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"Jason?" Bruce's voice was cautious, low, as if he feared that the excessively high tone might hurt him. "How do you feel?"
The others were all there, watching the scene, while Bruce helped him sit up on the infirmary bed. All in silence.
Fuck, how much he had missed the silence.
The magic sucked. Jason wasn't just saying that because he was a normal human — about taking away the whole All Blades thing that didn't always come in handy since those damn swords didn't show up when he fucking needed them — that he had to do with mystical bullshit.
He said it because risking at least once a month to end up stuck in a time loop because he had annoyed a witch, or having to deal with yet another nervous breakdown of Raven, sucked.
The magic was unpredictable. He had his own rules, rules that Jason didn't understand. And magic users had a more fucking moral code than his, and it took some.
Did you help them? Here, they had to give you a gift, even if you didn't want to. Especially if you didn't want to.
For a week, Jason had been in danger of going crazy, with the thoughts of others swirling in his head. With Bruce's thoughts always present, drilling into his skull and making him wonder if this was the kind of Hell that man was constantly experiencing.
Nothing will be secret from you and you will have everything at your disposal, said the wizard who had accidentally helped during a job with the Outlaws. The asshole forgot to say Ah yes, there will be no way to rein in your thoughts, no painkillers will soothe the pain, and you will see things that might drive you crazy.
He had tried to manage it alone. Yes, very bad idea. But being alone was better than being assailed by other people's thoughts.
But the situation had reached the point where Jason needed help.
He had to ask Bruce to help him. And it had been terrifying.
He had thought he was dying. Bruce had feared it, too. And he had done everything in his power to prevent it.
Jason hated feeling indebted. He hated the feeling of dependence, even though he knew Bruce would never use it against him. No, Bruce was too good for that.
A good person.
A good person to whom all of them gave hell because his brain did not work as it should.
"I don't understand,” he croaked; the sound of his own voice was foreign to him.
“What don’t you understand?” Bruce asked, remaining kind.
That damn gentle tone. That fucking kindness.
Jason wanted to shake him by the shoulders and tell him to stop. Stop being so kind. I don't deserve it. None of us deserves it.
Jason looked at the other man, the one who had tried to kill so many times and had forgiven him, the one who always forgave everyone and shouldn't have done it,"I really don't fucking understand. Why are we still here?"
"Jason! What the hell?" Dick shouted, as if Jason had just cursed or made something irremediable. Joke on him, that was probably the least cruel thing Jason had ever done in his fucking life.
"Oh, don’t even try, Goldie. You weren’t in his mind like me, Jason said with a grimace. God, the things he had seen...” I can understand you feeling a responsibility for the brat, since he's still a minor, and for Duke, since his parents are basically just vegetables now. But what about the rest of us? Aside from Cassandra, every single one of us has given you hell. Multiple times. Fuck, I almost killed you, and I came close. I was glad I came close. So, why do you let us come here again?"
Other people's thoughts were noisy. Unbearable. But Bruce's... Bruce's had shown him how he saw them. As they appeared when they tried to be heroes, independent adults, but they were worse than capricious children who tore off the pieces of their favourite toy and then threw it away as soon as they got tired. Jason had seen.
He had heard. Hatred. Not Bruce's. No, but theirs.
The hatred that had been poured on him, in a loop, cruel phrases that cut more than the fucking batarangs, which were always in Bruce's mind, constant, reminding him of his place. Bruce believed they hated him. He was convinced of it. But despite this, he still let them be part of his fucking life.
Who in their right mind would do that?
"Isn't it obvious?" Bruce looked at him, his expression neutral, “As you said, you were in my mind. You know.”
This made Jason's mouth dry even more. Yes, he knew. He had heard it. He had been overwhelmed. He was silly. It was stupid. It was so Bruce that he would almost kill him just to make a point. It was just fortunate that he was too out of his mind to even think about taking the gun, let alone using it.
"I know. But they should hear it," he replied, nodding to the others present, "Maybe they will stop their victimisation if they hear you say it. Fucking hypocrites."
"Jason, I understand that you just recovered..."
"No, Dickhead. Let the old man speak. I know you're not used to listening to it, but for once, try it without being an asshole."
A flash of anger crossed Dick's face. It didn't take a telepath to know what was going through his mind. Jason saw him open his mouth when Bruce finally said, "Because I love you. Isn't that reason enough?"
The others looked at him with shocked expressions.
They were really surprised that Bruce loved them. Not that you could blame them: if you treat a person as if they were a piece of shit almost every day, you ostracise them, you shovel shit on them, you don't expect them to love you.
But, since Jason had been in their position, he knew it wasn't just that: Bruce was a man who expressed his emotions differently. His brain was different.
They all wanted him to be more normal, more appropriate to the concept of how he should be; they wanted to forget that Bruce was different. Different, not wrong.
Bruce was still a paranoid bastard, let's be clear. But they were not innocent lambs.
For this reason, he could say with certainty, "No, Bruce. It isn’t.."
