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raaorqtpbpdy · 4 months

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Bothersome Bonds (DP x DC)

For @ghostbsuter for the BatPham secret santa exchange, with an illustration also by me. (Posting here on tumblr late since it was supposed to be anonymous for a little while)

You can also read it on AO3

[No applicable warnings]

Unfortunately, this wasn't the first time Jason had woken up on a cold, concrete floor with no idea how he'd gotten there. He didn't exactly keep count of specific bullshit like that, but if he were to hazard a guess, he'd say it was probably the fourth or fifth time at least. And it was always concerning.

His joints groaned as he pushed himself up into a sitting position. He'd slept in worse places, but a concrete floor made for a less than ideal bed, to put it lightly, and his back was killing him. The soreness in his body was the first thing he noticed as he started to take stock of the situation.

The second thing Jason noticed was a heavy cuff around his left wrist—one half of a pair of strange-looking handcuffs that didn't appear to have any sort of lock or even hinge to open them. The other half of the handcuffs was attached to... he didn't really know.

Well, no. He knew that it was a young man—probably about the same age as Jason himself, close to six feet tall, if not a few inches taller, but built like a beanpole, with messy black hair—still unconscious. What Jason didn't know was who exactly this random-ass dude was, or why they were handcuffed together.

Or where they were.

Or... how they'd ended up there.

Come to think of it, the last thing Jason remembered was stepping out of his apartment to do his rounds of Crime Alley around 9pm. He wasn't wearing his Red Hood uniform now, though, and when he felt around his body, he discovered that all his weapons were gone, even the little ones he kept hidden in his civvies.

His wristwatch showed 1:55, and it was still ticking, which meant it had been at least five hours since then, unless someone had messed with it for some reason. He had a strong sense that it had been a lot longer, but no memory of any of the time that had passed.

No matter how much he concentrated, or tried to dig up the memories of what series of events had led him to this situation, he kept coming up blank. Heat started to build in his chest as frustration rose, but for some reason it felt... different, compared to the kind of anger he was used to, quieter, almost muted, and less overwhelming.

He shrugged it off and tried to examine the room he was currently in.

It was basically a big cement box. The walls and floors were covered in water stains and scrape marks. The way the floor sloped suggested this place was at least partially underground, but there were windows along one wall near the ten foot ceiling, so it wasn't completely subterranean.

Jason guessed this place was probably some kind of cell, maybe even an interrogation room... maybe even a torture room. But there were no chains hanging from the ceiling, or rack of weapons, or anything. It was empty except for himself and the unconscious stranger next to him. For now.

The one thing Jason didn't see, though he twisted around and craned his neck looking for one, was a door.

The guy he was handcuffed to stirred, and Jason waited for him to wake up, but instead, he just rolled over, tugging on the handcuffs and pulling Jason closer to him in the process, and kept on sleeping.

Great. Real helpful.

Jason rolled his eyes and fished around in his pocket for any kind of tool that might help him get out of these cuffs. He didn't find anything.

Even if he had, there was no lock to pick. No keypad to try and guess a combination. Not even a chain to try and break with brute strength. The cuffs were held together with a glowing green cord that didn't even strain in the slightest when Jason tried as hard as he could to break it. Since he didn't know what it was made of, he didn't know what signs of strain would even look like.

He looked down at the softly snoring guy beside him. He was actually pretty nice-looking. His skin was smooth, if pale, his jawline sharp, his nose strong, his ears slightly pointed, a bit like an elf. Looking closely, though, the guy had some serious eye-bags. Jason wouldn't be surprised if this was the most sleep he'd gotten in weeks. Too bad he was the only one Jason could ask about this situation.

"Hey!" Jason shouted, roughly shaking him by the shoulders. "Wake up sleeping beauty!"

"Aww, you think I'm beautiful?" mumbled the guy, still clearly half-asleep, even as he wriggled up into a sitting position with a wide yawn that revealed sharper-than-normal canines.

"Are you familiar with a little thing called sarcasm?" Jason said, despite the fact that he had literally just been thinking about how attractive this guy was. He didn't need to know that, whoever he was.

"Too familiar, if you ask my sister." Ice-blue eyes blinked open and fixed Jason with a blank look. "Who're you?" Those eyes widened and looked around, taking in their surroundings for the first time with shock. "Where is this?"

"I dunno," Jason said. "I was hoping you would."

