'd been aching to...then elbowed him sharply in the stomach even he told her how replaceable Robins were.

"I'll put a dagger in your gut instead of my elbow if you tell me that again." She grumbled, glaring at him before laying her head on his shoulder.

So Jason had been Robin. And Batman was his father. God, she couldn't even process this...first the monsters in the alley, then this...

...and she loved him. She was starting to, anyway. She was falling for the Boy Wonder. One who used guns, and she was pretty sure Batman didn't...

Her head was spinning with questions and worry and thoughts racing at the speed of light, and her head felt spinny on top of it all...

Thread the needle, Allison. Jason needs you. There's time to talk, but not if he's seriously hurt.

With a shaky sigh, she lifted her head, peering into his face and running her hands over his arms and shoulders.

"You might need a doctor. God knows what that thing did you you." She paused, taking his face between her hands, more gently this time.

"Jason...we can talk later, okay? Or not talk, I don't care." Her hand smoothed over his cheek, then she leaned in to kids his forehead.

"I need to know you're okay. Please, Jace."

[prodigaljaybird]

"I'm okay." Her hands aren't much warmer than his own skin, but they're a comfort, smoothing away the worst of the fractures in Jason's heart. "I think it was eating our energy," he says, frowning. "Like a...a Dementor. I've seen a lot of weird shit, but never anything like that."

He curls his fingers through her own, blinking sore eyes to get a decent look at her up close. "Are you okay?" he asks again, brushing a lock of dark hair from her cheek. She's holding it together, and she's walking, talking, that much is clear, but she'd seen something in that alley, too.

"It was your dad," he says. "That thing I couldn't see."

[theresalwayshope]

She felt a little better when Jason reached out for her, tangling his fingers in hers, brushing back her hair. Asking about what she saw, though...that sting of longing pierces through her again, and her eyes grow bright with unshed tears she didn't give permission to spring up.

Lowering her gaze for a second, she bites her lip and nods with a shaky sigh.

"I think it was pulling from our memories." she admitted, bringing one of his hands up to kiss his knuckles before she guided their joined hands to rest on her knees, keeping a tight grip on his fingers. "The stuff my dad was saying...we lived in Orange County for a couple months when I was six, and I got lost at the county fair. When I saw him in that alley...he looked exactly the same, he sounded the same."

She paused, not wanting to bring it up again, but needing to if they were going to figure this out. Reflexively, her grip on his hands tightened.

"And the Batman I saw, it was from a movie, like I said." Meeting his gaze, she shifted closer, kissing him quickly, as if she could soften the discomfort of talking about his father with the gesture, with her nearness...will away the pain just by holding on tight enough, or being near enough to wrap him up and never let him go.

"The actor who played him in the movie had a little bit of a lisp...does your dad have one?"

[prodigaljaybird]

"God, no," says Jason, moved to a tiny smile by the very idea. "Something that identifying would get him killed." He strokes his fingers through her hair, not missing the way she seems easier for the constant contact. Here they are, barely across the threshold and curled up on the floor, but Jason doesn't yet feel like moving. It's just another surreal part of an already fucked up day, and this time, he's the one to lean in for a kiss.

"Mine wasn't a straight memory," he admits after. Bruce had asked to help him more than once, but he'd sure as hell never hugged him, however much Jason wanted it. "More like, something I wanted to happen. Something that'd make me stick around so it could keep eating."

He sighs, shamed by his own need when it comes to Bruce, but another thought strikes him. "What's he like?" he asks, curious. "In your movies?"

[theresalwayshope]

Allison kissed him back with a soft smile, then with a sigh, finally moved back into her previous place. This time, however, she twisted around so she could sit between his legs, laying back against his chest with her head pillowed against his shoulder while his back lay against her front door.

Yes, it was a weird place to snuggle up, but nothing about them was normal. It was just...right.

"In the movies, he's a good man." she admitted. "Damaged...hard-headed, occasionally he's a dick, but it's superficial. He cares a lot about the people he loves, but everyone's sort of at a distance. He makes it that way, he thinks he has to be alone."

She paused, tipping her head back to look up at him for a moment, then tilted her head a little further so she could kiss his jaw. "And he doesn't have a Robin, but the movies are supposed to be a trilogy. So far, only two have been released for me back home, I think maybe we'll see him in the third movie. At least I hope so: I don't think there's ever been an incarnation of Batman that didn't have a Robin. I mean...he's not the Dark Knight without the Boy Wonder."

