It only took about twenty seconds of talking to John Constantine for Steph to realize that she'd never talked to a man like John Constantine before, and she'd probably never talk to a man like him again. She was usually good at figuring people out. If she had any inborn talent at all, it was communication. She didn't have Beryl's level of mastery, but she could almost always tell what was and wasn't really being said, and why.

John defied definition. She couldn't tell what was going on in his head, other than she probably didn't want to know the details. There were some people that she wanted to understand, and some that she knew she was better off holding them at arm's length. John was one of the latter, as interesting a man as he was.

But she'd expected that. Beryl hadn't come out and said that he wasdangerous, but she'd hedged around the word enough to make Steph believe that he was more dangerous than words could paint and too slippery to outline. Her advice had been brief: "Don't muck around with pretending to be anyone you're not, 'cos he hates that. If he says he doesn't want to get involved, tell him thank you anyhow and leave. He's got a way about him, Steph. He's sold friends to save his own skin, so you'd best believe he'd do that and more to a stranger."

She'd kept that in mind, but she hadn't let it scare her. John was the first real lead that she'd had, and she wasn't going to flub that chance by worrying about what he may or may not do if he didn't like her.

Her personal brand of fearlessness - one part actual fearlessness, one part stubbornness, and one part just not knowing when to give up when the getting was good - hadn't failed her too badly over the years, and it'd just happened to charm Mr. Constantine. He had, he admitted over beer and a cigarette she wouldn't let him light, something of a soft spot for spitfires. Some may have called women like her harpies or bossy or even just bitches, but he preferred a brass tacks kind of girl, especially in this day and age.

Steph didn't tell him who she was, or whose soul she was petitioning for, but she she had a feeling that he knew already. She didn't use names, but the particular tilt of a grin made her all too sure that he thought her hardwired desire to keep some kind of secret identity was adorable.

Magic people. They were kind of smug, when it came right down to it.

"And he's an asshole," she said, with the moody surety of someone who knew exactly how much of an asshole Damian could be. "But I still feel like the situation he got himself into isn't his fault, you know? He was a kid. He didn't know what he was doing, and I don't think that he ever really wanted to make the deal. He just figures he's stuck with it now. He's doing this whole martyr thing, and he doesn't even know about the baby yet - and I know that'll make it worse. Frankly, it's pissing me off."

"Well," John said, rolling his shoulders in a barely-there, barely-invested shrug. "If you tell him about the bun he put in your oven, he'll straighten out on his own. Odds are in your favor. Blue-bloods 'ave two ways about propriety: he'll either marry you to make your bastard legal, or he'll give you the means to live before he sweeps you under the rug."

"He won't do either," she said firmly. She couldn't even name the sharp edges that were poking into her, the emotions that churned and grated on the inside. Being reduced to 'wronged, knocked up lover' terms felt cheap, and calling her baby a bastard felt worse by far. She and Damian had never been caught up in impressing anyone else, or following societal standards. They'd respected each other, and she'd - she'd promised herself that after Dean, she'd never be that girl again. "Because I'm not going to tell him about the baby. I don't want him to be influenced by what he thinks he 'owes' me."

"Ah!" John cried, mock-hurt. "So you're one of those, then. Dirty rotten idealist. And I'd had such hopes for you, luv."

"I'm an idealist, but I'll still cheat to get my way. In this scenario, 'my way' is getting him out of hell. I'm giving the man a choice, but if I have to show my full hand, so be it."

"Now, see," John said, finishing his beer and raising two fingers to the bartender for another. "That's where things get a mite sticky. I know you think he's a real gem, but scrub off that lovey film for two moments. What makes you figure that he isn't headed for hell anyhow?"

And that thought hadn't ever really occurred to her - not like that, not fully.

Damian was a killer. Past tense, sure, but sins were sins and he'd never sought absolution. She had no concept of how many people he'd murdered as a child, no idea how many lives he'd snuffed out.

Murderers ended up in hell. They had their own reserved seating. Seventh circle, front row.

"Gotta powder my nose," Steph said, pushing her chair back with shaking hands.

She calmly walked to the bathroom, opened the door, and stood beside the sinks. She had to swallow repeatedly to clear the bile surging a hot line up the back of her throat, but she did - had to. She had to keep her head, had to stay strong, even though her body was fighting her every step of the way.

Steph was stubborn as hell. If there was any one word that described her, it was determined, chased closely by hopeful, and whether Damian liked it or not, all that stubborn hope was going to be pushed in his face. She wasn't - couldn't - ignore her pregnancy, but there were things that had to be done.

Yes, Damian had made mistakes. Yes, he had done horrible things. She was intimately familiar with all of that. But if she gave up on him - when he wasn't even twenty-one years old and had already given up on himself for all eternity - who did he have in his corner of the ring? Nobody.

She loved him. He was an asshole who hated himself and most of the people around him, but she loved him.

So Steph gripped the edge of the sink with one hand, biting the fingers of her other. She bit down hard on her knuckles, forcing herself to breathe evenly and control her body and its reactions. Yes, she was pregnant. Yes, her hormones and emotions were going through wild ups and downs.

But goddammit, she was still Batwoman.

It took a few minutes, but she wrestled herself under control. Her knuckles throbbed from where her teeth had dug in, but she hadn't thrown up. Every small victory was celebrated, at this point.

John had ordered her a ginger ale and stirred it with a straw until it was flat, leaving it on the bar in front of her empty chair with no comment. She sipped it gratefully when she sat back down, though it didn't do much to settle her stomach.

"I don't care," she said, once she'd taken a drink and swallowed down her nausea for good. "I'm going to save him anyway."

"By the golden standards, his soul isn't worth saving. He's no great hero," John said, giving her a sideways glance. He had this way of looking at her that made her feel like he could see through her, at least a little. She had loads of new insight as to why Bruce hadn't liked the magical crowd. "But, that doesn't make saving him impossible. If you think there's something in the little bastard worth keeping around, that's your prerogative. All it means is that it won't be easy. A simple switch is one thing, but you'll have to barter."

"Barter?" she repeated, chasing the thought with a gulp of ginger ale.

He nodded. "See, there's two ways about this thing. Demons don't do nothing they don't want to, so you've got to have their number dialed in, so to speak. You've gotta have some leverage, and it absolutely must be good, or you run the risk of ending up a bloody smear. Either you blackmail one of the slimy bastards, or you trade 'em something of greater value than what they've got. It's imperative that they feel like they're the one getting the most out of the exchange."

John's voice sounded tinny and far away. The magnitude of what he was saying was too big to process, so it left her numb.

"So, if I want to get his soul back, I have to sell someone else's soul," Steph heard herself say.

"That's it precisely. And if you're going to do it, it has to be soon," he said, flicking a pointed look at her stomach. "'Cos demons have a cultured taste for the flesh of innocents, and nothing's as innocent as a newborn. Demons think it poetic - as soon as you have it, they won't take anything else in a trade. It won't be interested until it's born, though. It's not considered a proper soul until it's taken its first breath on its own." John shrugged again, mulling over his beer. "And don't harp on the ethics and issues of that. I'm only telling you how they play the game, not saying how it ought to be played."

Steph nodded mechanically. She understood. She was silently repulsed by the mere idea, but she understood.

If she was going to save Damian, she'd have to damn someone else to hell in his place. If she was going to save him and not jeopardize the life of their child, she'd have to do it in the next couple of months. If she was going to save him because he wanted to be saved and not because he felt obligated to her, she'd have to do it before she started showing. That left her with a horrific decision to make and no time to make it in.

Her lungs felt crushed by the sheer hopelessness of the situation.

Maybe she'd been wrong all along.

Maybe Wayne luck was even worse than Brown luck.

