entranceway | one; text {come to my house & we'll pick the bones}

[Jason doesn't bother replying. He chose a room on the top floor, for easy access to the roof, so he makes it there in five minutes, scowling as he searches for this mystery person he's meeting, a broken chair leg in hand for a makeshift weapon.

... He really misses his guns.]

( jason's there, but he takes his time watching. . this jason from the shadows, following his movements, watching the gait of his walk. it's seven minutes past the last text when he steps out of the shadows, helmet still securely in place, guns strapped to his thighs, and a knife in his hand.

which he's turning around in his palm, offering the hilt to jason with one hand while the other raises palm-up to show he doesn't have any intention of reaching for those guns yet.

and when he speaks, it's muffled through the mask: robotic, almost. much like bruce, he's not fucking stupid enough not to use some kind of voice changer: ) Gonna need some proof you're not some kind of sick Clayface incarnate.

[Ah, so this must be the mysterious know-it-all from the network. Sick helmet, dude. Jason watches tensely as he approaches with the knife, left hand wrapped tightly around the chair leg, ready to strike if it's necessary - which it isn't, apparently. Jason glances from the helmeted figure to the knife and back again - he's really offering him a weapon? The implication's pretty clear - he wants to see his blood, and Jason's not on board with that idea, but sure, he'll take that knife, thanks. It's a little awkward to hold in his right hand with half of his fingers still splinted, and judging by the other guy's getup, a knife probably won't do a whole lot of damage against him, but Jason already feels better with the metal resting in his palm.]

Yeah? Well, I'm gonna need a pretty damn compelling reason to give you proof of anything. Start by losing the helmet.

( a knife won't do shit against his armor, especially considering how fucked up this jason is. voice patterns, his gait, his face--it's like looking in a fucking mirror, if his face wasn't so fucked up. not that this jason's is much better, but at least he hasn't been branded. he looks--a little older, maybe. not by much, but enough to be noticeable. there are small differences, but nothing large enough to call him an overly shoddy impostor. he's either clayface back from the dead, a strange as shit copy, the mirror bullcrap they talked about, or. . just a different jason.

the last one's probably closest, but also the one he's extremely hesitant to believe. )

Helmet comes off after you bleed. ( his neck cranes in the opposite direction, shoulders raising in that same, smart-assed shrug. ) Or we could do it my way and I put a bullet in your brain. Considering the look of you, it wouldn't be too hard.

Haven't you heard? No one stays dead here.

[Not that this is any real surprise for Jason - nothing of huge difference from his life before he woke up in Wonderland. It's not bad enough to get murdered, he had to get brought back and deal with everything after, knowing that his death didn't mean shit to the people he cared about the most. He laughs under his breath.]

You wanna see me bleed? You first.

[He shouldn't be fighting so soon, not with those cracked ribs still healing, but going hand to hand with a guy wearing this much armor is stupid, no one would seriously entertain that idea. No one except Jason, apparently. He's thinking - clock him in the head with the chair leg as a distraction, sink the knife into the back of this guy's knee, maybe the armor doesn't cover that far.]

Nah.

( but that's fine. this "jason" may be beat up, possibly with a few broken bones here and there, fighting hard to stay standing, but--jason todd has no problems shooting someone down who is in that condition. he's quick to pull one of his guns out of it's holster, raising it before giving jason a chance to respond and pulls the trigger with the barrel aimed for the side of his arm. not enough to do much more than skin him a little, but.

skinning him a little's all he needed. )

[Injuries mean his reaction time is off - Jason should've been able to dodge that bullet, but he doesn't. He's not wearing armor, just regular street clothes from the closet in the room he's taken over; it's not much in the way of resistance, and the bullet slices neatly through fabric and flesh.]

