TITLE: right of passage
AUTHOR: Anonymous
RECIPIENT:
PAIRINGS: Damian/Jason with peripheral Damian/Dick, Jason/Talia, Jason/Bruce, Bruce/Dick
WARNINGS: underage frottage, semi-public sex, choking, forced domination, dubious consent, fighting, unrequited feelings
SUMMARY: Christmas is for kids, and growing up is all about realizing no one ever really gets what they want.
NOTES: Happy holidays sinnaidle! This is my first time writing Jason and Damian together, but I tried to include as many elements of your prompts and general likes as I could. I hope you enjoy!

Destroying public property as a result of saving Gotham from the criminally insane and indiscriminately slaying seasonally festive lawn decorations are two different things, but both happen to involve a boy in a hood with an R on his chest. Batman would disapprove, greatly, but when isn't that the case?

Perched on the roof ledge of an apartment complex from which an exceptionally loud television blares about shooting one's eye out, Robin scans the street below.

All of Gotham seems occupied in a way that has nothing to do with the city's usual activities. The streets are mostly empty, populated only by the hopelessly pious and the truly destitute, each huddled in whatever warmth they could scrounge up. The Cauldron is quiet, strung up with lights and devoid of the familiar square faces of Irish thugs prowling the streets. Church windows burn bright and pews are filled to the brim, standing room for one night only. Everything was quiet and still down at the docks, the harbor almost peaceful in it's unusual inactivity. Sleepy cops venture just far enough outside of Old Gotham to meet their quotas, huddled close to the dashboard's heat and never venturing out of their patrol cars. Some streets are quiet enough that an unnoticed observer could hear the crunch of mostly melted snow under the tires' rubber tread.

The electronic earpiece molded specifically to his ear shape remains silent and Robin briefly considers hacking into the GCPD radio frequency, just to prove he can. To prove he doesn't need anyone on the other end of the line.

Taillights disappear around the corner, surrendering the street to the glow of streetlamps and multicolored lights strung up around every other residence. Tomorrow, GCPD will have a perplexing string of holiday related vandalisms to investigate, but for tonight, the boys in blue drive away untroubled.

Firing a line is usually little more than a negligible whisper in the cacophony of Gotham's nightlife, but it is loud tonight, as if to prove a point.

Robin leaps off the roof, swinging toward First Avenue.

There's always something going wrong in the East End.

: : :

Crime never takes a holiday in Gotham, and although Robin may be late to the party, not everyone in Gotham is.

Not the two men groaning on the pavement, nor the helmeted man standing above them, gun held loosely in his hand. Robin watches from the rooftop, silent, a gloved hand going to his belt more out of habit than any desire to step in.

From above, it is easy to see the practiced way Red Hood crouches, elbows on his knees, his weapon concealed by the cradle of his body. Robin didn't come equipped with long-range audio surveillance equipment, the goal of the night nowhere near that coordinated when he set out, so he quiets his breathing and strains his ears to hear what's being said. With any luck he can find out about Red Hood's plans and intercept whatever deal he's doling out punishment for before the other man can profit from it.

Satisfaction comes in many flavors, and thwarting Red Hood's plans is one of the sweetest. The man is hardly an innocent bystander.

Despite nearly holding his breath in his stillness, their words don't carry far enough to be heard. The roof of the adjacent building is lower, shadowed enough to provide decent cover should he decide to move...

"Come on down birdboy." Red Hood calls out, loud enough that it nearly startles Robin out of the shadows.

Clenching his fists, Damian debates ignoring the summons, turning tail and leaving with little more than a flick of yellow cape. It's an enjoyable thought, but the alternative involves the possibility of kicking thugs in the head—and that is just what Damian needs at the moment. He drops down, kicking off the icy metal railing of a fire escape on his way, and lands a respectable distance from the hooded vigilante.

"Oh look, it's the brat wonder." Jason lifts his boot up and settles it on the cheek of the nearest thug who groans as his face is pressed into the cold, snow slushy pavement. "To what do I owe the honor?"

"What are you doing, Hood?" Damian glares, his lenses thinning in concert with his mouth.

"Ah ah," Jason's helmet turns left to right, and Damian can't help but think the hood was a good idea—it discourages people's natural urge to punch Todd in the face for being a smartass. "I asked you first."

"Patrol, you imbecile." Damian spits, already irritated and not at all enamored by stupid questions with obvious answers.

"Hey," Jason holds his hands up in the universal gesture of surrender—it would be more convincing if he didn't have a firearm in one of those hands. "No name calling."

Damian doesn't need to see Todd's face to know he's smirking. He bites his tongue on the 'you started it' that crowds behind his teeth, knowing that defense for the infantilizing trap it is.

Light catches on Todd's headgear, drawing attention to the marginal tilting of his head. Were he wearing his domino and not his hood, perhaps the subtle checking of his peripheral would have gone unnoticed, but the high gloss of the faceplate all but broadcasts the action. When Damian realizes what Todd's looking for—more aptly, who Todd's looking for—he shrinks back into his own hood, letting the shadows swallow his pinched expression. "This is my patrol, Hood."

He means to make it sound threatening, to cow Jason for assuming Batman would be lurking in the shadows somewhere, playing guardian when Damian's more than proved himself. It ends up sounding annoyed, like he's eleven again and at risk of stomping his boot for emphasis.

There are no eyebrows on the hood, just lines on the faceplate where reinforced metal meet, but somehow Todd makes it clear he's raising an eyebrow at Damian. "And the big bad Bat knows about this?"

Finding Todd was a bad idea.

"Batman knows everything that goes on in Gotham." Damian says, because they're in the presence of Gotham low lives that may or may not be conscious.

Todd scoffs, shoving his gun into its holster. "Yeah, yeah- and I've got a toilet made of kryptonite."

