Chapter Text
“Just to hang out?”
Jon groaned under his father’s suspicious look and carefully set the tupperware Meemaw had given him at the bottom of his backpack.
“For the last time, yes, Pa.”
He folded up his pajamas and put them in along with his toothbrush and toothpaste. The light blue packaging winked up at him and promised cool, refreshing breath.
“Who else is going to be with you two?”
Jon rolled his eyes.
“One of Dami’s older brothers, I promise we’re not gonna get in trouble--Maps and Colin are going to be there too, they’re not superheroes.”
His Dad settled from his hover when Mom pushed the door open and nudged him aside.
“Don’t mind your dad, kiddo,” his mom grinned and mussed his hair, “it’s your first sleepover.”
Jon felt a scowl try to pull at his lips as he ducked away.
It wasn’t his first sleepover, he’d slept over at Tommy Anderson’s house back when he was eight. That persistent, hollow feeling settled in his bones; Mom and Dad didn’t remember.
It'd been like any other day in Metropolis, when the world changed. He'd come out of his room, yawning and feeling oddly tired. There hadn't been any breakfast waiting and his mom had looked at him, startled, over a cup of coffee.
"Mom?" He'd asked, puzzled.
Her expression cleared at his voice, before twisting into alarm and then flattening into calm.
"...Jon," she'd answered, her voice slow, like she'd somehow forgotten his name.
His heart had twisted into a knot, as a wrongness started to seep into his world.
He could only ask again, voice scared, "Mom? Are you okay?"
Finally, he noticed.
No gray hair.
The hands clenched, white-knuckled, around her coffee cup were straight and even. No lattice of healed fractures on her finger bones.
The fractures he'd assumed so long ago were simply a feature in his family except for him, his dad, and Kara.
The kind of history one accrued when you cared for children with strength that could powder rocks with an enthusiastic squeeze.
Love marks, Meemaw had called them when he'd mentioned it off-hand one day when he caught her rubbing her finger joints.
His gut tightened when she, the stranger that looked like his mom, answered.
"I'm fine, baby," somehow the endearment was awkward coming from this Not-Mom.
His own Other-Mother, he expected to see buttons instead of eyes when their gazes met again.
He couldn't imagine how Coraline could ever like something so close to looking like her mother, but so far; all he felt was a creeping, hollow fear.
"Who are you?"
A pained look came over Not-Mom's face.
"I'm your mom, I'm Lois--," her voice cracked, before she said, "Clark, I need you."
His dad arrived in a snap of speed, pulling a whirlwind through the door after him, and rattling the furniture around the apartment.
"Lois, what's--," then he saw Jon and his expression went blank, "-- Jon," he said like he'd taken a laser to the chest, breathless.
His dad looked the same where his mom didn't.
He caught Jon's flying body before he could make it out the door and the windows rattled as the boy threw reckless hits. Wind frenzied against the walls of the apartment.
" Let me go ," he'd screamed, "what did you do with Mom and Dad?"
His Not-Dad simply hugged him close saying,
"It's okay, you're okay, please Jon just listen…,"
He told Jon about dimensions colliding, about time-bending and resonance, about the destruction of planets across timelines.
How his parents became people so different, and his survival a part of their desperation.
His mom and dad were still themselves, only younger, from a timeline without him.
Tommy Anderson didn’t exist, neither did Amelia or Ricardo or Farah. Jon had checked after that terrible day, when he woke up and his world had changed irrevocably.
His entire grade was full of strangers and his parents didn’t remember him properly.
It had been that way for a little more than half a year now, by Jon's count.
Not that he was counting.
A new, forgetful, pair of parents.
He zipped up the bag with a hiss and click of metal teeth.
“Ready,” he reported with a smile.
His dad escorted him to the edge of Gotham airspace, close and warm.
He pulled him into a hug, before letting him go with a pat on the head.
“Have fun,” he said, voice low.
“I will.”
He made sure to land in a copse of trees when he darted out of the clouds, a fenced nature feature of knurled trunks with spidery branches. He wondered if they were supposed to look like that, or if plants just became creepy when they were planted in Gotham.
He stepped over the low fence enclosing them and carefully read the brass sign on the pedestal next to the garden.
Instead of an explanation or dedication like he expected, it said: Do Not Disturb The Trees.
Nothing else.
Gotham was weird .
He walked quickly, but not too quickly, down the block, towards the tall gates of Gotham Academy. They were closed, the painted metal black and imposing. Jon checked his phone.
Damian's last text glared at him.
'…OUTSIDE the gates. '
Jon squinted and listened. His dad said that you could learn someone's heartbeat, if you pay attention enough. He was largely unsuccessful in duplicating the feat. Heartbeats didn't sound much different, person to person. Some faster, some slower, but mostly the same.
Voices were much easier.
Unfortunately, Damian didn't talk to himself much, or really make a lot of sounds when he was alone.
Jon texted him a gif of a cartoon pumpkin twerking.
He listened; no vibration or ring from a phone, but a scoff.
Damian.
He scanned the direction the sound came from, peering through the walls of the building and smiled when he spotted his friend, walking down an empty hallway.
Heading for the gates.
He leaned up against the brick pillars bracketing the dark metal, he felt a bit slouchy, though. Meemaw said only ruffians leaned up against brick when they had perfectly functional legs to hold them. He stood up, but then he felt like he was waiting in his assigned line at school, so he crossed his arms.
But Dad crossed his arms when he was disappointed and angry.
His arms drop to his side.
He tucked his hands into the small of his back and rocked on his heels, shaking off his buzzing thoughts.
Damian could scoff at anything, no matter how he stood. His friend always walked around straight-backed and with a kind of smoothness that made Jon check to make sure he wasn't gliding in the air.
He was a bit mean about it.
Then again he didn't mind when Jon was a little mean too.
A dark car pulled up in front of the gates and the hazard lights, dull and yellow, started flickering.
A tall man stepped out of the driver's side, clicking the door shut as he lit a flame and sucked smoke in from a cigarette between his lips.
Jon's nose twitched. Despite what the PSAs at school used to say, he loved the pungent smell of burning tobacco. His mom hated it, but his dad winked at him and took him to the fields so they could light cigarettes and smell them burn.
It was like the taste of tin, he figured, or the crunch of metal forks between his teeth. It was just nice and made something deep inside shiver happily.
Under the bill of an old-timey hat, the kind Jon only saw in movies with proper, white-gloved limousine drivers, softly glowing eyes peered at him from oddly deep shadows.
A puff of smoke escaped the man's mouth.
“Got something to say, kid?”
Jon blinked and tilted his head, because this man looked strange, something about him wavered in Jon’s eyesight, like a heat mirage.
“Um, are those Lucky Sixes?”
They were his dad's favorite brand, the tobacco strain utterly odd and the smell uniquely sharp.
Grown in Gotham dispensaries for Gothamites.
He liked the drawings on the packets, filled with cartoons of gargoyles explaining the risks of overdose and hallucination in tourists.
Apparently they were illegal to sell or transport out of Gotham city and the surrounding counties. His dad hid them in a sock tucked behind the fridge.
“Yeah, what are you doing so far from home without your parents, brat?”
Jon stiffened.
“What? I'm not--how do you know I'm not from Gotham--and I'm here to hang out with my friend for your information,” he sputtered, crossing his arms.
