Chapter Text
With the distinct sound of a window sliding in its tracks and a groan, the helmeted figure left the cold fire escape. Entering the warm apartment, his boots stepped into a rug. He frowned with displeasure. had he broken into the wrong apartment? Looking around, the layout was familiar, the same as when he was a kid: top floor, large window to the fire escape, and roof access. He was in the right place, so why did this safe house look lived in?
Closing the window behind him, he took stock of the changes the place had apparently gone through. The open living space still transformed seamlessly between living room, dining room, and kitchen. On one side down the hall was the master bedroom and on the other side a bathroom and second bedroom. Cheap utilitarian safe house furniture had been replaced by comfortable mid-range pieces. It was homey, decorated with plants, personal knick-knacks, photos, and books.
It seemed whoever Bruce had rented the place out to wasn’t home; that suited Red Hood fine. He needed some time to rest and sew up the knife wound on his side. Taking a seat on the hardwood floor–no point in bloodying someone’s nice furniture–he rested his back on the front of the couch. Yeah, a little time to rest, he thought as the room became fuzzier. Leaning his head back he closed his eyes, just for a minute … and then slipped into unconsciousness.
The sound of voices roused him; Red Hood wondered how long he had been out. He heard a woman's high laugh, quickly joined by another, younger voice. The jangling of keys prefaced the sound of the lock turning. No time to get up and back out the window, so that option was out. A wounded man sitting would be less threatening than an armed man standing. He wasn’t looking for a fight, so he stayed put.
The light for the living space turned on, and the conversation the two were having abruptly stopped.
"Shit," the woman said, taking in the vigilante on the floor, the teen next to her dropping a workout duffle on the ground.
"James," the woman ordered, "first aid kit, now." She quickly stripped off her coat and made her way to the man on the floor. She openly assessed him, noting the dark tactical pants, tan leather jacket, and dark armored shirt with a distinctive red bat-shaped symbol emblazoned across the chest. She watched his hands, noted his weapons, and waited to see if he'd draw on her. When he didn't, she knelt down next to him.
Red Hood observed the two from behind his mask. The woman's long dark hair hung in a braid with a few loose strands. The athletic shorts and tank top hinted that she had finished some sort of physical activity. The calm and assertive manner that she moved and spoke in pointed towards training in how to handle emergency situations, and despite her small frame, ropey muscles could be seen on her bare arms and legs. She seemed a little young to be former military, but currently-enlisted could be a possibility. Law enforcement crossed his mind, but after past clashes with the GCPD, Red Hood doubted a cop would be willing to help him.
"On it!" the boy, James, said. He, too, had dark hair, and surprisingly soft features, the curls hanging in front of his eyes and freckles smattering across his face. The two were obviously related. The age difference seemed too close to be mother and son; siblings would be more probable but he could also see aunt and nephew. The kid was tall, gangly, nothing but arms and legs, no more than 14 or 15, and also dressed in workout gear. He moved fluidly, as if aware of his body’s capabilities, a trait few his age possessed without training. Perhaps an athlete or a martial artist? He disappeared down the hall towards the bathroom in search of the first aid kit.
The woman crouched next to him, and he looked into her warm hazel eyes. "Hey, I don't know if you can hear me, but I hope you can. I'm Petra. I'm going to check your vitals, ok?" She gently put two fingers on the pulse point on his neck, her touch cool, quietly counting as she checked his heart rate and noted his clammy skin. She could hear his ragged breathing from behind the mask, and had it been off she would have been close enough to feel his breath.
"I'm not dead yet," Red Hood grunted.
Petra let out a relieved sigh as she continued to scan him for injuries, "Good, you're conscious ...'' Her voice trailed off as she saw his hand clutching his side, blood darkening the fabric of his shirt under his jacket.
"Got it!" James came rocketing to Petra's side, a large canvas bag in his hand that clearly wasn't your basic home first aid kit. This was a real proper med kit. Red Hood filed that information away. Currently-enlisted, medic? He mused. There wasn't any hint of branch or affiliation in the decor or knick-knacks. He found that odd; most current or former military had something repping their branch as a point of pride. Instead, the bookcase pointed to solely intellectual and athletic pursuits. A lone exception was a kitschy plaque that read “New Home, New Beginnings” and listed their name as “The Williams.”
"Glove up, then help me get this jacket off of him. He's bleeding, keep pressure on it here," Petra instructed as she opened the bag. Petra and James put on clean pairs of latex gloves, and the two gingerly removed the tan leather jacket.
"What happened?" Petra asked the man.
He shrugged with his good shoulder. "Pretty sure I got stabbed."
He let part of his attention wander around the room, and kept the rest focused on the strangers ... no, on Petra and James.
"Oh, you definitely got stabbed."
A Wayne Tech computer sat on the coffee table beside him, state-of-the-art. The brand was usually reserved for the ultra-rich (unlikely) or employees of Wayne Enterprises. Combined with the fact that they were living in a former Batman safe house made two connections to Bruce.
"I'm going to lift your shirt up to get a better look at the cut."
"If you wanted to get me out of my clothes, all you had to do was ask, '' he joked, never one to pass up an opportunity to flirt with an attractive woman. She huffed a laugh but remained focused on the wound bleeding through his shirt.