She paused, a smile touching her face. "So...you were really Robin? Is that where you learned all the weapons stuff?"

[prodigaljaybird]

Jason grunts for the description. It's not wrong, even if it's not entirely right, either. These movies might actually get Bruce better than Bruce does himself.

"For a few years," he answers. The best of his life in so many ways, even if Jason can't look back on them now without pain. "I was a street rat, making it on my own however I had to. The Batman, he drove into Crime Alley, left his car alone for too long. I stole the wheels off the Batmobile."

He smiles, a little proud of it, even now. "I guess he liked my nerve, 'cause he adopted me that week."

[theresalwayshope]

"Oh my God, you stole the wheels off the Batmobile?" she gaped, giggling as she twisted around just enough to look at him. "Okay, I knew you were a badass, but I didn't know you stole the wheels off the Batmobile! That's..."

She trailed off, jaw hanging open and still smiling in amazement. A few hours ago, he'd still been so much of an enigma to her, full of secrets and things he didn't think he could share...scars and shadows and every line of him a knife's edge...

And now she could see so much more of him. Maybe she didn't know everything, but she could imagine with some certainty where those dark parts of him were born.

"...you are the most amazing person I've ever known." she finished, reaching out to run her fingers back through his hair, the scar along his scalp no longer so mysterious. A battle wound, earned on the streets of Gotham...just a kid, Robin was always a little kid...

He was so much braver and stronger and...better than she would ever be, and she loved it. She loved him, she loved him so much right that second she ached with it.

[prodigaljaybird]

Jason grins back, not flinching when her fingers drag along the scar he hates most of all, her smile more than bright enough to chase any shadows away. "I was a little shit," he laughs, but he's proud of that, too. He'd been what he needed to be to survive - it's a talent that's never left him, even if it's gotten him into a hell of a lot of trouble.

"But, um," he says, sobering a little. "If he ever really does come here, don't expect a happy reunion." In case that hadn't been obvious when Jason pulled his gun. "We don't get along anymore."

[theresalwayshope]

"You told me that once before...it's okay." she assured him softly, smiling as she regarded him with open affection. She was curious...she had so many questions, but that much hadn't changed: he'd tell her when he was ready.

She wouldn't go digging for the skeletons resting in his graveyard.

"And if he ever does come here," she added, remembering how Jason had reacted, "he won't get a welcome reception from me." Shaking her head a little, she held his gaze. "Not after what I saw today...you don't have to tell me why, just...understand that I'm with you. You and I...we're pack. You know what that means to me...stronger together than apart, your enemies are mine, and your beefs with your dad? I'm on your side, no matter what."

[prodigaljaybird]

Her face is so open, expression unguarded so Jason can see that she means it. She's with him, not horrified or disgusted or confused why Jason would choose to cross the Batman. Allison doesn't know everything yet, but she knows enough, and she accepts it. Accepts him.

Lux loved him, he knows that, but not this fiercely. Certainly not this generously, and his breath stutters in his chest, an odd little sound that Jason is quick to cover with a smile.

"You're amazing," he says, more extension of his thoughts than intended utterance, but Jason doesn't take them back. "I'm kinda - well not kind of, sort of a lot." Rolling his eyes at his own incompetence, Jason tries again. "I'm sort of a lot in love with you."

[theresalwayshope]

Allison looked into his eyes as he said it...saw it shining out of him and heard it in his voice, and she couldn't breathe around it. It was a feeling she'd experienced before, but not like this...not love for the sharp edges and the dark places inside her. Not the awe for the blood she drew and the reverence for the shard of ice in her heart.

Scott loved her, the bad with the good...but Jason loved both. All the same, all equal, all as beautiful and precious and lovable. She didn't have to protect him from herself, he was in love with the danger.

He was in love with her...even the parts she never let Scott see long enough to hate or fear.

Burrowing her hands in his hair, she drew him closer, pressing her forehead against his, drinking in that look as he said it, memorizing the way it filled his face...giddy, drowning in the way it made her feel, so familiar and so different and so humbling...

"I'm in love with you, too." She whispered with a smile, small at first, then bigger until it was splitting her face nearly in two. She pulled him closer for a kiss, then another, still grinning and repeating it between kisses.

"I love you...I'm in love...with you...I love you, Jace..."