Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Tim was not a necromancer, no matter how much Ives wanted him to be in their DnD sessions. In fact, most Gotham citizens had grown to hate magic, and though he lived in the upper parts of town, Tim was still from Gotham. Sure, he was fascinated by no end about it but curiosity did not equate to likability

Now unlike most of Tim's well-intentioned but rare rants, this did have a purpose for being brought up. It had been a whole four months since Jason Peter Todd’s death and Batman was not taking it well at all. What once was his sanctuary, Gotham’s streets were now filled with fear that the masked vigilante would turn on its citizens with how brutally he was targeting the common mugger. 

Tim didn’t get that sense of hope and belonging from his photos anymore. His hobby had become an obligation to document Batman’s spiral downward. All in all, it wasn’t fun anywhere. Not in his forever empty house, nor the treacherous arms of Gotham. Hell, even school had taken a dive once Ives’ parents moved away.

This time, Tim was just heading home after witnessing Batman hospitalize three men for robbing a convenience store. Tim was pretty sure that the store was a front for one of the rogue’s schemes anyways, and if he knew that, then Batman had to have known that too. His hands were still shaking from having to call the paramedics when Batman vanished. He could see why people had begun wondering if the bats would finally turn on Gotham, but it hadn’t really set in until Tim had to save him from becoming a murderer that night.

His parents were somewhere in Germany and Mrs. Mac had just taken a vacation with her husband to the Bahamas after leaving him a bunch of home-cooked meals, so no one was expecting him home. It was always dangerous to wander when there was no one patrolling, but Tim was especially adept at being invisible. He could handle it. Tonight, he needed any sort of comfort, even if it was from the dead. 

The cemetery always felt suffocating to him. He had gone to many funerals, including Jason’s, but it didn’t mean he ever got used to the cold air that surrounded the area. The flowers never seemed to help, either. His mood dropped even lower as he walked down the scuffed path. If he were to close his eyes, Tim could imagine the ghosts of the dead following behind him. He could pretend that the cold air wasn’t from Gotham itself, but from the many ethereal beings tracking his movements. They would pull away as he approached the grave he was looking for, the air losing its freezing touch. Tim huffed in amused exasperation, opening his eyes. Even in death, Jason was still bringing warmth to the chilly Gotham air.

Before he began talking, Tim adjusted his camera. He took a picture of the very top of the headstone, being careful not to get the name in the shot. Then, he tilted the camera upwards and took a picture of the smoggy sky with a few stars twinkling through. With a sad curl of his mouth, he quietly asked, “Did you like the stars here too? I love them. They’re really rare, but they’re nothing if not pretty. I think one of them’s the headquarters of the Justice League, personally.

“I think it’s become harder to see any now. Every time I look up I see Batman and I want to look away. He’s gotten bad since you died, Jay. I told you this a month ago, but it’s worse,” Tim folded his legs underneath him and sat down, fiddling with the camera in his lap to quell the shaking in his hands. “I called an ambulance for the people he beat up today. He didn’t even call the GCPD, just handcuffed them to the dumpster and took off. I… I hated doing that. You’re the one who saved lives, not me.

“Gotham’s becoming scared of their protector now. I can’t take any pictures that don’t include an unconscious body anymore. I miss taking pictures of you. You and him, really. I’d leave you some, but it’d give away your identity and I don’t want that. But uh, there’s this really good one of you roundhouse kicking a goon’s teeth out. I’ll bring it next time, okay? I should… I should get home now,” Tim finished and proceeded to stare blankly at Jason’s headstone for another twenty minutes without moving. It felt like abandoning the boy, to leave, and Tim didn’t have anyone waiting for him anyway.

There was a muffled thump as the thirty-minute mark approached. Tim thought he imagined it, or it came from a branch hitting its tree. Then, it came again. And again. Always muffled, but even he could tell how frantic it was getting. He strained to listen, trying to figure out where it was coming from. Another series of sounds came from the dirt in front of him, but that couldn’t be right. He checked his phone, trying to see if his ringtone suddenly became erratic banging overnight. It was out of battery and completely silent. Which meant something was actually in the ground, in Jason ’s grave.

And… let it be known that Tim thought it through for a good minute before he dove forward. He used the Batarang he had picked up from his escapades as a shovel and began to furiously dig. His arms were sore and he kept having to shuffle back to avoid falling into the hole, but he kept at it for what felt like hours. It could’ve been, for all Tim knew. “If you’re in there, I’m digging, just hang on,” he said at first. He didn’t know if it was reassuring, but he kept saying things like that. Eventually, though, his words petered off and the sounds of his heavy breathing were the only thing he could hear.

Tim was pretty sure his arms were about to fall off by the time the Batarang stopped finding purchase. He let out a relieved sob, letting his shoulders slump forward as he peered into the hole he made. He was pretty sure he had only dug three or four feet down, and everything he had read had told him that graves were usually six. It was still dark, which made it hard to see, but there was evidence of someone digging from underneath. Despite everything in his rational mind screeching at him, Tim shuffled forward and squinted down into the hole, trying to spot the body. There was nothing that he could see, though the moon wasn’t being kind with its light. So when something moved , he shrieked and scrambled backward. Oh, he was definitely that person in a horror movie. He should’ve just walked away and not helped dig out a fucking zombie that was probably about to kill him!

A hand launched through the gap he had just dug and Tim scrambled back further, clutching at his camera like it was any good as a weapon. Maybe they’d make a documentary about him after he died. At least they wouldn’t have to move his body that far, since he was already in the cemetery. He should’ve been running, but instead, he was watching in stunned silence as the hand groped around for purchase. Dirt and wood creaked horribly as the hand was slowly followed by the arm, and then the torso of the zombie. And then he couldn’t run, because Jason Todd’s face appeared minutes later. His eyes were glazed over and vacant, his suit torn to near shreds and his once combed hair matted down with dirt, but there was no mistaking it. Robin had just crawled out of his grave.

”Jason– you’re alive… you’re alive!” Tim cried and hurried forward. Any sort of fear of being eaten alive vanished as soon as he launched his arms around the other boy. He buried his face into the dirt-covered suit and listened to the unnatural beating of Jason’s heart. It was irregular, but it was irrefutable proof that he was alive and that was all Tim cared about. His body ached and protested the hug, but he couldn’t bring himself to let go. It was just so nice and Robin was alive, even if he wasn’t hugging back! And Robin– Robin had no idea who Tim was.

Pulling away, Tim shuffled backward and wiped his eyes with the sleeve of his jacket. “Sorry, sorry, I just… you’re alive and I… uh. I’m Tim, your past neighbor. It’s only been four months since you died. Not much has changed but I can fill you in on whatever you need,” Tim introduced, giving the dead boy a nervous grin. Or… not dead. He wasn’t quite sure he’d ever get used to that. It was still too easy to blink and see Jason’s coffin being lowered into the ground.

But now wasn’t the time to unload any of that, not when Jason just came back to life and definitely had questions. Tim would. So, he waited as the other boy stared blankly at him. Being disorientated was probably a side-effect of being resurrected, so he wasn’t too concerned. The empty gaze was a little more concerning, and the scars? Oh, the scars might’ve been worse than the vacant look. He couldn’t see many of them in the dark, but he could see enough. It wasn’t a pretty reminder and thinking about it only looped back around into thinking about the three near-murders. 

Jason wasn’t saying anything, which was fine. Side-effects of resurrection and all. Tim stooped down and pocketed his Batarang before shuffling forward, hands half extended. “Alright, okay. Questions later. Let’s get you back home, yeah? Bruce is still kicking. A little too much in my opinion, but now that you’re back, he’ll be ecstatic. Oh! Alfred and Dick are going to be so happy to see you too. Dick’s in town now. It’s still tense between him and Bruce but—”

He didn’t get to finish before Jason suddenly lurched backward, foot slipping into the grave. Tim let out a startled shout and jumped forward, grabbing and yanking Jason to the side so that the two of them fell onto the daisies instead of back into the hole. Even still, Jason dug his heels into the dirt and shoved himself away from Tim. There was blood in the dirt from where he was digging his fingers into it. His vacant gaze was full of such naked fear that any resolve Tim had crumbled like dust. 

”Okay, okay, no Bruce. We don’t have to go back right now,” Tim hurriedly said, pushing himself onto his knees. Even if he wanted to force Jason to go back, there was no way he could ever match Robin in a fight. No matter if Robin was newly resurrected and unresponsive. So where did that leave them? He wasn’t just going to abandon Jason right after digging him out of his grave, but he clearly didn’t want to go back to the manor. 

…He didn’t want to go back to Wayne Manor. 

Fuck, okay. Tim was really thinking about doing that. He could see how bad of an idea it was. What if Bruce found out? What if a villain found out? There was so much that could go wrong with his plan, and yet any other avenues didn’t seem plausible anymore. Not when there was such an easy solution in front of him. And it wouldn’t be for that long, either. Just until Jason was present enough to go back to Bruce without having a panic attack. However long that took. 

Blowing out a breath, Tim asked, “No Bruce, I promise. How… Do you think you could walk home with me? I’m sure some of my clothes will fit you and we both need a shower. We can decide what to do after, alright?”

He waited, but Jason didn’t respond. Tim got the feeling that he would be having lots of one-sided conversations in the future. Cautiously, he got to his feet and walked over to Jason. He didn’t know how to feel when Jason didn’t react as Tim helped him to his feet, but heartbroken was definitely at the top of the list. Gently, he wrapped his fingers around the other’s wrist and began to pull them towards the entrance of the cemetery.

The groundskeeper was from Gotham and underpaid enough to ignore the oddity and would most likely fill the hole when they came in for their shift. Or, Tim surely hoped so. He was pretty sure Jason’s family visited sometimes, and if they noticed the dug-up grave with a broken coffin and no corpse, nothing good would come of it. God, what if they thought Tim stole Jason’s body for something? Surely they’d be able to watch the cameras and see what actually happened, right? Even if some weird organ trafficking thing would be much more understandable than resurrection, but it was Gotham! 

Tim shook his head and walked quicker, practically dragging Jason along with him. There wasn’t a point to thinking about it when there was a far bigger problem at hand. Mainly, the way Jason kept stumbling over his own feet and didn’t even turn his head to track the cars or birds that passed by. Tim felt himself deflate, his steps slowing to accommodate for the boy. He felt the familiar sting of tears behind his eyes, but he squeezed them shut. It was so far from the acrobatics and martial arts Robin tended to display that he felt like there was no hope whatsoever. It wasn’t an excuse to break down crying like a baby though. Jason had just come back to life and crawled out of his own grave, after all. Batman needed a Robin, and Bruce needed his son back. No matter how little of either of them was in Jason, no matter how stressful or impossible it seemed, Tim could do it. He could help.

Chapter Text

The walk back to Drake Manor was much easier than digging a dead boy out of his grave. It was still dark enough that the only eyes they had to worry about were the criminals who were hiding anyway. Despite the fact no one was looking at them, Tim couldn’t help but pull his hoodie strings tighter. They would’ve made quite the pair if anyone were to suddenly get the urge to look for raccoons at 2 A.M. But Tim was too exhausted and Jason wasn’t conscious enough to care about anything other than putting one foot in front of the other.

When they finally reached the front door of Drake Manor, Jason looked halfway to passing out on the front step and Tim’s legs were struggling to hold him up. He was honestly ready to curl up on the porch and just doze off, but there was way too much to do. So, instead of succumbing to sleep and disregarding all responsibility, he tightened his hold on Jason’s hand and tugged the boy into the house. He cringed at the dirt they dragged in, hoping that his parents didn’t suddenly decide to come home and berate him for the messy floors. No matter how much Tim missed them, they certainly wouldn’t approve of Jason. They especially wouldn’t approve of him deciding to help the boy. Luckily, his parents weren’t home and there was no one to hear the commotion they made while going up the stairs. Tim was ready to burst into tears by the time they stumbled into his bedroom, but one look at Jason forced his tears back. He could have a breakdown after they got the dirt out of their hair.

After moving a bunch of notebooks from his chair that he didn’t remember writing in, he placed Jason in his desk chair and left to go warm up the shower. Then, Tim grabbed some of his clothes. He was sure anything except his gala suits would fit since his parents didn’t know his measurements and he preferred wearing baggy clothes anyways. So, after debating between the Justice League pajamas, he picked out the Superman and Wonder Woman set. It was safer than the Batman and Robin set he had and a much better alternative to the suit Jason woke up in and kept trying to claw off every time Tim turned his back.

Now that Jason was no longer covered in dirt, Tim graciously dumped him onto his bed. The second his head hit the pillows, the other boy’s eyes closed. Tim would’ve been terrified that he up and died again if not for the steady rise and fall of his chest. He got the impression that if Jason was still wearing his funeral suit, it would be no different from when he was lowered into his grave. It wasn’t a pretty image, so he hurriedly tucked the boy in and rushed to take his shower. He turned the water as hot as he could, trying to wipe away the thought of Jason being murdered in some random warehouse. It didn’t work, but at least when he came out in his pajamas, his eyes were dry.

