Revive

Scar

 Jason woke up with his head still throbbing and his vision blurred.

He took a deep breath, mentally counted to three and sat down on the stretcher at once. As he gathered the strength to get up, he tried to remember what had happened in the last few hours - he just remembered blowing up one of the sheds where they were storing illegal substances.

— Damn... — he moaned softly — Fuck, fuck, fuck... — he cursed as closed his eyes tightly and opened it again. He saw everything blurry, with indistinguishable shapes that made him nervous.

— I'm here, son... here... — Bruce murmured softly and in his sleep. He had slept sitting next to Jason's stretcher, probably holding one of the rebel's hands until he woke up - Selina was beside him, hugging the night watchman and giving himself to the same heavy sleep.

— What... the fuck... — The boy took a deep breath, felt a sickness in his stomach just to imagine that Bruce - or Batman, since he couldn't determine the presence of the hood - being there with him was more of a hallucination — Calm, Jason. Keep your fucking calm — he ordered himself, lying on the stretcher again.

To lie down and relax was an impossible idea to materialize, since his mind was overflowing with signs of "imminent risk". Even looking at the ceiling made him nervous: he felt that at any moment a gigantic stalactite could come off and fall on him; the cave could collapse due to poorly controlled infiltration and bury it down there...

— Calm the fuck! — declared as he got up again, now getting off the stretcher and walking with hurried steps out of the laboratory.

Alfred did not notice that the boy had already awakened: he was busy serving as a support for Batgirl, Red Robin and Nightwing. More warehouses had been discovered throughout the city where those chemical compounds were being kept.

Jason was too nervous to look for the butler, he just went upstairs and went to hide in the mansion. He felt that the dinosaur could activate and attack it; that the giant coin could slip from the base and roll towards it; that weapons could fire on their own; that the gigantic Joker's card would release Happy Gas... He felt that the previous alternatives could happen simultaneously as well.

However, going to the mansion was not a good idea starting with the chandelier: he was afraid that the large decorative object would fall on top of him. The images of that rainy day, when he arrived at what he still called "home sweet home" terrified him: he found Damian under twisted steel and shards of crystals... his body torn, divided, bloody, dead, with eyes frozen in fear. Damian was too small to have died like that... he didn't want to have the same end!

When he finally got to the stairs, Todd was already breathing fast and all the other symptoms of an impending panic attack. He crawled up the steps, afraid he was going to trip and fall. He kept crawling until he found the first door unlocked and managed to get in, get under some furniture and stay there, huddled.

He was now in the office, suffering with an extraordinary anxiety, with fear, with vertigo that barely allowed him to open his eyes without feeling sick... he was suffering alone, because his mind only accepted that Bruce being close was a hallucination. He didn't blame him, after everything he had done in the past few day ... what he had said...

The makeshift shelter he had set up, a small tea table, trembled as did his body. The delicate porcelain pieces creaked with the tremor - they moaned like small creatures in agony.

But the sound didn't bother him, his mind was busy making him relive more painful memories.

The hallucinations lasted until the sound of an alarm clock echoed through the emptiness of the mansion and overpowered the others. It was an unceasing noise, fast and extremely loud. Then, footsteps... footsteps approaching. Perhaps it was just one of the toxin's side effects, yet another hallucination that seemed to be real.