The frustration was a live wire in your chest, sparking and dangerous. You paced the length of Dick Grayson’s minimalist living room, your boots soundless on the polished concrete. The vast window overlooking Blüdhaven’s skyline did nothing to calm you; the glittering lights just felt like a mockery of the cold distance you felt.

“God knows where he is right now,” you seethed, throwing your hands up in exasperation. “Probably knee-deep in some alleyway, trading bullets with some two-bit thugs, or brooding on a gargoyle somewhere. And you know what? I’m just fine with that.”

You stopped, wrapping your arms around yourself, the words tasting like ash even as you forced them out. You were trying to convince yourself as much as Dick, who was watching you with that infuriatingly calm, empathetic Nightwing expression.

“Because loving Jason,” you declared, your voice cracking with a bitter, poetic ache, “is like loving the stars themselves. You can admire them from a distance, you can navigate by them, but you don't… you don't expect them to gaze back at you! It’s a one-way transaction. A silent, beautiful, and utterly heartbreaking arrangement.”

You turned to face Dick fully, your expression hardening as you built to your final, damning point. It was the core of your pain, the truth you’d been avoiding.

“And if I happen to find myself in danger—real danger—Jason is not stupid enough,” you stated, jabbing a finger in the air for emphasis, “and he is certainly not in love enough, to find himself standing in it with me. He’d calculate the odds, deem it a lost cause, and be gone. That’s just survival. That’s just who he is.”

The silence that followed your outburst was thick and heavy. Dick opened his mouth to respond, but his eyes flicked over your shoulder, widening just a fraction. A cold dread trickled down your spine.

From the shadows of the hallway, a figure emerged. He moved with a predator’s silence you’d know anywhere. Leather jacket, the glint of a buckle, the faint scent of gunpowder and night air clinging to him. Jason Todd stood there, having heard every single, damning word.

His expression was unreadable, a carefully schooled mask, but in his Lazarus-green eyes, a universe of pain flickered—a deep, profound hurt he would never, ever voice. He looked older in that moment, wearier, the white streak in his hair seeming to glow in the low light.

He took a single, silent step into the room, his gaze fixed on you.

"Hello, princess."

The old nickname, usually delivered with a roguish smirk or a roll of his eyes, now fell from his lips in a voice you’d never heard before. It was rough, layered with a sadness so immense it was physically palpable, yet underneath it all, there was a terrifying, gentle tenderness. It was the tone of a man who had just had his deepest fears confirmed by the one person he’d foolishly hoped might see past them.