Archive of Our Own

"You know, it's been smashing, but I've got a thing --" Jason tosses a small smoke pellet at them and leaps off the roof.

Jason's boots ring against metal as he lands on the fire escape of the adjacent building. Waving away the smoke, Dick crouches on a turret and watches his descent.

Jason's taller than he used to be. Leaner, too, even with the bulk of body armor and leather jacket.

"He'll be back," Batman says, already turning to go.

"Go after him!" Dick yells.

The cape snaps and Batman flies away. Of course he doesn't reply.

Dick rolls his shoulders, but the tension refuses to loosen.

He would call it cat-and-mouse, but that's for Bruce and Selina. Whatever this game is, the stakes are higher than simply who gets to top tonight.

He shoots a line and sails downward, back into the thick of things.

He doesn't go back to the manor. Not just yet.

Instead, he changes into civvies on top of the old Metro Post Office and heads for the East End.

He's halfway there, transferring from the subway to the Grant Park bus when something catches his eye. Just in his peripheral vision, the fall of dark hair and tilt of broad shoulders.

"Forget it," he tells the driver and jumps off the bus. He moves quickly, dances around a clot of hookers at the end of the block, then takes off running when he recognizes Jason's profile turning the corner.

Jason runs like he doesn't have a care in the world. He doesn't look back, he doesn't speed up, he just moves.

Dick dashes up an alley, scrambles over broken pallets, jumps for the lowest rung of a fire-escape ladder. His heart thuds in counterpoint to the noise of his footfalls.

He manages to cut Jason off when Sixteenth Street narrows, but Jason just slows down and sticks his hands into his pockets.

"C'mon," Dick says. "Jason."

"Oh!" Jason feigns surprise, grinning like this is the nicest surprise he's had all week. "Hey, Dickie. 'sup?"

Dick shakes out his hands. He's had them clenched during the chase; his knuckles ache. "We need to --"

"We need to do a lot of things, sugar," Jason says. He saunters into the narrow space between two brownstones and leans against the wall. "You want to start with a good suck, or move right to bending me over and plowing me open?"

Dick's mouth opens. He tastes the city and can't think of a single thing to say.

"God, you're so fucking pretty..." Jason's tongue flickers in the corner of his mouth.

Dick watches him move, turning his head to follow. When Jason gets within arm's reach, his hand comes up, almost cups Dick's cheek.

Dick flinches away. After staring for a long moment, Jason shrugs, tips back his head, and laughs.

"What?" Dick drops into a fighting stance. Neither of them is suited up; that doesn't mean they can't do this. He steps in a half-circle, back and forth. "What?"

Jason splutters more laughter, wipes the back of his hand across his mouth, and bursts forward, swinging a left hook, kneeing the spot where Dick was half a second ago.

They scrabble, arms around each other's necks, like wrestlers at the start of a match. Their breath comes in heavy pants, sour sweat slicks their faces. But the alley is too narrow for this, the walls keep tilting over them and closing in, smacking their shoulders, bumping their hips. Jason doesn't obey any rules whatsoever. He bites wherever he can reach, knees and trips and pounds with his fists. Dick shoves him away, punching him for good measure. To keep him down a few seconds longer and give himself time to move back, reconsider and reanalyze the situation.

Jason spits blood and shows his teeth. Smeared pink, wet with more than blood. "That's all you've got?"

Dick holds his breath and strikes fast, low, right at Jason's waistband.

Jason stumbles away, bounces off a recycling bin, then gets his balance back. His hair stabs down over his eyes. He reaches under his jacket, cocks his head, and blows Dick a kiss.

"The hell are you doing?" Dick moves before he's finished talking, as soon as he sees the gun. He comes in fast and low, knocks the piece out of Jason's grip and kicks it toward the far end of the alley. He shoves Jason against the wall, arm across his throat. "No guns, Jay. We don't use --"

"Who's this 'we', white boy?" Jason smiles, looking for all the world like he's having a friendly cup of coffee, not getting pinned against a filthy wall. "Well. Honorary white boy, isn't that right?"

"No. Guns."

"...enough money, anyone pure as the driven snow," Jason continues. He looks downward and pouts. "Except me. Never could get me all the way clean, could they?"

