This is part of a larger continuity of stories. Please consult my profile for the master reading list if you want to read them in order.

Hey guys! So, this is the first part of a three-chaptered piece about the turning point of the Jason/Roy relationship. Well, a turning point. See, these two just blindsided me. They're so damn adorable together, and Roy is a total dork but he's self aware and fantastic about it. This definitely only started out as a 'Jason gets hurt and Roy freaks out' slice of life, but then it morphed and now it is important plot in my Earth-3 storyline.

Warnings: This story contains non-graphic but severe injury, threat of character death, basic open relationships, and unrequited love. Pairing wise there is Jason/Roy, Dick/Jason, Tim/Kon, and Roy/Koriand'r. Enjoy!

The hero I'm shooting at — Cheshire, and oh have we already been introduced — ducks away from the swing of my bow, slicing at my face with nails way too accurate to her name. They nearly catch me, and I have to fall and flip back to not get nailed with scratches that — at the total least — would take me out of play for at least the day. Damn sedated nails, among other things. Being sedated is the lucky option, of course. She is a hero, even if she is one of Ra's', so it's not like anything she uses is immediately fatal, but that doesn't mean it won't hurt like a bitch.

We've done some fighting before. I think she likes me.

"Red!" I call, and a second later Cheshire recoils from where she was coming after me, blood beading bright on her tanned skin from the graze of a bullet past her neck.

"Busy!" he shouts back, about fifteen feet to my right, and I spare one glance to see that there's some big, made-of-metal looking guy coming after him. He's an Owl, so the guy's not hitting him, but it's a close thing and Jason is really, obviously on the defensive. He's got one gun out in his left hand, his knife in the other, and miracle of miracles his helmet is still on.

I run for him, keeping my attention focused on Cheshire as she comes after me, and batting the throwing stars out of the air with my bow. It's good practice, really. In what might be one of the more suicidal things I've done today I skid down between Jason and his opponent, startling them both for a second as I draw one of my taser-arrows — they've got a real, 'fancy' name but that's what I call them for reference — and loose it towards the meat of the metal-man's torso.

It sticks, goes off, and he gives a shout and falls back, skin phasing out of metal and back to some weird combination of orange, purple, and white. "Swap?" I throw over my shoulder, at Jason. "You can handle Cheshire, right?"

He honest-to-god laughs, sounding kind of vicious and really pleased. I glance sideways to see him face her, and I can't see her expression past the porcelain mask but she definitely backs off a step or two. "I can handle her," Jason confirms, with total certainty. "Not a problem." He spins the knife in his hand, and then he's leaping at her.

He gets halfway there before there's a roar. He jerks and ducks automatically, as I turn and Cheshire leaps away, and then a blurred black shape crashes into the street about five feet from where Jason is crouching. The impact knocks him onto his back, and the thing in the crater gives another roar that shakes the street, pulling itself out of the crater and fuck that's Doomsday. Oh fuck.

Cheshire vanishes in an explosion of smoke, and Jason scrambles backwards but it's too late. A blur of motion, too fast for us regular humans to follow, and Jason slams into the building to my right, breaking most of the way into a decorative pillar. Doomsday — what is he even doing here? Doomsday isn't a hero he's a thing — follows him, right past me.

I can see the shape shifting hero in front of me moving, getting up, out of the corner of my eye, but I can only stare as the black and grey monster wraps a massive hand around Jason and slams him against the pillar. Once, twice, and he's not making any noise but his knife is gone and he's not fighting either. The pillar finally breaks all the way on the third slam, and I can see one of the chunks of concrete, as it falls, smack into the side of Jason's helmet, I can see it shatter.

Doomsday turns and flings him down and away, and either by chance or the thing's smarter than it looks, Jason smacks into the street pretty much at my feet. He's limp, not moving and I can see blood on him, and I look back up at Doomsday for a second and he's staring at me, I'm next.

A red and blue blur slams into him, driving the monster into the ground, and there's a roar that cuts off as Ultraman solidifies into a shape I can see and his eyes burn red, down into Doomsday. He's got a snarl on his face, his costume is ripped and I think I can see blood dripping down one side of his face, but then the next moment he's reaching down and flinging his monster into the air. With a blast of air and force that knocks the breath out of me, slams me back on my ass, he's launching after.

I focus down on Jason, catching my breath as I get to my knees and crouch over him. Not touching, not yet, and Christ that's a lot of blood. The shape shifting hero moves and I react, drawing an arrow and putting it to the string of my bow, aiming it up at him. He stares down at me for a second, and then raises his hands and backs off. He turns, starts to go, and it's stupid but I don't wait to see if he means it. I sloppily hook my bow over my back, slide the arrow away, and move to take a better look at Jason.

