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Jason woke up to a world panted shades of red. The strange light radiated from an angry sun that sat fat and low on the horizon. From the window, Jason looked down on the Gotham streets where people shuffled along the sidewalks pointing at the sky in disbelif, edging past the rivers caused by the winter slush suddenly melting away. He knew with certainty that today the world would end.
Television news supported his theory, of course. The media networks offered running commentary, interviews from experts, questions that streamed across every available screen. The world wanted causes and effects, logic and a plan. The science guys squinted apologetically into the camera. No one had answers for anything, especially the question screaming across every channel: Where is the Justice League?
Where indeed. Jason rolled the communicator between his fingers and sighed. It was dead. He’d tried it over and over again. There wasn’t even a message on his phone.
Turning off the television, Jason headed into the kitchen. He toasted a bagel then added both cream cheese and grabbed some lox from his favorite deli that he kept stashed. After taking that first salty, creamy bite, he tossed another bagel in the toaster. It looked like he’d need the carbs.
:::
Hey, boy blunder. If something's going down, you're going to need an experienced hand watching your back. Let me know where to be. Jason thought about leaving the message but that's not the right one.
:::
Jason always understood Gotham City. The city was his own, in his blood, from the grimy corners of Park Row to the tree-lined streets of United Avenue’s countless museums. He’d walked every inch of it, bleed for it, protected it in the best way he knew how. In return, the city kept him warm at night. Gave food when he was hungry, spared a safe shadow to hole up for the night, even brought him back from the other side.
The Red Hood stepped out onto the rooftops of his city, ready to be the hero it needed.
:::
I can't get in touch with anyone at the cave. What's going on? Where are you? Iwas pretty shitty to you and you were being shitty right back, so don't shut me out like this. He sounded too desperate in his mind, too worried, too angry. Not fitting for last words.
:::
It helped that half the city was so blasé about imminent doom. But after you’d faced unquestionable destruction on an annual basis, certain death every time a jumped-up asshole decided to take over every few months, Arkham escapees and survived, well... You wouldn’t think you’re indestructible, but you would have developed faith in the fact that despite everything, you will go on. It wasn’t just determination of the human spirit. It was the cold, hard tenacity of Gotham. Like a stream of ants facing a broken path, the people climbed together and formed a new pathways when it got washed away, blown up, frozen, gassed, or visited by a sentient tree hell-bent on subjugation.
Jason witnessed some of this drive as he swung across the city. The comfort found in a stranger’s smile. A hesitant word of thanks. Doors opened, food shared. Even the light of the bat signal flickering across the bloody clouds, keeping the home fires burning.
There were idiots out of course. Jason spent the better part of three hours breaking up looting parties. He shut down a would-be shooter whose impotent rage wound free and foils an attempt on the Gotham City mint. Jason’s communicator still refused to work, and no one picked up on his intermittent calls, not even when he hangs on the message line just in case. He could pick up the city’s emergency bands though. When he dropped beside a GCPD lieutenant, she smiles at him, grim and assessing. “Red Hood! Thank god you’re here. We need you,” she said, which was rare.
“Evening, Lu,” he said, pressing his back against the barricade. “What can I do to help?”
:::
I think I had my last meal this morning. Bagels and lox. You and Alf, man, put me onto this shit. I never thanked--fuck.... I'm getting pretty maudlin out here. Are we winning? Can I look forward to pancakes in the morning?
:::
News crews circled the downtown area looking for the next bit of breaking news. Jason kept tabs on them. A crowd of people lined around block. Protesters, evangelists, cops in heavy uniforms carrying plastic shields. One wrong move and the entire thing could become an unforgiving situation.
Like the tense citizens below, Jason waited. The city feels suspended, frustrated in the red, heated haze. He’d been waiting for a long time now but communication with other heroes was dead, and he hadn’t run across any of Gotham’s own.
