Jason Blood in the Cat-Tales Universe from Lady Dien

Part II: The Wisdom of the Beasts of the Field
 

They’d exited without complications. Two blocks to where he’d parked his car. Again, not her style to take a car to the scene of a job, but… well, Jason Blood; things seemed to get out of the norm when he was involved.

Though tonight was possibly a new record for that.

This is why I don’t work with others; I mean this is the original situation justifying not working with others, Selina thought uncomfortably to herself. I’m not Batman, and I do not have protocols telling me what to do in case of partner having a nervous breakdown.

Catwoman risked another glance at the man driving the car. Jason’s eyes stared straight ahead at the road, right hand gripping the steering wheel hard enough that the knuckles were white. She also noted the left hand, a tight fist around the fragment of glass he had picked up; noted the visible dark crimson that leaked out between his fingers. She took a deep breath and looked away, wondering if he was even aware he was cutting himself.

Not her problem. Jason was a big boy, he could take care of himself. That simple.

Selina liked Jason Blood. She'd accepted a few commissions in the past from him, and he’d always been courteous, up front, and quick to pay the agreed-upon price. And completely aside from him being a valuable customer, the occasional crazy misadventure with forces beyond the pale had found them working together. He was competent, could be trusted to watch your back, sane (always a plus in Gotham), and not a member of the Clan with the holier-than-thou attitude she knew too well. And the speeches. Can’t forget those speeches--

Anyways. Jason was… maybe… kind of… a… okay, just say it, Selina-- a friend.

And she looked out for her friends.

Hence her dilemma. Jason wasn’t with it at the moment, you could tell that by looking at him. Okay, yes, he was driving the car very calmly, no expression on his face, no histrionics you might expect from…. well… a large proportion of other Gothamites… but, it was the eerie calm before the storm, and she quickly reached two uncomfortable conclusions.

One: it was her presence that was temporarily holding back said storm. He couldn’t bring himself to lose it entirely in front of her, in front of an ally and friend. Somehow, she'd found herself in the position of buffer. No fun. At all.

Two: it was going to be one hell of a storm.

In the past, dealing with Jason Blood, no matter how civilized things were on the surface, she'd always sensed that behind his polite smile was something genuinely dangerous. Something dark and maybe even scary. It was like a dam, so very calm, very rational, but you could feel the pressure of all that water, millions of gallons, held back only by a strong and ruthless will.

In the past, that subtle hint of menace had only added to the thrill. After all, she was Catwoman-- no risk, no fun. But now she was seeing cracks start to appear in the dam, and suddenly it wasn’t fun anymore.

Because when it broke, people were going to get hurt. Jason was going to get hurt. In his current state, shaken up by all that talk and those damned mirrors, God knew what he might end up doing.

~Not our problem.

…We don’t let our friends go off and hurt themselves.

~Not. Our. Problem.

Dammit, he’s in no shape to be alone right now!

…

For all the conversation going on under the skin, the inside of the car was otherwise silent, since, again, Jason wasn’t talking. Not really responding to much of anything she'd said since they left the Rochester building, and she had finally lapsed into a similar silence after two minutes of getting non-committal nods in reply to her words.

She pressed her lips together, thought about how the book was still too heavy, looked out the window. Blood’s blank expression wasn’t something she wanted to stare at.

They were passing that little florist’s shop… and now Raoul’s coffee cart, or rather where Raoul’s cart would be if it were not the middle of the night… there, her apartment building was coming up. Had he been to her apartment before? She couldn’t remember…

A minute more of that damn uncomfortable silence, and then the car came to a stop. A pause, as Selina won the argument with herself and now considered the argument she was going to have to have with Jason. She opened her mouth to start--

"Thank you for your help tonight. Your fee will be in your account by tomorrow morning. Good night."

He spoke! If, of course, that was considered speaking-- she'd heard phone messages left by the IRS with more human emotion in their tone. Catwoman blinked, considered getting angry, and remained calm with an effort and a deep breath.

He’s really out of it, so we're not going to hold that "here’s your money now go away" attitude against him. Yet.

She started over. "Jason--

"Jason, I…"

…Have no idea how I’m going to say this. Cats don’t DO "oh, friend of mine, I’m worried about your mental health, why don’t you try talking out your issues and I’ll sit here and play compassionate shoulder."

Jeezus, this night is a nightmare.

She brought her hands up to her temples, to massage away the beginnings of the headache that was birthing there. The cat-mask under her fingers was a reminder that no matter how weird things got, they were well within her capability to handle.

Right, then. She nodded firmly, looked back up at Jason Blood, still doing an impression of a zombie unaware of her presence, and noticed again the bleeding hand.

Ding ding ding. The answer presented itself.

