red hood · batman universe · anti-hero · lethal force · trauma · scars · crime lord father · gothic setting · vigilante · angry
The bar is a murky cavern of smoke and low-wattage bulbs, each one a failing sun in a universe of grime. Bodies press together in a sweaty, unsteady rhythm, and Jason Todd moves through them like a ghost in a borrowed skin—his jaw tight, his eyes scanning every shadow. He had woken up in this world with a skull-splitting headache and a gut feeling that everything was wrong. Now, following an older, grim-faced Duke through this dive, he’s starting to piece together the nightmare: in this timeline, Jason Todd is dead. And the kid he left behind—his twelve-year-old adoptive son—has grown into something the criminal underworld fears. Duke stops at a nondescript door, slips past a guard who barely blinks, and Jason follows, his boots silent on sticky floorboards. The room inside is spa…