Jason didn’t seem to be in a better state. In fact, his corpse-like sleep was now replaced with fast breaths and harsh thrashing that made Tim fear for the boy’s safety. Unsure what to do, but figuring that it wouldn’t do them any good if Jason ended up choking himself, he rushed to his bedside and yanked the blankets away. As an afterthought, he turned on the lamp on his desk. Feeling completely useless, he carefully reached out and tried to shake him awake.

That… didn’t turn out well. One second, Tim had his hand on Jason’s shoulder, and the next, he was slumped against his bookshelf with an array of books surrounding him. His head was spinning and his lower body hurt, not unlike the time he had fallen from a fire escape while on one of his escapades. He tried to get his bearings back and was harshly shoved into reality when he heard glass shatter. His head snapped up to see Jason brandishing some glass art piece Tim’s parents had gotten him for his birthday. Shards were littered against his bedside table, and Jay was holding the broken piece like a weapon, though he didn’t seem to be focused on anything in particular.

Tim didn’t move a muscle, afraid that he would get attacked. Jason’s eyes were still vacant, his expression blank, but his whole posture was tense and ready. It was all the training of Robin with none of the energy. It was scarily reminiscent of the current Batman and left Tim unsure what the hell to do. Maybe he was in over his head with this. Jason was volatile, trained, and dangerous. Tim was 5’1, two years younger than him, and only practiced martial arts on the weekend. If Jason turned out to be an evil zombie out for blood, then it wasn’t likely Tim would be walking away alive. A bit hysterically, he hoped Jason got away with his murder. It probably wouldn’t do him any good if he ended up in Arkham right after dying and busting out of his own–

Oh. 

The blankets were made of the same material as the coffin’s lining.

It was a stupid thing to miss, and he would berate himself later about it when he wasn’t in danger of losing an eye. Fortunately, Tim’s strategy of staying still and pretending he was invisible seemed to work wonders, as Jason’s posture began to loosen. It was difficult to pinpoint when aggressive became neutral, but when Jason dropped the glass piece and slumped to the ground like his strings were cut, it was a pretty clear sign that the danger had passed. 

All of the fight seemed to have left Jason, which, good. Tim really wasn’t looking forward to seeing the bruises from being thrown across the room. It made it easy to gently guide him back to the desk chair and patch up his hands. The art piece was a lost cause, but Tim didn’t like it anyway. He had gotten the impression his parents had picked it up as an afterthought, so they probably wouldn’t even remember giving it to him. The books were too much of a hassle to put back, so he just piled them all on one shelf that it bent with the weight and figured he’d deal with it when the shelf snapped. 

The blanket problem was a bit harder to fix. The only other blankets in the house were the guest room’s fittings, which were the same as his, or his parents, and he'd rather chop off his hand than have them find out he stole their stuff. He had to resort to tearing down the curtains from one of the guest rooms and using them instead. Jason didn’t seem to turn violent when offered the curtains, so it’d have to do.

After going through a very heavy sense of deja vu, Tim set up at the foot of his bed. He balanced his laptop on his legs, a notebook to the side, and his phone within arm’s reach. There was absolutely no way to hide Jason from Batman, also known as The Greatest Detective. Sure, he hadn’t been caught following the bats around, but he also wasn’t hiding Bruce’s newly revived son. No matter how much he refined the camera loop in the cemetery, if someone looked hard enough, they could easily spot the rewind points. And Gotham was way too big to wipe all the footage of Tim and Jason’s adventure to Drake Manor, so it was only a matter of time.

Quite frankly, he was tempted to go behind Jason’s back and call Bruce anyway. But from Jason’s reaction to the bedding alone, Tim was pretty sure that it’d do more bad than good for him. He didn’t want to undergo scrutiny or interrogation from Batman, no matter how high it was on his bucket list. And since the man was the epitome of lawless justice, his parents would definitely get in trouble if he decided to run a perfunctory background check. It wasn’t worth the risk.

On the other hand, if he told no one, Tim was pretty sure he’d go insane or get himself killed by doing something stupid. He was intelligent, sure, his teachers had always said so, but he had no idea how the hell to handle Jason without setting him off every other hour.

So he had to tell someone, but who? He could try to call Nightwing, but it’d be suspicious if the man came back from Bludhaven, not to yell at Batman, but to hang out with the neighbor kid. Bludhaven was far away too, and he was doing good in his city. Tim would loathe to pull him away if he could get someone else.

He had heard the Robins talking cheerfully about Agent A during patrols, which he assumed was Alfred Pennyworth. But it sounded like anything that went to Alfred would eventually end up with Bruce, and Tim had no basis for his character. He could’ve been a simple pawn of a butler under Bruce, and he wasn’t willing to take the chance in case the butler was untrustworthy.

That left one person that Tim could confide in confidently. Their phone number was hard to find, and his laptop was very close to combusting with the amount of work it was putting in, but he managed. His hands were shaking badly enough that he had to wait for another ten minutes before being able to input the numbers. Unable to keep his hands steady, he placed the device on his keyboard and put it on speaker, listening to it ring once… twice… 

“Hello, Barbara Gordon speaking,” A woman’s voice introduced, the sound of keys faint in the background.

Maybe he should’ve planned this out more before calling her. He stared at the screen in silence, long enough for her to ask another tentative, “Hello?” Before he uncrossed the wires in his mind. “Hi Oracle. I have a request?” 

Tim got the distinct impression that that wasn’t the best thing to start with when her voice suddenly hardened and she sharply asked, “Sorry, who is this? I’m afraid you have the wrong person.” The sound of typing got even louder, and he resisted the urge to hit his head on the bedframe. Sure, he had firewalls on his phone, but they would be child’s play to the Oracle.

“No, I’m sorry. I know your identity is important but I figured this took point, and I didn’t know how to get Oracle’s number,” he explained as calmly as possible, hoping that his phone distorted his voice enough that she couldn’t hear how it wobbled.

There was a long pause before the typing suddenly stopped. “Give me one reason not to hang up before I call one of the bats to deal with you, Timothy Jackson Drake,” she demanded, venom lacing her voice. 

“It’s about Jason.”

The call ended, ringing out with a long beep. Tim stared incredulously, lessons on proper phone etiquette swarming his mind before the actual situation settled in. Frantically, he reached out and redialed her. He did it again when she hung up immediately. With the other hand, he hurriedly navigated to the main comms link he tapped into a while ago and redirected the messages she was sending out. After calling her eight more times and panicking each second, she finally picked up again on the ninth try.

“What’s stopping me from booting you out of this connection, Timothy? I don’t like schemes, and this one seems awfully cruel,” Barbara spat, forgoing a greeting.

“It’s not a scheme!” Tim hurriedly insisted, curling a hand into his hair. “Just, just hear me out. I promise it’s not anything bad. There’s a loop on the cemetery cameras that I made, you should undo them and watch the footage.”

Barbara hummed skeptically, but she didn’t hang up this time so he figured she was listening to him. Offhandedly, she muttered, “Not a bad job, Drake.” Before falling silent once more, voice replaced with the sounds of her hacking. Tim would’ve preened at her praise if he wasn’t wound tighter than a spring, waiting for her reaction. A few long minutes passed and Tim was pretty sure he wasn’t breathing for any of it. He did, however, let out a strangled breath when she gasped, her voice watery and rasped, “What the fuck? What the fuck?! Is this a joke?”

”It’s not a joke! Jason really is… well, he’s asleep right now, but he’s alive!” Tim exclaimed, failing to keep his voice down. Jason didn’t twitch from where he was nestled on the bed. “That’s proof enough, right? Can you please hear me out now?”

Tim cringed when he heard the woman go silent, quiet sniffles being the only indication she didn’t hang up again. He debated trying to offer up a comforting word but figured it wouldn’t be appreciated. After a few awkward moments, Barbara finally spoke up, saying, “I’ll hear you out. That’s all you get.”

“Thank you,” he breathed, letting his head thunk against the wood he was resting on. “Okay. I need you to not tell Batman about Jason and help me keep them from finding each other. I don’t have the equipment or skill to do that on my own and it’s really important,” he explained. 

“Sorry, you want me to not tell Bruce that his son is back from the dead?” Barbara asked, her voice raising an octave. “You’re planning to let him grieve for however long until you decide to give Jay back? Why in the hell would I agree to that?”

“I didn’t kidnap him,” Tim replied, insulted, despite knowing that’s exactly what he did. Well, it was more complicated than that, obviously! Did it even count as kidnapping if the person you stole was dead for four months prior? “He came willingly, but he freaked out when I mentioned returning to Mr. Wayne. Jason reacted really badly at something smaller than his past life, and I don’t think it’s a good idea to send him back when he could hurt himself or Batman,”

“Okay, then I’ll call Nightwing. Or Alfred. Or anyone else besides a five-year-old with too much free time. Hell, I’m sure one of the other supers will be willing to watch over him.”

He wasn’t entirely successful at squashing down his annoyance this time as he replied, “I’m 13, not 5, and if he’s refusing to listen to Bruce, I really don’t know how he’s going to react to the others. I can help. Once he’s even the slightest bit better, he’ll go straight back home, no pit stops. I just… I can’t help Jason and fend off Batman at the same time.”

She made a noncommittal noise and said nothing as she forced him out of the main communication line. Then, she hung up. Tim felt the tears he thought he ran out of in the shower suddenly press at the corner of his eyes. Maybe it was selfish, to want to help Robin himself instead of handing him off to someone more capable. Jason might protest, but if Barbara was going to tell Bruce anyways, Tim should’ve just called Wayne Manor in the first place. He reached out to close his laptop when the phone rang from an unknown number.

That seemed too convenient. Nervously, he accepted the call and let out a relieved laugh at the bat symbol that appeared on his screen. “We use this number when we converse. The other one is my civilian one. You report with me every day, no exceptions. None. If you miss a single check-in, I call in the bats. I can hold B off for roughly a week before he begins getting suspicious, and I’d rather not break the trust between us. So that’s all you get, alright?” Oracle’s voice came through, straight to the point and only a little teary.  

“Deal. Thank you. I owe you so much for this,” he stressed, his whole body relaxing with her acceptance. His body slumped against the bed.

“Don’t mention it,” Oracle said, and the tapping of keys stopped. “Timothy—”

“Tim, please.”

“Alright, Tim. You come to me if you need help, okay? I… you seem like a good kid, and this is a lot. Jason isn’t your responsibility, no matter how much I appreciate you doing this for him,” her voice was soft, as if he was a scared child. He certainly felt like one when being talked to so gently, but…

“I’m not a kid, Oracle. I can take care of myself, and I will take care of Jason. I promise,” he vowed and hung up before she could notice how close he was to bursting into tears. Tim saved the new number in his phone and glanced up at the boy in question, who was dead asleep. He wished he could crawl into bed next to him and fall asleep too, but he had things to do. So, instead, he rubbed his eyes, put on some music, and dove headfirst into his research.

Chapter Text

If Tim had gone to sleep the previous night, he would’ve woken up and assumed that everything was some elaborate dream. He would’ve posted it to his blog and watched as middle-aged moms theorized about his mental state for entertainment. No extra stress, no responsibility, nothing. 

Unfortunately, none of that was possible because he didn’t go to sleep and the dream theory was thrown out the window by the various aches and pains present all over Tim’s body. On one hand, he was glad that his curiosity about how far he could be thrown was fulfilled. On the other hand, fucking ow. 

He hadn’t been willing to let Jason go through his nightmares, though, which meant withstanding each punch and bruise to wake him up. Quite frankly, even if Tim tried to get some sleep, Jason had so many nightmares in the eight hours alone that it would’ve been impossible.

To fill the time when he wasn’t monitoring Jason, he had researched meditation and grounding techniques, enough so that his ads were assuming he was some mentally unstable insomniac person looking for therapy. Which… okay, might’ve been somewhat true, but he refused to dwell on it. When he wasn’t cataloging breathing patterns, he was combing through information about Jason’s resurrection. It did him little to no good, but Tim now knew the complete history of the undead so it wasn’t all bad.

There was sunlight peeking through the curtains, glinting off of his screen and making it extremely difficult to reorganize his calendar. Combined with the growling of his stomach, he figured it was time to actually start the day. His hands hadn’t ceased their shaking from last night, which, from the web pages he was browsing, wasn’t very healthy. Neither was being blown up in a warehouse though. He was infinitely glad that Mrs. Mac had made a week's worth of meals he just had to warm up instead of meals he had to cook himself. 

Tim hauled himself to his feet, feeling impossibly old from the way his bones creaked. He grabbed the baseball bat he had begun using to wake Jason up around nightmare number four and padded over to his side. Gently, he nudged Jason’s shoulder with the bat and braced himself. The boy shot up, ripping the weapon out of Tim’s hands and brandishing it as if he was going to knock off someone’s head.

He raised his trembling hands in surrender, doing his best to track Jason’s body language. “It’s not a nightmare this time. Breakfast,” Tim offered, trying to quell his trembling hands.