When Damian doesn't merit that with a response, Jason shrugs and turns to leave, the thug under his boot groaning when he pivots off his face and Damian can't tell if it was intentional or if he forgot that he was posturing. Damian almost expects him to leap up for the fire escape, to take to the roofs with an agile grace, but that's because he's used to working with-

Damian steps forward, annoyed at himself for letting his mind wander places it shouldn't, and demands of Jason's retreating back, "What did you take these two down for?"

Near the street, Jason turns, the whites of his eye lenses bright in the unnatural, expressionless flatness of his faceplate. "Fun."

A scowl turns Damian's mouth down even if his heartbeat kicks up a notch; it can't be helped. It's easy to believe Jason, to take his swaggering walk and his impetuous talk at face value. All too easy to believe that maybe the thrill of the chase is all he really wants out of all this.

"You're just going to leave them?" Damian looks down at the two men, lying still either from a good sense of self-preservation or because they haven't regained consciousness yet.

Jason turns more toward Damian, canting his hip with the obvious intent to draw attention to the way his palm rests on the butt of his gun. "Are you encouraging my bad habits?"

Eyes narrowing, Damian goes for the zipties in his utility belt. "Hardly, Hood."

"Then what's it matter to you birdie?"

Answering is more trouble than Todd is worth.

Crouching by the closest thug, Damian hefts the man's right shoulder from under his considerable body weight, zipping his wrists together behind his back. In the past Todd's questions have always been designed to needle, voiced or phrased to intentionally try to get a rise out of him. Allowing Todd to rile him tonight would be... a mistake. So he does his level best to simply ignore the other. By the time he has the second man's arms restrained, he fully expects Todd to be gone, melted into the cold darkness of the night—but he isn't.

Standing there at the mouth of the alleyway, arms crossed over his chest and his feet planted firmly just beyond the natural width of his hips, like a promise, or a dare—and how blind must his Father have been not to see his training in that stance? How intentionally deluded could the world's greatest detective be toward one lost boy?

Damian finishes zipping the two thugs together, back to back.

"Is that what they're teaching Robins nowadays? How to clean up other people's messes?" Jason's head tilts to the side and Damian has to clamp down on the urge to lunge at the other.

"The duty of Robin is to protect Gotham. That means disposing of trash like this correctly." Frustrated and willing to take it out on Todd, Damian jabs at the R insignia on his chest. "Try to act like you have some idea what this symbol means."

Tension tightens Jason's shoulders like an electric jolt, obvious enough that even the untrained eye could catch it, and Damian indulges in a vicious moment of triumph at Jason's expense. It doesn't last long, Jason's shoulders rolling the tension off like so much unwanted weight.

"Moving up in the world means you don't deal in chump change, kiddo."

"Tt," Damian snorts, stepping around the two men while pulling up their coordinates. Batman would want GCPD to pick them up before they froze to death. "If that's what you need to tell yourself to feel relevant."

"You know, you're a real pain in my ass." Jason shakes his head, arms still crossed over his chest as annoyance creeps into his tone. "Why don't you go back to your Christmas carols and whatever else it is you're ducking out of right now?"

Glaring at his communicator, Damian very pointedly ignores Jason's baiting while patching himself through to the Bat's GCPD tip line. Usually Oracle is the one to relay field information, but she's not on the line tonight and Damian isn't inept.

"Oh. Is that it?" Jason asks, annoyance turned to taunting on his tongue. "Baby bat doesn't want to play nice with the others?"

Despite the biting cold keeping day old snow from melting, the dirty slush clumping near the gutters and on dumpster lids, Damian's embarrassment is an unbearable heat rising up from his collar.

"That," He says, stabbing at his communicator perhaps more viciously than he normally would. "Is none of your business."

"It becomes my business when you track me down and truss up my bad guys like they're your own."

Embarrassment tightens Damian's shoulders, and it is as much a give away as Jason needs to know he's right. Damian hadn't left the Manor with the intention to track Jason down—hadn't even thought of it until he'd crossed into East End and passed a billboard he'd been thrown through last time Father and his notorious lost Robin butted heads over some squabble or another. He's not claiming Jason's take down by cuffing the guys any more than Todd is affiliating himself with them by wearing the symbol of the Bat on his chest, but Damian loathes the idea that Todd might think otherwise.

"I am keeping Gotham safe!" Damian snaps.

"Really?" There's laughter lurking in Jason's tone. "Because it looks like I'm keeping Gotham safe and you're playing 52 thug pick up."

Frustration flares bright and furious in his chest, and Damian explodes. "Gotham isn't yours to protect!"

Quiet falls like a sheet settling over them and Damian doesn't get the satisfaction of seeing Jason react. At one point or another, Damian has flung words like so many knives at each member of his crime fighting family, often undeserved and regretted upon reflection. Each has a different reaction, upon which Damian can gauge the severity of his trespasses—Drake's serious look, his Father's narrowed mouth, Brown's annoyed pout, Grayson's eyes gone soft with hurt and disappointment—but Todd's silence, the stoic stillness of his faceplate, is an unknown.

He isn't saying anything his father hasn't said many times before, what Dick reinforced by donning the cowl when the need arose; but Damian can't know how much it stings when Jason is keeping Gotham safe—the people in Gotham who need the most protection. The kids in the bad parts of town who have nowhere else to go, the kids who grow up hard and jaded because there's never enough to go around and nothing to celebrate on the rare occasion there is.

The angry, sharp-toothed thing lodged in Damian's chest might not care even if he had.

"Well, I'm all she's got at the moment." Jason says, like he's long since gotten used to being Gotham's consolation prize. He gestures with open palms to his immediate surroundings, blatantly dismissing Damian's presence.

Damian wants to cut the thugs lose and pretend he never crossed paths with Todd. Or, better yet, he wants to see how well Todd's teeth hold up once he rips that eyesore of a helmet off his head and kicks him repeatedly in his condescending mouth.

