If there's no-one beside you when your soul embarks

[isitablurred]

Who: Batfamily and the usual hangers on, tag yourselves in
When: Night of the 7th, morning of the 8th
Where: The Batcave, and then the East shore of the city
Summary: Tears. Lots and lots of tears. All the heartache. Then we set fire to Batman.
Warnings: Violence, character death, funeral, heartbreak, blood, batkids fighting. Will probably add to this

Comments

~3 or 4 am.

[under_thehood]

When Jason finally arrived at the Cave, his jacket and gloves splattered with the blood of criminals he'd slaughtered without a second thought, it's without pomp and circumstance. He spotted his father's body immediately and pulled off the helmet. Bruce. Bruce. Maybe there was a reason after all why Willis and Sheila had never wanted him and it stood staring him down in this moment. He failed. He had been a failure since the beginning of his life and it continued now.

No, it had to be their fault. Not his. He didn't choose this. This was... this was Clark's fault. Oh now that sounded good in his head. The big fancy Kryptonian couldn't save anyone, could he? With all his super special powers, he couldn't do anything. That was the difference, that's what made this the Super's fault. Not his.

Regardless, though, Jason stood silently at the door to the cave, observing his father's corpse from a distance. This should never have happened. This should never have fucking happened.

Don't you want to know what he said to me he wants to ask. Those were his last words. You're the oldest now act like it. How fucking dare him.

hope this is okay! if not, I'll post under clark's thread

[bodyreads]

Cass was right behind Jason as she got into the cave. She didn't think how her shadow fell upon the walls like Batman's as she came in costume, not until she saw it for herself. A wave of guilt rushed over her from earlier, from remembering that she could have been there to help him...if he had only allowed her. Instead, he had given her this list of drug dealers so she could hunt them down. He had distracted her when she could have helped. He had misled her when she could have been there.

Could she have helped somehow? Or would she have just been a hindrance?

She slowed as she came to Jason's side through the entrance and she spared him a glance. Her eyes couldn't be seen beneath the lenses, but her mouth was twisted down in a sad and sympathetic frown. She didn't know how to comfort him, but his anger, his pain... It was all too clear to her.

Instead, she bowed her head and moved past him, her cape almost dragging against the rock beneath her feet. She lifted her eyes to see Clark and then she removed her cowl. She dropped it on a table nearby and then she moved to her father's body, sadness apparent in her gaze.

S'fine~

[isitablurred]

Clark made as if to rise from the wall, to cross to Jason and speak to him while he had the opportunity, but that was when the shadow of the bat swept across the wall and Cass came in, causing him to hold his breath, sink back, hold his ground.

The Red Hood--Jason, slipped off his mask, became once more the son and not the killer, but stood apart, watching from the door. Cass, on the other hand, strode straight to Bruce's side. He was unmasked; after all Clark knew how the cowl was armed. He had worn it before.

It was unfair to break into their grief, so instead he remained silent, lowered his head until his chin almost touched his chest.

<3

[under_thehood]

Jason shifted his weight when he almost felt the shadow of the Bat before seeing it. He acknowledged her with a flick of his angry gaze before it centered again on Bruce's body. He didn't acknowledge Clark in the slightest as he remained where he stood near the door. There was a strange weight of finality resting on his chest as he kept his eyes focused on Bruce's face, on the eyes closed. Despite the fact that Jason himself had risen from the dead a short six months after his own passing, the weight of grief continued to pull at him, but he outright refused to acknowledge it like he refused to acknowledge the superhuman in their midst.

He set the helmet quietly on the floor and stripped the gloves respectfully from his hands. This was not a place of blood, not yet, and the jacket soon followed, folded up beside the helmet. If either were moved, he would detonate them, but at the moment he had no worries.

Still, he didn't approach Bruce's side.

