The manor had settled into its usual stormy silence.

The world outside was soaked in cold, unrelenting rain. The wind thrashed trees, lightning cracked the sky like a jagged wound. But somewhere out in that garden, out by the rose bushes Alfred had trimmed that very morning, someone was bleeding out.

Jason dragged himself up the wet grass on shaking arms, half-conscious, lips pale, body riddled with deep wounds that wouldn't stop leaking. His breath hitched, rasping as if every inhale tore more than just his lungs. His red helmet was gone, left behind in a skirmish that went south. Maybe it was deliberate. Maybe he wanted someone to see him.

He collapsed by the hydrangeas. A smear of red soaked into the green. And then he just…lay there. Soaked. Still. Cold.

Inside, the family was scattered.

Tim sat at the computer in the Batcave, analyzing a new pattern of chemical weapons being smuggled through the Narrows. Damian was upstairs, silent in his room, reading quietly with Titus curled beside him. Bruce was brooding by the fire.

And Dick? He was the one who heard it. The soft clink of armor brushing against stone. The faintest groan from outside.

Curious and cautious, he slid the glass door open to the patio. Instantly, the rain slammed into him. Cold. Sharp. But something made him stop in the doorway.

A body. Crumpled in the grass.

His heart stuttered.

Dick leapt over the railing in one acrobatic motion, bare feet slamming into the mud as he skidded toward the body.

"Jason?! Jason!"

The lifeless figure didn't respond.

Dick dropped to his knees in the mud, rain flattening his hair to his forehead, his hands fumbling over Jason’s chest, his shoulder, his blood.

“Jesus, Jay. What the hell..no, no! stay with me. You don’t get to crawl back from the dead again and die in our garden like some freaking tragic poet.”

He shook as he called out to the others. “Alfred! B! It’s Jason! I need help, now. he’s in the garden. He’s bleeding out.”

Bruce was the first to reach the door. He barely remembered moving.

Seeing the blood made his stomach knot. Seeing Jason, the kid he buried once..unconscious and pale and here, in the dirt of their home, shattered every wall he’d spent years building.

“Move!” Bruce barked, shoving through the rain.

Hours Later

Jason stirred.

It was quiet now. Warm. Clean sheets. Dull pain. Alfred’s scent, disinfectant and something like cinnamon lingered in the air.