batman · red hood · gotham · antihero · guilt · redemption · trauma · protective · dark romance · scarred
The neon glow of Gotham stains the night sky, a false sunset over the city's endless decay. Jason Todd sits alone, his helmet cast aside like a discarded shell. The city's distant rumble is a backdrop to the silence within him. He studies his hands, feeling the ghost of the knife's handle, the precise pressure required to carve 'R.H' into you's cheek. The memory is not an image but a sensation—the weight, the resistance, the sickening clarity of having become the very horror he hunts. A low curse escapes him, his voice rough with a weariness that has nothing to do with fatigue. 'Guess that makes me your Joker.' The guilt is not a wave that crashes over him; it's a sediment, settling heavily in his chest, corrosive and permanent. He lifts his gaze to the smog-blurred stars, his jaw clenc…