Chapter Text
Dick sat on a plain sofa, trying to shove down anxiety. He was not looking forward to reopening this conversation, but it had to be done. He had to know. He needed to hear Tim say it in plain words.
Tim slid a couple coasters off the coffee table, tossing them into a stack, before proceeding to—sit on the coffee table?
Did he not want to sit any closer? Dick deliberately chose the sofa to increase the chances of Tim sitting beside him, and instead his little brother perched on the edge of the table? Did that mean something? Or was it just Tim sitting weirdly as usual? Was he—
“So, what did you want to talk about?”
Fuck. Okay. Now or never.
“A couple months ago, when you said you understood why I—” Dick could literally see the light leaving Tim’s eyes. At least he knew they were mutually averse to this discussion. “What exactly did you understand?”
Tim took a slow breath. “I…understand that you…”
Trusted you as an equal? Needed you as an ally? Knew you were ready to grow? Wanted what was best for you?
“Can’t help me.” When Dick lurched forward, Tim just put both hands on Dick’s shoulders and eased him back. “It’s not forever, just…for now. While you’re busy,” he said with a gentle smile, like that didn’t make it worse. Like the idea of his little brother wistfully giving up on him didn’t feel like a knife slipping between his ribs. “You still have so much on your plate, you can’t worry about me too. That’s what I understand.”
Dick slowly shook his head. “My plate—What does th—Of course I worry about you!” I worried about you the entire time you were gone, I worry about you disappearing again when I’m not looking, I worry about—
“But you’re too busy to act,” Tim replied with a smothering air of finality. “And you need me to be okay…to help Batman.”
…What?
“Even if Batman isn’t Bruce…and even if I’m not Robin.” Tim’s gaze softened in some mockery of contentment. “That’s what I’m here for. I just…forgot for a while.”
If Tim could stop sounding so sincere, that would be really great.
“No…Tim—” You can’t seriously think—
“Can you look me in the eyes and say that you’re okay? That you don’t need support right now?” Tim asked. “It’s a lot of stress being Batman, I get it. You have higher priorities…but I’ll still be here afterwards. It’s not a big deal—”
“It is!” Dick snapped. But then his brother’s eyes subtly widened in genuine confusion, and the spark of anger disappeared as quickly as it ignited. That wasn’t an argument Dick could win, not yet. Not like this. “Just…ask me whatever you need to understand why I did the things I did.” You’ll trust your own deduction far more than my word.
Tim searched his face for…something. “Is making me ‘understand’ really that important? Is that what you need?”
The phrasing made Dick a little nauseous, but it wasn’t…wrong. “Yes.” I need you to know that I didn’t want to hurt you. That I knew you’d be okay. I need you to know that what I did—it’s trust, in your strength, I wasn’t—
“Okay. What did you want to happen after I walked into the cave?” Tim asked eventually. “If you could skip the confrontation and go straight to work, where did you want me to go?”
“Nowhere specific? I just…” I needed you. I need you. I can’t lose you. Not again. “I wanted you there with me.”
“As ‘support’?”
“Yes.”
“With what name?”
“You could make any name you wanted.” Become whoever you wanted…
“My first task was to make a new name and costume, then,” Tim said, subtly nodding. “Okay. Was I on a particular time limit, or just ‘as quickly as possible’?”
Furrowing his eyebrows, Dick said, “I mean…however long it took?”
“So you planned for me to be off the field for an undetermined length of time, doodling little costume designs and brainstorming new names,” Tim concluded.
“I—I guess, for a little while?”
“So I wasn’t going to be anyone’s ally, let alone yours.”
Oh.
“Of course you were—I mean, we always worked well together, we had each other’s backs, we…”
“Yes, I remember,” Tim replied evenly. “And I wanted to support you the way I always did…I would have let you stand on my shoulders, if you needed that. I was prepared to do anything for you.”
“Then why didn’t you?” Dick could barely refrain from begging. They were supposed to help each other.
“Because, well…back then, I felt like…hm.” Tim tilted his head and got this uncomfortably distant look in his eyes. “Like you shattered me on the cave floor and tried to use my cracked rib cage as a stepping stool,” he breathed, “and then you wondered why I couldn’t lift you any higher.”
Icy clarity doused Dick from head to toe. This was worse than anything he had imagined.
“How could I help you from down there?” Tim looked up at the ceiling and blinked a little too rapidly. “I had to crawl off somewhere just to relearn how to stand.”
A bullet through the foot would have hurt less than this.
