Chapter Text
“All accounted for.”
Tim holds his breath until the door shuts behind the teachers’ last bed check at the Metropolis Grand, then rolls soundlessly out from under the blanket, landing between the bed and the window. Reaching under the bed for his duffle bag, he pushes the window open silently—he oiled the sash several hours earlier, the first moment he was unattended in the room—and grabs the top of the casement to flip upwards, kicking the window closed behind him.
Minutes later, he’s in his Robin suit, poised at the edge of the roof. Taking several strides back, he sprints and leaps off the edge, holding back a whoop as he feels the wind rushing through his hair. After a few seconds of the exhilarating plunge he fires his grapple to swing up to the next roof.
“This is more like it!”
Batman isn’t a big fan of Metropolis, but Tim is loving his time there so far, both as a member of the Gotham High math bowl team, and now as Robin. He knows there’s no need for an actual crime patrol here: Superman and his many allies have that well in hand already. But a rooftop run through the city will help him relax and get rid of his nerves before the competition starts the next day.
Swinging through the brightly-lit streets of Metropolis, shining with chrome and gold against sheer mirrored glass, is a completely different experience from Gotham’s dark, threatening chasms. It almost feels like he’s diving through a video game world, some fantasy city in the clouds.
The skies are clear, too, unlike Gotham’s constant smog and low cloud cover. Tim flips around a series of flagpoles, then hangs from the top one, staring at the silhouette of the Daily Planet building against the full moon.
What a beautiful, peaceful night.
Perfect for clearing his head, making sure he’s at his best ahead of the Tristate Math Bowl’s opening round. Gotham has held the trophy for three years running: he isn’t about to blow it for them in his first year on the team.
Just as he flips off the flagpole and fires the grapple at a nearby spire, Tim sees a shadow dive across the moon.
Bird? Plane? Superman usually operates during the day…
Tim swings up, feeling himself hang in the air for a second as he releases the grapple before starting to plummet.
Something plunges past him, red and blue twisting in a graceful barrel roll. And it’s…singing?
“I am the one and only~!”
“What the—” Robin grabs an ornamental arch of lights over the street, hanging in a chin curl position.
“Nobody I’d rather be…”
His tail dives past him with a quick two-finger salute, then swoops back up, hovering on the other side facing him.
It’s not Superman: not unless Superman suddenly lost a foot in height and fifteen or so years in age. And all his taste in music.
“Who—”
“Give me a sec.” The (super?) boy reaches down to switch off a Walkman, then pulls the headphones off through curly dark hair. “That’s better.” He rests his arms on the frame holding the arch, gray eyes flickering across Tim’s body quickly before settling on his face. “I know you, you work with Batman. You get lost migrating, Robin? Gotham’s thataway.”
Okay, maybe he can see now why Batman doesn’t usually go to Metropolis in his cape. Having a super confront him so casually on his home turf, seeing him fly so easily, while Tim knows at the back of his head he’s risking his life to do a poor imitation every night—it does set him on edge a little.
“What is this, ‘tourist go home’?” Tim’s arms are starting to ache, but the super is blocking the angle he needs to grapple away. He can’t tell whether he’s doing it on purpose or not. His expression is friendly enough, but… “And who are you, anyway?”
“Huh?” The super pushes off the arch to do a spin and a dramatic pose under the moon. “Bro, when was the last time you picked up Teen Beat?”
“Uh…never?” Tim takes the chance to pull himself all the way up, sitting on the top of the arch, and finally gets a proper look at the super.
“I’m Superboy!”
“Super—oh!” He’s muscular, under the tight red and blue suit, but not in the bodybuilder way that Superman is. In fact, he’s annoyingly more like a perfected, slightly taller version of Tim’s own build. A black leather jacket silhouettes the sharp line of his shoulders, and Tim isn’t trying to look at the yellow belt around one thigh but he sure isn’t not looking, either. “The new one.”
“Geez, you really know how to give a guy an ego boost.” Superboy flips in the air so he’s facing Tim upside-down.
“So what’s with the welcome wagon?”
An inverted shrug. “Oh, you know, boring night, saw you flipping around, figured what the hey, maybe you could use a wingman.”
"Thanks, but I'm just looking," Tim replies, and backflips off the arch, firing the grapple to swing under and past Superboy.
Two swings later, Tim lands on a chrome-plated statue to find Superboy already hovering in front of him. "Sounds like you need a tour," he grins, hands in his jacket pockets.
Tim sighs. Superboy seems to mean well, and considering Tim's line of work it would be a terrible idea to be rude to the nearest neighboring capes. So much for that quiet, relaxing night. "Yeah, sure. Lead on."
"...And this is the opera house, and like, I went once and let me tell you it is so boring! Pretty building though." He lands on one of the abstract marble curves. "I eat lunch here sometimes."
Tim releases the grapple from the peak of the opera house and lands next to him, putting his hands on his knees as he catches his breath. Superboy was talking nonstop for fifteen minutes and didn't even seem winded. Flight is definitely an unfair advantage. "I like opera," he says finally, once he's sure he won't embarrass himself by wheezing in between words.
"Dude, for real? Blink twice if you need help—or I guess I wouldn't be able to tell with the mask."
He turns to look at Tim as he straightens up, his expression suddenly intent. Tim jerks back, and not just because they're standing much closer than he thought. "You did not just x-ray me!"
"What? No!" Superboy takes a step back as well, looking offended—or rather, Tim realizes a moment later, looking worried he's the one who offended Tim.
