dear_mun | tentative voice test, maybe looking?

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tentative voice test, maybe looking?

Wow, so.

You do know the phrase 'curiosity killed the cat', right?

[He eases his hands into the air in a gesture of (faintly amused) surrender. Like he's one to talk.]

Just checking. Never thought I'd see the day you'd pass over you-know-who [He makes little Bat-ears just to drive the point home. And no, he doesn't mean Voldemort, because that is entirely too terrifying to contemplate.] to take me out for a spin.

Can't say I mind. You know how I like working up a good sweat.

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Hasn't everyone taken you out for a spin.

[ Deadpan as heck. Take that however you want. (The meanest possible interpretation is probably safe, not that Jason really thinks it's that mean.) ]

[... so wry,]

Walked right into that one, huh.

[hey, little wing. Dick's expression is... careful. A little resigned, maybe more than a little sad, even though he's still smiling.]

That, or some other verb.

[ It could be construed as playful, if there were any play in his voice. There's not much of anything. But he showed up, so that's something. Maybe. ]

Hey, there's an awful lot of verbs in the English language. We'd be here all night if we ran through all of 'em.

[He definitely doesn't look like the one he wants to use right now is 'hug'. After a sec, he edges in closer (manages to make it look careless, because it's Dick and that nonchalance is practically ingrained in his economy of movement) and gently bumps Jason's shoulder.]

[ The shoulder bump is... tolerated? Ignored? In any case, no corresponding bump is offered, and Jason shifts slightly away, just enough to be noticeable and to indicate his preference that that not happen again. ]

Wow, that took about six seconds. It's nice to know I still have a little share of your guilt complex.

['What's a little guilt between brothers'? 'Guess the real-estate is cheap'?

Dealing with Jason is... difficult at the best of times. He always manages to feel like he's a half second away from having a rug pulled out from under him, and no amount of acrobatics can keep him on his feet.]

It's got less to do with guilt and more to do with family, Jason.

[But obligingly, he steps further away from Jay. Under the pretense of stretching his wings, so to speak.]

Same thing with us, isn't it?

[ He sounds so reasonable, saying that. Calm. A hint of smile now, but not a nice one, of course. ]

So how is everyone. Alfred. Babs. The new kid... what's his name again? Tim.

[ Like he doesn't know it, and everything. He can make something toneless, something that's only one syllable, sound like a drop of poison. ]

Yeah. Tim.

[The way Jay chooses to say... everything is its own brand of knife in the ribs. The aural equivalent of several years of accumulated hurts and injuries. Dick's expression twists into something not quite smile, not quite grimace.]

It's not the same thing. Sometimes the two just happen to overlap.

[How do you say 'I didn't even know you died until you were buried'? Somehow he doesn't think the fact he was off on Tamaran is what Jason needs to hear.]

You know Alfred. He's something else.

[Sometimes he seems like Bruce. Someone who can't die. But Dick knows better.]

And Babs is... good. Fine. She'd be happy to see you, if she could.

[Given what the Joker did to her only a few months before Jason's death, he sometimes thinks that she took it harder than almost anyone but Bruce. When did it stop? God, when did any of it ever stop? And he's quiet then, for a bit, trying to figure out what he can say about Tim that won't be salt in an open wound.]

Tim's a good kid.

[ At that first part, Jason tips his head fractionally, as if he understands something beyond what Dick said, something only he can see. And he doesn't say anything about it at all. Whatever (unfair, irrational) conclusion he came to, he keeps it to himself, an accumulated coldness behind his steady gaze. He lets it rest in the awful, exactly two seconds long pause before he responds. ]

Good.

[ It's both a sardonic echo and that same chilling way he has of saying simple things. ]

Well. Good talk, Dick. Glad I ran into you.

[His brow furrows.]

Jason. Please--

['Please' what? Don't go? While Dick knows that he could stop Jason from leaving, he's not exactly sure what hogtying him and sitting on him would accomplish at this point. Somewhere in the midst of that one word he took a step forward and half-lifted a hand. He looks down at it as if he's not entirely certain how it happened, clenches it and drops it back against his side.]

Tim wasn't a replacement. Not for Bruce. Not for any of us. I want you to know that.

[ But Jason steps forward, and he reaches for Dick's shoulder to put his hand there. Somehow, though, it's all wrong, like it has been throughout the entire conversation — a horrible cutting mockery of the closeness almost every Dick he encounters tries to engender because they can't help being themselves. He's studied every instance and imitates it back now with an uncanny valley style near-perfection, down to the faintly tortured, almost tender voice. ]

And knowing that makes all the difference.

[ With that, Jason squeezes Dick's shoulder, lets go, and steps back smiling. ]

[Excuse you, but Dick knows perfectly well when he's being mocked and it actually pisses him off. Not the mockery itself - let's face it, he makes himself a target for a reason - but the nature of it. And why Jason's choosing to do it. It pisses him off for the same reasons that Batman declaring Bruce Wayne a persona non grata made him angry. It's a denial of everything he believes in, a revocation of the familial bonds he'd do anything for.