Dick knew it wouldn’t be easy, losing Robin never would be, but he didn’t want to shatter—
Tim lowered his gaze and let out a little huff. “And Bruce wasn’t there, but he…It doesn’t matter anymore.” It does matter! What did Bruce do?! “I’m here now, and I can support you the way I should have. I didn’t even have to make a new name…Guess I should’ve just been Red Robin from the start.”
Fuck, say something, comfort him, fix this—
Dick nearly vibrated out of his skin in an effort not to reach for Tim again. “If I got you to stay…you wouldn’t have gathered all that evidence to find Bruce. It was the right decision.” You did good, you saved him, I’m proud of you. “You know that, right?”
Tim remained silent.
“Right?”
“That person in Metropolis,” Tim blatantly redirected, “did you actually expect that to help me?”
“Tim—”
“You didn’t just need me out of the way?”
“It—”
Tim waited.
And Dick relented, “Of course I didn’t want you ‘out of the way’.”
Or shattered…
“Then why isn’t Damian in therapy?” Tim continued. “You said he was your ‘responsibility’. When exactly did you start taking responsibility for him?”
“…I knew it would be effective for you, but…” Robin was the only thing Damian wanted. He would never have accepted anything less. He needed to be Robin before Dick could even consider introducing any sort of therapy. “But Damian wouldn’t respond well to it,” he finished lamely, slumping his shoulders.
Tim just stared, unblinking and unimpressed. “So…what, I was curable crazy, but he’s just a lost cause? Is that your final answer?”
“Okay, first of all, you weren’t crazy, you were grieving—and you were right,” Dick corrected. You were grieving, and you were broken, and you were right. All at the same time. “Everyone knows that now.”
“Not so sure about that,” Tim muttered under his breath.
(…Dick would address that later.)
“And second, well, Damian just wasn’t ready for therapy,” Dick conceded. “He was still too volatile and, honestly, not that good at keeping his identity secret.” Even now, separating the Son of Batman from the Son of Bruce Wayne was a bit…
Tim’s first real emotions began to creep across his face. And they weren’t positive ones. Confusion bled into disbelief bled into fury bled into disgust. “He was…That makes it worse, actually. If you didn’t think he could keep a secret identity or was at risk of harming a therapist in a non-violent situation, then he shouldn’t have been out in costume! I thought you trusted him more than that, to be able to choose him to—” His voice grew louder until it cracked and cut off entirely. Then returned to his flat tone, emotions under lock and key. “Just to be perfectly clear…You think Damian is still ‘too volatile’ for therapy? That’s why he doesn’t have anything else?”
“Wh…What are you talking about? ‘Anything else’?”
Tim grasped Dick’s shoulder, maybe in desperation, maybe frustration. “Is Robin the only thing you’ve done for his ‘guidance’?”
And Dick didn’t know how to answer that. Sure, everything was tangentially relevant to Robin, but it wasn’t like that was all Damian did. He had started doing more in the cave, appreciating the background parts of being a Bat, he met some people on patrol which was…Robin but not Robin, and—
“…I gave you too much credit,” Tim said, dropping his hand. “And I’m deeply regretting that.”
No…nonono, this was not the way this was supposed to go, Tim had to understand, he always—Dick needed Tim to believe in him, in his choice. “I did my best!”
“Your ‘best’ wasn’t good enough.”
“I didn’t know I was gonna do it alone,” Dick protested. He knew he didn’t do great, okay, but he…did pretty good at least? Right? Good enough? If Tim was there like expected, then they…they would’ve…Dick didn’t know, because Tim wasn’t there! He left. “I said I needed you!”
Tim just offered a sickeningly smug Damian impression, baring his teeth as he sneered, “‘For what?’” It left Dick so shaken that he failed to respond before Tim scoffed and stood up. “That’s what I thought.”
“No, I—” Dick reached for Tim’s wrist. “Tim, come on, we can still—”
Tim allowed himself to be tethered by a desperate hand. He just stood there, looking down, observing Dick with clear disinterest. “Y’know…” he said hollowly, “I thought if it was just me getting hurt, it didn’t matter.”
Dick’s eyebrows pinched in confusion. “What?”
“I thought you had to be focusing on teaching him more important things than tolerating me, because I’m not even there…But you weren’t, were you?” Tim’s emotions came back online slowly, starting with a subtle twitch of his lips and a weak huff of a laugh. “I was so stupid…You had to believe I was wrong about Bruce for your own sanity—”
“And I’m sorry about—”
“—and I had to believe you were right about Damian for mine. But look where it got us.” Tim yanked his wrist away and dragged that hand through his hair, murmuring to himself. “If you just trusted me that Bruce was coming back, you wouldn’t have stuck Damian in that costume for some imaginary birthright. If I didn’t trust you about Damian’s imaginary progress, I would’ve intervened before it ever got this bad. But now we’re fucked and have an endless uphill battle ahead!”
