he's just lying there, mouth open, eyes so wide they look glassy. not moving. not breathing right. his hands hover over your hips like he's scared to touch you.
you're the hottest thing he's ever seen and he's afraid he would burn if he touch you.
you roll your hips down slow, and the only sound in the room is his shaky little exhale and your voice. he's so quiet. no dirty talk, no growling. just these soft, punched out moans every time you sink onto him.
"you—ahh—okay baby?" you ask.
he nods all dumb, lips parted, eyes locked on where your bodies meet, then back up to your tits and face. his mouth moves but nothing comes out. then you clench around him, just a little, and his whole body jerks. his eyes roll back and he's cumming with this broken, high pitched whimper.
you're just too beautiful and he's too in love to hold it.
"ughh fuck—" he gasps, face red, hands finally gripping your waist. "pretty—y-you're so pretty—so p-pretty"
he's trying. he really is.
so just smile down at him and run your fingers through his hair. tell him he did good. he'll blink up at you all teary, still hard somehow, and whisper that he loves you.
Hal Jordan watching the 17th Batkid of the year crash the JL Founders meeting just to sit behind Batman’s chair and say absolutely nothing for the next four hours
ৎׅ ׄ synopsis ⋮ You meet android!jason todd for the first time.
wc. 4.2k - this is a character study!!
Jason used to hate the smell of motor oil.
When he was a kid it meant something had gone wrong long before he got there. It meant garages with their doors half-open and radios playing too loud to drown out shouting. It meant ducking behind dumpsters in Crime Alley, knees pulled tight to his chest, while engines idled too close and gasoline fumes curled thick and nauseating in the damp Gotham air. Oil meant heat trapped between brick walls and the sour tang of alley water that never quite dried. It meant other people’s cars, other people’s escapes, other people who could turn a key and leave.
He used to think the smell followed him on purpose.
Now it lives with him.
It seeps into the plaster of his apartment walls, settles deep into the mattress where he sleeps too lightly and not nearly enough, threads itself through the cotton of his sheets until even clean laundry carries that faint metallic undercurrent.
He scrubs harder than he needs to.
He was good at scrubbing when he was a kid. Good at standing on a crate so he could reach the sink properly, sleeves rolled up, small hands red from hot water as he worked soap into fabric with a focus that bordered on reverent. Laundry sorted without being asked. Stains pretreated with stolen patience. He knew how to get anything out—blood from split knuckles, vomit from threadbare collars, the sharp chemical bite of whatever drug his mother had taken that week. He could take a shirt that reeked of smoke and sweat and something acrid and make it smell like nothing at all.
Mama liked that.
She’d ruffle his hair even sometimes, call him her good boy, say he had careful hands. Said he was useful.
In a tone an owner would use for a guard dog who isn't allowed to sleep in the bed, who isn't even allowed to be unchained from the porch.
It’s different now.
Now there’s no detergent strong enough, no cycle long enough, no amount of scrubbing that can strip the oil from his clothes without consequence. Because the oil doesn’t just sit on the fabric anymore—it works its way into seams and cuffs, into the places where skin meets something colder and less forgiving beneath. If he lets it fade too much, if he washes everything twice and lets the air clear until his apartment smells like cheap soap and dust instead of metal—
His fingers start to lock.
It’s subtle at first. A hesitation in the joints. A stiffness when he curls his hand into a fist. A fraction of a second delay between intention and obedience that no one else would notice but him. The oil isn’t aesthetic. It isn't a habit. It’s maintenance. It’s the thin, slick mercy that keeps his knuckles bending the way they should and his wrists rotating without catching on something internal and wrong.
You can’t wash away the thing that keeps you moving.
And despite what people assume—despite the way they look at him like he’s carved from something fireproof and unfeeling—he overheats.
Not metaphorically.
Heat builds beneath his skin in ways that feel mechanical and biological all at once, like something running too hot without adequate ventilation. He goes through at least two gallons of water a day, sometimes more if patrol runs long or a fight drags past midnight. He buys the cheapest plastic jug from the gas station down the block every morning, the kind that dents inward when you grip it too hard, and refills it before he even takes off his jacket.
When he can’t be bothered to wait for a sink to fill, when exhaustion sinks too deep into his bones to care, he heads for Gotham Harbor and crouches at the edge of the dock, sleeves shoved up, letting the black water lap at his hands and wrists until the worst of the heat bleeds off into something colder.