He's breathing at least, even if it's worryingly shallow, but there's a lot of blood.

"Nightingale!" I shout, praying that our coms are still up this time, that no one's fucked with it yet or fried our leader's. There's silence, and fuck the back of Jason's jacket is shredded and there's blood dripping across the visible slice of his face. "If you're there answer me you son of a bitch!" I shout again, desperate. "Fuck, anybody!"

"Black Talon here," cuts in a voice, "what's going on?"

I'm really starting to think that Nightingale should just not be the one we look to for orders. He somehow never fails to lose his com systems or have them not be working. Now is not the time for us to not be able to contact him.

"Red's down," I blurt out, "lots of blood, I need an extraction and medical for him right now."

"On it's way," T says, with what sounds an awful lot like concern. "Is there anything you can do for him?"

I swallow, trying to pull together and figure out his injuries, trying to look past the pool of blood forming under the man I thought was unbreakable, the mess of his leather jacket — he loves that thing, he's going to be so upset — and the unnatural angle of the arm lying over his chest. The blood is soaking through his clothing, the totally useless armor, and it's hard to see specifics under that but I tug off one glove and lower my hand to feel instead. Under the slippery, hot, wet feeling of blood is leather, cloth, and what feels like stone and shards of metal. I look up at the pillar he was slammed through, and my breath stops short for a second.

Apart from the jagged edges of concrete, what must be in his back, there are bent, broken, metal support bars. I can't account for all of them and that scares the shit out of me.

"No," I gasp out, looking back down at Jason's form. He's so still. "I, I can't. Most of it's in his back — at least concrete, maybe metal — and I don't know what's left of his ribs. If I try stopping any of the bloodflow…" Any pressure against the gashes in his back might help slow the bleeding, but it could break cracked ribs, or drive shards of them into organs that he really, really needs. If I even try pulling any of that mess out, all I'm going to do is make him die faster. I can do first aid but I'm not a medic and I'm not a surgeon, and he needs both. Ideally he needs a healing metahuman real fast.

"What happened?" snarls a voice, Nightingale, and somewhere underneath the fear for the broken man in front of me is anger. Where the fuck was the older Owl-family member when Jason needed him, why the hell didn't he answer my first shout?

"Doomsday happened," I answer. "Ultraman threw him into the street and Red was too close; it happened too fast." Ultraman needs to keep better control of his enemies. Without warning or a plan we're just ants under that kind of power, and sure maybe I could do some damage or at least get the hell out of the way if I knew Doomsday was coming — I know Jason could; he's an Owl — but without that? We're targets and punching bags.

You don't fling that kind of power around your allies without warning them, and you damn well shouldn't do it at all. It would be like me flinging a nuke in the middle of the fight without letting anybody know. Ultraman's real opponents are dangerous.

"Is he breathing?" T demands, as I pull my glove on. The blood's still on my hand, on my fingers, but there's nothing I can do about that even if it really mattered.

"Yes," I answer, and there's a faint sigh of relief from my com. I couldn't tell you which ex-Talon made it. "Shallowly," I continue, and my throat feels locked tight and hard to push words through. "It doesn't sound wet." He's probably not bleeding into his lungs, at least. It would be more bubbly, I'd be able to hear it.

I lean over him, finding the catch on the bottom of his helmet — Jason showed me where it was a while back, taught me how to get it to come loose — and pulling the shattered frame off his head. Slowly, making sure I'm beyond careful. He's totally limp, mouth just slightly parted and face relaxed in unconsciousness, and he doesn't so much as twitch even when his skull falls the last inch or so to lie against the ground and his shoulder. There's blood sliding down his face from a slice near his hairline, where I saw the concrete hit, and it's covered a good portion of his jaw and leaked back into his hair.

"He got hit in the head with some rubble," I say into the silent coms, glancing up because where the fuck is my transport? "The helmet broke, he's bleeding pretty bad, but I think he was unconscious before that happened." I don't think Jason was conscious for anything past that first impact with the pillar, I'm pretty sure he didn't have to feel the next three, or getting thrown at my feet. Small mercies.

I bite my tongue to keep from saying anything else, staring down at Jason and then taking another glance up at the street, the sky. Where is it?!

This isn't fair!

I'm the squishy one, I'm less of a threat, and I'm not as skilled as Jason is when it comes to any fight that isn't ranged. I should be the one on the ground, by all rights it should have been me. If I hadn't switched our fights, if I hadn't sent Jason after Cheshire, I would have been the one closest to Doomsday. It should have been me.