He won't, because the situation at the Manor will not have changed a bit in his absence, and Todd's company is preferable to the looks, and no doubt talks, he'll be subjected to once he returns—but that doesn't make Todd any less irritating.

"Don't be a fool." Damian growls, stepping forward and crossing his arms over his chest. It forces him to take up more space and makes his presence more difficult to ignore.

No one would mistake it for asking, he's barely being civil enough for it to be considered offering, but the message is the same; if Jason has reason to believe Gotham needs a protector, Damian isn't going anywhere. Briefly, Jason wonders why beating on thugs with him is more preferable to spending Christmas Eve at the Manor, but he recognizes the firm set of the teen's jaw, his stubborn resolve, and doesn't push the subject.

Jason plants a hand on his hip. "You think you can keep up little bird?"

"Does trained since birth mean nothing to you?" Damian sniffs, turning his nose up like he's the one making concessions with his night.

"Yeah... it's starting to mean something." Jason intones, derisively.

From under his yellow hood, Damian glares at Jason, unamused but too used to the jabs at his demeanor to let the comment rile him all that much.

"Okay, here's the deal. According to these upstanding citizens," Jason inclines his head toward the thugs behind Damian. "There's a group of these guys who heard Christmas Eve was a real good time to get into the burglary business. Seems like no one told 'em it's also the best way to hop on the fast track to the top of my naughty list."

Wordplay might as well be a time stamp when it comes to Robins, and Damian doesn't even try to hide how he rolls his eyes. It doesn't seem to deter Jason in the slightest.

"Now, I've seen little leagues more professional than these guys. That disorganization, and the general shittiness of this neighborhood, is going to make their hits hard to pinpoint-"

Damian snorts, brushing past Jason with a disdainful, "Maybe for you."

"Uh," Jason turns on his heel, calling after Damian. "I've got a four man lead on you baby bird, so good fucking luck."

Damian's smirk is a sharp, wicked thing tossed over his shoulder. "Good. Consider that your due handicap, Hood."

In a pop of noise and a blur of yellow, Damian is soaring over the rooftop, gone before Jason has a chance to question how this suddenly became a contest. Friendly competition between Batman and Robin is relatively normal, but Jason isn't Damian's Batman, and Damian has never been particularly adept at the whole friendly part of being Robin. Between them, a competition is just that—a winner and a loser, no in between.

Jason will be damned if he's going to get shown up by a fifteen year old.

: : :

Pushing him off the roof is becoming more and more appealing to the visibly fuming teen with every passing moment, and nothing could delight Jason more.

"All I'm saying is how do I know you stopped this so called mugging?" Jason asks, with all the laborious skepticism of a person unwilling to cede the upper hand—or in this case, their claim to a tie.

In the time it's taken Jason to find and apprehend another pair of heavily armed thugs, Damian has alerted GCPD to three other thwarted burglaries and stopped a mugging on his way back to Jason's location. The mugging puts them seven to six, in Damian's favor, and while Jason doesn't really care, he's having too much fun winding Damian up to let it go.

"Besides the fact that I have honor?" Damian says the word slowly, like he's introducing a particularly foreign concept to Jason. "There is an ABP out on the girl."

"So while I was getting shot at by tweedle-dee and tweedle-dumb, you were chasing girls." Jason snorts, the sound muffled as he reaches up to remove his helmet. His hair is shorter than it was the last time Damian saw him, and it sticks up in odd places from being trapped in the helmet for too long. "Yeah, that sounds like Dick's protégé."

"One girl," Damian holds a single gloved finger up, either for emphasis or for Jason's benefit. "And if I had chased her, GCPD wouldn't be looking for her—she would be in custody."

Jason turns the full force of his grin on Damian for the first time that night, sly because Damian is surprisingly easy to manipulate when he's irritated. "So you're saying she got away. Which puts us each at six."

"Stopping the action counts as much as the incarceration, Todd!" Damian growls, fists forming at his sides.

"Nope. Doesn't count." Jason denies, trying his hardest not to look like the kid who intentionally pressed all seventy-two buttons in the elevator of Damian's impatience.

"The duty of Robin is-"

"Yeah, yeah, kid." Jason cuts Damian off, waving him off with a flick of his hand. "Save it for someone who gives a shit. Jeez, who are you, Tim? There's no extra-credit in the field wonderbrat. Face it, we're tied."

"How dare you imply something so vile?" Damian hisses, like he's gutted at the implication that he and his most recent predecessor share even the slightest of traits. "And we are not tied. I am the better vigilante and you are clearly either unable to count or simply a sore loser."

For covering nearly a third of his face, Jason's domino manages to maintain surprising expressivity; Damian liked it better when he couldn't tell Jason was raising his eyebrow at him.

"You're the one with your proverbial scaly panties in a twist—over a tie, I might add—and I'm the sore loser?" With his helmet shoved under one arm, Jason shrugs exaggeratedly, like he's appealing to an invisible audience for laughter. "Whatever you say tiny tot."

Which is an innocuous, almost brotherly, taunt Jason could get away with on any other night, but tonight is quiet and still in a way Gotham can't be when there are bats and birds lurking in the shadows, and Jason honestly should have known better. Damian's fist connects with Jason's jaw, a solid hit that sends Jason reeling and nearly off the roof. A small part of his brain is stunned at how inhumanly fast Damian moves despite the weight and height he's put on since becoming Robin, but the more immediate part of him is reacting to the very real threat of being knocked off a roof by an angry former assassin.

Narrowly avoiding Damian's kick, his helmet flying out from under his arm in the process, Jason twists just far enough out of Damian's reach to give himself a moment to react. The sound of his helmet clattering to the floor is a distant, altogether unimportant noise compared to the relatively quiet click of the safety disengaging on Jason's gun. It's mostly reflex, Jason sighting the R on Damian's chest because the prickle at the back of his neck—not to mention the throbbing in his jaw—says threat, even if his brain recognizes the red and the yellow and knows better.