Sometimes the water hisses faintly where it touches him.
Forty-nine nuts and bolts.
He counted them during the second month, sitting cross-legged on his apartment floor with a rag between his teeth and a screwdriver in hand, cataloging each one like a prayer he couldn’t afford to forget. Ankles. Knees. Hips. Spine. Shoulders. Wrists. Tiny points of vulnerability disguised as structure.
They need to be changed bi-weekly.
In the beginning, he forgot.
He would leave the apartment already running late, helmet tucked under one arm, mind halfway to the rooftops, and only realize mid-patrol that something felt off. The first time his right foot detached at the ankle, it wasn’t cinematic or dramatic. There were no sparks, no catastrophic failure. Just the quiet, nauseating give of a bolt that had worn down too far and the sudden, brutal reminder of gravity when he landed wrong between buildings and felt himself come apart in a way he couldn’t explain to anyone.
He’d sat there afterward on the gravel, city lights flickering below, reattaching himself with hands that didn’t shake even though something inside him wanted to.
He doesn’t forget anymore.
Maintenance is ritual now. Every other Sunday night if he can manage it. Tools laid out in careful rows on the kitchen counter. Jacket folded over the back of a chair. Music low enough not to distract him. He works methodically, tightening, replacing, oiling, checking range of motion with a precision that borders on obsessive, because the alternative is another misstep, another reminder that he is only as functional as his last adjustment.
The Red Hood helmet became multi-use somewhere along the line.
It isn’t just protection from bullets or shrapnel or the occasional misguided punch. It’s insulation. It’s containment. It’s the final, necessary layer between the world and the truth of what he is.
Because his face—his real face—is intact in the cruelest way imaginable.
Intact enough to feel everything. Wind across his cheeks. Rain stinging against his skin. The drag of sweat at his temples when he pushes too hard. The scars are still there if you know where to trace them, pale lines cutting across flesh that healed ugly. The brand is still visible, a ghost beneath the surface. He still grows stubble along his jaw, uneven and dark if he ignores it too long. His nose is still crooked from an old break that never set right. His eyes are still hollowed out by memory rather than mechanics.
He looks human.
He feels human.
That’s the problem.
The helmet completes the illusion in reverse. Glossy red and featureless, reflective enough that anyone staring into it sees only themselves warped back. It erases the twitch of a muscle, the flare of anger, the split-second flicker of doubt. It lets him move like a machine without having to explain why his hands are so careful, why he drinks water like he’s dying of thirst, why his apartment smells like a garage that never closes.
The leather jacket and combat boots are almost cosmetic by comparison, theater layered over function. They sell the image. They make him look like a man who chose this aesthetic instead of someone who requires it. They ensure that if anyone suspects the truth—that there are bolts beneath his skin and oil working through his lifelines—they’ll dismiss it as a metaphor.
He is the only one who knows the exact shape of the machine he’s become.
The only one who feels the faint resistance in his joints on colder nights. The only one who counts screws instead of hours. The only one who stands in the middle of his oil-scented apartment, a cheap water jug sweating in his grip, and wonders how much of this is repair and how much of it is penance.
Not dead. Not entirely alive in the way he remembers.
Just assembled, piece by piece, every week, making sure nothing vital comes loose when he makes the next jump.
He started rusting.
Isn’t that funny?
Of all the things to happen to him—after Lazarus pits and crowbars and resurrections that never quite took—Jason Todd is rusting.
It begins at the edges.
Fingertips first, where the nail meets skin and something colder hums beneath. Toes next, faint discoloration blooming along the cuticles like bruises that never turn purple enough to explain themselves. And then the place that makes his stomach drop every time he catches it in the mirror—the thin line at the base of his neck, just beneath his collarbone, where metal ends and flesh pretends to begin. There’s a tint there now. Subtle. Green-brown. Like an old penny pressed too long into damp earth.
He notices it under bad lighting.
He notices it more in good lighting.
At night, when he lies on his back and stares at the cracked ceiling of his apartment, he can smell it. That sharp, wet-metal scent that sits at the back of the throat and refuses to leave. It threads through the motor oil, through the stale air and the cheap detergent and the ghost of gunpowder that never quite washes out of his clothes. Rust has its own voice. Thin. Inevitable.
It makes him feel like a corpse laid out too long before burial.
And he’s tried everything.
He bought a bathtub.
