you must've seen this coming; closed

[copsormasks]

WHO: Jason (Titans) copsormasks , Bruce Wayne (Comics) theknightshift , and eventually Bruce Wayne (The Batman) batsymbol
WHEN: In the second half of the mission, when things get weird
WHERE: Random alleyway
WHAT: Violence
NOTES\WARNINGS: Violence, descriptions of injuries, etc.


[Jason is out on his own for the first night since arriving and it feels fucking amazing. As much as he has enjoyed life as the dynamic duo again, Jason has always more of a lone wolf. Tonight, he's on his own, on his bike as he makes his way across San Francisco. He pauses when he spots the familiar jewelry store he and Bruce helped save earlier in the mission. However, as he kills the engine of his bike, he hears something. Metal on bone, screams, begging, and Jason stupidly surges around the corner and into they alley without so much as half a plan.

What he sees startles him.

It's... Bruce? The other Bruce? The other Bruce is wailing on this burglar with what looks to be a crowbar. What the actual fuck? Jason dashes forward, again without a plan. He reaches up and catches one end of the crowbar in his gloved hands, trying to pull it back to prevent another strike.]

What the fuck are you doing!

Comments

Let's get this shitshow started

[theknightshift]

[ Bruce is...unwell. The descent had been a slow fall down a sheer cliff, steady and unrelenting. No slip, no sudden drop. Just that constant pull forward, inch by inch, until the ground was gone beneath him and all that's left is the wind, shrieking in his ears - and the certainty that the crash, when it came, would be final.

The crash comes when he picks up the crowbar for the first time. When the first skull gives way underneath it. When the hot spray of blood hits him and he doesn't flinch. When the rage boiling inside him doesn't burn out, but roars higher. When no part of him comes to his senses.

Tonight, he isn't Batman. No cape. No cowl. Just all black tactical gear and a domino to keep the blood out of his eyes. Jason finds him in the thick of it, the man beneath him begging for mercy. Bruce doesn't hear it over the wet crack of the crowbar hitting bone again and again and ---

There's a pull, a drag, added weight to the crowbar that wasn't there before. He turns to look, see the intruder. It's Jason. Bruce knows it's Jason but for an erratic heartbeat - sharp and dizzying - it's Sam. Sam's hands. Sam's voice. Sam's face. Like the dream had finally slipped its leash, taken shape with him here in the alley. His chest feels tight, head swims, eyes burn. He shoves Jason back, hard, so he can get back to the work that matters. ]

I'm working. Go home.

ayooo

[copsormasks]

[The crowbar is painted with gore, grey matter, and blood and it's easy for Jason to lose his grip on it, even as he tries his best. The shove is not unexpected, but Bruce is at least one if not two weight classes above him. Jason stumbles back into a couple bins before he can get his feet back under him.]

I'm not going anywhere.

[Jason dives for the crowbar again, fingers barely wrapping around the bloodied tail.]

Get the fuck out of here! [He calls to the man on the ground and it doesn't take even a heart beat for the guy to get up and run for his life.]

[theknightshift]

[ His prey flees into the night and Bruce shifts to give chase, but the tug comes again- insistent, breaking his momentum. He turns on the boy and sees him. Jason. His kid. Someone he loves. The recognition hits like a breath of fresh air. But it doesn't last. The heat of the rage scorches it away clean and all that's left is. Nothing. The hunt. The throb of blood in his ears. The visceral need to destroy. ]

Let go. He's getting away.

[copsormasks]

[Jason barely keeps his grip as he looks from Bruce to the fleeing burglar. It's a distraction, he's focused on something other than Bruce as the burglar turns a corner and disappears from sight.

It's a mistake that Jason doesn't usually make.]

[theknightshift]

[ The burglar's footsteps fade into nothing. Bruce strains to hear them, but he's gone. Escaped. The realization strikes like a match on dry tinder - sudden, searing, unstoppable. There's some distant part of him that tries to put it out, but it burns him, scorches his insides until he thinks he might breathe out the smoke. He wrenches the crowbar free, the weight of it an anchor for his rage, and swings it at Jason's face. ]

This is your fault!

