Tuesday: Time Travel

[argentum_ls]

Hello, everyone. I’m argentum-ls, pinch-hitting for the week, and today's theme is time travel. Prompts can be characters going back or forward in time, time itself changing directions, metaphors about time or traveling through it, or any other way you way to interpret the theme

Comments

fill - 1/2

[likewinning]

The whole thing takes five minutes (and a couple of decades). Joe Chill dies like any old crook, one shot to the back of his head. Jason leaves him out in the open for all to see. The Waynes come across his body on their way home from the movies, and it inspires them to hold more benefits for crime prevention, donate more money.

Gotham gets a little cleaner. A little safer. Not enough to scare the gangs away, not enough to save the cops from corruption -

But enough.

-

"Brucie," the woman says. Her name is Veronica, and Jason's been casually insinuating his way into her life for weeks, just to get dragged along to this party. She's good friends with Bruce Wayne (as much, she had prefaced, as anyone can be good friends with Bruce, considering his attention span), and currently, she's dragging Jason by the arm to where Bruce holds court over his empire of drunk rich people.

"This," Veronica tells Bruce, shoving Jason forward, "is the one I've been telling you about."

Bruce looks up at him, and Jason forgets to breathe. He looks -

Rested is one way of putting it. The young side of thirty-something, like he's never met a problem he couldn't throw money at.

Another, far more accurate way of putting it is that Bruce looks fucking beautiful. Eyes twinkling blue. Hair just the right side of tousled. Skin tanned and unscarred, arms muscled but not Batman built.

Bruce is fucking beautiful, and just for a moment, he's giving Jason his full attention.

He holds out his hand, offers Jason a blinding, billion-dollar smile and says, "Jacob, isn't it?"

Jason doesn't bother to correct him. He licks his lips and thinks close enough.

2/2

[likewinning]

-

He stays long after the others leave. Bruce asks him about himself, and Jason mixes all kinds of lies in with the truth - that he's an orphan, that he works for the city, that he travels the world but he was born and raised here in Gotham. Bruce half-listens to him in between letting other guests fawn over him, but every time Jason gets up to (pretend to) mingle, Bruce draws him back in with a strong hand around his wrist.

And Jason, well. He changed Bruce's entire past for him. It's not like he's able to resist. Anything.

"So," Bruce says. Just about everyone's gone; the cleaning crew is already here, and it's just the two of them in front of Bruce's fireplace, Jason sitting on the arm of Bruce's throne of a chair like there aren't a hundred other places he could be. "How is it I've never seen you here before?"

Oh, you know, Jason thinks at him. Been stuck in the wrong shitty reality. Instead he looks around the penthouse - a lot of the decorating is gaudy as hell, like someone's been telling Bruce the wrong way to spend his money, and a small part of Jason wants to smash things up just to fuck with Bruce - and then back at Bruce.

Bruce looks - maybe not happy, but content. Relaxed. Just the right side of drunk, and Jason can work with that. "Must've just slipped under your radar, Brucie," he teases, and Bruce's nose crinkles up and he laughs, actually fucking laughs, and the sound of it startles Jason so much he nearly falls off the chair.

He doesn't, though, because then Bruce's hand is on his leg - casual but proprietary, warm and strong. "You know," Bruce says, "no one I'd actually call a friend ever calls me that."

"Good to know," Jason says, and Bruce's hand is a little higher up now, and any minute Jason is going to be in Bruce's lap, and Bruce asks, "And what do your friends call you?"

If I had any? Jason doesn't ask, because in this world he's still - he's still Jason, and it's not like he's here for anyone else but -

Bruce's other hand is touching his neck now, thumb over his pulse point, and, "You," Jason starts, stops. You called me Jay, he doesn't say, just lets out a breath and doesn't say you can call me anything because a million dollars says Bruce has heard that one before.

All at once Bruce tugs at Jason and Jason is straddling Bruce in the chair, and Bruce might not be Batman anymore but he's still swift and graceful as fuck and his mouth is against Jason's throat, teeth just there but not biting and he just says, "Hm. Well, we'll come up with something."

And Jason doesn't know if it's just something Bruce says in this moment before he pulls Jason down and kisses him, or if he means it like Jason's here to stay.

It doesn't really matter. There's time to figure that out.

Re: 2/2

[daria234]

!!!!!!

I love this SOOO much!!! (This is the Bruce/Jason prompt I've left that I most wanted someone to fill and I am SO happy you did!!!!)

I love that Bruce is so possessive with him even though they've just met. I love Jason thinking he's beautiful and observing all the similarities and differences. I love that Bruce still has moves fast enough to pull Jason close -- super hot, that :)

Thank you so much for writing this terrific fic :D

Re: 2/2

[likewinning]

<3! that's so funny because I saw this one when you first prompted it and I was like "I WILL COME BACK TO THIS ONE DAY. :|" (or really i kept waiting for someone to write it but you can't always get what you want, hahaha)

anywayyy I'm so glad you liked this. I just loved the prompt so much because for all their issues, ugh, Jason would totally turn everything else upside down like that for Bruce. (and if his Bruce ever found out he'd probably kick his ass. because you can't just mess with these things, jason, jeez. ;D)

you're so welcome! :D

Re: 2/2

[leni_ba]

Interesting! I kinda want to see more about this Bruce.

Re: 2/2

[likewinning]

Thanks! In my head he's a little bit of Christian Bale's Bruce Wayne mask (aka a spoiled, entitled dick) who's lived this really easy life, but also he's fucking bored. This Bruce has never worked and his parents are still alive so he doesn't have to run the company... so basically Jason, who seems to know him without actually knowing him, is the first interesting thing he's seen in probably, well, a decade.