Jason could keep track of the day of the week by keeping a finger pressed to the pulse of the street. For all the ups and downs, all the coups and attempts to push control one way or the other, there was a rhythm to it. For someone like him, who had been a part of the street for what amounted to too much of his life, he could swear by it. Everything was cyclical. Domestic abuse on paydays and holidays was no-brainer stuff, but it went deeper than that. Aggravated assaults and murders happened the most on Saturdays and Sundays, climbing steadily through the day and peaking around midnight. Burglaries and thefts were more common during the week, especially on Wednesdays and Fridays. Thefts spiked in the early evenings, burglaries in the early mornings. Summer meant ice cream trucks and murders. Schizos fell apart during full moons. Jason didn't need a calendar or a watch when he had the bloody dregs of humanity keeping time for him.

There was a weird kind of comfort in it, a familiarity. So long as there was crime, he had a reason to prowl the streets and keep a finger on its pulse. How he felt about his role had a cycle, too. Sometimes it was a grim satisfaction, sometimes it was a burden, but it always was his role.

He was a bad man who did bad things. All the little bats and birds knew that.

So that was why it jarred him when something shifted, somethingchanged, and the city's pulse increased its beat. Batman - and all the men who had worn that cowl - was as constant as crime itself, always semi-visible unless he had a damn good reason not to patrol. A couple of months back, though, the Bat had disappeared for almost two weeks. Now, his presence was erratic - sometimes he'd be at the edge of Jason's periphery for a week solid, then he'd be gone for days. In that week or more that he was around, he was fucking everywhere: relentless and increasingly violent, rattling the gutters from dusk to dawn without any breaks. Then there'd be a day or two of absolute radio silence, and the cycle would turn over.

Jason wasn't sure what to make of it. Dick and Bruce had been cut from similar cloth, altruistic and self-limiting. Damian, though - Damian was more like Jason himself than any of the others. His limitations were the ones that Bruce had set, and he'd been over the edge of them before. He hadn't thought that the kid would adjust well to being Daddy's little stand-in, but for the last couple of years he'd been pretty stable.

Something had changed, and he had a feeling it had to do with the fact that his better half was doing the Bat equivalent to backpacking around Europe. He'd watched this all play out, interested but not all that invested, and figured that it was none of his business if the Batman was losing his shit. Hell, it would be kind of poetic, in a way. Jason hadn't planned to get involved, but he'd always gotten sucked into the politics of the Wayne legacy whether he liked it or not.

This time, it started with a phone call. It figured that it was a Saturday, which meant aggravated assault with a light sprinkling of drug running thrown in to keep things fresh. Jason was pinned behind a stack of shipping crates, but he wasn't all that worried about it. Most hoods were dumb, and poorly-equipped to boot. Sometimes, the key to victory was patience, because sooner or later they would run out of ammo and stop spraying bullets. It'd take a lot more than some strung-out idiots with shitty Chinese knock-offs of shitty Russian guns to take him out.

Maybe he was a little cocky, but he'd always had a smart mouth and a healthy ego - and he could back it all up with skill, and that's what reallymattered.

So he'd been cooling his heels and idly counting rounds when his phone started ringing. It wasn't a number he gave out often, and he'd programmed in ringtones to give him a fair warning if it was a call he'd rather miss. Only a complete idiot would have real names or monikers stored in the memory, so the ringtones were things that only he would be able to associate with the numbers.

Dick got a stirring tribute by Sir Mix-a-Lot, Timbo was "White and Nerdy" by Weird Al, Damian was "Stacey's Mom" for obvious reasons, and back in the day, Bruce had been given no ringtone at all - he knew better than to think he'd call him first.

But his phone was merrily pealing the opening bars of "Walking on Sunshine," which meant he had to answer. Jason swore at the fuckingtiming of it all, yelled, "Just a moment, gentlemen! I have me a lady caller, and you know how women are about getting pushed to voicemail!" and answered the phone with a cheerful, "Hi there, pudding-pop. How's life treating you?"

There was a beat, a moment of dead air, before Stephanie replied with a hesitant, "It's been better, I guess."

He'd figured as much. If she was in England and Batty Jr. was going cuckoo for cocoa puffs, all was not well in the cave. And maybe he'd been hoping that this would happen, at least a little bit. There was something about her that he liked - that he wanted. Maybe it was physical; maybe it was the natural effect of having one of the Bats trust him and give a shit about him. Either way, he was no stranger of wanting something and not having it, so the idea of possibly getting a chance athaving was one he found appealing.

"Tell me all about it. I'm all ears."

"Are you in the middle of something?" Steph asked, because the chuckleheads on meth had started peppering him with bullets again.

"Me?" Jason asked, mock-shocked. He stretched out his long legs, twirling his gun around his index finger. "Oh, no, not at all. I can talk."

"Jay," she said, her tone flat. "I can hear the gunshots."

He flicked a quick look at the men, held the phone to his chest to muffle the sound, and dropped one of them. Quick, efficient, and neat. Having a certain savoir-faire about his job was what made him a natural, and not just another thug with a gun.

"Just a bug," he informed her, holding the phone against the crook of his shoulder as he reloaded.

"You're capping a bug with a gun?" Steph asked, completely unconvinced.

"It's a big bug."

"Jason."

"Snookums, this is Gotham. This bug is big, armed, and has gang connections in four countries. Everything in Gotham is big and mean and ugly. I promise that it hasn't changed since you left. I mean, if anything, it's gotten a little less sunshiney," he said with a shit-eating grin she couldn't see.

"I don't have the energy to argue with you about this," she said, and she truly sounded like she didn't.

"Then don't argue with me, and tell me why you called."

"I - I don't know. I just - I'm - "

Jason took the tiny window of her stammered hesitance to take out the other gunman. The things he had to do to get a little peace and quiet to have a conversation.

"Shh, shh, take a deep breath and relax. I'm in no hurry."

"I'm pregnant."

It wasn't every day that someone said something that robbed him of a witty comeback, but Stephanie was full of surprises.

"What?" Jason demanded, standing up and frowning. He'd heard her, of course, but he wanted to make sure.

"Preggers," she said tiredly, tonelessly. Unhappily. "Knocked up. Expecting a little bat-bundle of bat-joy. Need I go on?"

"Seriously?"

"Do you really think I'd joke about this?"

There was a soft edge of pain in the way she said joke that actually, honestly bothered him. Tallying up the clues and facts, he wasn't surprised. Something had happened that'd pushed Damian into batshit territory, she was three thousand miles and change away, he was suddenly looking like one of the more even-tempered and reasonable vigilantes on the street, and now there was a baby to factor into the whole mess.

God, sometimes he swore that the bat clan was just one big, fucked up soap opera, and he was the only one with enough distance to see it for what it really was: Daddy Issues R' Us. The irony didn't escape him. He knew he was one of the bunch, but that didn't mean he couldn't accept that about himself.

"No. I don't think you'd joke about that. I'm just a little - " Angry? Confused? " - surprised that I'm on the phone tree, that's all. For one reason or another, I don't get the good news calls very often."

"Yeah, well." Stephanie sighed. She really didn't sound good, and he suffered the unexpected urge to find Damian and put him through a wall or five. Caring did weird things to his head - probably because he was out of practice. "You're actually the first one in the 'family' that I've told."

"Hold on. Back the fuck up for two seconds. I'm the first one to know?" Jason didn't even know what to do with that information - that trust. Of all the possible people, she'd called him. Not her old pal Babsy, not her old boyfriend Timmy, not even - "Shit. Lemme guess. Babybat's the babydaddy, and you haven't told him, either."

The watery silence said it better than her small, eventual, "He can't know yet."

Sometimes, Jason wanted to be a part of the life he'd had before his life had gotten an unexpected sequel. Sometimes, he wanted to be as far away from it as he possibly could. Most of the time, he was stuck in the gravitational pull of the Bat, and once in a while he got pulled in all the way.

"Look. It's - what, one or two in the morning where you're at? Lay down, take a metaphorical chill pill, and I'll be there when you get up. I don't want to discuss this over the phone."