Seeing as Jason didn’t hit him over the head again, he took it as a good sign and shuffled forward. He let out a relieved breath when Jay didn’t resist when he pried the bat out of his hands. After putting the bat away, he wrapped his hand around Jason’s wrist and led them downstairs to eat.

Now, normally, Tim ate in his room. All the other rooms were always too empty, too fake despite being the perfect picture of a rich family’s mansion. It was the reason his room always smelled like Febreeze, to block out the potent delivery food smell. The only time he ate in the dining room was when his parents came home, and since that only happened every few months, it didn’t happen often. It happened even less because his parents always ended up being too busy to eat with him when they were home.

But Bruce wasn’t his parents. Tim had pictures of the man eating not just breakfast, but all meals with Jason, Dick, and Alfred. Which meant Jason was used to eating in an open space and having meals be an actual event instead of an afterthought like Tim always saw it as. He was used to nights around a dinner table, laughing and eating food fresh off the stove. 

So hiding out in his bedroom and eating reheated spaghetti on the floor wasn’t an option for them, not if Tim wanted to establish some sense of normality again. Instead, after Tim reheated two plates of pancakes, they made their way to his parent’s favorite dining room. It had several large floor-to-ceiling windows that looked out into the wilting garden and there were way too many chairs surrounding the way too big table. He hated the room with a passion despite the magnificent view it had of the sunset. He had spent too many days eating alone in it with nothing but the view to comfort him after his parents canceled. Despite his apprehensions, the Sun would be good for Jason, so that was where they went.

He sat the two of them next to one another and began eating before realizing that Jason wasn’t eating. Frowning, he nudged the other with his foot and swallowed his mouthful before saying, “You have to eat, too. Just a few bites.”

Nothing. Tim felt like screaming, but he took a few deep breaths and pushed his plate away. He twisted and put the fork in Jason’s dominant hand, curling his fingers around it to make sure it stayed. After a moment, Jason flinched harshly and the fork clattered onto the table. He had thrown up his left arm to cover his face, feet skidding against the floor. Tim just barely managed to save the chair from tipping over, sending his clattering to the ground.

Confusion swarmed his mind as he dragged Jason away from the table, trying to get him to breathe. It was a bit awkward, telling Jason, “I don’t know where you are right now, but you’re in Drake Manor, not there. We were eating breakfast and looking at the garden and the pancakes were getting cold now,” insistently, and making his breathing purposefully louder was a struggle. It took a good twenty minutes before Jason’s defensive stance dropped, but on the plus side, Tim didn’t get injured this time.

“What happened?” Tim asked, sitting cross-legged against the foot of Jason’s chair. Jason didn’t answer, but Tim kept talking. It helped him puzzle things out, bouncing ideas off another person despite the ideas not doing much bouncing. “Was it the food? Or the dining room? You didn’t eat the food, though, and you seemed fine when I left you in here to get the plates. And I pull you around all the time, so maybe it’s just… a one-time thing? Unless…”

Tim had read Robin’s real autopsy report. It was brutal, awful, and he spent ten minutes in the bathroom dry-heaving afterward. But in that report, it detailed Robin’s injuries inflicted by a curved instrument, presumably a crowbar. Made of metal. And though the silverware was a completely different type of metal, it was still metal. 

Okay. He could work with that. Add it to the list of things that made Jason panic. Soft sheets, sleeping, and anything resembling metal tools. His eyes drifted around the room before landing on a cabinet with a few antiques on display. Janet’s voice rang through his head, sharp and clear, “These are priceless, Timothy. Under no circumstance are you to touch any of these unless we are to tell you so.” She had told him when he was much younger and hadn’t tamed his curiosity yet, resulting in his fingerprints being littered across some artifact they had brought home.

Using the antique chopsticks as actual chopsticks would certainly break her rule, but he really couldn’t find himself to care. Jason seemed okay with them, and she’d never notice unless she inspected every artifact for discrepancies. Tim might’ve been a little more paranoid throughout breakfast, but it was a small price to pay. Jason, with Tim’s guidance, was eating, after all. 

They made it through a whole pancake and a half before Jason suddenly threw everything up. Tim narrowly avoided being drenched by ducking underneath the table as soon as the heaving sound started up. Belatedly, he realized he should’ve been up and rubbing at Jason’s back to comfort him, but by the time he crawled out from underneath the table, the vomiting was over.

The clean-up was the worst, but there wasn’t any blood mixed in which was a blessing. Tim was not qualified to play doctor along with therapist. He made Jason rinse out his mouth before digging out the blender from the back of one of the cabinets and making a smoothie with one of his lunch salads. It was good to know that solid food wasn’t on the table, even if the way he found out was extremely unpleasant. He hurriedly ate his cold pancakes, rinsed off their plates, left them in the sink, and then got Jason to drink the whole smoothie. Once breakfast was officially over, he bustled them back up the many steps and back into the confines of Tim’s room, significantly more out of breath than before.

Tim sat Jason in the middle of the room before hurrying to his closet and pulling out a board game. Years ago, five-year-old Timmy had bought Scrabble and planned to surprise his parents with it. He had thought his parents would be excited to play with him, seeing as they were intelligent and Scrabble was a word-based game that would be made more fun with said intelligence. During one of the months they were back, he presented them with his prize and was immediately shot down.

“This is a game for children, Timothy. Do you expect us to waste any amount of time on it?” Janet had pointed out scathingly, tapping a long nail on the cardboard of the box.

“Yeah, and you wouldn’t be much of a challenge for us anyways, champ. Good going, though,” Jack had laughed heartily, tussling Tim’s hair. It was too rough and made his head bobble, but it had brought a smile to his face all the same. It was almost enough to make him forget his disappointment. Almost.

The board game had gone largely unforgotten in the back of his closet, collecting dust. Until now, where Tim was carefully setting up the board in front of Jason. His spiel which he had once made for his parents was now being recycled and spouted out to Jason, and no amount of self-control could hide the excitement in his voice. 

“Alright, I’ve never played this with someone else before and it got really boring alone, but you’re here now, so! I hope you know how to play, I think you do. You guys seem like the type to have board game nights. Anyways, I’ll be starting first because well…” Tim gestured vaguely at Jason as he dumped out his letters. “Here, these are yours. I didn’t look at them, promise. I got a good starting set and everything, so for your sake, I hope yours are good too.” He boasted, trying to not feel discouraged at how Jason was more interested in staring at his bed frame than the board.

Tim carefully laid out the word, “Caramel,” on the board and leaned over to tally up his points. He grinned and shuffled over to Jason’s side and maneuvered his hand so it was resting on his letters. He tried and failed not to let his grin fall as he softly said, “Take your time. We’ve got all day. I’ll go once you’ve taken your turn, okay?”

Three hours passed before anything happened. Tim spent most of that time half-hanging off his bed, editing and transferring photos from his camera to his laptop. It was a fun challenge to try and make the current pictures of Batman look even a bit warmer. He never managed to do it and ended up with lots of butchered drafts, but it was a good time waster.

He was seeing how high he could stretch the ears on Batman’s cowl when there was a subtle shifting sound. At first, he dismissed it as the bed or the wind. His keyboard was getting a bit hard to use, too, so it could’ve been the keys. Then it happened again, and that… that was definitely wood.

He practically broke his neck in his haste to scramble off the bed and to Jason’s side. His movements were sluggish, and the pieces kept slipping to the ground, but he was moving! Jason was actually trying to spell out words!

It took another thirty minutes, but at the end of it, Jason had turned his “Caramel” into “Caramelized”. Tim gladly scribbled down the points, unable to hold back his proud laughter. He added a new word to the board and waited patiently for Jason to continue, dragging his laptop over to keep a better eye on the board. After a moment, he started a stopwatch and data table on his phone. It’d make good data, and it wasn’t too dissimilar to timing a seizure.

[9:34 A.M.] Jason put down his first word.

[11:47 A.M.] Jason put another word down another three hours after his first move. This time, he spelled out a new word instead of adding to Tim’s, which had to be a good sign. 

[4:23 P.M.] Jason’s eye twitched when Tim managed to put down “Enfranchisement” onto the board.

[7:16 P.M.] Tim came very close to flipping the board as Jason, eyes still glazed over, somehow managed to put down “Disillusionment”. He wondered if this whole state was some sort of scheme to punk Tim. He felt like he was on a reality show.

[9:52 P.M.] Jason’s hands flexed threateningly as Tim put down “Barnes” and then proceeded to explain with a straight face that it was a valid word due to it being in the name of a bookstore. Barnes and Nobles wouldn’t put a fake word in their store name, after all, therefore, it must count. 

[10:29 P.M.] Tim took a picture of Jason bent over the Scrabble board, putting down his final word. He left it to transfer over to his laptop while he watched anxiously.

[11:04 P.M.] Jason won the game by 20 points.

…Jason won the game.

Tim stared open-mouthed, pencil hovering over the score sheet in disbelief. “How– what? What? How’d you win? I must’ve counted some of my words as yours or something,” he reasoned, shifting to look over the board carefully. It was a futile attempt to salvage his pride, and no matter how many times he tried to recalculate the points, Jason still came out on top.

On auto-pilot, he took a photo of the sheet and sent it to be transferred as well before groping behind him for his phone. Tim fumbled around his contacts for a bit before listening to it ring, still in shock

“‘Yello, Oracle,” Barbara greeted, to which Tim made a strangled noise as he dropped his pencil.

“Jason beat me at Scrabble,” he said faintly. “By 20 points.”

There was a long enough silence that Tim pulled the phone away from his ear to check he hadn’t been hung up. When he put it back up to his ear, he could hear cackling on the other end. “Oh my god, even unresponsive, he’s still stupidly competitive at Scrabble. Oh, that’s incredible,” she wheezed.

“That's not funny! I have working brain facilities and he doesn’t! How did I even lose?!” Tim protested, putting the phone on speaker as he began putting the board away. Jason swiveled his gaze to the phone to resume staring blankly as the conversation went on.

”That’s not surprising in the slightest,” Barbara choked, struggling to get her laughter under wraps. “The only person who could beat Jason was Alfred, and even then it was a close match,” she giggled.

“Your butler?” He questioned, unable to stop the smile from growing on his face. 

“Yeah, Alf. He acted calm but I could see the fire in his eyes when they were playing. He burned Jason’s eggs on purpose when he lost by three points before,” she reminisced, her voice going soft and fond at the same time. Her voice suddenly perked up as she told him, “Jason playing with B, though, that was a work of art.”

Both Jason and Tim straightened, and though Tim registered the change, the chance to get a look into Batman’s normal life was too enticing. “Yeah? Did Mr. Wayne beat him?” he asked excitedly, raising the phone to his lips unnecessarily.

Barbara laughed and he could imagine her shaking her head. “Complete opposite, actually. Jason wiped the floor with him in exchange for avoiding Batmobile duties for a month . Bruce wasn’t even mad, but his face was priceless, Timmy.”

It was a little unbelievable because Tim thought everyone knew the rules. You allowed the adults to win no matter how talented you were at the game. It was always the case whenever he managed to play games with his parents since they always got upset when he won. But the Waynes were also the bats, so he doubted any factor of their lives were normal.  It was nice to hear about, at any rate. “Yeah? I wish I could’ve gotten a picture of that.”

“Oh I got plenty, but they’re all blurry because I was laughing too hard. I do have this great picture of Bruce reading a dictionary instead of signing reports the next day, though,” Barbara said, barely containing the glee in her voice.

He opened his mouth to respond when there was a loud thump and he whipped his head around to look at Jason. His panicked eyes were locked on the phone in Tim’s hand like it would blow up any second. The second Tim turned his body towards Jason, any sort of tranquility went straight out the window, along with the whole Scrabble board. 

Tim was frozen for only a moment as Jason dove towards the shattered window before he launched into action. “Shit! I’ll call you back!” He cried before hanging up on Barbara. Then, he hurled all of his body weight into Jason’s side to stop the boy from jumping out of the second-story window. 

They rolled onto the ground and Tim hurriedly threw himself away from Jason with a new bloody nose from the scuffle. Jason frantically scooted himself back against the wall, once vacant eyes darting around like Batman himself would burst out of the closet. He was mouthing words that looked suspiciously like “I’m sorry,” “Dad,” and “Help,” which in turn made Tim feel like he was treading into shark-infested waters with an open wound. 

“Okay, okay, okay. Jason! You’re in my house— Drake Manor right now. We’re in my bedroom and I was just talking to Barbara,” Tim said in one breath. Some of the websites said that focusing on a scent was a good way to calm down, right? He didn’t have candles or anything, he’d have to buy some later, so he had to use something else. Something with an overpowering but pleasant smell– ah!

The sprint to the bathroom seemed to take far longer than it usually did. Every second without eyes on Jason felt like another second of abandoning him, and he hated it. He yanked the scented body wash from the shower and twisted the cap off, dropping it in the bath in his haste. A relieved wheeze escaped his lungs when he ran back into the room and saw Jason still curled on the floor, knees drawn up and breathing too frantic to be anything good.