Jason is the better fighter, he can take more, he can do more. The only thing I'm better at is long ranged combat, and that's just not enough to make me worth more than him. If one of us deserves to live it's him, and if one of us is worth less than the other it has to be me. If I could switch things, if I could change them, I'd never have swapped us. I could take the pain, and if I die so what? Kori would do just fine on her own, and Jason has Nightingale. It's not like I mean enough to Jason for him to really grieve for me anyway, that's a really one-way street and I'm alright with that. He has enough trouble just liking himself, he doesn't need to care for me on top of that.

I've got enough heart to love Jason for the both of us, and I can take the fact that I'm a convenience for him. He loves Nightingale, and he trusts him, and maybe I don't get that but it's alright. It's Jason's choice, and even though I know firsthand people are capable of loving more than just one person, it's not for everyone.

I can love Jason without him loving me back, that's fine. I know how to cope. I've been doing it with Kori for years.

I swallow hard and force myself to concentrate, to think past the fear and the mind numbing thought that Jason could die on me. What will the medics do first, before they can treat him? What can I do to help that move faster, or cut out anything standing between him and help?

Clothes. They'll need to see the injuries, which means they'll need his jacket, shirt, and armor off. I can do that. I've stripped Jason enough times, and maybe he murders me later for slicing his jacket apart to get it off him but hey, if he's murdering me then he's alive. That's good enough for me. He could understand, and if he's still pissed I won't even be sorry.

I drag my knife out of the sheath at my thigh, swallowing again and taking a deep breath to stop my hands from shaking. I'm a professional, right? If I can assassinate someone from far enough away that no one can even see me, without hesitation or even nerves, then I can cut clothes off a guy without my hands shaking. This is easy, and Jason needs it so I can sort out all my other shit later because I have to help. It would be sad if I let the man I love die, just because I was too afraid to keep myself steady when I could have done something.

And besides, what kind of a cruel world would kill a guy twice, after he went through so much hell the first time? Jason's already had his life yanked out from under him once, fuck any world that would do it to him a second time.

I start at the broken arm lying down across his torso and onto the ground, carefully slicing apart the leather of his jacket, down to the end of the sleeve. My heart's in my throat, and I feel just a little sick, but I do it anyway. On the plus side, his arm might be at the wrong angle but when I shift the leather away from it there's no blood. The bone hasn't torn through his skin, so it's not as bad as it could be, not by a long shot. I try not to move it at all, try not to move him. Who knows what else could be broken, or what the shrapnel in his back might be in danger of damaging? Fuck, what about his spine?

It's these kinds of times I wish I believed in a god I could pray to. Tell them; 'please, not this one, not right now'.

The back of the jacket is shredded, and there's so much blood it's hard to see what's left of it, but I carefully, slowly, pull the leather away from him. He twitches, breath catching just a little bit, and even though it scares the fuck out of me my heart takes a pit dive back to its rightful place in relief. He's still feeling, he's still at least a little responsive, and that's good, right? Even unconscious his body is reacting to pain, so that means he can still feel his back, which at least means his spine is probably mostly alright. Right?

I wish I knew more about all of this. First aid does not cover stuff like this and I'm not normally the one taking care of downed teammates. Or lovers. Usually it's the opposite way around.

Jason should not have gone down that fast. Damn Ultraman. For once, I hope Owlman hurts him for letting this happen. I'm not usually one to hope for a war, but this is his fault and Owlman doesn't usually take it passively when people get his Talons hurt. Jason counts, and throwing an enemy into your allies, especially one as volatile and dangerous as Doomsday, without immediately following, counts.

Before Doomsday, Jason was fine. Maybe a scrape or two, a few bruises, but nothing that isn't always part of a battle this big. He was fine.

I stare down at the shreds of jacket, and there goes all of my relief. It's… It's bad. There's more empty space then there is actual leather, and the edges are torn, jagged, ripped. That's not even counting the blood. I swear this was brown just a few minutes ago. I know it was. I try not to even look at the shirt or the armor underneath yet, following the line of the jacket down to where it's caught at the bottom.

I can't move Jason, I know that, and I can't reach the jacket that's pinned underneath him to get it off, so I'll just have to slice the jacket off where I can reach and leave it at that.

I take the knife to the edge, slicing through the sections still together to leave only an inch or so before the rest of it, underneath him. After I toss it to the side, I let myself look at the rest of his back for just a second. It's still hard to see just how bad the injuries are, through the scraps of his shirt and the black of the armor underneath, so I take in another deep breath and move on.

Come on. Did someone knock the damn transport out of the sky or are all of my allies just useless when it really matters? This is serious. Jason's hurt and he's dying, they can manage just a little speed can't they?