Ow, [he mutters, stumbling half a step backward, dropping the chair leg onto the roof but he hangs onto the knife even as his hand moves instinctively to cover the wound. It's fine - he's been shot before, this is just a graze, nothing he can't stitch, and who would Jason be if he couldn't tolerate a little pain? It's pain worth tolerating; he has a little more information now, valuable information about how this armored figure operates. Jason pulls his hand back from his arm, and sure, there's the blood that was requested of him, a nice normal human shade of red, smeared over his hand and the knife held in it.]

You missed. [His head, anyway.]

I didn't miss. ( he got what he wanted; blood dripping to the floor and not turning into mud as soon as it hits the rooftop. he's real, but it still doesn't rule out something like--hush's case. but who would want to copy jason todd, and more importantly, he's missing the scarring. jason doesn't have the equipment to run a full dna test yet, but. maybe he'll have to look into getting one.

for now, he's moving a hand up to the helmet covering his face, unlatching the front and pulling it up a bit before taking off the entire helmet itself with one hand. the other keeps a firm grip on the gun, just in case. he knows himself well enough, but he's not exactly sure who this asshole is.

his face is nearly-identical to the other's own: a little younger, maybe. definitely more scarred--and then there's the burned "J" seared into his cheek. their voices definitely match, at least. )

I answered your question, are you gonna answer mine?

[The helmet comes off, and Jason's eyes go wide as saucers. It's like looking in a mirror, almost - the scars, the J brand, those are obvious differences, but the rest of it? Far too close for comfort.]

You already know who I am.

[That much was clear from the initial texts, and that's about as much of an introduction as Jason's willing to offer at this point. But what it means that he knows who Jason is - what Jason's brain is struggling to reconcile with his understanding of reality - that's much less clear. Clayface is an obvious guess, he'd mentioned it earlier, but just why the hell would Clayface want to pass himself off as another version of Jason, here, much less confront him like this? That makes no sense. A mirror doppelganger on the loose, maybe, only they don't look exactly alike.

A different version, perhaps. There's timeline fuckery afoot so why the hell not fuck around with different dimensions, too? Jason points at his double with the knife in his hand.]

What the hell is this?

[Explain, dude.]

( another knife's pulled out from his belt--and jason's moving to remove a glove from one of his hands (fingers twisted, broken and rebroken to try to get the bones back in place but they've never quite set right) and wraps his fingers around it, squeezes hard enough to break skin.

and then he's opening his hand, palm down. letting the blood leak free from the wound and drip down on the roof, makes his own small puddle of red. he's not clayface. the one in front of him isn't clayface. which leaves clones (unlikely), alternative versions (also unlikely), or he's really lost his shit this time (extremely likely). there's. seriously no reason to copy jason todd, though. declared dead years ago, abandoned by bruce wayne and left for dead. replaced. he's worthless.

just a street rat who should have died years ago. )

Why the hell do you think I know?

[Not Clayface - OK, that's one possibility ruled out. Still leaves plenty of others, though.]

You're the one with the file on me, wise guy - seems to me like you know a lot more than you're sayin'.

[Having all that info on Jason Todd was unnerving enough, and that's before Jason saw this guy's face. He sticks the knife through a beltloop at his back and wipes his bloodied hand on a clean spot of his shirt sleeve.]

What's with that getup, anyway? You s'posed to be some kind of robot clone or something?

All that shit I said was information on myself. ( why the hell does he have to be the one to clarify this. jason supposes he was the one who dumped information out out on this guy, therefore.

still doesn't stop him from hating every bone in this jason-clone's body. it's good he didn't expect to get that knife back; handing over something sharp and pointy to him would get much the same reaction. a free blade is a free blade, and he has good taste in all things sharp and pointy, thanks. )

Kevlar enforced armor. ( as if that explains it. honestly though-- ) Do you think if someone was trying to clone you, they'd brand your face? What kind of stupid, shitty move would that be?

( more importantly: ) Who the fuck would clone Jason Todd?

[Who indeed. No one wanted just the one around. Jason's mouth settles in a hard frown.]

