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Jason gasps as Bruce increases the pressure on his abdomen, hands lost beneath a surge of blood. It's too much too fast. He didn't account for everything. He should have stopped Jason taking the hit for him. Dick frantically urges Tim to their location.
"I know, I'm sorry, I know. Stay awake, Jason." He can still salvage this—Leslie's clinic is close enough, and she's always cared for Jason. She won't refuse. If the car would just get here—
"B, do you," Jason swallows roughly. "Do you remember—when I was—I was Robin?"
Bruce would appear implacable, but everyone in the room has learned to read him. He may as well have been slapped.
"Yes, Jay—yes. I remember." G-d knows he's tried not to; G-d knows he'd never forget.
"I was—I was a good Robin. Good—" Another bitten down cry of pain.
"Yes, Jay. You were a good—stay still, sweetheart—you were the—you were good. Amazing."
"I know, B. I was—why—why did you lie about—" He squirms and Bruce holds on.
"Jason, baby, stop moving," Bruce pleads.
"No, you said—you say I was a bad Robin I wasn't a bad Robin, B—I was—remember? You—for days you'd—I was in charge of the city—that's why, with Blackfire—took so long to find you because—two weeks was too long, but before—" They can't do this, not right now. Not when he might lose his boy again.
"Jay, Jay calm down, you need to—"
"No, you wouldn't have—not if I was a bad—and," a whine escapes Jason and he grabs weakly at Bruce's arms "You loved me, we loved each other so much and—"
"Jay," Bruce's voice cracks. "Jay, I still love you, sweetheart, please just—"
"It's like I'm the only one that—that remembers? It makes me feel—I feel crazy sometimes, but you—why did you tell everyone I was bad?" It spears Bruce clean through, like he's the one bleeding.
"Jason, I didn't—"
"It wasn't my fault, B—I didn't—just Joker's, no one else—but you didn't even—just there for a case, didn't care—just a case that lined up with—" Bruce remembers. He remembers. He remembers.
"You understand, don't you?" "Sure Bruce, nothing glamorous about hunting down a runaway."
"Looks like we're working on the same case after all."
"Jay." He feels the tears trail out from under his cowl. "I know, baby, I'm. I know, I'm sorry—"
Jason's head lolls and his eyes flutter. "You—you lied and it didn't even—just lied, just lied, just—you think I was bad I wasn't…wasn't…"
Bruce presses down harder, tries to shake him. "Jason. Jason, stay awake," He pushes the Batman voice into full effect to no avail.
Dick jumps to open Jason's eyes, patting at his cheek hard trying to rouse him.
"Little Wing, open those eyes, Jay. Open."
Jason cracks his eyes open a fraction, mumbling and still distraught. He isn't hitting Bruce, though Bruce would prefer that to the weak grasping Jason manages.
"Where—B—B, no one even knows, just you and me know and you—now no one even—just bad, just think I'm bad, doesn't even…" His head falls forward and his hands loosen. Bruce can't breathe.
"Jason! Jason—shit, he's," Dick swallows heavily, "He's out, B. Tim, where's our transport, NOW."
Bruce looks around helplessly, willing his son to not grow cold beneath his hands again.
"So are you, like, mad I didn't die again? Or mad I almost did? Too reckless?"
Bruce startles, looking up sharply to see Jason at his study door; Jason has always managed to sneak up on him.
Then he processes the words and stands so abruptly he overturns his chair.
"Jason. What—"
"You've been avoiding me. Haven't seen hide nor hair of you since I woke up, so I can only assume you're disappointed."
One of Bruce's greatest flaws is his willingness to suffer from miscommunication and assumptions rather than expose himself, rather than lay himself bare, but Jason—Jason has earned a conversation. Maybe Bruce has earned it, too.
"When you were…injured." He internally recoils at the recollection; so close. It had come so close. "Prior to transport. Do you—you spoke about… I thought my presence might cause you. Undue upset."
Jason's face flushes and his shoulders raise minutely.
"Oh." He crosses his arms. "I thought maybe I'd, uh. Imagined that." He works his jaw and looks around to avoid eye contact.
"Jason, I. I know that by choosing to follow the case rather than—" Bruce comes out from behind his desk, not moving too close to Jason but removing the obstacle between them, keeping his posture open.
Jason makes a frustrated noise.
"That wasn't—I mean. I know you'll always be Batman first, okay? I know that. I'd hoped…but I've always known that. That's why I knew I had to be Robin—" Bruce wants to argue but Jason continues quickly. "Stop, I loved it, I did, but I also knew—it's just..."
"Jaylad," and Bruce sounds wounded, he knows, because he is. He is always failing his children.