But family doesn't mean he can't recognize when the people closest to him need a wake-up call. He reaches out without even thinking about it and grabs Jason's wrist. It's one of those grips that usually takes broken bones to get away from.]

Do you have any idea what it was like for us? For any of us? You died, Jason! Any one of us would have traded places with you. Me, Bruce-- [his voice doesn't break, per se, but it does end up a little more emotional,] even-- even Alfred.

[This is a Dumb Idea. Capital letters. Do not pass go, do not collect two hundred anything. Unfortunately, for all that he thinks with his head he has a tendency to act with his heart, and at times like this ne'er the twain shall meet.]

You died, and it-- I'm not even going to pretend I know what that's like.

[He wonders if Jason felt the same way he had when he thought Two-Face was going to kill him. He remembers how desperately wanting to live warred with the desire for the pain to just stop. Was it like that?

No. Because at the end of the day, Dent's nothing like the Joker, and Dick's grip lessens a little. Reflexively apologetic.]

But you're back. And the most important thing to you is that you get revenge on us? I don't buy it. I get that you're angry. But we don't deserve this. And neither do you. Not enough people get second chances, Jason.

[ Normally he'd accept the broken bone, he'd fight like hell to get loose with whatever it took, stabbing, biting, anything, but he's less inclined to do that here; here's different, here is a place where he can do what he just did. Here he doesn't have to sacrifice a limb like an animal gnawing off a paw to get out of a trap.

Jason tenses, yes, is unmistakably close to violence, but he listens. What he gets out of it is probably not what Dick wants him to get out of it, but it's a change from the unyielding restraint he showed before. The look in his eye is at least alive, if still wrong, and that smile hasn't gone away. He twists his arm in Dick's grasp without real force, only impatience, with every expectation that Dick will release him. ]

If revenge was what I wanted, I would've had it a long, long time ago. But it isn't. What I want is none of your business. It's between me and Bruce.

Or do you think you have the right to tell me what he and I deserve from each other?

You aren't old enough to be using phrases like 'a long, long time ago'. That's reserved for bad Star Wars jokes and Wildcat.

[He clings so desperately to what humour he can, even in the worst situations. But this is Jason. He used to laugh once upon a 'long, long' time ago.]

You think he didn't damn near kill himself over what happened to you? You think he didn't push every single one of us away and try to commit suicide-by-thug? Because he did, Jason. I don't give a damn if you don't think it's my right. Bruce loves you. Even if there's rocks out there that are better at showing it. Why can't that be enough?

[He already knows the answer to that question. He's known it ever since Jay came back. Ever since Chemo was dropped on the 'Haven, since Jason found him in New York.]

[ He knows Dick knows. His expression is patient, though not kind. I know you know, so stop bullshitting me. ]

That question doesn't sound like it's for me. I didn't spend years agonizing over whether Bruce gave a shit, if he was proud or disappointed or loved me at all.

[ Though it's as calm as before, it's also way more personal, like he can't quite stop himself. He's not angry, not yet, but Dick's outburst has succeeded in provoking more meaningful reaction. ]

I just have a simple question for Bruce, and I'm going to ask it on my own terms. It has to be this way. I have to have an answer. Or else...

[ It's more a shrug than a spreading of hands. Or else I'll stay this way. ]

[Well that's not a slap in the face or anything. Dick grits his teeth and very definitely does not let go of Jason's wrist. He can feel Jason's pulse against the pads of his fingers and he just--

He's doing this all wrong.

Damn you, Bruce.]

'Why didn't you kill the Joker?'

[ Jason watches him — his stare is unwavering and simultaneously seems to come from far away, like half of him isn't even there. He finds it strange to hear the question coming from Dick. Not so strange that he freezes up or reacts strongly, though. ]

Close.

[ In that word is a ghost of madness, something close to fanaticism; something that can't be extinguished or made to submit by reason. It's almost worse that he's otherwise completely lucid. ]

Now let go.

[ No "or else" is added to that. It's not necessary between them, he feels. ]

[Not necessary? Usually not. But Dick doesn't capitulate. Doesn't even think about it.]

Give me a reason to.

[One that isn't a threat of broken anythings, because really they've both survived so much worse than even what they could potentially do to each other.]

[ Fighting here is worse than futile, in Jason's opinion, even if it's his natural recourse. But there's no sense in playing to Dick's martyr complex, and breaking his own arm to make a point seems melodramatic at best. ]

Because I'm not Tim and I don't respond to hug therapy, seeing as I don't have a stalker hard-on for you.

[ Crudeness is cheap, but whatever accomplishes the goal is fine by him. Let go. ]

[My god, Jason, he wants to shake you.]

So you can what? Run away?

I do have things to do, you know. Some of them I'll want to do alone, like pissing. Generally, I find that someone's sweaty hand clamped to my wrist makes it difficult for me to get started.

[ It's only going to escalate from here. ]

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tentative voice test, maybe looking?

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