Chapter Text
Jason Todd stood in his empty dorm room and fuck maybe he was crying a little. How could he not? He was going to college. Getting here had been… It had been a lot. Growing up poor, he’d hoped he’d get a chance like this. As a homeless kid just trying to survive, he’d been sure he wouldn’t. When he’d been adopted by a billionaire, suddenly college wasn’t just an abstract hope. It was a sure thing.
Then he’d fucking died.
Dead kids didn’t get to go to college.
That had been his mantra after he’d emerged from the Lazarus Pit. He was a zombie with a side of murderous rage. He wasn’t good for anything except anger and death. College wasn’t for people like him, and if he were honest with himself, it never really had been. Not when he’d been a street rat and not now that he was a dead street rat. That’s what he’d thought anyway.
But after he’d completed his training, ready to head back to Gotham in a storm of rage, hatred and blood, Talia had pulled him aside, put her hands firmly on his shoulders, and asked him a question he’d never forget.
“Is this really what you want?” she had asked. “I will support you in anything, habibi. You are my son. Damian’s brother. I love you. Is going back to Gotham and carrying out your plan what will make you happy?”
Talia had never been one for open affection, and honestly, her calling him ‘my son’ had thrown Jason completely. It had thrown him enough to clear his mind of the haze of the Lazarus Pit and truly think about what he intended to do.
“I,” he had frowned. “I want…” What? For Bruce to kill the Joker? For Bruce to prove his love?
All this time, he’d spent so much of his energy thinking about a man who probably didn’t care about him at all. Who’d probably never cared about him. Because of course Bruce hadn’t cared. If Bruce had loved him then the Joker would be dead. If Bruce had loved him then there wouldn’t be a new Robin flying around. If Bruce had loved him then he wouldn’t have buried him in a public cemetery next to the egg donor who had sold him out. If Bruce had loved him then his only memorial wouldn’t be a bloody Robin suit with a plaque that read ‘A Good Soldier’. If Bruce had loved him then he would have been there when he needed him. Not just when he’d died, but after too. When he’d been wandering around Gotham with no idea who he was.
But Bruce hadn’t been there. Talia had. Talia loved him. Damian loved him, even if the little demon would never admit it. And Jason loved them back.
Why had he wasted so much time thinking about a man who didn’t give a shit about him when he already had a family who loved him?
“What do you want, my son?” Talia asked him. “What do you truly want?”
And when Jason pushed aside his obsession with Bruce, the answer was so clear. He knew exactly what he wanted. He knew what he’d always wanted, ever since he was that little street rat who spent money he needed for food on making himself look clean. Because he’d needed to look clean and presentable to get into the public libraries. Because they wouldn’t have let a dirty homeless kid touch the books.
“I want to go to college.”
And Talia had made that happen for him.
“Errr,” an unfamiliar voice said from the doorway of his dorm room. “Homesick?”
Jason frantically wiped the tears off his face as he turned towards the stranger. He thought he should feel embarrassed to be caught tearing up, but well, he had fought tooth and nail to get here. He wasn’t ashamed of getting emotional about it.
“I never thought I’d make it here,” he told the other teen honestly. “They’re, err, good tears.”
The other teen gave him an understanding smile. “I get that,” he said. “If it wasn’t for my scholarship, I wouldn’t be here at all. I’m Matt, by the way. I assume we’re roommates.”
“Jason,” he said as he took in his new roommate. The guy was small and twiggy. Jason could probably bench press him. He was swimming in a green hoodie and looking like he was about to teeter over from the weight of the box he was holding. His dark skin was sheened with sweat, likely from nerves or exhaustion. “Need help with your stuff?” Jason offered.
Matt grinned at him, open and genuine. “If you don’t mind?”
Jason shrugged. “It’s no problem.”
The two boys spent the next ten minutes or so moving Matt’s stuff from a beat up Honda on the street to their dorm room on the third floor. Matt’s mother was stationed by the car, guarding her son’s belongings. When they were finished, the friendly but pushy woman insisted on treating Jason to lunch before she headed on home. It had actually been pretty nice, although Jason and Matt hadn’t been able to get many words in between her enthusiastic chatter. The woman had even given Jason a hug as she left, saying, “I’m so glad Mattie is already making such nice friends. Look after my boy, won’t you? He can be a little shy.”
“I’ll do my best,” Jason promised, finding he actually meant it.
Matt groaned and put his face in his hands as his mum drove away. “I’m so sorry about that.”
“Don’t be.” Jason grinned and nudged the boy playfully. “It’s only fair I get to see your mum embarrass you after you walked in on me crying.”
