ILLUSION || Jason Todd

SEVENTY

❝I KNOW IT'S LOVE 'CAUSE I WILL ALWAYS BE THE FIRST

TO START MAKING UP EXCUSES WHEN IT HURTS❞

LITTLE MIX, NOBODY LIKE YOU

Her hands scrubbed back and forth against her suit as the water fell from the tap, the water only beginning to run clear from Tim's blood. It had been a long night, her eyes drooping low with exhaustion of a limited sleep filled with the tortured images of Jonathan Crane and his latch on Jason, and his history with the young Archmage.

The team had spent hours upon hours searching for any sign of Jason or Scarecrow. Neither had been found - a deliberate choice from Lorelei with her newfound discovery of Jason being her talisman. Things were complicated, even more so with the drug infused into Gotham's water system.

She would find Jason, she just had to get the timing right. To hope he was free from Jonathan, still amidst the thought of returning home, back into the arms of the girl who loved him.

"We need to talk." Dick's voice blared, his footsteps following him into the room.

The young Archmage rolled her eyes as she rubbed the corner of her eye with the back of her wrist, a smudge of dried white tears that she hadn't quite catched that morning crusting away with the friction. She knew this was coming, the questions and wonders about the things she hadn't quite yet explained; whether deliberate or not.

After last night, there was no avoiding the uprising conversation about all things Jason Peter Todd and the surroundings of her unnerving defend for his heinous actions. The blind forgiveness she seemed to have despite her heart becoming utterly frozen with hurt, the sudden appearance of just knowing things like the drugs effect on a person and the denting grip it had on a mind.

"How did you know where to go?" He asked, the question falling into Lorelei's intuition with a hint of smug knowing.

"Magic." She replied, throwing a fake grin over her shoulder. Lorelei knew how it seemed; she was being nothing but sarcastic and avoiding the conversation they had delayed for far too long. That couldn't be, for the first time in too long, further from the truth.

Lorelei was being entirely truthful from the very beginning despite her eyes being unable to see Dick's pearled blue eyes with her head dropping back towards the sink.

"You're hiding something big, you can't keep this in." Dick sighed, his words falling with a tired defeat clinging to the Titans that morning. He was just back from visiting the GCPD, his paid visit to Barbara for any and all updates from both ends.

That was why Lorelei waited until late morning until getting up. Avoidance for something that would inevitably come and bite her ass. Plus, her suit really did need to be cleaned.

The young mage took a second before responding, her shrug cancelling out her thoughts of venturing far from the truth; the spills of lying through her teeth and making a sweet excuse from the invisible butters and sugars of the blueprints they left behind in the Batcave.

"Magic." She repeated, her suit dropping into the sink as she let go of the material. The tap dropped its final droplets of water as Lorelei shut off the water, her body turning against her suit with a serious gaze raising to her surrogate brother.

Dick's eyes softened as Lorelei folded her arms across her chest, his hands pushing further into his jeans pockets. "I can't help you if you don't talk to me, Lorelei."