"My King," Jason breathes. Where the words are coming from, he doesn't know. All he knows is the pull in his chest, the whisper in the back of his head, the feeling of complete and utter rightness curling around him, sinking into his skin.
"My Knight," comes the echoing answer, awed and crooning. The voice hums through the air, and Jason nearly closes his eyes in bliss. He could have waited eternity to hear that voice; would, still, if that's what it took to hear it again.
The being- white hair, green eyes, sharp teeth, long, spindly limbs- pushes through the barrier Constantine had sewn so painstakingly into the edges of the summoning circle, working desperately to avert catastrophe as he called for the entire Justice League Light, Dark, and anyone else on hand to get their asses in gear and be prepared for a dimension-wide catastrophe.
Passing through the watery veil that shimmers in and out of sight, barely visible and not quite there, seems to pain the being, if the desperate way they claw at it and the grimace twisting their face is any indication.
Rage howls through Jason at the sight. He wants to eliminate the threat, draw his guns and shoot until Constantine's insides become his outsides and the whole damn League know never to so much as dare look his King's way in malice ever again, but something holds him back.
He hasn't been given the order to move. His King wants to come to him- is coming to him- and Jason will be damned if he moves a single inch before his King gets whatever he wants from him, however he wants it.
Two cool hands cup his cheeks, and Jason melts into the hold, his whole body leaning forward, straining for this being like a flower to sunlight. His King takes mercy on him, pressing their foreheads together with a soothing rumble that Jason doesn't hear so much as feel, doesn't feel so much as become submersed in; everywhere all at once.
Something clicks into place inside his own self, deeper than conscious thought, where the All-Blades rest. An hiccough struggles out from that same place in answer to his King's call, cracked and wheezing, snuffed out as soon as it starts.
It's so distressing, in that moment, that a strained whine falls from his physical lips instead, aching in his throat, searing the inside of his skin with the wrong kind of heat.
That crooning, again. A hand lifts away from his face- no, please- to stroke across his brow instead; to thread through his hair. Jason relaxes once more.
"My Knight," the being says, still rumbling that sound that felt dangerously like a purr, and Jason thinks, out of nowhere but entirely serious, that if Damian is ever granted the honour of hearing his King in such a state, he may actually have to kill him. "I missed you."
Jason bites back a sob. He knows what the being means. Until this moment, he never realized what it was he was missing, didn't realize he was missing anything at all, but now that he's been near his King, has heard him and seen him and is, even now, feeling his touch, he knows that he'll go the rest of his life conscious of that space inside him, empty whenever the being isn't near.
"Missed you, too," Jason dares to say, presumptuous as it may be, and is rewarded with a soft sound like the chuff of a big cat or the throaty ringing of a distant gong, carried on the wind. And a smile. One that curls across the being's face, full of far too many teeth.
It's uncanny, but Jason doesn't care. He can't imagine feeling anything but safe with his King. Has he ever felt like this? Maybe when he was a child, so small he could be wrapped up and tucked against his mother's chest, so small neither his mind nor his body remembers.
"My Knight. I would know your name, if you would tell me."
"Jason," Jason replies immediately. If the being wants his name, his loyalty, his eternal soul and servitude, he'll give it willingly. He already has. "My name is Jason, my King. Jason Todd." He hesitates, then adds, in a much smaller voice than he means to, "Some call me the Red Hood."
The soft touch of a nose brushes the side of his, and any apprehension drains out of him at the affectionate gesture. "Which do you prefer, My Knight?"
"Jason, please," Jason requests, nudging his nose shyly against the being's in return, prompting a renewal of the purring sensation from before, loud and vibrant. It settles like sunlight in Jason's bones. "Hood is better when I'm in the mask. Helmet. This."
The being chuckles. "I am known as Phantom, My Knight." Lowering his voice, which is already low and private, into a whisper that Jason is sure he wouldn't be able to hear if he wasn't quite literally cheek to cheek with Phantom, and coming ever closer to being definitively in his King's lap with every passing moment, Phantom says, "But between just the two of us, I would be glad if you called me Danny. It was my name, when I could be counted among the living."
Jason's breath caught in his throat. He wanted to know, burned with it like a need; the desire to hear and understand everything, straight from the source, from Phantom's- Danny's- own tongue.
As if sensing his curiosity, Phantom laughs softly, that resonant, bell-like sound. "Another time, My Knight. Not to worry, you and I will have plenty of it. But for now, I think your colleagues, perhaps, are getting quite anxious. We should settle their fears."
Blinking out of the warm bubble of emotion he allowed himself to slip into without thought or hesitation, Jason looks around to see that, yes, the entirety of the Justice League is in fact launching a cohesive and targeted attack at a glowing green dome surrounding him and Phantom.
When Jason looks to him, he simply quirks a small smile. "For the initial Bonding, I thought it better that we remain undisturbed." His expression doesn't visibly change, but Jason feels a troubled ripple stretch across the space between them, feels it stream through his body and pluck at something far deeper.
It makes him shiver, to be brushed and caressed so intimately in that place that's never known any touch but his own.
(If he lets himself think about how badly he wants more of it, he'll do something both foolish and irrevocable.)
"There is yet more to discuss, My Knight, but I would hear it from your own lips, and I would that you should hear it from mine. Until then, know only one thing, if you can believe nothing else: You are Mine, and I will always, always protect what is Mine."
Jason nods dumbly, because he can feel it, the strength of Phantoms determination and conviction, his absolute willingness to follow through on that statement, and the bottomless, bitingly cold well of power that Jason knows makes it not an idle statement, but a testament; immutable fact.
"Ready, My Knight?" Phantom asks, with the barest hint of a tease, and all the warmth of the life-giving yellow sun.
"Yes, My King," he says, because even if he wasn't, he thinks would follow Phantom anywhere. No hesitation, no doubt.
The green dome thins, wafting away into nothing, and together, they step forward into the unknown.