"That I would know what?" the other asked. "Who you are or where this is? Do you not remember your name? I remember mine. It's Danny."

"I'm Jason," he said. "Obviously, I meant the second thing."

God, Jason took back everything he thought about his looks, this dude was already annoying enough to cancel them out.

"So does that mean you don't know where we are either? Do you know how we got here? Did we get kidnapped or something? The last thing I remember is leaving work and after that... I got nothing."

"God, shut up," Jason growled. "I regret waking you up already."

"These are kinda like Skulker's," the stranger said, ignoring Jason and examining the shackles that tied the two of them together. He laughed. "Man, I'm kinda gettin' déjà vu. You wouldn't happen to secretly be a heavily armed vigilante with a red costume hellbent on destroying me, would you?"

Jason froze. "What?" he demanded.

The response was a chuckle and a shake of his head. "Don't worry about it—private joke."

Jason dragged a hand down his face with a groan. "Why couldn't I have woken up handcuffed to fuckin', I don't know, Roy or something instead of an obnoxious total stranger."

"Again, Danny. We've met already."

"When?"

"Like two minutes ago," Danny said, brows furrowing in frustration. "Nice to know you were paying attention, Jason. See, I remember your name."

"Whatever," Jason said gruffly, rising to his feet, and ignoring the way Danny winced as he got dragged up after him. "We need to find a way out of here."

"Worked that out all by yourself, Sherlock?" Danny scoffed, twisting the shackle around his right wrist to give them both a little more space.

Now that they were both standing, Jason could see that Danny was a good three inches taller than him, and his irritation towards him grew.

"I don't think we're gonna get outta these cuffs without a key-card or a saw," Danny said.

"Key card?"

"I mean, I assume." He shrugged. "No keyhole, no number pad, no fancy lock, just a flat metal surface and an EPC cord."

"What's an EPC cord?"

"Don't worry about it," Danny said again, and Jason sneered.

"Fine," he said. "Let's start with getting out of this room. I don't see any doors, do you?"

"No, but there could be secret passages or something." Danny looked around again, remarkably unconcerned by this whole situation, for a civilian. "I see windows. They're kinda high up, but if we can get to them somehow, maybe they're big enough for us to get through."

"At the very least, if we can see out, we might get a better idea of where we are."

With minimal tugging on the shackles that bound them together, the two of them walked over to the wall. The windows were much too high for either of them to reach alone.

"Get on my shoulders," Jason commanded.

"Uh... are you sure about that?"

"Well I'm sure as hell not getting on your narrow shoulders, Jack Sprat," he scoffed. "I'm pretty sturdy, I'm sure I can handle you."

"No, I mean... our cuffs are on opposite hands," Danny pointed out.

"So what?"

"So, if I get on your shoulders, we're gonna have to face... different directions. Our arms won't be able to reach that far across while I'm getting up," he said, then hastily added, "on your shoulders," as if Jason might think he was talking about something else.

"Whatever, man, we need to know what's outside, so climb the fuck on and stop wasting my time." Jason stood with his back toward the wall and squatted to give Danny easier access to his shoulders.

Danny hesitated for a few seconds until Jason used his uncuffed hand to pat his shoulder impatiently.

"Okay... if you're sure about this."

Carefully, he slid one leg between Jason's head and their manacled hands, and then hefted the other over until his knees were hooked over Jason's shoulders.

And Jason, now with a face-full of Danny's crotch, finally caught on to the reason for Danny's hesitance. He turned his face into the slightly less objectionable position of being buried in Danny's thigh and leaned his head away as much as he could, trying not to blush and failing miserably. Both hands reached up to hold onto Danny's thighs for stability as he carefully stood up.

Even sitting on Jason's shoulders, Danny had to use his free hand to pull himself up a little further to see through the window.

"Do you see anything?"

"It's definitely outdoors," Danny responded. "It's dark so it must be night right now. I don't see any people, either, but I don't have a great angle. Looks almost like a military base." He looked down at Jason questioningly. "Did we get kidnapped by the military?"

"How should I know? Last thing I remember is leaving my apartment to go... uh... grocery shopping," he covered quickly.

Come to think of it, Jason really did need to go grocery shopping. He was getting low on a lot of things and it wasn't smart to have a safe-house less than fully stocked. Plus, some of his canned goods were getting close to the expiration date, so he should really donate them before then, even if expiration dates were mostly bogus, he felt better when food got eaten before them. Safer. He really didn't want to get E. coli again, like that time when he was a kid. Once was more than enough.

