Chapter Text
Jason felt a wave of exhaustion wash over him as Bruce's voice faded into the background.
"-son, this is the last time I am warning you. If you do not control yourself, I will be forced to-"
"Put me in Arkham, I know. Let's stop pretending that you're just looking for any excuse just to prove to yourself that you are correct about me."
Damian decided that was the correct time to voice his opinion. "Todd, Father is doing you a favour by giving you any chances at all. It would be unwise of you not to show gratitude for his leniency."
"Demon Brat, shut it. There's a saying about glass houses, and I'm pretty sure your royal ass knows about it."
Bruce immediately rose to the occasion. "You have no right to speak of Damian that way. You know that he had been brainwashed from childhood."
"Please, Bruce, we all know that's not why you're giving him a pass."
"Jason, would it kill you to admit that you were wrong?" Dick asked.
"I'm sorry, but I am not going to apologize for letting a child trafficker die to save an innocent kid instead."
"You do not get to make that call. You need to try harder and do better." Bruce stated coldly.
"Why? 'Cause you're Batman and I need to obey you?"
"Yes. You are in the field because I allow you to be. I need to be able to rely on you to obey orders."
"Ah, you want a good soldier, don't you?" He saw Bruce flinch at that but disregarded it. "Wow, your ego is wider than the fucking Pacific. How you manage to fit it into that frame is beyond me."
"Todd, you are not permitted to speak ill of Father. He was generous enough to take you in; you are obliged to show some gratitude for it." Damian interjected hotly.
"Oh, I think I paid him back for taking me in, with my life. He doesn't get to ask for more."
Bruce was not going to accept that. "You died because you disobeyed orders."
"Really, Bruce? Lying again?"
Damian appeared to be incensed by the accusation. "Why would Father lie about that? Cease this farce, Todd, and apologise already."
"I don't know, ask him. Probably because he wants to tell himself that everything is about him."
Bruce was having none of this. "Jason, this is madness. If I had known this is how you would turn out, I would never-"
The room fell silent.
"Go on, say it." Jason prompted.
More silence.
"Go on."
Jason looked to Cass, who was standing off to the side silently. He turned to look to Alfred, who was standing in the med bay, preparing his instruments for providing first aid, and remaining equally mum.
As time slipped by, nobody said a word.
Jason looked at Bruce, staring into his adoptive father's eyes for a few more seconds. He could see the longing, the love, the boundless affection.
But it was not for him.
He smiled, shook his head, and walked away towards the parking area.
Cass quickly broke through the group and strode ahead, grabbing his arm.
He wrenched it away violently and glared furiously at her.
"Don't. Touch. Me."
Her expression conveyed her shock and pain, and he wanted to assure her that it was not her fault.
He didn't.
He continued towards his bike, removing his helmet from below the seat and swinging one leg over.
He turned to the side, scanning the room until his eyes landed on Alfred once again.
He stared at the man he had once regarded as a grandfather. A kind man. A just man. A good man.
He shook his head, put on the helmet, started his bike and rode away.
And for the first time in a while, he didn't know what to do next.
As Jason left the building, Cass felt that this time, it was different.
She couldn't pinpoint exactly why, but it felt like Jason wouldn't come back this time.
She turned to Dad, who was still staring at the doorway. Her other brothers had shaken their shoulders and walked off to the med bay.
Dad turned around, to stare at the case with Jason's Robin costume. Covered in blood, torn and burned, he always looked to it whenever he argued with his son.
She knew that he knew he was in the wrong, so why did he try to force Jason to bend to his will?
She knew he loved him. She knew Jason could see it too. So why did they have to fight?
Why did Dad hurt someone he loved so much?
She had to tell him that Jason wasn't coming back. He needed to know, needed to go out there and apologise and make sure that it won't happen again.
"Dad."
"Yes, Cassandra?"
"He... will not return."
Dad looked... hurt. Stricken, she remembered, that was the word. Jason had taught it to her during a reading session a few weeks back.
She swallowed back a sob at the thought that she won't get another one.
Dick seems to have a different opinion. "No, Cass, that's not going to happen. They always argue, and Jason always comes back. They'll fix it."
But Dick had either not seen the look on her Little Brother's face, or not understood what it meant. She had seen it, and she knew that Jason had left for good.
"He is not coming back. Not this time." She had to make sure Dad understood.
He remained silent.
