Jason Todd (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
runningred) wrote2015-01-03 01:17 pm
runningred) wrote2015-01-03 01:17 pm
Entry tags:
A Gotham Christmas, part two - Selina.
[Part one]
I was lying of course, when I told Alfred I had somewhere to stay. I hadn’t been back to Gotham in four years and the last time I was there I was a brain-broken mess with grave dirt still under my nails. All my nests and safe-houses in the city belonged to my Robin days and there wasn’t one Batman didn’t know about. Not safe ground to lay my head.
It was nearly dawn and I was exhausted. Talking with Alfred for the first time since before I died left me so drained I could barely steer my bike. I could have walked into any hotel and take a room. I had money and identities strong enough to stand up to even Bruce’s detective skills but I wasn’t there as Jason Todd. I was there as Red Hood.
I didn’t know if Alfred would tell Bruce what had happened, or if Bruce would find out another way but... I couldn’t deal with him right now. I needed rest.
I don’t know if it was the time I’d spent with little Cat or Alfred’s mention of Selina but I found myself turning north, towards the old Haynes building.
It surprised me to find that the area had been gentrified a whole lot since my time. The once abandoned old department store had been gutted and turned into a trendy nightclub. Even so close to dawn, party goers wandered onto the streets like confetti in the wind. But the roof was still the same.
I nearly fouled the jump and found myself dangling over a six story fall by my fingertips. Good thing my reflexes are still sharp, even if my mind was half asleep already. I dragged myself up and through the hatch behind the south gargoyle.
Just before WWI, Alberto Haynes – an Italian immigrant opened a little general store on what had once been the northern edge of Gotham. By the forties, it was the grandest, most lavish department store in the city. In the sixties, the great grandson of said Alberto, keen to keep the family business afloat, invested everything into building a railway station on the roof, hoping to connect it to Gotham’s elevated train system. However the city engineers refused. The foundations of the building would have been shaken apart by the vibrations and weight of the trains. Bankrupt and in disgrace, Haynes had the rooftop station boarded up and a year later, the building was abandoned.
Why this little detour in to Gotham’s past? Because knowing shit like that could save your life one day. The fact the station was still there, in all its art decoesque glory was a secret known to me and one other – the beautiful Selina Kyle, known to most of Gotham and the world as Catwoman.
Sel’s safehouse in the old station master’s quarters had the sort of style that made you think of film noir – black velvet, red silk and dangerous liaisons. It was everything that remembered and loved about her. I had no right being there but I fell into that bed without a single thought and was out like a light.
The sound of pearls on cut crystal woke me but she leaned over and kissed my cheek. “Go back to sleep.” Her voice was as dark and smooth as smoke and for a moment I thought I dreamt it. But then she slipped into the bed beside me, her satin skin warm against my own as she brushed her fingers over my eyes, closing them softly. “Sleep.”
The sun was low through the geometric coloured glass when I opened my eyes again. She was still there – my first crush and in the truest meaning of the word - my first lover. All sleek skin and toned muscle. The greatest catburgler in the world and the embodiment of feminine grace.
The corner of her lip twitched as I looked at her, her eyes still closed. “I can hear you thinking, Jay. And it needs to stop.” She rested one lazy hand on my shoulder and pushed me down.
It had been five years since the last time I’d been in her company and in her bed. A dark and stormy night in more ways than one. She had sheltered me, taken me into her arms and with gentle words and even gentler actions; taught me how to make love. A street whore from age twelve, I knew the mechanics of sex but she taught me the meaning of pleasure. I had been two month shy of my sixteenth birthday and very soon to die.
Five years and the lifetime between that night and this. I buried my face between her thighs and gave back all she had given me so long ago.
It was dark before we prepared to part with no more words than that. She pulled up the zip of the formfitting suit as I laced up my boots. She looked at me for a long time, goggles dangling. “You shouldn’t have come back, Jay.”
I shrugged, unable to meet her eye.
She lifted my chin. “Forget Gotham. Forget him. Make a new life for yourself.”
I pulled away and shook my head. “I can’t run anymore. It has to end. I have to end it.”
Her hand was at my throat then and I could feel the razor tips of her clawed gloves prick the skin over my jugular. She pulled me into a violent kiss, splitting my lip. She lapped at my blood, hissing sharply as she kissed me again. Her eyes were a feral green that made me think of Eric.
She threw me back onto the bed, still kissing me with a brutal intensity that left me breathless. What passed between us then had nothing to do with affection but deep and visceral lust. Our day of lovemaking had broken to animal need, like sudden thunderstorm and somehow I knew this was her way of saying goodbye.
She left me there, bleeding from a hundred shallow scratches and some not so shallow. Some that would scar and mark me forever. A sign on my skin of what she had done to my heart. What we had done to each other.