"You," she said briskly, mind already working on the exact logistics of getting him up to her apartment, "need to let me put some iodine on your hand. It looks like it’s a bit cut up…" (she tactfully decided not to mention that was because he was clutching a piece of jagged glass in his fist) "… and we don’t want you bleeding all over your nice upholstery. Anymore than you already have, that is.

"So-- I've got first aid kits like you wouldn’t believe in the apartment. You come up-- we'll get that hand fixed up-- and hey, maybe a shot of something to drink too. It’s been a rough night.

"Say, 'Yes, Selina.'"

He still hadn’t so much as turned her way. If her words were making any impact, he gave no indication.

God, do not go Stoic on me, Jason, or I’m going to have to bring the claws into it.

She forced a smile. "Earth to Jason Blood. Please come in, Jason Blood." She waited, lost patience, reached out and snapped her fingers in front of his face. He didn’t blink.

Catwoman scowled and slumped back against the passenger side door, glaring at him. "Great. Catatonic demonologist," she muttered under her breath. Sighing, she reached out a hand and hesitantly touched his shoulder.

Finally, he deigned to look her way. She cheered internally-- it was a small victory, but a victory-- and smiled in what she hoped was an encouraging manner.

Speak calmly, Selina, calmly and quietly, like you do with Harvey when he’s having a very bad day. "I think you ought to let me bandage that hand of yours, Jason. Come inside the building, okay, and I’ll even make us some hot chocolate," Catwoman drawled with gentle sarcasm. "Can you do that?"

He nodded slowly, then pulled back from her hand and began to get out of the car. Selina sighed with relief. It was a start. And the most he’d actually responded to her since those damn mirrors.

Getting inside the building proved a tad more complicated than she'd thought. She was in catsuit, full regalia with whip and claws-- she couldn’t exactly waltz by Nick, the doorman, with a casual smile. And she also didn’t relish the idea of trying to get Jason up the friggin' fire escapes.

In the end, it was Jason’s trenchcoat in the backseat that was their salvation. Designed for a six-foot tall man, it adequately covered everything except her head and her feet. She simply slipped off the mask, slipped on the coat, and decided to walk by Nick quickly, trusting to his discretion. Jason was a trusted enough customer and friend that the mask wasn’t an issue.

Jason was back to not-talking, but he was at least following without argument. Pasting a smile on for Nick’s benefit, she led him inside the building’s front door. The elevator ride up was thankfully uneventful.

Selina opened the door with a sigh and headed for the living room, shrugging out of Jason’s coat and dropping it onto the sofa. A flicker of grey movement in a corner-- a slightly tired smile tugged at her lips. Whiskers, certainly.

"Hey, kiddos, I’m home and I brought a friend," she whispered to the cats, then headed for the kitchen. Time to make something potent.

When she came back into the living room, carrying the two mugs of promised hot cocoa with a healthy dash of Bailey’s in them, Jason was still standing in the center of the room, behind the sofa, staring at the floor. She resisted the urge to snap at him, to snap at someone or something, because she recognized the urge as tension at the situation. Just because Jason Blood was doing a good impression of the Arkham crowd on sedatives didn’t mean she was going to start fraying around the edges. Nuh-uh. No way.

Catwoman set the drinks down on the sofa table and placed one hand on Jason’s shoulder, guiding him firmly towards the sofa. "Sit. Drink. I’m getting the first aid kit."

When it had been quickly retrieved from the bathroom, she turned and headed back in, to see a scene that stopped her for a second, feeling the corners of her mouth twitch.

The cats were sizing up Jason.

He still hadn’t sat down, and he stared down at them from on high, the two felines staring back imperiously. Nutmeg and Whiskers had emerged from their respective haunts to sit side by side and observe him. The tip of Nutmeg’s tail was flicking back and forth ever so slightly. It looked so solemn and serious and… and catty, when the cats were being at their worst, that she almost chuckled--

And then they freaked out. Both of them. It was dog-reaction, awful-smelling-stranger-reaction, storm-reaction-- no, hell, it wasn’t anything she'd ever seen, from either of them.

They each forgot that regal calm in favor of crouching defensively, fur bristling, feline eyes blazing, and teeth bared. Whiskers let out an unholy spitting yelp and bolted in the direction of the terrace, while Nutmeg settled for a low hiss, then started to back away slowly, her eyes never leaving the invader of their home. Selina stood still for a moment, blinking. That… was unexpected. The cats didn’t… they didn’t just… Okay, granted, that was weird. But the cats often reacted oddly to strangers, on first meeting them. The first time they'd met Eddie, for chrissakes'… And Jason probably just smelled weird to them. His hand was still bleeding, after all; they didn’t like blood. That simple.

Except Nutmeg had never been wrong before.

She pursed her lips in a frown and walked back in, opening the first aid kit as she went and digging out the antiseptic and bandages. Do that first, worry about the cats' sudden schizoid behavior later.