She turned to Grandpa, who was performing first aid on her brothers. He turned to look at his son, the one he had raised and guided for so many years, and then looked straight at her.
And she could see that he knew.
She felt rage-fear-sadness rise in her, as Jason went further and further away and nobody tried to stop him.
She had to try. She had to. She needed to let Little Brother know that Dad loved him.
She put her mask back on and walked briskly to her bike.
She would get him back.
Barbara kept an eye on Cass and another on Jason, guiding the former and attempting to stop the latter.
It wasn't working very well, but it was working.
At this rate, Cass would take at least half an hour to catch up to Jason.
She decided to bite the bullet and enter the traffic system. Jason had been obeying traffic laws so far, so there was a chance that he didn't anticipate anyone coming for him.
And wasn't that a sobering realisation, that Jason expected to be abandoned by the rest of his family in the face of Bruce's will?
As much as Barbara disapproved of Jason's methods and decision making, she couldn't deny that in this scenario, she would probably have made the same choice as him.
The somewhat more disconcerting realisation was that Bruce had probably attacked Jason merely because he was Jason. The odds of him giving the others a pass were... disturbingly high.
She changed the signal timings to put Jason on a more convoluted route to Park Row while giving Cass a shorter, more direct route.
And the effects were immediate - Cass was able to shoot down a street without hitting the brake while Jason had to loop around more than few winding alleys to get back on track.
By her estimate, they would meet up at the next set of light.
As Cass rolled up to the intersection, Jason took a turn onto the same street and stopped right there.
The two of them looked at each other, and an unspoken exchange of some sort happened between the two.
Barbara never knew how Cass and Jason managed to communicate that effectively with each other. Still, clearly the conversation (or whatever it was) had been fruitful since the pair managed to move away from the lights at a somewhat sedate pace and remained side by side as they headed towards Jason's safe house.
As the pair parked in the somewhat broken-down building that Jason had taken up residence in, Barbara wondered if this was truly the last straw if Bruce had finally crossed a line and lost his chance of ever having his son back thanks to his bone-headed insistence on reshaping Jason into the son he was still mourning.
As Jason entered the tiny studio apartment that contained his few valuable possessions, Barbara decided to activate his TV to get in on the conversation. Thanks to a chain of deplorable circumstances, the array of cameras and microphones Bruce had planted throughout the building his estranged son lived in would be of some actual use. (Sadly they were all pretty low-res, recording at just 1080p. Barbara made a mental note to tell the Bats to upgrade their city-wide recording setup to at least 4K as soon as possible. They needed to move with the times, after all.)
Cass was following close behind and shut the door as Jason moved around the house, removing a duffel bag from the wardrobe and stuffing it with some clothes and the books on the shelf.
Cass was clearly determined to get a word in.
"Little Brother... please stop. Please."
Jason, on the other hand, seemed oddly calm. There was no anger, just cold detachment.
"No."
"He loves you. You love him."
"Doesn't matter."
"He cares. I can see."
"Then tell me one thing, and please do not lie - did he mean what he said?"
Cass did not reply.
Luckily enough, Barbara was looking for an entry point into the conversation.
"Look, I know he said some things he shouldn't have, but you don't need to do this. You can work this out."
"I don't want to."
"I understand that Bruce has fucked up pretty badly, but trust me, he will apologise for what he said, and-"
"Doesn't matter. I don't want to have anything to do with any of you."
"Why can't you-"
"Because I'm done."
All three of them fell into silence, with the rustling of Jason's movements being the only audible noise.
"Little Brother-"
"Not anymore."
"Please, don't do this."
"I can't be your brother anymore. And don't bother telling me that Bruce is doing this because he can't accept me as I am now - he did the same thing before I died."
"What?" Barbara exclaimed. That was absurd, Bruce would never do that!
"He did. I don't know if asking him will do any good, since he's even lying about the reason behind my death, but hey, give it a shot. Maybe Cass will be able to overcome her overwhelming love for her new father to actually see if he's lying or not."
"Don't you dare attack-"
"A person who claimed to be my older sister and watched in silence as my father decided to drag my name and character through the mud for the umpteenth time, and came to me to try and patch things up so that he can sleep easier?"
"She didn't have-"
"A choice? Really? Because Bruce is a God, and cannot be opposed in his domain? Even when he's wrong? And I am supposed to go back to that?"
"You're being unfair."
"So was Bruce, and none of you dared speak up to him."
