“I don’t know what on earth crossed your mind to put such a harebrained notion into it, Jason Peter Todd,” Alfred almost growled as he carefully wrapped Damian’s wrist in a strap to keep it stable.
Jason was really angry at both himself and his fair skin at this point; his face was aflame and he wanted nothing more than to turn and run and never come back. “I–”
He hadn’t meant to hurt the kid. Really, he hadn’t. But he’d seen the look on his face, the instant after Jason’s smart remark had left his lips, and he never wanted to see the kid so devastated again.
Hell, he’d insulted the kid’s mother and father before. Multiple times. With swear words. He’d called Damian all sorts of awful things—and he hadn’t really meant any of it, of course he hadn’t—but…Damian had always taken those without so much as a flinch. Sure, he’d sputter indignantly and yell threats, but he did that in response to everything. But this…his eyes had been huge, and there were tears glistening in them. Fucking tears.
Jason couldn’t let that stand.
He knew he couldn’t take it back, or awkwardly explain that it was sarcasm, or go find Dick and make him explain it. He’d made this mess, he was the only one who could fix it. So he’d approached Damian slowly, like he would an injured animal.
“Dames. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it that way, I swear. I do trust you. I trust the hell out of you. You want me to prove it?”
Damian had stared up at him, eyes still huge and wary and expression cold and cut-off, but he’d nodded.
So Jason led him upstairs onto the soft grass in the backyard and picked him up off his feet, grasping him under his arms. He finagled the boy onto his shoulder. Damian gripped his arm with hard, clinging fingers.
“You wanna shift some? So you’ll go farther?” Jason asked, and Damian’s eyes glinted determinedly and he shuffled around until he was positioned semi-horizontally, like a javelin.
“Ready?” Jason asked, and Damian nodded harshly, eyes fixed on the field. Rearing back and planting his feet, Jason threw him.
As was, he supposed, fairly typical of these sorts of family interactions, it was only after he’d thrown Damian and saw him hurtling through the air as clear as day, tumbling end over end, that he thought What have I done, and, in increasing horror, Dear heaven, we’re still in view of the house. And when he heard the thud of the boy landing–along with a huff of breath leaving him as he hit—he was pretty sure he understood why Bruce went so pale anytime any of them did anything risky. He ran full out across the grass.
He reached Damian at the same moment that the child rolled up into a half sitting position, propping himself up on his elbow. “How far was that?” He asked, breathless and hoarse.
Jason was far too preoccupied with cupping the brat’s face in his hands and frantically feeling along his ribs for any breaks—what if the hoarseness was from a punctured lung, what have I done. “Who the hell cares?” Jason choked, brushing dirt from Damian’s cheek and wincing at the grass stains on his pants, along with the three foot tear in the grass where he’d apparently landed and rolled.
“It must at least be fifty feet, correct? Would you say?” Damian panted, trying to push himself up to his feet but sinking back down with a hiss. Jason grabbed him and pulled his arm closer to inspect it. Damian caught his breath when he extended the limb and bit hard into his lip.
Jason felt along his arm with his heart in his throat. He finally finished the length of the arm without feeling any obvious breaks—plenty of tenderness and swelling, but no breaks—and didn’t even have time to breathe a sigh of relief when hammering footsteps came up behind them.
“Master Jason, what on earth is going on?” Alfred had the shotgun at the ready. “I just saw Master Damian flying past the window and—” he trailed off at the scene in front of him, Damian half slumped against Jason, whose gaze immediately snapped to Alfred with his damned perpetual guilty expression. He’d always hated having that. Got him into so much trouble with Bruce.
“Of all the reckless, irresponsible things to do,” Alfred was practically on a tirade now. “He could have been badly hurt, and all because he irritated you?!”
Jason closed his eyes tightly, unable to say a word in his defense even though the facts were wrong.
“Pennyworth,” Damian said breathlessly, and he tugged on Alfred’s shirtsleeve. “He wasn’t trying to hurt me, he was trying to help me. He did as I asked.”
Alfred’s eyebrows went nearly into his receding hairline. “What in—why would you ask him to–?”
“He was helping me,” Damian repeated, glancing at Jason, who had barely managed to blink his burning eyes back open. “It’s alright. It was worth it. I know he trusts me, now.”
Alfred, for once, seemed lost for words. “This family,” he muttered, shaking his head and fumbling with a cloth as he cleaned his hands and wandered back off towards the staircase.
Damian cringed, but reached down and attempted to climb slowly off the table. Jason tried to force his useless, numb tongue to move, to work. “Kid, don’t. Don’t…don’t come…”
Too late. Damian landed with a light falter on his feet, trotted over to where Jason stood and firmly wrapped his lower torso in a hug.
“Thank you for your honor, Todd,” he breathed quietly, squeezing for a long, surprisingly fierce moment, before letting go and scurrying off, his own face flushed darker in embarrassment.
Jason just stood there for a long time.
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