"Look that's not the point. Alright, at the core of it, you and I both seek to procure and enact justice, right?"
Bruce inclines his head slightly. Jason languidly paces the room, still favoring his left side.
"Yes, yes," Jason waves his arm grandly, "We diverge considerably in the matter of what comprises that justice. You, for example, believe in the legal system, correct?" Bruce shouldn't be endeared by the impromptu deposition. Jason would have been a wonderful lawyer—defense attorney, probably, with his inclination to rail against unfair bias and sentencing. Would have been able to be, if Bruce had managed to care for him properly.
"You know I do. I have to, Jason."
Jason chuckles, and it's tired but not mean, which Bruce recognizes as the overture it is.
When is the last time he heard Jason really laugh? Does he still laugh the same?
Does Bruce?
"Right…so, I guess I have one question." Jason spins to face him. "Where exactly is my justice, Bruce? What justice," he bites, "Did you provide for me? Was that pathetic little simulacrum of man charged with my murder? Because from where I'm standing? You lied, and perjured, and conjured a story. You stopped this so called justice system from operating in its full capacity, did you not? Weaved a story of a difficult, disobedient, troubled teen. You bit off more than you could chew."
Ice in his veins, an ice pick in his heart. He can't talk about this.
"Jay…it would have put everyone at risk, not just myself—I couldn't—" Bruce defends, weak even to his own ears.
"You couldn't…yeah. Abuse of power comes as no surprise, but Jesus, Bruce. You fucking slandered me!" Jason runs a hand through his hair and scoffs. "My favorite color isn't even green. You know that. I know you know that." Jason turns away fast when his voice cracks.
Bruce flexes his hands uselessly. It was necessary. It was. The problem, is that Jason isn't wrong.
"There was no vengeance for me. No justice, not even the paltry amount awarded within your idyllic purview. And Bruce, Camus said it well—’when the throne of God is overturned, the rebel realizes that it is now his own responsibility to create the justice, order, and unity that he sought in vain within his own condition, and in this way to justify the fall of God. Then begins the desperate effort to create, at the price of crime and murder if necessary, the dominion of man.'"
They've trod this ground before, and Bruce can't help but play his part.
"Jason, I know—I can never allow myself to become the sole arbiter of the value, or lack thereof, of human life. You've never understood—"
"Oh I've never understood?" Jason interjects, storming up to Bruce. "As though I haven't had to pull you away from the edge of murder? As though I've never stopped you?"
"Batman stop…! Stop! You'll kill him!"
"He took her from me, Robin… Every woman I love, something always takes her from me…"
And if Jason hadn't stopped him... G-d, will these disgusting ironies ever cease dogging his heels?
Bruce sets his jaw, averts his eyes, and Jason crowds closer, looking up and chasing Bruce's gaze. He smells like Bruce's soap and his lip is still split where he keeps biting at it.
"Not only did Batman fail me, Bruce—my father did. What was it you said? A father's righteous anger? For every action in this universe there is an equal and opposite reaction? Consequences." He barks an angry approximation of a laugh. "There's no escaping them, Bruce."
Bruce looks down at his son, ever in awe of his existence. Sees how his shoulders have broadened into almost a man's; how he's nearly as tall as Dick, now; his face smooth and free of the violence it suffered in his death; eyelashes, long and thick as ever, framing his same beautiful eyes.
His son, alive—the only reprieve from consequence he may have ever received.
Bruce slowly, slowly raises his hand and brushes Jason's hair back from his forehead; Jason stops breathing, eyes wide and searching. His sweet, sad boy. He won't do this again. He'll do it right this time.
"I'm so sorry, Jason." Bruce's voice is barely above a whisper. "I have failed you; unimaginably so." He brings his hand around to cup Jason's face. "I did terrible things. I twisted… It was the only way to survive, Jay." Bruce closes his eyes briefly. "Come here, let's sit." He takes Jason's hand and pulls him to the loveseat Jason favored when he was younger, lowering himself with a groan.
Jason huffs and sits next to him, thigh pressed snug against Bruce's.
"Your age catching up to you, champ?" Neither of them pull their hand away.
Bruce levels a deadpan stare.
"My back was broken, Jason."
"Sure, sure." He takes Bruce's hand within both of his, fiddling with it nervously, and Bruce squeezes Jason's thigh.
"Losing a child…is the worst thing that can happen to a parent, Jay. Losing you…is the worst thing that has ever happened to me."
Jason's breath hitches, and he stares straight ahead.