Not a nice one. Not porcelain or claw-footed or anything remotely elegant. Just a secondhand tub he hauled up three flights of narrow stairs by himself, shoulders burning, jaw locked, and installed in the corner of his dingy bathroom with the kind of stubborn precision that borders on self-punishment. He sealed the edges with shaking hands and ignored the way the pipes groaned in protest the first time he filled it.
He stole Dick’s fancy herbal shampoo for it.
Didn’t ask. Just pocketed the bottle from Wayne Manor the last time he’d been there, because it smelled clean in a way Jason had forgotten was possible—eucalyptus and something sharp and green, like leaves crushed between fingers. He poured half the bottle into the water, watched it foam and swirl, pale and promising.
He soaked for over an hour.
Sat there with his knees drawn up, water lapping at his “collarbones”, steam fogging the cracked mirror, and scrubbed until his skin flushed red and tender. He worked at his fingertips with a rag, at his toes, at the place where metal met flesh at his neck, twisting to see it properly, teeth gritted against the awkward angle.
The smell got stronger.
Heat draws it out, apparently. Like something steeping. The longer he sat, the more pronounced it became, rising with the steam until he felt like he was breathing himself in.
After that, he tried rust remover.
The weak kind first. He dabbed it onto a cloth and pressed it carefully against his fingertips, watching for a reaction, for bubbling or fizzing or anything that would tell him it was working.
Nothing.
The discoloration stayed. The smell lingered.
So he bought the heavy-duty kind.
Industrial. Corrosive. The bottle came with warnings printed in bold, blocky letters about gloves and ventilation and avoiding contact with skin. Jason read them once and then set the paper aside.
He locked his apartment door. Opened a window. Sat at the kitchen table with his tools pushed to one side and the bottle placed dead center like something sacrificial.
He started with his fingertips.
It was one of the two places he was showed mercy after all–his face and neck and his hands.
His hands kept their feeling.
He poured a small amount onto a rag and pressed it to the green-brown tint until his nose scrunched up. There was a faint sting at first, manageable, almost encouraging. Then a deeper burn that made his jaw clench and his shoulders hunch forward as if bracing for impact. He counted under his breath—five, ten, fifteen, twenty minutes—before yanking the rag away and dunking his hand into a bowl of water he’d set beside him.
A thin layer came off.
Not dramatic. Not transformative. Just enough that the metal looked raw. Progress, if he was being generous.
The base of his neck was harder.
He stood in front of the bathroom mirror, shirt discarded, shoulders tense, trying to angle himself so he could see without twisting too far. His articulation only allows so much before something grinds unpleasantly beneath the surface. He soaked the rag again, wrung it out just enough to keep it from dripping, and pressed it carefully against the discolored line where metal ends.
The burn was immediate.
Sharp. Deep. Wrong.
It didn’t feel like cleaning a wound. It felt like dissolving something structural. His stomach lurched violently, bile rising up his throat as the skin there flared red and angry beneath the chemical bite. He kept it in place longer than he should have, because stopping would mean admitting this was permanent, that the rust wasn’t surface-level, that it wasn’t just neglect he could scrub away with enough effort.
When he finally pulled the rag back, his vision swam.
The green-brown tint was still there.
Maybe lighter. Maybe not. It was hard to tell through the angry flush of skin and the way his hands trembled—not from weakness, he tells himself, but from the body’s natural response to pain.
He grips the edge of the sink until it creaks under his fingers, breath coming shallow and measured. There’s a chemical smell layered over the rust now, acrid and sharp, burning the inside of his nose.
He looks at himself in the mirror.
Face intact–well if you could call it that.
Rust at the edges.
Jason laughs once, soft and humorless, because of course this is how it goes. Not with a dramatic failure. Not with sparks or catastrophic collapse. Just slow corrosion at the margins. A creeping reminder that even machines left in damp places will start to give.
He rinses his skin carefully. Pats it dry. Reaches automatically for the oil afterward, working it back into his fingertips with slow, deliberate strokes, because maintenance doesn’t stop just because something new has gone wrong.
When he finally lies down to sleep, the smell is still there.
Faint.
Persistent.
He stares at the ceiling in the dark and wonders how long it takes for rust to eat through something vital—and whether he’ll feel alive when it does.
–
“Next!”
You call it out without looking up, your eyes still fixed on the register screen as it lags slightly behind your taps, the numbers updating just slow enough to be irritating when you’re already tired and counting down the minutes until you can close. It’s late—later than it should be for a place like this to still be open—and the overhead lights hum in that constant, low way that makes everything feel flatter, more drained, like the night has been stretched too thin.