"Look, I get we messed up, but-"
"This will be the last time? Bruce will never repeat this? He will never hurt me again, with words or actions? He'll magically overcome his hatred of me?"
"He doesn't hate you!"
"He does. He hates me for not letting him have his mental construct of 'a good soldier' that can help him fuel his pointless crusade for control over Gotham and his ever-increasing brood of Bats."
"You're exaggerating."
"I'm not. And that's about as much justification as I can give you Barbie, for old time's sake. But I humbly request both you and your protege here to leave me alone."
Cass's expression showed her displeasure quite clearly. She hated the idea of her little brother walking away like they don't matter.
"Please. Stay. For us. We love you."
Jason's cold expression breaks down, and even though the slightly low-resolution camera footage, Barbara could see the sadness on his face clearly.
"Love isn't good enough for him to stop hurting me. And it isn't good enough for me to keep getting hurt by him."
He picked up his bag, his helmet, and his sniper rifle, and moved past Cass towards the door.
"I'm sorry. And goodbye."
After leaving Cass in what used to be his apartment, Jason strapped his bag to his bike, swung himself onto what space remained on the seat and rode off. It wasn't a golden sunset, which meant that he was not getting full points for dramatic effect, but it would be sunrise in a few hours, so he supposed he could work with that instead.
It hurt, to leave behind the best big sister he could have hoped for and a genuinely loving grandfather, but he had to.
Love was always painful like that.
He had been riding for about 90 minutes already, having left Gotham behind. He didn't exactly have a plan on where to go next - running away impulsively doesn't really give the best planning opportunities.
He decided to call the Outlaws. The would know what to do here.
However, before he could get to the speed dial embedded into his helmet, he saw... a black smudge near the horizon to his right.
Somehow, despite being black, it seemed to be... glowing? It was hard to tell.
Jason turned off the highway at the next exit, taking a somewhat less-travelled road towards what seemed to be... a deserted farm. He wondered if he was still in the boundaries of the State of New Jersey because he could find no explanation for such wastage of prime real estate.
It was barely a couple hours away from the city of Gotham, surely they could find a buyer.
He saw the black glow increase in size, but he was a bit too far away to tell if it was because he was getting closer or if the thing itself was becoming brighter. Well, he would be able to tell in a short while, so no point worrying about that.
He rode on ahead at a somewhat leisurely pace, enjoying the peacefulness of the desolate countryside.
There was a time not too long ago when he would have thought that he had been chained to Gotham. He had always felt this pull beneath his skin, tying him to the city despite the despair and hopelessness and betrayal that consumed him nearly every waking moment.
Or maybe it was caused by the despair. He couldn't tell.
The glow became even larger, and yes, he was definitely getting closer. He could also tell that there was an object suspended in the middle of the sphere of blackness (and looking at it made part of his brain kept scream at him that this was bad and he should run) and that it was pretty tiny.
It was probably dangerous, but hell, Jason's been living dangerously for his entire life. He has rarely if ever, had the comfort of safety, he could deal with a glowing orb in some deserted place in the middle of nowhere.
Jason stopped the bike once he was within a few feet of... whatever it was. He got off the bike, pulled out the stand and walked the rest of the way to it.
It seemed to be a force-field of some sort... surrounding a ring.
A black ring.
Uh-oh. This was bad.
"Jason Todd of Earth-"
"No, no, no. No. Just no."
"...Well, I can't say I didn't expect that."
"Wow, you are surprisingly cooperative. From what I've heard, rings usually don't actually understand consent that well."
"That's because this ring is not programmed to do anything, really. It merely has a direct line to me."
"And who are you?"
A projection pops up, showing something... no, someone that looked an awful lot like that Ganthet dude that Kyle had talked about. Except that the general colour scheme was more... black.
"I am Scar, the Guardian of the Black Lanterns."
"From what little I know about the shit you pulled not so long ago, I think you're the type I'm supposed to fight against."
"Black Hand and his plot are in the distant past, at least by your standards. The entity named Nekron no longer exists, and neither does the Power Battery containing the Anti-Monitor. And yet, the rings still remain. I have to believe they have a purpose."
"I don't see how I am a part of this."
"You have been left without hope, or will, or fear, or rage, or greed, or compassion, or love. Due to recent events, I believe. And yet you still have the capacity for those emotions."
Jason bristled at the thought of someone trying to psychoanalyse him from the other side of the universe, but he decided to grit his teeth and ignore it. "That sounds like a pitch against you, you know."