"The things I had to do to survive…they were. Abhorrent. I became unrecognizable." Bruce's eyes are unfocused, looking at their intertwined hands. "I had to justify it, I had to find a way to… If I acknowledged my blame, it would have eaten me whole." Tears break down Bruce's cheeks and he holds Jason's hands tightly.
"Bruce…"
"I couldn't face it, Jaylad. If I pretended it was down to your actions, I wouldn't have to know it was my fault. And remembering you as you were…it was…incomprehensible. I couldn't give up any part of you; you're—you were mine, Jay. My boy. But to keep you to myself…oh, Jay," he whispers, lifting his hand to brush a thumb underneath his son's eye. He shakes his head slowly, and Jason stares at him, stares and stares and stares.
"I treated your memory so poorly. I thought maybe if I could stop one child from taking up the cape, from endangering themself, maybe it would…would be something, anything..." He trails off, closing his eyes. He feels Jason shift.
"But I mattered, Bruce. I didn't make that up, you—you loved me. We loved each other. I still—I had to come back and nobody knew that, like none of it was—was—"
"No, Jason." He interrupts harshly. He turns fully, grabs Jason's shoulder, cups a hand to his neck; feels his strong pulse. "I'm. I'm ashamed, sweetheart. I'm ashamed at who I had to become to survive losing you. I owed you more. I love you. I've always loved you. Since you swung that tire iron at me. I…" What words are there, to beg for absolution when it isn't deserved?
Jason makes himself small, looking lost.
"I'm so tired, Dad. I don't know what to do.” His voice cracks on the last word and Bruce's heart breaks again, over and over again for his boy. “Nothing changed, but everything did. It's like I didn't matter at all, like I wasn't ever here—"
Bruce looks at him, insides ablaze. He shakes Jason, just a little.
“I am an arrogant, selfish man, Jason. Everything changed. Part of me died that day, with you. That doesn't. Absolve me. It is unforgivable, the things I have said about you. I shouldn't have… But I abandoned you. I…hurt you."
"Fuck," Jason exhales. He curls his hands up into Bruce's chest, crawls halfway into his lap, eyes shining.
“Jason…” Bruce doesn't know what he said wrong. He wants to fix it. He always wants to fix it, but it seems he never can.
“You said—all the stuff you were probably supposed to—a lot of what I wanted, too—and—” Jason's voice breaks. “And I still feel like this. It's not. It's not gonna go away, Dad. It's not gonna—it doesn't fix anything, does it? I wish I just stayed dead. Then I wouldn't have to know. It's gone, it's all gone. I'll never forgive you and you'll never forgive me.”
Bruce moves like his back was never broken, pulls Jason all the way onto his lap, mindful of his side; cradles Jason's face into his neck, gripping tightly enough to leave bruises. He tucks his chin over Jason's head, pressing into his curly hair, brushes his thumb over the nape of Jason's neck, holds desperately to his hip; feels the weight of his boy across his legs, leaning into him.
Jason still died, scared and alone, believing he had lost his family and his home. Bruce still lost his son. But his boy is here, alive in his arms—eyelashes blinking wet against his skin.
"Don't say that, Jason. That's not true. That's not true, sweetheart. I'm sorry Jay, I forgive you, I forgive you—you never have to forgive me. I love you, Jay. I love you." He curls Jason closer, willing himself past the abyss of loss between them. Two sinking bodies holding each other.
"I miss my dad," Jason whispers hot into his collarbone, clutching at his shirt. "I—I miss you all the time. You're so different, now. You don't even laugh the same. You don't—where's my dad?" Bruce wants to wail.
"I'm here. I'm still your dad, Jay, I am." Bruce cracks his jaw, forcing the words out. He feels the failure gnawing away inside him like bile. "I don't. Show you. Enough. You coming back to me…I will never be able to express how—how grateful I am."
"Everything—everything changed. Everything moved on. I don't—I don't fit anywhere, anymore." Bruce grips him closer, wishes he could wrap his boy up inside his skin to protect him from the world—to protect him from Bruce's own fumbling hands.
"I'm sorry, sweetheart. I'm sorry you lost your dad. But please, you fit here. You fit right here, Jay." He presses his lips to the crown of Jason's head.
"I don't—" Jason takes a shuddering breath. "I'm sorry you lost your son."
Bruce closes his eyes, throat tight, voice thick and weak.
"Me too. But I'm so lucky, Jay. I got you back; I got you back, sweetheart, and you fit right here. Please, Jay. You fit right here."
The silence stretches too long, filled with Jason's quiet crying; Bruce feels half mad.
"Okay," Jason whispers hesitantly. "Okay."
"Thank you, Jay." Bruce splays his hands, touching as much of his son, alive, as he can. He can still salvage this. "Thank you, sweetheart."