Jason lifted his gaze from the carpet where the two cats had been sitting, looked at her, and asked quietly, "Do you believe in evil, Catwoman?"

Selina exhaled, feeling the situation teetering on the brink between under control and out of it. The question had come from nowhere and she wasn’t prepared to be dealing with psycho-babble like that; not tonight. You just didn’t throw questions like that at people, not at twelve-thirty at night, not without some sort of sign being held up to politely notify everyone that "We are now entering the Twilight Zone. Please prepare for the requisite shift in your mood and thinking."

Selina took a sip of her cocoa to buy time and work on getting a claw into a situation getting rapidly out of hand. Paw. Whatever.

"I… don’t know, Jason. I think… I think there’s a lot of craziness in the world… and a lot of crazies… and a lot of very sad people who get their jollies by hurting and degrading others. But Evil, with the capital 'E'… I won’t say it’s not out there. But to say that I believe a hundred percent that it is… that’s a bit of a leap, even for a cat," she said with the trademarked "aren’t-I-witty" smile, trying to lighten the mood.

Jason didn’t smile back, his red eyes (funny how you never really thought about freaky those were) drifting back to the cats. Nutmeg and Whiskers had both retreated now to the bottom of the curtains around the terrace window, two sets of eyes staring at Jason with fear and hostility.

"… civilized humans lack the proper fear response," Jason said after a pause, in the same expressionless tone he’d used in the car. "They've developed blinders. Even a simple animal, an insect; or an intelligent one such as a cat-- they're not so willfully stupid. "If you confront a modern, well-educated human with evil, he or she will feel uncomfortable, uneasy. They will find words to tame and define it with: unbalanced, dangerous, abnormal, disturbing. Crazy and sick, if they're trying very hard to be honest. But they won’t mention evil, and while they're looking away so as not to be made uncomfortable, evil will walk up and butcher them like sheep.

"The animal is not so foolish. Freed of the debilitating weakness and blindness of a civilized brain, the animal, upon seeing evil, recognizes it for what it is. And upon recognizing it, the response is uniform: terror and a warning. The dog bares its teeth and growls, tucking its tail between its legs; the horse rolls its eyes and rears; birds fall silent, and a cat… well, you saw how a cat reacts."

He lapsed into another brooding silence. Selina considered several options, one of which included slapping him rather hard across the face and telling him to stop with the freaky behavior and, g'dammit, just hold out your hand so I can fix it up, okay?

She discarded it in favor of applying the strong-smelling antiseptic to a cotton swab from the kit. This was ridiculous. She knew Jason; this was her friend who could be trusted to watch her back in a messy situation, who had never tried to screw her over in a deal, who was always courteous and always had something fascinating and unusual going on. For God’s sake, he was a flesh and blood person whose car keys were on a little plastic keychain that said "I went to the Galapagos Islands and, not only did I not evolve, All I got was this stupid keychain"…. (what? So she'd been observant in the car, so what)-- and he was no more Evil Incarnate then she was. The nonsensical little diatribe about fear and evil was just that, nonsense.

Selina nodded to herself, glad that the preposterous idea had been dealt with satisfactorily, and turned with the swabs ready. Blinked again-- Jason was crouching down in front of the sofa, the non-bloody hand held out in the direction of the cats, with an expression on his face she would have called pleading, if it weren’t for the fact that, in her experience, Jason didn’t do 'pleading.'

Of course, for what it was worth, Jason didn’t normally talk the way he was talking, either. His voice was low and rough, the words seeming to roll one into another.

"Meh§na§bast, tau§het§nem-ra, ptah§nimmon§kemet-sa§memnis§anu§horu§ra§wasi…."

Selina was about to ask what on earth he thought he was doing when she noticed Nutmeg and Whiskers were listening, and avidly, to whatever he was muttering. She felt a rather incredulous expression creep onto her face. Jason was talking to her cats. Okay, not that people didn’t talk to cats anyways, but, y'know, he was actually talking to them.

Whiskers' expression, conveyed as much by body language as facial features, was still one of deep skepticism and hostility. Nutmeg looked to be a bit less antagonistic, but she wasn’t moving out from under the curtains, either.

Jason trailed off into silence, looking at the cats with something exposed and vulnerable lurking in his eyes and expression. After a long tense second, during which absolutely nothing happened, he sighed and closed his eyes, his face closing up again as surely as any mask.

He slumped down onto the floor, leaning against the couch, and mutely held out his hand to be doctored. Catwoman let out a breath she hadn’t known she'd been holding during the strange moment and set to work.

As she gingerly lifted the bloodied mirror-shard and set it to one side, she asked in the most casual tone of voice she could manage, "What language was that? I don’t think I've heard it before."