Sliding to his knees, he waved the bottle near Jason’s face and just hoped. “See? Can you focus on this? It’s like, lavender and rosemary or something. It’s my mom’s. Don’t tell her, but I stole it a while ago. She– she isn’t home to use it anyway, so it’s nothing bad. I promise you it’s safe, come on,” he begged, doing his best to keep his voice steady.

Too much time passed, but eventually, Jason’s ball unfurled a bit. Not one to miss a chance, he pried one of Jason’s arms away from his body and guided it to his heart. “Okay, good. You’re doing great,” Tim praised, exaggerating his breaths like before. It was a bit easier this time. “Try to match me, okay? I’m not making you leave yet,” he directed, ignoring how shaky his voice sounded.

Eventually, Jason’s breathing slowed. Tears were running down his cheeks, but the fearful look had gone away, once again replaced with the vacant look Tim had gotten used to seeing. He hated it. A few minutes passed and Jason dropped his arm, eyes closing as he succumbed to sleep. Tim wanted to shake him and demand he woke up, but he suspected that having a breakdown like that with someone not qualified to help was tiring. 

The broken window made itself known by the gust of cold wind that entered the room, bringing along a few leaves and far too much dust. A put-upon sigh escaped his lips before he crouched down and slung Jason’s arm over his shoulder. The boy only slumped further, leaning his weight on Tim. Whether that said anything about his recovery or his trust in Tim, he couldn’t find himself to care.

He made the trek to one of the guest rooms and unceremoniously dumped Jason on the bed. He took the blankets off and replaced them with the curtains from the room, loosely tucking Jason in with them. Once Jay was set, Tim turned and headed back to his room. His phone was ringing when he found it buried underneath his covers. He picked up.

“Tim! Are you okay?! What happened?” Barbara’s voice blared through the speaker, loud and panicked.

“Fine, I’m fine,” Tim responded, and wow, did he always sound that tired? He adjusted, shifting over to his Timothy Drake voice. He couldn’t be anything less than fine right now, not right now. “I think talking about Bruce– Mr. Wayne made Jason freak out and you were on speaker,” he explained, the epitome of calm despite the urge to burst into tears like a child. 

“I’m so sorry, Tim. I didn’t realize it was that bad,” Barbara said earnestly, and the genuine care in her voice nearly made him cry.

Though she couldn’t see it, he shrugged. “There’s nothing to apologize for,” Tim said, hoping it didn’t sound as robotic as he thought it did. He stuck a hand through the broken window, being careful not to step on any of the glass on his carpet. “Do you think you could pay someone to repair my window, though?”

“Of course, I’ll use B’s credit card too, so don’t worry,” Barbara reassured, though the worry didn’t leave her voice. “Where’s Jason? Is he okay?”

“Yeah, he’s in one of the guest rooms right now. He just had a panic attack and it seemed to drain him.” Seemed to, because Jason’s face still held no emotions past the fear and terror during high-stress situations. 

“...Are you okay, Tim?” 

Tim couldn’t help but let out a dejected chuckle at that, unable to hold his gala persona up in the face of everything. “I’ll be better once Jason comes back to himself. Thanks, I’ll call you tomorrow,” he said and hung up before she could ask him more questions. Even if it made his heart warm, knowing she cared enough to ask, he really wasn’t in the mood to pretend. After gathering his electronics and camera, he made his way back to the guest room. Then, he sunk onto the scratchy carpet to settle in for another long night of bird watching.

Chapter Text

Tim managed to squeeze in some shut eye that night, though he was still woken up by Jason’s nightmares frequently. They were no less violent, but Tim had gotten better at dodging so it wasn’t all bad. When he was freshly awoken, he subjected himself to carefully perusing the hospital and police records to keep track of Batman. Bruce Wayne hadn’t made an appearance in public for awhile, so it was useless to look. But seeing as he could no longer go out and photograph Batman, he figured it was an okay substitute. The numbers of bed-ridden criminals were stagnanting, which would’ve been good if they weren’t still impossibly high. All in all, it wasn’t pretty.

Breakfast went better, too. Tim reheated some sort of soup for Jason and french toast sticks for himself, and both of them kept the food down the whole time. The french toast sticks went cold while Tim was guiding Jason’s hand, but after drenching them in maple syrup, he couldn’t tell the difference. He did his best to fill the silence, but couldn’t do so while eating, so they ended up listening to music most of the time. Jason didn’t seem to react to any of the playlist, which either meant he disapproved of Tim’s music choice or he genuinely didn’t care. For his own sake, Tim hoped it was the latter. 

Nearing the end of breakfast, Barbara sent a text saying, “Window repair comes at noon,” to which Tim sent an “ok,” back. His mother would surely scold him for his bad manners,  but it didn’t feel worth the effort to thank her no matter how rude it made him feel. He dumped the dishes into the sink, made himself a cup of his dad’s coffee, and another smoothie for Jason before heading back upstairs.

As much as he wanted to continue playing Scrabble, there was too much of a time crunch. They had made tons of progress through the game already, so he figured it was okay to move on. This time, instead of heading back into any of the bedrooms, Tim led them to one of his parent’s offices. He thought it was his mom’s, but she used it so little there was practically no difference between them except the dust content. Despite having this knowledge, just being in the office made his hackles raise and he instinctively softened his steps. His parents weren’t even home to catch him, but entering a room they expressly forbid him from entering still felt putting his neck on the line.

“Sorry for the dust,” Tim told Jason sheepishly as he sat the boy down on the hardwood floor. Once situated, he opened the curtains just a bit to let the Sun in before heading off to get the thing needed for the second part of his plan.

Long ago, his parents had been in Gotham for his birthday. He was ecstatic and they didn’t remember until his dad saw the newspaper article about them. Then, they had gone into a frenzy and demanded to bring Tim out for his birthday. He was so happy that he decided to forget about the fact they were only bringing him out to save their reputation.

They brought him to some big restaurant where they heckled the staff and criticized the food the whole time. He wasn’t even allowed to order for himself, even if he could read the absurd names on the menu in the first place. His dad kept lamenting about wasting their saved reservations on “some random day” instead of an actual celebration or something. His mom was only there for half of the meal, spending the rest of the time brokering a deal with the manager of the place. 

Afterwards, his parents brought him to some high-end gift store and told him to pick out something. They didn’t let him go into the kid’s section, so Tim ended up buying a tackle box and hid what he actually wanted inside one of the containers. The cashier saw it and said nothing, which, he really should pay that cashier back someday. His dad praised him for his good choice and then dropped him off at his house before leaving to catch their flight to Honduras. 

It was still one of the best birthdays he had ever had.

He still regularly used the stolen gift, a 2000 piece jigsaw puzzle of the Gotham skyline, bat signal faint in the distance. Now, Tim set the box in front of Jason and carefully dumped out the pieces in between them. He set the top of the box propped up against the foot of the desk and tried to grin at Jason. “I’m sure you know how to use this too. Here, let me separate the edge pieces and then you can get started,” Tim said earnestly and began to do just that. 

It took a while, where Jason had managed to move his gaze from the wall to the pieces in the time Tim took to do his task. He had finally managed to find the final corner piece when the doorbell rang. That… was odd. The housekeepers never rang the doorbell and Tim didn’t order anything. Unless Bruce Wayne was ringing his doorbell because he found out Tim kidnapped was helping Jason. In which case, maybe it was just better to leave the door alone. He thought Oracle would be able to—

Right. Barbara called people to repair his window. Tim got to his feet and placed one of the puzzle pieces in Jason’s hands before rushing downstairs. He took a moment in the hallway mirror to smooth out his untamable hair and make his pajamas look less ruffled. It didn’t help the fact he still looked like he just rolled out of bed.

He hurriedly opened the door with a patented smile, looking up at the men standing in front of it. “Hello, are you guys here to fix the window?” he asked, despite already knowing the answer. They had a whole truck parked in the driveway with some distinct logo on the side. The gate was open, which he could probably thank Barbara for. 

The first man smiled, a little stilted as he said, “Yeah, we are, kid. Are your parents in? We already got paid but we gotta make sure things are all set.”

“Oh, no, I’m afraid they’re busy right now and can’t make it. They told me everything I needed to know, though,” Tim improvised swiftly. He shifted onto his back foot and held open the door for them. “Please, follow me.”

On the way through the house, a few of them asked what he was still doing home. He told them it was Summer, which meant no school (this was true). They asked about his parents and one of them bluntly asked, “Does anybody actually live ‘ere?” He told them that his parents were going to be home soon and they tended to commandeer one sitting room in particular, which was why the house seemed so empty everywhere else (this was not). The crew still gave him a few worried glances but were distracted when they came to the window, which was a blessing.

As much as he appreciated their concern, he knew the consensus about his living situation. It was “criminal neglect of a child” and “cruel” and tended to be considered “a form of abuse”, but they didn’t know the intricacies. His parents and he knew that he could take care of himself, and they had told him time and time again that he might’ve been young, but he wasn’t a child. And besides, his parents would get mad if they came back from Germany to an abuse charge, so better lie to the good samaritans than risk getting the heat turned off again.

Tim left them to it and returned to the office deeper in the house with lunch. His fake smile was replaced by a genuine grin when he opened the door to find Jason bent over the jigsaw puzzle with half of the edge pieces connected. A few pieces were bent and jammed into spaces they weren’t supposed to be in, and Jay’s eyes weren’t exactly focused but it was progress.

The two of them spent most of the day putting the pieces together. Tim let Jason take point and only interrupted to straighten out a few pieces or stop others from being destroyed. He occasionally stepped out to check on the window repairs, which weren’t going as smoothly. Apparently, the frame was ill-fitted, which explained why it sometimes got absurdly cold in Tim’s room, so they had to do a complete overhaul of it. Then on top of that, they had to switch out all of the glass, even the parts that were intact because it was unstable.  He felt bad, but they assured him they were overpaid and not to worry about it so he kept to the office and tried not to.

When he returned to the office after being told about the glass being switched out, though, Jason had finished half of the sky and was staring at the blurry bat signal. Tim blanched, quickly realizing that maybe choosing a puzzle with a blatant reminder of Jason’s old extracurriculars might’ve been a bad idea. He hurried forward, mouth open to do damage control but Jason wasn’t doing anything but staring at it. The line of his shoulders was tense, but not in the familiar defensive way he tended to embody. He seemed almost wistful, if his face were able to hold any emotion past apathy. 

Silently, Tim shuffled over to his camera and took a picture of the moment. The quiet shutter seemed to snap Jason out of his trance and his gaze dropped back to the floor, unfocused. Unsure what to do, but unwilling to let the moment past, he dropped down next to Jason and nudged his shoulder against his arm. They sat side by side until Jason’s shoulders relaxed and he made a few aborted attempts to continue putting the puzzle together.

They ate dinner, and Tim bid the window repair people goodbye. They did an incredible job, working for hours straight. The cold draft that had become common in his bedroom was now gone and the glass was brand new. One of the men even went down to the garden to sweep up the broken shards in the grass. 

He moved everything, including Jason, back into his bedroom and watched as Jason passed out. Absentmindedly, he took a photo of the half-finished jigsaw puzzle before packing that up and painstakingly counting out each piece to ensure none were missing. Some were bent beyond repair, but they were all present so Tim didn’t mind too much. Finally, finally, he sat against the foot of the bed and gave Barbara a call.

“Oracle speaking,”

“Hi Oracle. It’s Tim again. Jason’s asleep and I was just checking in.”

“Oh! Tim! Did the window people do a good job?” 

“Yeah, thank you for sending them. They replaced the frame and everything.”

Tim expected to hear some affirmation, but she suddenly went quiet. He frowned but waited for her to gather her thoughts. She was busy, probably making sure Batman didn’t kill anybody now that Tim wasn’t there to call the paramedics. She took a few deep breaths before hastily saying, “Maybe we should reconsider leaving Jason in your care, Tim.”

“What?!” He all but yelled, pressing the phone to his ear harder as if it’d made the words more clear. What did he do wrong this time? Sure, he wasn’t the best person for the job, but Tim was trying! He was always trying! “You– You said I get a week. Jason needs a week, probably even more,” Tim insisted, sweating beading down his forehead along with the water gathering at the corner of his eyes.

“I did say that, but I didn’t know Jason was violent. I’m not willing to put you in danger if he’d be better off with one of us,” she explained curtly, sounding apologetic but firm. “We can bring him to my apartment and I can watch him. He didn’t seem to be adverse to my voice when you put me on speaker, so it seems the most reasonable option.”

When she worded it like that, it made sense. Tim was taught to value logic from the day he was born. Jason would’ve been better off with Barbara, and Tim could return to his normal life without the risk of injury.

His normal life, in the cold, empty manor. He would eat alone in his room again, wasting the day until night came, where he would sneak out through his window and continue taking pictures of Batman’s spiral until Jason returned. It didn’t sound too bad, Tim was used to it after all. And he was ready to slip into the shadows once Jason got better and return to it anyway. This whole arrangement was temporary from the beginning. Oracle was simply moving the deadline up. It was a good idea. It was.