You shift your weight behind the counter, rolling one shoulder back to ease the stiffness there, already thinking about getting home, about peeling off the denim work shirt that smells faintly like rubber and soap and whatever’s soaked into it over the past few shifts. Med school isn’t forgiving, and neither is rent, so here you are.
Bootsteps approach.
You glance up.
He’s taller than most of the regulars, which is the first thing you notice, and then everything else fills in after—leather jacket that’s been worn enough to soften at the edges, a black beanie pulled low but not enough to hide the uneven fall of his hair, and a streak of white near the front that stands out under the harsh lighting. His face catches your attention for a second longer than you expect, something about it sharp but tired at the same time, and there’s a brief, automatic reaction before it gets interrupted.
The smell hits.
Oil, definitely. Grease too. That’s normal here.
This isn’t.
It’s stronger than it should be, layered with something metallic and damp that makes you instinctively sniff again before you can stop yourself, your nose wrinkling slightly as you try to place it.
Across from you, he notices.
Jason watches the small shift in your expression—the way you rub at your nose like it might help, the quick recalibration—and straightens a fraction, not enough to be obvious, just enough to register as discomfort on his end too. He already knows what he smells like. This was a mistake.
He sets his items down one at a time, movements controlled and deliberate.
A metal brush.
Pliers.
A set of screwdrivers.
A gallon of gasoline.
Rust remover.
His hands are covered with gloves, worn but intact, and when he pushes the items closer it’s done carefully, like he’s paying attention to the exact amount of pressure needed to move them without knocking anything over.
You reach for the rust remover first, turning it slightly in your hand to check the label even though you already recognize the brand.
“This one’s not that great,” you say, your tone even, more out of habit than anything else, because you’ve had this conversation enough times now that it comes automatically. “I can show you a better one, and it’ll probably cost less too.”
There’s a small pause before he responds.
“…Heard it’s strong,” he says, voice low, a little rough, like he doesn’t talk much unless he has to.
You shake your head, setting the bottle back down.
“Too strong,” you correct, tapping it lightly against the counter. “It’ll wear down whatever you use it on, even if you’re careful, and the smell doesn’t go away quickly. It’ll stick around.”
“It’s not a concern,” he replies, a little quicker this time. “As long as it works.”
You glance at him briefly, then back at the items.
“It’s better, actually,” he adds.
You don’t argue. Just give a small shrug and start scanning, the register beeping softly with each item as you move through them one by one.
You glance at the clock on the iPad.
12:23 AM.
You exhale quietly through your nose, already regretting agreeing to another night shift. You’re not even sure why the store part stays open this late when the garage itself is closed, but it’s not your decision.
As you scan the screwdrivers, your attention drifts toward the window, catching sight of a motorcycle parked outside under the streetlight. It looks used, not in bad condition, just not maintained as often as it probably should be.
“She yours?” you ask, nodding toward it.
He pauses slightly before answering.
“…Yeah.”
“She needs a tire change.”
“I can do it myself.”
You nod, not pushing it further.
“Alright.”
You slid the last item across the scanner, the familiar electronic chirp sounding almost automatically beneath your hands as you reached for the customer's bag. The words were already forming before you had even looked up.
"Cash or—"
The front door flew open hard enough to send the little brass bell above it rattling violently against the glass.
You didn't need to turn around.
You already knew.
"Hey—slow down," you called instinctively, though the warning arrived far too late to accomplish anything.
Jordan tore through the entrance like a storm compressed into the shape of a ten-year-old, sneakers squeaking against the polished tile as he darted between shelves and displays without so much as acknowledging the other customer standing at the register. There was no hesitation in him, no concern for personal space or social etiquette, only the singular determination of someone carrying a crisis that, in his mind, could not possibly wait another second.
Jason stepped aside without thinking.
It was a small movement, almost unconscious, creating just enough room for the boy to squeeze past him before reaching the counter.
Something heavy landed against the laminate with a metallic clank.
"He's broken again!"
You looked down.
Optimus Prime.
The same one.
Large enough to require both of Jordan's hands to carry comfortably, painted in bright reds and blues that had dulled slightly beneath months of enthusiastic play, its die-cast frame carrying more weight than any children's toy reasonably ought to.
It looked considerably worse than the last time.
Resting both palms against the counter, you picked it up with practiced familiarity, rotating one of the shoulders before testing the elbow joint with careful fingers.
