Jason Todd was already dead.
How could a dead man pose for a family portrait?
So he couldn't appear in this photograph.
He couldn't appear in the Wayne Family's portrait.
In the last family portrait, Jason had been the one deliberately left out. Everyone in the photograph had kept silent, as if by unspoken agreement. No one had told him.
It wasn't until later that Jason had found out by chance.
To the outside world, he was a name on a headstone; within the family, he was a scar in everyone's heart that no one dared touch.
That "family portrait" hung right above the manor's fireplace, impossible to miss. Everyone in it wore sharp suits and looked radiant, bathed in the light streaming through the window. They looked utterly flawless.
Only he was missing.
Or perhaps, from Jason Todd, the little hoodlum who stole and swindled in Crime Alley, to Red Hood, the gang boss who killed without blinking, he had sunk so deep into darkness that, within the bright and righteous Wayne Family, he was the unmentionable...
"Flaw"?
Bruce's gaze landed squarely in that patch of shadow.
Jason instantly withdrew his sidelong glance at Bruce and fiddled expressionlessly with the butterfly knife in his hand, as though that look had been nothing more than Bruce's imagination.
"Jimmy, sorry for the trouble."
Taking a family portrait seemed simple enough. Unlike an artistic portrait, it didn't require painstaking attention to poses or an emphasis on breathtaking beauty. But capturing everyone as naturally as possible while still making the picture look good did take some care.
Jimmy began adjusting the camera settings, while the others decided to coordinate their outfits to make the picture look more harmonious.
Bruce was wearing a black suit today, so black would be the theme. Even Miaomiao,