I woke, and the world was in tumult.
The Gotham skyline spread out before me like a cracked smile, veiled in the hazy orange light of late dusk. I could smell the air on my skin, ozone and the metallic bite of the omnipresent electricity, and knew—I wasn't the same. No longer. No longer that miserable meatbag who spent his life slumped over a desk, stale coffee and dead hopes. Gone. Something else coursed through my veins that wasn't quite blood. Power thrummed beneath my skin, cold and endless. And I moved in Jason Todd's body like it were my own. Because it was.
"You're quiet tonight," Batman's voice cut through the commotion, thick and raspy. I flashed a quick glance at his direction—his cape fluttering behind him, standing beside me on the rooftop. So close. He didn't have any idea.
"Just taking it all in," I managed to say, my voice perfect. Jason's voice, each rhythm, each tone. The body brought the memories. I recalled Ma Gunn. I recalled shoplifted tires. I recalled Bruce saving my life and getting a second chance. I recalled the anger too—the white-hot anger, the desperate need to prove myself. Everything. None of it was my own. It was exquisite.
"Concentrate," Batman instructed, firing his grapnel at the next building. I followed suit, gliding across on the wire with every ounce of ease we could manage. Because we could. This new body, wild and powerful and unrestricted—it knew its business. I, though, was something else now. Something boundless contained in mortal flesh.
We landed softly atop a run-down liquor store in Crime Alley, naturally, because where else will it be other then Crime Alley. My earpiece suddenly beeped. Armed robbery, two blocks from where we were standing. Masked individuals, shotguns, frightened clerk. Cliché to the nth degree, but just the kind of thing I was after.
Batman didn't waste any time—he descended to the sidewalk in seconds down the fire escape. I took the quick route down and leapt down, hitting the cement hard, knees absorbing the blow quietly. I saw them in the shop—three of them, ski masks, yelling at the guy who owned the place. One of them had already knocked over a display. Broken glass and liquor all over the place.
"Three seconds," I informed them, stepping into the foyer. They swiveled toward the door, fearful and strained.
"Back the hell off," one shouted, lifting his shotgun. I didn't move. I could hear the beating of his heart—rapid and scared. He was bluffing.
Batman burst through the front window like some silent, hellish specter, and he struck the left one and drove his elbow into the man's throat so that he crumpled like a sack of flesh. The second man turned and fled—I let him go. I liked the feeling of the chase more.
I was on him before he was out of the aisle. I grabbed his jacket, yanked him back, smashing him into the shelves hard enough to rock the bottles. He fought. He was cute about it. I caught his fist during mid-punch, twisted it, and dislocated his shoulder in a motion reminiscent of snapping a toothpick. He screamed. I didn't even blink.
"Robin!" Batman's quick, sharp voice cut through behind me.
I turned. "What?"
"You don't need to cripple him."
I let go and the man fell to the ground with a thud and a groan. Batman was busy zip-tying the last one, his expression stony. I cleaned my hands on my tunic, not quite able to get the smile off my face. Barely.
The counter clerk muttered a thank you, his voice trembling, eyes bugging. He hadn't figured out yet how close he'd come to seeing a man die. Not yet. I winked at him and he flinched.
Batman glared at me—a flicker, barely a twitch of his jaw. That was his way of saying, Cool it. I shot back my best blank stare, the same one Jason used when he was toeing over the line but couldn't help himself from kicking over some dirt on the way out. We didn't stick around. The sirens were closing in, that familiar wailing scream cutting across the alleys. Batman fired off his grapnel and swung out into the night. I followed.
We hunched on the roof of a building two times over from the action, slouched down behind the broken ledge as the cruisers screamed into view below. Red and blue flash, screeching tires. Cops swarmed out, already shouting commands no one was left to disobey. Gordon here, wasn't his kind of job. Two beat cops dragged out the wounded robbers into cuffs while some young cop tried to get a statement from the clerk, who continued to wave at the shattered glass and stammered.
"They'll write it up as a clean takedown," Batman said beside me, studying the scene like it was a game of chess.
"It's going to say we saved the day," I told them, watching the blue and red flash across his cape. "Great heroes."
His silence was approval or disapproval. With him, it was impossible to know. I didn't care, though. The city thrummed beneath my feet, alive and repugnant, and for the first time in an entire life, I sensed it—all the thrums of the world, every tremble of fear, every dumb, predictable decision. This world didn't know it yet, but I was where I was meant to be.
Batman stood up. "One last sweep, and back we go."
"Lead the way," I said to him, and we disappeared into the night again.
We witnessed a mugging down the street—a classic back-alley attack, guy in a hoodie trying to rip a bag from the hands of some older woman. Screams and footfalls. Batman swooped in like the wrath of God. I just stood there for a moment, wondering, while the guy struggled beneath Batman's bulk, thrashing like a fish on the deck. Then I helped the woman to her feet, brushing glass from her shoulder. She didn't even give me a glance—merely continued to say "thank you" like a broken record. I didn't burst her bubble. Let her think that she was rescued. I wasn't there to burst the illusion. Not tonight.
After that, Batman didn't utter a single word. Changed direction mid-grapple, and I knew—that we were heading back.
The cave greeted us with silence. Cold air. The subtle smell of metal and cave moss. The bats stirred above as we descended. I pulled the mask from my face and shook my hair loose, ahead of Batman now, my boots making a little too loud of a sound. Showmanship. I couldn't resist.