[copsormasks]

[Jason looks up at the movement, but doesn't have time to duck, he brings up his gauntlets instinctively in a boxer's guard, but in the heat of the moment has forgotten that one is broken. His damaged left gauntlet stands between him and a face full of crowbar, but his forearm cracks with the force of the swing and the shock of it sends Jason stumbling back into the bins. He clutches at his arm, his vision whites out for a moment as pain bursts through him.]

What the fuck is wrong with you!

[His voice is thick with pain as he stares up at Bruce.]

[theknightshift]

[ the crunch of bone is a satisfying sound. It cuts the rage, tempers it into purpose. It propels Bruce toward Jason, arm raised to strike him again. ]

You won’t leave me alone. So now I’m going to make you.

[copsormasks]

What? [Jason reaches for the lid of one of the bins as an emergency shield, deeply unaware of just how flimsy aluminum trash cans really are.] I just want to help.

[theknightshift]

[ The crowbar lands on the lid. The sound is wrong - ugly, clattering aluminum bending under the force of the blow. I just want to help. It should have broken the fever. Burned out the rage. But it doesn't. It only makes Bruce angrier. ]

Go. away.

[copsormasks]

[The aluminum crunches around Jason’s good arm and there’s a moment of fear that skitters up his spine but he ignores it.]

No! You told me to trust you. Just stop.

[He doesn’t wait for Bruce to stop. Instead he’s swinging out his leg to try and knockthe crowbar from Bruce’s hands.]

[theknightshift]

[ Just stop. It should be easy to do nothing. To back away. Put the crowbar down. But something dark inside of him insists Jason has to pay for the interruption. Then he could stop. Then he could finally rest.

The kick lands, but Bruce's grip on the crowbar is iron tight. He sees Jason's face - familiar, beloved - and swings for his jaw. ]

[copsormasks]

[The swing takes Jason by surprise. One moment, he’s standing back up from the kick and the next, the crowbar is cracking against the side of his head. It impacts his cheek and eye socket and downs him as his ears begin to ring with the force of a thousand bells.

He stares at the asphalt as he tries to recover, but in this moment, he’s helpless.]

[theknightshift]

[ Bone cracks under the weight of his swing and the fever burning inside of feels like a furnace now. That sickening sound plays on repeat, not as a warning, but as encouragement. This would fix things. This would let him sleep without seeing Sam's face. Close his eyes without that suffocating sense of being watched. Bruce looms over Jason, arm raised for another strike and brings it down as hard as he can, before the kid can escape. ]

hopital

[copsormasks]

[Jason doesn't wake up the entire trip to the hospital. He doesn't wake up as he's assessed, or as he's wheeled in and out of surgery to put pins in his arm, to reconstruct his broken eye socket and mend various facial fractures. There's talk of how he's lucky to be alive, how he will need extensive time to heal, but Jason misses all of that.

Instead, he stirs in the middle of the night, his mind still buzzing as he tries to figure out where he is. He turns to see a dark figure next to him and fear shoots through him. He tries to crawl away, his vision still foggy and his left arm strapped to his chest.

It takes a moment for the dark shadow to clear up and for the younger Bruce to come into view. Jason breathes out and sags back down to the bed. Pain replaces the fear as he watches Bruce.]

Bruce? [Jason's throat is dry and sticky from multiple surgeries.]

[batsymbol]

( Bruce hasn't left his side.

Aside from the moments of surgery when he wasn't allowed, he's been right there beside him, much as he had been with Alfred back in his Gotham. Like that, he's there, slumped over some in a chair, having given in to the moment of rest his body had been unable to fight off. The moment he hears his name, however, he instantly stirs from the light slumber he'd fallen into and looks over to Jason with tired but concerned blue eyes. )

Yeah. ( The word soft, he takes a second to swallow as he straightens up there in the armchair. ) I'm here.

