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He only refused orders when the orders were detrimental or over cautious. He was a teenager, his judgement skills weren't always the absolute best, but nine times out of ten, he'd follow orders with his whole heart. But sometimes, he couldn't hear the order over the sound of that pearl in his insides getting plucked. Sometimes, all he could hear or see or smell was someone in pain, someone reaching out for protection.

Someone that sometimes looked and felt alarmingly like himself.

In another world, in another time, his anger for Gloria would be all consuming. His anger at her assault. Her death. The fact that her rapist was just going to get a slap on the wrist before being sent back home to Daddy. His anger would blow up and he'd watch Felipe's body plummet with cold ice in his pale blue eyes. In another world, he would have turned and lashed that anger out at the man who'd let Gloria's rapist almost get away. In another world....

But not this one. Bruce landed heavy behind him and he turned, eyes wide with a mix of pain and anger and agony as he reached out to take handfuls of Bruce's cape in his hands. He shook with it, shaking his head over and over as he tried so hard to process what had just happened.

"I-I just wanted to talk! I ju-...I wanted to yell. I'm so mad, B. I..I wanted to hurt him. Punch him until he knew just how bad he hurt her! But, I got here and he was drinking and I-..oh God..." He pushed away, falling to his knees and barely feeling the sting of the wood against his skin as he retched into the trash bin that smelled like stale alcohol and cigarettes. Nothing came up, his breakfast long since gone, but he trembled like something wanted to come up anyway.

"I tried to catch him. He spooked and stumbled and I tried to grab him but he slipped and..." His back heaved and he gagged hard.

Bruce knew the feeling. He knew it because there had been no small part of him that wanted to pummel Garzonas into paste, until he was nothing but a stain on the underside of Bruce's boot. It lived in that dark, quiet part of him that emerged when Joe Chill put a hole in his heart. But it was discipline that stayed Bruce's hand. Discipline and his father's eyes and warm words: if you can save the life, then save it. Felipe didn't deserve to live, but Bruce did not have a license to take that life away.

And maybe, maybe if circumstances had been just a little bit different, Bruce would have looked at Jason differently. Would have quietly wondered if Felipe had fallen or if he'd been pushed to his death. But he doesn't wonder, because he trusted his Robin. He could be willful and headstrong and stubborn and maybe a little too violent, but he was a good kid at heart. A good kid who cared so much about others. That kid, the one Bruce knew, would never have pushed Felipe, no matter how much he hated him.

He reached for the boy when he fists clenched his cape, arms around his shoulders to anchor him, help get him grounded. And when he pushed away Bruce followed him, hand settling along his back as he gagged into the garbage.

Bruce believed him.

“This wasn't your fault, Jason,” Bruce said quietly, hand running up to his shoulder and down his back again. Meant to be comforting. A reminder that he was here and wasn't going anywhere. “Let me take you home.”

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