Chapter Text
So maybe working at the cave was not the best idea Tim had had. Looking at the cases, the debriefing, and even the work for WE. He knew he wasn’t gonna get any sleep this time. What made it even more insufferable was the fact that Jason and Damian were trying to get a rise out of him. They kept throwing insults; calling him weak, pathetic, telling him that he should have never been Robin, that he would never belong in the family, and telling him that he should have stayed gone. All while Dick and Bruce did nothing, hell even Alfred did nothing while he set down some coffee and tea. Cass was training while listening to music. It was honestly starting to get tiring and annoying. Tim seriously started to think that Damian and Jason seriously had nothing to do.
He was about to open his computer when he felt the feeling of dread and cold. Two combinations that Tim wishes to never feel again. He turned towards Bruce and the others, they were on high alert immediately, Cass even took off her headphones. He realized he wasn’t being paranoid. Good to know on any other occasion. They turned towards the entrance from where the cold came from. And there it was behind Dick. It was floating slowly, the cold feeling spreading. A humanoid shape dressed in a black cloak, almost wraith-like.
Tim wanted to yell at him to move, but he knew it would be useless. The closer it got to Dick, the more the older male froze. His face was frozen in shock. Tim knew it was a matter of moments before Dick was sent into a state he could never come back from. Bruce and Jason took out their weapons but their attacks did nothing. Almost immediately, He reached down to his ankle, fingers brushing against the hidden holster, and pulled out a slender, intricately carved stick—a wand, about 11 inches long. He had it strapped to his ankle and under his pants. He stepped in front of Damian pushing the younger boy behind him with his left hand. The younger boy protested with an insult, but Tim didn’t budge. He pointed his wand towards the dementor and waved it, his movements confident and precise.
“Expecto Patronum!”
From the tip of his wand, a light misty light came and took the shape of a rave. It was made out of white vapor and translucent. It flew towards the Dementor and shielded Dick. Flapping its wings it drew the Dementor back making it fly away while the raven followed it.
Wand in hand, Tim walked towards where he was sitting and gathered his stuff. When he turned back around, they were all looking at him with faces of skepticism mixed with shock, or in Bruce’s case, a frown. If Tim didn’t worry at that moment, he would make a snarky comment. But this wasn’t the time. He placed his wand back around his ankle before throwing his backpack over his shoulder. He looked at them and they were all still looking at him.
“Tim?” Dick slowly said.
Tim wanted to explain, he really did, but he knew there was no time. If that dementor was here, it could mean there was abound to be more. He walked towards his locker that after a while Dick convinced Alfred to convince Bruce they needed some. He took out his clothes and pushed them into his backpack. He walked towards the monitor but was stopped by Jason.
“What the hell was that?” Jason demanded, his voice rough and disbelieving. “And what the hell did you just do, Replacement?”
Tim didn’t answer immediately. His mind was racing, torn between explaining everything and the pressing need to get them out of there. He couldn’t afford to waste time. There was no time to waste.
“We need to leave. Now,” Tim said, his voice calm but urgent. He could see that Damian was about to protest but Tim cut him off. “There’s no time to explain. Get whatever you think you’ll need. We’re going to Drake Manor. We’re going on foot.”
“What the hell is going on, Tim?” Dick demanded, finally finding his voice. He was still shaken, his mind struggling to comprehend what had just happened. Tim understood, well at least tried to.
Tim ignored the question, his patience wearing thin. He glanced at Cass, who had taken off her headphones, her eyes full of questions. “Cass, get your skates,” he instructed. “We need to move.”
Jason, still reeling from the shock, was not as easy to understand. “Answer the damn question!” he shouted. “What the hell was that thing? What the hell are you?”
Tim whirled around, his eyes flashing with anger. His patience with him and Damian was already strained and this made it worse. “Unless you want that Dementor to come back with its friends and suck the happiness out of you, you better get your shit and move!” His voice was harsh, filled with an edge that none of them had ever heard from him before.
There was a moment of stunned silence, and some hesitation before they all left to grab their stuff. Some were just freaked out, that much was obvious, while others (2 to be specific) were more angry. As they hurriedly packed, Tim pulled out his phone, his hands shaking slightly as he dialed a number.
“Hey, Kon,” Tim’s voice was softer now, but it still had some shakiness. “No, no, I’m fine… Listen, remember what I told you about that one school I go to?...yeah, something happened. I might be off the grid for a while. I’ll have to take the Bats…I promise I’ll be fine… Tell Bart and Cassie I’ll be back soon. I promise….okay, bye.” He laughed a bit at the end due to Kon’s mother henning.