There was a hitch in her breathing. "I'm in England. You don't have to - "

"Yeah, I know," he interrupted, and started to stack the dirty merch to burn. "You want to talk, so I'm wrapping up this roach motel and hopping the next flight. Shut up about it."

"Jason, I - "

"Do me a favor and stow the thanks. I don't do shit for thank you cards. Just go to sleep, preggo. Stress and pregnancy do not a healthy baby make."

Steph said thank you anyway, because she was stubborn and did what she wanted. Then she hung up, which freed his hands to quickly raze and burn the wannabe meth moguls.

He really hated when he got involved in the affairs of bats. It never ended well for him. He was getting too old for this particular cycle.

Steph tried to sleep, but sleep wasn't in the cards. Every time she closed her eyes, her eyelids dance with grotesque maybes: all the bad things that could happen if she tried to deal with the demon - what if the demon decided it wanted her baby, even as small and underdeveloped as it was; what if that was how Damian found out; what if it just scooped it out of her; what would she do if she lost this one, how would she deal - all the bad things that could happen if she tried to talk with Damian - what if she'd projected her feelings about their partnership onto him, and he didn't actually give a damn either way; what if she set up the whole new deal and he backed out; what if he turned out to be as sociopathic and hard-hearted as people painted him; what would she do if she'd been played for three years, how would she deal - what if, what if, what if.

Her head was too busy to shut down, and stress brought on nausea. She ended up just sitting on the floor in the bathroom, a blanket around her shoulders. It cut down on having to make trips from her bedroom to the toilet, and it wasn't like she was finding rest in her bed, anyway.

It all boiled down to two questions. One: was she willing to throw someone else's soul under the bus for Damian's sake? And two: if she was, if she could make herself go there, who would she choose? Would it be worth it? Would she be able to live with herself if she sent someone's soul to damnation, and ended up with a big fat zero in return - or worse?

The two main questions didn't have answers. They only prompted endless strings of more questions, and Steph didn't know what to think or where to go from there.

She'd meant it when she'd told John that she was willing to sacrifice to set things right with Damian. She just hadn't known that might mean sacrificing another person. Personal sacrifice was one thing, but offering up someone else was another thing entirely.

Steph had been almost asleep, sitting up with her back against the bathroom wall, when her cellphone had started to shrill the opening lyrics of "Bad Reputation." It was a text message from Jason, not a call, and it gave her the name of a motel in town and a room number.

He'd been true to his word. He really had hopped the next flight to England.

Steph washed her face, braided back her hair, and brushed her teeth twice. She still didn't feel like a presentable human being, but it was as good as she was going to get on short notice.

Twenty minutes and a bus ride later, she was knocking on the door of his motel room, wondering distantly what the hell she was doing with her life choices.

Pregnant, thousands of miles from home, and willingly walking into a motel room that held one Jason Todd the Probably Untrustable. It sounded like the setup to a Lifetime original movie, and it pissed her off that it was her life, not a canned movie plot. If this was really a Lifetime movie, though, Jason would bare his secret emotive, gentle side and take her away from all the terrible complications. That, or she'd end up pushed down a flight of stairs by a jealous lover she'd never known about.

It was a good thing that her life was its own brand of screwed up, and didn't take its cues from Pregnant Damsel in Emotional Distress clichés.

The door opened, and there was Jason. She'd somehow forgotten how big he was. It wasn't something she'd really wanted to be reminded of, since it occurred to her that she hadn't even told Beryl where she was going. She was batting a thousand as far as terrible decisions went.

"I can't believe you flew here just to talk to me," Steph said, because hifelt awkward.

"And I can't believe you let the pipsqueak's little swimmers start homesteading in the fertile valley of your uterus, so let's get over our joint disbelief and move on," Jason said, and opened the door all the way for her. "You look like shit, by the way. I mean, you've got the whole pregnant glow and yadda yadda yadda, but you look like you're gonna swoon, princess. And you never struck me as the swooning type."

With Jason, she could never decide when he was insulting her and when he was complimenting her. He could do both in the same breath.

"I didn't mean to get pregnant," Steph told him sourly, and tried to not-so-obviously look for a place to sit. There was a single bed, a small round table, and one chair by the table. She took the chair, because it seemed like the safest option. Not that she thought that Jason would go there, especially knowing that she was pregnant, but she had trouble reading him. She didn't know what to expect from this talk.

"I've heard that one before. But face it: you're percolating the heir to the Wayne family fortune. There are a probably a thousand women who'd rent out their womb for a shot at that grand prize."

She briefly saw red. Her emotions were more ferocious than usual in just about every direction, but that was a sore spot that Jason should have known better than to jab.

"I. Didn't. Mean. To," she said, each word clipped short. She got back up, her tiredness curling up under the heat of how suddenly angry that implication made her. "I'm not a fucking gold digger. I don't care about the money. It was a goodbye quickie gone wrong, and I'm dealing with the consequences. If you think that I - "

"I don't think that," he said, rolling his eyes. "Sit your ass down. I was joking. I know you're not going to use your little whoopsie as leverage against him. That'd make you normal, and let's be real. You wouldn't be talking to me, or doing what you do, if you were normal."

Steph did sit back down, feeling slightly embarrassed by how quickly she'd flipped, but he didn't seem bothered by it.

"Nothing about this is normal. This is galaxies away from normal. And that - that is why I called you. I just…" Steph searched for words, but they wouldn't come.

Jason stretched out languorously on the bed, toeing off his boots and crossing his legs at the ankles.

"I came here for the full story. Lay it on me."

She didn't know where to start, so she began where Damian had, when he'd finally come clean.

"When Damian was fourteen years old, Bruce was killed. Contrary to popular belief, it wasn't his fault. But he was - he was just a kid, y'know? It scared him. That same night, he went to a crossroads, and he made a deal."

It took about an hour to get it all out, from beginning to end. Jason was quiet through most of it, nodding where it was appropriate and muttering what was probably threats against Damian's health and general well-being under his breath. Steph was proud of herself, because she managed to keep even and composed through the entire explanation - even that raw, stilted description of how and why she'd left Gotham.

Jason was silent for a while afterward, arms folded behind his head and gaze tilted toward the ceiling.

"He really fucked it up, didn't he," he said, less of a question and more stating fact.

"Yeah, but I think…I mean, maybe…he could still pull through it."

"Do you really want him to?"

The question surprised Steph, because she thought the answer was obvious. If she didn't really want him to, she wouldn't have been contemplating damning someone's soul to the fiery pit. That alone should have shown a whole lot of want.

"I'm just saying," Jason continued, completely conversational. "That maybe you should take a good hard look at this. So, you're carrying a kid that's half him, half you. Being a sperm donor doesn't mean he's gonna be a good father to your spawn. He's civil on a good day, but he couldn't understand kids when he was one himself. What makes you think he'll know what to do? You know he's got a temper on him."

Steph had trouble swallowing. Her mouth had gone very dry.

"He's said that he wants kids," she said slowly, struggling with what he was saying. He was right. He was right, and he was reasonable, and Jason Todd should never be the voice of reason.

"Wanting 'em in theory and knowing what to do with 'em when you're saddled with them are two different things," he said, sitting up a little and looking at her. "And let's face it. The timing's not great. He might think you did it on purpose, to keep him in line. He's twenty, and you're almost thirty. You barely escaped making him a teen dad. If I were him? I'd resent that, at least a little bit."

She had thought these things before - had tried to tune them out, clinging instead to the solidity she'd convinced herself they had between them.

Now, hearing Jason voice her own insecurities, they seemed insurmountable. What the hell was she doing? Who was she fooling?

It was that, the problems she'd been turning a blind eye on to focus on 'demon deals et all', that made her sniff hard.

Steph just felt lost. She had thought she had it all figured out for her life, but the past four months or so had jerked the carpet out from under her feet and dropped her on her ass.

Oh, god, this really was turning Lifetime on her.

Jason sighed loudly. He sat up, swung his legs over the side of the bed, and stood over her chair. He tilted her chin up, and she thought that he might try to say something encouraging, which would have just beenbizarre, but then he started kissing her, instead.