He doesn't know what it is, maybe the spike of adrenaline from the gun's appearance, but suddenly Dick is aware, painfully aware, of every single little detail. The sweat on his arm, under his sleeve. The whistle of Jason's breathing and rise-fall of his chest. The heat coming off Jason, the creak in Dick's bum leg, the loose fall of hair over Jason's ear.

Everything sharpens, goes prominent, demands attention.

"Must be why Daddy loves you most of all," Jason says. He shifts his weight and brings his body up against Dick's from knee to shoulder. "So clean, you. So goddamn beautiful."

"He's not --." Dick presses his lips together and fights to think.

The day the adoption became final, Bruce signed the papers with a flourish. I never wanted to be a father, he said, pushing the papers away. I wanted -- I want something else for us.

Partners? Dick had asked.

Bruce's smile was a painful twist.

"He's not Daddy Dearest?" Jason puts in. "Of course not. He just plays one on TV."

Dick blinks away the memory of the lawyer's office, mahogany bookcases and Bruce's green tie. Jason presses his upper back against the wall and thrusts his hips up against Dick. Blood is clotting under his lower lip; there's a streak like ink along his jaw.

Dick could suck it off. Lick him clean.

Startled, he drops his hold and pitches back.

"And then you went and grew up," Jason says, following Dick, leaning over him, crowding him against the opposite wall. "Puberty's a bitch, ain't it?"

"Shut up," Dick mutters and knows it's nothing, knows that Jason's just going to keep laughing at him and taunting him, whispering obscene bullshit and teasing him until Dick either takes him down permanently or dies trying.

His skin hurts. His eyes are dry, his skin is tight, and everything is pinched, sharpened, right here.

"Sugar," Jason says, almost humming, his lips buzzing down the length of Dick's cheek. His hips twitch back and forth, brushing Dick's fly, as he grasps Dick's wrists and holds him here in place. "Make me."

Dick kisses him. Knocks his head forward, almost butts him, and Jason's head snaps back, his mouth falling open and sharp teeth catching the light. Dick kisses him, getting one hand free and grabbing Jason by the neck, shoving his tongue inside, sucking Jason's teeth until, laughing like the rumble of an oncoming train, Jason kisses him back.

"Fucking finally," he gasps against the side of Dick's mouth.

Dick wasn't chasing anyone. He was getting chased. He was the hunted. He gets that, now, and has half a moment to admire Jason in that half-strangled, almost shamed way he admires Batman.

They're kissing like they've never done it before. Noses bumping, teeth clicking and ringing, biting down on tongue and lip, spit smearing across their chins. Dick holds on, tight as he can, Jason plastered to him, kisses him so hard his eyes squeeze out tears. They shuffle for balance, moving together, circling, eye to eye, bumping and grasping.

Dick's hips roll when Jason's do; Jason gets a hand flat up under Dick's shirt, finds a nipple and works it until Dick thrusts hard and ragged and drops the kiss to catch his breath.

"Sweetness, you're looser than a drunk goose --" Jason kisses him more gently, working his hand over Dick's fly, tugging and twisting the fabric. Frustrated, he gives up and moves back a little. "You do it. You want it so bad, open up."

Flattery and disdain, coaxing and challenge: Jason's abrupt mood shifts are enough to keep Dick unsteady even without the confused arousal. His hand is heavy and half-numb as he works down his fly and takes himself out.

"I want -- I can't help. I –" Dick hates words.

Jason smiles at him. "Bullshit. You're a fucking superhero, of course you can help it." He moves closer. "You don't want to help it, though, do you?"

That's closer to the truth. Dick shakes his head and strokes himself.

"Good job." Jason wolf-whistles and closes the gap between them, pushing into Dick's hand. "Now do me. Do me."

When Dick succeeds, Jason kisses him, congratulations and confirmation both. Dick tries to jack them together, but there's little room and his arm's at the wrong angle and Jason seems content just to thrust and grunt, rub himself on Dick's stomach.

"C'mon," Dick says and his voice sounds alien and hoarse to his own ears. "Let's do --. Got to get this right --"

Jason tips his head back, smirking. "Is that so?"

"I --" Dick has no idea why he said any of that. His cock throbs and shudders. Finally, he manages to level his gaze on Jason and keep his voice nice and even. "Let's do this right."

"Thought you'd never ask." Jason whoops and drops to his knees, like a string got pulled. He tilts in, yawning mouth and intense stare, and takes half of Dick right there, so sudden and tight that Dick's head bumps back, then his ass, and he has to grab Jay's hair to hold his balance.