"Sorry," Tim says. "I just…I've never been up close with a Kryptonian this long before." Superboy still looks stressed. Maybe bringing up the exploded planet in the room was a bad call. "Also you would not believe how paranoid working with Batman makes you."
Superboy laughs, floating up a few inches as he does. "I'll bet. Are you down for a late-night snack?"
Trying to keep pace with Superboy was a far more grueling workout than Tim had planned for, and the boxed dinner at the hotel left much to be desired. "You're a lifesaver," he says.
"That's what they put on all the magazine covers." Superboy floats up further, then kicks off the roof and looks down at Tim expectantly.
It's a long shot to the nearest spire, but still well within the grapple's range, so Tim shrugs and fires.
It happens so fast that he doesn't realize the hook didn't catch on the spire until he's already reeling in. "What—"
"Cool," Superboy says, looking at the grapple clamped around his hand—a non powered human would probably have broken fingers from the force, if not worse.
Tim lets the line reel up until he's hanging about ten feet below Superboy. "I kind of need that." He tugs lightly on the line.
Superboy looks down at him with a bright grin. "You still haven't had a real view of Metropolis," he says. "Hang on!"
"Wait, I think I'm good actu—whoa!" Tim clutches the handle of the grapple gun, gasping for breath in the sudden wind-tunnel force as Superboy rockets upwards, then stops so fast the line goes slack. Tim flails back and forth for a moment, glaring up at him. “Are you nuts? Put me down, I’m not gonna be able to breathe—”
“Look!” Superboy gestures down with his free hand.
Tim takes a deep breath, squeezes his eyes shut for a moment as he tries not to think about the fact he’s five hundred feet up with the only thing holding him being the line wrapped around Superboy’s hand. Then he turns his face towards the ground and opens his eyes.
“Oh…”
Past the whipping edge of his cape and his split-toed boots he can see the lights of Metropolis spreading below: gently undulating red and white streams of cars along the web of streets, skyscrapers picked out like constructs of light, and in the center of it all, the bright globe of the Daily Planet in its pillar of spotlights.
“Everybody down there, they have their own lives, their own families, and it all comes together like this.” Superboy sounds thoughtful, and Tim looks up to see an almost wonderstruck expression on his face as he stares past him to the ground. “Wild to think about. Beautiful, right?”
“Yeah…”
Superboy turns to look at him, then blinks, the playful grin back on his face. “Pizza? I know a place that’s open late.” Before Tim can reply, Superboy swoops towards the waterfront, still holding onto the grapple.
“You don’t have to tow me!” Tim protests, letting the line run out several more feet.
“Give your feathers a rest, Robin, I’ve got this!”
Tim can’t deny that his arms are getting tired after grappling all over Metropolis, so he decides to give in gracefully, letting Superboy pull him across town until they set down on the roof of one of the boardwalk restaurants.
“Back in a sec, they know me here…” He dives over the edge of the roof, then flips back up again, lounging in the air in front of Tim. “Please tell me you don’t like any weird toppings.”
“When it comes to pizza? I’m as boring as they come.”
“Then we’re gonna get along just fine.” Superboy fires finger-guns at him, then swoops towards the ground. Tim hears him land, then a jingle of bells as he opens the door. “Guess whose favorite Superboy just turned up!”
The door closes before Tim can hear any more of the conversation, but he catches the first syllable of an excited greeting.
“They really like you in there,” he says as Superboy floats up to the roof with a pile of pizza boxes ten minutes later.
“Another satisfied customer, what can I say,” Superboy laughs, balancing the pile of boxes on one hand and grabbing for Tim’s grapple with the other.
“Oh no, not again,” Tim says, holding it behind his back.
Superboy shrugs. “Have it your way. Figure we’ll stop up at the Planet.”
Five minutes (and as many ‘Okay, but are you sure you don’t want a tow?’s) later, Superboy and Tim are perched in the Daily Planet sign ringing its globe, the pizza boxes wedged in the fork of the ‘y’.
“I’ll pay my half of the pizza,” Tim says around a mouthful of stuffed crust, reaching for his belt.
“Don’t sweat it, man, these were on the house anyway.” Tim mumbles his surprise as Superboy keeps talking. “Yeah, I saved their restaurant once, or you’d think that from the way they talk about it. I don’t think it made the news or anything, like, it was just an oil fire. Shhhhwhoom.” He mimes sliding a pan lid gently closed with a slice of olive mozzarella thin crust, then laughs. “Genuinely they did not need a super for that. But the fire doesn’t care who puts it out, right—and what am I supposed to do, tell them not to give me free pizza? I’d have to be nuts!”
Tim laughs, swinging his feet in the air as he leans back and stretches. “Listen, it’s been fun, but I’ve got to be getting back.”
“You got it.” Superboy holds up a hand.
Tim hesitates for a moment, then brushes some crumbs off his gloves and joins him in a slightly buttery hi-five.
“See you around, bird boy.”
“Maybe.” Tim jumps down from the Planet’s ring to the roof level, then turns around to look up, smiling back as Superboy gives him another two-finger salute. “Listen, nothing personal, but…don’t follow me this time, okay?”
Something around Superboy’s eyes goes tight, but he still laughs. “Not my usual style after a date, but whatever you say. I am an alien of my word.”
Tim waves and runs for the edge of the roof, firing the grapple. Somehow it’s never felt so close to flying before, he thinks as he releases the line to flip in midair.