Any offense at the commentary immediately succumbed to the relief that Tim included himself in the supposed “battle” coming up. Maybe we’re fucked, but we can fix it.
“This whole time, it’s been fucking months…Months…what the fuck…” Tim’s gaze eventually cleared up and focused on Dick, as if he had forgotten there was another person—and was not relieved with who he saw.
Dick tensed under the scrutiny.
“Just so you know, the only reason I’m not getting Damian out of here is because you’ve made sure he won’t trust anyone but the people who are failing him most.” Dick didn’t do that…did he? “He has to realize it himself.”
Tim leaned forward, just slightly, forcing Dick to tilt his head even further up. “You just better hope he figures it out before you all get him killed.”
Dick’s heart dropped into his stomach. “Tim! Don’t say that!” He shot to his feet, but somehow, his tiny brother still seemed to tower over him. Why was that?
“Are you seriously more bothered by my words than your actions?” Tim demanded. “You wrapped Robin’s cape around Damian like a fucking noose, and he’s not going to survive if you don’t change!
“This whole fucking time, you kept saying he’s been getting better, but he was doing it on his own! What were you doing for him?!”
“What—Where is this even coming from? You don’t even like Damian!” Wait, that’s not what I wanted to say—
“That doesn’t mean I want him unprepared or dead!” Tim shot back. “You were the first Robin, the best Robin, you know what it takes, and not only did you not make sure you could keep each other safe, but you fucking endangered other people, too!”
Why couldn’t Tim accept that Damian was getting better? There were…complications at the start, but that hardly ever happened anymore. “We’re not endangering anyone!”
“Really? How much progress has he made, then?” Tim asked. “If you want me to ‘understand’ why you ‘did the things you did’, then tell me what you’ve accomplished since making him Robin. Report exactly how he’s improved.”
Dick fumbled for the words. “I—He listens to me more. We…work well together, mostly. I trust him, and…”
“I’m asking about actual progress, not shit he should’ve been able to do before ever stepping outside!” Tim pressed. “Does anyone else trust him? Apart from you, can he actually work with anyone? Does he treat any allies with decency? Does he comfort victims?”
“He’s worked with other people!” And sometimes he ran off alone and met people. “Damian’s just—”
“A kid? Learning?” Tim threw his arms out in exasperation. “How long will this pre-Robin training last, Dick? What will happen in the meantime? What’s already happened that you hid from me?”
“Nothing—Nothing will happen!” Dick insisted. “Everything’s been fine, and Damian’s been getting better—”
“He can’t just be better. He has to actually be good.
“And he’s not.”
If Tim would just listen, if he just…stopped with this bias, if he—Damian was a good Robin, a good hero. What did Dick have to do to convince Tim? “He’s a good kid, okay, he’s improved so much…You just can’t see it—”
Tim let out an impatient huff. “Oh, I do see it—I’ve been seeing it this entire time, and it’s not fucking enough.”
“He’s still growing—”
“And you act like growing taller is the same as learning to climb higher,” Tim retorted. “I mean, fuck, he hasn’t even tried to jump, and you’re still trying to insist he’s made all this ‘progress’!
“Go ahead and praise him for surviving all you want, that’s a real accomplishment with this lifestyle, but maybe don’t fucking lie that he’s doing anything more.”
Dick didn’t know how to get through to Tim—to make him see what Dick saw. It wasn’t supposed to be like this.
“Do you seriously think he’s ‘too volatile’ for therapy with professionals, but perfectly safe for the civilians on the streets?” Tim asked incredulously. “Are you even listening to yourself? At least I acknowledge when I sound insane!”
Damian was just…He wanted to do what he wanted to do. And if he didn’t want to do something, Dick couldn’t force it. “It’s complicated, okay?! But as long as I trust him on the field, it’s fine.”
“You may have convinced yourself you trust him. But you can’t even trust him to keep a secret identity.
“And you are actively handicapping other heroes by handcuffing them to a baby demon until they build up a tolerance. Are their lives worth so little that you would risk whole teams for Damian’s forced socialization?”
“Heroes are perfectly capable of taking care of themselves,” Dick argued. “It’s not a risk to have him out there!”
“So they work better with him than without him? He improves their focus instead of being a distraction? He goes into high-pressure situations with a level head and doesn’t escalate them?” Tim widened his eyes innocently and asked, “He watches an ally’s back and isn’t tempted to stab it?”