On the bright side, though, thinking about foodborne illnesses was helping Jason fight off his blush. Silver-linings.

"Can you climb out through the window?" he asked.

Three loud bonks echoed in the concrete room.

"Outlook not so good," Danny replied. "Shatterproof, and a solid inch thick, and I'm at a terrible angle to try and break it, even if I could. Judging by the water stains, it leaks around the edges, but it's not loose enough to just pry it out without tools. Looks like the windows aren't an option, unless you have a crowbar on you."

Jason grimaced. "No."

"I guess we gotta look for another way out of here," Danny said. "Let me down."

Jason slowly knelt down so he could carefully extricate himself from his perch.

"The two of us got in here somehow, so there must be some way to get out," Danny continued, dragging Jason by the handcuff to another wall and feeling around for... secret passages or something? Jason didn't know.

"Unless this is a Cask of Amontillado kind of situation."

"What's that?" Danny asked. "Some kinda booze?"

"No, it's..." Jason paused, considering. "Well... actually, yes, but I was referring to the short story by Edgar Allan Poe."

"Oh, the raven guy! Yeah, my goth friend loves him. Personally I'm not much of a reader. Too busy, y'know."

Jason pulled a face. "Poor excuse," he said. "Anyway, what I meant is that they might have walled us in while we were unconscious."

"You think?" Danny asked, taking his hand off the wall. "Isn't that too convoluted? I mean if they had us in this room, unconscious, why not just shoot us, or stab us, or even strangle us? There are so many much simpler and easier ways to kill someone. Why go through the trouble of walling us in?"

"You have a point," Jason admitted. "Plus, if there was no way to escape, why bother handcuffing us together? If we're dealing with the kind of people who can knock us out and erase our memories, then there has to be some reason for them keeping us alive."

"What if this is a test?" Danny asked. "Like an escape room or something?"

"Somehow, I don't think that's likely," Jason disagreed. "If they wanted us to escape, they'd have left a note or something, or some kind of tool. I don't see anything written on the walls, so at least we know it's not the Riddler's doing. My guess is, whoever put us in here is just saving us for later."

"You think so?"

Danny went back to feeling around the flat wall resolutely.

"What are you doing?"

"Looking for a secret door!" he said. "If they plan to come get us later then there has to be an exit somewhere."

"It could be a door that only opens from the other side," Jason pointed out. "Plus, we don't know if they cuffed us before or after putting us in here. It's possible the exit is too small for two people cuffed together."

"Why are you being such a downer?" Danny complained.

"I'm just trying to cover all our bases."

"If that were the case, you'd be pointing out bases we can actually cover!" barked Danny, taking a step back from the wall to turn and glare at Jason. "If it's a one way door, or a passage two small for the both of us, there's nothing we can actually do about that. We should be focusing on the possibilities we can do something about."

Jason clenched his teeth and scowled. Normally this would be about where he started to lose his temper, but remarkably, he was still under control. As much as this guy was getting under his skin, Jason somehow managed to keep his cool. He wasn't going to tell Danny he was right... but he was right. And, if only in his own mind, Jason could acknowledge that without blowing up at someone.

"If there's a secret door, you should be looking for it where there are seams in the concrete," Jason said instead. "They'd make it easier to hide."

Instantly, Danny's eyes darted across the walls before landing on the nearest seam. At least he actually listened.

"Hey!" Jason yelped as Danny dragged him to it. What a hyperactive guy. "Ugh. You'll also want to look for scrape marks that could indicate a door swinging or sliding open, although those could be on the opposite side. And there's also a chance—if there's a secret door at all—that it could be on the floor or ceiling, like a trapdoor, or a hidden elevator."

"Got it."

"And if they weren't planning for us to slowly suffocate and die down here, then there's probably an air vent, too, although I doubt they'd make it big enough to crawl through."

Danny scoffed. "Especially for you, Mr. broad-shouldered muscle guy," he said.

There was an awkward pause before he added, "That was supposed to be an insult. You're big and probably heavy, was what I was going for. It's not my fault you're obviously buff."

"I'm big?" Jason raised an eyebrow. "Look who's talking, stretch."

"Hey, I'm not that tall!" replied Danny, indignantly. "My sister is taller. And my dad is like seven feet, so compared to that, six-three is basically average."