I slice apart the shirt at his shoulder, and then go in again at the armor laid over it, working where I know the weakest parts of it are. That, Jason's never told me, but I've run my hands over it enough to know where it feels thinnest, where it can't be as firm because Jason dodges more than he absorbs so he has to be able to move. Even at the weakest point I can find up there, it isn't easy to cut through. I have to saw through whatever material it's made of, but I grit my teeth and keep at it until I finally get all the way through. The buckles are on the opposite side, under his non-dominant arm for the sake of caution, and normally that'd be fine but right now it means I'll have to work to get it off him.

I peel the shirt — weaker than the jacket and so ripped apart I barely even have to use my knife — away from his back, and toss the scraps of fabric aside, over where his jacket is. I take a glance at the long line of armor down his side, and then at my knife. That would take forever, but maybe…

Jason didn't have his knife after the first slam against the pillar, and I know his knife is a step up above pretty much every other blade I've ever run across. It was a gift from someone he respects, and he treasures it about as much as his jacket — that's going to be a hell of a way to greet him if he lives — and it's dangerous. If I can figure out where it landed, then I can probably use it to get his armor off a whole lot faster, so I can actually see how bad the damage is.

Like I need to see it to know that it's bad. The blood under my knees is enough to know that, isn't it?

I look up, taking my first seconds to scan around the remains of the pillar, and then along the line between the pillar and where he was crouching before Doomsday grabbed him. Nothing catches my eye, apart from the smeared blood and scraps of fabric still caught on some of the rubble. Damn. It has to be somewhere; under rubble or maybe just a bit out of view. If I get up for just a minute—

But what if I go looking and Jason stops breathing? What if I'm not here? What if I don't notice? Then I can't leave him alone. If he's going to die someone should at least be here, right? I should be here. But grabbing his knife is useful. There's nothing useful I can do just kneeling here.

What the fuck do I do?

The whirring of engines cuts into my attention, and I snap my head up to find the sleek, black and grey lines of one of the Owl-family jets sinking down pretty much right in front of me. Ten or so feet away, and there's a bit of a rush of air but a lot less than I expect. Right, silence is kind of their thing, isn't it? The side starts to slide down in a ramp, and before it's more than about two feet down a black and blue shape slides out in the gap. Nightingale, grace in motion and running at me, dropping to his knees.

"Jason!" he nearly shouts, hands reaching out and then curling back, not touching or shaking like I was sure he was going to. I can see him put things together, see his head twist from the crater to his right, along the line to the broken pillar. He snarls, head lifting to look at the sky, and over his shoulder I can see more figures slipping out of the jet. Black Talon and M'gann.

Then Nightingale's on his feet, and I follow him up more slowly, shakily. There had to have been some kind of orders given on the way, because Nightingale slips aside and then M'gann is there and Jason lifts off the ground smoothly, in exactly the same position. Good. That's good. Black Talon escorts him, smaller form slipping between the rest of us as his neck tilts to study the mess of Jason's back. I follow, and of course it's when I take my first step forward that metal catches my eye, just out of view of where I was kneeling.

I detour to grab the knife, and I'm just turning back when Nightingale — at the side of the ramp and watching M'gann lift Jason in towards what looks like a gurney — gives a jerk of his chin and says, "Get him back to Gotham, T. I'll handle things here."

"Where are you taking him?" I ask, trotting back over and glancing up into the jet. One of their larger ones, designed for the whole group of them to be able to fit, probably.

"A friend," Nightingale snaps, "then to the Roost, until he's better."

The Roost? As in the Owl's base that no one else ever gets into, ever? I don't fucking think so.

"Woah, wait, what?" I demand, taking a step forward towards Nightingale. "You are not taking him anywhere I can't follow. Not in a million years."

Jason's other lover, the one he actually loves, turns fully towards me, and his mouth is a dangerous smile. More like he's flashing teeth at me to warn me he could tear my throat out if he wanted to. I think some part of him does want to. It scares the hell out of me, but I'm already running high on a lot of adrenaline and terror as it is, and Jason means more than all that.

"You have a job to do," Nightingale spits at me.

"I know that," I spit back, my hand tightening around the hilt of Jason's knife. "And the second we're done I'm going to go to Jason's side and camp there until he wakes up. You aren't taking him where I can't do that. Not gonna happen."

Nightingale moves towards me, smile turning into a thin sneer. "You're not family," he hisses at me, "you don't have the right, Arsenal."

I take a lot of shit, and normally I don't care, but no. Just because it's Nightingale that Jason loves, just because he's got a stronger hold, doesn't mean that mine is totally invalidated just like that. Jason trusts me — he trusts me — and even if the sex is just that, I'm important to him in some way. I'm a friend, and he's mine in at least that small way.

