Endings and Epilogues

This, he had been expecting. For months actually. Ever since he'd started. He was actually surprised it had taken this long for someone to try and stop him. It was probably going to help Otto that had brought this on. Oh well. Nothing he could do.

Except run.

If Superman rarely came out at night, this was one of those rare times. Already, he had chased Red Hood seventeen blocks, tossed him into four buildings, a lamp post and the street. Twice. If it hadn't been for his body armor, he would definitely have more than a few broken bones.

And, from the way Supes kept squinting at him, it was a good thing he'd gotten a lead lining in his helmet.

But he was getting winded. His shin was cracked and he was having trouble running. Four broken ribs made breathing hell, and he couldn't grapple because his forearm had snapped like a twig on that last landing. And that wasn't even mentioning his collarbone, pelvis, three fingers, two toes, and the numerous bruises and cuts he had from the experience.

Finally, Superman cornered him. With one last decisive swing of his arm, he sent Red Hood into a concrete wall. Jason felt his helmet crack at the impact, but thankfully, it stayed on.

"I'll admit, I'm impressed." The Boy Scout floated over to him, lazily, and picked him up by the collar of his shirt. "From what I can see, you have fourteen broken bones at least, and you were still running. Are you a meta?"

"Hah... haaaa... Nope." Red Hood wheezed. "Just a... normal human. Trying to d- do... what I think is... right." It was hard to think, but he ran through his list of failsafes. One in particular. He'd picked it up after Metropolis.

Superman regarded him. "This is right? Acting as judge and jury, terrorizing the people of this city?"

"Work...ing, isn't it?"

It was true. Crime in Bludhaven was down. Very, very down. There hadn't been a murder in weeks, there were no reported cases of rape, and drug dealers were selling decent product, not laced with poison, and they were staying off of school yards.

But the Justice League would never see that. "That's not the point. We have to be better than this. Set a proper example for the people. For the children."

Before Red Hood could call him out on how cliche he was being, a snowball smacked into Superman's head. "You put him down!"

Both of them turned to look at the source of the snowball. A fairly large group of kids had gathered, all of them holding snowballs, all of them glaring at Superman.

Jason recognized them.

Darius stood at the front of the pack. "Put him down Superman. Or you'll have to deal with us."

Glaring at the kids (uselessly, they wouldn't be able to see with the helmet in the way), Jason shouted, "Get out of here! You shouldn't get involved in this!"

A snort from Emily, a thirteen year old who had needed help making paper roses for school. "We'll get involved if we want to. And right now, we want this big jerk to put you down!" The last word was punctuated by a foot stomp.

Poor Superman. He'd never gotten this kind of reaction from kids before. Normally, they clamoured for his autograph or said he was awesome, or asked him to punch a bad guy for them. But now he was hurting these kids' hero. And they didn't like him. At all.

"But..." He looked between Red Hood and the steadily growing gang of children, going back and forth so fast his face was a blur. "He's a criminal. He murders people. Hurts people."

"Yeah?" Anna, fourteen, called him about a lost cat, spoke up. "Well Red Hood killed the guy who murdered my daddy. The guy who had been threatening Mommy and telling her he would kill her if she didn't pay up." Ok, he didn't remember that. Totally possible though. "Because of Red, Mom is happy again. So you can stop hurting him!"

Tomas came up. "H-h-he helped my b-brother look up-p-p cars for a rep-report. Greg g-got a hund-red because of him!" Oh, Greg had gotten full marks on that one? Good for him.

Addie, a petulant nine year old who never got told "no", but had still called him to make sure her worst enemy was alright when the other girl had been missing from school for a week, stepped up. "Red Hood is my big brother. So you leave him alone!" She was joined by a dozen other voices, all claiming Red Hood as their own.

Jason was seriously confused. Yeah, he'd talked to these kids. Helped them with their problems. Some of them had said that he was their hero. But this...? They were standing up to the strongest man in the world for him. And calling him brother. This was...

Was it possible to be completely and totally happy when he was probably bleeding internally?

Superman was distracted. It was now or never. Quickly, he fished in his belt, unclasping the lead-lined compartment and pulling out the tiny shard of rock stored within. It was smaller than his pinky nail, but the effects were immediate. Superman dropped him, doubling over in mid air before sinking to the ground.

