Death is inescapable.

… yeah, no shit, Sherlock- he of  all people should’ve been aware of that much by now, honestly- given the fact he had met the quota and then some by this point.  Yet, when asked of what happened to him- of what laid in the great beyond, it was as if he was a novice in the field.  Jason wasn’t exactly the Dale Cooper of his time- whatever true understanding of the lodges of light and darkness that laid out in the world to be discovered, Jason wasn’t the one to do the deed- much too caught up within his own self-loathing or burying his fist within the region of incisors that, when met with the perfect amount of force, would cause the shards of teeth to become buried within the gum, earning a nasty reaction from any individual- much to his delight, but he digressed from his fiery nature for a moment.  The lids of his eyes became heavy, an all too familiar sensation of drowsiness that had become as much of a commonplace for him as that of the sun rising and setting hitting him like a brick to the face.  Just a five minute nap, he pondered to himself and just as soon as the notion had crossed his mind, it was lights out.

… and then it struck.

The sensation of bruised ribs, of an aching body, of blood dripping down his features- the taste of copper filling his mouth to the point where it was practically unbearable all pounding into him like waves against the shore.  Lips desperately tried to open, as if to invite any fresh air to wash the taste out but much to his dismay, it was as if a seamstress had sewn his lips.  Darkness enveloped his vision, a feeling of claustrophobia rising within him.  Where the fuck am I?  Need… need to get out, not enough.. air...  Any process of true thought seemed to send a rattling sensation into his cranium, ruling out any possibility of thinking his way out of this situation- Bruce would’ve been livid at that notion alone, naturally.  Craning his neck upwards, cerulean orbs struggled to make out the surroundings of the cramped space he had been locked away in- his usual attire of any shirt he found that hadn’t been stained with blood was replaced from- what he could tell by just moving digits up and down his chest was a three-piece suit- which couldn’t have been his doing naturally, monkey-suits weren’t exactly up his alley in terms of apparel.  The thought dissipated within a few moments as reality set in once again.  This was far too inspired by the Fall of the House of Usher, being buried before his time- digits desperately clenching as knuckles pounded against the maple cover of his case.  The evident thumping would’ve surely been heard by anyone on the exterior but- the cover itself wouldn’t budge, regardless of how hard knuckles collided against it, to the point where the skin began to peel back and droplets of blood began to roll and slip through the crevices between his digits.  Digits fumbled and found his belt, undoing it enough to allow digits to quite literally rip the buckle off and, after using it as a makeshift brass knuckle, fist colliding with the cover while metal dug into flesh, the searing sensation of splintering wood combined with the prod of the buckle scraping into flesh doing little to deter him from the task at hand.

… was this really how he’d go?

After years of bashing heads with the likes of Batman, of placing plastique on Freeze’s helmet with the pure intention of pissing him off, or spending his evenings treating the world’s most notorious  assassins and scumbags alike with the same respect he’d show a street urchin- it boiled down to asphyxiation in a fucking coffin.  Testament to the failure that he had developed into- testament to the fact that he was, as Pagliacci had put it, nothing more than a second-rate… and with that alone, the rage awakened.  An almost burning heat filled his core and up to the brim of his throat, knuckles pounding the wood with such a vigor that with any given punch the possibility of breaking every bone in the frontal region of his limb was almost a certainty- yet with that same stubbornness that had put him in the grave once, his course of action remained the same, not even a notion of tentativeness evident within his features.  Old habits die hard, he thought- and only moments later, with his knuckles already a soft shade of purple, flesh missing from each of his knuckles, a trickle of dirt escaped through a crack- and his arm shot up, almost like something out of a horror movie, desperately clawing at anything he could, every ounce of what little strength he had left being poured into pulling himself out of the metaphorical abyss that was the coffin- and then reality set in once more.

His vision was no longer blurred, a cold-sweat dripping down his features while his index digit tugged up his shirt, wiping it away before slumping back in his chair.  “So much for a sweet dream.”  Lazily turning, hues caught sight of his calendar- the 16th of August, possibly his least favorite day of the year right up there with Halloween.  (Gotham already had enough shit-heads running around in capes and spandex- that holiday only pushed the quota to new lows.)  Digressing, hues grabbed the arms of his chair and forced his frame up right, to the point where he practically sprung up on his own- dwelling on his own issues hadn’t been his style for quite some time, while the same couldn’t be said for the healthy alternative he found in pummeling someone’s facial structure past the point of recognition.

Your dreams are simply that- just dreams- nothing more than the machinations of your mind playing deceitful tricks upon you.

It was a piece of advice he’d been told not long after his first and only therapy session what felt like decades ago, mandated by Alfred- so at the time, it had practically been a command from a being with the practical status of a deity in the Wayne household.  Strolling over to his helmet, digits slipped into the opening and tugged it up, holding it in front of his features in a fashion all too similar to that of a being analyzing a skull.  The hues of the helmet were but white slits, emotionless and not offering any reprieve to those unlucky enough to cross gazes with it.  It was testament- not to failure, not to his ‘evil’ as so many had dubbed it- but to his identity.  “ Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio, a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy. He hath borne me on his back a thousand times, and now… I don’t know.”  Lips curled into a small smirk before turning the hood over into his palms, holding it above his features before dropping it into place.  He was honestly half sure that through some sixth sense Alfred would’ve been aware that Jason managed to butcher Shakespeare’s genius.  (probably in a fashion similar to something like http://i.picpar.com/Ka2c.gif that tbh.)  Shrugging on his jacket, the white ovals of his hood looked outward into the bustling city in the distance, the signal of the city’s resident bat infestation shining seemingly endlessly into the night sky.  Maybe a visit to a certain Kryptonian was in order- after all, he had undeniably found solace in watching her demolish buildings in moments followed by pizza dates with 90s re-runs of prime time television keeping the duo company- but that could wait for an hour or two.  Someone had to keep the morticians and dentists in business, and well… Jason would happily oblige.