multiversallogs | the lebanon won't speak my name

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the lebanon won't speak my name

Who: Barbara Gordon and Jason Todd
What: saying hello
Where: Barbara's residence in Brock Marsh
When: late morning
Notes: "hey I'm alive want to join my secret club"
Warnings: probable FEELINGS

Although he'd told Rex he'd have Barbara contact him, Jason had not even spoken with Barbara; he had no idea if Barbara would even want to talk to him, let alone have anything to do with any of his vague plans. He'd been acting on instinct, drawing on the one resource he'd been so reluctant to draw on until now. He didn't care to count the years that separated them. In many ways, he'd come to assume that her silence was more meaningful than his. He had the files Talia had given him, and Barbara had herself as Oracle. They could have both made contact at any time. But Barbara didn't know he knew. If she never contacted him, it must be deliberate.

Then again, one of the reasons he'd made his move in Gotham at the exact time he did was because of two people exiting the city: Cassandra Cain, and Barbara. Their collective absence was the only thing that had allowed him to run wild like he had — that and Bruce's unwillingness to believe the truth. What (if anything) she read into that, Jason couldn't know.

It is not right, it is not fair, for him to swing by after a long night out, to sit on her doorstep and drink coffee and think about how he kind of needs to shave. But she must know that he's like this already, even if she doesn't know he's in the city. There aren't cameras everywhere in Baedal like there were in Pseudo New York; there, she'd sent Cassandra to him so he could serve as a warning, as an example. An educational tool for the family member Barbara wanted to keep, he'd decided, and did not resent that. It had given him a chance to make his case to Cass, though in the end, it served Barbara's purposes.

He had been relatively incautious about tracking Stephanie, but he's been much more wary of surveying Barbara. There's only been a few glimpses here and there, always at a distance. He thinks he probably should have stopped at the apartment and shaved. It's a ridiculous thought. He's here because he's pretty sure she'll have finished this morning's tutoring session and may head home from there, so fuck shaving, at least he brought her some coffee. Hopefully she'll be back before it gets cold. Hopefully she'll actually talk to him. Hopefully she may even let him inside. Hope is stupid, like him; neither of them will stay down, and he can't tell whether this decision to approach her is stupidity, instinct, hope, or both.

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She's smiling again, soft and warm as she gazes at him. She still can't quite believe what she's looking at. It's even stranger than Steph, because she's had a long time to - not accept Jason's death, but learn to live with it.

"Of course. You're - you're Jason." And that's that, really. "I can be with you, when you tell him. Practice my mediating skills."

She knows it's probably a foolish hope that they reconcile, even with everything Jason isn't saying. But she's staring at a miracle, so she's all right with that.

The softer look of a moment ago recedes with this reaction, replaced by a mulish and almost grim amusement. There is, he dimly realizes, an instinct in him to fuck this up, to tell her everything he's done, because she won't be able to look at him like this after that. There's also, however, a more pragmatic cold-blooded logic at work: he needs her help. The desire to alienate her is irrational, even if it's honest, but more importantly, it will get in the way of his plans. But a little honesty about what he's done and what he's capable of will go a long way, since Stephanie and especially Tim will be able to tell her the truth. She has to hear it from him first.

"No, I'll contact him over the CiD. But I'll filter it to you too." Carefully, he leans forward a fraction more, resting his forearms against his knees with his hands loosely clasped. "He has every reason to hate me, Barbara. The first time we met for real, I was going to kill him." Jason shrugs, casually callous. "I wasn't really all together back then. He impressed me, though. So I just broke him a bit and left." He's actually forgotten the bit where he used Tim's blood to vandalize Titan's Tower; leaving it out isn't intentional. "I was still feeling kinda raw."

He says it with such detachment, it's easy to see he thinks he's changed. Yet that same dismissiveness is, in its own way, not indicative he's completely right. He doesn't intend to attack Tim again, but he could do it without feeling very guilty, if he thought it necessary.

"I've done a lot of things, killed a lot of people. You'll hear it all from Tim, I'm sure." His gaze is steady. "But I'm not running wild anymore, I promise. That's not gonna work here."

Barbara gazes at him steadily for a moment. The easy warmth has faded, but there's no cold judgement there, either.

It takes her a moment to ask, and her voice is low and quiet when she does. "Did it still happen? Ethiopia?"

"Yeah." The pause is deliberate, a moment to take his thoughts all the way back there. It's only been a few years, but it was also an entire lifetime ago. And it's worth going over, in case Barbara is from a slightly different universe. "Got benched. Went to look for my biological mom. Got in trouble."

There's that grim amusement again, like any of this is funny. But he does think it is. The sheer misguidedness, the youthful stupidity — he doesn't blame Sheila. Some dumb kid showing up out of nowhere. "I don't know what happened to bring me back, or why. My memory of that time isn't real great. Patchy memories, lost time."

And he's just not going to mention Talia. It's complicated and after everything she did for him, even though he's pretty sure she wouldn't care, he can do this for her. He'll keep her out of it, though Barbara isn't stupid and there are only so many ways for someone to get better so drastically.

Barbara just stares at him, for a moment, before she nods. "Yeah, that's - that's what happened in mine, but I - I don't know if you - " But he could have. Dear lord, he could have.

He could be her Jason, just a few years ahead. Like the others.