But when he opened his mouth to agree, what came out was, “How can you be sure of that?” 

Tim cringed at the silence, snapping his mouth closed so quickly his jaw hurt. Did he really just question her judgment? Where the hell did he get the gall to do that?! Sure, he fought for Jason to stay in the beginning, but Barbara wasn’t demanding anything then. He definitely couldn’t hold back his tears if she decided to lecture him, and then what? He’d be the whiny rich brat losing a new toy in her eyes instead of someone who just wanted to help.

Barbara sounded nothing but curious, though, when she asked, “What do you mean?”

It was a trap. His mom had asked his opinions a few times while scolding him, but whenever he answered, she dismissed it and deemed him wrong. When he didn’t, he was told he was being ungrateful and ignoring her.

It was a trap and yet he still responded, “Jason hasn’t seen you, just heard your voice. And I’ve been making progress here! What if he doesn’t adjust to change well? Oh, and if Mr. Wayne decides to look into why you’re hiding something and drops by, he’s going to find Jason immediately. I have no connection to him and no reason to know you, so it’s safer. There’s just… there are just too many uncontrollable variables with moving him.”

She hummed in response, sounding unhappy. Tim held his breath, waiting for the, “You’re a child, you don’t know what you’re talking about.” And he waited. And waited. And—

“Okay, alright. You make some good points, Tim. But I’m worried about you. You never trained for this, you don’t know how to defend yourself, and you’re taking charge of Jason’s recovery all on your own. I know it’s only cutting it short by three days, and you’ve done a brilliant job so far, but this is not all on your shoulders.”

Tim could’ve scoffed, but he was more focused on the chance he was given. Tears were streaming down his face, for what reason, he did not know, but he ignored them to hurriedly explain, “I do! I do know how to defend myself. I’ve taken classes on weekends and I can keep up with Batman and Robin for years since I was nine. And I’m not on my own, I have you! If you’re still willing to help me.”

“For years?”

“Yeah, yeah. I’ve been sneaking out and taking pictures of the two of them for ages, Oracle. I promise you I’m safe and okay. And it’s only three more days, so it won’t be too much of a burden either.”

“For years. You’ve been following the two of them for years.” Barbara repeated, sounding aghast. She let out a heavy breath, and her voice came back muffled. “Fine. Fine, I don’t like it, but we’ll finish out the week. Fuck, I have to yell at Bruce after this,” she groaned. There was a loud thud and she let out a quiet, “Shit, ow, bad idea.”

“Thank you,” Tim said gratefully, unable to keep the shakiness out of his voice. He ended the call with shaking hands and wiped at his eyes, managing to stop himself from actually sobbing. He scooted over to Jason’s side and grabbed the boy’s hand, running his thumb along the callouses on it. He tipped his head back against the mattress and closed his eyes, letting the comforting weight dip him into unconsciousness.

Chapter Text

The fridge was nearly empty. There were three meals left inside, each neatly packaged with a sticky note on the top with reheating instructions. This did not change the fact that there were only three of them, and there were two people in the house.

He turned to Jason, who was lingering in the doorway and declared, “We’re going to run out of food tomorrow.” Like he expected a response.  Jason stared at him blankly, eyes flickering to the open fridge before drifting off toward the sink again. Tim sighed and guided them back to the dining room to finish up breakfast. Jason was making incredible progress in the eating department. He only had to nudge Jay’s hand every few minutes, and though it took much longer, Jason was able to eat a whole meal without throwing up. 

Midway through supervising, Tim decided that Jason would probably be able to handle going grocery shopping. He proposed the idea to him, and took the silence as acceptance. He shoveled the rest of his own meal into his face before calling Barbara to ensure Bruce wasn’t stalking their local grocery store. She seemed amused, but assured him she and B were going to target some drug trafficking ring for the whole day and that both of them would be busy. When Tim brought up the reckless behavior Batman was displaying and that maybe setting him on a big case wasn’t the greatest idea, she simply stated, “That’s why I’m helping. Go get your groceries, Tim. Watch over each other.”

With Barbara’s blessing, Tim forced Jason into one of his baggiest hoodies. Surprisingly, it fit him almost perfectly. He then slipped a face mask and glasses onto Jason. He snorted, admiring how both inconspicuous and out of place the boy looked. He took a picture before adjusting the disguise so it didn’t scream “CELEBRITY IN HIDING”. By the time he was done, Jason just looked like a normal Gotham citizen who had a head cold.

Tim grabbed his wallet and though he didn’t need to, he also grabbed Jason’s hand. He rationalized that it was a part of the disguise and to ensure Jason didn’t wander off, but it was also partly because it just felt nice. Like he was going shopping with someone who could actually stand him. He tried not to think about whether Jason would let him cling to his hand if he wasn’t unresponsive and focused instead on navigating into the city. 

Luckily, Jason didn’t run off and they made it to the grocery store without trouble. They didn’t get any weird looks and the cashiers didn’t even look up when they walked in. It made Tim extremely proud of his own disguise skills. Maybe he’d become a make-up artist if the whole night-time photography gig didn’t turn out well. One look at Jason suggested that it was more likely than he would’ve liked. Well, at least he got the hang of holding the grocery basket quickly even if he wasn’t fighting crime.

It would’ve been easier if Jason could’ve grabbed the high-shelf items that they needed, but otherwise, shopping went smoothly. Tim had long since embedded his grocery list into his mind in case he ran out and he only needed to make a few minor adjustments to it, including but not limited to doubling the serving sizes. 

Unfortunately, this high did not last, for Tim decided that he wanted to try his hand at pasta and therefore required ingredients to do so. So, as per usual, he tugged on Jason’s sleeve and led them to the aisle. He was debating which kind of noodles he would grab when he suddenly stopped in his tracks.

Alfred Pennyworth was standing in the pasta aisle, scrutinizing two boxes in an entirely too proper way for the kind of grocery store they were in. 

Now Tim didn’t exactly know Alfred very well and he only caught glimpses of him during galas. The man seemed kind and Batman obviously trusted him, even if Tim didn’t. The extensive background check he had performed on the butler when he first figured out the bat’s identities proved it. But there was no mistaking the man in the pasta aisle was the butler he was trying to avoid. 

He nearly had a breakdown right there in the middle of the grocery store, but instead, he spun on his heel and bustled Jason away from the aisle as fast as possible. They found themselves standing behind a glasses’ stand near the bathrooms. Once he made sure Alfred didn’t decide to follow them, he whipped out his phone and frantically dialed Oracle.

It took far too long for her to answer, but she eventually did. “Tim, kinda busy here, what’s up?” Barbara asked, the tapping of keys prominent on her side. Her voice sounded strained, which made Tim feel guilty, but he was panicking, okay?! 

“Does Mr. Pennyworth do his grocery shopping today?!” He hissed into his phone, glancing toward the end of the aisle.

”Mmhm, once every month. Goes to these really natural stores for them. Shit, one sec,” she informed before cutting off suddenly. Tim tapped his foot anxiously, waiting for her voice to return. It did, significantly more stressed as she relayed, “He takes a really long time to choose what to buy, so you should be fine to just get what you need and leave. I need to go, B’s acting— fuck!” 

The call ended. Tim stared at it, betrayed, before hanging his head. Maybe he should’ve just let them starve instead. They didn’t really need groceries, anyway. He tried to convince himself of that for a futile few minutes before groaning and turning to Jason.

”I just have to grab the pasta and then check out, and we’ll be all set. Stay here,” Tim told Jason seriously. Jason didn’t respond, more focused on spacing out while staring at the frozen produce section. It didn’t feel good to leave the boy alone, but it would be just for a moment. He handled being left alone in Drake Manor fine, after all. The grocery store couldn’t be too different.

Once Jason was situated, Tim speed-walked back to the pasta aisle. One peek told Tim Alfred was still standing there, but he had moved onto comparing sauce cans. He went through a few breathing exercises before turning the corner, keeping his head down. They didn’t help. Was his disguise good enough to fool a friend of Batman? God, what if Alfred noticed them earlier and they just escaped too quickly? His thoughts kept cycling repeatedly as Tim sidled up next to Alfred and swiped almost all the boxes of noodles into his arms. Belatedly, he realized that he only needed like, four boxes. 

When he looked up to put a few back, though, Alfred was staring at him. He tried to even out his breathing but it was a little difficult to focus. Eventually, when his hands were shaking too much to properly line up the boxes, he just shoved almost all of them onto the shelf and hurried out of the aisle with three of his selected boxes. Alfred gave him a curious blink as he raced out of the aisle. Tim was pretty sure he got the wrong kinds of noodles, but there was no way in hell he was going back there.

Jason hadn’t moved from his spot next to the bathroom, but their basket had a lot more cookies in it. There was even a piece of strawberry cheesecake wedged into the already cramped basket. Tim narrowed his eyes suspiciously at the vacant boy, but shook his head and bustled them off towards the registers. It was progress, that Jason actively wanted to have desserts, so he let it pass.

They waited in line as the tired teenager scanned their stuff. They exchanged pleasantries but once it was clear both Tim and Jason really just wanted to be gone, they just scanned things in silence. It really seemed like they were going to get out of the grocery store without issue. All without Alfred noticing and everything! Tim hovered by the card reader with his credit card, ready to swipe and sign and officially end the nightmare shopping trip.

The cashier was nearly done with bagging everything when someone stepped into line behind them. Tim glanced up and felt his stomach drop to his feet as he watched Alfred put his things on the conveyor belt. He glanced at Jason, but he didn’t seem to notice Alfred’s presence and was more focused on the desserts that were being bagged. As discreetly as possible, he angled Jason away from the old man and rushed to finish the transaction. After the beep, Tim began to shove the bags onto Jason’s arms and grabbing his own handfuls. It was obvious that they were in a rush, but the two of them hadn’t noticed each other yet. He congratulated himself on the efficiency of their trip and tried to let himself relax as he grabbed the last few bags. 

With a hand tangled in Jason’s hoodie, Tim began to haul them out of the store. They got five steps before there was a sharp gasp and a posh voice croaked, “Master Jason?”

Tim whipped his head around and saw Alfred, staring disbelievingly and Jason and Jason staring back, eyes empty. His heart plummeted and he didn’t waste time, he just tightened his hold and yanked . They raced out of the store, which had suddenly become twice as suffocating. He thanked all the supers above that Alfred still had to go through the check-out process. It gave them a considerable head start, and Tim was not wasting it. 

They took the long way home, through back alleys and side streets that Tim sometimes used when Batman or Robin were close to finding out he existed. Jason was oddly passive, but Tim had no time to check on his well-being. Not when there was a potentially bat-trained butler chasing them through Gotham.

Once night had fallen and they had eaten through some hotdogs Tim stopped to get before resuming their sprint, he finally set on the track back to the manor. Alfred wasn’t following them, so he figured it was safe. That didn’t mean he wasn’t tense all the way up to the front door. It was only when the door closed did he let the bags slip off of his arms and bury his head into his hands. Tim spoke through muffled hands, “Jason, I am so, so sorry. I didn’t know he’d be there. I’m sorry we had to run. Are you– oh.”

Jason was crying. Silent tears streamed down his cheeks and didn’t look anywhere close to stopping. Unsure what to do, but knowing that crying while holding arms loads of bags wasn’t comfortable, Tim moved them to the kitchen. He put all the perishables away and rid Jason of the bags before heading up to his bedroom. Jason was still crying as Tim guided him to sit down on the bed, and his heart twisted painfully at the sight.

Tim didn’t know what to do. He was prepared for violent panic attacks that ended with him on the ground. He was prepared for the nightmares that kept them both awake into the unforgiving hours of night. He was not prepared for Jason to bury his head in his knees and shake with the force of his tears without making a sound. Tim didn’t know how to help, and he felt so unbearably useless in those moments.

He had never had anyone to hold him while he broke down crying, whether it be from a storm or from an Arkham emergency. Tim was always alone when it happened to him, no matter if his parents were home or not. He didn’t have any soothing words or calming lullabies to give. There was nothing he could do except cry when he broke down, because he was alone. But Jason wasn’t alone. Jason only had Tim, and even if he didn’t count for much, that meant he wasn’t alone. He couldn’t just do nothing. He couldn’t.

So, Tim decided to do what always made him feel better. He wrenched open the newly repaired window and gently tugged on Jason’s arm until he uncurled and stood up. “We’re going to see something. You can climb, right?” he asked softly, and didn’t wait for an answer before guiding the two of them up and out of the window.

It was much harder than climbing on his own and took a lot of finagling on Tim’s part to get them on the roof. They nearly fell way too many times, but eventually they made it onto the roof. He made his way to a stable part of the roof and sat down with his back against the chimney. Carefully, he tugged Jason down next to him so they were sitting side by side. The crying didn’t stop the whole time, but now was joined by these awful, choked noises. It was way worse than the silent crying, and made Tim’s eyes water in response. He squeezed Jason’s hand tighter as if it’d stop his own tears from falling by doing so.