And kissing her was more like Jason than playing the part of the soothing maybe-friend.

She didn't push him away as quickly as she should have. Jason's hands were big and a little rough, his stubble an interesting rasp, and he was a good kisser. He knew what he was doing, and he was taking his time.

But it hit her as just a tiny bit convenient. Maybe crushing the self-esteem of distraught women and then sweeping up the pieces was a winning formula for him usually, but he'd said it himself: she wasn't a normal person.

And he didn't know Damian better than she did.

Steph pressed a hand against his chest - not aggressively, but firmly.

"Look," she said, taking a deep breath. She felt better, for whatever reason. "Maybe the whole emotional manipulation thing works for you, but I'm not buying it. You've got a point. Seriously, you do. Your argument is solid. But, that only applies to normal people. If I'm abnormal, Damian is fucking insane. He said he wanted to have kids with me the first timewe had sex, so I'm going to believe that he'll want this baby until I have evidence to the contrary."

Jason smirked. He didn't draw back very far, but he did straighten.

"Can't blame a guy for trying his luck," he said, and instead of being pissed off that she'd seen through his scheme, he seemed to be amused. Even at her lowest, Steph was still stubborn and sharp. She didn't tolerate bullshit.

"Don't think I'm saying this is a never," Steph said, because heat had crept into her cheeks and he was still looking at her expectantly. "Just that - I - I love that jerk. I can't. Not without him. If he's going to be a martyr or doesn't want to bargain, we'll revisit this. But I still have options to exhaust. So. So whatever this is, it's tabled until further notice."

Jason took a step back. He was full-out grinning, widely and crookedly.

"Huh," was all that he said. He picked up his jacket from the floor and laced up his boots. Taking a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket, he tapped it against the flat of his palm a couple of times. "I need a smoke break. I'll be back in twenty minutes - a half hour, tops."

So he expected her to wait for him, basically.

Steph knew that she should take the time to check bus schedules and get back to Worden. Things would be awkward when Jason got back - there was only so far that she could feasibly push her luck before it went all Brown on her.

But getting herself up and moving was more of a fight than she had in her at the moment. She stood, but then the bed looked really inviting, and she flopped down with even less grace than usual. Between stress and morning sickness, her energy level had bottomed out. When Jason came back in, she was more than halfway asleep and still telling herself to go check the bus schedule on her phone.

He kicked off his boots, tossing his jacket over the back of a chair. He stretched out on the bed beside her, his weight making the cheap springs in the mattress squeak. Steph rolled closer to him when the bed dipped, gravity pushing her closer to him. Jason's face was cold, and he smelled like damp night air and menthol cigarettes. She ran her fingers through the vivid white shock of his bangs, kneejerk curiosity she didn't pull back. He dyed his hair, she knew, but dye didn't stay for long. She'd wondered why the back and forth between black and red, why the dye at all, but now she knew. He was covering up that broad hank of snowy hair, which she had to assume was natural - and unwanted.

Jason hid his defining marks. Even on the outside of the bat colony, he swung between the extremes of being everything they were not, and mimicking them. It was like he didn't know what he wanted. She understood the feeling a little too well.

"I've got a solution," he announced, wrapping a hand loosely around her wrist. "And we're gonna do it. When people ask, I'll take all responsibility."

If he was offering to protect her, it was a bad idea. Morally gray at best, criminal at worst. She knew that.

She took a breath, then let it out. Thought about getting up again, but didn't. She could barely keep her eyes open.

If she trusted him enough to be in the room with him, to fall asleep with him next to her, stretching that trust far enough to cover his solution wasn't all that difficult. Maybe it was a bad idea in theory, but she didn't have many options. Trusting him hadn't blown up in her face.

Not yet, at least.

"What if I shoot it down?"

"You won't. It's the best chance babybat has at getting out of the deal. You'll still be able to look at yourself in the mirror, cupcake. I promise. Nobody'll die."

"But we'll have to offer up someone's - "

"I know." Jason kissed the top of her head, putting his arm around her. "Just blame me. Everyone knows that I'm a bad man."

She slept for about sixteen hours straight, which was far from a personal record, but it was still noteworthy. Jason was snoring next to her when she finally cracked her gummy eyes open again - his jeans were discarded on the floor, but he was on top of the covers instead of under them with her. Steph wouldn't have assumed that he'd be that respectful, but her new rule of thumb was to never assume anything about him. He was a lot like John, in that regard. And Damian.

And maybe she was developing a type.

He woke up as soon as she started moving, yawning and stretching until his back popped.

"Feel better?" He asked, his voice still sleep-rough.

"Mmhm," she murmured, rubbing her eyes.

"You look significantly less shitty."

"You need to remember that I do have the training to crush your balls before you can block me," Steph said, matching his smirk. "I'm the goddamn Batwoman. I can and will blame it on hormones."

She felt significantly less shitty, too. Jason had outlined The Plan, and he'd been absolutely right - she hadn't liked it. But, she realized that of all possible options, it was the most viable one. She didn't think she'd ever be comfortable with it, but it had a weird kind of justice to it.

It wasn't good, but it wasn't bad. Bruce hadn't believed in that gray, but it seemed like it was the murky middle zone that they operated in, anymore.

Steph had agreed to the plan, but on one condition: they had to get Damian on board before they started assembling the necessary people and pieces. If he didn't want help, they couldn't force it. It was as simple as that.

And for being a simple thing, it was difficult to contemplate.

"The flight leaves in three hours," Jason said around another yawn. "If you don't want to have to share the shower, we'd better get moving."

She tossed a pillow at him before sitting up. She'd slept in her camisole and underwear, and she was all too aware of his eyes on her - specifically, on her stomach. Without a loose shirt covering it up, the swell of her belly was fairly obvious. She didn't look pregnant pregnant yet, but she had the makings of a baby bump.

"The clock's ticking, mommabear," he said, and didn't sound like he was laughing anymore.

The flight back to Gotham was just about as bad as the flight over, but at least she knew why she was so airsick, this time around. In retrospect, it was so obvious. Steph should have known after Cass had looked her over, seen the changes in her bearing, and figured it out. On some level, she had been in denial. She hadn't wanted that to be the reason that she was a sick wreck, because she hadn't been ready to handle the complications.

But now, she was. At least, she was better equipped to handle what life was pelting her with. She had to remind herself of that a couple of times during the flight, then the ride to Wayne Manor.

Damian had to have seen them coming. That was just assumed, because nobody and nothing went unnoticed by the security systems. One did not simply walk into Wayne property. It just didn't work that way.

But he wasn't at the gate to turn them away, and he didn't answer the front door when she knocked. If he hadn't been home, the security system would have kicked in. Since it didn't, she had to surmise that he was there, and throwing what she'd dubbed a bitch fit.

Steph had expected that. The silent-but-seething treatment was one that he'd resorted to more than once.

Unfortunately for him, she was going to talk to him, even if that meant yelling at the house itself until he called the police or started listening. And she knew that he wouldn't call the police, so it was just a matter of time until she broke his patience and got him to react.

It was easier than she'd anticipated. Out of curiosity, she'd punched in the last security code that had been set before she left.

And the door opened. It shouldn't have, because Damian changed the codes religiously, but it did.

She walked into the place she'd called home for the past three years, and found herself feeling more heartsore than anything else. Most of the lights were off, and rooms had been left completely untouched. It was eerily quiet, like it hadn't been lived in for weeks.

But Damian was there. She knew he had to be, especially after she heard a soft thump and a trilling feline question.

Steph couldn't see him in the dark, but she knew that her furry baby was somewhere in the house, calling for her. It was stupid, because he was just their cat, but she'd missed that more than she'd realized.

"Alfie," she said, voice low. "I'm home."

And that was when Jason started swearing a blue streak.

