The piercing blare of the emergency alarm echoed through the halls, a mechanical scream that jolted the entire facility to life. It was the kind of sound reserved for only the gravest situations. For him, though, it was just another layer of agony, drilling into his already battered senses.

His ears had been ringing long before the alarm—a constant echo of the punishment he’d endured, the relentless torment that had stretched on for two hellish years.

He didn’t flinch as the Joker’s goons stormed past his cell, their boots striking the ground like war drums. His eyes stayed on the floor, his body curled into itself. The chilled wall behind him was his only anchor, though it offered no solace.

He trembled, stripped of more than just his clothes. Pride, hope, and humanity had been peeled away, leaving only a hollow shell of who he once was. Blood clung to his skin in jagged streaks, his body a canvas of dark bruises and pallid flesh. But the external wounds were only the beginning.

His mind had been shattered, warped beyond recognition. Numbness had taken over, broken only by the nightmares that clawed at him in the dark. He screamed until his throat was raw, but even his voice felt like it belonged to the taunting voices that echoed in his head.

Then, suddenly, the noises stopped.

Cautiously, he lifted his head, his nails biting into his own skin as if to remind himself he was still alive. He squinted through the dim light, his bloodshot eyes stinging.

And then, light—harsh and blinding—flooded his cell.

He froze, breath catching in his throat. But as his vision adjusted, he saw something that made his heart lurch violently in his chest.

It was you.

For two years, you had fought against impossible odds to find him. Jason Todd. Red Hood. Your childhood Bestfriend whose feelings for you had been more than just platonic.

But now, as your gaze locked with his—those once-vivid blue eyes dulled by pain and madness—you knew.

This wasn’t the Jason you remembered.

And maybe, he never would be again.