That startled a laugh out of Matt. “I’m so glad you were crying. I would have been way too intimidated to talk to you otherwise.” Then Matt’s eyes widened. “Errr, not that I’m saying you look mean. You just look like the kind of guy who’d stuff a nerd in a locker. No wait. That came out wrong. I just mean—”
“It’s fine,” Jason said with an easy grin. “I know I’m a big guy.” He was two hundred and fifty pounds of pure muscle, after all. He wasn’t a stranger to accidentally intimidating people. Hell, during his time with the League of Assassins, he’d used his size to intimidate a lot of people on purpose. He wanted to tell Matt that he was a total softie underneath, but he’d probably killed a few too many people to be able to claim that.
The boys continued to chat as they unpacked their stuff in their new dorm room. Turned out Matt was an engineering major with a passion for race cars. Since Jason was a literature major they didn’t have any classes together.
“Dang,” Matt joked. “Now I can’t use you as a social buffer.”
“Me? A social buffer? I promise I won’t be any better than you at making friends.” Jason had spent the last few years talking to no one but assassins and ancient warrior monks. His conversation skills were all kinds of rusty. Even before he’d died, he’d struggled to connect with the rich kids at Gotham Academy or the teen heroes who saw him as Dick Grayson’s replacement.
“Then at least we could have been bad at making friends together,” Matt wined.
“Have a little faith, Matt-ch Stick. You’ll be fine.”
“Alright, I’m confiscating nickname privileges. That was terrible.”
“Aw, come on. Nicknames are how I bestow affection.”
“Matt is already a nickname. My full name is Matthew.”
“That doesn’t count. Please?”
Matt sighed, trying to hide the smile that broke through his fake exasperation. “Fine. What else have you got?”
It was the first day of classes at Metropolis University and Jason was a mess of nervous excitement. He felt like a kid. He hadn’t felt like a kid in so long. Not since… No. He pushed all thoughts of Bruce and Robin away. There was one primary reason he’d chosen to go to college in Metropolis and it was that Metropolis didn’t need a vigilante. Metropolis had Superman, and unlike with Batman, Metropolis was thriving for it. Even though Superman couldn’t be everywhere at once, the mere act of victims calling for Superman’s help was enough to make a would-be mugger run away. The crime rates were low and the people here were happy. It made Jason uncomfortable, but it was worth it. No part of Jason Todd felt like he should don a mask and fight crime. Unlike Gotham, Metropolis didn’t need anything from Jason Todd.
But, fuck, trouble just seemed to find him, he supposed. It had happened so quickly. Someone had yelled, “That’s my bike!” Then in a split second, Jason had taken in the situation and stuck his arm out, clothes lining the would-be bike thief, and catching the bike before it could get damaged. The dude groaned as he lay on the ground next to Jason. A moment later, two girls about his age came running over, panting up a storm.
“Oh my god, thank you!” an Asian girl gasped as she looked up at Jason.
“Uhh, it’s what anyone would have done,” Jason said. Because it was, right? This didn’t count as vigilante work because any good samaritan would have stopped a bike thief.
“And you did it well,” said the other girl, a tall redhead. By the girl’s admiring grin, there was some kind of innuendo in there, but Jason didn’t know the first thing about flirting so he decided to pretend he didn’t notice. Dating was way down his list on becoming a regular college student. Right now he just wanted to make friends and learn things.
The thief scrambled to his feet and boosted it. On instinct, Jason almost chased him down, but then he remembered that he wasn’t doing vigilante things anymore and let the dude go. The girls didn’t seem to care anyway, since they had their bike now.
“I’m Susie,” the Asian girl introduced with a bright smile. She was short as hell and styled all pink and flowery. She gave a little wiggle like she was brimming with energy, and Jason was reminded of a puppy in the best way. No harm should ever befall this cinnamon roll, he decided.
“Lisa,” the redhead introduced. Her smile was more of a smirk and while Susie was all softness, this girl was sharp. Her style wasn’t completely goth but between the extra piercings and worn jeans, it definitely had an edge to it.
“Jason,” he introduced.
“It’s great to meet you Jason,” Susie said. “I’d totally buy you a coffee or something as a thank you, but I have to get to my Austen class.”
Jason perked up. “‘Jane Austen and Her Legacy’?” he quoted the class name. “I have that too.”
“Oh nice!” Susie cheered. “Class hasn’t even started yet and I’ve already made a friend.”
“Yep, that sounds about right,” Lisa teased. “I have to fight other people off Susie with a stick.” She pretended to size Jason up. “I think I can take you.”
Jason snorted. “Sure you can, Red.”
“Don’t underestimate me,” Lisa joked. “I fight dirty.”
“Well so do I,” Jason said with a grin.
“You guys can duke it out later,” Susie said, pointing towards the literature building. “We have to get to class.”
“Damn, yeah, I have physiology,” Lisa grumbled. “We can finish this another time.”
They split off as Susie chatted excitedly to him about Jane Austen. Jason was more than happy to gush back. It turned out, Susie was also a literature major like him, and she made period costumes on the side. Susie had also informed him that Lisa was a nursing student, and her best friend from high school. Jason patted himself on the back for making more friends and decided to forgive his vigilante-like actions.