I can tell what it is, genius - I'm not blind. What I'm asking is why you're wearing it. [Honestly. Why does he have to spell this out.] Has Gotham - I'm guessing it's Gotham? - gone to that much shit, or are you just really into cosplay? I mean, if you're me and this [he gestures at the other Jason's armor] means I've got some kind of latent nerd fetish, I think I should know.

( what's really stopping him from pulling out his gun again, resting his index finger against the trigger, and pulling it? this mansion isn't big enough for the both of them anyway, is it. )

April 27th.

( his voice is low, calm even if there's an edge to it that says he's struggling like hell to stay calm. )

The fuck happened to you? ( because that's what led him into this armor, isn't it? an explosion, waking up tied to a chair, getting the shit beaten out of him day in and day out. being abandoned. left for dead. replaced. tortured, drugged, hit, kicked, stabbed, dealing with harley-fucking-quinn. )

[He recognizes that tone, and somewhere in his brain, Jason knows he probably should shut his damn mouth, or at least try to keep his tongue in check. He always knows when running his mouth isn't the smart move, but it never stops him from doing it.]

What happened to me? [His eyebrows reach high up into his hairline. What is with this guy?] Why're you asking what you already know? I died.

[He has to stop then, inhale a shaky breath. Pull himself back from the edge of screaming incoherent, pure rage, just like he did when he came back to life under water.]

What, you want a blow-by-blow for comparison? [His face twists into an ugly snarl as his voice takes on an imitation of the Joker's tone, words that have echoed in his ears every day for the past five years:] "What hurts more - forehand or backhand?"

( familiar words, sure. but jason states he actually died. not just. died, but died died. he raises the helmet back up, puts it back on over his head and presses it down with a hand to the top of it. that was more than long enough with his face exposed, thank you. and the last fucking thing he wants is for someone to happen on them, see how similar they are, and draw the correct dots. )

People don't just come back from the dead. Not unless "people" are Ra's al Ghul. ( raising both hands up!! ) I didn't die.

( there really is no point in hiding jack shit either, is there. ) I spent a couple years in an abandoned wing of Arkham tied to a fucking chair for that asshole's amusement.

[Somehow, looking at a helmet instead of his own face doesn't help - Jason knows what's underneath the helmet now, and that brand on his cheek is still sharp in his mind. He doesn't miss the namedrop, though - his lips curve into an angry smirk.]

Y'ever wonder what would happen if you dropped a dead guy in Ra's' little fountain of youth? 'Cause - not to spoil the ending, but it's all right there in the name.

[Lazarus Pit. Duh.]

Don't remember hearing being told to "come out," but it was a little hard to hear anything over all the screaming.

[Mostly his own. Which Jason didn't realize at first, but hey. Details. Which he isn't gonna volunteer, nope.

At first, Jason thinks his doppelganger's talking about Ra's being the one who kept him captive, marked up his face, but - no. That's a little too small in scale for someone like Ra's al Ghul. It takes his mind a couple of seconds to piece together what Jason's saying, and what he's not saying, but the brand is a J, and it happened in Arkham, and suddenly, the picture becomes very clear.

It was the Joker.

And some part of Jason understands that what this Jason is saying is that he spent two years being tortured by the Joker. Another piece of him understands that Batman must not have saved him, if it went on that long. This Jason didn't die, he said as much, and Jason still has to bite back the urge to ask him Yeah, but did you die? when he explains in few words the fate that befell him.

Jason doesn't want that sick, sharp feeling that's now twisting in his gut to be because he's thinking about what two years of what he experienced at the Joker's hands would feel like. He doesn't want to have the realization that death would've seemed like a goddamn relief to be settling heavy in his heart. He doesn't want to think about anyone else's pain but his own, but he is now, and he hates it.

Because some small part of him knows, now, that dying isn't the worst thing that could've happened to him. Jason's expression doesn't really relax, but it settles into something a little more stony, less indignant.]

Didn't really figure the Joker for having the attention span for such a long-term project.

