no rest for the wicked [jason todd]

thirty one

TERROR BUBBLED UP IN HER THROAT.

Tye kept her finger on the trigger though, her hand raised as she pointed it right toward the woman. "We have no reason to trust you," she said in a low voice, her dark eyes narrowed now, "what if you're the one who wants to kill me, huh? We can arrest you for reporting a false crime, you know. It doesn't mean a thing if you pretend to know stuff just to freak us out. Do you really need to see my god damn badge, ma'am?"

"Wait," Dick said, extending out a hand to stop Tye from moving, his eyes locked onto the woman. "Can we hold on? Let's hear her out."

The woman clasped her hands together, looking between the two of them. "Roman," she told them in a hesitant voice, "he's going after you, Tye. Roman Sionis, he thinks you're the key to getting everything he lost back to him. If he's not planning to kill you, he's planning to do something bad. You have to believe me, really, I need you to believe me. You can't die."

Dick paused, his eyebrows raising slightly. "Why do you care about her?" He asked finally, crossing one arm over his chest, the other holding the pistol. He seemed to trust her more than Tye did. "Why would you care about a random cop at GCPD? There's something you aren't telling us."

"My name is Amelia Melrose," the woman told him in a firm voice, turning toward Tye, "I'm your mother. That's where my concern comes from, doesn't that—"

Her jaw tightened and Dick watched her finger hesitate on the trigger. "Look," he said, "her mother's dead, so if you could not lie to us here, would help a lot. I don't know who you possibly think you are, but I'm gonna let you know we need you to be honest. My partner has no hesitations in pulling that trigger, and I'm starting not to either. What's your name?"

Amelia's face scrunched up slightly and she took a step forward. "Your middle name," she said to Tye, "you hate it. You don't use it, correct? It's Valeria." Her voice had the hint of an accent when she spoke, but it came out more when she said the name. "It was my mother's name," the woman continued, "Valeria."

Tye's voice died in her throat and she didn't know how to continue. Her grip on the gun was shaky to say the least and she lowered it toward the ground, briefly straying a glance at her partner. "You left," she said quietly to the woman, Amelia. "You left me all alone, made us think you died. Why? Why did you do that?"

"I had obligations," she said softly and reached out for Tye, watching the young woman jerk away from her touch. "You wouldn't quite understand. I've kept tabs on you. You were never alone."

Dick swallowed nervously at the notice of a knife in her waistband. "Your obligations," he supplied, "your loyalty, they belong to the League, don't they? You're part of the... Shit, Tye, we should go. This isn't a good idea at all." He reached for her arm and she didn't stop him as he cautiously stepped back toward the door.

"Don't, hear me out," Amelia pleaded now, reaching a hand out toward the two of them. "I can explain everything for you. Everything."

Tye moved to put her gun away and stepped forward cautiously. "Put the knife on the floor," she said, "any weapons you've got, set them down now. I don't want to ask again. If we're talking, it's going to be on my terms, lady."

There was a bitterness in her voice Dick nearly missed hearing. He wondered if there was a time where he'd ever seen Tye angry, because even now, she didn't seem anywhere close. Her expression was controlled, eyebrows pulled together and lips pressed into a straight line. He'd seen fear on her face, anxiety, panic, but had he ever truly seen anger? Did she even have it in her to be angry at him?

Her mother did. She took the knife from her waistband and set it on the ground, and then she took two more from her boots. Another was removed from under her jacket on her back, a long dagger or a short sword.

"...Wow," she said, rubbing the back of her neck and looking toward Dick, "that's a lot of weapons."

He laughed nervously and nodded, turning toward Amelia. "Let's start at the beginning," he informed her, "you left Tye when she was just a baby, I've heard the stories. Why did you leave her?"

The older woman's eyes held a hint of sadness as she turned toward the side of the barn for a long moment, unable to meet either of their eyes. "Your father," she began now, "wasn't a good person. He was violent and argumentative, but on top of that... I already had duties and obligations to the League. I had to go. Staying would put you in more danger, but I can promise you that I knew he would never hurt you. I made sure of it."

"Except," Tye's voice came out uneven now, and Dick was pretty sure it was from anger now. "Except he did. Maybe not physically, but he put a gun in my hands and made me shoot someone when I was eight. Locked me in a room when I told him I wanted to call the police. Pressured me into a relationship with an absolute dumbass, left me in the care of a guy who knew his way around a gun more than how to take care of a kid."

Her mother was absolutely silent. The entire barn was silent, even as Dick reached out and gently squeezed her shoulder.

"I had no idea," Amelia said, pulling strands of her dark brown hair out of her eyes. "I thought you were better off with him, and I do believe it could have been much worse if I'd stayed around."

"I don't want to hear it," Tye told her bitterly, reaching for her gun again. "Do you know why this Roman guy is after me?"

Dick was hesitant to speak out of turn, but he chose to anyway. "Black Mask," he told her, "Roman Sionis, like she said. He's probably after you because of Jason, if I'm being honest. Jason took over the shipments from the docks from Roman, the guy gave him a couple lessons and Jason knew he could do it better. A shitty 'Apprentice surpasses the master' situation, really."

"All roads lead back to the same guy, huh?"

"I saved you," Amelia said when Tye went to move. "From the man with the green hair. Put you in the back of a used Honda Civic I was driving and reported it missing. I knew someone would find you."

Tye turned away from her. "Even if you are biologically my relative," she told her without even turning to look back, "you'll never be my family."