Chapter Text
Jason Todd falls from a rooftop the night he meets his soulmate.
A lot of things had happened in his life before that moment —So many things he almost believed he would never (Seriously, like never ever) got to live long enough to meet her.
Well, truth be told, he didn’t know it was going to be her.
A doctor! Of all people –His soulmate was a fucking doctor!
It is almost ironic: Red Hood’s soulmate is a medic; someone whose whole deal is to heal people.
And well, his whole deal is usually killing people.
From his point of view, laying down on a lonely street, some Gotham alley that most people tend to avoid with pretty good reasons –As Jason learns that day. She looks so young he even wonders how could she hold a medical ID hanging over civilian clothes.
She is so focused in taking care of his blood loss that she seems to not notice how her ID rumbles over her own soulmate timer that has stopped running entirely, marking a perfect 00:00 freshly engraved on her pale skin.
The exact same mark he now holds on himself.
It was so distracting –The moment he felt the sudden tingling on his skin, in a place where he didn't have any sensibility after coming back from the dead, made him stopped on his tracks while running from a local mob.
Obviously, Jason Todd would never have thought he would get so distraught as to fell off in front of her.
Was it a good first impression? Hell, was it even a decent one?
He is bleeding out a lot from his leg, he can feel it. Even if he is distracted by the whole soulmate deal. The blood is staining his pants an ugly shade of red.
What would he have fallen into?
“It’s okay buddy” She whispers. She puts on such a soft voice, as she is talking to an infant. Jason’s mind wanders if his nephew, Domi, would like her voice. Domi always likes soft voices better. “You’re going to be okay”
Ten years ago, when he died, his mark changed.
For most people, soulmates’ marks are like a clock, always tickling. Counting back the minutes until you met the person you are going to spend the rest of your life with. One way or another. Your person.
The night Jason died, his mark hadn’t even reach anywhere close to its end.
It was such an odd thing really, even if you didn’t date or marry your soulmate, you’ll always get to know them before your dead.
It was an implicit rule.
On that horrible night, Jason felt his soulmate’s mark ticking under the fabric of his suit, pulsing like a second heart on the sensitive skin of his arm. It gave him comfort, actually. His timer marked ten years more before he even got the chance to meet his soulmate.
He got time.
That thought alone, and the trust he had on his dad arriving on time, helped him overcome the overwhelming fear he held on his chest when he understood Joker’s true intentions.
Jason couldn’t die that night, right?
His soulmate was waiting for him in the future.
“You’re going to be okay, buddy” The voice of his soulmate shakes him off his flashback. Her hands go around his leg with precaution “Just stay awake, okay? Focus on me.”
It is clear she is actively trying to downplay her own freaking out. Jason notices the brief shaking on her voice. He supposes that anyone on her position would have completely panicked by then. It is a lot of blood coming off his leg, after all.
And after all, he is the red hood.
A criminal, a mob boss, a killer.
A criminal whose soulmate is a fucking doctor.
There is blood. So much blood. Jason is not strange to being injured, but even then, he can tell something is just so wrong with the way his leg feels. He drowsily asks himself if she would have ever taken care of someone he took down.
It is strange, in some way. The dizziness and the mixed thoughts. The harsh pain makes him remember a harsh sensation he has feel before. It is something he can’t put his finger on.
Right?
He cannot put his finger on the sensation.
He has felt a pain like that before. Harsh, cold and sudden. It feels like someone beat him out of the blue. His leg is pulsing with energy, bursting with a blood flow that dyes his soulmate’s clothes with quickness. Jason shakes his head to let the intrusive thoughts go away.
He has been beaten before...
... before?
Jason shuts his eyes and tries to stop his body from shaking. He does not want to remember anything. Not on that moment. Not at all.
Blood
Blood out. Move. Try to think about something different. Don't look in front of you.
Blood.
His blood.
"You're hyperventilating" Her voice stops his railing sense thoughts, helping his way back to current reality "Stay with me, okay? You're gonna be okay"
His dad –No, no. Bruce, he has told Jason that his own father was a doctor all his life.
Bruce told Jason all about his surgeon hands and his perfect accuracy, how everything Sir Thomas Wayne managed was based on his trusted clinical eye.
Thomas Wayne had wished that Bruce became a doctor.
Something that obviously never had the chance to happen, even if Bruce himself admitted he thought about the idea to enroll to medical school. Just to honor his father's legacy.
Jason's mind wonders if, in any other universe where Bruce did become a doctor, he would have the same comforting voice tone as his soulmate. Or even a similar gentle touch over his wounds. To distract him from the pain, his mind guesses if he has ever been treated with such kindness before.
If that is the moment he truly dies, once and forever, he doesn't care about anything else at all.
He finally had the chance to meet her.
She looks small. Such a petite woman with such a fierce will. He feels her hands going around his legs as his breath started to slow down for a bit. The thought trail becomes much slower. Tiny hands for a tiny woman. Jason allows himself to rest. She is tying a piece of cloth around his thigh.
He feels mesmerized. Is he dreaming? It doesn’t matter this time.
"Can you tell me your name?" She hurriedly asks
Her curly hair bounces over him as she finishes tying the rope over his wound. She has small freckles on her right cheek and big blue eyes with the longest, curliest lashes he has ever seen on his life.
She is beautiful. And skillful. Jason can’t breathe deep enough to calm himself.
“Alia?”
The name escapes from his lips even before he can realize he read it out loud from the ID over her pocket.
It feels like a dream. Like none of it was real. She is not there, not really. It is a dream. He is going to wake up in his nightmares.
Jason had dreamt about her before. After he came back from the dead all of his dreams were a mixture of Joker’s hands, Batman's cape and her voice.
Usually, she didn’t say much in his dreams. Only a few whispers, sometimes he even heard her say his name, calling him in the dark like a lost soul.
“Yeah, that’s my name”
She jokes and spins around the empty alley as if looking for any help, but there isn’t a single soul wandering those lonely streets. She stares at the floor blankly, not truly realizing she has never mentioned her name to him.
“I’m not a doctor yet” She mentions “, just a student, and I'm afraid this is not a hospital, so there’s just so little I can do for the moment but I’m going to call an ambulance for you, okay buddy? We’ll get you help”
“No” Jason immediately says. The panic on his voice is evident “I don’t have insurance”
It is the first excuse that comes to his mind. He can’t end up on a hospital bed after a simple patrol night. It would lead to too many questions to cover up –And too many jokes from his siblings for nights to come.
“Don’t worry about the cost. All Gotham’s hospitals have Wayne Medicare”
Fuck.