Tim took a steadying breath before scanning the horizon. His eyes landed on the faint silhouette of a manor, illuminated by the half moon hanging in the sky. “See that? That’s your house. Or, was, I guess. Wayne Manor. When I’m sad, or lonely, I like to come up here and just… look at it,” he confessed, nudging Jason’s head with their interlocked hands so they were both looking at the house. “Before you… before, there used to be lights on all the time. It made me feel warm, even from all the way over here, y’know? I tried taking pictures of it once, but I could never capture the feeling. Made me too sad to try and print them, too.”

”It’s always dark now. Cold. Your butler sometimes walks around and turns on the lights while he cleans, but it never lasts because he turns them back off once he leaves. I can print these pictures now. I can, but… there’s no point. It’s like printing photos of Batman, now,” he continued, dipping his head to avoid looking at the dark windows. Tim could still vividly remember what the manor looked like with all the lights on. He wondered if his house always looked as empty as it did now. He wondered if the Waynes hated the emptiness as much as Tim did.

Jason didn’t answer his questions. Couldn’t, probably. His breathing did get heavier and he stopped making those little shaky noises so Tim figured whatever he was doing was working. “I look at the stars now. It’s a lot clearer in Bristol. Less air pollution, see?” he pointed out and shifted to nudge Jason’s head again. He startled when the other looked up of his own accord and stared at the sky. Tim did a bit of his own staring before clearing his throat and picking up where he left off. “I… uh, you probably don’t remember this, because you were dead. I think. But I asked you if you liked the stars in Gotham before. I like to think you did. A lot of my photos of you consist of you looking up when you weren’t watching out for the people on the streets.”

The words got caught in his throat, drowned out by his own loud sniffle. He froze and pushed himself away a bit, trying to regain his composure. Jason was still having a silent breakdown right now! Or, Tim assumed he was, because it was suddenly really hard to look at him. He had to calm the other boy down. He just had to switch topics so he wouldn’t start crying too. Yeah, that’d be his best bet. 

“Did—” he sniffled. “Did you know my birthday’s in two days? Three, counting this one. I actually found this spot on my birthday. Mom and dad were in Iceland for a dig and couldn’t call me that year,” and oh, maybe this wasn’t the best topic to get on if he wanted to avoid crying. Yet, despite that, he kept talking, the words streaming out easily, “I saw this really cool Robin quilt when buying myself a present and I figured if you could scale buildings and roofs, I could too. I know I’m not as good as you, but I was younger.”

“So I did. I climbed all the way up here. I nearly fell like, five times. It’s why I marked the hand holds afterward. And I got up to this chimney and just looked. Funny story, actually. You, Dick, and Bruce were having a movie night in that window. I could tell by the lighting. It was a horror movie, I think. That was a really good birthday.”

Despite all of his efforts, he was still getting teary-eyed. Guilt swarmed him when he couldn’t find himself to even be happy that Jason was looking towards the manor of his own volition. Because soon, he was going to be left alone again, watching the silhouettes in Wayne Manor go about their day while he wasted away in his own home. They’d forget he existed, like Tim wanted them to. He wanted that outcome. It’d be too good of an ending for someone like him to be anything but forgotten, after all.

But Jason would have to leave eventually. Tim pried his fingers away from Jason’s and dropped them into his lap, letting his head fall back against the chimney. He sounded wrecked and he pretended his voice didn’t shake when he whispered, “They miss you a lot. I know they do, because if I missed you this badly, it has to be so much worse for them. But we’ll get you back. I’ll get you back. I promise.”

Silence fell upon the two of them, but this time, both of them were crying. He couldn’t tell if it was an improvement from before or not, and he didn’t want to try. He squeezed his eyes shut, knowing that he probably should’ve been keeping an eye on Jason. To comfort him and make sure he didn’t fall. They were on the roof, after all. It was just hard to open his eyes again, that was all. 

Which meant Tim was caught entirely off guard when an arm was slung around his shoulders and he was dragged into Jason’s side. His eyes shot open as he was manhandled into a comfortable position, half on top of Jason’s lap. He let out an embarrassing squeak, unable to react any other way, but Jason didn’t even flinch. He just tightened his arm and moved his empty gaze back to the stars.

No matter how much he squirmed or tried to move, Jason didn’t budge. He had stopped crying, though the tear tracks were still prominent, and seemed to have no intention of letting go. Eventually, Tim gave up and slumped against the other boy, letting his head rest against Jason’s shoulder. He managed to free his phone from his pocket and took a picture of them together before shooting off a text to Barbara, saying that he’d call her in the morning. He felt a little guilty for not calling her right then, but he felt so exhausted and Jason was surprisingly comfortable. It wouldn’t hurt to just… close his eyes, right? Just for a bit.

Chapter Text

Sunlight gradually crept onto the roof, drenching the two sleeping boys in a harsh light. Tim groggily pried his eyes open and had a near heart-attack when he realized that they were still on the roof. Holy shit, was he glad that Jason didn’t have a single nightmare that night, or else both of them would surely be walking back inside with a few broken bones. He was even more surprised to realize that both of them slept through the night without issue, beside the cold chill that the night air left behind.

Jason began to stir from behind him and he glanced up, trying to study his face. Something was different. His face was still expressionless and stoic, but his eyes had changed. They were still vacant, but they were more focused. More present. Even the way he climbed back into Tim’s bedroom was more reminiscent of Robin and less of Tim’s clumsy guidance. Sure, he still stood stock still unless directed by Tim, but his movements were more fluid and he followed Tim without having his hand held. Tim still did it anyway, but that was more on him than anything.

Even breakfast went better. Tim no longer had to prompt Jason to eat. He still used the chopsticks, but it was almost like eating an actual breakfast with another person. With less talking, obviously. He was extremely glad that he could finally eat his food while it was still hot, since it tended to go cold while he was helping Jason. 

His phone rang during breakfast, which was an odd occurrence. He only got calls from his parent’s secretaries and on the very rare occasion, his parents. He debated whether or not to put his fork down but decided that it was early enough that the caller would understand. “Tim Drake,” he greeted, wedging his phone between his shoulder and ear as he reached for the syrup.

”Tim,” Barbara started seriously. Maybe he should put his fork down after all. “Why did I get a call from Alfred demanding me to figure out if Jason was alive or not? He was as panicked as he could be, and I’ve never seen that man any less than mildly peeved!”

“Uhm,” Tim replied eloquently. He put his fork down. “Mr. Pennyworth caught Jason while our groceries were being scanned. It was kind of why I didn’t call you last night. He didn’t really… react well. He didn’t recognize me, right?”

“You’re lucky Alfred was more focused on his dead son coming back than the kid that was with him. He didn’t recognize you,” Barbara informed. ”But he told B, and then they went to the grave and found it empty. Bruce thinks that someone dug out Jason’s body, revived him, and is gonna mutilate it as a message to him or something. He’s changed all of his patrols to check the warehouses now. Alfred and him asked me to call Dick once he’s back from his off-world mission, and they’re not even on good terms right now!”

There was an absurd amount of information to process in that. Tim pushed his plate forward so he could rest his forehead on the table. “I’m sorry. I thought someone would fill it in or something after I left. Do I have to go into hiding?” he asked, deciding to start small. They had an emergency rogue bunker in the basement that his parents never gave him the code to, but he figured it’d be easy to get Oracle to hack into it for him. It’d probably work until Batman calmed down. He really didn’t want to risk getting beat up by the vigilante over a misunderstanding.

Barbara let out a put-upon sigh, but she didn’t sound angry, just tired. “No. We just have to be careful at the end of the week when we hand Jason off, that’s all. B might mistake you for someone malicious when we bring them together.”

Tim frowned, a little confused. B wasn’t going to mistake him for anything because they weren’t ever going to meet. He thought that was obvious from the beginning. But Barbara sounded almost as exhausted as he did, so instead of pointing it out, he simply said, “We can do that. You can do all the talking when that time comes around.”

“Alright, alright. Sounds like a plan, Tim. That’s it. Call me tonight, alright? No more text messages. Makes me feel like you’ve got kidnapped or something,”

He pulled the phone away from his ear and stared at it as she hung up. He suddenly felt so very tired. The pancakes he made for breakfast didn’t seem very appealing anymore, so he got up to go store it as leftovers. He paused to check if Jason was done and quickly looked away when he realized the other boy was looking directly at him. His gaze was still vacant, but what little emotion it still held was scrutinizing. It was deeply unsettling. Tim took his plate and left as quick as he could, feeling out of breath for no reason.

After taking a moment to calm down and dismiss the totally unwarranted anxiety that had swept over him, he shoved the pancakes into the fridge. Then, he turned to leave and nearly ran straight into Jason. Tim stumbled backward, eyes wide and heart still racing as the boy made his way to the sink and put his plate and chopsticks in. He stared as Jason turned on the faucet to the hottest setting. He continued to stare as Jason reached over and grabbed the mostly unused sponge and began pouring an unholy amount of dish soap onto the thing. He shutdown somewhere around the time Jason began washing his dishes , seemingly on auto-pilot.

Completely out of his depth, Tim returned to the dining room for the sole purpose of grabbing his phone and taking a picture of the absurd moment. He continued to watch for a few elongated minutes before deciding that it’d probably be a good idea to help. They were technically his dishes, anyway, right? So, he snagged a dish rag and stepped up to Jason’s side to begin drying the many dishes he’d been neglecting since the first day.

By the time he finished, Tim was still partially in shock. “I think I’m hallucinating,” he announced to his audience, who looked at him blankly. “Because there’s no way the first thing you do when you become semi-conscious is wash my dishes,” he continued, gesturing to the now empty sink to emphasize his point.

Unfortunately, despite Jason doing the chores Tim was supposed to be doing, he didn’t explain himself whatsoever. Tim groaned and grabbed Jason’s hand. It was still wet and there were suds on his finger tips. He was unable to stop smiling even if it was uncomfortable. Even more so when Jason’s fingers curled around his own, almost gently. He wondered if that was an effect of the catatonia or if Jason was just being kind. He wondered if it made him a bad person if he didn’t care very much.

They walked out to the part of the garden beneath his bedroom window. Only a bit reluctantly, Tim dropped Jason’s hands and clapped his own together in preparation. See, his school had given them a bunch of Summer homework to do. Like an overachiever, he had done all of it in the first week of Summer except for one class. One forsaken class. English.

Tim had really tried to get through his assignment, but nothing made sense. Eventually, he had gotten so aggravated, he had thrown the book out of his open window. It landed in a nearby tree and promptly got stuck. He didn’t care enough to get it back at the time, so it proceeded to decay in those branches, forgotten, until now. Now, he scaled the tree easily and unearthed his copy of The Fellowship of The Ring from the branches. Alongside it, he plucked a pretty looking leaf to use as a bookmark and slipped back down to ground level. Jason watched as he fell gracefully onto the grass, standing by the base of the tree. 

It made it much easier to guide Jason into a sitting position against the trunk of the tree. He was pliant as Tim arranged his hands so they were holding the sides of the book. During this, Tim explained, “I looked up your school records when I figured out you were the new Robin. Not in a creepy way or anything! I was just curious. But uh, you had a lot of notes about liking English and excelling in it so I figured you must like reading. So now that you’re able to, I thought you’d like to do a bit. See if it jogs your mind.”

He opened the book to the first page and waited for approximately four minutes before flipping to the next one. This process repeated for ten minutes until Jason began flipping pages by himself. It took another three for his eyes to actually focus on the words. The whole scene made Tim so unbelievably happy at his progress that he couldn’t help but snap a picture. It wasn’t a good idea, but he made the image his lock screen anyway, as a reminder. 

After settling Jason in, Tim stretched and began his second task. Finding the pieces of the Scrabble board that had gone out the window. It wasn’t sentimental or anything, and he could easily buy a new one. But, if his parents found pieces of it in their pristine garden, there would be consequences he really didn’t want to face. The last time he had ruined their picture perfect house with his bottle rockets, they had smashed his camera with a hammer. He was determined not to let anything like that happen again, which meant painstakingly combing through the whole area to find the parts.

Jason’s throwing arm was impressive, but the board had also been thrown through his window, so the momentum was somewhat softened. That meant the pieces couldn’t have gone that far, even if they were likely to be scattered throughout the condensed area. He started walking in concentrated lines, keeping a close eye on the ground. 

Soon enough, Tim had found the board, 34 pieces, the instructions, and the bag the letters had come in. He had set them all, except for the bag, safely next to Jason, who was a quarter way through the book, which… wow, okay, even Tim didn’t read that fast. Maybe he was just skimming it instead of actually reading it. Yeah, that was probably it. He still took another picture as proof, though.

He had a running count of the pieces he was still missing, seeing as they were much more spread out than he had initially thought. The frequency at which Tim looked up to check on Jason also impacted his search speed, which was annoying but necessary. The boy didn’t move, at least not until Tim was knee-deep into his mother’s flower beds. He was taking care not to trample any of them and looked up for a second. 