"Jesus Christ, how tall's your sister? What, is she an Amazon or something?"

"She's six foot five, and no, she's not an Amazon, she's a brain surgeon—well, going to be. She's still in medical school, but she graduates this year."

"What did your parents feed you two?"

For some reason, that particular question seemed to strike a nerve, and Danny shifted, visibly uncomfortable.

"Can we just focus on finding a way out? Please?"

"Fine, sure," Jason relented. "Somebody's sensitive."

Danny ignored him and kept dragging him along to the next seam in the wall.

"Look," Jason pointed to the floor. There was a tiny white scrape mark at the bottom of the seam.

"Scrape mark!" Danny noted. "This could be it."

"If it is, it'll open outward. But there's no guarantee we can force it open from this side, and we have no idea what's on the other side."

"If there are guards or something, we'll have to be ready for a fight," Danny agreed.

"Our only shot at opening it—if it actually is a secret door and not a coincidence—is gonna be slamming our full body weight into it," Jason said. "We need to concentrate as much of the force as we can right on the edge. Think you can handle it?"

"Sure I can," Danny agreed, positioning himself to body-slam the wall.

For a bare moment, Jason considered just standing still and watching Danny slam himself full-force into a concrete wall. It would definitely be good for a laugh. But them being tied together meant that Jason would probably just fall on his face. And on the off-chance it was a secret door, he would rather die again that have to hear this particular pain-in-the-ass say 'I told you so'.

"Ready?" Danny asked.

Reluctantly, Jason positioned himself and nodded.

"On three. One. Two. Three!"

the two of them took a running start and slammed into the wall as hard as they could. Even with the meaty parts of his body absorbing most of the impact, Jason still grunted in pain. Surprisingly, Danny didn't even seem to flinch.

More surprisingly, the concrete shifted. Putting their whole weight into it, the pair of them pushed as hard as they could. There was a quiet scraping sound as it dragged across the floor. Soon enough, though, the hidden door was open, and they were standing on the other side.

"I can't believe there was actually a hidden door," Jason remarked as it slowly fell closed behind them. "Honestly, I was just humoring you."

"Hey!" Danny sounded surprised and a little upset.

"Don't get ahead of yourself. Now we have to get out of this room," Jason put his free hand on his hip and looked unimpressed.

The room they were in now was much smaller than the room they had been in before. Thankfully, there were no guards inside. The ceiling was the same height as the room they'd just left—even if the room itself was smaller—with a single florescent light and an air vent that looked like it might be big enough for them. There was also a door and a window with blinds opposite the secret door they'd come through.

On this side of the secret door was a keypad and retinal scanner.

Now that he was seeing this side, Jason felt sure that the two of them should not have been able to force the door open from the other side with brute strength. Either he was a lot stronger than he thought he was... or Danny was a lot stronger than he gave him credit for. He side-eyed the taller man suspiciously.

"At least this room has a door," Danny said. Jason easily followed as he stepped over to look through the window. He spread the blinds with his fingers, and almost instantly let them fall shut again.

"What is it?"

"White suit," Danny said. He looked as if he was holding his breath, muscles stiff and jaw clenched.

"What does that mean?" Jason asked.

Danny looked at him for a long moment before shaking his head and visibly forcing himself to relax. "Nothing," he said finally. "Just a weird fashion choice."

Jason narrowed his eyes, wondering why Danny would lie when his reaction had obviously been about more than just his fashion choices. Danny kept talking before Jason could press, though, so Jason decided to let it slide for the time being.

"Anyway, I was wondering how long it would take before we ran into a guard," Danny said. "It's just the one, though, and he has headphones on playing music so loud I can hear it through the window. That's probably why he didn't hear us up to now. I'm sure we can take him."

"I'd rather not tip them off to our escape if we can avoid it," Jason disagreed. He jerked his head upward, indicating the air vent. "I'm pretty sure that vent will hold us. You think we can get up there?"

Danny examined it with a thoughtful look. It was definitely too high for him to reach just by sitting on Jason's shoulders like before, but it was worth a shot if it meant getting out of here without anyone realizing they were gone.

"How much do you weigh?" Danny asked.

"About 225," Jason answered.

"Damn, okay," Danny said. "Yeah, I can get up there, but we'd better hope that vent is really strong."

"You can?"

"Yeah." Danny grabbed Jason by the shoulders and carefully positioned him right under the vent. "Stand here, and hold as still as you can."