Damn Nightingale for thinking that he can tell me I don't have the right to sit with Jason, to make sure he doesn't die without me there.

I grind my teeth together, meeting his challenge head on and putting one of my feet very firmly on the metal ramp. "I have every right," I snarl back, and that's not a tone I use very often; it actually seems to startle him just a little bit. I do my very best to take my life as it comes, to weather what I can and laugh at what I can't, and I don't let myself get really, genuinely, angry at my allies or my friends.

Right now Nightingale is only barely the former, and there will be blood — mine, but that's not the point — if he tries to stop me from watching over Jason.

"You're not an Owl," Nightingale hisses, and he looks about a step and a knife away from slicing open my leg to get it off the ramp. "You don't get privileges just because he fucks you."

"I love him!" I shout, and then flinch back when it actually registers what I said and oh fuck I haven't even dared saying that in front of Jason yet. Nightingale goes very still, and I swallow thickly. Fuck it, it's too late now. "He's yours," I say quietly, between us, "but I love him. Please don't do this to me."

He's not sneering anymore, which is at least something, but I don't know if the flat line of his mouth is better or worse. I don't know Nightingale's expressions well enough to read him, the most I can usually do is tell you whether or not his smiles are intended as warnings. I'm generally good at reading when people's expressions are a step away from either pain or murder. Past that… I haven't seen Nightingale make this particular face much, and I don't know what it means. I don't know if he's thinking about actually letting me, or if he's considering gutting me for even daring to try laying claim on what's his.

"Nightingale," snaps a voice to the side, Black Talon's, and apparently the utterance of his name means a whole lot more to Nightingale than it does to me.

He's moving, and I barely have time for an instinctual jerk of motion backwards before he has me by the arm. He twists and it's like lightning down my arm, spasming my fingers and forcing me to drop Jason's knife and he catches it. It slices up at my face, and for a second I'm convinced Nightingale is straight up killing me for daring to even care for Jason, and I pull back but it's not far enough. There's a sharp sting and burn of pain across my right cheek, but I realize after a second that I'm not dead, and that's something.

I gasp in a breath, and then the hilt of Jason's knife is pressing tight up against my jaw, into my throat. Nightingale is in my face, as tall as I am in those heeled boots of his, and his mouth is still that tight line. "This isn't done, Arsenal." He pulls back, lets me go, and presses the hilt of Jason's knife into my hand. "T," he calls, turning away from me in dismissal, and I can't shake the feeling I just barely got out of that with my life. "The plan stands; Arsenal goes with you. M'gann!"

I manage to pry myself out of shock enough to watch M'gann sweep through and carry off Nightingale with her telekinesis, and then nearly run up the ramp and into the jet. Black Talon is at the helm, to the left, and the ramp rises before I'm even halfway in — my last few steps are more of a skid — and then the engines hiss to life and we're rising. He hits a few buttons and the area I can see of the nose, past the glass of the window, fades out of existence. He stands and whirls, black armor and cape turning him into what feels like a shadow more than a person.

Jason is laid out on the gurney-like surface, and Black Talon sweeps over to it. I jerk myself into action, following.

"What can I do?" I ask, staying far enough away that the younger Owl can move as he needs to without running into me. Not that an Owl would ever run into someone unless they meant to.

"You cut the layers off?" he asks sharply.

"Yeah, and the helmet. I—" I have to swallow. "It was all I could think of. There's too much in the wounds for pressure, and his ribs, his spine."

"At least you're not an idiot," he says flatly, still not even looking at me. "Ship's on autopilot, it'll get us there as fast as possible. Everyone necessary has been called, we're just here to buy him some time. Tell me exactly what happened, and cut the rest of his armor off while you talk."

With that he's turning, heading to what look like storage cabinets set into the walls, and I head forward to Jason's side. He's still breathing, thank god. I snap back to the realization that I'm still holding his knife, and lean down over him to start sawing at the bottom edge of the armor, at his waist.

"Doomsday hit the street next to us," I start, but keeping my focus on the knife in my hand and the armor. Jason does not need any more holes in him. Jason's knife does cut through his armor much better than my knife did. "Jason was only a few feet away, and he tried to get away but Doomsday threw him past me, into that pillar. I think the first hit knocked Jason out, but the bastard grabbed him, slammed him into the pillar until it broke. Three times, then threw him at my feet. When the pillar broke I saw a piece smack into the side of his helmet, where that cut is. It broke."