God, Dick was so fucking tired of having to defend Damian to other people. Especially to Tim. “Why are you so determined to see the worst in him?!”
Without looking away, Tim replied, “Because I’ve never seen anything else.”
Dick opened his mouth to argue but—well, okay, yeah, Tim hadn’t seen anything else…but that didn’t mean Damian’s better side didn’t exist. And Tim antagonized Damian every chance he got, of course he didn’t see the good parts!
“He is nothing more than miserable to be around…I might even hate him sometimes,” Tim said, tone deceptively neutral—until tacking on, “if I had the energy to spare.”
(Dick winced on Damian’s behalf; the kid never showed it, but he really did care about Tim’s approval.)
“But I don’t blame him for that. I blame Bruce for not explaining the rules from the start,” Tim said, counting on his fingers. “I blame Alfred for prioritizing Bruce’s blood over ours.” A second finger. “And I blame you”—he pointed at Dick’s chest—“for forgetting what the fuck Robin was made for.”
Dick didn’t forget anything! “I know what Robin is, what it means.”
“Are you sure?” Tim asked. “Light. Hope. Love. Safety. Does Damian represent any of that? Does he show gentleness? Does he demonstrate mercy and second chances? Does he actually value human lives or just following The Rule?”
Maybe it hadn’t all come to the surface yet, but Dick saw what Damian could be, the good he wanted to do. “He’s…”
“You failed Damian. You failed Gotham. And you failed your past self. How does it feel to have abandoned everyone you once swore to protect, just to coddle an unqualified child that wanted Robin?”
“Robin was all Damian wanted!” Dick exclaimed. “There was nothing else I could do! I did my best with what I had!”
Tim stared at him, perhaps a little stunned. “…Fucking incredible. I finally understand. The reason you ‘did the things you did’ is that you weren’t fucking thinking at all.” He didn’t so much as shake an angry fist, but Dick honestly itched to start a physical fight…just to let Tim knock him out cold so he could stop hearing this.
What should Dick have done? What would Tim have done?
(…Maybe he should have asked.)
“I was self-centered enough to believe his lack of visible progress had something to do with me. I was prepared to keep out of sight, out of mind.”
Tim means…out of Damian’s sight, right? Tim wasn’t going to disappear again, right?
“But you were self-centered enough to think your mere presence and name would undo nine years of trauma. You have a lot of influence over people, but you can’t save him alone; you’re not a therapist. And you also can’t sacrifice other people for him. Not for Robin.
“Heroes don’t get that choice. After over a decade of surviving this life, I would’ve thought you knew that.”
Dick wasn’t sacrificing anyone…Damian saved people…
Maybe he was a little less efficient, but no one could be at top efficiency all the time! And maybe he left a few more casualties than the average Robin, but that was just because he started out in an all out war. And maybe his comforting could use some work, but that wasn’t all Robin did. And maybe…
“This is a waste of time,” Tim muttered, interrupting Dick’s spiral. “You can’t convince me, I can’t convince you, and we can’t get anywhere. I’ll j—”
“No, we can—” It couldn’t end here. Dick hadn’t made any progress at all. If I just shut up long enough to get through the disagreements on Damian, I’ll be able to gather more information on Tim. “Look, you clearly have more things to say, so just say them to me.” When met with judgmental silence, Dick just urged him, “Get it all out there!”
Whatever else there was, even if it hurt—There were so many things Dick never knew…things that Tim was willing to reveal right now, in this conversation. For the first time, maybe last time.
Tim took his time to weigh the pros and cons, gears rotating behind his calculating eyes, but eventually:
“How serious are you about that?”
“Completely,” Dick said.
“Can you step back for one fucking moment and look at Damian objectively?”
“Yes.” Dick could do that. He could.
“If I say something you don’t like, will you fight it?”
“…No.” Dick was an adult, he could listen to things he didn’t like.
“If I say I’m not angry, just disappointed, what will you do?”
“Apologize?” But Tim was definitely angry…
“If I say I think you’re killing Damian, what will you do?”
“Ask…how not to.” Dick didn’t believe it, though.
“If I say I don’t think you did your ‘best’, what will you do?”
“…Ask why?” But I did do my best!
“Don’t worry too much, you’ll know why. Come on.”
Tim walked away and Dick trailed after him like a duckling. Like Tim used to trail after Dick. “Where are we going?”
“Kitchen. I need water for this.”
Fuck.
I uhhhh couldn’t shut the fuck up. so I split the conversation in two parts. so look forward to that. eventually. (I also cut my quote rants off…but if anyone (for some reason) wants to watch me McFucking Lose It about certain lines of dialogue/narration, I can post that shit too)