With that, Danny tightened his grip, jumped off the floor, and kicked off the wall behind him, so he was doing a hand-stand on Jason's shoulders, his knees bent. He quickly straitened his knees, kicking the vent cover out.

Jason reached out his uncuffed hand to catch it as it fell to the ground. Even with headphones on, the guard would have heard it clatter. Although... he should have heard the crash, too. Damn, he must have had his volume maxed out. He was likely to ruin his hearing that way.

Danny wriggled is way up into the vent, and then reached down to pull Jason up after him. It was awkward, and took both of their combined strength, but they managed to get Jason up there.

"Wow, you really are sturdy," Danny remarked at a whisper. "You didn't even sway or anything."

"You're really not that heavy," Jason said. "That was... kind of impressive, though, I'll admit. You're stronger than I expected."

"Ha, thanks."

The two of them were on their stomachs, their faces just inches away from each other in a dark, dusty vent. Jason cleared his throat.

"We should get moving," he said. "You go backward. The vent probably gets smaller toward the room we were trapped in."

"Got it."

Danny began awkwardly shimmying backward through the vent with Jason following closely. Thanks to their shackles, they couldn't put much breathing room between them. A few times, they nearly knocked their foreheads together.

Jason was grateful for the darkness. There was no way Danny could see how red his face was.

God, when was this uncomfortable foray through the vents going to be over? The quarters were way too close. Jason could smell Danny's lemony-fresh lip balm. And he was very deliberately having no thoughts about that.

Suddenly, Danny stopped, and Jason once more narrowly avoided slamming their faces together by accident. There was a soft tapping sound coming from behind Danny.

"This is either a dead end behind me, or another grate," he said.

"Well, which one is it?"

"Shhh!"

Jason scowled, but was silent, letting Danny listen for whatever he needed to hear to decide what the answer was.

"I'm pretty sure I hear crickets," he said finally. "So it's a grate... probably. I'm gonna try and kick it out and see what happens."

Danny squirmed a little farther back, lining himself up, giving his feet as much room as possible so he could kick the grate with maximum force.

Then there was a loud clang and a quiet thud of metal on dirt.

"Yup, grate," Danny said, working his way back out of the opening.

Finally, they were outside, and what a relief it was to be more than three inches away from Danny's face.

"What was that?" they heard someone say from around the corner.

"Shit," Jason whispered.

He grabbed the vent cover in one hand and Danny's hand in the other and hurried as quietly as he could. Hopefully, if there wasn't a dented vent cover laying there, they would think nothing was amiss. The dirt was dry and shifty, so it probably wouldn't leave clear footprints, especially if they were running. At least... he hoped it wouldn't.

When he was pretty sure no one had followed them, he stopped in a narrow path between the back of a building and a chain-link fence and chucked the vent cover over to the other side.

"You know, we're handcuffed together," Danny pointed out. "You don't have to hold my hand."

Jason immediately dropped Danny's hand like it had burned him. "I didn't mean to. I was trying to act fast."

"Sure you were."

"Shut up," Jason hissed. "Listen, I don't think we're in Gotham anymore."

"You're right," Danny agreed. "If there was a base like this in Gotham city limits, I would know about it. So where do you think we are?"

"I don't know, but the more pressing question is: how do we get out of here when we don't know where we are or which way we're going?"

Danny gestured for Jason to follow and led the way to the edge of the building, very carefully peering around the corner. "There, you see that big warehouse looking building with the curved roof?" he asked, pointing it out.

Jason looked around the corner and easily spotted it. "Yeah. That's an aircraft hangar, right?"

"Bingo," Danny said.

Jason grinned. He didn't know planes very well, but if there was a helicopter in there, he could fly them home. It would be loud, though, so once he got the engine going, he'd have to act fast.

"We should skirt around the edges, less risk of running into someone," Jason said.

Danny nodded in agreement.

Quickly and quietly, the two of them made their way along the chain-link fence, sprinting across the gaps between buildings, until they reached the back door of the aircraft hangar.

"Locked," Jason sneered. "Help me find a big rock."

"Or..." Danny said, pulling Jason closer by the handcuff. He wrapped the cord around the door handle in a weird and very particular way, then pulled as hard as he could.

The handle came out completely. They could hear the clatter on the other side of the door as the opposite side fell to the floor. Then Danny reached in to pull out the latch. He held it up with a victorious smirk.