And Red Hood landed solidly on his head, and his helmet cracked off.

Dazed, not really thinking, he sat up, and looked Superman dead in the eye. Watched as the Man of Steel's eyes widened, recognition flooding through them. "It can't be..."

As fast as he could with at least fourteen broken bones, he flicked his hand forward, tucking the Kryptonite shard between Superman's collar and his skin. The alien collapsed from the shock of it, but whether "it" was his one weakness touching his bare skin or the fact that someone he had thought was dead, well, wasn't, or some combination of both... Well. It was a mystery.

As soon as Superman went down, the kids swarmed them. The older ones lifted Jason up, using their winter jackets as a stretcher while the younger ones kept the adult watchers away and grabbed his fallen equipment. His guns, his knife, the remains of his helmet.

His helmet had a failsafe on it. Ha. Batman's paranoia filtering down to him. Useful though. When the helmet was forcibly removed or broken off, it emitted a weak EMP that shut down electronics in a fifty foot radius. Prevents people from taking his picture. Hopefully that was still working.

Eventually, the kids managed to lose the adults, and started talking amongst themselves about what to do. Marcus, eight, called to talk about trains, valiantly offered his bedroom. Tania, sixteen, wanted to know the best way to plant a tree, thanked him and said they would keep it in mind. Ivan, fourteen, called to report his older brother as a serial killer and please don't kill him, said that his dad was a black market surgeon and would totally help if he asked. Since that was the best plan they could come up with, they followed Ivan.

Tara – she looked much better, much happier in her new place – was helping to carry him. "How are you doing Red?"

He gave out a weak laugh. "Not great Tara. Not!" He exclaimed, as she reached out to him, "Not the injuries. I've had worse. But..." He paused. But he could tell these kids. "It's kind of over now. Superman saw my face."

On his other side, Macy snorted. "We've seen your face. You take off your helmet every time you talk to us."

He did. The helmet was supposed to inspire fear in his enemies. The blank red showed no mercy, no pity, no emotion of any kind. But he didn't want that for the kids. "Yeah, you have. But you don't know who I am. He does."

Quietly, so quiet Jason almost thought she hadn't said anything at all, Tara said, "We do though. You're Robin. Not the one we have now or the first Robin. But you were."

Jason's mind blanked. "But... how...?"

Angus grinned fiercely. "We figured it out between us. I used to watch you on the news. You fought like a street kid and I always tried to copy your moves. You still fight like that, did you know?"

He hadn't, but it made sense. It was his first style. Shifting his arm closer to his chest, he sighed. "Yeah. I was the second Robin. Some stuff happened and..."

"It's ok." Roger, seven, called because his parents hit him, rested a hand on his arm. "You don't have to say. Besides. You're a superhero. Your backstory is supposed to be secret."

Jason had to let out a chuckle at that. "I guess. Thanks guys. Can you do me a favour though?"

Dozens of eyes turned towards him, and half as many heads nodded.

"Keep who I was a secret? It's going to get out, well, Batman's going to find out, and then who knows what will happen. But for now, I'd like to just stay like this." Batman would disapprove of literally everything he'd done since he'd been resurrected. Dick would bowl in with hugs and apologies and lectures. The Pretender... he didn't want to think about him. It would just make him angry.

But this. This was nice. Being Red Hood, older brother to all the kids in Bludhaven (and a few in Metropolis), being important and needed, and not just that but wanted. Being wanted. That was enough.

Rahman just smiled. "Is that all? Red, after all you've done for us, we'd do anything for you."

And Jason smiled back. "I know Rahman. I know that now. And thank you."

Epilogue

Batman had heard of course. The day the Red Hood shot his first criminal, Oracle had contacted him about the new player in Bludhaven. He would have gone to confront the man, but Two Face had escaped Arkham the week before and Batman needed to find out what he was up to.

After that, the new vigilante wasn't a priority. He kept to Bludhaven, showed no sign of intruding on Batman's territory. And with all the upheaval in Gotham's sister city, criminals were migrating across the river, trying to get away from the man with the blood red helmet.