"There are many across the universe that have been left without the capacity for emotion. Those who have been reduced to basic survival, where the various aspects of the emotional spectrum have little part to play. Those who are, as far as the rings are concerned, dead."
Jason knew what that felt like. He had known it for far too long. Ever since the streets, he had known what it was like to be ground down to a point where survival was all that mattered. A state of mind that had come back now, under these new circumstances he found himself in.
"And yet, here you are, alive. And so are they."
"The other corps are present all across the universe. It's their job to provide all that good emotional juice to these people, right? What's one Black Lantern going to do?"
"They can look down on those robbed of the power to feel, and show sympathy and pity. Is that what you want at this point?"
"...No."
"Then there you have your reason."
"I don't see how this is supposed to work. At all. Like, on any level."
"I'm not entirely sure either. But then again, we all need reasons to live, and you don't feel enough to be able to supply one for yourself."
No, he didn't. But he'd be damned if he let some random entity tell him how to live his life.
"I need time. To discuss this."
Scar nods. "Go ahead. I will wait."
"So... how do I find you again?"
"I can have the ring follow you... or you can keep it."
Before Jason could voice his concerns, the entity continued.
"You will not need to wear it. You can carry it on your person. And when you are ready, call for me."
Well, he could work with that. He could see if this was a nefarious plot of some sort.
He really needed to call Roy already.
"Okay, this is crazy. Way too crazy."
Roy was clearly not going to be the quiet, sympathetic friend that let him voice his concerns and think through this on his own terms.
Which was probably a good idea, since the guardian - Scar - had clearly stated that he was emotionally compromised, by dint of no longer having any emotions left in the first place.
Oh well. Maybe the women in the room would be more useful. They always were.
"Kori, Artemis, what do you think?"
"I agree with Roy on this - it is crazy." Kori declared.
Well, at least Artemis would be somewhat more reasonable.
"And so do I, Little One. This is crazy."
Well, shit.
"You guys are supposed to be my friends. Support my decisions, dammit."
"Not when they are foolish, Jaybird." Roy shot back.
"Why is it stupid? I get to leave Bruce behind somewhat permanently, I see that as an absolute win."
"You're becoming a Black Lantern. That didn't go well with anyone last time."
"And besides, if it's a space trip you want, we have a ship on hand. A pretty good one, thanks to Roy's work." Kori added.
"Look, it's more than that. You know it."
Everyone fell silent at that.
"You do not need to prove your worth to us, Little One." Artemis reminded him gently.
"Of course I know that. But I need this... I need to do something else, be something else. Something that Bruce doesn't get to define."
"And that's why you're thinking of fleeing Earth and becoming a Black Lantern after getting disowned by Bruce?" Roy asked.
"It wasn't the first time he's done that. It doesn't matter to me."
"Like hell it doesn't." His tone was clipped, and Jason could sense the anger leaking through.
"Hey, let's have another chat with this Scar person. Maybe we can get more details out of them."
Roy shook his head, evidently giving up on this round of the argument.
"Roy, please, don't look at me like that."
"Yeah, I'll stop when you stop being stupid like this."
Jason removed the ring from his pocket, where it had been sitting for about half a day. He looked at Roy, then Kori, and finally at Artemis, before looking at the room where Bizarro and Lian were sleeping. The three of them looked back at him.
"Okay, so what do we do now Jaybird?" Roy asked. He was still angry.
Jason shrugged his shoulders and seemingly decided to buy into the stupidity of it all. "Scar, we would like to talk."
The ring floated out of his hand, and the projection he had seen before started up again. An alien's face - probably Scar's - was visible on it.
"Jason Todd. It is good to see you. What would you like to know?"
Roy decided to speak for him. Jason couldn't be trusted to save his own skin here. "We would like to know how the ring works and why it chose Jason."
"Unfortunately, I do not have definite answers to either question. I have theories, but they can be better explained if Jason was to put on the ring and demonstrate."
"Yeah, no can do-"
"I'll do it."
Roy's head snapped around to face Jason, but before he could warn the ex-Robin about how ridiculously reckless that was, the guy had already gone and done it.
"What the fuck, Jason? You can't just do that!"
And it seemed as though their suspicions had been validated - Jason wobbled on his feet and the ring spurted a black goo that enveloped the prospective Lantern's arm, nearly going all the way to the shoulder before receding into the ring.