The man smiled crookedly.
“To answer your second question--you didn't tell me to go fuck myself on a gargoyle.”
Jon gasped.
“Why would I be that rude?” he erupted, wronged.
He couldn’t even imagine the look Meemaw would give him if he dared be so rude to a stranger in the street.
The man huffed a laugh, blowing out a stream of smoke.
“In Gotham?” he asked, “ ‘cause it isn’t my business what you’re doing.”
Jon's brows furrowed and--,
“Kent!”
He nearly jumped out of his skin.
“Damian!”
The man in front of him hummed in realization.
“Who are you--ah, Todd, you are punctual,” his rapid steps slowed as he finally reached the gates of Gotham Academy.
The man, Todd, twirled his fingers in a sarcastic little salute.
“Ask and ye shall receive,” he drawled.
Damian scowled at the man and harrumphed.
“Of course I will,” he crossed his arms and that arrogant little look that always made Jon want to roll his eyes twisted his lips.
That crooked smile reappeared briefly and Todd doffed his hat, revealing dark curls and a streak of white, opening the passenger side door.
“Your chariot awaits Brat Batticus junior.”
Jon couldn’t stop the giggle from escaping and Damian shot him an annoyed look.
“You would do well to address me by my name--come along Kent.”
Todd winked at him when he followed after Damian with a murmured thanks for the opened door.
The man slipped into the driver's seat in a smooth, graceful movement that reminded Jon of Damian.
“It would have been great if you told me you were bringing Superboy the second back with you,” Todd said, idly tapping ash into a tray that he pulled from the dashboard.
Jon stiffened.
“You know who I am?” then he caught himself, “wait I mean--Superboy who?”
Damian snorted and rolled his eyes.
“Todd is one of my…brothers, he knows who your father is.”
Tension left Jon in a rush.
“Oh, that's okay then.”
Todd huffed out an amused breath.
“I wouldn't say that.”
Damian scooted forward in his seat.
“Yes, yes--be menacing to someone who cares, turn left here.”
A mean little grin scrawled across Todd's face, a slice of curved bone in the rear-view mirror.
A little shiver worked down Jon's spine and his hands rose to adjust his glasses. There was something off-putting about Damian's brother; his skeleton and organs and everything looked just like anyone else. But there was something putting Jon's teeth on edge, making him compulsively check his heartbeat, slow, and stare at his lungs, breathing.
“That's not the way to the Manor,” the man said, turning as directed. He taps another bit of ash into the tray, blowing a stream of smoke out of the partially open driver's side window.
“It isn't,” Damian confirmed, “we will also be picking up Colin and Mizoguchi.”
Jon shifted--why did Colin get his first name? He shook off the little sting of jealousy. Maps was called her last name too, and Damian had known Colin longer.
“The big man know you're inviting a whole gaggle of brats to the Manor?” his tone wrapped around the word ‘big man’ like a bed of needles, prickling.
“Father need not concern himself,” Damian countered, “we will not be going to the Manor--turn right here.”
They stopped behind a line of honking traffic and Todd twisted, hooking an arm over his headrest.
“Not the deal, Bat Brat” he rumbled, “I agreed to chauffeur your spoiled ass so you could get out of telling Alfie about your detention--to and from the Manor, no detours.”
Damian scowled, before his expression crumpled with pain. He placed a hand over his stomach with a small gasp. Jon nearly leapt across the seats between them.
“Damian?” he asked, alarmed as he looked for broken bones or bleeding.
His friend appeared the same as always: healed knucklebones, striations across his arms and legs, the odd, healed fracture at the edge of his lower spine.
Todd squinted suspiciously at them.
“What?” he snapped.
Damian pouted, expression tight.
“Think nothing of it, just a flare up from an old wound.”
Todd's eyes narrowed further, glowing menacingly under the shade of his hat.
“You little shit,” despite his words, his tone held an admiring edge, “but that's not going to work.”
Damian straightened like he'd never been in pain, Jon realized, belatedly that he'd been faking.
“Will it not? I could always call Grayson to pick us up if you are unwilling, I am sure he would be more sympathetic,” Damian never sounded innocent in his life, Jon was sure, but that must be the tone he was going for. To Jon he sounded like some kind of menacing, movie ready mob boss negotiating with a rival family.
For a breathless second, Todd glared at them both, then a car horn blared from behind them, making Jon jump.
“ Move that fucking hunk of junk you dumb motherfucker!”
Todd turned and rolled down the window, leaning out, his middle finger leading.
“Fuck off you useless piece of shit,” Damian's brother bellowed, “ I'll move when I'm fucking ready!”
He then settled in his seat and shifted the gear into drive
“Fine,” he snapped at them both, “we'll pick up your friends--this won't become a habit, I have shit to do.”
Jon blinked. He'd heard Mom curse before. It was hard not to when she hacked away at her articles, eventually moaning for Dad to come and help her spell check. He'd learned many colorful turns of phrase Mom had told him to never, ever repeat.
He hadn't heard such words yelled like that in front of him, though.
Damian smirked.
“Perfect--take the next left.”
They passed from the crowded streets of Gotham's downtown after a few minutes of navigating Saturday traffic, rolling through an open gate and into an entirely different world . Curated lawns greeted Jon's wide eyes, preceding beautiful, multi-story townhouses.
It was still Gotham, so the eaves of the homes had different, miniature gargoyles and the gates enclosing the yards were dark and pointed.
In one yard a child threw a ball, sending an excited, whining hound dashing after it. In another, a man worked on some kind of construction project, drilling one slab of plywood to another.
A granny sat on a porch swing, hands moving with smooth confidence as she hooked thread into knots, forming a panel of cloth.
It was a total contrast to the loud honking of the city streets, the rushed, indifferent walks of the foot traffic and the screeches of arguing Gothamites.
Todd puffed on his cigarette, his second one, and muttered something about, “More spoiled little brats.”
Jon frowned, feeling targeted.
“ I’m not spoiled,” though Damian was--he thought helicopters were something you just ride to school sometimes. His dad didn't even give him a curfew .
Todd snorted and raised a brow.
“Sure, kid.”
Jon scowled at him, feeling sudden kinship with Damian.
His older brother was a jerk.
“That one,” Damian rose to lean on the shoulder of the driver’s seat, ignoring Todd’s reprimanding hiss, “with the birdhouse in Robin colors.”
Indeed, standing under a large oak was an elaborate birdhouse in yellow, red, and green--no black, though, so not all of the Robin colors.
On the porch of the house behind it, below the snarling visage of a gargoyle, flags in the shape of fish hung, twisting in the slight breeze. One big black one, a pink one, and then two increasingly smaller ones in blue and green.
It looked oddly familiar, like he'd seen something like it before. He frowned and tried to identify it as Damian rapidly texted on his phone.
“Mizoguchi will be out shortly,” he pronounced, “she is finishing up packing.”
Todd's brow raised, “Packing?”
Damian simply glared as Jon peeked through the walls of the house.
Maps was in her room rooting through her drawers and scattering clothes over the floor as she threw things into her backpack. Was that a bag of Legos ?
“Fine,” Todd sighed, “I’m stretching my legs.”
He opened the door and stepped out.