Edited 2017-12-20 02:43 (UTC)

( jason knows what the pit does, thanks. he also knows that one has to be at least a little bit alive for it to work, that something has to be still ticking in a body to bring it back up. this jason doesn’t have any fucking reason to lie to him though, not one that he can find, so he’ll believe him for now. what choice does he really have? interrogating himself isn’t going to get him anywhere. hell, he’s been through that shit enough and wouldn’t even want to fucking touch it.

and if he’s being honest, that shred of hatred he feels for this jason todd grows even stronger knowing he got to take the easy way out; he died. it was over for him. he was brought back by the pit, resurrected by ra’s al ghul for god knows what reasons. to get back at batman. to have some leverage over him, something. whatever his reasons were, the al ghul’s aren’t—nearly as fucking crazed as the man with the glasgow smile. this jason todd died the day the joker nabbed him. he got out.

unlike him. it explains how few scars he has, the lack of a brand. the mild differences between them. and hell if he isn’t jealous. he wishes he had died. wishes it’d have been over—hell, he wouldn’t have blamed bruce on it, jason’s the one who ran four steps too far and got himself into that bullshit. if he’d died, he would have been done.

he wouldn’t have begged for it to end, begged for the joker to stop, begged for him to please just let him go. jason cracked, he had been broken and repieced back together into a suitable toy. carved out and replaced with nothing but hatred and— )

Neither did I. ( both hands free, he raises them up to his sides, gives an idle shrug of his shoulders as the blue slits in his mask over his eyes glow faintly. ) But as it turns out, even crazy assholes with zero attention span can find somethin’ to hold onto. ( the voice changer kicks in, muffles his tone. but the venom in it is still evident enough even through that. ) Guess we can’t all be winners.

[Jason didn't stop to ask about the specifics of how and why the Lazarus Pit worked - he just knew that one second he was dead and gone, and the next, he was back, alive, alone. Bruce was nowhere to be found, and by the time Jason got his head on straight long enough to piece together what happened while he was dead, he discovered that the Joker was still alive.

And that knowledge - that Bruce cared so little about Jason's murder that he let the Joker continue to breathe - hurt more than being murdered in the first place.

Maybe if Jason had stayed dead, he could've counted himself luckier than his counterpart. He hears that tone through the scrambler, though - easier to pick up, now that he recognizes the voice as his own - and that shred of empathy dug into his heart disappears.]

You think this is what winning looks like? [He scoffs quietly, pointing at himself.] I think maybe you need to get the wiring in your helmet looked at, pal.

( the helmet back in place gives him some sense of control, some sense of—himself, of who jason todd has become, rather than what he was. he’s not robin, trying his best to impress, or the captured boy wonder, tied to a chair and babbling nonsense. he’s the arkham knight—completely in control of himself, leader of his own militia: the man who will take down batman. )

My wiring’s just fine, kid. ( a gloved hand raises, index finger pressing to the side of the helmet and thumb moving down—pulling the trigger on his own makeshift gun despite the fact he has two perfectly good ones on his thighs. ) Or as fine as it’s gonna be, right? ‘least you’ve still got your pretty face going for you.

( he drops his hand down to his side, braces his palm against his hip. ) How’s this gonna play out, “John Doe”? This place isn’t big enough for the both of us. Especially not with. . even more doubles on the other side of those mirrors.

[Kid earns Jason a raised eyebrow from this Jason, as does that comment about your pretty face. He may not have as many visible scars as his double but Jason's under no illusion that he's ever been much to look at.

He knows his own defense mechanisms, though, knows that he defaults to sarcasm and barbs as a way of covering for his own insecurities, knows that he shines an aggressive light on the things that hurt him the most as a way of pretending that he's untouchable. Is that what this is, then - insecurity? Does the other Jason feel threatened somehow by this Jason's presence, by their similarities and their differences? Not physically, of course; Jason's still injured, his double is heavily armed and armored, so in a physical contest at this particular point in time, there's no question as to which of them would walk away the winner.