Night had fallen as I cast my jumpline, the red mask covering my face as I threw myself into the Gotham sky. I would never see her again. That I knew for sure. This too must end.
[Part three.]
I was lying of course, when I told Alfred I had somewhere to stay. I hadn’t been back to Gotham in four years and the last time I was there I was a brain-broken mess with grave dirt still under my nails. All my nests and safe-houses in the city belonged to my Robin days and there wasn’t one Batman didn’t know about. Not safe ground to lay my head.
It was nearly dawn and I was exhausted. Talking with Alfred for the first time since before I died left me so drained I could barely steer my bike. I could have walked into any hotel and take a room. I had money and identities strong enough to stand up to even Bruce’s detective skills but I wasn’t there as Jason Todd. I was there as Red Hood.
I didn’t know if Alfred would tell Bruce what had happened, or if Bruce would find out another way but... I couldn’t deal with him right now. I needed rest.
I don’t know if it was the time I’d spent with little Cat or Alfred’s mention of Selina but I found myself turning north, towards the old Haynes building.
It surprised me to find that the area had been gentrified a whole lot since my time. The once abandoned old department store had been gutted and turned into a trendy nightclub. Even so close to dawn, party goers wandered onto the streets like confetti in the wind. But the roof was still the same.
I nearly fouled the jump and found myself dangling over a six story fall by my fingertips. Good thing my reflexes are still sharp, even if my mind was half asleep already. I dragged myself up and through the hatch behind the south gargoyle.
Just before WWI, Alberto Haynes – an Italian immigrant opened a little general store on what had once been the northern edge of Gotham. By the forties, it was the grandest, most lavish department store in the city. In the sixties, the great grandson of said Alberto, keen to keep the family business afloat, invested everything into building a railway station on the roof, hoping to connect it to Gotham’s elevated train system. However the city engineers refused. The foundations of the building would have been shaken apart by the vibrations and weight of the trains. Bankrupt and in disgrace, Haynes had the rooftop station boarded up and a year later, the building was abandoned.
Why this little detour in to Gotham’s past? Because knowing shit like that could save your life one day. The fact the station was still there, in all its art decoesque glory was a secret known to me and one other – the beautiful Selina Kyle, known to most of Gotham and the world as Catwoman.
Sel’s safehouse in the old station master’s quarters had the sort of style that made you think of film noir – black velvet, red silk and dangerous liaisons. It was everything that remembered and loved about her. I had no right being there but I fell into that bed without a single thought and was out like a light.
The sound of pearls on cut crystal woke me but she leaned over and kissed my cheek. “Go back to sleep.” Her voice was as dark and smooth as smoke and for a moment I thought I dreamt it. But then she slipped into the bed beside me, her satin skin warm against my own as she brushed her fingers over my eyes, closing them softly. “Sleep.”
The sun was low through the geometric coloured glass when I opened my eyes again. She was still there – my first crush and in the truest meaning of the word - my first lover. All sleek skin and toned muscle. The greatest catburgler in the world and the embodiment of feminine grace.
The corner of her lip twitched as I looked at her, her eyes still closed. “I can hear you thinking, Jay. And it needs to stop.” She rested one lazy hand on my shoulder and pushed me down.
It had been five years since the last time I’d been in her company and in her bed. A dark and stormy night in more ways than one. She had sheltered me, taken me into her arms and with gentle words and even gentler actions; taught me how to make love. A street whore from age twelve, I knew the mechanics of sex but she taught me the meaning of pleasure. I had been two month shy of my sixteenth birthday and very soon to die.
Five years and the lifetime between that night and this. I buried my face between her thighs and gave back all she had given me so long ago.
It was dark before we prepared to part with no more words than that. She pulled up the zip of the formfitting suit as I laced up my boots. She looked at me for a long time, goggles dangling. “You shouldn’t have come back, Jay.”
I shrugged, unable to meet her eye.
She lifted my chin. “Forget Gotham. Forget him. Make a new life for yourself.”
I pulled away and shook my head. “I can’t run anymore. It has to end. I have to end it.”
Her hand was at my throat then and I could feel the razor tips of her clawed gloves prick the skin over my jugular. She pulled me into a violent kiss, splitting my lip. She lapped at my blood, hissing sharply as she kissed me again. Her eyes were a feral green that made me think of Eric.
She threw me back onto the bed, still kissing me with a brutal intensity that left me breathless. What passed between us then had nothing to do with affection but deep and visceral lust. Our day of lovemaking had broken to animal need, like sudden thunderstorm and somehow I knew this was her way of saying goodbye.
She left me there, bleeding from a hundred shallow scratches and some not so shallow. Some that would scar and mark me forever. A sign on my skin of what she had done to my heart. What we had done to each other.
Night had fallen as I cast my jumpline, the red mask covering my face as I threw myself into the Gotham sky. I would never see her again. That I knew for sure. This too must end.
[Part three.]