"What happened this time?" you asked, your voice carrying the quiet resignation of someone who already suspected the answer would somehow be nothing.
Only then did you glance back toward Jason.
"Cash or card?"
"Cash."
His answer came automatically, though his attention had already wandered.
It wasn't difficult to see where.
His eyes remained fixed on the toy resting between your hands.
"I didn't do anything," Jordan protested immediately, leaning so far over the counter he was nearly standing on his toes. "He just started rusting."
You paused. Your thumb brushed thoughtfully against one of the shoulder joints.
There was, in fact, the faintest bloom of orange discoloration gathered near one of the screws.
"And all his joints are stuck," Jordan continued with mounting frustration, nudging the toy a little closer to you. "How's he supposed to save the world now that he has arthritis?"
The question was delivered with complete sincerity, as though the fate of humanity genuinely depended upon your answer.
You accepted the fifty-dollar bill Jason offered without looking, counted his change from the register by muscle memory, and slid the shopping bag toward him across the counter.
"Jordan," you sighed, "go back to Fifth Street. Your brother is—"
"YOU'RE NOT GOING TO FIX HIM?"
The outburst rang through the little convenience store loudly enough that Jason actually startled, his gaze dropping from you to the child.
"WHAT'S THE POINT OF GOING TO MED SCHOOL?"
"It's a robot, not a person."
"Optimus Prime has feelings."
"I bet he does." The comment escaped Jason before he had the chance to reconsider it.
It earned him a look immediately.
Not an irritated one. Not really. Your eyes lifted to his with unmistakable exasperation, but there was something warm beneath it, something impossibly gentle that softened the expression before it ever had the chance to become genuine annoyance.
It lasted less than a second.
Still—
Something inside Jason shifted. It felt absurdly similar to scratching at a piece of rust only to discover clean metal waiting underneath.
"Tomorrow," you said firmly.
"Tonight."
"No."
The answer came just as quickly, though you stopped yourself almost immediately.
Your eyes flickered toward Jason.
Then back to Jordan.
Something thoughtful crossed your face.
You knew the boy well enough to recognize that strangers usually sent him retreating behind your legs, and perhaps because of that, perhaps because you were quietly hoping embarrassment might accomplish what reason could not, you smiled toward the man still standing patiently beside the counter.
"Why don't you ask the mister over here?"
Jordan froze.
His head turned slowly toward Jason.
Without saying a word, he shuffled two careful steps sideways until there was a little more distance between them.
Jason couldn't help smiling.
It was barely there, only the faintest pull at the corner of his mouth, but it came naturally all the same.
Years ago, children being frightened of him would have stung.
Now...
Now it simply felt sensible.
His size alone was intimidating enough before accounting for the leather jacket, the gloves, the scar stretching across his face, or the permanently exhausted look that never quite left his eyes. If their roles had been reversed, Jason wasn't entirely convinced he'd trust himself around children either.
So he lifted one gloved hand carefully.
Slowly.
Offering nothing more threatening than a small wave.
Jordan stared up at him for several long seconds.
Then, with the complete sincerity unique to children, he asked,
"...Is he your new boyfriend?"
You made a sound somewhere between a cough and a choke.
Jason felt heat bloom beneath the skin of his face so suddenly it almost startled him. Had his body still been entirely human, he suspected he would have been blushing with enough enthusiasm to betray himself completely. Instead, the warmth settled strangely beneath old dings and rust, spreading through him until even the metal hidden beneath his clothes seemed almost capable of retaining it.
"What—no!" you sputtered, recovering only halfway through the sentence before coughing once more into your sleeve. "Where did you even get that idea from?"
Jordan looked genuinely confused by the question.
"You always go after the ones with motorcycles."
"Jordan."
The warning left your mouth in a sharp whisper.
"Go. Find your brother."
Ignoring you entirely, Jordan tilted his head back toward Jason.
"Mister... can I ride your motorcycle?"
Jason hesitated.
"...As the driver," he asked cautiously, "or the passenger?"
"You are not riding it at all," you cut in immediately, pointing accusingly between the two of them. "You don't even own a helmet."
Jordan grinned. "But you have a helmet."
The words caught you off guard.
Jason watched something quieter settle across your face as your expression momentarily drifted somewhere else entirely.