Jason blinked in shock as the door swung open all on its own. "Yeah, whatever," he grumbled, pushing past Danny. He refused to be impressed by something as simple as opening a door... even if it was kind of impressive.

They couldn't risk turning any lights on, meaning they had to check each aircraft one-by one, but none of these shadowy silhouettes looked like a helicopter. And upon closer inspection, none of them looked like regular planes either.

"What are these? Experimental crafts?" Jason asked. "I can't fly any of these."

Danny snorted. "You thought you were gonna fly them?" he asked.

Jason could feel his frustration growing again. He finally realized why it felt different though. No matter how much Danny got on his nerves, it was only regular frustration and anger. The Lazarus Pit inside him stayed still and silent. It had been silent the whole time. Was it this place? Or was it something weird about Danny himself.

"Oh, and you think you're gonna fly a fuckin' experimental stealth bomber or hyper-sonic jet?" Jason scoffed.

"Uh... yeah," Danny said obviously. "I mean, I'm a test pilot for Wayne Enterprises' aeronautics and space division. It's kinda what I do."

"... oh."

"We should go with a stealth jet," Danny said, pulling Jason over to a plane they'd passed earlier, one which was painted pitch black. "That way they'll have a harder time tracking us once they realize we're gone."

"I agree, but as soon as that hangar door opens, we're gonna have guards on our asses," Jason pointed out.

"Right. I'll see if one of these jets has vertical takeoff capabilities so we don't have to get to a runway."

After examining all the stealth planes in the hangar, the best they could find was one with near-vertical takeoff capabilities. It would have to be enough. Danny deactivated the tracker so their captors wouldn't be able to follow, and then prepared for them to take off. The engine was nearly silent as he taxied the small jet in front of the hangar door.

The next problem was that, to open the hangar door, someone would have to stand there and hold down the door button.

"We could tape it down," Danny suggested.

"With what fucking tape?" Jason shot back.

"How are you at knot tying?"

"We don't have rope or string either, genius."

"I can tear a strip of fabric off my shirt," Danny said, frowning in irritation. "Why are you always shooting down my ideas?"

Jason wanted to argue—mostly because Danny just generally made him want to argue, but he wanted to get out of here more. "Fine, yes, I'm good at knot tying. That'll probably—possibly, potentially work. Maybe."

"Why can't you admit that I had a good idea?"

"Because you're a pain in the ass."

"Oh, and you're not?" Danny shot back, rolling his eyes.

He lifted up the bottom of his shirt to tear the hem off with his teeth, and Jason was surprised to see lean muscle and toned abs—though perhaps he shouldn't have been, considering how strong Danny had already proven to be, despite how skinny he looked. Even more surprising, and definitely more noteworthy, however, was the large, Y shaped scar spanning Danny's entire torso.

Jason bit back a gasp as his hand slowly reached up to his own chest, his fingers landing on the intersection of a scar just like that.

Danny was like him.

Danny had died and come back, like Jason had. Was that why the pit was so quiet around him? Was that why Jason felt so inexplicably antagonistic?

"Here." Danny held out a strip of white fabric for Jason to take, apparently not noticing that he was still staring.

Jason took it, but didn't start tying yet. He couldn't stop thinking about it. About Danny.

"How did you get that scar?" Jason asked. He couldn't help himself.

Danny's eyes widened. "What scar?"

"The fucking Y-incision scar across your torso! What the hell do you mean 'what scar'?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Danny said, though the way he shifted his weight and averted his eyes suggested that he knew exactly what Jason was talking about. "Can you just tie down the button so we can get out of here?"

"Fine," Jason relented through gritted teeth. They'd have plenty of time to talk on the plane.

He tightly wrapped the fabric until the button pushed down and tied it securely. Once that was done, and the door was steadily rising, the two of them sprinted toward the jet in lockstep.

By the time the got to the jet and took their seats in the cockpit, the door was only halfway open.

An alarm was sounding outside, and guards had already arrived. There were dozens of them, men in white suits forming a solid line across the entire entryway. They took aim with futuristic-looking laser weapons, but unfortunately for them, it seemed their jet was laser-proof.

As one, Danny and Jason turned to each other.

"How cool are you with just running these guys over?" they asked one another in unison.

Danny laughed and started flipping switches. "Guess that answers that question," he said cheerfully. "If they value their lives they'll move."

Maybe Danny wasn't so bad after all.

