Chapter Text
"Jason," Tim gasped. "Kiss me."
Immediately, Jason pitched backwards, pulling away as if he’d been shocked, as if Tim’s words were static - and indeed, Tim was electric, his body taut and quivering, the hairs that had escaped the knot at the back of his head fanning out around his face. Jason blinked, all swagger evaporating, stunned speechless by the sight of Tim underneath him, breathing heavily, flushed and undone, daring and desperate and…
Wanting.
Jason moved without thinking, leaning forward to press a tentative, chaste kiss to Tim’s open lips. He couldn’t help it really, not with Tim looking the way he did, staring up at him the way he was. He pulled back before he could fully comprehend what had happened, looking quizzically at Tim as he did so.
Tim followed Jason with his hand, the tentacle that had restrained him slipping and coiling lower on his wrist as Tim reached up and grazed a thumb across Jason’s cheekbone, his jaw, his lower lip, the ridges of his thumbprint pulling at the chapped, delicate skin.
“Is that the best you’ve got?” Tim murmured, his hand falling from Jason’s face and stretching back up over his head, his fingers curling around the tip of the tentacle that suckered at his palm. Jason shivered.
“I…”Jason muttered. His voice had gone hoarse. He swallowed. “You really want this, don’t you.”
“You have no idea,” Tim breathed.
Jason’s hands wandered slowly across Tim’s chest, skimming over every ridge and valley over the damp fabric of Tim’s shirt, digging in slightly when he couldn’t contain the tension that raked sharp claws across his consciousness. His fingers shook.
“Tim…”
“I know what you’re thinking,” Tim whispered. “I know you’re afraid.”
Jason swallowed.
“Jason. Have I ever given you a reason to be?”
Jason’s hands twitched, his fingers sinking deeper into Tim’s skin. He took a deep breath and leaned down, his head coming to rest just below the jut of Tim’s collarbone.
“ ... no , ” he breathed.
Tim hummed, arching up into Jason’s touch. “You know what I’m thinking,” Tim murmured into Jason’s hair. Jason quaked against his chest. “Jay.” Tim’s voice was warm and dizzying. “Do you need me to say it out loud?”
Jason let out a quiet groan, then pressed a kiss to Tim’s chest, drowning in the feeling of the heartbeat, strong and sure, he found beneath his lips. Unwilling to listen to the doubts scratching at the corners of his mind, he kissed Tim again, and again, mouthing at the fabric of Tim’s shirt until it was damp with his saliva before nudging Tim’s chin back and leaving more kisses like fallen pink petals along the column of his throat. He could hide here forever, Jason thought hazily, losing himself in the soft sounds Tim made as he moved upward, the thrum of Tim’s heartbeat, now trapped under Jason’s calloused palm, flying faster with every touch of Jason’s lips. With his free hand, he toyed tentatively at the hem of Tim’s shirt, recalling vivid memories of what that creamy skin looked like when painted like a canvas in the soft reds and hungry violets of Jason’s adoration.
“What do you want, Jay,” Tim demanded quietly.
Jason pulled back, breathing heavily, his mind a ship caught in a stormy sea. He wanted to run. He wanted to curl into Tim’s touch and forget himself completely. Never in the seven years since his resurrection had he dreamed that he’d find himself here , never dreamed that someone could look past what he was and want him, love him anyways. He could never have prepared for a moment like this. Tim’s heartbeat was the earthquake that shook Jason’s fault-lines, changing him with every desperate breath.
He sighed, searching Tim’s face for answers to questions Tim couldn’t possibly have - or maybe he could. Tim had always been too perceptive for his own good. Jason didn’t know. “You lookin’ for the abridged version or the full story?” Jason stalled.
Tim raised an eyebrow. “I want you to tell me honestly. What do you want?”
What did he want?
Jason wanted…
This.
Whatever this was.
For as long as he could have it.