I'm most of the way through the armor, and I swallow and try to ignore the blood starting to stain the fabric covering the metal table. "I took the helmet off, cut away his jacket and shirt, started on his armor. When I felt his back I could feel concrete, and metal. He doesn't sound like any of it damaged his lungs; he's breathing alright. He did react, twitched and his breathing stuttered a little bit when I pulled the jacket off him, so he can still feel."

The armor snaps, and almost instantly Black Talon is at my elbow, peering down and reaching forward to take the edge of the armor. I watch as he pulls it away from Jason's back, and real fear tightens my throat.

"Christ," I whisper, and out of the corner of my eye I can see — some distant part of me notices — Black Talon's jaw tighten just a little bit.

Some of the debris comes away with the armor, which the younger Owl flattens down over the edge of the table, but most of it doesn't. The only thing I can see that's good is that the damage is pretty much contained to between his shoulders and his lower back. Everything else is pretty much fine, except his broken arm. That has to be a plus, right? At least there's no damage to his legs, hips, his neck. He could be worse. Or dead.

"Take his mask off," Black Talon orders, pushing me back into action, and easily snags the knife from my hand. He starts at the other side of the armor, and he handles that knife like Jason does, like it's part of him. "Then there's supplies in the storage I opened, clean what you can of the area around that head wound, get it to stop bleeding if it hasn't."

I'm doing what he wants before I really stop to think about it, and that kind of surprises me but I really don't stop. It's just a wake up call that while Nightingale might be the charming, dangerous, charismatic one, Black Talon has more of a knack for keeping people working and focused. I swear I've heard Owlman use that same tone before, too. Props to the kid for learning his mentor's talents, I guess.

I peel the mask away from Jason's face, setting it to one side of his head, and head for the open storage area. At a glance, I'm pretty sure it's got just about everything you could need for emergency surgery, plus a whole lot more for more basic first aid. I guess that makes sense. There's five Owls, and they're all human even if they're scary as hell. Humans can only take so much damage, and they actually have to care for the wounds unlike most of the metahumans out there.

Now first aid, first aid…

I grab a bottle labeled as saline water, and a package next to it of wipes. At least all the very basic first aid stuff seems to be shoved in the same corner; I imagine the Owls have pretty much got this memorized. After a second I probably can't spare, I grab a second bottle and package, and head back in a rush. My pair goes to this side of Jason's chest, and I reach over him and set the other pair down next to Black Talon.

He doesn't look up, but his mouth flickers in a small smile for just a second. Good, alright, work.

My hands aren't shaking anymore — overload of adrenaline, maybe? — and I pull open my bottle and package. I manage to not be a moron, and pull out a wipe to hold against his skin before I rinse the wound down with the water. Jason really doesn't need salt water in his eyes. Then it's just a case of wiping down the surrounding area.

The gash itself doesn't look too bad, and it has already stopped bleeding. I definitely can't see any bone through it, and none of the shards from his helmet are stuck in it either. His helmet must have taken most of the force. I guess it is good for something, even if it breaks pretty much every fight. Without his helmet in the way, I don't think he would have survived that hit. I don't even think he would have made it out of hitting the pillar.

"Arsenal," Black Talon says quietly, and I freeze. Fuck, what did I do? I was just swabbing, the gash should be fine and I didn't make it bleed again. The younger Owl doesn't look up from where he's working on the armor — it's nearly off — and he barely even seems to register my existence.

"What?" I ask, heart in my throat.

"If you're intending to take Jason from Nightingale, you should know that would be largely equivalent to suicide." He does glance up, briefly, as the armor comes apart and he tosses it aside. But Black Talon is even more of a mystery to me than any of the other Owls, even the big bad Owlman himself. I have no idea what he's thinking underneath the half mask and large, round shine of his goggles. Jason seems to be able to, but I guess that's prolonged exposure to him or something.

Wait, no, that wouldn't make any sense. This Talon was Jason's replacement, and by the time Jason came back he was already part of our team, an unofficial leader when Nightingale wasn't around. I've known Black Talon longer than Jason has.

"Take him?" I echo, kind of confused though I admit I'm totally not thinking straight at the moment. I'm sure his statement — warning? — makes sense to anyone who isn't riding as high on fear, adrenaline, and worry as I am.

He glances up again, reaching for the bottle of saline water and unscrewing the top with a flick of his wrist. "From Nightingale, yes." He tucks Jason's knife away somewhere beneath the fall of his cape. "You're useful to the team, and I'd prefer not to lose your skillset or foster any kind of resentment with Red Archer. I have very little control over Nightingale, however, and he will kill you before he'll let you have Jason. Love or not."

"Oh!" I exclaim, the pieces clicking together in my head. "No, no, I—" I swallow and shake my head. "Jason doesn't love me back, and he doesn't need me demanding anything from him. I'll be whatever he wants me to be, his choice. If he doesn't want me as anything more than a convenience then he never needs to know it's any deeper than that."