Hood was right about the kid being an athlete. A portrait of him in a soccer uniform sat on the bookcase. Also on the bookcase was a worn photo of the woman and boy, much younger, standing in front of an older dark-haired couple; that confirmed that they were siblings. The resemblance was uncanny. There were a couple of other photos that Red Hood glanced at, but couldn’t glean any further information, until he spotted a particular group photo. In it James stood between a smiling Dick Grayson and Tim Drake. A third connection between the pair and Bruce.
Interesting.
Petra carefully moved the fabric of his shirt up around his chest, exposing his abdomen and the stab wound, as well as the crisscross of silvery scars and smattering of bruises in various stages of healing, some new and some old. Shocked, she sucked in a breath, surprise quickly turning to pity ... no, not pity, understanding. Over her shoulder, James’s face grew dark, hard.
Red Hood watched the pair’s reaction with interest. He could almost feel the anger coming off of the boy in waves.
Petra also felt the shift in her brother’s demeanor, and turned to look at him. “Hey,” she whispered as she gently took hold of his wrist, “why don’t you go cool down, okay?”
"His scars, Petra," he hissed out through gritted teeth, his eyes taking in the silver lines across Red Hood's torso.
"I know. Go take a breather, I need to concentrate on doing these stitches. If you’re not back down by the time I finish them, I’ll come up and check on you. Okay?"
James nodded mechanically as his sister gave him an encouraging nudge towards the front door. He grabbed his jacket from where it rested on a kitchen chair and went out the door.
The kid’s behavior was familiar to Red Hood; he had seen it in himself too many times to count. Almost anything could be a trigger: the way the light reflected off of metal, red numbers on an alarm clock, too-loud laughter. It sent him back there, back to that place, back to those feelings. Red Hood recognized a trauma response when he saw one. It was not a reaction he expected.
“He going to be okay?”
“Someday, hopefully,” she replied with a quiet voice as she prepared the suture.
Alcohol was applied to cotton balls, which were then pressed to the bleeding cut. Red Hood hissed at the contact. Then Petra started with the suture, making quick clean stitches with a clearly-experienced hand. Her touch was soft and cool, brushing his skin as she grasped the needle and pulled it with care. Her gaze was intent, focused on the deep cut on his torso. Red Hood found it hard not to stare at her face, hard not to notice the way her lashes dusted her cheeks as she blinked, or the shape of her nose against her face, or even the bow of her lips as she bit the lower one in concentration.
"How do you know all this medic stuff?" he asked, breaking his focus and taking the opportunity to test the hypotheses he had made about the woman. "Military? Nurse? EMT?"
"No, none of that,” she replied, still focused on her task. “Training in basic field medicine."
"Oh, basic training,” he said with a sarcastic huff. “Great."
"Hey, so far it's been enough to take care of your sorry ass,” she retorted, pricking him with the needle a little sharper than necessary. “Other than the stab wound, any other pain?"
"I'm pretty sure I dislocated my arm."
"Headache, nausea, blurred vision?" she pressed. "Who's the President? What's the date?"
"No head trauma, if that's what you're worried about."
"I'm going to need your shirt out of the way, to get a look at that shoulder. Can you manage getting it up around your neck?"
Not even a mention of removing his helmet; for whatever reason, she wasn't risking exposing his identity. How much did she know about Bruce, about his family? Did she know anything at all? And how would her presence and (possible) knowledge impact him?
Still, he had to play the part of suave antihero. She could hear the smirk in his answer. "I told you, all you had to do was ask."
Once the stitches were in and bandaged, he shrugged out of his shirt, groaning at the soreness in his ribs and shoulder. Carefully her fingers probed over his swollen and bruised shoulder, then grabbed his arm deftly moved it back into place.
"Ow! A little more warning next time!" he yelled, but the relief was almost immediate. He shrugged the shoulder a couple of times to test it out.
"I'd be careful using a grapple with that arm for a while," Petra suggested, but she didn't sound convinced he would take her advice.
The sound of the door opening and closing again announced James re-entering the apartment, his skin flush after its exposure to the night air. He shrugged off his coat and set it on the same kitchen chair. His anger seemed to have cooled, but his gaze was still distant.
"I'll be just a sec." As Petra stood, she grabbed the bloodied supplies and threw them and her gloves away before taking a seat in front of her brother. Looking into his downturned face, Petra took his hands into hers.
“Hey, you’re home, you’re safe,” she spoke reassuringly, “Okay?”
"Sorry," he answered, his voice low. "I saw his scars ... and I was there, all over again. You don’t–you don't just get scars like that."
Petra gave him a soft look. “Is this a trigger we need to look out for in the future?”
He shook his head, unsure. “I don’t know.”
"Hey." Petra squeezed his hands three times, an unspoken I love you . "It's okay, these things take time. Do you want to make something? Get your mind off of it?"
“Maybe?”
She gave him a reassuring smile. "You know I would never say no to your cooking."
In truth, Petra wasn’t sure how smart it was to invite a total stranger, especially an armed stranger, to join them for a meal. But her focus wasn’t on Red Hood, it was on James and what he needed. Right now, he needed a break from his intrusive thoughts, and one of the easiest ways to do that was to get him focused on something he enjoyed. It seemed rude to kick out the vigilante in his injured state, and James desperately needed the distraction.
She raised her voice to get Red Hood’s attention. "What do you say Hood, want something to eat?"
When she turned to face him she found his spot on the floor empty.
Red Hood was gone.
With a sigh she rolled her eyes."I hate it when they do that."