Red Hood's first month was a veritable horror story of gore. Six or seven targets a night, or two entire gangs. Destructive, yet meticulous. Crooks with purse snatchings got away with crippling injuries. Criminals with murders on their records died.

Then, after a month, the deaths started slowing down. Four a night. One. After five months of activity, Red Hood was going after one, sometimes two targets a week. When he went after gangs, the survivors reported some unusual behaviour. Red Hood would go for kill shots, right up until his phone rang. Then he switched to knee caps, often leaving minutes after answering the phone.

Truly odd behaviour for a man who had shown almost sociopathic dedication to his goals in his first month.

But still, it wasn't Batman's problem. He kept tabs on the very likely chance the Red Hood would become bored of the crime in Bludhaven, or simply run out, and move over to Gotham. And yes, Red Hood did eventually get bored. But it wasn't Gotham he went to. It was Metropolis.

After destroying one gang, he returned to Bludhaven and Superman brought the matter up to the League. Wonder Woman and Aquaman were unconcerned. But Green Arrow and Green Lantern were anxious, to say the least. What was to stop Red Hood from showing up in Star? Coast? Flash kept looking like he wanted to say something, but it didn't seem to be important. Clearly, he wasn't overly worried about Keystone or he would have done a better job of making himself heard over the shouting.

Finally, after a month-long debate, interrupted by two interplanetary crises, Batman told Superman to handle his own mess and stalked out. He definitely didn't have time for this and the argument was making him more than a little irritable.

He had not been expecting the result. At all. He had watched the news reports while he had been getting ready for patrol. It had started out as usual. Superman chasing the criminal through the streets, getting his hits in where he could. The Red Hood was surprisingly adept, able to avoid most damage and keep running for nearly twenty minutes before Superman caught him. The only news copter following was of the more controversial station, the one that didn't condemn Red Hood's actions too often. So the commentary was mostly about how Superman came into their city, uninvited, and was causing massive property damage.

Then the children had shown up.

A swarm of them, ranging from age five to well into their teens. All armed with snowballs and empty pop cans and scowls. While they distracted Superman, yet another thing he would have to talk to Clark about, Red Hood fished a piece of Kryptonite out of his pocket. They both went down, Red Hood's helmet cracked off and the children carted him away.

Batman sighed as one not-so-concerned citizen strode up to Superman and plucked the Kryptonite out of his clothing. Less than a minute later, Superman was awake and flying. The copter went to go follow him, looking for more news, while the feed cut to a ground reporter.

All of the Bludhaven news stations were reporting the same event. Witnesses, all of the adults who had been in the square at the time, were clamoured over, asking for a description of the ever-elusive Red Hood. Understandable. Few who had seen the Red Hood had lived to tell of it. But there were no pictures, despite the multitude of cameras and camera phones in the area. Most likely a short range EMP.

With a sigh, he turned back to his work, letting the reports wash over him, listening, but not really hearing. He was getting low on batarangs, and his all-purpose scanner needed charging. The smoke pellet compartment could use a refill as well and-

Wait. What had that woman said?

Luckily, the reporter, Evelyn Masters, asked her to repeat it. So the woman, older, mid-fifties, stood straighter and said clearly, "You heard me. I saw the Red Hood with my own two eyes and he was just a boy. Not even twenty by my reckoning! And that Superman fellow, with all his fancy powers and flying, went and beat him to high heaven! Imagine that, beating up a child who can't fight back!"

The other stations started reporting the same. "Now that you mention it, yeah! He did look pretty young."

"He didn't sound too old either. His voice I mean."

"He looked around the same age as most of my first years. Eighteen, nineteen, somewhere in there."

"Not even old enough to drink yet."

"I have a niece his age."

"And he saved that neighbour kid when Abe lost it!"

"Yeah, I know Red Hood. Stops to talk to us on the corners sometimes. It's cause of him that we don't get beat any more. Nice kid."

"Shelly sleepwalks, so we set up a camera in her room. We used to have to go looking for her. Nowadays, Red Hood drops her back home, safe and sound."

"I saw Red Hood dropping off sixteen baskets of food to the orphanage across the street."