The security codes had been easy to disable, but that wasn't the only thing keeping the manor safe from intruders. Alfred knew and recognized her, of course, but Jason was a stranger, as far as he was concerned. Alfred didn't like strangers, and she hadn't thought to warn Jason. The way he was yelling, he was being attacked by a raptor, not a singularly determined housecat.

"Alfie!" Steph hissed, grabbing for the puffed-up ball of black and white fur and claws before Jason shook him free. "It's okay! We like him! Stand down!"

Normal couples who had normal pets taught them normal commands. Alfred chose to listen to her, slithering up to perch on her shoulder and groom himself furiously. Once he'd tamed his coat, he headbutted her face and purred noisily.

At least someone was glad that she'd come back.

"I fucking hate your boyfriend," Jason said, with great feeling. "And I fucking hate your cat. And I need a fucking drink. Tell me you have booze somewhere."

"If D hasn't drank it all himself, we do," she said, and stood in front of the grandfather clock for a few long seconds before she went down. Jason followed two steps behind, gingerly touching the bleeding scratches on his face and neck.

Alfred hopped from her shoulder and lead her down the stairs and straight to Damian. He was standing by the computer console, arms crossed over his chest.

"Get out," Damian said, before she had a chance to say as much as hi. She'd expected him to be angry - she hadn't said goodbye, not really - but he just sounded tired and resigned. He looked like he hadn't eaten, shaved, or slept since his television appearance. He was gaunt and unkempt, two things he abhorred. "If you're here for the cat, you may not have him. He was a gift, if you remember correctly."

"I'm not here to establish custody rights of our furry child," Steph said, sighing. "I came to see you."

"And now you have." He said, so evenly he sounded robotic. "Get out."

"Damian."

"You're not wanted here, Brown. You made it clear that you don't want to continue our partnership. I have respected your space, so you will respect mine. If you want your things, take them and go. I don't fucking care."

Brown. Ouch. Twice-damned harlot at least had some investment in it, some laughter. Using her last name alone was an insult, but one that was gummy and uncomfortable, not sharp. He rarely, if ever, used her last name, because her father wasn't someone either of them liked to dwell on.

It was more effective than any four-letter word he could have balled up and thrown at her.

"I'll leave you two kids to sort yourselves out. I've got a date with your liquor cabinet," Jason said, forcibly cheerful. He gave her a look, a you yell if you need me, like he didn't quite trust Damian to stay in line. She wasn't positive if she appreciated that, or resented him for it. She wanted to believe that she could handle this situation, but it had already hiked up to a level of aggression she hadn't braced herself for.

Maybe she should have.

Silence hung between them. Damian said nothing, his body language too stiff to read. He'd thrown up every icy invisible wall possible, and she suffered the awful, gut-twisting idea that maybe he wouldn't forgive her for leaving. He'd given her more trust than he'd put in any other person alive, and as he saw it she had betrayed that thought that he might not want anything to do with her ever again made her feel vaguely like she was falling.

Vertigo would turn to nausea if she didn't cut it off at the quick, so she took a cleansing breath. She'd have to offer up an explanation if she puked on his shoes, and that wasn't a conversation she was prepared to have right then.

"You haven't changed the codes, D," Steph pointed out, finally.

"I've been busy."

"You change the codes twice a week, and it's been two months." She breathed in, then plowed on. "You don't really want me out, do you?"

"A dangerous assumption for you to make, Brown," Damian growled, and this time she winced reflexively, because it felt like a slap.

But like hell would she come all this way just to let him bully her.

"It's not an assumption," Steph said, her voice hard. If he thought he could make her back down by namedropping her daddy issues, he was kidding himself - or didn't have much ammunition left. "I know that I'm right. You were too busy - " and she threw that up in air quotes, just so he knew she meant business. " - to do basic security maintenance. Come on. Who do you think you're talking to? You're talking to the girl who was locked out how many times, and had to yell until the security cameras picked it up. You chose to keep them the same. Don't try to bullshit me."

His mouth bunched and pulled, a sneer that didn't quite make it to indifference.

"You made your decision. I will not - " Damian paused for a beat. " - cannot - change. Thus, we are at an impasse. You're wasting your time here. I won't ask you to leave again."

It was that pause that answered the question of whether or not he had forgiven her. If it'd been just will not, she would have chalked it up to stubbornness and ego, and yes, she would have been wasting her time.

But he'd said cannot.

"Because the big bad Bat got himself into a deal, and noooooobody can save him now." Steph's voice got steadily louder; she gestured widely with both hands. "So you're just going to let yourself die horribly and go to hell, because you made your bed and are going to sleep in it like a REAL man."

"Don't patronize me," Damian muttered, too tired to sound annoyed.

"You can't change, but not because you don't want to change. You can't, because there's no hope for you at all," she continued, hearing her own voice echo back faintly. Leathery wings beat high above their heads.

"Get out," he said, no tone or inflection at all. If anything, he might've been resigned.

"No," she snapped, and felt her emotions bend in weird, hormonally-driven ways. She wanted to cry and to slap him in equal parts. "Because what you think is complete bullshit. There's still hope for you, and I want to help. I'm your partner. Let me."

Damian's expression crumpled. He bowed his head.

"Stop it. Just - stop it, you insipid twat. You can't will this situation better," he said, and then: "I poison everything around me. I've accepted this fact. You should, too."

"Damian," Steph sighed, dropping down to a less aggressive volume. He seemed sufficiently beaten-down, and yelling at him wouldn't help. She wanted to reach for him, but she knew that she couldn't. "You can't really believe that."

"How can I not?" He demanded, low and tight and angry. Finally,something. "Use your fucking head for once. Your absence has given me time to think, and I realize now that leaving was the correct decision for you to make. If you have any sense whatsoever, you will stay gone."

Damian really did believe that, and it broke her heart. It was one thing to think poorly of yourself, but another thing entirely to feel like you cursed everyone around you.

"Do you want me to leave?"

She'd posed that exact question to him the night she'd left. He'd said no, but he'd outlined conditions she couldn't abide by. Now, she was just checking in to see if anything had changed in the past two and a half months - if he'd hit the epiphany she'd been praying for.

If nothing had changed, she wouldn't be coming back for a third time. She'd disappear, and he would never know about their child. As he was now, he was right - he was dangerous to be around. His self-destructive habits created a blast radius that was impossible to live inside.

"I love you," he said hoarsely, looking down at his hands. "That has not changed. Nothing has changed, not for me. Dismiss it as youthful inexperience if you must, but I do not believe that will change. Because of that, I want you to go. Please, Stephanie."

And she knew that. Steph believed him. It scared her to believe that he could love anyone like that, much less her, but she knew it was the truth. That was one of the things that had brought her back. Tarnished soul or not, he deserved a chance at a real life.

"I did what you told me not to do," Steph said. She couldn't touch on his admission. Couldn't dwell on the fact that he'd broken down enough to tell her that he loved her. Not yet. "I started looking for a plan B for your deal."

Damian's head jerked up; his eyes were wide. "No."

"And," she continued on like she hadn't heard his plead, "I found one."

He stared at her, mouth partially open. It wasn't often that unflappable Damian Wayne wore that expression.

"No. No such thing exists. You cannot undo a deal like mine. You don't know how demons work."

"I found a way," Steph repeated, this time firmer. "I don't know how demons work, but I used my lifeline and phoned a friend who happens to be an expert in demon deals. But it's up to you if you'll take it. If you do - and if it works - your deal will be void. You'll be 100% human again. No more super healing, no more cheating death."

Silence stuffed in around them again, cottony and thick. Damian stared at her and she didn't look away. His hands - clenched in white-knuckled fists at his sides - relaxed, and he rubbed them over his face.

"If I do this, will you come back?" Damian asked, cautiously hopeful.

"You can't do this for me," Steph warned him, both hands held up. She hated to say it, because yes would have been so easy. Yes would have sealed the deal, would have ensured that everything could have been neatly wrapped up between them, but she couldn't say it, not in good conscious. Holding herself back was a struggle. "This has to be something you do for yourself, because you want to live and not punish yourself for living. If you don't do this for yourself, we're back to square one and the vicious self-hate cycle starts all over again. You're a good man, and you need to start treating yourself like one."