He ticks the barrel up by half a centimeter.

Few people can be so utterly still, regardless of training, and Damian's stillness is not entirely a fear reaction to being on the wrong end of a firearm. He's still the way Jason has seen cobras coil up in Tarim, and tigers tense in Bhutan; the way all lethal things react when threatened, and all the more dangerous because of it.

Jason reconsiders the R on Damian's chest.

"For reference, this is loaded." Jason says, calmly. "So let's not do anything we're going to regret."

White lenses narrow in Damian's domino, but otherwise the teen remains observably unimpressed. He's not scared, and it isn't the false bravado of a person who has never seen what damage Jason can do at such a close range, its just nerves of fucking steel. It's growing up in the shadow of the demon's head, the threat of attack ever present and the expectation to always do better, to be better. Damian knows Jason would pull the trigger, and he doesn't care.

It is impressive, in a psychotic way.

Then again, vigilantism never claimed to attract the sound of mind.

"Alright, pack it in. You win." Jason lifts the barrel, angling it a generous ways away from Damian's chest. "What d'you want for it?"

Of all the ways to catch Damian off guard, Jason wouldn't have bet on that being the most effective, but it works surprisingly well. Devoid of an equal and opposite force to rail against, Damian's anticipatory rage is awkward and unwieldy on him.

Weight settled more evenly, not poised on the balls of his feet, Damian demands, "What?"

There's an audible degree of cautiousness in his tone, and Jason's sure Damian's still calculating the probability that he's going to turn around and sight him again, so he shoves his gun back in it's holster. It doesn't do much, but it's as meaningful a gesture of good faith as either of them knows how to interpret.

"Six and a half-" Jason can see Damian's hackles rising, but he barrels on regardless. "To an even six means you win, and winners get something for winning, right? So whaddya want?"

Damian looks momentarily lost, like he's never considered what might happen if one day he got his way without a fight.

The newness of it does nothing to change old habits though, and Damian recovers quickly enough to sniff, "What could you have that I would want?"

Jason has never wanted to hit a fifteen year old quite as often as he does when Damian's around.

"Well I'm no saint, so we're not gonna go with patience." Jason says, and stoops to grab his helmet. He shoves it on and steps up to the roof's ledge, looking down at the street below as if orienting himself. When he turns back to Damian, it's with the air of an open invitation. "C'mon."

Damian doesn't have time to ask any questions before Jason's gone, scaling the fire escape with a practiced efficiency, the frozen metal groaning with the weight of him. He isn't obligated to follow Jason anywhere, in fact, Grayson would probably advise against it.

There's something to be said for the satisfaction of petty defiance.

: : :

Gotham is exactly the kind of city where an infamous crime-fighter and a dubiously affiliated part-time vigilante can walk into a diner and still get the hairy eyeball from an overworked night shift waitress. It's not like the place is exactly busy but it is nearly midnight on Christmas Eve and its more the principle of the matter than the strenuousness of the work. Jason orders two hot cocoas to go and gets the hell out of her hair.

He hands one off to Damian, wispy tendrils of white steam rising up from the small opening in the lid, and starts scouting for the nearest available rooftop. Abandoned buildings aren't exactly a rarity in this part of town, the property demand driven down by the East End's alarming crime rate, and truly, the tough part is not sloshing scalding hot liquid everywhere while rappelling up a building.

"I wanted coffee." Damian complains, alighting on the roof next to Jason.

Setting his cocoa down, Jason pulls his helmet off for the second time that night. "Coffee'll stunt your growth."

"No it won't." Damian grouses, as if familiar with this argument.

Jason swaps his helmet for his cup, his fingers leeching the warmth from the thin paper cup. "Yes it will."

"There is no evidence to support that conclusion." Damian snaps, wanting to prove his point, but unwilling to fall prey to Jason's pigtail pulling—again.

"Look who's a scientist now." Jason waves his cup in Damian's direction, raising the paper cup in a mockery of a toast. "Is there anything they don't teach you in assassin school?"

Damian levels a taciturn stare at Jason from behind his domino. "Remorse for killing half-wits."

Back in the day, Robin banter wasn't quite so macabre. Then again, back in the day Robins wore short pants and pixie boots and came with slightly less parental baggage. It's a whole new world, apparently.

"Just 'cause I didn't shoot you, doesn't mean I won't slap that cup right out of your hand." Jason warns, eyeing the loose grip Damian has on his beverage.

Out of defiance, or maybe just petulance, Damian wraps another hand more securely around his drink. "This is my just reward."

"So shut up and drink it." They both know there's a sarcastic 'princess' missing at the end of that, but Jason is still figuring out what got him punched in the face and even he knows six stories up on an icy rooftop probably isn't the best place to start testing any theories.

Not that either would have the reason or desire to call it such, but something like companionship settles between them. Down below, the street is quiet, devoid of the festive, singing lawn ornaments of suburban Gotham, and the constant commercial racket of the City. An attempt at holiday cheer glows in a few of the windows, but the heavy wrought iron bars fastened over the glass panes cast strange shapes out onto the street. The cocoa does what it can, but there's only so much warmth to be had in the middle of a December night in Gotham.

"You were invited to spend the evening at the Manor." Damian says, his voice an unexpected disturbance.

It isn't really a question, more a statement of fact, but Damian has never been one to break silence unnecessarily, which means there is a question lurking somewhere in that head of his. The rise and fall of Jason's shoulder is wholly noncommittal.

"It is impolite to disregard an invitation." Damian snaps, his words heavy with accusation, like he had any say at all in Jason getting an invite.

Jason can't help the slight twist of his lips. "How is it that you have friends when you speak like that?"

"I don't." Damian denies, as if friendship is some childish notion Jason is misguided in expecting Damian to believe in.