Roy picked up his bow from the nearby table and notched an arrow, ready to disable Jason to the best of his ability. Near him, he saw Artemis summon Mistress to her aid, and Kori's hair became even brighter as she braced herself for combat.
Then, Jason slowly got up. He opened his eyes.
They all remained ready.
Jason looked at them, and they looked at him. His pupils, which were always switching between various shades of green and blue, were now black.
But then he cocked his head to the side, and his pupils ran through a gamut of colours too fast to follow.
"You're afraid of me."
Wait what?
Thankfully, Artemis knew what to say here.
"Not afraid of you, Little One. Afraid for you."
Roy decided to push the desire to hug and cuddle Jason to the side for now and ask the important questions.
"What do you see, Jaybird?"
"Something new." Scar quipped.
"Oh shut up, we don't need your sage wisdom here." Roy snarled. "Jason, are you alright? Answer me."
"Yeah... I am. I think."
"What do you see?" Kori asked.
"Wires. Or maybe strings? I don't know... but something, along those lines. They're coming from you to me. They're... purple and yellow and... I don't know what this colour is. It's blue, but not exactly."
"Indigo." Scar provided. "The colour of compassion."
"And red from Roy. Quite a bit of it." Jason added.
"I would hope so. I am pissed at you. You did not need to pull that stunt."
"He wanted answers, and he got them." Scar helpfully informed him. Roy wanted to punch that... woman? Man? Something else? He didn't know, and he didn't care.
"Yeah... I did." Jason said, his voice choked with wonder and awe. "There's a similar set of black lines coming from the ring to my chest."
"And that, I believe, answers one of your questions."
Roy was done with these cryptic sage types who answer every damn question with an incomprehensible riddle. He was sure that they only did it so that they could get people to ask them the question he was about to. "What the fuck does that mean?"
"I believe the ring, in the absence of any other source of power, uses the bearer to fuel it. The Black Lantern rings have always gained power from the emotional capacity of others."
"So it's sapping us?"
"No. It is using what you can provide to Jason as a source."
"So it's sapping Jason. That's not much better."
"Unlike most other rings, which use the bearer as a conduit for stamina, this one has the advantage of only taking what Jason will give."
"But you said that Jason doesn't have emotions left, so what does he have to give?"
"And there's a reason for that, isn't there, Jason?"
Jason did not reply.
While Roy was arguing with Scar, Jason looked at the other... strings. Yeah, he should call them strings. Or threads, that would work just as well. He just needed to get the point across.
One of them was purple and thicker than most of the rest. It came through one of the windows to the South-East and was angled slightly towards the sky. It also had some red mixed in, and quite a bit of indigo and standard blue as well.
No prizes for guessing who that belonged to. He reminded himself to send a text. She would be pretty mad if he didn't.
There were three other strings, comprised of varying amounts of orange and yellow and red and violet. Those guys would need some texts as well.
Another one built out of red and yellow. Nah, he's not getting a text.
A couple threads of violet and indigo, with touches of yellow. Some more similar threads, with less violet and more yellow.
And one large string of multicoloured threads - violet and indigo and blue and green and yellow and orange and red.
But the coloured parts were minuscule compared to the black rope that they were bound to.
Jason bent down and decided to touch the rope to see who it was. He had an idea already, but then, he had never been one to shy away from painful truths.
As his fingers wound around the string, he felt the life drain out of him, and a whirlwind of thoughts that were not his own.
It was too much.
He pulled his hand away, dropping the string. The maelstrom of emotions and ideas stopped, but his heart was still beating wildly.
Dimly, he could hear Roy asking him to respond, but it was hard. So hard.
Slowly, consciousness returned, and he found himself cradled in his favourite archer's arms.
"What was that?"
"...I think I get why it chose me."
"Then please, tell us. Scar over here has this bad habit of speaking in gibberish."
A short, barking laugh rang across the room, but nobody paid any attention to it.
"I'm already used to what the ring does. I've already learned how to live with it."
"Why?"
"Bruce."
"Oh."
And honestly, what else could be said about that?
Jason does have one question for Scar.
"If I do this... will I get to break away from him?"
"No. That kind of bond... seldom breaks. It is capable of lasting across universes and timelines."
"Well that sucks."
"But you can learn to live with it. Lower its power over you, and not let it rule your life."
Jason looked at the large black rope again, as it looped over itself and dwarfed pretty much everything other connection he had.
"I accept."