“Todd, do not wander--,”
“Take a chill pill, Bratling, I'm just standing.”
True to his word he leaned against the closed door of the car and pulled out his phone, puffing idly at his smoke as he began texting someone.
Jon couldn't imagine it was easy; he was using some kind of old flip-phone.
Damian huffed and crossed his arms.
Jon nudged him, ignoring the narrow-eyed look he received.
“You were in detention?”
Damian’s nose wrinkled.
“Think nothing of it,” he dismissed, “it was a minor confrontation and my opponent clearly was not prepared for it.”
Jon felt his eyes widen.
“Did you fight someone at school?”
Damian rolled his eyes.
“Of course not,” he scoffed.
“Just cursed him out so bad you made him cry,” Todd said, a laugh at the edges of his words, voice carrying through the crack in the driver’s side window.
A mean little smirk pulled at Damian’s lips.
“He should not have speculated about Mother and Father’s relationship in my hearing,” he said, chin proudly tilting, “I have no sympathy for that…brat.”
His eyes flickered to where Todd leaned up against the door.
The man grinned to himself.
“Old Robin past time,” he said, “hiding detentions from the big man.”
Jon shifted.
“Won't he find out, though?” he checked Maps’ house again, seeing her rattle down the stairs to the kitchen. Her mom was by the window peering at their car through a gap in the blinds, “I mean, he's Batman.”
He might not have super hearing like Dad, but he was Batman .
A little furrow wrinkled Damian's brow.
“He doesn't care overmuch as long as he is not contacted,” he asserted, crossing his arms, “and Grayson is in San Francisco for the next month.”
The sound of Todd's phone keys clicking stopped and his head turned slightly.
Then it started up again, and he turned back to the screen.
“Really? Huh.”
“--go out with your sister, Kyle,” Maps’ mom was saying.
“Why?” the boy reading some kind of comic at the kitchen island asked, distracted.
“Listen to your mother,” the man sitting on the couch ordered.
The boy sighed heavily as Maps looked up from the tin she was inspecting, closing the lid and shifting it in her arms with a rattle of cookies against metal.
“What? I don't need Kyle to walk me to the curb ,” she protested.
“Mia,” her mother said repressively, making Maps groan and concede.
Jon looked at Damian out of the corner of his eye.
He was scowling at his phone and tapping out a message.
Jon's parents always knew when he was in trouble at school. They always had something to say, even if it was Mom trying not to laugh as Dad sternly lectured him on proper behavior.
At least that's how it used to be.
Maps threw open the door and practically skipped down the painted wood of the porch steps, jerking to a stop as she caught sight of Todd. Her brother hurried down the steps behind her with a huff.
“Maps,” he complained, “wait a second.”
Then he, too, caught a glimpse of Todd.
His heart started fluttering faster in his chest and Jon's nose twitched, catching the faint scent of sweat building.
He stepped closer to his sister, back straight and a frown pulling at his lips.
Damian stepped out of the car, swinging the door open and leaving in a smooth movement.
“Hurry up, Mizoguchi,” he drawled, “we don't have all day.”
Maps visibly relaxed and strode over, her brother a stiff shadow behind her.
“Hey Damian,” she greeted with a grin, “who's big, tall, and menacing?”
Damian tilted his chin to Todd, who waved his cigarette in greeting.
“My brother, he will be driving us today.”
“ ‘Sup,” he grunted with a smirk, tucking his phone away.
Jon leaned out of the door, hovering slightly when he missed the seat and almost fell over. An unnoticeable slip, but he could feel Damian's gaze on him.
“Hey Maps!”
This would be the first time they met in person, outside of pictures and the shape of pixels on a screen.
“Jon!”
She leapt forward and gathered him in a hug.
“Ohmygosh, it's so cool to meet you in person, finally,” she babbled.
Jon couldn't help grinning and hugging her back, gently.
“Second hand smoke is bad for kids,” Kyle said, tone stiff and barely trembling.
Jon listened with half an ear as Damian scoffed at Maps' enthusiasm, smirking when she turned to playfully mock him for his scowling demeanor.
Todd's eyes locked on the younger man for a breathless second, before he smiled charmingly and pinched the end of his smoke, smothering it.
“You're right, my bad,” he conceded easily, tucking it back into the pack hidden in his jacket pocket.
Kyle's shoulders relaxed slightly and his heart slowed by an increment.
“--leftover cookies,” Maps said, reaching into the pocket of her skirt and pulling out a plastic wrapped stack of sesame cookies.
Jon leaned forward eagerly as she unwrapped them, distracted from Todd and Kyle.
“Children's Day!” he realized as he smelled the familiar treat, making Maps blink at him.
His father had taken him to Japan during Golden Week, once. It was back when he was very small and had to stay clutched in the warmth of his dad's embrace for the trip. They'd gotten packs of mochi, cookies, and sandwiches from a corner store and wandered a large, streamer bedecked square.
“Golden Week was months ago, Kent.”
“Yeah,” she said, “but Chichi always makes enough snacks for weeks after, he always forgets to take down the flags too.”
Jon tilted his head.
“ Chichi?”
A faint flush rose is Maps’ cheeks.
“It's, um, the Japanese word for Dad.”
Damian nodded.
“Of course, shortening of the more proper Chichihue .”
Maps rolled her eyes slightly.
“I'm not going to call my dad that , unless we're at a ball or, like a formal party or whatever.”
Jon grinned.
“Damian wouldn't call his dad anything other than ‘Father’, even if you put thumbtacks to his fingers.”
Damian scoffed.
“Under such pitiful coercion? Of course not--I afford my Father appropriate respect.”
Maps made a face and heightened her voice into a near squeak.
“ Appropriate respect,” she mocked, making Jon laugh and Damian flush.
“I do not sound like that ,” Damian protested, flushing deeper as his voice cracked on the last word and sending Maps and Jon into fits of giggles.
“--keep an eye on them,” Todd promised gruffly, releasing the grip of his handshake with Kyle and nodding as the teenager turned to return to the house.
The door clicked as he slid into the driver's seat.
“Buckle up you little gremlins.”
Maps ignored the order and leaned into the front seat, hand slipping and clutching onto the shoulder of Todd's jacket.
He didn't twitch as he pulled away from the curb.
She shivered slightly before asking, “Do you call your dad, ‘Dad’?”
Todd's finger began tapping on the steering wheel.
“Nope,” he said, casually, “Bruce is Bruce, called my first dad ‘Pops’ or ‘Papi’, though.”
Maps sent Damian a smug, teasing look as if to say “See?”.
Damian scoffed.
“That doesn't signify,” he protested, that odd British twist to his words thickening slightly, “Todd was raised in--,” he paused and pursed his lips, biting off his words, “--a much less formal environment.”
Todd sent him an amused look in the rearview mirror.
“Missed opportunity,” he said, grinning, “if you called him Baba or Die he'd fold like a house of cards.”
Jon giggled.
“Really?”
Then again, when he wanted to wheedle and get something out of Mom and Dad, he always pulled the ‘Mommy’ and ‘Daddy’ from the childhood vault. He's much too old to use those names now, it was just embarrassing , but it always made Mom and Dad a little softer, even now.
Damian glowered.
“I would never use such inappropriate terms,” he denied, cheeks flushing, “and such a thing would never work.”