No, the threat - if that's what it is, and Jason's gut tells him it is - must be something else. Something deeper on the inside. Sure, Jason's unsettled by the other Jason, by knowing what he does about what happened to him, but as much as he refuses to admit it aloud, the other Jason is, to some degree, right - out of the two of them, he's the one who's suffered more. Jason's death and subsequent resurrection weren't easy, but in comparison to years of torture in that maniac's hands, what Jason experienced was a goddamn cakewalk.

Ah. There's that spark of empathy again, burrowing deep in his heart like a parasite, forcing Jason to consider pain beyond his own, reminding him that he's human and not the monster he's convinced himself he needed to become - or maybe was all along, lurking underneath skin and muscle, in his nerves and blood and bones - in order to accomplish his goals.

He hates this - hates feeling, and hates himself, if he's being honest - but he can't find it within his battered heart to hate this other man who was unlucky enough to be born with the same name and face as him. He's had enough to deal with, from the sound of it - he doesn't need a feud with Jason on top of it all.

So Jason chooses, here and now, not to fight the other Jason - in his very Jason way, of course.]

What do you suggest, we thumb wrestle for who gets to stay? [He rolls his eyes.] Believe me, if there was a way outta here, I would already be gone, and you could have all this Wonderland bullshit all to yourself.

[They're both stuck here, regardless of the size and population of the place. Unfortunately.]

How's this sound? You stay out of my way, I'll stay out of yours.

( the absolute shittiest part of all of this is—he can see the gears start to turn in the other jason’s head, can imagine the shit going through his brain. there are probably quite a few other differences, but he can read it on this guy’s expression that they’re not all that different. the quirked brow—he doesn’t think he’s much to look at either, never did. street rats were meant to blend in with the rest, and there are several hundred of them in gotham, including himself. it ticks him off that he can read this guy reading him, that their ticks are similar enough to be picked up on both ways.

and that he can see the moment jason decides not to fight him, too. that the stupid banter is just that—it’s just there to cover. they’re both stuck, they both know that, there isn’t any point in stupid, reckless fights with himself. he’d beat this jason down easy, but what’s he gonna do? kill himself? where will that get him?

absolutely fucking nowhere. with more blood on his hands. )

Keep the knife. You look like you need it more than I do. ( jason has another to spare, and he's not about to fight this guy for the one he's got in hand. ) You stick to your side, I'll stick to mine.

( simple enough in theory. in practice, he imagines it'll be a little more difficult, considering that there aren't sides here to occupy. levels inside the mansion, sure, but if they start fighting over who gets which floor, it'll be a fight for the top-most floors, and neither of them are going to want to give up the high ground. )

Don't bother me, I won't bother you.

[He doesn't have a helmet, but Jason doesn't try to conceal anything in his expression anyway. If the other Jason reads him well - that's to be expected. Trying to hide from someone who knows you about as well as he knows himself is futile, so Jason doesn't even bother trying it.]

Yeah ... [he nods.] Sounds like a plan. [It's a totally reasonable and workable plan. Surely nothing will go wrong here.] Which floor're you staying on? So I know which one to avoid.

Tenth.

( he would have thought that was obvious: always have the high ground, just in case. jason assumes this guy's also on the same floor, too; makes that whole floor-avoidance thing a little difficult. asking for room numbers is more likely to help, but like hell is he telling, and he expects the same from this guy. )

[Yeah, that should've been obvious. Jason nods in begrudging acknowledgement, mouth set in a wry twist.]

I'm not moving. The view's too nice.

[So yeah, he's on the tenth floor too. Maybe it would be smarter to relocate - maybe it would be smarter still to keep his location a secret. But if this Jason's anything like himself, he'll probably find it out anyway before too long, if he hasn't already.

That should be the end of the discussion, but for a reason Jason can't quite put his finger on yet, he feels compelled to say more. Extend an olive branch, maybe, or just let the other Jason know he's not afraid of him.]

Room number's 2, far end of the hall.

Edited 2018-01-04 19:35 (UTC)