Jason watched in awe. He could barely recognize any of the controls. They looked like nothing he'd seen before, and he couldn't even guess the purpose of half of them, but Danny took to them with practiced ease. Jason just let his arm be pulled across the cockpit by their manacles without resistance.

In no time the jet was moving, and those white-suited guards held steady until the last possible second before diving out of the way. Jason had no idea how Danny timed it so perfectly, but as soon as they cleared the hangar, they started lifting off into the sky.

"Jason, see that switch there?" Danny pointed to a blue switch on Jason's side of that dashboard. "That should be the landing gear. Flip it!"

Jason did so quickly, and they felt a slight shift as the landing gear collapsed into the underside of the plane just in time to avoid clipping the building across. Danny sighed with relief.

"Oh thank the Ancients," he said. "I was only about sixty percent sure that was the landing gear."

"Wait, have you been guessing at all the controls?"

"Most of 'em," Danny admitted with a shrug. "I'm a test pilot for experimental planes and rockets and stuff. I've flown countless different crafts, all with slightly different controls, but they're all variations on the same standard. Like, see these blue buttons next to the screen. One is global positioning, one is radar, one is proximity cameras. Do I know which is which? Of course not. I've never flown this model before. But I know they're all there."

Jason pressed each of the three buttons. The top was radar, the center was proximity cameras, and the bottom was GPS, just like Danny had guessed.

"Looks like we're over the Midwest, flying east," Jason observed.

Danny looked down at the screen and adjusted his heading to a slightly more southerly direction.

"Where are we gonna land exactly?" Jason asked.

"I was thinking the airport," Danny said. "They have air traffic control there, so we can minimize the risk of crashing. We should have plenty of fuel. I just hope the weather's not against us. It was supposed to snow, last I checked. Hopefully it won't be too bad."

For a short while, silence fell over them. Judging by their speed, the flight was going to be about an hour and a half, as long as the weather was fair. As much as two hours if they got caught in the snow. Without an approved route from the FAA, they had to fly at a lower altitude to avoid other crafts.

"So, when did you die?" Jason asked, hoping the shock of the sudden question might trick Danny into answering.

Danny just sighed. "How'd you know?"

"Well, the autopsy scar was kinda of a dead giveaway," Jason said.

Danny cracked a smile. "Right, autopsy."

"Plus... I don't know how to describe it, but I can kind of just... sense death on you. Did you get brought back in a Lazarus Pit too?"

"What's a Lazarus Pit?" Danny asked. "And what do you mean 'too'? Have you died before?"

"You didn't pick up on it? I thought it would be mutual."

"Well, you never set off my ghost sense or anything, so how would I know that? Now what's a Lazarus Pit."

"Some magic water or some shit that can heal wounds and bring the dead back to life," Jason said. "You never actually answered my original question though. When did you die? And how did you come back, if it wasn't a Lazarus Pit?"

"Oh, when I was fourteen," Danny said. "There was... it's complicated. Basically I died and was brought back to life at the same time? Something like that."

"Sounds intense."

"You have no idea," Danny shook his head. "What about you?"

"I was fifteen," Jason replied. "Joker." Danny winced. "I don't actually know how I came back either. I wasn't really lucid for a long time. It wasn't until I got thrown in a Lazarus Pit that I could remembered who I was."

"Yikes."

"That about sums it up, yeah."

Jason couldn't exactly pin-point when, but at some point between waking up in that cold, empty room, and flying in a stolen jet toward home, Danny had gone from a pure, unadulterated annoyance, to... a fond annoyance? Maybe even, almost, a friend? He had a nice laugh. Pretty eyes. And he was smarter than Jason had wanted to give him credit for, a quick-thinker.

Oh.

Oh no.

"Motherfucker," Jason cursed under his breath. He wasn't seriously becoming attracted to this idiot. No way.

"What?" Danny asked.

"Don't worry about it," Jason said. "So uh... how'd you start working for Wayne Enterprises?" Jason hoped that the reminder that this guy worked for Bruce would be enough of a turn-off to quash this thing before it really got rolling.

"I always wanted to be an astronaut, so after I got my pilot certification, I applied to every aeronautics and space facility in the country, and of the places that accepted my application, Wayne Enterprises paid the best."

"Shame about having to work for Bruce Wayne, though," Jason said. "That guy's an idiot."

"I've never actually met him," Danny said. "Any time he comes in to check up on everything, I make myself scarce. I don't exactly have the best track record with billionaires."