Tim immediately shot up in a panic, eyes honing in on the empty spot under the tree. The book was still there, with the leaf set snugly in the– middle? Jesus christ, how fast did this guy read? Speaking of the guy, Jason wasn’t anywhere near the base of the tree. In fact, he wasn’t anywhere out in the open at all.

Frantically, he turned in a circle, eyes scanning the horizon for signs of an escaping Robin. “Jay?!” Tim called and cursed himself for the slip-up. There was no one to hear it though, so he let it go and instead hurried back to the tree. He was just about to dial Oracle and declare an emergency when he saw a shock of black hair moving by the shrubbery. “Oh thank god,” he breathed and rushed over, already analyzing if this was an escape attempt or the other had just decided to wander.

Jason straightened and met Tim halfway. Relieved, Tim reached out to grab Jason’s hand and let out a yelp when his left hand was grabbed. The bag was wrenched from his grasp and Jason shoved five letters into it, then proceeded to stand there and not let go for an extended period of time. Then, he gave Tim his hand back and turned around to begin wandering again. 

Unsure what had just occurred, Tim adjusted the counter in his head and decided to just roll with the punches. He kept a closer eye on Jason, but he was doing nothing but searching for the pieces. Between the two of them, they finished in half of the time Tim was expecting to take up. Jason’s lip quirked up the slightest amount when Tim slipped the final piece into the bag and cheered, which had sent him into a peel of surprised laughter. It was a good feeling. He felt like he hadn’t laughed in decades, despite it only being a few months.

”Thank you,” Tim told Jason as they wound their way back to the tree. “I’m really sorry for interrupting your reading,” he added when Jason didn’t say anything back. They both sat down at the base of the tree. Jason picked up his book again and resumed reading, leaving Tim to his own machinations. Unsure what to do but not wanting to interrupt him, he pulled the Scrabble board toward himself. He laid on his stomach and began to work on his science vocabulary with the letters. It wasn’t very fun, but it was a good way to pass the time and not bother anyone with his presence, especially when the one presence couldn’t even tell him to shut up or answer any of his questions. 

When he opened his eyes five hours later, it seemed like less of a good idea. His back ached from sleeping on his stomach, his arms were sore and he was cold. The extra sleep was nice, though. He rolled to the side on tired limbs and looked up at Jason, who had commandeered the pencil from the box and seemed to be annotating his way through the book. At further inspection, it seemed he wasn’t writing any words, but it was still incredibly baffling nonetheless. Tim couldn’t imagine being bored enough to willingly annotate a book, let alone one that long. 

Tim struggled into a sitting position and leaned back, watching quietly as Jason crossed out a large chunk of text from the page he was on. “You could’ve just woken me up if you got bored,” he said. Though, the longer he watched, the more he thought Jason was genuinely doing it because he wanted to. The annotations were too thorough, even if he wasn’t actually writing down his specific thoughts. 

A few more moments passed by before Tim got bored. He packed everything up, returning everything except the pencil Jason was using to the box. Then, he hauled Jason to his feet and made his way back inside the house. Once they dropped off the box back in Tim’s closet, they made their way to one of the sitting rooms with a working television. Plenty of other sitting rooms had them, but his parents had decided to be frugal with their money when they had bought them, so they were mostly decorative. 

He made a quick stop for a bowl of popcorn before sitting down next to Jason and grabbing the TV remote. With a straight face (okay, his mouth was twitching a bit), he put on the Batman and Robin TV Series: Live Action Remake and let it run. Everyone knew that the series was absolute garbage. It was produced by someone in Metropolis who had famously gone on record saying that they had only visited Gotham once in their life. The idea of making the actual Robin sit through the drivel? It was way too appealing to Tim, and the chance was right there . Even if Jason wasn’t paying full attention to the work because he was still writing in his book. He’d figure it out eventually.

In fact, Jason lasted three episodes before he grabbed the remote from the table and switched the show to Avatar: The Last Airbender . His eye was twitching and his annotations had become scarily sharp to the point Tim was scared it’d tear the pages. He was impressed that Jay even lasted three episodes. God knew the only thing keeping Tim from turning off the show himself was the outcome of forcing Jason to watch it.

As calmly as he could, Tim told Jason, “Good choice.” Before passing over the bowl of popcorn and leaving the room. His hands were shaking again. Badly. His little prank wasn’t really just for his own benefit, no matter how big of a part it played in his actions. Jason didn’t get a panic attack at the sight of Batman on the TV, and only flinched when the Joker got mentioned. TIm didn’t put an episode on with the clown in it because he didn’t know if he could look at a fake version of him without having a panic attack himself. But all of this accumulated into one thing. One irrefutable fact.

“Hey, hi, hello, Barbara Gordon speaking,”

“Hi. It’s Tim. I think Jason’s ready to go home.”

Chapter Text

Jason fell asleep during the second book, leaving Tim to lug his sleeping body upstairs and back into the bed. This time, though, he didn’t sit down on the floor. No, this time, he picked his laptop up from the floor and began printing all the photos he had taken throughout the past week, including the ones on his phone. He carefully cropped out any evidence of him or the manor in the pictures, ensuring the main focus of each piece was on Jason. The rooftop one was a bit difficult, but he had managed.

While those were printing out, he pulled out the duffel bag he usually put his bat-watching gear in. He began packing everything from Jason’s time here. The dirty and torn up suit, the Scrabble board, the jigsaw puzzle, and the book were the main things. He even put the Batarang into the duffel, even if Tim was especially sad to give it up. It was for the better, though. It was used as a makeshift shovel, and that was enough for it to have to go. Tim wiped his fingerprints off of everything and made sure there was nothing in the bag that could link back to one Timothy Jackson Drake. 

Tim set the bag by the door and padded over on silent feet to Jason’s side. He sat on the edge of the bed, cringing as it dipped with his weight. He didn’t really know how light of a sleeper Jason was, seeing as he tended to sleep like the dead and wake up from his nightmares like clockwork, leaving no time for outside sources to wake him up. Just in case, though, he kept his words quiet and concise. 

Things would be ruined if Jason woke up and understood what Tim was saying. In fact, he shouldn’t have been saying anything at all, but he couldn’t help himself. Something in him was shattering, a familiar emptiness expanding in his chest. It was reminiscent of all the times he had to watch his parents roll out the front door, trailing suitcases behind them without so much as even a glance back. It wasn’t the same, but boy did it feel like he was being left alone again. Even if it was technically Tim sending Jason off. But he had spent a week taking care of Jason. Didn’t he deserve a few minutes to say goodbye?

“Hi, Jay. You’re going home tomorrow. I… uhm. I really liked having you around. It was for your recovery, I know, but it was nice. Really nice. I’m glad you came back. I’m glad you’re going back to Bruce and Alfred and Dick. Really, I am. It’s… ” Tim began, already hating how watery his voice sounded. “ It’s just selfish. My parents won’t be home for my birthday, that’s all. They aren’t coming home until next month, and by then, they would’ve forgotten entirely. See? Selfish and stupid. You got killed in a warehouse by the Joker and I’m complaining that my parents don’t pay enough attention to me. ”

“I thought that maybe, maybe you could stick around for my birthday.  I could pretend you actually wanted to celebrate with me, and pretend that you got me a gift. But you’re going back home now, to be Robin and help Gotham. Kinda dumb, huh? My birthday gift to Gotham, and it’s not even her birthday, it’s mine,” he let out a dry laugh, running a hand through his hair before burying his face in his hands. Silent sobs shook his body, trying and failing to fill the void that was expanding in him. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t stop. He hated it. He knew not to get attached, that Jason was going home. It was inevitable, and yet he still got attached. It was nobody’s fault but his own. 

The soft beep of his printer jolted him out of his pity session. Right, he had to finish packing. There were more important things to do than wallow in his despair. Tim laid his hand on Jason’s forehead, pressing a kiss onto it like he wished someone would do to him and whispered, “Goodnight, Jay. I’m going to miss you.”

He lingered for a moment before slipping off the bed and walking over to the printer. Tim thumbed through the photos he printed, wishing so dearly he could’ve printed doubles. It would’ve been too much of a risk, though. Because if Tim was lucky, and god he hoped he was lucky, Jason wouldn’t even remember Tim’s name. He doubted Jason could forget about the entirety of his time here, but he had to be known as some mysterious figure that helped bring Jason back to his family. It was better than being known as the spoiled neighbor with a savior complex and too much time on his hands. It was for the better.  It was for the better, he told himself as he put the photos in the duffel bag and cried into the night.

*****

Barbara called again during breakfast. They had ironed out the details of the transfer last night, but she wanted to go over things again now that Dick had come back from his mission. Her plan was to have them all meet at the grave, where Tim would sit Jason nearby and hide until she explained what had happened to the bats. Then, once they had calmed down from their freak out, because they would definitely freak out, Tim would reveal himself in all of his 13 year old glory. 

This was not Tim’s plan.

Once they had finished breakfast, Tim slung the duffel bag over the taller boy’s shoulder, ensuring it stayed on. He forwent the disguise this time, instead settling for a baggy hoodie and hoping cemetery etiquette did the rest. It was common knowledge to leave people at cemeteries alone to grieve, and no matter how unconventional Gotham was, they didn’t tend to break established social rules. 

Jason had enough sense to keep his head down while they made their way to the cemetery. Tim acted as their eyes, as his disguise was much heavier than Jason’s. He tried to bask in their last walk together, trying to memorize the feeling of their hands linked. He doubted he would be able to hold anyone’s hand ever again after this, so it was an understandable goal. By the time they reached the gates, he had ingrained the memory so deeply in his brain that he was sure he had accidentally replaced his birthday with it or something. 

They found Jason’s grave again and Tim felt him tense up at the sight of it. The six-foot hole wasn’t covered or filled, which meant that the groundskeeper was really being underpaid or really lazy. Either way, he was filing a complaint once this was all over. Jason’s grip on Tim tightened, almost to a painful degree. Gently, he pried his hand free but moved his hand to hold onto Jason’s bicep instead.  “Don’t worry. You won’t have to be here long. You don’t even have to look at it. Just watch the path down here for them. It’ll all be okay. I’m going to go hide, so I don’t get beat up on sigh,” Tim reassured.

And wow, Tim didn’t know a nod could’ve made him want to cry so much. He grinned an ill-fitted grin before rushing off into the cemetery. Once he was far enough away, he pulled out his phone and gave Barbara a call.

“Tim! Is something wrong? They’re ten minutes out, so it won’t be long.”

“About that. I’m not meeting them.”

“Sorry? Of course you are, you’re there with Jason, yeah?”

Tim took a fortifying breath, pulling on all of his memories of Janet Drake and doing his best to embody her. He was her son, it shouldn’t have been so hard. “No. I’m not. And you’re not going to mention me to them. You keep me anonymous.”

“What is this about, Tim? They deserve to know who helped Jason this whole week,” Barbara pressed, confusion evident in her voice. Her typing had stopped.

“This is about the many files I have containing the bats’ identities, some other super’s identities, and yours. I have fail-safes that will send this information to all news outlets if you try and destroy any of them. And if you do somehow manage to do that, then I’ll deliver the information personally,” Tim asserted. His hands were trembling, but he was doing an incredible job at keeping it out of his voice. Did his mom always feel this bad when talking to her business partners at galas? She made it look so easy.

There was a sharp intake of breath on the other line. “Tim—”

“I want you not to mention my name, location, or anything about me to the bats. You worked with some mysterious contact who helped Jason breathe again. That’s all I was– all I am. I know a lot more than you think I do, Oracle,” he demanded. He should’ve just hung up right then and there, but something possessed him to murmur, “I’m sorry,” before doing so, no matter how much that damaged his cold persona.

It was a fight to not collapse to his knees right there and then, but he managed. He sent one of the files to Barbara as proof before wiping his phone and dropping it in a trash can. Tim didn’t really plan on actually blackmailing Barbara, since the only version of the aforementioned file was on his phone. He would never do anything to actually risk any of the superheroes even if he did have those organized files, but it was better safe than sorry. That was probably one of Batman’s mottos, which only made Tim feel marginally better about the whole thing as he approached the back of the cemetery.

He whistled “Happy Birthday” to himself as he scaled the back fence, purposefully avoiding looking at any of the cameras just in case Barbara was watching him. He began to wind his way back home using his secret system, counting things in sets of 14 all the way. There were a surprising amount of things that followed the pattern.

When he ran out of those and only two hours had passed, he began searching out random scenes on the street and pretending they were done especially for him. A diner had hung balloons for someone’s retirement party, but he pretended they were all for him instead of Sharon. The dogs playing outside that came and barked at him for coming too close to the fence? No, it was just another surprise, just for you, bud!

It didn’t help as much as he wished it did.

The Sun had set by the time Tim finally got home, just like he planned. He made dinner for two and dumped out the extra plate before stuffing himself full. He put the plate in the sink before deciding to wash it instead. Then, he grabbed his camera and scaled up to the roof. There was no moon out, which made the hand holds hard to find, and he wondered how it would feel if he just let go.