"Mmm." He sounds unconvinced, hands busy at Jason's back. Or maybe that's just me trying to read some kind of emotion or meaning into a blank sound of acknowledgement. With Black Talon, who knows?

"I'm not a threat," I try and push, and his mouth curves in a tiny smirk.

"I'm not the one you need to tell that, am I?" Alright, okay, he's got a point. Black Talon isn't the one who pretty much threatened that there was a reckoning coming later on. He's really not the one who sliced my cheek open, or put the knife to my throat. In fact, he seems pretty alright with it in general. But if he wasn't, how the hell would I know? It's not like I can read him at all.

"You're alright with me?" I ask, staring at him, and his shoulders lift in a very tiny shrug.

He glances up at me, and I guess I should really be paying more attention to his hands, to what he's doing, but if I want to catch even the slightest tell it's going to be on his face, right? I can't watch his hands — I'm at a bad angle to do that anyway — and still watch him to see what he's thinking.

"We'll see," he answers noncommittally. "You haven't done anything to make an enemy of me yet, and you seem to mean what you say. If Jason continues liking you, it's not my place to tell him what to do." He straightens up just a bit, and the smirk that flickers across his face almost feels dangerous, but mostly just like a silent version of laughing. "Have you thought this through though, Arsenal?"

"What do you mean?" I ask, and the smirk flickers through again. That blank face he's got between looks is really pretty creepy. I don't know how the hell Jason manages reading it when I can barely even watch Black Talon fake emotions and looks without being kind of unnerved.

"You love Jason, yes?" he asks, and I nod in confirmation.

"Yeah, I do."

"Have you considered that even if he accepts you, if he decides he does care for you in return, that you are not just dealing with Jason himself?" I'm pretty sure I make a face, I must, because he barely waits a moment before continuing. "Apparently not."

"What are you talking about?"

'Not just Jason'? What the hell does that mean? Who else is there to deal with? Nightingale, I guess, but that's not really something that I'd even considered worrying about yet. As long as I share — and I am so capable of sharing, that's fine — why would Nightingale care? I'm pretty sure it's Jason being taken from him that Nightingale is opposed to, not just me existing around Jason now that the information's out there that I care for him. At least, I hope not.

I can probably ease around a territorial Nightingale, but if he demands that I straight out stop being around Jason, at all? I don't know if I can do that; not even for the sake of my own health. That's a lot to ask, and it's a lot for me to give up. I can be Jason's friend, or his lover, or his, or just the guy he fucks sometimes, but not seeing him at all? I think that would hurt too much.

I might do it if it was what Jason wanted, but if it's just Nightingale telling me to stay away because he doesn't want to lose his hold…? I don't think I'm that concerned with my own health, over how much it would hurt to get cut off from Jason. Besides, it's Jason's choice, not Nightingale's. He doesn't get to tell me I can't love Jason, or split us apart just because he doesn't like the idea that there could be something more between the two of us. That's all up to Jason.

"Jason is an Owl," Black Talon points out, and I know that should mean something to me — well, it means a lot of things but nothing I can think of that immediately relates to the conversation — but it just doesn't. I don't understand, and apparently that's a really easy thing for any Owl to read, ever, because Black Talon shakes his head a little bit and makes a faintly disappointed noise. "If you want Jason to be yours, and far more importantly that you want to be Jason's—"

"I do," I break in, and he barely even glances at me but the look is enough to snap my mouth closed again. Right, don't interrupt Owls. I should know better, shouldn't I? Jason doesn't like it either.

"Then you're also signing up to be one of us, Arsenal. So far no one has been accepted into our family but us four Talons, ex or current." His smile is sharp, predatory like he can sense that my mind is taking a nosedive into 'oh fuck', and unlike his previous ones this one stays on his mouth as he speaks. "We're very selective about who gets to be part of our family; think you're up to proving yourself to each of us individually, Roy?"

Okay, wait, let's take a step back from outright panic and actually think about this. I have to think about this because otherwise I'm going to panic, hyperventilate, and pass the hell out. Not a great 'I want to date your older brother figure' impression to make on Black Talon. I've been doing half decently with him so far, haven't I?

Alright, first, it's not just Jason who knows my name. Okay, unpleasant but not unexpected. Knowing too much is kind of an Owl trademark, isn't it? It doesn't surprise me that — at the least and if I choose to be naive and optimistic — two of the five Owls know who I am outside of my mask, even though I definitely didn't tell any of them.