"So there you have it folks. Not only did Superman come into our city and cause thousands in property damage, he mercilessly beat up a child who could do nothing in his defense, a child who does so much for us. Which begs the question: Are superheroes really what the people of this city, of this country, need? Join us at ten for further discussion. This has been Trevor Hunt with WGBT News. Back to you Alice."

Thumb and forefinger went to the bridge of his nose, pushing back his cowl slightly. He didn't need this. At all. The political fallout from this would land directly on the Justice League. Batman had told Superman to handle his problem, not make the problem worse. Not to mention the fact that there was now a sliver of Kryptonite floating around one of the worst cities in America that he had to retrieve.

His line to Oracle suddenly crackled to life. "Bruce," she sounded a bit triumphant, "With everything that's happening in Bludhaven, I decided to run a deep web probe on any mentions of the Red Hood."

"What did you find?" Something he could use to take the villain down hopefully.

"The usual news sites condemning his actions, right up until Superman showed up of course. Now they're singing his praises."

"It's more likely they're using him as a reason to attack the League and our policies."

"At first, but now they're definitely on Red Hood's side. Right after some civil servant posted the crime statistics. Murder is down, as is rape, smuggling, assault, theft, and, oddly, juvenile crime. Heck, even the suicide rate is lower than it was before Red Hood showed up. And more stories like the ones on the news, of Red Hood helping people. Lots of people."

Batman cursed. This made things a lot harder. Even if the Red Hood was lowering crime rates, he was still murdering people. That made him a criminal, which meant that the League had a duty to take him out. But if the people were so attached to him, they would fight any League presence in Bludhaven tooth and nail. "Anything else Oracle?"

"You know it. A bunch of minor mentions on the usual sites. Facebook has a page dedicated to his victims, et cetera. But there's this one site. It was a little tricky to hack into, but once I was in... Well, it's really something you have to see for yourself. I'm sending you the link and the password now."

RedKids. A soccer team website if the background on the homepage was anything to be believed. The password appeared to be a phone number. Oracle was probably tracking it now. Once the password was in, he was led to another page, a forum by the look of it. He'd have to keep an eye on this website. It looked like the users kept a page dedicated to Red Hood sightings, probably so whoever was in the area could... bring him snacks?

He checked each sub-forum carefully. The users told stories about their individual encounters with the man. Based on diction, spelling and grammar, the users were children. All of them. It made sense considering the domain name he supposed.

The stories themselves didn't fit what he knew of the Red Hood. Helping children with their homework, saving their lives, improving their standards of living. A far cry from someone who spent his nights as the Red Hood did. Perhaps the public was being more truthful than he had first believed.

But the forums went on. A user named LadyPrada had started an appreciation thread, lauding the Red Hood's jawline. Bio-Toxic had started a timeline of Red Hood encounters, with his or her own right at the top and coinciding eerily with the time Red Hood's behaviour had started changing. There were innumerable recipe threads, and survival tips, and self defense advice.

By far, the most visited board was the Red Hood Theories board. The internet had a habit of over-analyzing everything from movies to public speeches, something Batman could relate to. And it appeared that this board was dedicated to that. Every snippet of conversation with the Red Hood was dissected and analyzed, pulling hidden meanings where there was none.

There were theories that he was the latest in a line of Gotham villains, which made sense. The Red Hood Gang had been in and out of Gotham mythos for the past century. This theory was debunked by the simple fact that this Red Hood worked alone. Some believed he was an avenging angel, but based on the number of heart emoticons in their signatures, they were female and in love. The most popular theory seemed to be-

No.

It couldn't be.

It couldn't!

He was staring at the screen in disbelief, trying to form some sort of explanation. Clearly, these children didn't know what they were talking about. There was no connection. They were making leaps of logic that held no basis in reality. It was an internet theory, one of hundreds which got disproved each day.

And then Superman flew into his cave and Batman's world shattered.

AN: And so that's it! Help has ended. Unless I write a sequel. Which I might. Or I might forget to. Hm. Nah, I'll probably write it.

Thank you all so much for reading and requesting! This would have ended a lot sooner if if hadn't been for you. I truly hope that you had as much fun reading it as I did writing.