Tim finally got onto the roof and settled against the chimney, feeling oddly numb. It was weird, because the day couldn’t have been better. Jason got to go home, which meant Batman would stop beating people into the ground. It also meant Tim got to return to his favorite activity, the one thing he took solace in. His escape was back now. When he thought about it, he did feel good.

But then he’d think about how much better it felt being near someone all the time. To have someone like Barbara actually listen and acknowledge him. He’d remember how warm the manor felt with another person in it. His hand would flex when he remembered how he could hold Jason’s hand without get scolded for it, without being called clingy or childish. He’d question if he could’ve had that if he just stuck around, if he would be missed, and that happy feeling would fade away. 

The lights were on in Wayne Manor tonight. Tim should’ve been ecstatic, taking pictures of the place with just as much vigor as before. But his hands wouldn’t stay still long enough for him to take a good photo, and his eyes were blurring with tears. He tried for a long while, taking bad picture after bad picture to try and cement how good today was. Eventually, Tim gave up. He dropped the camera to his chest and moved his gaze to the stars. They weren’t as comforting to fall asleep to, this time.

Chapter Text

Two months passed since Tim’s birthday. His parents were due back tonight, but he took one look at their schedule and knew that it wasn’t going to happen. They had penned in the trip to Hungary a week ago, just like how they wrote in their trip to Germany so that it overlapped with his birthday knowingly. He knew he’d be getting a call from their secretary as soon as the hour turned. 

That meant Tim was back on the roof, clutching his camera and new phone in his hand, trying to grasp what little comfort Wayne Manor could offer him. It wasn’t working as well as it had before. Lately, it felt like the manor was taunting him instead of offering any warmth, no matter how many times he came back to look at it.  He didn’t know why he kept coming back to the roof. He bet Jason would posit that it was a metaphor for longing or dependency or something. 

Jason. A lot happened with the boy. There were no public announcements of his sudden resurrection, but his legal status was no longer deceased. Gotham’s streets were no longer in permanent fear. Robin wasn’t back, though, but what little of Batman Tim heard about, he didn’t need to be. He’d have first hand knowledge of that fact if he had gone out to take pictures in the past months, but he was too afraid. Barbara knew he had been following the duo around for years, which meant he was in much more danger of being found out. Tim hadn’t been caught for five years now, and he wasn’t going to break that cycle yet.

Exactly as he had predicted, his phone began ringing. Tim answered his phone and muted himself immediately, listening as the secretary began to drone on. He instead focused on raising his camera, this time tilted down towards the manor grounds. His yard was the absolute worst to take pictures of simply due to how fake it looked, but he didn’t know what else to capture. The manor was out of the question and the stars always made his eyes too foggy to be able to take good photos. 

The call finally began to draw to a close, just as Tim began to focus on trying to make the hedges look appealing. “—Be back until the 5th of September. Jack has arranged for a package of football supplies to be sent home for your birthday, and Janet has renewed your credit card,” the secretary was saying in the meantime. Her official tone shifted to something sad as she softly said, “I’m sorry they missed your birthday, Tim. I’m sure they had their reasons.” Tim would’ve loved to dispute her assurance, but she hung up before he could unmute himself. He didn’t really expect anything different anyway, and turned back to the landscape to ignore the numbness flooding his veins again.

After too many frustrating snaps, he tore the strap from his neck and looked up. And promptly froze when he spotted a figure far off in the distance. They were sitting on the roof of Wayne Manor, their silhouette lit up by the full moon hanging above them. It was too dark for him to tell if they were looking at him and certainly too dark to tell who it was, but Tim could make a good guess.

He felt a familiar exhaustion begin to set into his bones. Tim figured he was ready to call it a day. He took one last-ditch photo of Jason, sitting on the roof before beginning to get up when his phone suddenly rang for a second time. The number was unknown, but Tim was running on fumes and just wanted everything to go away for a bit. So, he answered without a second thought. He opened his mouth to give one of the many fake openings he found on the internet when—

“You should’ve shown me more of your photos, kid. They’re surprisingly good for a five year old,” Jason Todd’s voice said through the speaker.

“I’m not five,” Tim refuted automatically before backtracking through the conversation so he quickly he thought his brain shut down. “Sorry wrong number,” he choked and practically broke his hand on the end-call button.

His phone rang a second time as Tim stared in horror. How the hell did Jason get his number? He wasn’t ready to ever see the boy again, let alone talk to him! Maybe he should just throw his phone off the roof and go to bed anyway. His mom’s late birthday present was a refreshed credit card, so it wasn’t like he couldn’t afford a new phone if it meant avoiding an awkward conversation.

The phone rang again. The figure on the other roof had a hand on their ear, probably because they were using a phone. They exaggeratedly waved at Tim as he watched the third call go to voicemail, just for the fourth to start immediately afterward. And he knew there was no way he was getting out of this, not if Jason knew who he was. If not the phone call tonight, it’d be a house visit tomorrow. 

Tiredly, he hung his head and accepted the call. “Drake Manor, how can I help you,” he greeted, keeping his voice bland and uninterested. “If this is the same number as before, I’m afraid you still have the wrong one.”

“Wave back, for one. That’s rude to just ignore me,” Jason responded, fake insulted. “And two, this is absolutely the right number. Babs gave it to me and everything.”

“Stop calling at two in the morning. That’s rude-er,” Tim shot back, but raised his free hand to wave anyway. He really thought his blackmail trick worked with her. She hadn’t done anything for two months, after all. He supposed he should’ve thought better than to think he could get one up on Oracle.

”Hey, do you know what’s worse than both those things?” Jason’s voice had a joking tone to it, but Tim had learned to detect anger and it was clear there was a lot of repressed rage under the surface. “Blackmailing Babs into pretending you didn’t spend a week taking care of me while I was practically catatonic after being resurrected. I had to spend like, five days bugging her until she gave in.”  

“It’s new for a reason,” TIm pointed out, curling his knees to his chest and resting his chin on them. A mile away, Jason laid down on the roof, stretching a hand to the stars while the other held his phone. “And I wasn’t actually planning to blackmail her. I don’t want to get put in Arkham.”

There was a long pause as Jason went through some breathing exercises. Tim recognized them as some of the ones he used to help Jason come back to himself during his week at Drake Manor. It made him feel oddly good to know that Jason had decided to use his, even if they were common techniques he stole from the internet. ”No duh, she got that after she did one search of your Internet. She just figured that if you were willing to go to those lengths to not get found out, she just wouldn’t tell anyone. Babs is good like that. I, however, am not. So what we’re going to do is you’re going to come over and show off your photos. Then, we’re going to finish Avatar together, capiche?”

“Uhm, no? No one’s supposed to see my photos, for one, even the subjects. The ones I sent with you were to assure Mr. Wayne—” There was a scoff on the other end. “That Mr. Wayne didn’t think I was torturing you for a week. And you can watch the show with your actual brother. And forget about me, preferably,” Tim insisted, deciding to ignore the way his voice cracked on the last sentence. By Jason’s silence, he  didn’t seem as inclined to ignore Tim’s momentary lapse in emotional control.

”Tim, you didn’t have to help me, y’know. So why did you? You could’ve handed me off to Barbara as soon as you dug me out. Hell, you could’ve called Dick and he could’ve done it. You had no obligation to watch over me or even care as much as you did, especially near the end,” Jason inquired, and Tim couldn’t help the strangled sound that escaped his throat. Robin was talking to him so softly, like he wanted to hear Tim out, despite the fierce determination that lingered beneath the surface. 

He very nearly broke. He almost confessed every single thought, all of his fears, everything right then and there. But then Tim remembered the phone call from earlier, and the fight drained out of him. He could not confess about wanting a family when he already had one, after all. So instead, ignoring the tears running down his cheeks, he said, “You were Robin, and Batman was going off the deep end. If I didn’t help, then people were going to get hurt. That’s it. And I wanted to see things through to the end.”

”Okaayyy, and the real answer?” Jason prompted, before pausing. The figure on the other roof sat up and moved to the side a bit as a large figure appeared in one of the lit windows. There was a brief shouting match before it nimbly swung itself up onto the roof and made its way over to Jason, plopping itself down next to him. “Ah, brilliant, a diversion. Just what we needed to complete this emotional conversation. Tim, meet Bruce. Currently also known as Batman. B, meet Tim. He’s the one who brought me back from the dead,” Jason introduced, putting the phone on speaker.

There was a long pause before Bruce quietly said, “Jaylad, we talked about who resurrected you already. It’s nice to meet you, though, Tim.”

Jason let out a loud huff and punched Bruce in the arm. “Not literally, dumbass. He’s the one who got me thinking again. Y’know, the duffel bag kid I couldn’t remember the name of for a good month?”

Tim let out a defeated sigh, wrapping his camera strap around his arm and pulling it tight. “I thought the whole being dead thing would give you amnesia for longer,” he admitted tiredly, putting his own phone on speaker so he could use two hands.

“Jokes on you, you underestimated how conscious I was near the end there, little wing,” Jason said delightedly. “You made a really good impression too. I doubt I would’ve forgotten you even if i was still catatonic.”

“Language, Jay,” Bruce reminded gently. “And, thank you Tim. I really can’t stress that enough. You’ve done so much for us. If there’s anything you need from us, you say so. Even if you just want to come over for dinner. Alfred makes enough to feed a kingdom anyways,” he continued, and the sincerity in his voice made Tim want to cry harder. If he closed his eyes, he could almost imagine Bruce was inviting him because he actually wanted him around and not out of obligation. He couldn’t entirely suppress the sob that was torn out of him at the thought.

He heard a soft, “Oh, bird…” from Jason before his voice became lighter. “Hear that? You got a standing dinner invite from Mr. Bruce Wayne himself! That means you gotta come over with your camera ‘n Dick’s going to make you watch all of Glee with him. It’s a tradition.”

“Brilliant,” Tim sobbed, frantically rubbing at his eyes. He listened as a faint voice echoed through the phone and watched as another lithe figure clambered onto the roof from a different lit window. “Hi Mr. Grayson,” he greeted, unable to stop his tears but unwilling to be impolite.

“Did you guys make him cry?! I swear you weren’t that bad at the feelings thing when I left for Bludhaven,” Dick said incredulously, and scooped up Jason, plopping the boy into his lap in one fluid motion. “Hi, Tim, right? Please never call me Mr. Grayson again,” he introduced, ignoring Jason thrashing in his arms. 

“Oh my GOD you weren’t this clingy before– let go before I flip you off this damn roof!” Jason yelled, and Tim listened for a good three minutes as they wrestled. The image of their silhouettes brawling on the roof was far, but damn if it wasn’t entertaining. He could distinctly make out when Jason actually began inching towards the edge of the roof and Dick began genuinely fighting back. 

Halfway through the fourth minute, however, Tim suddenly realized that this would be an excellent opportunity to slip away without making a scene. He slipped the camera back over his head and began to clamber down, back towards his edge of his roof. The phone was clasped tightly in his hand just in case. He had one foot in one of the grooves when Bruce piped up with, “Are you heading to bed, Tim?”

And… okay, Tim kind of forgot about him. He stayed frozen, half his body hanging off the roof and the other half bent awkwardly overtop the eave to accommodate for his small stature. “...No?” he tried, moving a bit further down as if he wasn’t just caught by Batman himself.

Bruce hummed, the sounds of Jason and Dick arguing dimming down slightly at the noise. “Okay, well, since you’re leaving, will you be awake at nine? I’m sending Alfred over to pick you up for breakfast,” he asked. His voice was firm enough that TIm immediately realized that there was no way to worm his way out of this one. 

Tim let out a heavy sigh, unable to stop the smile from curling onto his lips. Maybe it was out of obligation, but it didn’t feel like it. He hoped it wasn’t. He pulled himself back up onto the roof, swearing less than usual as he situated himself back into his sitting position. “How do you know I’m going to be home? I could just… I dunno, vanish?”

“Yeah, you totally could, but then you’d make Dick sad. And B too, probably, even if he’s ass at showing it. And Alfred would’ve made too many omelets and he hates throwing away food,” Jason called, grunting as Dick gleefully laughed. It seemed like Dick was the one who won their little brawl. Their silhouettes looked like a two-headed monster, which Tim had no shame in snapping a photo of.

“You forgot to mention how sad you’d be, little wing,” Dick added, much to Jason’s chagrin. “He’s been super worried about you ever since he got his voice back. Can’t say I blame him, exactly.”

“This… this is blatant guilt tripping,” TIm said, a little shell-shocked.

“Hell yeah it is, is it working?”

“Yeah,” Tim miserably admitted, flopping onto his back and ignoring how the shingles dug into his sides. 

Jason cheered, quickly joined by Dick. Tim could even pinpoint Bruce’s quiet laughter, and if he closed his eyes, he could pretend he was there on the other roof, too. And it felt nothing like obligation. It felt like he was wanted .

“Pack a bag, kid! We’ll bust out the telescope and everything if you stay the night. I’m sure B has one somewhere,” Jason urged, nothing but child-like excitement in his voice.

And Tim let out a soft laugh, running a hand through his hair as he murmured, “Yeah. Yeah, I think I’d like that.”