He narrowed his left eye. The lens focused down on a disturbance in the crowd that churned and shifted to avoid the presence of one man. The guy looked up, shoulders twitching nervously, and shrugged his coat. The move revealed a silver spray of metal glinting coldly against his skin.
Bingo. Jason slid across the roof, grapple extending, and he exploded into the air.
:::
He tried an encrypted message. The words blinked at him, unfinished despite how long much thought he’d put into them. He pressed the backspace watching each letter fall away.
I just want you to let me know what's going on. Let me know if you're okay. All of you.
Decided to erase that one too.
:::
Nightwing swooped down beside him sixteen hours into his patrol. From behind the mask, Jason cataloged the limp in his step and the way he favored one side. Dick smiled at him, wild and tired but so relieved. Even the red light illuminating the world couldn’t dim it. The urge to touch Dick was one he’s fought against for the longest time. He wanted to now though, check the burn slicing across his sternum, check the cut healing across his cheek. But he didn’t know how to bridge the gap.
“You’re a hard guy to get keep up with, Jaybird,” he said tossing a brown paper sack at him. Inside was a banana, a bottle of water, and something wrapped in aluminum foil. It smells hot, like cheese and ham, and Jason didn’t realize he was this hungry.
“I like it that way. Thanks for this.” Jason pulled off the hood and opened the water. He pointed to the sun that still hangs in sky. “What’s up with that?” he asked, wiping the sweat from his chin.
“Expediency,” said Dick. “Best the Lanterns can tell, an ancient band of marauding space Vikings have broken free of their prison. Our galaxy is a technological backwater rich with resources—”
Jason snorted. “And ripe for plunder. Right. So the sun thing is to take down Superman?”
“In part. Expand the sun and it melts down the only inhabited planet in the solar system and they could swan in without a fight.”
“And our status?”
“Better than it was an hour ago. Beta team has, well, Diana kind of owns the life of every space Viking after defeating their leader in a trial by combat.”
Jason’s mouth twitched into a faint smile. “You’re goddamn right she does.”
“Alpha team has breached their war machine. Captain Atom, Atom, and Mr. Terrific are working out how to reverse the sun-killer just in case. No casualties,” he added quietly. “But there are many who are wounded. It got pretty bad, you know?”
Jason knew. He had tried not to think, only act, but now Dick was in front of him grimacing. It can be from pain, from recent experience. It didn’t matter, he only wanted to wipe it away.
“I thought you’d be leading a squad.”
Dick shrugged. “I was. But Epsilon through Theta were called back to Earth to help keep the peace. Then I saw the reports of the Red Hood running into a burning apartment building and. I knew where I had to be.”
“Got to keep tabs on the black sheep, huh? Make sure he's not fucking up while the family's on vacation? Seeing if your city's safe?” Jason meant for there to be bitterness in his voice, a sharp bite of venom but. It didn’t seem worth it, not with Dick standing in front of him.
“To keep you safe. I know what you’re doing and it’s working.” Dick shifted closer. “I felt it.”
“Felt it?”
“Hope,” he said, pulling Jason’s hand to his chest. “Right here. Someone’s got to keep it going, and you did. Always do.”
Jason closed his eyes. “I couldn’t get you on the line. No one really, but I couldn’t reach you. For hours, Dickie. I.” Jason spread his fingers and imagined that he can feel the steady beating there. Dick was wrong. That imagined feeling, steady and true that was what keeps it going. “I just want to be enough.”
“Jason. Jason,” Dick whispered, closing the last bit of distance between them. He wrapped his strong arms around Jason and squeezed. Jason raised a shaking hand and carded his fingers through Dick's hair, rested his thumb against his skin.
“I always thought that there would be time,” he swallowed thickly. “I believed that I would have time with you. To do things right and I thought about what to say. All day—”
Dick exhaled into the hollow of his throat. The damp breath, the sigh like the ocean's spray, distant and yearning. “You're enough. Jason, you are enough. I don't need right. I just need you.”