They're about an arm's width apart on the roof—an awkward distance for strangers, and an even more awkward distance for two people who share the tentative title of brothers—sharing a reluctant-team-up cocoa and dancing around something, and Jason just doesn't have the patience for this.

"C'mon." Jason sighs, rolling his eyes. "You really are insulting if you think a hulking dude in a beat up trench coat and fedora stomping around my part of town is gonna go completely uninvestigated by me."

Damian's mouth thins. "Stay out of things that don't concern you."

"Wow. Great advice. I'll remember that next time I track you down." Jason swallows most of his remaining sarcasm down with a generous sip of cocoa; it lessens the bitterness of familiarity in the shape of Damian's mouth. "So what's the deal? He wasn't interested in being part of the Wayne rendition of A Very Orphan Christmas?"

Annoyance cascades off Damian in waves and Jason's domino ticks upwards with the raising of his eyebrow. It takes a moment, in which Jason keeps more than a peripheral eye on the punch-happy teen, before Damian manages to answer. "We had a disagreement, therefore I rescinded his invitation to the Manor."

Not sure he's the best candidate to be playing Dear Abby to Damian's cryptic friendship woes, Jason mumbles into his cocoa. "That doesn't sound like reason enough to be out here freezing your balls off."

When no response is immediately forthcoming, Jason looks over at Damian. Frustration blooms on Damian's face, the light from the street contorting his look into something much harder than it should be. Someday, the kid's gonna make an intimidating Batman, but right now he just looks dangerous.

"He was right." Damian spits out, and it seems to take a great effort.

Jason swirls his cocoa around in his cup. "About what?"

A certain amount of talent is required when donning the cape and tights, not to mention a hell of a lot of training, but gut feeling goes a long way to keeping a guy alive—and Jason's starting to get that phantom feeling in his gut.

"I miscalculated on a matter." Damian finally says, rough with something strangely like disappointment.

In his peripheral, Jason can see Damian turn towards him, looking for any facial cues that might suggest Jason's ready with a snappy put-down. A light in a building across the street goes off, the window going dark, and Jason sips from his lukewarm cocoa. Damian looks down on the worst part of Gotham, as if willing an emergency to manifest.

"Grayson refused my affections." Damian finally says, fierce and quiet like he's still trying to find the right way to say the words so the reality of them hurts less.

Understanding unravels in Jason's gut, like having the lights turned on in a room that was previously pitch black. Suddenly, Damian's desire to prowl the streets, even if it meant doing so with Jason, his reckless lashing out, his solo patrol—it all makes sense.

Jason doesn't need the specifics to know how it all went down. Dick loves Christmastime, flourishes in the kindness of the season the way sunflowers turn themselves toward the sun, and Jason can see how Damian wanted it all to work. Dick under the mistletoe or alone in Damian's room, Damian's seizing the opportunity with his heart in his throat, buoyed on the belief that circumstance and bold-faced luck might be enough to make his mentor finally notice.

Dick's gentle refusal and Damian's blistering shame.

It's a Robin right of passage, almost.

"Go home." Jason sighs, his breath a white puff in the space just beyond his mouth. He tosses his cup over the edge of the roof, watching it sail through the air.

Damian turns, slowly, like he's trying to find a deeper meaning in what Jason's said. Some wisdom or sympathy Jason should, but has never claimed to, have by way of age and experience. There isn't any, and it doesn't take Damian long to figure that out.

"Are you deaf or just stupid?" Damian snaps, allowing his hurt to turn him cruel.

Itching for a cigarette, Jason mutters. "Well, I can hear you."

"And 'go home' is all you have to say?" Damian demands, warningly, a serrated edge to the question that says Jason had better have something else to add.

There is a right and a wrong way to answer, and Jason's not quite sure which of them is to blame but they're careening down the well-worn path that ends nowhere good. Maybe it's a Wayne thing; this need to push until something breaks. Maybe that's giving too much credit where an entirely different explanation is due.

Jason knows he shouldn't, but its been so long since he's traveled the path of least resistance, he probably couldn't find it if he tried. "Yup."

Damian's anger is a hot coal flaring in the darkness, bright and greedy, fed by slight and shame and something Jason recognizes but knows better than to inspect too closely. Hot breath condenses before Damian's mouth, loud and noticeably uneven—an attempt to call upon countless breathing techniques, learned from yogis and shaman and everything in between, to calm the incendiary intensity of his rage; forgetting that oxygen only fuels a fire.

"Then you are a greater idiot than anyone has ever accused you of being." Damian spits, a vehement accusation, a stab in the dark; nowhere near close enough to make Jason flinch, but Damian is persistent. "You truly were a waste of my mother's time."

Jason's fist clench by his sides, unintentional and all too telling—and Damian was trained by the best, raised to scent weakness like a starved shark.

"And an even greater waste of my father's."

Talia would be disappointed if her son went for anything less than the jugular.

Jason sends Damian's cup flying, the contents splattering tights and boots alike with sugary flecks of cocoa, and the full force of his weight slamming up against the nearest wall pries the air from Damian's lungs. Uneven brick digs into the teen's back and Jason's hand is a band of steel at Damian's throat. It doesn't matter that Damian saw the attack coming, doesn't matter that he blocked soon enough to get a bruising grip on Jason's forearm—Jason's got eighty pounds and at least eight inches of leverage on the kid.

Just a little more pressure and Jason could crush Damian's windpipe. There's a merciless, perfectly clear moment where Jason imagines doing it.

"I've had just about enough of whatever this is—so lets get to the fucking point." Jason can feel the thud of Damian's pulse through his glove, ten dull points digging uncomfortably into his forearm, and he barely has to lean down anymore to growl in Damian's face. "What the fuck is it you want?"

