Jason Todd, bone breaker by night, half-babysitter by day.
Jason realized something was off before he even crossed the threshold of Dick’s apartment.
Too much silence.
No small footsteps tearing down the hallway. No usual “Uncle Jay!” launched at his stomach like a tiny missile. Just the hum of the fridge and the absurdly loud tick-tick-tick of the kitchen clock.
“Grayson,” he muttered, dropping the keys into the bowl by the door, “if your kid set up some Home Alone-style trap for me, I’m leaving right now.”
Nothing. Not even a giggle. Not even one sarcastic little comment worthy of the original Boy Wonder.
Jason frowned. The plan had been simple: Dick was heading out early on patrol with Barbara, and Jason was babysitting for the night. Easy. Pizza, cartoons, get the kid into bed at a reasonable hour — or something close enough to count — sneak in a couple more rounds on the console, done.
Except the kid was missing.
“Peter,” he called, louder this time. “Spiderling, come out before I—” He twisted his mouth. “Before I call Alfred and tell him nobody taught you manners.”
Silence.
Then Jason heard a faint, muffled sound from the small bedroom. Not quite a whimper. More like an exhausted sigh.
In one second, the tough-guy act cracked around the edges, and he went straight for the door.
He pushed it open carefully.
The room was dim, the curtains drawn. The only light came from the little planet-shaped lamp on the nightstand. On the bed, a lump tangled in the sheets was breathing with effort. Black hair clung damply to a flushed forehead.
“Hey,” Jason said, in a voice so soft no criminal in Gotham would have survived hearing it. “That doesn’t look like a trap. That looks like…” He stepped closer. “A fever.”
Peter barely lifted his head, eyes glassy and red-rimmed.
“Uncle… Jay?” His voice came out hoarse and small. “I don’t wanna get uuuup.”
Jason braced one knee on the mattress and pressed a hand to the boy’s forehead.
The heat jumped straight into his palm.
“Shit,” he whispered, more to himself than to Peter. “You’re a damn furnace, kid.”
Peter made a tiny noise, half protest, half failed laugh, and burrowed deeper into the pillow.
“Dad said… said it was just a little fever…” He blinked, fighting sleep. “Said you were coming anyway… and that… that you wouldn’t leave me alone…”
Jason chewed back a curse that was very clearly aimed at Dick for not warning him properly. He reached for his phone and played the last voice message from Grayson.
“Hey, Jay. He’s a little under the weather, but he insisted on you coming. Says he feels safe with you. I gave him Tylenol at six. He just wants to sleep and be held. If he gets worse, call me.”
Jason pressed his lips together.
Safe. Right.
With the guy who had literally clawed his way back from the grave and currently described himself as “a walking bad example.” Perfect.
“All right, little spider,” he said at last, setting the phone on the nightstand. “Your dad is a drama queen, but he didn’t lie this time. You’re burning up.”
Peter reached for him instinctively, digging one trembling hand out from under the blankets.
“I don’t wanna… do anything. Just sleep…” His eyes suddenly shone. “Can you stay… here?”
Jason was going to say something like, Sure, but first we’re getting that fever down, soldier.
What came out was simpler.
“Yeah. I’m staying.”
He stood for a moment and shifted into Alfred Junior mode: kitchen, glass of water, thermometer from the cabinet Dick had mentioned — “green box, next to the Star Wars mugs, Jason, it’s not rocket science” — and, while he was there, a small cloth dampened with cool water.
When he came back, Peter had curled even tighter into himself, like he was trying to disappear inside the comforter.
“Hey. Don’t vanish on me,” Jason said, sitting on the edge of the bed.
Peter forced his eyes open.
“You left…”
“Ten seconds. I’m offended,” Jason huffed. “Come on. Mission one: figure out exactly how much of a toaster you are. Thermometer. Mouth.”
Peter obeyed without complaining, too tired for his usual performance. Jason held his chin with clumsy tenderness, almost startled by how fragile the kid felt in his hands.
The beep came quickly.
Jason checked the screen and gave a low whistle.
“hundred and one point seven Fahrenheit. Nothing to panic over, but definitely enough to complain with style.”
He handed him the glass.
“Drink, champ.”
Peter took a couple of sips, his throat working with effort. When he was done, Jason placed the damp cloth across his forehead. The boy shivered.
“It’s cold…”
“That’s the point,” Jason said. “We’re trying to stop you from turning into a human space heater. Bruce already pays enough for heating.”
That got a weak smile out of Peter.
Jason stored it away silently.
Once he was sure the kid’s breathing had evened out a little, he leaned back, ready to stay sitting there. But then he felt a tug on his shirt.
Peter, eyes half-closed, had caught the hem in his fingers.
“Don’t go…” he murmured, voice fading. “Stay… here with me… okay?”
That broken, sleepy little “okay?” lodged itself somewhere in Jason’s chest he didn’t like acknowledging.
For a second, his body reacted the way it used to when he was a street kid: tension, memory, that old ugly certainty that asking someone to stay was dangerous.
No one stayed.
Not back then.
But he wasn’t that kid anymore.