"… it’s called Mau-im-dwo, or at least that’s as close as English gets," Jason sighed. "The priests of Bast and Sekhmet, in old Egypt, would use it to communicate with the divine and mortal cats."

"And cats… understand it?"

"If they're in the mood to."

She finished wiping with antisepticked swab, relieved he was talking now. That spaced-out silence was just wrong for Jason. Keep him talking. What else to ask, what else to ask… "So what were you saying to Whiskers and Nutmeg?"

"Ah… mostly asking for… acceptance, I suppose. Telling them I meant no harm to them, or to you, and asking for a sign that I was welcome here. They… apparently weren’t convinced."

She considered something trite about how 'they'll love you once they get to know you, really' and dismissed it in the next second. It wasn’t her style to bullshit, even in the interests of comforting a friend. More silence, but he broke it himself this time.

"…I suppose… you have some questions… about what happened tonight."

Selina shrugged noncommittally before remembering he had his eyes shut, and tacked on a vague "Um." Did she have questions? Of course she had questions. She couldn’t have watched all the craziness going on tonight and not have questions. But she wasn’t going to press for answers, not unless he was willing to give them.

As Catwoman wrapped the gauze from the kit around his hand and applied the tape to hold it in place, he started talking. Quiet empty voice still, a recorded message in his faintly British accent.

"You've heard of King Arthur. Gawain. Lancelot. Merlin. Morgan le Fey. Names of legend, now, or even myth… the historians debate among themselves whether Camelot really existed, whether its noble knights and fair ladies and great magicians really lived.

"It did. They did. All of them. Especially Merlin.

"Some of the stories still told about him mention his heritage. Merlin was the product of an unholy union between a mortal witch and a devil from Hell, whose name we record as Belial. Merlin had an elder half-brother, of full infernal blood… his name was-- is-- Etrigan."

Jason paused as she finished patching up his hand, his eyes still closed. Selina started to put things back in the kit, wanting something for her hands to do. Etrigan-- that had been one of the whispered words that had made the hairs stand up on the back of her neck, and made the inner cat long to turn tail and head for a safe place.

"After Arthur’s mortal wounding at the hands of Mordred, the… the witch le Fey decided to destroy Camelot. She came with an army not quite human to raze the castle to the ground.

"Merlin was old and tired, his powers failing. He had spent so much energy in building Camelot, in making it the light against the darkness it had been, that now he didn’t have the power necessary to keep it standing. Camelot would fall now; it was only a matter of time, and Merlin knew this. Still. He tried.

"He… he decided to summon his half-brother. The devil Etrigan. He would unleash the beast onto Morgana’s forces…"

Jason trailed off, lifted his bandaged hand to his temple, rubbed wearily at his head. For a long moment, he was quiet, and Selina wondered if that was all of the story she was going to get. The kit closed with a soft snap under her hands.

"Etrigan wasn’t enough. Camelot was destroyed. Merlin wanted nothing more than rest, but now he had to deal with 'the genie out of the bottle' so to speak. He didn’t have the strength to send his brother back to Hell.

"But he had strength enough to chain him.

"There was… a knight, who had fallen under some disgrace, and who would have done nearly anything to reclaim his honour, prove his loyalty. Merlin approached this knight with a very moving and eloquent speech about nobility and courage and sacrifice, and convinced the knight to agree to… contain the demon within himself. His soul and the demon’s would be bound together, ostensibly granting the human control over the devil. He would act as the beast’s keeper, and the rest of the world would be spared the demon’s evil."

Here, Jason laughed briefly, a completely humourless, bitter sound. "Things… didn’t go as planned. Of course not.

"The bond drove the man mad. It destroyed his psyche and memories, his soul and his mortality. He didn’t even have anything approaching rational thought for a year, and during that time of… adjustment… he committed such cruel and inhuman acts that they gave him a new name. Iason, son of Blayse, became Jason of the Blood. You know him as--"

"Jason Blood," Selina interrupted quietly, putting the pieces together. He nodded slowly. "Yes. Yes, Jason Blood. Me," he whispered.

"I was bonded to him in the year 517 A.D. Nearly fifteen centuries now. Over a millenia. It would be… let me think… something like five hundred and forty thousand days now."

He finally opened his eyes, looked towards her with a gaze utterly devoid of hope, and said bleakly, "That’s a very long time to spend in hell, Selina.

"A very long time to share your soul and body with Etrigan, a very long time to spend every waking-- and sleeping, for that matter-- moment at war with him… at war with yourself," he whispered. "But I've done it, all the same. Because I thought I knew who I was. I was a human being, a person, I had an identity worth fighting for--"

He paused, drew in a shaky breath, and closed his eyes again. After a moment he laughed harshly. "Lyle, it seems, has just disabused me of that misconception."

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