Thrashing like an animal against Jason's hold, Damian brings his knee up and into Jason's stomach, nearly knocking the breath out of him. Jason exhales a pained grunt, but his grip never loosens. Not wanting another knee to end up where it shouldn't, Jason crowds Damian against the wall, pressing him still with the bulk of his body. It's a simple thing to manhandle the other into submission, to squeeze the corded column of his neck, and feel Damian's gloved hands flutter faintly in time with his pulse.

Harsh breath stutters out of Damian's chest, and it takes Jason a moment to recognize the hardness pressed against his thigh.

"What the-" Jason nearly pulls away.

Damian's grip tightens on Jason's forearm, keeping him in place.

Confused, Jason takes in the color rising on Damian's cheeks and experimentally flexes his hand around Damian's neck.

This close, Damian has no hope of twisting out of Jason's grip, and if he weren't burning hot with a heady mix of shame and arousal, he would know better than to even try—but he's got nothing to lose with Jason. He doesn't care if he looks ungainly struggling against Jason's weight, if his efforts are in vain, panting wet and heavy plumes of white in the cold night. He kicks and tears at Jason and it's as inelegant an attempt as it is futile.

It takes Jason a minute to understand why Damian isn't getting anywhere, why he isn't some kind of seriously injured.

The answer, when it comes with bared teeth and empty threats, is surprisingly simple.

They are the hallowed sons of collateral damage, the ones who won't stay dead, and Damian doesn't want Jason's affection; hasn't fought for it through blood and tears and unholy resurrection. Instead, Damian sought him out like digging under the skin to free a splinter, boyish and bullheaded and wanting somewhere deep down for this too to leave a scar. A reminder—like the knotted tissue along his spine, the shiny pink skin knitted over the hole ripped through his abdomen—that all things that hurt, eventually heal.

"Oh kid," Jason shakes his head. "You came to the wrong person to figure that shit out."

"Keep your mouth shut." Damian growls, his words like loose gravel through Jason's grip.

"You know, you're really not in any position to be demanding anything." Jason reminds, watching as Damian's scowl deepens.

He bucks against Jason, an angry thrust designed to use Damian's entire bodyweight against Jason—but it is mostly an effort to cover up the push of Damian's hips against Jason's thigh. Friction creates warmth, and its warm between them but the cold clings to Jason's back with a determination to match Damian's. Jason shifts, tucking his thigh between Damian's legs, and the bitten-off, strangled sound he can hear smothered in Damian's chest is enough evidence to suggest it may have been a good move. Or, at least, one that may not end up with him kneed in the balls for his efforts.

Damian thrashes, his grip loosening on Jason's forearm with vague intent, and Jason's got his wrist pressed to the wall in a punishing grip before he can get any ideas that involve nerve strikes.

"Is this what you tried to get Dick to do?" Jason asks, taunting, the curve of his mouth the reciprocal to Damian's. "Because I can see where that went wrong."

"I said keep your mouth shut, Todd." Damian spits, fighting against Jason's hold.

"Why, don't you want to think about him?" Jason's grip on Damian's throat keeps him from turning away, and the blush that spills across his cheeks is as much confirmation as Jason could need. Damian never asked for Jason to be nice. He's a means to an end, a warm body to rage against, and maybe there's an ember of spite that flares to life in Jason's chest—at Dick, at Talia, at... It doesn't matter. The point is, Damian doesn't get to forget who this body belongs to. "I know you are; that's how replacements work."

"Did you learn that from my father?" Damian snarls, digging the bony jut of his kneecap into the soft flesh of Jason's inner thigh, in case the words aren't hurtful enough.

Jason jerks Damian by the neck, his head connecting sharply with the brick, before he can pretend it isn't a reaction induced by Damian's words. If Jason were a better person, he wouldn't notice the satisfied smirk curling at the corners of Damian's mouth, wouldn't let the knowledge eat through his stomach like acid.

Ducking his head, his breath warm on Damian's ear, Jason digs his thumb into the soft give of Damian's neck. "You want me to be nice to you? Make you feel real special, like Dickie does?"

"You don't know what you're talking about-" Damian pants, either curling in on himself or into Jason's shape.

It's a bluff Jason's willing to call. He leans in, lips touching the crest of Damian's ear in a careless brush of warmth on cold bitten skin. "What do you want me to say, hm? What makes this better for you?"

"Nothing." Damian bites out, just short of a sob, and in another context, it could sound like a plea; at least they're being honest with each other now.

"Maybe call you little D? Ask you real nicely if you're having fun on my thigh?" Jason loosens his hold on Damian's throat, entertaining the idea of exploring other parts of Damian's body.

Damian tenses, his grip on Jason's forearm turning painful once again; providing an interesting counterpoint to his words. "Remove your filthy hands from my person, Todd."

When Jason shifts to oblige, to move away, Damian throws his strength into fighting back, hooking his foot around Jason's calf and pressing down warningly on the muscle Jason needs to remain standing. He only lets up when Jason stops pulling away, and Jason laughs at the contradiction of it all— Damian's desire like one of those woven finger traps that only pulls tighter with resistance.

"You know, this is why Dick doesn't take whatever you feel for him seriously." Jason growls, catching on to how Damian needs this to go. "He's not gonna push you for love, and he's certainly not going to take this kind of abuse." Jason shrugs, knowing Damian can feel it from shoulder to thigh. "You may be a Wayne, but you're not the right one."

"Take that back." Damian snarls, face pinched in anger and unguarded injury.

"Why? You know it's true." Jason breathes into the warm space between them, smirking when Damian's hips roll up into him with a sullen resentment. "Set your sights a little lower and look what you get."

Damian's knees draw together, and Jason can't tell if he's embarrassed by the innuendo or the reality. Tensing as pleasure licks at his nerve endings, Damian abandons himself to the act; aborted little thrusts turning more determined, coordinated, and Jason can remember rushing towards the finish line with anyone who would stay still long enough; angry and humiliated and picturing someone else. He gives Damian's throat a squeeze. "Though I guess between Talia and Bruce, pragmatism was never going to be your strong suit."