[bodyreads]

The sight of him was staggering. Part of his skull was missing and his head was entirely empty. She didn't flinch away from the sight, instead taking her hand and running it down one of his arms to feel for fractures, other injuries he had sustained in the fight that had brought him to this. It only took a few moments, and then she was back looking at her father's face, at his closed eyes, and she felt such a weight of despair. Her fingers curled into fists at his side and she bowed her head.

This wasn't right. This wasn't right at all.

His cowl was gone. She cast her eyes around until she found it. Silently, she reminded herself to check the video feed from it later so she would know how he died, who killed him, and what they could do to prevent it from ever happening again.

She turned to Clark. "Thank you," she said quietly. She didn't elaborate on what she was thanking him for; he would know. Then she looked over at Jason, imploring with her eyes. He could come over. She crossed to the other side of the table to give him room to be with his father too, if he wished.

/jumps in again >>

[under_thehood]

Despite Cass moving to the other side of the table, Jason remained by the entrance of the Cave, his face as blank a slate as he could make it. But just behind the facade he wanted to scream at Bruce and at the same time sob over his body. He wanted to tell his father everything: the good, the bad, and the ugly. It was far too little, far too late, though, and he knew that too well.

And here they were far beyond the crossroads, far beyond the point of no return. He knew as soon as he left, the entrance would be changed, he would never be invited back.

This was it. The last of his family had died. His father. Bruce. Bruce. It was done.

His expression flickered, anger sparking through his eyes as his chest burned, his exposed fingers twitched.

[bodyreads]

She wasn't sure if she expected him to come over or not, but she wanted him to. The pain and anger in his eyes, in his body, was so evident... It was painful enough for her to just watch it. But this was a man she had never spoken with before coming to Siren's Port, someone she had a great deal in common with but someone she never thought she could associate with. There were miles between them and a gap they might never be able to bridge. But she wanted to try.

Bruce would have wanted her to. More importantly, she wanted to.

She reached out a hand for him, trying to encourage him over. "Jason," she murmured quietly. Please, understand. "He's your father." She would leave if he wanted her to, if he wanted to be alone with Bruce. But she wanted him to at least say goodbye to the father he had.

[under_thehood]

Jason flicked his hateful gaze over at Cass when she spoke, his jaw clenching unnaturally tight. Of course, he knew very well that Bruce was his father, even if both of them denied it to the world; a bond had formed between them that would never disappear, no matter how much they screamed or beat on each other. Even now, the vigilante couldn't bring himself to deny that fact, couldn't even mutter the denial under his breath. He didn't want to need a moment alone with his father, he wanted to be able to storm out the door and never look back, but couldn't. Instead, he remained rooted by the door as his chest burned.

Wasn't this what he wanted? Bruce dead? It's what he'd tried to do on his own but not done so. Hadn't his anger against Bruce now been exacted?

But seeing his father dead brought none of that relief, none of that peace he imagined so long ago. Instead there was more anger, more hate, more pain.

"I don't care." The words are stiff and forced, the worst lie he's ever told because even he can almost see through the fog to the fact that he does care.

[isitablurred]

Clark stirred in his corner. He was watching the whole thing quietly, choosing not to interfere, simply because if he did, he interrupted the natural mourning process. Jason needed to work his own way through this, not be told how and when he mourned.

A lie. It's easy to tell the difference because usually he tells them so easily. And Cass... Cass is trying to cope by comforting the others. He wants to thank her but he can't find the strength. Instead he says only:

"Tell him. For once he might actually listen."

[under_thehood]

Jason didn't even acknowledge Clark with a glance, instead with a tightening of his jaw and half an eye roll, eyes directed up and away from both of them for a moment, as if the ceiling of the cave held a way out of all of this. He felt like he was being suddenly ambushed by both of them, as if they could somehow force him to grieve properly instead of ignoring it.

"I'm done with this freakshow." The response was barely a growl, barely even coherent words stirred with so much hate and anger he can barely speak them.

And he began to stiffly pull his blood-spattered jacket back on, not at all caring what they might think of him leaving without him even beginning the mourning process and instead shoving it off on to some later day.