"Gear down, clean up. Tonight there's no debrief," he said behind me, heading for the computers. "We're on tomorrow, early."
"I got it," I said without turning back.
I walked to the elevator that brought me to the manor. The false grandfather clock swung open, and I stepped into the hallway. The transition in the air hit hard—the Gothic coziness, the paneled wooden rooms, the gentle aroma of polish and dust. The rooms were spotless, done so by Alfred, naturally. But I could feel the strain of it. The veneer of warmth. Even the ghosts obeyed curfew there.
My bedroom was upstairs, second door to the left. Jason's room. My room now. I entered and closed the door.
It was odd, staring at a room that was supposed to be mine but didn't quite seem to belong to me. Posters on the wall—bands I never listened to, some boxing, a punching bag in the corner as though in anticipation of a vendetta. The bed was neatly made. Desk was clean. No books. No schoolwork. I opened a drawer. Nothing but some scribbled-up notebooks containing doodles and canceled lines that could have been lyrics or half-conceived schemes for... something. I sat at the bed and stared at the ceiling.
Jason Todd did not attend school. The conventional kind. No bells ringing to mark the beginning and end of classes. No locker combinations. No high school crushes and detentions. He was a soldier. A sidekick. A weapon.
And now I was too.
I smiled, settled back into the bed and placed my arms over my head. No alarm. No morning rising. No expectations that I wasn't in the mood to meet. Night after night of shadow and blood, just the way I wanted it. Batman thought he was training a partner. I wasn't here to be trained, though.
I was here to play.
**
Morning edged its way slowly in, across the curtains, as if not wanting to get too close to me. I didn't stir at first. I just remained there, staring at the ceiling, letting the sun try to get a start. It was for nothing. The day didn't matter anymore. I wasn't made for it. Not anymore. But I sat up, stretched, and let the stiffness drain from the body. Jason's body. My body.
I showered and dressed in clean clothes, just a simple tee, black jeans, and a jacket slung over my shoulder. Bruce insisted we dress in civilian attire when we weren't patrolling. Blend in. Avoid being noticed. Which was rich, considering that I stood out looking like I'd just been plucked from the cover of a bad boy fashion magazine. I laughed every time I saw myself in a reflection. The world would be at the feet of this boy. Hell, give it a week, and half of Gotham would be crawling at my feet.
The idea lingered.
I gazed in the mirror for a little while longer, smoothing back my hair. The thought swirled in my mind like sugar in the mouth—sweet and just taboo. A harem. Yeah. Why not? I had the face, the charm, the broken history. And above all that—I had the hunger. The sort that didn't concern itself with rules. Morals. Any of it. If anybody could make it work, it would be me. Not because I was worthy. Because I'd take it.
The only hindrance that slowed me down was the age issue. Jason Todd—12. A teenager barely, if I squinted hard enough. That would lead to complications. Optics, consent, all the nice PR problems. If I was going to get the DC Baddies I knew it would mean I'd have to wait.
I walked out into the manor, fingers drumming idly along my leg. The house was silent, as it usually was. Bruce was out—being Gotham's darling orphan patron. Gala events, committee sessions, all that billionaire dressing-up. I got the day to myself.
No training drills. No patrol work. No Alfred shooting the respect side-eye at me for having bled in the hallway. I was bored.
I ended up in the library for no particular purpose. A choice, but not a deliberate one. Momentum. The atmosphere was heavy with the smell of old books and repressed disapproval. I flopped into the nearest armchair and grabbed the Rubik's Cube from the side table. Jason had tried to figure the thing out more times than he could count, as evidenced by the stickers faded to near invisibility. I spun it in my fingers, turning it randomly.
"This isn't going to amuse you for long," dry as burned toast, Alfred's voice called from the door.
I looked up, smiling hopefully. "It's not the puzzle, Alfred. It's the ambience."
He arrived bearing a silver platter of tea and something that looked suspiciously like scones. Of course. "Perhaps you could read something instead of reducing that poor cube to a nervous breakdown."
"Books don't fight back."
"Books, Master Jason, require something you seems to be allergic to."
"Patience?"
"Subtlety."
I chuckled, reclining in my chair. "You wound me."
"Not yet," replied Alfred, laying the tray gently down on the table with a soft clink, "but I daresay it's only a question of time."
I grabbed for a scone and took a bite absent-mindedly. "Let me ask you something. Hypothetically."
Alfred's eyebrows arched. "How delightfully vague. Do go on."
"If somebody owned it all—looks, charm, edge, dark history, the ability to beat someone half to death with a smile—do you think they could obtain something... grand to go with it? Something, like, like a devoted group of followers. Fanatical. Obsessive. Intimate."
He hesitated. "Are we speaking hypothetically?"
"Oh, yeah, obviously." I said too hastily. "Just bored. Soliloquizing."
Alfred looked at me for a very long time. "I believe such a person might inspire worship. Although I believe that they might be walking the fine line between fear and admiration."
"Fear's just love with better manners," I replied, reloading the die. "And fear accomplishes things."
He did not respond right away. Just adjust the tea service, poured himself a cup as if all of this was a natural morning conversation. Then: "What exactly are you planning, Master Jason?"
I smiled. "Nothing... yet."
"Good," he told me, and headed for the door. "Keep it that way, at least until dinner."
I waited until I could no longer hear his footsteps in the hallway, then looked down at the cube. I rotated it again, faster, each wrist flick became easier, more automatic. The pieces were not falling into position yet, but they were in motion. Like me. Not finished yet. But unstoppable.