"I don't - I do not - "

His chin trembled and he closed his eyes, trying to compose himself. Stupid, arrogant, self-righteous Damian Wayne was having a complete breakdown in front of her. Two minutes ago, he'd been yelling - yelling at her, raging. But now, he was crying. He sat down heavily in his chair, face in his hands. His shoulders shook, but he made no sound.

She'd known that leaving would hurt him, but she hadn't expected how much. She'd seen him cry exactly twice, and both times it'd been over the loss of his father and brother. She hadn't anticipated him crying overher - that he'd put her absence on the same level as those who were dead and gone forever.

Steph closed the distance between them finally, her hands on his back. His arms slid around her, pulling her close and all but crushing her against him. It made her stomach flip-flop weirdly when he pressed his face against her and cried - she knew he couldn't possibly know about the baby, but to have him touch her belly like that made her heart forget its usual tempo. She hadn't expected this kind of unselfconscious breakdown - especially with Jason still lurking - but Damian was rarely able to express how deeply he felt about the people around him. She stroked back his hair, curling around him protectively.

"I do not respect the man I have become," Damian said, his voice thick and hoarse. "If there is a way, I will take the risk."

So, that was a yes.

Unfortunately, getting him to throw in with The Plan was the easiest part of it.

Steph had to make Damian swear that he wanted to see The Plan through to its end, because he would've balked if he hadn't been bound by his own word. She could tell that each new element that she revealed was making him more and more uncomfortable, and she'd purposefully kept most of the details from him. He'd been argumentative when she'd told him that their know-how and help was coming from John Constantine, suspicious when she'd insisted that they had to do it as soon as possible, and more critical of the whole thing once they'd chosen a small, abandoned house at the outskirts of the city and began preparing it for their otherworldly caller.

Steph was asking a lot of him. She knew that better than anyone. Damian was a control freak, so to have his soul riding on a plan he barely understood was maddening for him. She could all but watch him discover the holes, the things that she'd kept quiet - he'd asked where Jason had gone to four times just in the time it took John to get the summoning incense burning and the chalk lines lightly mapped out on the uneven wooden floor.

"Jay's doing errands" stopped being an acceptable answer for him, so Steph finally took his hand and pulled him into one of the empty spare rooms.

The house was condemned and decrepit, about as far away from romantic as possible. Still, she held his hands and managed a smile.

"I don't like this," Damian said, his brows rucked together with worry. Helplessness hadn't been a good fit for him, ever. "I don't like Jason's involvement, and I don't like Constantine much either, though I recognize his expertise in this field. And I," the worry-crease across his forehead deepened. "I would rather you were not here for this. The fewer people present, the better."

"I know," she said, still disarming him to the best of her abilities with a smile. "This'll be risky. We are dealing with a demon, here. But I'm the one who threw this thing together, so I'm going to see it through. No matter what happens."

"I - I just - "

"I love you, Dami," she said, touching his jaw lightly with her fingertips. "This is a good plan. Trust me."

And then, before he could react or realize what she was doing, she cracked his jaw the same way Cass had done to her so many times so many years ago - a nerve strike. She hit hard, though, as hard as she could. Hard enough that it was overkill, or actual 'kill'. His eyes rolled back and he crumpled.

"I could've done that," Jason said, leaning in the doorway. She shook her head.

"He would've seen it coming and fought you. I wanted it to be as painless as possible, so it had to be me. We won't have much time before he comes to. Let's get this going."

"As the lady wishes," he said with a flourish. He left the room, and she knelt next to Damian's unconscious body. Guilt tugged at her, but she knew that if he was fully aware of what was going on, he'd tear it all apart and want to discuss what they were doing and why they were doing it. He wouldn't think that he was worth the risk, and they'd argue.

She couldn't let herself - or anyone else - overthink this. They didn't have the time for it. The window of opportunity was narrow enough as-is, and she didn't want to fight with Damian over whether or not he deserved the sacrifice.

Jason may have come up with the plan, but she was the one who had gathered up all the pieces and put it into motion. She knew that it wasn't right by Bruce's working definition, but none of them were him.

They wouldn't break his law, but they would pry it apart for any loopholes. Right then, right there, that was what was necessary.

Jason came back with a body slung over his shoulder. She heard them coming, because there was no mistaking that voice. "It's been so long since we've seen each other. Don't you want to catch up? I only want to know how you've been - nothing up my sleeve this time. It's only the breeze we'd be shooting, I swear!"

Jason unloaded the Joker without any grace or care. The skinny man was half stripped and bound four different ways. They hadn't wanted to take any chances at all.

"If I don't ask for the nitty-gritty details of what you've got planned, can I watch?" Jason asked with a sharp, dangerous grin. He was vibrating with tension, a screaming red emotion that being near the Joker brought out in him. He hadn't been able to defeat his monster, hadn't been able to do what he felt that Bruce should have done.

He hadn't been able to do what Steph was about to be party to. She was dizzy and nauseous just thinking about it, but she crushed all obvious signs. She had to put on her strongest face. If she didn't act like she was confident that this would work, it wouldn't. She knew all about self-defeating prophecies.

"Yeah," Steph said, looking at the thin, ugly man on the ground. Tied up and prone, he didn't seem as terrifying. "You should be here for this. I figured you'd want to be."

"What's the plan?" The Joker said, his teeth stained a filmy pink with blood. He craned his neck to look around him, taking in the chalk lines that John had drawn on the floor and walls. "Oooh, ritual sacrifice? You don't say! If only you'd told me ahead of time, I would've worn my good suit. Blood doesn't show up as well on purple, don't you know."

He keened with shrill, painful laughter. Jason tensed further, grimacing. She wondered if he heard that laughter in his nightmares, the way she heard Black Mask's oily little chuckle.

"I wouldn't trade this moment for the world. Cupcake, you know me so well," Jason said - and it would've been a drawl if he hadn't been grinding his teeth - and slammed the steel-reinforced toe of his boot into the Joker's gut. The laughter cut off into a high wheeze, like a dog's chew-toy being squeezed. "It looks to the Proud Prince of Pranks that you're looking to cut a deal," The Joker said, his voice lowering to a rumbling octave Steph swore she felt in her ribs. "I already sold my soul once, my precocious little pranksters!" And again, that grating laughter. "For a box of cigars! Don't you know a joke's only funny if it comes in ones or threes? Two is neverfunny."

"It'd explain why he's still here," Steph muttered to Jason, forcing herself to look away from the sallow-faced monster on the floor. "Shouldn't he be like sixty or something?"

"No, whatever keeps him farm fresh has been there since the first time he showed up in Gotham. So I'm gonna guess that he found a way out of his gentleman's agreement with whatever demon he handed his soul over to."

"Neron," Steph said. Jason didn't turn, and she couldn't see his eyes behind the white-out lenses of his domino mask, but she could feel him search her for an answer. She could feel his question, but she wasn't going to address it.

The Joker had been ignoring her for the most part, all of his leering attention focused on the bird that'd gotten away. And, well, Jason had been standing half in front of her - the stance felt protective, but she didn't want to label it as such - so she'd been easy to miss behind his bulk. The fact that the clown was staring hard at her was proof enough that she'd tracked down the right demon.

John had given her two qualifiers when it came to demon deals. Firstly, you had to be willing to sacrifice to seal the deal. Secondly, you had to know who you were dealing with. When he'd dealt with the Joker, Neron had been the ruler of Hell. The Big Guy Downstairs. According to John, there'd been an uprising, and leadership had switched hands. Neron had died, rendering the contract Joker had made void. Conveniently, the demon that'd done business with Damian when he'd been fourteen and terrified was Neron's replacement.