( Like back in Gotham, given the "status" he has for himself here in this world, they're on a private floor and in a private room of the hospital. It's just them, save for when a nurse comes to check on Jason every now and then. )

[copsormasks]

[Jason lays back in bed, watching Bruce through a film of pain. He recalls pieces of what happened, but nothing after pulling his ear piece off. Frowning, Jason tries to figure out how he got here, to this bed or the hospital in general. There’s the assumption that Bruce brought him, but as Jason reaches up for his face, his fingers don’t come away with eyeblack.

No, there are bandages and stitches covering his skin and he tries to remember how they got there.]

You got the ping. [Jason breathes out slowly.] You came.

[batsymbol]

Yeah.

( Again, he swallows, gaze dropping down for a moment, brows furrowed. )

I came.

( A little too late though, but. That's for him to beat himself up over in private, not to share with Jason or anyone else for that matter. Maybe if Alfred were here, but. He's not. It's just him... trying to juggle so much he doesn't always know he's prepared to handle. )

You're safe now. At the hospital.

[copsormasks]

[Jason gives a little sigh of relief and relaxes for a moment before he remembers,] It was the other Bruce. He was beating up some guy/

[And aftet what happened earlier with the robbers and the shotgun, Jason recalled not wanting the same thing to happen. Except, it just meant he took the hits instead.]

You okay?

[batsymbol]

I dealt with him.

( It's a non-answer and yet very Bruce Wayne of him at the same time. Honestly, it's expected.

He pinches the bridge of his nose, sleep not having been kind to him in the time Jason's been out and even before, and he straightens himself up some again in the chair as he takes a breath — licks over his lips as he gives himself a second. )

They're going to keep you here for a bit... make sure you're ok.

[copsormasks]

[Jason tries to remember all of it, tries to match the hits with the pain, but he thinks he might be missing more pieces than he knows about.

Regardless, Bruce didn’t really answer his question. Jason looks down at all the wires and bandages and then back up to Bruce.]

Not what I asked. [Jason frowns, but regrets moving his face.]

[batsymbol]

( It's not but it's all he can give him because he doesn't know how to answer him. He can still see Jason's limp and broken body there on the concrete — the way he looked so lifeless there cradled against him and how fear and panic had nearly drowned him had it not been for anger taking their place so quickly. Even then, he'd had to hold back. For Damian's sake. )

I'm just glad that you're...

( Ok isn't the word and he licks over his lips as eyes fall shut for a moment — as he gives himself another second. )

...just glad that you're here.

( Alive. )

[copsormasks]

Alive? [Jason asks as he watches Bruce for a moment more before turning his gaze back down to all the wires stuck to him. He remembers the time he fell, how hurt he’d been then too.

Dick had given him some space, but eventually couldn’t allow Jason to stew. Bruce? He’s been in London, far, far away from San Francisco until the problem returned to Gotham. Until he couldn’t ignore Jason’s issues any more.

Would his Bruce have been there? Ready to fight?]

Thanks for being there. I’d probably be dead if you weren’t.

[batsymbol]

( He doesn’t want to think about that possibility because it’s an all too real one had he not arrived when he did and the thought of that… he can’t handle it. Can’t handle losing people he cares about. No Bruce ever can.

Swallowing, he looks over to Jason then — looks at how he’s holding up there on the bed and the things they’ve got on him before he drops his gaze, eyes falling shut for a moment. )

I’m sorry I wasn’t there sooner.

( That’s about as much as he’ll say regarding that. )

[copsormasks]

I thought I could take him.

[Jason admits quietly as he, too, looks away.]

Thought he’d—-

[He goes quiet, pain lancing through his face as he tries to grimace.]

He said I could trust him. Back when I was out in the woods. Thought I’d get through to him if I said the same thing.

[Obviously not, considering the full extent of his injuries.]

I didn’t hit the ping ‘til he was just about to take me out.

[batsymbol]

You sent it though. That’s what matters.

( And he’d received it and responded as quickly as he did. If he hadn’t been close by… if he hadn’t kept a tracker there in Jason’s suit as well… he doesn’t want to think what would have happened. What did is bad enough.

Licking over his lips, he looks to Jason there — hesitates to move from his chair. )

Do you need anything? I can call the nurse.