But that wasn't the point of the question. She takes a breath, steadies her emotions.

"Wouldn't expect you to be all together, then." A faint, wan smile. "I sure as hell wasn't."

His answering smile is that same brand of bleak amusement. "I'm probably already in Gotham. I was waiting for the right time, for you and Cassandra to leave, because either of you, and especially both of you, would've ruined my plans."

The amusement-bitterness ratio intensifies just slightly in favor of the latter. "I knew he would drive both of you away sooner or later."

And just like that he sits back, finishing his coffee.

Barbara shakes her head before sipping her own. "Wasn't his fault, really. Nothing drives me away from my city if I don't want to go. I just...couldn't, anymore."

Not after thinking it happened again. She was supposed to be powerful enough to stop it, now.

"What was your plan, exactly?"

"Same difference. You're too sensible to work with him for long. The rest of us don't have a lick of sense and that's how we stay. When even Dick leaves you know it's bad."

There is some scorn in that last statement, but ultimately, Dick's loyalty is what it is, and he's not that mad about it anymore.

"I took control of the drug trade. They were already scattered and I killed a bunch of them, killed anybody dealing to kids especially. Then I frustrated the hell out of Black Mask, fucked with Bruce's head, and beat the shit out of the Joker with a crowbar. I never got around to killing Black Mask — he was unexpectedly pretty quick on his feet — but I hear Catwoman took care of that anyway. I think she kind of had dibs there. Also, I got to kill a Nazi. Seriously, how many people my age can say that? Bruce flipped his shit, of course, but it was Captain Nazi, I did the world a service. If killing Nazis is wrong I don't want to be right."

Barbara bows her head, but it's really not enough to obscure the curve of her lips.

"Not too many people would convict you, I'm pretty sure." Krieger definitely lived up to the name. Barbara's certainly not shedding any tears.

When she looks up, her expression is thoughtful. "So Sionis is dead. That's - a weight off my shoulders, frankly. And..." Her lips twist. "I suppose Bruce saved the Joker again."

He laughs shortly, but with genuine humor, albeit certainly very black.

"Yes. Yes, he did."

And he could elaborate, or he could just lift his chin a little, and there, just barely visible, is the scar. You could say it's karma, though he's not sure (and doesn't care) if he left a scar there on Tim.

"So how is Stephanie alive?"

His persistent interest in this topic is well-shielded from reaching his voice or face, but Barbara probably understands why he's asking regardless.

She almost drops her coffee. To think of Bruce doing that - to his son - for the fucking Joker -

It makes her insides twist and tremble and dear lord when she sees that man again she might have to punch him. Doesn't matter if he hasn't actually done it yet.

And if she has anything to say about it he won't.

Jason's questions jerks her back into reality, and she considers it for a moment. "Leslie faked her death, to get her out of - well, everything. She spent a year recovering in Africa."

She shakes her head, voice softening. "It must have been a close call, though." It still shouldn't have happened.

Something in him goes shuttered again, and it's because he's actually a little disappointed, which surprises him. It's not like he had anything invested in the supposition that Stephanie had died and come back to life. Yet still, there is a tinge of strange regret, something which he dismisses entirely after a moment of it.

"I'll talk to her." He says, neutral enough that someone else might take it in a more ominous way than he intends. "You know Helena Bertinelli is here?"

It's habit to suppress shock, and that's the only reason her eyebrows don't hit the ceiling. Her eyes widen, her lips part, but only slightly.

"Huntress is - how long?"

"A while — since before you came actually — but she doesn't know you." He knows he could be less blunt, but he doesn't see the point. Barbara isn't a delicate flower.

"At all. Never even heard of Oracle, doesn't know anything else about you. We've been working together some and she'll be in on this too, most likely. So there's you, me, her, Stephanie, maybe a vigilante friend of Stephanie's, this scientist inventor guy I'd like you to talk to about some kind of alternate communication system... there'll be more, though. This is gonna be a thing."

The disappointment is like a spear in her chest, leaving her to sink - but it barely shows. A curt nod is all she gives.

"We'll have to get to know each other, then." She considers him a moment, and then, "If she's anything like my Huntress, though - she's not naturally a team player. How big are we talking? How connected are we going to be?"

He might know that they've worked together, but he doesn't know how much Barbara cares for Helena, and the humorless smile he gives her is inadvertently unsympathetic.

"Almost none of us are, and until we do learn to work together, if that ever happens, we're gonna have to stay as mostly independent, coordinated pairs. Another area I figured we could use you. If we get enough people, if we can all get along, then we can think about bigger things. There were four of us going after one Militia guy and we nearly blew it because we weren't expecting each other, or the quick response from the rest of the Militia. Also, Stephanie's friend didn't want to kill the rapist. That's not gonna happen again."

She wouldn't expect him to, really, and sympathy may only salt the wound. Simply getting on to business is generally how she deals with things.

"Makes sense as a starting point. We'll need to know what other groups are doing, too." She considers for a moment, and then, "We'll also have to find out if she's willing to work with others willing to kill at all. If so, she can go on non-lethal missions. It's a question we'll need to ask of everyone."

She's silent for a moment, almost uncertain. "I don't suppose you have a way of guaranteeing honesty?" Sometimes she really misses working with J'onn and Diana.

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the lebanon won't speak my name

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