He ended the call quickly, shoving the phone into his pocket. He heard footsteps come down the cave’s door. He looked up to see Cass with a backpack and a duffle bag. She looked so determined that he didn’t have the heart to tell her that she overpacked. So he settled for a smile that she returned. She signed ‘ready’, and Tim nodded. The others joined soon after. They each had a backpack and some kind of extra stuff. Tim’s gaze lowered to all their bags and just sighted. This was going to be a long trip. You didn’t have to be a detective to know what they were all feeling. Well you did, but you could tell clearly. Damian and Jason were frustrated and angry. Dick was confused and worried. Scared as well but that was normal since his encounter with the dementor. Cass was apprehensive and concerned. Alfred was also concerned. Bruce was trickier. Tim could tell he was concerned but also freaked out in a way.
When they were all ready, Tim led them out of the cave, his wand still around his ankle. He hasn’t used it since May. It will almost be three months now in about a week and a half since then. They moved through the dark streets of Gotham, sticking to the shadows. They were quiet as they walked. It wasn’t too far. As they walked, Tim sent Babs a message telling her, Duke, and Stephanie that they were gonna be off the grid for a while and to keep Gotham safe. He left out some details, for obvious reasons, and told them they would be back soon. Cass skated near Tim who had his skateboard, both further away from the rest.
Dick walked with Jason, Bruce, and Damian. They made sure that no one or anything was following them. He couldn’t shake off that feeling he had in the cave when that…thing showed up. It was as if all his fears were thrown at him simultaneously. All that pain, that fear, it was unnatural. He knew they all felt it, but Jason and Bruce powered through it. Tim powered through it, he even protected Damian. Dick looked at Tim as he smiled lightly as Cass roller skated beside him. Dick couldn’t remember the last time he saw Tim skate. He remembered how much Tim loved it when he was younger and even tried to teach Dick how to use the board. It must’ve been years ago, almost 4 at least.
“I swear, one way or another I’m gonna get answers out of that kid,” Jason said as he walked beside Dick, Bruce was on Jason’s right while Damian was on his left. Alfred was on Bruce’s right.
“Do any of you know why he chose Drake Manor?” Dick asked.
“I fear that I do not,” Alfred said. He himself had packed a backpack and a duffle bag. They all had. “As far as I am concerned, the place has been abandoned for years,”
“Tt, this is a waste of time. We must find out what that creature is,” Damian said. The boy walked close to Dick in a sort of defensive way. Any other time Dick would have found it adorable, but right now Dick saw it as a way to keep him safe.
“Tim called it a Dementor,” Bruce said, looking ahead. “He said it could suck the happiness out of you,”
“If Timbit knows what that thing is, he must know more,” Jason said as he looked at Tim. Just what the hell did that kid get into? The feeling he felt when that so-called Dementor floated into the cave, it was something Jason never wanted to feel again. His fists clenched harder on the strap of his duffle bag as he looked at Tim. The way he used whatever the hell that stick was and how it created that bird. It must’ve been magic.
“Well, I for one don’t want the happiness sucked out of me. Come on, Dami,” Dick said, grabbing Damian’s hand and walking faster.
“Old Man,” Jason said, not looking at Bruce.
“I know,” was all Bruce said, he looked at Tim. The way he moved and used whatever magic he had. How or when did he learn that? Bruce pried himself a great detective, so how did he not know that his son knew magic? How come Tim never mentioned it?
They kept walking until they reached the old, abandoned Drake Manor. The manor stood before them, cold and broken, a shell of what it once was. It had been abandoned since the deaths of Jack and Janet. They called in cursed because of their bad luck and the fact that Tim was left orphaned. No one wanted to buy it after that. It was pretty much just an old house now with vines growing around it. It brought bad memories back but Tim just pushed them away. It wasn’t the time for that now.
“Tim, why are we here?” Dick asked slowly
“I made Drake Manor into a safe house recently. No one knows about it and no one would suspect since well it’s been abandoned,” he replied as he looked at the house.
Dick looked at Tim and then back at the old manor. He felt guilty for a lot of reasons. Mainly because he didn’t realize Tim made a whole safe house just next door. Did he truly not trust them so much that he had to make a new safe house? How did no one notice?