"Harder," Jason mutters around Dick's shaft, lips stretched and shining wet. He turns his head in Dick's grasp, pulls back to mouth the head of Dick's cock with soft little kisses that hurt, they're so tender. "C'mon, you know you want to give it to me."

He looks up, meets Dick's eyes, and drops forward, sucking in and down, until Dick hits his soft palate, and then he grunts and starts to swallowing, and Dick gets it. The chase is the rhythm, hard and fast, angry and awkward, so he fucks forward, fist twisting in Jason's silky-damp hair, and thrusts and pants through his teeth until he's almost had enough. Until he's not thinking of anything else, just a little teeth and a lot of spit and a tight, tight suck that's pulling the orgasm from every farflung nerve in his body.

Laughing, Jason pulls away, wipes his mouth, and jacks himself a couple times.

"Fuck," Dick says and his hips snap involuntarily. His cock bobs, aching and slick. "Jesus, Jay, come on --"

"Inside," Jason says and, holding his pants up with one hand, he skips down the alley, around the corner of the building, and disappears through a door under the brownstone's steps.

Dick should stop and think. He should finish himself off, clear his head, and go home.

He follows Jason, ducks into the doorway (the buzzer label reads JP Sweeney) and down a short hall into a basement apartment. The windows across the room are at shoulder-height, revealing the sidewalk. There's a futon on the floor, tattered posters for Scarface and Tupac Shakur on the walls, take-out cartons scattered everywhere.

Jason tackles him from the left, kicks shut the door and Dick goes with the fall, lets himself get tossed onto the futon.

"What the hell was that?" Dick asks. His balls ache.

"Got bored," Jason says and grins.

Jason's kissing him again, hungry all over again, sucking Dick's throat and wrapping a calloused palm around his cock, nearly undulating over him as he tugs Dick's pants down to his knees and shoves his shirt up.

"Turn over," Jason says, voice like thunder in Dick's ear.

"No," Dick says, and pushes forward, wrestling Jason back until he's on top, until he's got Jason's wrists pinned just over his head and their cocks are pushing at each other. He takes a breath and lets it out good and slow. "Talk to me."

Jason cracks up. "Talk? What are you, a fucking lesbian now?"

He's a goodlooking kid. He always was, and now that he's older now, less thick, brighter-eyed, Dick can't help but enjoy the sight as Jay squirms under him.

"I just want to know --"

"I understand. You want to ask." Jason nods and looks serious, makes his voice hushed and reverent. "It's all right. I went to the light."

Dick gets through most days by only thinking about what he has to. It's a ruthless sort of approach, one that he's hardly even aware of, until moments like this. Until the sheer bizarre absurdity of rolling around naked with his brother who is neither dead nor his brother smacks into him.

"Christ," he says and sits back on his heels. His chest feels evacuated. Just -- broken, hollow, ragged.

Jason looks like he's about to say something else. The smirk flickers, strengthens, then snaps away.

He reaches for Dick, one ghostly hand, and brushes his fingertips over Dick's thigh. In the shadowy room, he looks like a jumble of angles, narrow, scarred chest and planes of muscle, swollen lower lip, cock jutting against his hip.

Dick shivers at the touch.

"Rubbers are up by the pillow," Jason says gently.

"Lube?"

"Got it." Jason pushes him up toward the pillow and rolls on his side, kicking off one leg of his jeans. When Dick turns back, condom rolled down, Jason's on his back, leg in the air, two fingers slicking up his hole.

This is too much. Too real, perhaps, or too absurd. Too crazy.

"Jay?"

"Dickiebird," Jason replies and rolls onto his stomach, then pushes back onto his knees. "C'mon. Go to town."

Their voices are raspy and sad and none of this is right.

At Jason's funeral, Bruce didn't look at anyone. He stood under an umbrella, expression stonier than the Bat's could ever be, then turned on his heel and left.

Dick didn't know the Rom prayer for death, so he said the one for the naming ceremony. His pronunciation was wrong and he felt stupid, useless, ugly.

And now Jason's here, beautiful and breathing, with gentle hands stroking the bruises he'd inflicted. His tongue is in Dick's mouth and they're moving together again, legs tangling up, clothes getting shed. They're both hard again. They stink like Gotham, like sweat and blood, and they're calloused and scarred, but Jay tastes like wind and green things. Dick dips him over one arm, down to the bed, and they wiggle and grunt, bump knees and elbows, jaws on shoulders, foreheads on arms, but then Jay spreads his legs and hooks one over Dick's shoulder like it's nothing, like they're flying, like they do this all the time.