"And what the hell does that mean?"

"My godfather is a Billionaire," he started to explain. "He was friends with my parents in college. Shady as fuck, obsessed with my mom, tried to kill my dad several times so he could marry her and adopt me. Never mentioned my older sister for some reason. All-in-all, he was a major fruit loop, so I'm not pressing my luck with another billionaire who already has a substantial track record of adoptions. Nuh-uh. No way."

Jason snorted. Damn, that didn't work. He only liked Danny more now.

"What about you?" Danny asked. "What do you do for a living?"

"Uhh..." Jason tried to think of a suitable lie, since he couldn't exactly say he was a crime lord. "I... work... in Crime Alley."

"Are you a criminal?"

"What?"

"Well, you did say you work some place called Crime Alley," Danny pointed out reasonably. "And you're being very vague about the actual nature of that work. So I can only assume that you're a criminal. That or Crime Alley is the name of a sex shop or something. I could see that."

"No, Crime Alley is a neighborhood in Gotham," Jason said. "You haven't heard of it?"

"Maybe... in passing." Danny shrugged. "I've only lived in Gotham for about a year and a half. Anyway, if you are a criminal, I don't want to know. Plausible deniability is the name of the game, and I will not be responsible for saving your soul or whatever. I don't do that shit anymore."

Didn't seem to care if Jason was a criminal, or have any interest in 'fixing' him. Somehow, Danny was checking all the boxes.

"Anymore?"

"Don't worry about it."

"You know, you're kind of a weirdo," Jason said, and damn if that didn't make him even more attractive.

"I'm aware."

The conversation lulled once more, and Jason became more aware of his left hand hanging between them by the handcuffs while Danny kept both hands on the steering. It was starting to get pretty uncomfortable.

"Isn't there autopilot or something?" he asked. "My arm is getting tired."

"Is there autopilot at two-thirds cruising altitude, with no flight plan, and no approval from the FAA to be in the sky at all?" Danny said. "Hmm, let me think. Yeah, no."

"Right... well, I know a guy who can get these things off us. I'm calling him as soon as we get back to Gotham."

"And Ancients it can't be soon enough," Danny said. "Also, not gonna ask why you know a guy who can remove handcuffs."

"I know a lot of guys who can remove handcuffs." Jason shrugged. "Hell, if there was an actual lock on these, I could've removed 'em myself. Even without a lock, Dick could've slipped 'em by dislocating his thumb. It looks freaky as hell when he does it, though."

"Dick?" Danny turned to him momentarily to raise an eyebrow. "Is that his name or do you just hate the guy?"

"Both."

"Who willingly goes by Dick these days? And why?"

"Fuck if I know."

As the flight went on, the conversation waxed and waned. With what ended up being nearly two hours to fill, the two talked about many things: their homes, their hobbies. Danny talked about his sister the brain surgeon for a bit, but neither was particularly eager to talk about their families.

Conversation turned to banter, which turned to blatant flirting, and by the time they reached Gotham airspace, Jason was pretty sure he had the cute, undead test pilot in the bag.

"Air traffic control tower this is... uh... I don't know," Danny said. "We're an undesignated experimental craft, requesting permission to land preferably sooner rather than later, because we're low on fuel."

"This is air traffic control to undesignated aircraft, about how much longer can you stay airborne?"

"I estimate fifteen minutes at the most," Danny replied. "This thing burns through fuel a lot faster than I was expecting."

"Standby."

Soon enough they were on the ground. Then they had to try to explain to the airport employees why they were handcuffed together and flying an unregistered aircraft. It took a while, but Danny and Jason both, as it turned out, were quite proficient liars, and managed to get away without too much trouble, somehow.

They took a cab to the Bowery where Jason's locksmith sawed them out of the cuffs, and from there, they were able to go their separate ways. But Jason didn't want to part ways without knowing if he'd ever see Danny again.

"So uh..." he started to say while they hesitated on the sidewalk. "Can... can I walk you home?"

"I live all the way down in Tricorner," Danny said. "It's a bit far to walk."

"Okay, then how about you walk me home and I'll give you a ride in the morning?"

"Alright, smooth-talker." Danny smiled and held out his hand, and Jason took it with a smile of his own. "I'm in."

#dpxdc #fic #things i wrote #things i drew #crack treated seriously #dead on main ship #gift fic #handcuffed together

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