"Jason, that’s enough…”
It wasn’t. And he wouldn’t be quit about that, "Don't be a hypocrite, Dick. That's not reason enough. After everything we've done, after the things we've said behind his back, after all the time we left because we were angry, after all the hate…How can Bruce still love us? We don't deserve it. I saw how he felt, afterwards. After every time. He is not even the one who initiates the discussions. Very often, it is us. Fuck, I'd have punched you all if you disrespected me just a tenth of what you do with him. If I were Bruce, I would have changed the access codes to the cave, like, yesterday. How he can put up with people yelling at him for being nagging, controlling, and paranoid, and then help them when they come to him is a mystery to me. I swear I would leave you to die. We don't even ask his permission. We just show up and demand things from him, whether it's his time, money, or his affection. But oh, be careful, the affection must be normalised, standardised, it must not go off the track, not be too abnormal. And so, it's never enough; we're never satisfied. Because for us, he is never enough. He isn’t normal enough…”
"Jason, that’s enough," Bruce tried to interrupt him, but Jason didn't want to stop. He was probably wasting his time. All of them were stubborn bastards. But he had to try. He owed it to Bruce,” We wear him down; we hurt him. He shouldn’t even love us anymore; we have no rights over him. None!”
At the end, Jason almost lost his balance and nearly fell. It didn't happen by a hair's breadth, and he was grateful for it. It would have been such an anticlimactic conclusion to everything.
Dick and the others didn't look at him. Nor did they look at Bruce. Oh, Jason acknowledged the guilt. But it was a momentary thing. Damn, in a few days, and they'll be back to being assholes.
As soon as there is a joint mission of one of their teams with the League, they will immediately start puffing out their feathers like fucking peacocks to show that they know what they are doing, ignoring the risks to themselves. There will always be something that will break the momentary peace, a reason to unload one's anger on Bruce, no matter the reason, nor if the reason was valid (no, it never was, not at the price of heartbreak).
Fuck all of them, and fuck normality.
"What do you want me to do, Jason?" Bruce asked at that point, with the weariness of someone who'd found himself asking the same question many times before, only to be met with ridicule. Jason wouldn't even have considered it before, but Bruce tried. For them. He tried so hard that it hurt. And none of them reciprocated.
So, he didn’t hesitate: "I want you to put yourself first. To kick us out, to cut off contact with us, to..."
"Go no contact? “ Dick repeated, disgusted at the mere idea, “Hell, no.”
Jason looked at Dick with a grin that didn't reach his moist eyes, "What, are you afraid of losing your favourite stress reliever, Dickhead? Then, who can you blame without having to worry about the consequences? Barbara certainly didn't; she knew you too well. Maybe Kory, but if you tried, I'd rip your balls out myself, you bastard.”
“I don’t do that.”
"In case you forgot, I've been in Bruce's head. And it's pretty much what happens every fucking time you two fight. How did you call him... Ah, an amoral asshole who should learn to communicate if he doesn't want everyone to leave him to rot alone. What are you waiting for? Go away, if you hate him so much."
The older paled, "That's…I don't hate him, Jason.”
The worst part? Jason knew it was true. Dick wasn't lying about that. He had heard his thoughts, and God, that asshole was a daddy boy with serious codependency problems. He was not the only one.
It would have been easier if they hated Bruce. Maybe they would finally get out of the balls. Unfortunately, they did not hate him. They loved him. Not that that affection was worth much when all of them were contributing to Bruce's worsening mental health and pushing him away more and more.
"You don't hate him. Too bad you don't even like him. You would like it to be normal. Whatever that means. As if only one of us were normal. What stupidity," grunting, he got up from the bed, and with uncertain steps, tried to get away, "You know what? I'm not having it. I'm leaving."
It was a nightmare to stand; any remedy Zatanna had come up with to break the spell of telepathy had to be strong stuff. It felt like he was made of jelly. Despite his legs not wanting to cooperate, Jason continued to walk. He couldn't stay. He had no right to do so.
It hurt, in every way, because a part of him wanted his father Bruce. He wanted them to be a family. But he won’t pretend that he was not one of the cancers that were reducing the man's life.
He won't do it again. If Jason wanted a place in Bruce's life, he had to deserve it. And to do that, he had to solve his shit first.
Bruce tried to stop him, "Wait…”
"Don't blame yourself," Jason said, squinting his eyes to try to focus on what was around him, "Fuck, don't even think it's because I hate you. But I…I respect you too much to pretend. We do you more harm than good, Bruce. The sooner you realise that, the better."
"You're my children. I can't..."
"You deserve better. You have to have better. And we all have to learn to give it to you.” Jason turned to his right, towards Tim - no, wait, it was Damian, maybe, "If you really care about him, take a fucking step back and stop doing... whatever you all have going on. I can't read your mind anymore, and neither can he. He doesn't know that we don't hate him..."
"Then what? Shall we leave like you, Todd?" so, it was Damian there.
Jason snorted, "I'm doing him a favour."
"You're running away like a coward."
"Probably. But at least I admit that I am a problem. Can you others say the same?"
He didn't wait for the brat's answer. Nor did he listen to Tim or Stephanie when they told him he was still too weak to leave. He would send Roy a message to be picked up. Or in Kory or Artemis. Heck, even Bizarro would have been fine.
But he couldn't stay. He couldn't.
God, it was true: there is no curse more twisted than love.