And he wasn’t entirely sure how to express that, so instead of answering, he returned his attentions to Tim’s jawline, Tim’s throat, Tim’s shoulder, leaving slow, ponderous kisses wherever he wandered. Tim hummed at his touch, patient as always as he waited for Jason to sort through his thoughts. The tentacles around his wrists were happy to let Tim reach down and brush lightly over the curves Jason’s shoulders, the hard lines of his arms; as Jason peppered kisses under his clavicles, Tim ran his fingers gently through Jason’s hair, their easy silence stirring with questions neither felt ready to form.
“I…” Jason finally muttered, pulling his head back to cast a look of dismay at Tim’s shirt, “want you out of this,” he decided.
Tim grinned. “That can be arranged,” he replied, lifting his arms back over his head. Jason coaxed the shirt from Tim’s body with ease, tossing it aside before looking back to admire the view of Tim beneath him, his blush spilling from the slant of his cheekbones, trickling down his neck, and pooling in the dips of his chest, a curious gleam in his eyes and a mischievous slant to his lips. He toyed thoughtfully with the tentacles encircling his wrists - his hands tangled in the suckered tips that trailed the narrow curves between his fingers and the ridges of his knuckles, the bright red striking against his pale skin.
How long had it been since he’d last had Tim like this? He ran his hands over Tim’s bare chest, his fingers brushing over the scars Tim had collected over the years. Here, at his waistline, a trio of thin white lines left from the talons of an assassin from the Owls. There, to the left of his navel, the remnants of an arrest going awry. The surgery scars from Tim’s own near brush with death and the Lazarus Pit, following an attack from the Council of Spiders in the deserts of Iraq… it felt like it had been ages since Jason had last seen these scars, leaving them now familiar and unfamiliar all at once. His memories of their last times together now seemed hazy and vague.
Now here they were again. Tim watched quietly as Jason sat above him, taking it all in.
This would’ve terrified him once, Jason mused, feeling oddly punch-drunk. Maybe it terrified him still - he could feel his pulse racing through him like lightning screaming towards its target, filling his ears with its near-silent roar - but the only word Jason could summon to describe the sight was beautiful. He tensed, and beneath him Tim shivered.
Beautiful.
Breath catching in his throat, Jason leaned in and kissed Tim deeply, drowning his doubts in Tim’s taste, Tim’s scent. Immediately, Tim arched upward into him, moaning quietly into Jason’s mouth. Over his head, his hands curled into fists around the tentacles that bound him, squeezing once, releasing when Jason jerked at the sudden sensation, and then kissing him deeper still, desperate to forget the fears that had followed him for so long.
Tim smiled. Still bound in his fetters, he ran his hands down Jason’s back, following the sloping planes of strong muscle over his ribs and down his waist. As he did so, the tentacles peeled off his arms, choosing instead to explore Tim’s exposed chest and mirror the patterns Tim traced across Jason’s body. Tim huffed in amusement.
Something about the noise Tim made caught Jason’s attention. He looked up, blinking as he refocused. Tim could tell the instant Jason realized what his extra limbs had gotten up to, but before the flash of panic could fully settle across his face, his expression changed. Jason’s eyes went wide, his mouth falling open in astonishment.
Slowly, hesitantly, a third tentacle joined the two on Tim’s back, gliding over his skin with painstaking care.
“I…” Jason breathed.
Jason could feel Tim under the tentacles’ touch - his touch - and the reawakened awareness, dulled from years of disregard, tore at his consciousness like a tidal wave. He could feel the goosebumps prickling at Tim’s skin, feel the fine hairs standing on end, the lattice of so many silvered scars, and beneath it all, the faint flutter of Tim’s pulse, the phantom heat of it, humming unceasingly below the surface. Jason couldn’t help it - he gasped, letting the limbs fall away, too stunned to fully process.
Tim stilled, watching Jason carefully. “Everything okay?” he asked.
“It…” Jason paused. Inhaled.
Tim eyed Jason, scrutinizing his reaction. He waited.
Exhaled.