A groan tries to claw its way out of Damian's throat, imprisoned by teeth he isn't the least bit shy of showing off, and Jason's gloved hand. Quick to switch his grip from Damian's neck to his scalp, Jason yanks on the short strands there and pulls Damian's head to an acute angle, enticing a shudder either from the force of the action or from the shock of cool air on his bruised flesh.

Despite his comically raised chin and his vulnerable, bared throat—his painfully obvious erection trapped in layers of thermal tights, pressed pleadingly between Damian's stomach and Jason's thigh—Damian manages to look defiant. "Shut your mouth."

"C'mon kid," Jason taunts, shoving Damian further up on his thigh, the fabric of Robin's cape catching on the rough brick at his back. "What d'you really want?"

Damian bares his teeth and fights against the hand in his hair, the thigh pinning his hips in place, the cold biting at his throat and the reality of the situation—everything that has lead them here. He doesn't sob because he's a Wayne, because he's a goddamn al Ghul, and Todd doesn't deserve the satisfaction; doesn't deserve to see Damian like this. Todd is worse than dirt, nothing remotely like Gr-

"I'll- kill you-- Todd." Damian grits out, caught somewhere between a snarl and a groan, g
rasping the width of Jason's forearm with a familiar, spasmodic rhythm.

Jason laughs, turning Damian's face toward his so they can both be sure of the sound. "Before or after you come all over yourself?"

Panting, open-mouthed and poised on the knife's edge of orgasm, Damian snarls, his hand slipping from Jason's forearm to grope hopefully between them. His hand slips down Jason's armor, a runaway seeking a reciprocal hardness between Jason's legs, and cups the protective shape of Jason's armored jock.

"Uh uh," Jason shakes his head, and he's never been so turned on by someone's groan of disappointment. "This is your mess, not mine."

Not bothering to remove Damian's hand from between them, clawing at his body and catching on the buckle of Jason's hip harness like he needs something to hold onto, Jason pulls back enough to let Damian know he's watching. Talia likes to bite, and Bruce hardly makes a sound, and Damian gives into the pull of Jason's hand in his hair, shuddering and gasping a breathless sob of a name as he comes undone.

For once, it doesn't bother Jason that it isn't his.

: : :

Damian has receded into his cape, like being swathed in yellow doesn't draw more attention to him, and Jason is across the roof, inspecting the rim of his helmet like it's the most interesting thing he's done tonight. Later, there might be some remorse, some guilt where one of them feels bad about taking advantage of the other— they might even talk about how Jason had to peel Damian's cold fingers off his belt long after his knees were no longer weak—but right now everything sounds like an apology, so neither says anything.

Jason shoves his helmet on, hoping to deflect the glare burning a hole in the back of his head. Apparently his helmet only works on shrapnel and bullets; go figure.

"You got what you wanted, now get the fuck out of here." Jason says, gruff by virtue of being the one to forfeit silence.

He jerks his head in the direction of Wayne Manor, like either of them needed a reminder, and in his peripheral, Jason can see Damian's still form, his cape hanging heavy and undisturbed around him. It's cold enough without wind, but a gust might send Damian away with it, like so much ash, and Jason finds himself wishing for one. From here, Jason can't tell if Damian is caught between moving or speaking, but it keeps him rooted in place.

"What?" Jason barks, pleased to see the narrowing of white lenses in his direction; it's a normal response.

"If I arrive alone, there will be questions."

Confusion twists Jason's mouth, and he's glad he had the forethought to put the helmet on. "No more than you showing up with me."

Singed pink from being out in the cold for so long, Damian's scowl is the only indication that he may be blushing, displeased with Jason's response—and it dawns on Jason that Damian isn't inviting him back to the Manor out of some misplaced, post-orgasm kindness, he's trying to lure Jason back as cover. His arrival would overshadow Damian's return and, because Damian isn't in the business of taking Jason's feelings into account, effectively throw Jason to the wolves of concerned affection that would otherwise be set upon Damian for disappearing in the first place.

Damian has become the perfect blend of Talia's ruinous cunning and Bruce's prodigious avoidance.

"Oh no bratling," Jason laughs, equal parts surprised and impressed with Damian's manipulation. "That's not how this works. You're just gonna have to miss me."

"Tt." Damian scowls, his denial an immediate, familiar security. "Don't flatter yourself Todd, your uncivilized absence won't be mourned."

Behind his helmet, Jason rolls his eyes, finding his foothold in the conversation with every familiar barb.

"Next year, ask for an island or something." Jason kicks some snow sludge off the roof's ledge, waiting until it lands with a wet slap on the lid of a dumpster a few stories down. "You're too old to believe in this shit anymore."

"Don't insult my intelligence, Todd." Damian growls, anger bubbling in his words. "My mother would never have allowed me to entertain such childish delusions."

Adding that he already has an island seems unnecessarily contrary.

For an interminable moment, Jason is as quiet as his faceplate would suggest. He watches Damian with an intensity borne of his expressionlessness, and Damian scowls at him, twisting his face into a snarl like throwing a pebble into a smooth body of water.

"Of course not," Jason laughs, and the sound is whiplash without an expression to pair it with. "What would your mom want with a kid?"

Damian's shoulders draw up with the vague impression of taking insult, and Damian is such a conflicting mix of impulses—greedy and standoffish, but so needy and new to wanting so badly. Eager to belong and scared to share; mad with craving his part in a greater whole he's been promised since birth.

Its exhausting, and Jason doesn't even spend that much time with the kid.

Jason shoves his hands in his jacket pockets and he just wants Damian to leave. "I meant you're too old to believe that anyone ever gets what they want."

