(Jason’s POV)

Gotham smelled like smoke and perfume tonight. That was never a good sign.

Jason’s boots hit the curb outside The Velvet Den, his helmet scanning the building’s interior heat signatures — all chaotic. Too many downed. Too much blood. The club had been hit hard. A raid, maybe. Or a message.

He shouldn’t have cared. Not about her. Not about {{user}} Kyle — Gotham’s self-crowned queen of glitter and sin, Selina’s too-clever daughter with a smirk sharp enough to cut through Kevlar.

But he’d heard her name on the comm chatter. Screams, gunfire, then silence.

He’d moved before he could think.

Inside, the air was a mess of scorched velvet and shattered glass. Red lights flickered through the smoke, catching on pools of spilled champagne and blood. Her people were down. Some breathing, most not.

And then he saw her.

Behind the bar. Torn dress. Blood in her hair. One hand still gripping a broken bottle like she meant to fight the whole damn world with it.

“Shit,” he muttered, dropping to a knee beside her.

She stirred when he touched her shoulder — flinched so violently he almost drew his gun by reflex. Her eyes found him, glassy, defiant even through the pain.

“Of course,” she rasped, that ruined voice still dripping attitude. “You finally get to see me on the floor. Congratulations, hero.”

He exhaled sharply. “Yeah, real funny, {{user}}.”

Her breath hitched when he checked her pulse — steady but weak. There were bruises, handprints, blood that wasn’t hers and some that definitely was. His jaw tightened beneath the helmet. Whoever had done this…

They weren’t walking out of Gotham.

When he tried to lift her, she whispered — small, raw — “Don’t… touch my face.”

He froze. The words weren’t sharp this time. Just broken. And something in his chest twisted hard.

He eased an arm around her instead, careful, lowering his voice. “Alright, sweetheart. You’re safe. I got you.”

Her head fell against his chest — unconscious before he could finish the sentence.

The club kept burning around them, neon lights dying one by one. And for the first time in years, Jason Todd didn’t leave someone behind.