Second; proving myself to them? That's not such a different thought than the normal 'be good enough to date my son/daughter' thing, right? The only difference is that there's four of them instead of just a parent or two. Oh, and that they're all trained killers that could either make my life living hell or flat out murder me — without leaving a single trace — if they decide that I don't measure up to whatever standards they have. And it gets worse. What the hell kind of standards do Owls have about who one of their family gets to date? What kind of hell am I in for if I officially try and become one of them?

Well, wait, what about Kon-El? Kon's dating Black Talon, isn't he? At the least they're fucking like rabbits, and everybody knows it. But he just said that no one had ever gotten accepted into their family. Has Kon not gone official, did he fail — no, I'm pretty sure he'd be dead if he'd failed — or are they just skating under the radar? Is it some kind of thing where Kon can't be an Owl, because he's Ultraman's clone and the whole Ultraman/Owlman rivalry is a well established thing that cannot be gone against?

"What about Kon?" I blurt out, and then take in a sharp breath when I really realize what I said. I need to work on that whole thinking about what I say thing.

"You're getting the terms mixed up," Black Talon comments, glancing over his shoulder at the helm and front of the jet for a second. "You want Jason to be yours; Kon is perfectly content simply being mine. If that changes, he will face the same scrutiny you will be going through. Worse, in fact."

"Why worse?"

"He's a Kryptonian," Black Talon answers, with a tiny smirk, "and Ultraman's, officially. If he ever wants to join our family the way you intend to, Kon will have to prove that his loyalty to me is completely without question, and that he would never betray us to his 'father'. You're far less high risk, and obviously you don't have the same rivalry with us." He raises one hand and flicks it at me in some kind of gesture I don't understand, but luckily follows it up with, "Come here."

I round the table, and he shifts to one side to give me access to Jason's back. "What can I do?" I ask, swallowing down nerves. The bleeding at least looks slower, or maybe it just doesn't look as bad now that it's been rinsed clean.

"We're only a few minutes from friends, and they're ready for him. It's safest to leave anything else to professionals." He pulls away, straightening up from the table. "Their identities have to be protected, and you can't know the location of them or the Roost either. You understand that, of course." I nod, and I think he's considering me, but after a few intense — to me, anyway — seconds he echoes my nod. "I'm going to sedate you."

He turns and sweeps towards the still open storage area as I blink, staring. "Wait, sedate me? But Jason—"

"Is in the best hands he can be. There's nothing you can do but sit and wait, and you'd have to do so alone in the jet, blindfolded and restrained for the sake of security. That's more effort than I have spare attention right now, since Jason may be dying." He stands back up, a syringe in one hand, and I swallow. "So I can sedate you, or I can knock you out through more violent means. This is my preference, what's yours?"

Oh and he's not even remotely kidding. I guess I understand, I suppose it's alright. I don't like being put out, and not having any kind of clue about what's happening with Jason while whoever it is tries to keep him from dying but…

"Not much of a choice, is there?" I say with a grin, and he gives that same small, silently laughing smirk.

"Not particularly. Ready?"

I nod, and then jerk a little bit when he starts for me. "Wait, no, not ready. Give me a second." I loop around the table, back to Jason's head, and hesitate a second before sinking down to my knees. I reach up, finding the fold of his left arm and taking his hand, squeezing gently. He stays out, but I don't expect anything else. "Hey Jason," I say softly, studying the part of his lips and the smoothed out ease of his forehead, his closed eyes. "Hold on, alright? I don't care if it's for me, or Nightingale, or just to spite the world, but hold on." I swallow again, and look up at Black Talon. "You'll wake me up when it's done, when we're there?" He nods, and I squeeze Jason's hand again. "I'll be there when you wake up, Jaybird. Promise."

I let go, reluctantly, and get back to my feet. "Done?" Black Talon asks, and I look over at him.

"Yeah," I force a grin and shake out my left arm, offering it towards the needle in the younger Owl's hand. "So let's do this, hm?"

So, there's that. This is chapter one, and there are three. The third one is already done, because I got sick with the flu and to make my 1k-a-day a goal I just wrote whatever was in my head, regardless of where it fell in the continuity of the story. Luckily, I know exactly what happens in the second chapter, so that shouldn't be long. So next chapter will feature much more Nightingale, and oh he is mean. He does not appreciate this incursion on his territory.

In the current continuity of what's posted, this happens after 'Waiting for the Hoofbeats', but before 'Home For Christmas' and 'Holiday Spirit' (hey, imagine when all of my references won't just be Christmas themed ones!). There's another two chapters, as stated, and then I've got a bit immediately following it that's from Dick's PoV. That's right, from the PoV of the only Owl I haven't written yet! I'm excited. I'm really excited. Should be lots of fun!

See you next weekend!