There is no underlying sarcasm that Damian can detect, no hidden meaning he can decipher; just the bald recounting of hard lessons repeatedly learned. The straightforwardness of Jason's honesty makes Damian intensely uncomfortable, and Jason wonders what Damian wanted out of all this if it wasn't honesty. Under Damian's cape, Jason can detect a slight movement, like the crossing of arms or the controlled reach for his belt.

"I am a Wayne." Damian says, and its clear from his emphasis that he believes the name is a synonym for winner. "I always get what I want."

With a pop and a blur of yellow, Damian is gone.

: : :

Pulling his helmet off and kicking his door shut, Jason aimlessly scatters papers and discarded food wrappers until he finds a disposable cell phone. Jason hates initiating phone calls, but he hates entertaining uninvited guests even more so he sets his helmet down and pulls a glove off—only one, because his heater hasn't worked for days—and punches in ten digits he couldn't forget if he tried. Pressing the call button, Jason holds the phone to his ear, listening to the ringing with an annoyed determination.

"Brat's headed your way." Jason says when he hears the other person pick up, avoiding the tangle of well meant but entirely unnecessary pleasantries he's sure to receive.

"Jason?" Dick sounds confused, but not altogether surprised.

Jason breathes a silent sigh of relief. It could have been— worse. "Don't act like you didn't know he was down here."

The silence on the other end is as incriminating as anything.

"Anyway- yeah, he's headed back but-" Jason tongues his bottom lip, scratching absently at the corner of his domino.

"What happened?" Dick's voice is worried on the other end.

"Don't worry, just- uh," Jason rubs his palm against his thigh, reacquainting it with more appropriate sensations. "Give him time to change. He got a little... carried away."

If that isn't understatement of the century...

"Is he alright? He left so quickly I didn't have a chance to-"

"He's fine." Jason assures, not wanting to be murdered in his sleep because he gave Dick reason to sit Damian down for a heart to heart while still in sticky tights. Jason has no doubt the heart to heart is coming—Damian fucked up when he fell for the chattiest Bat in the world—but torture is all about circumstance. "Just give him some space, Dick."

There is a pregnant silence on the line, loud in the way silence can be when both parties know there's more to come and the only question is who will be the one to speak first. It doesn't take long for the words to free themselves from behind Dick's teeth.

"Did he tell you-?"

"No." Jason denies, and the quality of the silence changes. He's sure he's seen Dick relieved before, but Jason can't get Bruce's face out of his mind; the lines on his forehead smoothing, the strong dip at his temples easing. Forcing himself out of that place in his head, Jason focuses on his distorted reflection staring back at him from the smooth surface of his helmet. "And I don't want to know. Keep that shit in the family, and leave me out of it."

"Jason, you are family."

"Dick, not now."

"But you are-"

"I will hang up the phone." Jason warns, with every intention of doing so.

"You could come over." Dick counters, like he's being particularly clever when he's really just trying to get his way.

Jason looks around his dirty, mostly empty apartment. He can still remember the feel of garland wrapped around the Manor's banister, wound around the smooth surface as much for decoration as it was to stop them from racing down it. He can picture the odd decorations Alfred dutifully hauled out of storage each year, stupid things that had no real meaning but held a greater value for their uselessness. He wonders if they still put up multiple trees—because that's how things are at Wayne Manor.

That's how things are with Bruce. Always an abundance, until there isn't.

"I think I'll pass. Got just about all the Wayne holiday cheer I can handle for one night."

"Tomorrow then? Alfred's cooking, and we would all like to see you." Dick pauses, his tongue suddenly too large or heavy for what he wants to say next.

Jason knows he's not nearly lucky enough to get away without Dick saying it. He considers hanging up, right now, before he has the chance.

"Bruce would really like to see you."

Too late.

"Funny thing about those Wayne's; they always want something." Jason presses his knuckles into the table, waiting for either his bones or the wood to protest. "No's never really been an answer."

On the other end of the line, Dick sighs, "C'mon Jay, it's Christmas, don't be so hard on him."

Jason's knuckles start to sting.

"Say hi to Alfred for me."

Its quiet, and Jason wonders where Dick took the call for there to be so little background noise. He entertains the idea that Dick hung up on him. That would be a first.

"Alright." Dick finally says, and it's like a concession. One more failure for Dick to add to his lifelong list of things and people he couldn't fix for Bruce.

They all have a place; Dick's is just too close to Bruce to see that this is Jason's.

"Merry Christmas, Jay." Dick says, and despite everything, there's optimism there, like he still has hope that Jason might change his mind and they'll be a big happy family if Dick just keeps fighting the good fight.

"Yeah," Jason sighs, and turns his knuckles upward, the skin an angry blotchy red that will no doubt purple into bruises later. Damian will be wearing turtlenecks for days, and running the streets tomorrow is going to be hell.

"Yeah. Hey, uh," Jason swallows, shifts his weight, reaches up to thumb at his nose but his fingers end up pushing through the tangled mess that is his hair. This courtesy call wasn't supposed to morph into a full-blown conversation, but unintended seasonal misfires that end awkwardly seem to be the flavor of the night. "I gotta go."

And that's about as polite as Jason gets.

Dick probably says goodbye, because he's always known how to be better at all this than any of them have, including Bruce, but Jason's itching for the conversation to be over and so he hangs up before he can be politely reminded of his invitation to the Manor.

Warm in his hand, Jason shoves the cell into his pocket and shoves his hands back into his gloves. Grabbing his helmet off the table, Jason pulls it over his head. Coming back to the safe house was a bad idea, an invitation to think where he would much rather not, but tonight's been full of them so maybe Jason isn't fully to blame. He heaves open the nearest window and climbs out onto the fire escape, the metal singing with the cold.

Gotham is quiet, cold—a monolith of familiar darkness, and as Jason takes to the rooftops, snow flurries begin to fall.

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