Todd raised a brow.
“Yeah, it would,” he grinned, “I once ruined one of his and Selina's dates, got grounded for a month, but he folded and took me to the opera the moment I said ‘Dad, please?’.”
The glitter of reminiscence made his eyes brighten under the shade of his cap, his expression softening in the rearview mirror.
Then the corners of his lips pulled down slightly, erasing the expression.
“Take a right here, head for Lothlen street--I don't believe that.”
Maps sat back in her seat when Todd growled “Seatbelt,” at her.
The metal clasp clicked as she commented.
“It would totally work,” she looked at Damian with a grin, “you gotta put on the big eyes and pull out the “pretty please, Okaa ?’,” she clasped her hands and blinked limpidly at Damian and Jon.
An amused little huff escaped Damian and Jon laughed.
“You never called Talia, Ommi or Mama ?”
Damian cleared his throat.
“Only when I was a child,” he said, chin tilting up, “I refer to Mother as I should, now.”
Jon reached over and nudged his friend lightly in the shoulder.
“C'mon Dami, calling your parents ‘Dad’ and ‘Mom’ isn't hard.”
“Take the highway and exit for Barbrook when it comes up--I don't do it because it is inappropriate, I am completely capable of using those terms.”
Todd grinned mockingly as they picked up speed, merging into the winnowing traffic of the highway. Above them, on rails supported by sharp, gothic architecture, a train screeched by.
“Really? Let's practice--ring up Bruce and call him Baba .”
Damian's eyes widened.
“No!” he snapped immediately.
Maps giggled.
“Aw, I'm sure your dad won't mind.”
Todd nodded along with mock sympathy.
“Let's start small,” he suggested slyly, “to get that stick out of your ass,” Damian made an offended sound, “you can call me Jay- gege .”
Damian's eyes widened and his face went red .
“ I will not!”
“ Gege ?” Maps asked.
“Yes?” Jay answered innocently as Damian swiped his fingers at Maps’ shoulder, barely touching her shirt.
“Don't call him that--you sound like a baby!”
“What's it mean?” Jon interrupted as Maps retaliated, throwing cookie crumbs onto Damian’s pressed, clean shirt, making him hiss like an enraged teakettle.
“Big brother,” Jay answered, looking amused by Maps and Damian's squabble. Jon carefully leaned with the weight when Damian pushed Maps into him and her bulging bag pressed him into the door. He didn't want to crush anything important so he carefully didn't let himself put too much weight or force on the panel.
Damian untangled Maps’ fingers from his tie with a huff.
“It is a childish way to refer to someone, if I were to call you anything it would be… Er-ge ,” he muttered in the last part, like he was embarrassed.
Jay made a mocking, fond sound.
“ Didi ,” he cooed, making Damian go red again and kick viciously at the back of his seat.
“Shut up!”
Maps laughed.
“So, kinda like nii-san ?”
Jay made a sound of confirmation.
“It's similar.”
The man turned onto the exit ramp and the buildings around them changed. In contrast to the shining, dark metal and glittering chrome of the city around Maps’ neighborhood, the buildings around them were made of aged brick, with cruel iron struts drilled into eaves.
Dead neon hung listlessly from calm store fronts, people bustling about with cloth and plastic bags.
Occasionally, a newer building stood out among the tenements, brickwork not yet dyed black with Gotham pollution. They matched the pointed, gargoyle-laden architecture of their fellows, dark metal less corroded.
Maps grinned.
“I can call you gege too, right? Since Damian won't,” she said, smirking at Damian's exasperated look.
Jay huffed out an amused sound.
“Sure, kid.”
Jon leaned forward, grinning.
“Me too, me too, Jay- gege ,” he couldn't help his low laugh as Damian twitched.
Damian threw up his hands.
“Why am I friends with you both?” he moaned.
Jon's chest lit with a sparkler of joy, Damian wouldn't even admit to being acquaintances when they first met.
“Because we're badass,” Maps said, holding up a palm. Jon high-fived her with a smirk.
“Heck yeah.”
Jay grinned at them both, lop-sided and showing a twisted front canine.
“Sit down, kids, we're almost there.”
Damian jolted slightly.
“Ah, yes, take the left two blocks down, it's the church house on the right.”
Jay hummed.
“Jerry's Home?”
Damian eyed the back of the driver's seat.
“Saint Jerome's Home, yes.”
They parked smoothly on the street in front of a church. Jon stared up at it and its spires, so different from the square, stout buildings in Smallville.
Much less colorful than the beautiful Buddhist Temple of 5th Avenue in Metropolis, though.
He wondered if it was still there, he spent most of his time on the farm with Meemaw and Peepaw these days.
“It will only be a moment,” Damian announced after tapping at his phone, texting Colin.
Jay hummed in acknowledgment and stepped out of the car again, lighting his unfinished cigarette. He leaned on the hood, crossing his ankles and flipping open his phone again.
Maps stared after him for a moment before nudging Damian with her elbow and whispering.
“Who's he?” she asked, conspiratorially, “he's too tall to be Nightwing, I think--I thought your Dad was Batman.”
Jon leaned in, also curious.
“He's not Batman ,” Damian hissed back, offended, “and that's irrelevant.”
Maps eyes glittered with curiosity.
“You might as well tell me, or I'll have to figure it out on my own.”
“Yeah,” Jon agreed, “c’mon, it's not a big deal.”
Damian huffed and leaned into their little circle, “He’s the Red Hood.”
Jon blinked, not recognizing the name, while Maps gasped.
“ No freaking way , isn't the newest one, like, a huge drug lord--wow, no wonder he’s got the big, dark and scary thing going on,” despite her whispered words, Maps sounded delighted .
“Have some class, Mizoguchi,” Damian sighed, “he--well, he operates as cleanly as he can, with civilians in mind.”
His brow was furrowed and he frowned slightly as he said it.
Jon’s eyes felt like they'd pop out of his skull.
“ Drug lord ? Like--like a mobster or something?”
Damian gave him a dry look.
“No, like a drug lord--mobsters have a different connotation.”
Jon felt a flush rise in his cheeks but he sat back.
“Batman just lets him do all that?”
Damian shrugged jerkily.
“There are more serious crimes with many more victims he needs to keep in mind--we know what Todd is capable of and who he is willing to hurt.”
Jon frowned and sat back. It seemed weird and kind of wrong to him, but Batman was a hero and Dad trusted him.
“Okay.”
Jon startled at the sound of knuckles on glass, turning to look into a pair of warm, brown eyes. He finally noticed the new pair of heartbeats as Damian reached across the seats and popped the lock on the door, letting Colin pull it open.
Jon shuffled along the seat as Colin squeezed in, tapping knuckles with Damian with a smirk and quietly saying “Hi,” to Jon and Maps. She immediately started interrogating him on his build for their prospective D&D campaign. He'd apparently been radio silent this past week.
A nun was talking to Jay.
“--Jason, the new children are adjusting well,” she was saying, wrinkled hands clasped together as Jason hurriedly pinched his cigarette out and tucked it away.
“That's good to hear Hermana Sofia.”
The woman made a sound in her throat, interrogative.
“Is your…benefactor interested in Colin?” she asked plainly, after a moment, tone slightly stiff.