"Who is your little friend?" The Joker asked, his tone conversational on the surface. This was the man who found murder hilarious, so a mild demeanor meant nothing. She felt the threat he left unvoiced, and wished that John would hurry and finish up. "I feel like we've met, honeybritches, but I juuuuust can't put my finger on it! Give ol' Mr. J aclue, won't you?"

Jason leaned into her, a hand on her hip, and murmured into her ear like he was calming down a skittish horse.

"Don't let him get in your head, Steph. He won't get back out. Let's do this and be done."

The Joker erupted with hysterical laughter again. It was part sob, part shriek, part inhuman nails dragging relentlessly down a chalkboard.

"Stephanie Brown!" He said, too-wide smile leering. "I knew I knew I knew you. You were the sweetest little Robin I could hope for, but then Black Mask stole you away before we could meet. I almost killed him for that, you know?"

Steph couldn't breathe. All the air had been sucked out of her lungs, punched out of her throat. Years ago, those had been the words she'd wanted to hear. She'd wanted to hear them so badly, but neither Tim nor Bruce had given her that.

The Joker had tried to avenge her death?

She couldn't manage laughter or tears. She stood, staring.

"Oh, I'm just tickled pink," the Joker trilled, rolling like an excited child. "I finally have a chance at a clean sweep once again! Since there haven't been any new Robins in aaaaages, I'll just start from the last and work my way back up. I wonder whatever happened to the last one. He was such a little scamp. And so handy with a crowbar!"

That was where the Hood's self-imposed calm fractured.

"Listen up, fuckface," Jason snarled, his hand fisted in the clown's hair. "You're not doing shit. After tonight? You're done. Curtain call. Hear that, chuckles? It's the fat lady, and she's singing your song."

"The joke's on you, kiddo. The laughs will never stop rolling! Not tonight, not ever!"

"Kind of the definition of final words there, innit?" Constantine asked mildly, leaning against the doorframe. He ground out his cigarette with a nod to Steph. He might have been a complete bastard, but that didn't mean he wasn't a gentleman once in a while, when the mood hit him. "I'm all through with my bit. Shall I pitch in a hand dragging the bodies to the living room, then?"

"Help me with D," Steph asked, because she knew there was no way she could move him on her own. He had at least fifty pounds on her - maybe a little less, considering how he'd been taking care of himself in her absence. "Leave the Joker in here. I don't want him to know about him until the ball's already rolling."

"Lemme," Jason said, nudging her hands away. He hefted Damian up and over his shoulder with relative ease. "Shouldn't be doing any heavy lifting in your delicate condition."

"Of all the things she shouldn't be doing in her condition - but is doing anyway, peach that she is - heavy lifting is low on the list tonight, m'lad," John pointed out, but not unkindly.

"I know," Steph said, swallowing hard. "Believe me, I know."

The house had been someone's home, once upon a time, and when she'd first walked in she had seen the signs of life here and there. The big quake had made the neighborhood unlivable, so it was a ghost town of skeletal homes, mostly grown over and consumed by the greenery that was all too common now that Ivy had gone wild. John had transformed it in less than twenty minutes, pushing sunken-in couches and chairs to the corners of the room. The walls and floor were decorated with the lines of a magic circle, and there were sticks of summoning incense burning at the center. They bellowed steady, curling ribbons of smoke that brought tears to Steph's eyes.

John stood in the center of the circle, a sword in one hand. Jason dumped Damian in one of the mostly-rotted chairs, and he groaned. He was starting to come to.

"Didn't bother with the cats," John mentioned offhandedly. "Never had a taste for it, and they scream bloody murder when you impale 'em. It's just to impress the locals, if you know what I mean. Not necessary, any of it."

"Cats?" Steph repeated. She must have looked green, because he grinned.

"This'll get a lot worse than dead kittens before it's through. If you're going to be sick, get it out of your system. Preferably outside the circle, luv. I don't want to have to draw it all up again, and it's not the time or place to experiment with new elements."

"…Stephanie?" Damian demanded, holding his jaw and sitting up. "What in God's name do you - "

"Let's just jump right in it, then, shall we?" John said, and slit his own wrist with the edge of the blade. His blood was like tar, more black than red, and it hissed and bubbled when it hit the chalk on the floor. "Blaze, you Godless whore-queen of the pit, I'm calling your marker! Come up and have a talk! There's plenty in it for you, you selfish wretch."

Steph wasn't sure, but that didn't seem like a good way to call a demon. She was starting to get an idea of why people didn't team up with him very often - or why they didn't live very long around him.

The response was instantaneous, though. Say what you wanted about his methods, but John Constantine got results. Part of the floor caved, spitting sparks and a noxious steam that smelled strongly of rotten eggs.

A woman rose from the hole, pushed upwards by a hundred twisted, broken arms. When Damian had said he'd made a deal, she - and eventhinking about it now made her feel like an idiot - had imagined a man with a pitchfork. He hadn't given any details, so she had no idea that he'd sold his soul to a orange-skinned demoness with long black hair and ram's horns. She was beautiful, but in the way a natural disaster was beautiful: the sheer force of what it was capable of, what it could destroy, swept away the ruined bodies and left awe and fear in equal parts.

Hell currently had a Queen.

This was news to Steph.

"Who," the demoness asked, her voice slippery-slick. It was physically painful, but Steph couldn't put into words what it felt like. It just hurt, splintering in her head like a spike being driven at the base of her skull, tiny fireworks of agony that sizzled and bit. "Are you? This ritual is an insult. You're either a stupid worm, or an insolent one."

"All insolence is on me, luv," John said, his grin crooked. "But I'm merely the operator connecting this call."

"I am Ibn al Xu'ffasch," Damian said levelly as he stood, like he didn't feel the demoness the way the rest of them did. He could call up that ice and haughtiness that made him him no matter the situation. "Damian Wayne, Son of the Bat and heir to the House of al Ghul. You have dealt with me once before, and you shall do so again."

"Oh, you," the demoness rumbled, physically crawling up her skin and hissing tiny hot needles into each and every pore. "I remember you, boy. What makes you think you have something I want? I already have your grubby little scrap of soul meat." Damian hesitated, but only because he didn't know. Waking him up just in time for the main event had ensured that.

"We're here to barter," Steph said, chin raised.

And that's when Jason came in with the ace.

She saw it all play out on Damian's face - shock made him weirdly transparent, one thing that his various trainers hadn't managed to beat out of him. It was probably because not a lot rocked Damian, so moments of dangerous clarity were rare. But he looked at Jason, looked at the Joker - and there was a recoil of disgust across his features - then looked at her. He was demanding an answer, but the panic in his eyes said that he already knew.

He was the bright one between the two of them, after all.

"And what makes you think that this thing will tickle my fancy?" Lady Blaze asked, her terrible voice stretched into a bored drawl.

"This is the Joker," Steph said, and smiled. She put on the air of a saleswoman, gesturing with a practiced turn of her wrist. Daddy had taught her all about confidence tricks, so she knew how to sell a lemon if she had to. "Fell in a vat of chemicals, came out homicidal - you know the whole shebang, right?"

"Don't try my patience," the demoness said, which she translated as yes.

"Right. So, he sold his soul a couple years back, to your predecessor. The deal was broken when Neron died, but you and yours wouldn't have gotten him, anyway. He's got this thing, this ability to not age and not die, and that means that you demons got gypped."

The tarfire pits of her eyes narrowed, and the cooked meat-and-hair smell intensified. Steph swallowed frantically, breathing choppily. Had to keep it together. Had to.

"And I know," she said, not letting her voice quiver. "I know that your people hate that kind of thing. Being shortchanged, I mean. It's gotta be a blow to the pride - speaking as an insolent worm and-or useless sack of mortal meat, you're pretty impressive. Compared to you, I'm nothing. I know that. I accept that. I'm not trying to cheat you."

"Go on," Lady Blaze instructed, and she sounded curious. Curious was good. She could work with curiosity.