He had no way of knowing that there was a helmet sitting in the break room behind you, decorated with little Spider-Man stickers that had been peeling at the corners for months. He had no way of knowing someone else had bought it years ago, or that Jordan and his brother liked hiding in the break room whenever they visited because the old air conditioner back there worked better than the one on the sales floor.
All he saw was the tiny pause.
The brief flicker of memory.
Then your composure returned.
"...No."
"But—"
"No."
You turned back toward Jason, summoning the practiced smile reserved for customers despite the lingering embarrassment still warming your cheeks.
"Have a nice day."
"It's night," Jordan muttered beneath his breath.
You slowly looked down at him.
Before you could say anything, Jason quietly cleared his throat.
"...He's right."
-
You were right. The rust remover too strong. Jason flash rusted. Horribly so.
Maybe that's why he's laid across the backseat of your car right now, blood and oil staining your seats.
Dick in the driver seat while you hold up his head so he doesn't gag as he throws up.
big fan of the meta commentary on the perception of the robins that you can read from absolute batman #23.
even in a universe where they are presented to the public as a unified front, where they all have the same uniform & the same ultimate goal, and the public is not given any information about their individual backgrounds, personalities etc., there is still the tendency to project a superficial image onto each of them to fuel a popularity contest.
the sight of their mission gets lost in this media frenzy their existence has spawned, where instead of focusing on the issue at hand (the robins being a militarized group meant to protect gotham from the perceived threat that is batman), their existence is reduced to a figment of stan culture. everyone is known for only one or two traits, and it's the traits the public wants them to have rather than ones necessarily rooted in reality, as well as the traits they see desirable in one way or another.
looking at their mainline counterparts, they are coincidentally treated in a similar fashion, by both writers and fans.
DC K.O.: Knightfight #1
Heroes in Crisis #9
Task Force Z #8
of course, this kind of framing in the comics is largely a result of the fandom's TMNT-ification of the robins, which happens not only because of the constant game of superlatives fans of each robin like to play to prop up their favorite (smartest robin, angriest robin, coolest robin etc.), but also because any nuance in the original text gets lost when you only engage with it through the eyes of stan culture. the mainline robins all have so much more to them than the vague descriptors given to them by the greater fandom, and their motivations and values often get sidelined or forgotten in favor of this very one-dimensional way of engaging with the text.
circling back to the absolute robins, we get to see the consequences of such reductive framing in real time. they appear to be more exicted about this popularity poll than worried about the task at hand, and it's what skews their priorities later on. they get so lost in the media frenzy of it all, of sticking it up to dick (the only one who doesn't care about the poll) they let their guard down and well... it gets one of them killed. suddenly, it's not about their mission or "job", it's about vanity and popularity. they've gotten too comfortable in their celebrity status, too detached from their reality and now they've paid the price.
tim in particular is the one who seems to be winning the poll, the one who's most invested in its results and how they're all perceived, and the one who brings up the poll first after their supposed victory over dick (because it's not about catching batman, it's about beating dick and proving him wrong, once again highlighing how important this sense of competition is to them). so it's only right that he's the one to get killed as result. something something both tim and jason flew too close to the sun and now the reality of their situation has come crashing down. it's a painful reminder they're not these lovable celebrities meant to foster a fandom - they're expendable soldiers, too young to fully grasp the gravity of the battle they're fighting.
i can't help but seeing how this parallels fandom sentiment when it comes to the robins. not just with the simplifying of each character, but with how the fandom gets lost in the popularity contest of it all as well. the character's mission, motivation and values get lost in favor of propping them up on a pedestal, and even if the character doesn't suffer from this oversimplification, the purpose often becomes disingenuous, since it's about sticking it up to the other robins and their fans as opposed to discussing the character in earnest.
if you want to give scott snyder and co. more credit, notice how even the way the absolute robins are described seems to mirror the reductive descriptions given to them by irl fans (tim the popular lovable one, jason the bad boy, duke the silent one, steph the mysterious one). now granted, this could just be a product of the same framing that led to the other examples from mainline that i provided above, but with the commentary that can be gleaned from everything else in this issue, such an interpretation isn't that far-fetched in my opinion.
it's just a very interesting direction to take with the robins, since we don't ever really see dc exploring the consequences of portraying the robins as a unified group. it has me very excited to see where we go from here 🙂↕️
Does anyone else have the headcanon that Booster can switch his visor from opaque to transparent at will🧍I think it’d not only able make him harder to read in certain situations but give him the power to maximize his ability to talk Ted into various hijinks