Jason's head tilted slightly as he removed his hat, tapping it against his hip, once, twice.
“No Hermana , I'm the driver for them today, as a favor, should I be worried about him?”
Her lips pressed thin and her gaze wandered up and down the street.
“The Bat is the one who brought him to us--his circumstances are unfortunate and he is…stronger than most would expect from a child, due to Venom experiments, I fear that word has spread that he is here.”
Jason's eyes narrowed and the nun's gaze turned to a dark van, parked farther up the street.
Jon peered inside and spotted men, with guns .
He sucked in an alarmed breath as Jason's head tilted slightly, looking at the car from his peripherals.
“I see,” then he smiled at the Sister, “I'll make sure it's taken care of Hermana --by the time the week is out.”
The woman's eyes closed in relief.
“Thank you, Jason, Dios te bendiga .”
“Gracias Hermana Sofia, igual para usted.”
“Guys,” he hissed, shaking Maps from her interrogation, “there's some criminals with guns at the end of the street.”
Both Damian and Colin turned to him with looks that said they didn't understand his alarm, while Maps’ eyes widened.
“Where?”
“In the van, with the black doors.”
Maps immediately tried to look out the window, crawling over Damian.
“Wait,” Colin whispered, “don't let them see you!”
Maps froze, making Damian groan in annoyance and jitter his legs, nearly making her lose her balance and fall into the footwell.
“What are you all doing?” Jason asked as he slid into his seat.
“The guys in the van at the end of the street have guns, Jay- gege ,” Jon blurted, ignoring Colin's puzzled “Ge-what?”
“So does most of Gotham,” he drawled as he shifted the car to drive.
“But these guys are after Colin .”
Damian jerked in his seat.
“ What ?”
“The nun lady said so.”
Jason eyed him in the mirror, putting his hat on as they passed the van with the men.
Everyone in the back seat turned as the van rumbled to life.
“Oh my god,” Maps said and Colin made a nervous sound, eyes flicking to the rest of them.
“I'm sorry.”
“Don't be,” Damian said viciously, “they should know better than to pursue us.”
Jason made a contemplative sound.
“Strap in,” he said casually and flicked a switch on the dashboard.
There was a click and hiss, the shoulders of the backseat peeling up and expelling more seatbelts.
The same happened in the front.
Jon blinked at them and Maps yelped when Damian practically lunged across the seats and started crisscrossing and clicking them into the straps.
“No,” he snapped at Colin, “across your chest.”
Soon they were all strapped in and rolling up the ramp to the highway.
“How many guns?”
“Huh?”
“How many guns do the guys in the van have? What kind? Big two-handed ones or pistols?”
Jon turned and craned his neck, ignoring the glimpses of people in the cars around them as he squinted at the black van two lanes away.
“Um, both, I think?”
Jason smoothly merged into a different lane as the car in front of them slowed.
“You think or you know ?”
Jon breathed deeply, nose tingling with the smell of leather, sweat and the asphalt and smog outside their vehicle.
“I know.”
Jason grunted and turned their car towards an exit ramp, the van behind them merging to follow.
“How many men?”
“Five,” Jon answered promptly, “I could--,” his gaze flickered to Maps and Colin. He hadn't told them about his powers. All of them knew about Damian, but Jon hadn't even known about the ‘Venom’ experiments the Sister talked about. He'd thought Colin was normal, like Maps. He straightened his spine, “--I could fly out there and take the van somewhere else, Dad taught me how to quick-change last month.”
Damian reached over and gripped his shoulder like he was afraid Jon would take off right there.
“No dice Mini-S,” Jason drawled, picking up speed, “the moment even one person gets out their phone camera and starts talking about Superboy in Gotham your dad will fall on us like a pile of bricks--or worse, he'll call Batman.”
“You're Superboy ,” Maps cried, “wait, aren't you supposed to be a teenager or something?”
Jon sighed.
“That's Kon my…older brother, I'm the second, better Superboy.”
Colin snorted quietly, amused.
The buildings around them were changing, changing from residential and shopping facades into squat, wide buildings. Warehouses filled with various pallets and storage.
They were the only cars on the road.
The van behind them started to pick up speed, trying to overtake them.
“Don't hurl,” Jason warned cheerfully, with a wide, malicious grin.
“Wha--,” Maps’ question cut off with a yelp as Jon barely kept himself from slamming back through the seat and breaking into the trunk of the car.
His fingers punctured the leather of the cushions as he overcorrected, barely breathing from the close call as Colin and Maps screamed with terrified glee.
The little red hand of the speedometer was ticking against the end of its measure as they sped down the street, leaving the van in the dust with a roar of deafening power from the car's engine.
The crack-pop of gunfire rattled in Jon's ear and the straps across his chest creaked threateningly when his shoulders rose to his ears.
Jason hadn’t strapped himself in and was reaching under the glove compartment in the passenger seat.
Reaching for a gun.
“Don’t you bloody dare,” Damian roared over the sound of the engine, “I will not let you--,”
Jason groaned and settled himself more firmly in his seat, whipping the car into a drift around a sharp bend of road and into a narrow alley street between the warehouses.
“Oh, fuck off,” he snapped, but didn’t reach for the gun again.
Jon was too busy trying to keep himself from slamming into Colin to hear whatever he muttered to himself next.
He was suddenly grateful for all the fall lessons Kara and Dad had put him through when he was younger. Lobbing him across rooms in the Fortress and teaching him how to hit the ground without tearing it into rubble or bending solid metal like tin foil.
He wasn’t as strong as Dad or Kara yet, but if he let himself bang into something without catching himself, he could cause enormous damage. Not because he was too heavy, Kara had explained, but because of the instinctive reaction they had to hitting a surface. The reflexive tensing of muscles imbued with Kryptonian strength on contact were liable to tear or crush whatever they impact.
Luckily, Kryptonians had more muscular control than most humans, so they can train themselves out of the reflex.
Jason pushed the car through multiple hairpin turns and raced through narrow streets, losing the van quickly before calmly slowing and exiting the warehouse district, down a side street.
They merged into traffic without a hitch.
Colin took a deep breath.
“Holy crap.”
Jason grinned in the mirror.
“You all alive back there?”
Damian scoffed.
“Please, it was barely a car chase,” he said, while Maps burst out, “that was so cool!”
Jon smiled tensely, but couldn't find his words.
“I’m sorry,” Colin repeated, his excited flush draining from his face, “they were after me--the Sister’s--,”
“--do not apologize,” Damian snapped, tone harsh.
“Hey,” Jon interrupted, “don’t talk like that when he’s trying to say sorry.”
Damian scowled at the scold, lips parting to reply.
“He’s right kid,” Jason said over their burgeoning argument, “it's not your fault those asswipes decided to follow after you--they made their own choices.”
Colin ducked his head with a frown.
“Why were those guys chasing us anyway?”’
Colin’s hands clasped together and his gaze flitted nervously to Maps before settling on Jon.
He smiled at his friend and took off his glasses.
Colin’s lips tilted up slightly.
“I had a run-in with Scarecrow, a while back” he swallowed convulsively, “he put some kind of experimental drug in me that makes it so I’m super strong, I--I get tall too, and big when I need to.”
Maps blinked at him and absorbed that information before offering a bright look.