"So. So here's my deal. I'll exchange the soul and functioning immortality of this cheater - " and she pointed to the Joker, who seemed so frail now, so wholly impotent. Then she pointed to Damian. The real, tangible fear in Damian's eyes scared Steph by proxy, but she had to keep pressing her advantage. He was scared for her, but she only had one shot at this thing. He'd understand, later. Hopefully. If there was a later for either of them. " - for the soul and functioning immortality ofthis cheater. And I know that sounds like a straight switch, but it's not. Hear me out."

The room had gotten hot, but hot in a way that transcended heat. It was difficult for her to think, and harder yet to breathe. Steph wasn't sure when her nose had started bleeding, but she didn't realize it until she tasted salt and copper when she licked her lips. She felt like passing out would be a blessing, but she couldn't.

Fingers laced with hers, cool by comparison. Damian said nothing, but he stood beside her and held her hand tightly.

He trusted her. More than anyone else ever had, he trusted her.

"Either way, you win," Steph said, wiping her face on the back of her free hand. "Take this offer, and you're guaranteed the Joker. If you give Damian back his soul, there's still a chance that you'll end up with him, too. He's on your naughty list, right? If he doesn't get his shit in line before he dies, he's yours for all of eternity." Lady Blaze seemed to think about this offer, toying with the idea. Everything that Steph had said had been true, and delivered with 100% honesty. She'd laid down her whole hand, and even appealed to the demoness' vanity and ego. That had been her A game, and if it wasn't enough she could at least find some dim comfort in the fact that she'd given it all she had.

"The contract between us will stand as such, immutable from this point forward. You, Stephanie Brown, will sacrifice the mortal soul and abilities of this man - " The demoness' smile showed an impossible amount of teeth. " - the Joker. The soul of Damian Wayne will be returned to him in recompense, but his previous deal with me will be rendered null and void. Do you accept these terms?"

"Yes," Stephanie said, and the Joker started howling. The sound wasn't human. It was frustration and rage and fear at the most primal levels.

"No! Don't I get a SAY? This can't be the punchline! You can't do this! You - !" Jason grabbed him, slamming his head against the floor. The clown's voice dribbled off into a wet, limpid, "But this isn't funny. This isn't funny at all."

Lady Blaze's predatory smile said that she thought it was very, very funny.

"Then it is done," she said, and the blood and chalk lines themselves started to twist and shriek.

"C'mon, sunshine. Wakey wakey."

Damian dragged in the last of his first breaths, shivering and disoriented. He hurt. His throat was raw and his chest was incandescent; he vaguely remembered screaming until his voice broke. It'd been more agonizing than anything he'd experienced before, and he had met and crushed the human capacity for pain many times over. The demoness hadn't touched him, but he'd still felt her rooting around in his chest, cracking back each individual rib and pushing something both intangible and impossibly heavy inside him. Coming back from the dead in a dozen different ways had hurt less than having his soul returned to him.

But, he was alive. He was alive, and it was raining.

"What happened?" Damian croaked, struggling to make sense of what was going on. The roof and most of the upper storey of the house had been ripped back, letting in a steady drizzle. He was on the floor, his head and shoulders resting on someone's thigh. He knew that it was his partner's lap without glancing to confirm, but he forced himself to turn to look at her, anyway.

Stephanie was haggard-looking and pale, her hair a ratty mess clinging to her face and neck. Her nose was crusted with dried blood, and her clothes were soaked through.

"Oh, lots," she said with a slightly hysterical laugh. She rubbed one eye with the heel of her hand. Movement was agonizing, but Damian sat up and put an arm around her, drawing her close. Her skin was cold. Too cold. They shivered in tandem, vibrating on the same frequency. "Congrats on your soulification. How's it feel?"

"Terrible," he rasped. He'd almost lost his voice entirely.

"You're welcome," Steph said, and she managed to smile.

Damian's thoughts were molasses-slow. Each one had to be addressed individually. Christ, he was tired.

"Where's Constantine?"

"I have no idea. Think he left when things with the demon looked semi-dicey. Can't say I blame him."

"And Todd?"

"Doing errands," she said, which he understood meant that Jason was relocating the now-mortal, now-geriatric Joker. He hoped that the Hood dropped him off at the Commissioner's doorstep, but he didn't care if he got that far. "Think you can walk? I need to pass out, or throw up, or throw up and pass out. I'm pretty much done with today."

"I can walk," Damian said, though he wasn't completely sure of it. He worked his way to his feet, and when they supported his weight, he held out his hands to help her up. They more or less propped each other up. It was pitiful. After about three miles of walking through the rainy night, Stephanie stopped without warning, doubled over, staggered over to the curb, and was violently sick.

Damian hesitated, then combed back the wet straw tangle of her hair. He spread a hand over her back, stroking the curve of her spine as she heaved. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, not offering so much as an unfunny quip about how she'd already met one of her goals. Steph's face was almost gray, her lips bloodlessly pale.

"Come here," he said, leaning over and offering her his hands again.

"You can't carry me," Steph said tiredly. "You're barely vertical yourself, mister. Just gimme a few seconds to settle my stomach and I'll be fine."

"No," Damian said, digging deep and finding his favorite old air of condescending. "I can carry you. You're ill."

She looked at him, and it hurt to look back at her. He'd never seen her so wholly exhausted. Setting his wrongs right had put her through the wringer. She'd sentenced a man's soul to damnation - for him. He hadn't known that she had that in her, and wished that he had never found out. He was proud of her, but it was tinged with shame. He would never know if those depths had always existed in her, or if he'd dragged her to them.

He understood why his father hadn't been able to fully trust her, but what Father had seen as rogue tendencies, he saw as loyalty.

He'd repay that loyalty, if she'd let him.

"I'm your partner. Let me," Damian said, when she didn't reply. "Please."

Wordlessly, Stephanie slid her arms around his neck and let him pick her up. She was heavy in his arms, her solid weight making his already spasming muscles scream, but he didn't let it show. He couldn't, not when he had endured far worse. He couldn't, not when it'd been so long since he'd held her. He would carry her as far as he had to.

"I missed you," she mumbled against the side of his neck. "You and your stupid face."

"And I, you," he agreed, glad when he saw the faint pinpricks of headlights in the distance. He wasn't sure where they were at, but the Batmobile had been able to find them. "And your stupid face."

When the Batmobile stopped in front of them, engine purring, he set her on her feet again. The locks popped open automatically, and he got behind the wheel.

He turned the car to autopilot, because for once he didn't trust himself to stay focused enough to drive. Stephanie stayed in the passenger seat for all of thirty seconds before crawling into his lap again. Damian leaned his seat back and held her. The familiar, predictable pattern of her breathing made his body ache for sleep all the more. He knew that with her there, it would be real sleep, good sleep. If she stayed. That wasn't a discussion that they'd finished, and neither of them were in any shape to argue it out. But she wanted to be near him, and that was encouraging. He'd missed it. Physical contact had been rare and mostly unwanted for most of his life, but once he'd acclimated to it, it'd become a very real need. Maybe his body or his psyche was making up for lost time - frankly, he didn't care about the whys or hows of it, and merely knew that he was grateful to have it again.

It felt like everything should have changed after the deal was broken. It felt like life should never have been the same again, but that wasn't the case. Life went on, the world kept spinning, and their nightly routine played out like it always had. They stumbled back to the cave, shucking off ruined clothing and leaving a trail from the entryway to the washroom. Damian watched Stephanie wash her bloodied face, though his eyes kept sliding shut. He couldn't remember ever feeling so exhausted. He didn't have the energy to ask where they were now and if they were okay again, so he allowed her to lead him to his room, his bed.

They almost literally fell into bed together, getting into their familiar tangle of limbs and legs. She kissed him once, lingeringly, but he couldn't force himself to keep awake for more than that. He was dimly aware of her touching his face with her cold fingertips, of her mumbling something along the lines of, "You can sleep now, stupid. I'm not going anywhere."

And for the first time in months, he slept peacefully.