His smile breaks and beams, his fingers tighten in Dick's hair, and they exhale together as Dick pushes in. Jay's eyes close, then snap open and he pushes back, canting up to meet and taking Dick deeper inside, and then they're fucking together, more and more ragged. Dick's tongue is caught in his teeth until he cranes down and they're kissing again, and Jay pumps upward, changes the angle and stretches around Dick's cock, deeper than ever, and he laughs into the kiss, the noise full of shards and bright things that suck Dick in, then farther, deeper.

Jason's face is too close to see clearly, just flush and heat, and their skin squelches and sticks, and Dick fucks harder. He needs to be -- past this, somehow, inside, all the way inside, where Jason hides, where he'll be able to see. Some abandoned place, soaring spaces, angels in the walls.

But there's nowhere like that. There's just this, just some fucked-up approximation that has Jason bouncing and squealing on Dick's every downstroke, his cock squashed between them, his mouth open and begging. He curses and moans and yanks at Dick's hair. Dick must look just the same, needy and soaked and wrenching his thrusts. They've always looked alike. That was the entire point.

Until Jason clutches at him and bites his jaw, swirls his tongue to Dick's ear and whispers, "He's probably recording this. Watching us. You know that, right?"

At that, Dick pumps rabbit-fast, aching and full, and comes hard enough to shoot sparks past his eyes and lose track of his breath. Jason unfurls beneath him, warm and loose, lazily drawing figures in the sweat down Dick's spine.

Dick tries to pull out but Jason clucks his tongue and says, "Watch me."

He jerks off, eyes on Dick's, wrist flexing and fingers squeezing. When he comes, spunk welling up and dripping, he looks right through Dick, right through everything, eyes wide and deep as the grave.

"Christ," Dick says, later, finally, wiping the crusty sheet over his face. "Jesus, Jay --"

Jason's already sitting up and pulling on his shirt. "We should team up. Ever thought about that?"

The idea makes Dick laugh, heartily and helplessly, until he realizes that Jason isn't joking. He's just sitting there, hugging himself, shoulders rounded.

"We'd make a good team," he says and looks away. "Think about it."

Dick can't reply. He flops back onto the futon and squints up at the pressed-tin ceiling.

"Anyway, we should get out of here," Jason says, hopping up and pulling his pants on. No underwear, Dick notices, and his cock stirs a little.

"This isn't your place?"

Jason stabs his foot into one sneaker. "I killed the tenant and stole his place, Dick."

The truth of it is cold and flat, like marble, closing in. Dick blinks but doesn't know where to look.

He realizes he doesn't know what happened to Jason's gun. That oversight is unforgivable.

"His head's in the fridge," Jason adds, and toes on his other shoe before tightening his belt and latching it. He places his index finger against his chin and frowns. "Can't seem to recall where I put the torso..."

Dick wants to puke. Hit something, spew, jump and fall.

Above him, Jason sighs heavily, then kicks Dick's leg. "Fuck, you're such a gullible fucking moron, you know that?"

"You --" Dick makes himself look up at Jason. "Oh."

"Lucky you're so gorgeous." He's shaking his head. "The lack of trust, bro. It wounds me, you know? I'd say it's like a crowbar to the face, but -- Well. It really isn't."

Dick moves from one man's logic to another's, from Bruce's to the Bat's, to Clark's, to Nightwing's. All are approximate, all help make sense of the world, but none are enough, none are comprehensive, and none are fully his own.

He could easily believe Jason did slaughter this apartment's tenant, just as he could believe that Bruce had no choice but to become the Batman. That Tim is his brother, that Jason was dead.

But he doesn't know what he believes.

"You coming? I'm feeling like waffles," Jason says from the door. "My treat."

"Nah," Dick says and sits up, slowly enough to feel each vertebra pop into place. "I'll catch you later."

Jay bounds back to the futon and, dropping to one knee, hugs him hard. "C'mon, Richard-boy. Up and at 'em."

Dick lets himself be hauled to his feet and looks around for his pants.

He could eat, it's true.

"Spot me forty?" Jason calls from the bathroom. "You know I'm good for it."