“That’s so freaking cool,” she breathed, making Colin’s nervous smile transform into a grin.
Colin looked out the window.
“I guess someone found out about it and where I am and decided to--to kill me?”
Jason made a sound of denial and Damian sent him a sharp look.
“Kid as young as you?” the man said darkly, “They probably planned to nab you and train you up as an enforcer of something--don’t worry about it, I’ll take care of it.”
Jon’s stomach tightened uncomfortably at the thought. He was suddenly reminded of his Dad, of Kara, how they always made sure he was in hearing or sight when he was out as Superboy. How they always warned him to never, ever reveal his identity.
“Father was the one who found Colin his placement--so we can handle the matter, do not interfere.”
It felt like all of the warmth sucked out of the car in a single moment as glowing eyes glared in the rearview mirror.
Damian stiffened and his usual, regular heartbeat jumped as Maps shivered.
“Jerry’s Home is in Red Hood territory,” Jason said in a mild, reasonable sounding tone, “those guys were targeting a kid, and there are consequences for that.”
Damian’s brow was furrowed and Jon felt his own eyes narrowing slightly, something in his gut telling him to watch the man in the front seat for sudden movement.
“Your agreement is still in effect,” Damian replied, tone much more rough than his older brother’s, “you will not interfere with this.”
A heavy silence suffused the car.
Then Jason sighed.
“I can handle it without breaking the deal,” he said, tone exasperated, “nothing actually happened --I’ll just make them shit their pants and make sure Jerry’s has someone keeping an eye out.”
Damian’s heartbeat calmed and the car warmed again.
“Father and I can accomplish the same--without your involvement.”
Jason rolled his eyes.
“That’ll last all of a month before they see some JLA feature on the news and decide to move while the Big Bad Bat is out of town.”
Damian crossed his arms, about to reply before Colin said,
“Um, I think I want Red Hood to handle it.”
Damian shot his friend a betrayed look and the other boy stared back, firm.
“It’s not that I don’t trust you, but--it's just--the Sisters and the other kids, they’re not tough like me and if they get hurt…”
Damian’s lips pressed into a line, but he conceded with a nod.
“If that is what you wish.”
Maps shifted, knocking her shoulder into Jon’s.
“Now that that’s taken care of--are we going to the Magnolia Estate or not?”
Jason’s brows furrowed.
“The what?”
“The Magnolia Estate,” Jon said, smiling at Maps, “It's a big old house in, um--,”
“--the East Heights,” Colin supplied, and Maps’ head bobbed.
“It’s supposed to be haunted ,” she fluttered her fingers for emphasis, drawing out her words, “we’re going to investigate the rumors and go ghost-hunting all night.”
Jason’s gaze drifted in the rearview mirror, making eye-contact with Damian, who straightened and glared defiantly.
The corners of his lips quirked up.
“I see,” he said agreeably and took a right turn.
The rest of the car ride into the suburbs was spent with Maps poking at Jon and Colin, asking questions about their powers and writing notes on a tiny pad of paper she pulled from her bulging bag.
Jon felt oddly flattered by her fascination and a little bit proud when her face would split with a bright smile at his answers.
The car rolled to a stop in front of the decrepit gates, chained and locked with big ‘NO TRESPASSING’ signs plastered over the rusted metal.
They all spilled out of the backseat in one wave. Damian snapping at Maps for pushing him, Jon giggling as Colin drove his shoulder into his back and carefully letting his weight push against Maps’ spine as she snickered and bounced on Damian’s shoulder.
Damian was smiling, eyes narrowing slightly with the force of it.
It made something in Jon’s chest lighten, filling with air, seeing that look. He wanted to let go of gravity, like he should let the feeling carry him up into the atmosphere.
Colin yelped as Jon floated up. Maps stumbled out of the door and the other boy caught himself on the handle and stared up at Jon as he slid through the air over Maps to land next to Damian.
Jason stepped out of the car with an amused grin before turning his intense gaze to the foreboding gates of the estate.
He hummed.
“Definitely haunted.”
Damian shot his brother a narrow-eyed look.
“What?”
The man flicked his fingers towards the gate before them.
“Place ’s haunted.”
Maps grinned.
“I know, right?” she rummaged in her backpack before pulling out a notebook bursting with neon tabs, she opened it and a folded up sketch of the estate’s floor plan dropped out. Damian caught it before it hit the dirt.
“It’s one of those old colonial homes--,” her voice deepened into an ominous, wavering tone, “legend has it that it's built on an old burial ground and the former owners were killed by the vengeful spirits, angry about them building here.”
Jason made a vague sound of denial.
“It’s not a burial ground?” Jon asked.
Jason shrugged and squinted suspiciously at the looming, gothic Manor peeking over the hill beyond the gates.
“You’re planning on staying the night?”
Damian nodded sharply.
“Yes.”
Colin looked between the brothers with wide eyes and Jon followed Jason’s gaze.
Nothing showed up. Just a creaky old house with furniture covered in sheets. The basement level looked pretty big and cluttered, but other than that, he saw nothing.
“Don’t worry, gege,” Maps assured the man, “I’m a part of the Gotham Academy Detective club--I can handle a few ghosts.”
She held up an arm and patted her skinny bicep demonstratively.
Jason’s lips twitched when more papers escaped her journal. Jon helped Damian snatch them from the air, to keep the pages from getting stained on the muddy ground.
His gaze went to Jon and he nearly crumbled the papers in his hands under the sharp oddness of his focus, before that glow turned back to Damian.
He said something in a sharp, lyrical language that Jon thought was Arabic and Damian stiffened slightly before replying.
Jon’s friend cocked his hip and tilted his chin as he rolled his eyes, like he thought his brother was being annoying.
Jason grunted and sighed, before pulling up his sleeve.
The man pressed a thumb to the inside of his forearm.
His skin dimpled, then split.
Maps squeaked and Colin made an abortive gesture, Jon couldn’t stop a worried gasp from leaving his lips.
Dark blood immediately began dripping as the finger drew a line down to his wrist in a quick, economical movement. Then his hand hovered over the wound.
Jon blinked rapidly when a sword appeared in a flutter of ethereal, green flame. Pulled from the blood of the man’s arm in a swift movement.
Damian’s eyes were wide when Jason flipped the blade in an easy, familiar gesture and presented the handle to him.
He breathed something in Arabic and took the sword, giving it a few testing swings, falling into an easy stance that made him look like some kind of ninja.
“Holy crap!”
Maps’ eyes were glittering and Colin had an eager, amazed look on his face.
“You know magic,” the red-haired boy burst out.
Jason was frowning.
“For a given value,” he said, “you ever dealt with magic? Any of you?”
Maps shifted as both Jon and Colin shook their heads in the negative.
Dad was nervous around magic, he made sure that Jon was never near any sorcerers and had told him to never, ever fight something if he thought it might be fantastical. Jon didn’t really take him seriously. He could handle most anything his Dad could without a scratch. How was magic any different from lazers or bombs?
“A little bit,” Maps admitted, “I helped Batman handle some kelpies, once.”
Damian turned to her with a blink.
“You what?”
She grinned at him and mimed flipping her short hair.
“I was totally his Robin for a bit--I saved his butt.”