Hesitantly, several tentacles unfurled from Jason’s sides and reached out towards Tim, their movements slow and achingly unsure. One settled on the curve of Tim’s waist, just under his ribs, another on Tim’s hip, a third over steady drumming of his heart. The original three returned to Tim’s back, stroking lightly. He could feel it, all of it - everything he’d come to know and love about Tim rendered in breathtaking clarity. Jason shivered, his eyes drifting closed as he drowned in all the new sensations; strange, yes, but somehow familiar, and so, so good and -
Jason let out a sudden, desperate moan, any and all thought wrested from his mind by the sensation that thrummed through his body like a shower of falling stars.
Opening his eyes, Jason looked down, his breath coming out in short, heady pants, his stomach muscles twitching. Tim gazed up at him, his eyes wide and and too mischievous to appear innocent. In his hand he held one of Jason’s tentacles, the appendage curling around his wrist and fingers as he drew it slowly away from his mouth, looking pleased.
"You can feel it right?” Tim murmured, his breath ghosting across the tentacle in his hand. “I know you can, I remember from the bath. The first time. Jason. Tell me how it feels. Tell me it feels good when I do this."
Jason let out a shuddering breath. "Fuck,Tim... yes. "
Tim smiled and placed another gentle kiss on the appendage, watching Jason steadily to gauge his reaction. Strange, how he was the one pinned under Jason’s weight, yet Jason was the one spiralling out of control. He quaked, frozen, as Tim pressed his nose to the limb, drawing slow lines up and down, up and down, then peppered it with fluttering kisses, causing Jason’s eyes to shutter closed. The air felt too thin to breathe.
“Jason. Look at me.” Tim told him.
Jason opened his eyes, only to get caught instantly in the snare of Tim’s gaze. He watched in rapt disbelief as Tim flicked his tongue out to lick a slow stripe up the tentacle’s underside.
A quiet gasp cut the silence - and Jason only vaguely recognized the broken, needy sound of his own breath filling his own body. Jason never fully realized how much Tim noticed, how well Tim knew him, until he was taking him apart piece by desperate piece, unleashing an entire repertoire of carefully catalogued, concerted movements.
Timothy Drake could play Jason’s need like a concert piano, and Jason wanted nothing more than to be the instrument singing beneath Tim’s masterful touch.
Jason panted heavily, feeling light-headed as he groaned. “Tim - ah ,” The word cut off in another gasp. He tried again. “Tim… You’re killing me. ” Absently, he decided it wouldn’t be a bad way to go… but this - he needed to experience this before he went.
Tim smiled up at Jason, brushing the tip the tentacle against his lips. “Do you want me to stop?”
Several tentacles snaked out, wrapping themselves around Tim’s legs. “ No,” Jason breathed.
“Good. Neither do I,” Tim hummed, his tongue quickly darting out against the ruby coloured flesh, sending another shower of sparks through Jason’s nerves.
Jason groaned. “Are we really doing this?”
Tim grinned. “Yeah, Jay. We are.”
“Timothy Drake, you kinky fucker,” Jason huffed, half in shock, half in awe. His hands found the back of Tim’s thighs and tugged, wrapping Tim’s legs up around his waist.
Tim chuckled, reaching upward and winding his arms around Jason’s neck. “Shut up and take me to your lair already.”
“As you wish,” Jason said with a smirk, standing easily and carrying Tim to his bedroom - feeling for all the world like he had entered some dream he never wanted to wake up from.
The golden light of the waning afternoon streamed through the window of Jason’s bedroom, spilling through the lead-paned glass like honey from the comb. Caught in the glow of the moment, Jason paused before his bed, marvelling at the way the world had turned - he was here, wrapped around Tim, Tim wrapped up in him, his head in the clouds and the sound of Tim’s wanting drowning out the distant echoes of all his doubts. He breathed in deeply, drinking in the warm scent of Tim’s bare skin, brushing the tip of his nose over the lines of Tim’s collarbones. Tim’s heartbeat was a ringing drum in his ears, sure and steady, and Jason wanted nothing more than to bottle the sound up and carry it with him always. Smiling, he pressed a kiss to the hollow of Tim’s throat, humming as he did so.