Tim approached the door, waved his wand, and muttered a spell under his breath, “Revelio.” The doorbell transformed into a scanner and keypad, much to the surprise of the Batfam. Tim quickly inputted a code, and the door creaked open, revealing a darkened hallway.
“Get inside,” Tim ordered, his tone leaving no room for argument. They followed him in, their unease growing with every step. Once they were all inside, it was dusty and abandoned. It looked like any other abandoned building around. There was some furniture like a couch, rug, and chandelier. It all looked like a building out of a horror movie.
“You know, I knew I expected too much when you said this was a safe house,” Jason laughed as he touched a picture.
He wiped it with a hand letting him see a small boy, not much older than six in front of two adults. You could tell by the eyes and the way he was too thin for a normal six-year-old, especially by who the two adults were, the small boy was Tim. But he wasn’t smiling happily, it was the smile he used for meetings.
Jason looked up to see Tim walk to a wall and tap it with the tip of his wand in a circular motion, then tapped it over the top and the bottom of the circle and finally in the middle. He wrote some kind of runes as well before muttering the same word from before. If Jason didn’t know any better, he would say it was kinda freaky even by Bat standards. Jason watched as Tim grabbed what seemed like a feather, a quill, and wrote some kind of runes on the wall with it. It looked weird watching Tim do any of this stuff. He looked nothing like the Tim Jason had come to know. But if he was being honest, Jason didn’t know Tim.
“Revelio,”
The room changed in the blink of an eye. What had been an old dusty abandoned room was now a brand-new hallway. It was narrow and the side table with the picture was gone, replaced with a dark brown entryway table with some pictures. On the right, there was a shoe holder and a long coat hanger. The red carpet was still there but it was different. If you walked even more forward you could see stairs leading upstairs. It was so different from what they had just seen. By the left, you could see a living room.
They followed Tim who led them to the living room. It wasn’t much yet. There was a fireplace with a flat-screen tv over it and some pictures. In the center, there was a huge double chaise lounge couch that could be made into a bed. It had some throw pillows and a blanket. Under the couch and just in the center of the room was a white carpet with a coffee table with wheels in front of the couch and some books. There were some dim lights all over the room too, some in the back and others in the front of the room, it gave a nice aura to the room. But even so there was a small chandelier with lights that looked like candles. Some window benches were covered by dark drapes by the windows. There were also some other chairs like a wingback, a club, and a lawson. A huge bookshelf was in the back of the room, which was to the right. It was the perfect place to hang out, according to Bart, Cassie, and Kon. But Tim was sure that they wanted to add more stuff.
“My word,” Alfred said as he looked around the room. Old as he was, dressed in a tuxedo, he didn’t look tired at all.
Tim looked at them all and frowned. There were only at least 4 rooms ready since construction of the house had barely begun. Four rooms and there were seven of them. Tim didn’t like those odds. Especially with the Dementor out there. Plus, Tim didn’t fancy sharing a room with any of them, except Cass, no thank you. In the best-case scenario, they’ll sleep in the living room. Now, all Tim had to do was find the extra blankets and pillows, which was easier said than done, thank you Cassie and Bart. Those two put them away in places Tim didn’t know. Damn, those two.
“Damn,” Jason’s voice snapped him out of his thoughts. He had taken a seat on the couch, feet up on the coffee table. It was soft and comfortable. “Nice place, Timbit,”
“Tt, you spent Father’s money on this place?” Damian said, taking the place of the wingback.
“No, I used my own money,” Tim said as he pushed the coffee table off the carpet, much to the displeasure of Jason. “If you’ve forgotten, I was born rich. I am the heir of the Drake fortune plus, Drake Industries is still running,”
They all looked at him in surprise. They had concluded that Janet’s and Jack’s company had been shut down after their death. It had only made sense. They didn’t think it was still running, especially since Tim was still young. But Bruce had to realize that Tim was the one running WE along with Lucius more than Bruce himself had.
Tim walked to the center of the room and took out his wand. A hand moved as he spoke. “Protego Maxima. Salvio Hexia. Protego. “ Tim began muttering more spells, layers of protection weaving around the manor like an invisible net. From the other’s point of view, it looked like small balls of light shot out of the tip of the wand.
It was only after the manor was fully secured that Tim finally turned to face them, his expression hard, his eyes filled with an old, deep pain. The Batfam watched him in stunned silence, the reality of what they had just witnessed still sinking in.
“You want to know what that was?” Tim’s voice was low, almost detached. “Fine. I’ll speak,”