Jason crossed his arms, his cut already healed, leaving a rapidly drying crust of blood clinging to his arm. It smelled odd, almost like…rot? No, more like the scent of dead bones. The loamy fragrance of an animal mostly returned to nature.
It was oddly pleasant, if offputting to smell in the place of the normal metallic scent.
“Good on you, kid,” he said with a nod and a bit of a smirk at Damian’s surprised look, “First rule: don't make any promises. Second: don’t accept anything unless you’ve discussed payment first. Third: go for the center mass.”
He turned to Jon.
“If anything throws something at you; glowing, liquid--hell, a bouquet of flowers, do not let it touch you.”
They all stared up at him with wide eyes except Damian, who seemed to have become enchanted with his new sword again. He had stepped away and begun swinging it at the air.
“Um,” Maps said, “this doesn’t sound like a warning about ghosts.”
Jason eyed her with a bit of an amused smirk.
“It's not--it’s for the things that are hanging around that place,” he jerked a thumb towards the gates behind him, “you kids can handle them, but knowing is half the battle with these situations.”
They all stared at him before Maps asked.
“Can I have a sword too?”
Jason ended up giving her a knife he had strapped to the small of his back and seeing them off with a wave.
The Magnolia Estate wasn’t haunted, a sect of fae creatures had taken up residence under it. The basement didn’t actually stop at the edges of the Manor and they discovered the Underground entrance halfway through the night. Nothing could stop Maps from goading them all down the passageway, not that they needed much convincing.
Jon learned magic wasn’t something to be trifled with for a Kryptonian, even one that was half human. He took a brutal slice to the back of his calf from an enraged creature called a Redbone, at least according to Maps.
It was a terrible shock, the first time he’d ever seen himself bleed like that, ever seen his skin split.
Ever felt pain that deeply.
It was terrifying and after the adrenaline faded and they were hiding in a twisted ball of roots carved into the dirt of the Underground’s walls he’d cried like a baby.
Colin had hugged him through it, Maps and Damian both crouching awkwardly and sharing frantic looks beside them.
It’d made Jon laugh.
When they left the Magnolia estate, dirt-stained, bloody and smiling like loons, Jason was waiting at the gates with a lopsided little grin.
He dropped them off at Wayne Manor and Damian’s grandad--butler?--had greeted them with a horrified look at their dirty, ragged forms.
Jon healed before his Dad came to pick him up and Damian’s dad didn’t notice a thing, only staring at them all at the breakfast table over a cup of steaming coffee and squinting suspiciously, eyes vague and tired.
“Only the one,” Damian’s grandad had said to the man, tone amused, “he invited his friends over for the night.”
For some reason Damian’s dad looked relieved before turning back to the tablet he was reading.
Jon knew how dangerous magic could be, that's why he followed in his Dad’s slipstream when he took off after Nightwing’s call for help.
Kon-El joined them as they flew out of Gotham.
“Jon,” his dad was saying, “go wait in the Cave.”
“No,” he refused again, knowing his Dad wouldn’t take the time to try to force him, “I can help.”
Dad sent an aggrieved begging look to Kon, who twisted in the air to look at them with a mischievous little grin.
“I was younger than him when I started fighting magic beasties--I’m sure he’ll be fine Kal.”
Dad made a low sound that made Jon’s jaw ache, but didn’t grab Jon to taxi him back to the Cave.
It barely took them thirty seconds to get to Florida, riding in Superman’s slipstream.
Dad took one scan of the house before ordering Kon.
“I’ll drill through, you grab the debris and pull up the fire while I take care of the creature.”
Kon clicked his heels together in a snappy, sarcastic salute and Dad twisted. Whirling like a dervish and leaving a slightly steaming hole in the facade of the house as he arrowed down into the basement.
Jon firmed his jaw but didn’t follow.
Dad slammed into the scaled lady like a hammer, hooking an arm around her neck and yanking her back up, out of the house and into the open. Kon followed half a second later, feet tapping onto the floor and pulling up all of the debris and smoothly excising all of the burning sections of the house to pull it up after Dad as it crunched into a ball in his hand.
Jon heard Kon’s hiss of pain from the heat and knew immediately the fire must be magic.
His brother went to toss the conflagration into the ocean, speeding towards the beach.
Dad groaned and the scaled lady shook the earth as she slammed into it.
“Dad!”
His dad’s suit was ripped, showing slices over his ribs beading with red droplets.
“Stay back!” his dad roared, eyes flaring red as the creature howled, driven away by his heat vision. Jon’s heart leapt into his throat.
Dad never yelled at him like that before.
“Go help Nightwing,” Kon said, tapping Jon on the back, “me an’ Kal got this.”
Stomach roiling and hesitance making his fingers shiver, he drifted down, through the hole in the house and to the basement.
Words became clear to him as he cleared the last layer, a woman.
“--please, please, she’s right here, I just have to wake her up, please.”
Nightwing was crouched next to a woman, whose hands were tremblingly trying to stroke the hair of a ghostly girl, resting on the floor, flat like she was asleep.
She couldn’t be older than three.
The man was talking to her trying to calm her down as she kept repeating herself, hysterical.
Signal was inspecting a glowing circle in the ground and inside it was--
“ Gege?” he murmured.
He was right there, then Jon blinked and his vision wavered. It was a boy in his place, terrible burns climbing across his face, the bones of his jaw exposed to air. His skull was oblong, caved in and his legs looked like melted wax.
Jon felt his gorge rise.
Then he blinked again and it was the same boy, a white streak through his curls and a scar on his forehead. No burns, no wounds--just a boy only a little taller than Jon, wearing a uniform that looked like Robin’s.
The boy said something, but he heard nothing.
Signal cocked his head and turned.
“Superboy,” he said, flicking a look to the woman and shifting the pole grasped in his hands, “thanks for the save.”
Jon rubbed his arm.
“It's mostly my Dad and Kon,” he said, the sound of battle still in his ears as he drifted forward, he waved at the boy in the circle, who smiled crookedly and waved back, “who’s this?”
Duke shifted.
“The thing that kidnapped Jason,” he leveled a hard look at the silent boy, who sighed heavily and set his hands on his hips.
Jon turned wide eyes to the boy, who smiled sheepishly and shrugged in a ‘what can you do?’ gesture.
“ Please ,” the woman shrieked, “I just have to wake her up, please.”
“Ma’am,” Nightwing said, “Marie, we can’t let you do that, I’m sorry.”
She lunged for him, eyes full of tears and Nightwing caught her in a smooth movement, keeping her nails away from his face.
“You don’t understand,” she roared, “my daughter is right here, she can be alive again.”
Signal was distracted, frowning and looking like he wanted to intervene as Nightwing continued to try and talk the woman down.
The boy in the circle looked worried, his brow furrowed and gaze focused on the ethereal girl laying on the floor.
Jon looked and his breath hitched.
The girl was moving slightly, face wrinkling, like she was trying to wake up. Before his eyes her chest, so still before, started to move and the skin of her cheek started to part.
A slice, like someone had taken a knife and was slowly, torturously, drawing it over her skin moved down her cheek, towards her ear.
“Nightwing,” Jon called, pointing at the girl when the man turned slightly at the sound.
Outside, Kon yelled and a mighty thump rattled in Jon’s ear.