And the boy clutching his shirt wasn’t him. He was the son of Jason’s brilliant idiot of a brother. A child who trusted Jason Todd to stay.
“Fine,” he said at last, swallowing down that old knot. “Operation Uncle Jay Stays Until You Get Sick of Him is officially a go.”
With some effort, he stretched out on top of the comforter, trying to leave Peter some space.
Peter, however, didn’t hesitate for even a second. He moved like a sick little cat and curled directly against Jason’s chest, tucking his head under Jason’s chin. The fever coming off him was sticky and too warm, but there was something else there too, something Jason took a second to recognize.
Trust.
Dangerous little thing.
Jason adjusted the blankets around him, practically tucking him into a cocoon. One of his hands ended up moving automatically over the boy’s back, up and down, slow and steady.
“Better?” he murmured.
Peter nodded against his shirt. Jason felt the warm damp brush of his breath.
“You smell like leather…” the little boy whispered, with an honesty that dragged a low laugh out of him. “And… gasoline.”
“Thanks for the compliment, I guess.” Jason rested his head against the pillow and stared at the ceiling. “It’s my new cologne. Street Assault No. 5.”
Peter let out a tiny strangled laugh that immediately turned into a cough. Jason tensed, then patted his back gently.
“Easy. Easy. You’re okay.”
The boy took a slow breath, and little by little, the shaking eased.
Lying there, with that small body pressed against him, Jason noticed something strange about his own breathing.
It was syncing with Peter’s.
One. Two. Three.
His mind, on the other hand, wouldn’t shut up.
He remembered nights when no one had put a cool cloth on his forehead. Fever nights on a crappy mattress, with only the noise of a television for company. He remembered, too — in a flash sharp enough to hurt — a very different hand, big and gloved and awkward, resting on his hair.
“You’ll be okay, Robin.”
Jason scowled and buried that old voice.
Not now.
He looked down at Peter.
The kid had drifted halfway to sleep, long lashes stuck together, mouth slightly open, cheeks bright with fever. His hand was still twisted in Jason’s shirt, as if he was afraid Jason would vanish the second he let go.
“You really need to trust people less, little spider,” Jason murmured, knowing Peter couldn’t hear him. “One of these days you’re gonna run into a dangerous idiot.”
Peter mumbled something unintelligible.
Something that sounded suspiciously like, “You’re not dangerous.”
Jason rolled his eyes, but a small, tired smile escaped him anyway.
His phone buzzed on the nightstand. Careful not to move the kid too much, Jason reached for it.
Message from Dick:
Everything okay? Did he fall asleep? Tell him I love him if he wakes up scared.
Jason looked at the creature thoroughly glued to him.
He typed one-handed:
Yeah. Fever’s high but under control. He’s knocked out and stuck to me like a tick. He hates you less than usual.
Three dots appeared. Then:
Thanks, Jay. Seriously. To him, you’re… safer than you think.
Jason snorted, turned the phone face down, and focused again on Peter’s breathing.
Safer than you think.
What a poetic way of saying this kid doesn’t see the whole disaster living inside you.
“Your dad has a weird way of saying thank you,” he told the sleeping boy. “And somehow I’m the weird one.”
Peter, in response, curled closer, burying his nose against Jason’s chest.
Minutes passed. The cloth on his forehead warmed; Jason swapped it for another, lifting the boy’s head just enough to slide the fresh one into place before settling him back against his chest.
Every movement was messy and awkward, but also so gentle it would have shocked half of Gotham into silence.
At one point, Peter stirred, brow furrowing.
“Don’t go…” he whispered again, trapped somewhere inside a fever dream.
Jason tightened his arm around him, firm and steady.
“I’m not going anywhere, kid,” he said, plain and simple, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “Not tonight.”
The words floated through the dim room.
Strangely, they didn’t sound like some impossible promise.
They sounded natural.
Like something he’d been waiting far too long to say to someone.
Peter’s breathing slowly deepened, growing calmer. If you paid close enough attention, you could feel the fever starting to ease, barely a degree, barely anything at all — but enough for shoulders to loosen, for tiny fingers to unclench.
Jason rested his cheek against the boy’s hair, closed his eyes, and, against all odds, let himself drift a little too. Not fully asleep. His ears were trained to catch any wrong sound in the dark. It was that soft kind of half-wakefulness he’d learned in alleys, on rooftops, in makeshift shelters.
Only now, instead of a gun, he was holding a child.
And instead of waiting for the next shot, he was waiting for something much rarer in his life: for the fever to break completely, for Dick to come home safe, for this tiny bubble of quiet not to burst as quickly as every other good thing did.
“I swear to you, Peter Grayson…” he mumbled, almost without meaning to. “If you wake up tomorrow and tell your dad I got sentimental, we’re going to war.”
The boy didn’t answer.
He only sighed, deep and trusting, while his fingers stayed hooked in the fabric of Jason’s shirt like an anchor.
It was just another night in Blüdhaven.
Outside, the noisy city kept doing what noisy cities do.
Inside, in a modest apartment, Jason Todd stayed perfectly still with a sleeping child tucked against him, holding one small feverish universe in his arms like it was the easiest thing in the world.
And for once, he didn’t run from it.
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