“You could stand here all day, couldn’t you,” Tim murmured.
“Mmm…” Jason almost didn’t catch the question, distracted as he was by the feeling of Tim’s words vibrating softly under his lips. “Yeah, it’s…”
Better than a fantasy, more impossible and intoxicating than his wildest, wildest dreams. How many times had he stood here alone, cold despite the sunset at his back, repressing the harsh reality of his solitude, and now… now he was melting in the warmth of the moment, feeling the sun on his skin and the warmth in his hands and the odd, aching feeling that something hopeful had kindled inside him and was making him glow from the inside out. And then there was Tim, brushing his fingers across the short hairs at the back of Jason’s neck, Tim, squeezing his legs tighter around Jason’s waist, Tim, pressed so close to Jason it was impossible to deny how real the moment truly was, Tim -
“Good?” Tim asked.
“ So good,” Jason agreed, his voice rough.
Tim made a quiet, pleased sound. “Are you good? With this?” he pressed.
Amazing, amazing, amazing. The words of someone whose greatest fear was losing Jason Todd.
“Hell yeah,” Jason breathed.
Confidence coursing through his veins like adrenaline, Jason walked towards the bed until his kneecaps bumped against the soft edge of the mattress. He lowered Tim down onto it easily, supporting his weight with his arms and his tentacles until Tim lay on the downy gray comforter. Pausing only briefly, Jason followed, looming over Tim before settling in the space between Tim’s legs and leaning down, down, down until he was propped up by his elbows over Tim, pressing him into the mattress as they lay face to face.
“Looks like I’ve got you cornered, Timothy Drake,” Jason said, the wicked charm of his grin marred only by the nervous tension in his jaw. “How are you planning to get out of this one?”
Tim pretended to think about it for a moment before a smile curled across his lips, playful and coy. “What makes you think I’m not exactly where I want to be?” he countered.
Jason huffed, the swagger slipping for a moment to reveal a shy, tender glance. “Wouldn’t be the first time I’ve fallen for one of your clever traps,” he whispered, and then he leaned it to rub his nose to Tim’s, smiling gently as he did so.
“A trap? I’m insulted,” Tim teased. “This is my charm.”
Jason snorted at that. “Your charm…” He shook his head, muttering something under his breath about fools and smug bastards. Tim grinned.
“What was that?” Tim pressed, sounding wry.
“You are far too pleased with yourself,” Jason accused.
“If you could see how you look right now,” Tim breathed, skimming his palms over the taut muscles of Jason’s shoulders, “you’d know why.”
Jason swallowed, ducking his head to hide the flush he felt scorching across his face, his ears. He took a deep, shuddering breath.
With one hand on Jason’s cheek, Tim guided Jason back upward so he could press his forehead to his lover’s. “Jason, Jason, look at me,” he whispered.
Jason lifted his eyes slowly, his gaze lingering on the sharp lines of Tim’s body until he finally met Tim’s stare, looking up at Tim through dark lashes, with an uncertain expression on his face.
“I’m serious,” Tim said. “Jay… if you could see what I see in you...” He shook his head as words failed him, looking utterly, wonderfully awestruck. Hoping to continue where his words left off, Tim reached down to rub at Jason’s sides, running his hands across every bit of Jason that he could reach - the warm skin, the fine hairs, the raised scars, the stretch marks.
Amazing, amazing, amazing.
Jason shivered. Tim smiled.
“Jason,” Tim murmured, his hands becoming still on Jason’s waist as he decided what to say. “Do you trust me?”
“You know I do,” Jason replied easily.
Tim hummed. “Let me take care of you tonight.”
Jason paused, blinking quickly.
“You - what? ”
Tim’s gentle smile could’ve outshone the sun. “Trust me, Jay,” he said quietly.
Jason did.