The woman sobbing in Nightwing’s arms turned as well and the girl on the floor finally made a sound. Her weightless hair was settling and a hitching, drowsy groan drifted from her throat.
More cuts were forming, some deep, some shallow and with a nausea inducing crackle, her ribs slowly began to cave in.
“Baby?” the woman asked, sounding horrified.
The air vibrated and Signal and he whipped around.
The boy in the circle was yelling, a vein in his neck throbbed as he slammed his fists into the invisible barrier of his prison.
The girl’s eyes started to open and her teeth shattered, collapsing into her mouth with a terrible crack.
Tears began dripping down the apparition’s cheeks.
“Ma’a,” she slurred, hands rising, “Ma’ a hur’s.”
The woman immediately crouched over her daughter, eyes wide as she took her hand in her own. The girl's flesh gave, like she wasn’t quite all there, but the woman still made contact.
Senselessly, the girl sobbed, calling to her mother, crying out in pain.
The boy in the circle was pointing at the floor, gesturing to Signal and Jon, miming wiping away the edges of the circle.
Nightwing was staring down at the mother and girl, looking horrified. Signal wasn’t much better, stepping forward to place a hand on the woman’s shoulder, kneeling to be next to the crying girl.
Leaving Jon and the circle.
The boy’s face was earnest as he clasped his hands in a begging gesture. He pointed to the girl and then brought his hands under his cheek to mime sleeping, then pointed to himself and then the edges of his prison.
Jon looked to the crying girl, Signal and Nightwing speaking rapidly, trying to figure something out to help.
Her cries needled at him, made his chest squeeze with every hitching complaint, the crackle of her ribs grinding together loud in his ear.
He drew his foot over the edge of the bloody circle.
It didn’t feel like anything at all, but everyone else in the room suddenly shivered and looked up.
The boy in the circle smiled at him.
“Thanks,” he said, and walked past Jon.
“No,” the woman denied, gathering up the bloody ghost of her daughter to her chest, making her whine with pain “no, you can’t take her.”
Nightwing was on his feet, his fighting sticks in hand. One rose to point at the boy.
“Back off,” he warned, electricity crackling threateningly from the prongs.
The boy gave him an exasperated look.
“Do you want to help the kid or not?”
Duke grimaced and shifted the staff into a firmer grip.
“The deal--,”
“--is intact,” the boy said drolly, impatient, “I don’t need that to help her--I just need Maria to give her here.”
The woman scrambled farther away, only to pause, trembling when her daughter shrieked with pain.
“What did you do to her?” the woman cried, “she was fine earlier.”
The boy’s face turned pitying.
“She was asleep earlier--Maria she’s not meant to be here, she’s dead and she doesn’t have a body to protect her, her memories and history shape her form and on this Side it means she’s experiencing the wounds that killed her all over again, she has no way of stopping it.”
The woman looked shocked, then horrified.
“Bu--but she said if I--If I break the staff, I’ll have her back,” she turned to Duke who shuffled slightly, lips pressed tight with conflict.
The boy stepped into the woman’s line of sight, ignoring the crackle of Nightwing’s escrima.
“You would have her whether you broke the staff or not,” he said, tone dark, “to suffer her death wounds every day while you watch, without any rest.”
The girl cried for her mother again and the woman blinked furiously, tears dripping down her cheeks.
“How do I fix it?”
The boy smiled slightly and crouched to the woman’s level, holding out his arms.
“Give her here.”
The woman gasped quietly and her arms trembled.
“You know what this is, you can fix it, and she can stay here, with me, please.”
The boy’s expression closed.
“The solution is to take her back where she belongs, Maria, she’s dead, you need to let her go.”
The woman curved over the whimpering bundle in her arms.
“ No , I finally have her again, you can’t take her from me.”
Nightwing was staring at the boy, weapon lowering.
“There has to be another way,” he said, determined.
The boy turned to him with a frown.
“There isn’t.”
“Is that what will happen to Jason?” Signal asked quietly, “He’ll come back like that?”
He gestured sharply with his empty hand to the pained girl and her sobbing mother.
The boy let out a quick, annoyed breath.
“Of course not,” he snapped, “he has a body,” he gestured to the girl, “ she does not.”
The mother looked up, hope glittering in her eyes.
“If I can get her a body--,”
“ No,” the boy snarled, “it's long rotted, unless you want her to suffer as a desiccated corpse, unable to grow past her death for the rest of your life--it's not an option.”
“What if she had another body?” Jon asked, thinking of clones, of pictures of tanks filled with fluid.
The boy in the old Robin costume turned sharply.
“Not an option, every living body develops its own anima, even if you tried to make a brainless clone, it would be like she was possessing her twin--she’d fall apart mentally--she would degenerate.”
Nightwings lips were pressed tight.
“Only if it's not their original body, right?”
The boy turned to glare at the man.
“Yes,” he snapped before turning to Maria again, expression softening, “Look, Maria, I can take away her pain, return her to a place where she can sleep peacefully, a place where she will be safe.”
The woman trembled and stroked her daughter's hair out of her face, hands smearing sticky blood over the girl's twisted features.
“She’ll be safe?”
The boy shuffled closer, holding out his arms. His features were gentle, his eyes warm with something unnameable.
“Yes, no pain, sleeping the day away and dreaming her wildest dreams.”
Slowly, painfully, the woman uncurled. She shivered violently when the boy shuffled closer, fitting his arms over hers to lift the little girl from her.
He stood as the girl cried, asking for her mother, making the woman turn away, hand rising to muffle a sob. Nightwing stepped forward to kneel with her, offering his shoulder with his eyes pinned to the boy in the old Robin uniform.
He began humming and rocking the little girl, like he was trying to soothe a baby to sleep.
His voice wasn’t beautiful, but it was pleasant as he sang, one arm supporting the girl and a gloved hand rising to show his palm to the calming girl.
Then he flipped it to show his knuckles before showing his palm again, switching to the slow beat of his lullaby.
“ La linda manita,” he sang quietly, “ que tiene el bebé,” the girl’s hitching sobs quieted and her eyes began to flutter, focused on his hand, “ qué linda, qué bella, qué preciosa es.”
He repeated the lullaby in a soft voice and before Jon’s eyes the cuts began to fade from the girl. Her shattered teeth recovered and her chest crackled as her ribcage slid into place.
In minutes, the wounded apparition was a sleeping, ethereal child, resting peacefully in the boy’s arms.
Signal’s shoulders slumped and the woman on the floor sobbed harder.
The boy looked up and leveled a blank look at the despairing woman.
“If you want--,” his eyes trailed to Nightwing, “If you’d like, you can say goodbye, one last time.”
Nightwing stiffened, face going hard and pale.
Maria stood, pushing away from the vigilante comforting her to stumble towards the boy.
He barely came up to her sternum, yet her slumped, defeated posture made him seem like an implacable piller.
The woman leaned down to plant a trembling kiss on her child’s forehead.
“Marissa,” she whispered, “I love you, baby, I love you forever and to the ends of the earth.”
The boy smiled softly, then he stepped away.
He offered Jon a wink, grin curling slightly into something crooked.
“Remember the deal,” he said, voice hard as he addressed Nightwing and Signal, “tell the boss man I look forward to seeing him.”
Then the floor opened up, gaping, and he fell backwards.