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It starts like this. Dick and Tim are patrolling the Bowery together for the third night in a row, stopping several petty criminals and busting several drug dealers, and shadowing known members of a new gang that operates mostly within the Bowery and branching out through Crime Alley.
It used to be Tim’s case to work on since he'd been the one who'd discovered them first, but upon recent discoveries, Bruce had insisted he teamed up with someone to work on this because it was getting too dangerous to scope it out alone.
Tim has grudgingly agreed only because the gang was bigger than he'd originally thought and because they were selling the drugs they imported to several Gotham crime lords.
At the time, Dick had excitedly volunteered, using the fact that "things Blüdhaven were boring right now" as his excuse.
Which is why tonight, like the past three nights, him and Dick are patrolling the Bowery and trying to remain unnoticed. Patrolling there once is odd but not unusual. Twice is uncommon. Three times is suspicious. Four times is far too obvious. Tim doesn't want to scare the gang into going underground and render all of his careful research completely useless. They'll move headquarters just as Tim’s about to locate it.
He tunes out the chatter on the comms as he walks along the ledge of the building. Spoiler and Robin are bickering about something or other. He thinks Red Hood is ordering a burger somewhere, rattling off his order in Tim’s ear. Nightwing exchanged quick banter with Hood earlier but had gone silent several minutes ago.
He doesn't remember when they branched off and lost track of each other, but Tim isn't too worried about it. Their goal tonight isn't to interfere or make arrests. Their goal is mostly to catch them in the middle of a deal and follow them to their base and figure out who runs the show and pulls all the strings.
In the weeks Tim’s been working on this case, he still hasn't managed to find the identity of the leader or their main base of operation. He's successfully identified most of the people working for this operation.
Regardless, he's still relieved he caught this gang before they could sink their teeth deeper into Gotham, effectively making it harder to flush them out.
Tim jumps over the gap between two low buildings and lands in a crouch before carefully peering over the edge.
For the past several minutes, he’s been following a small group of people dressed in dark clothes, faces covered and talking in hushed tones. All of them are carrying duffel bags. The most telling sign that they’re not part of the regular Gotham crowd is the gun-shaped lumps under their shirts.
Tim isn't worried about being seen; the smog chokes out any possibility of the moon being visible, and he's too high up for the streetlights to give away his location. As long as he keeps his footsteps silent and as long as he doesn’t stray too close to the edge, they shouldn’t notice him.
The group vanishes into an alley and Tim carefully crouches and peeks over the edge. He’s laying on his stomach, his chin resting on his crossed arms, looking down into the dark alley.
There’s a streetlight, but the lamp is broken, casting the alley in pitch-black shadows.
Tim’s a Bat, and they’re anything if not prepared. He switches to night vision and notices the dark van sitting at the end of the alley, flanked on both sides by rusting garbage bins and stacks of wet cardboard boxes.
The driver and passenger doors open and two more people come out. Tim instantly recognizes them. The driver is massive. Bigger and taller than both Bruce and Jason, with an unruly beard showing under his hood. Tim instantly recognizes him. Ian Harris, mostly a low-level criminal who’s been working at the harbor for almost two years when he was recruited by the gang. The man isn’t anyone Tim needs to worry about. He’s just around to make sure no one steals their drug shipment. Tim’s seen the passenger around the shipyard, assisting Harris among several other workers who unload the ship’s cargo. Tim knows that his name is Jackson, though he doesn’t remember if it’s his first or last name.
He shudders, remembering staking out the shipyard for nearly twenty hours and how his car smelled like fish for days.
Below him, the two start quickly conversing with one of the people holding a duffel bag. The leader, Tim assumes. Her red hair is pulled back in a tight bun and though she’s significantly shorter than Harris and Jackson, her body language doesn’t show any apprehension. Then again, being in a gang probably rids anyone of apprehension, Tim supposes.
He tries to focus on their conversation, straining to hear what’s being exchanged.
Through the comms, Hood has taken to openly join in on the argument between Spoiler and Robin. Tim gets fed up quickly and turns his comms off, knowing that if things go to shit he'll most likely regret that decision.
That problem is for future Tim. Present Tim is busy being frustrated because he still can’t hear a single damn thing being said.
He purses his lips and then decides to make a dumb decision that would end so badly if he got caught.
He rises to a crouch and, sticking to the deeper and darker shadows, quietly lowers himself onto the fire escape. It barely groans under his feet when he puts his full weight on it. Tim freezes at every single tiny noise, eyes snapping to the gang, expecting to see one of them looking directly at Tim and pulling out their guns.
They don’t seem to notice Tim at all.
He doesn’t once let his guard down.
Tim only stops and crouches when he reaches the second floor. He knows that he could’ve stopped at the third floor and hear them just fine. But their voices are quiet enough that Tim definitely wouldn’t catch everything from that vantage point. Tim’s been on them for weeks. He can’t get sloppy and get caught, but he also can’t miss out on any sort of information.
“There’s two shipments comin’ in a week,” Harris growls, a note of anger in his gravelly voice. “You’ll have to wait until then.”
The woman speaks up. “We don’t have a week. Our buyers paid up, and they expect their cargo delivered in two days.”
“Listen, lady,” Harris snarls. “We came ‘ere to collect the money you owe the boss. Your buyers ain’t our problem. Can’t give ya cargo we don’t have.”
“Your incompetence isn’t our fault. We won’t pay until we get our cargo,” Red Hair drawls. “We got payin’ customers here. Who offered real good money for this and who will be majorly pissed if we don’t give ‘em what we promised. And these ain’t the kind of people you wanna piss off or get on the wrong side of. Y’all get me?”
Tim can see the man tense. He can see several people behind Red Hair with their hands hovering over their guns.
Tim himself knows what happened to the shipment. It was sunk somewhere in US waters not far from Gotham. They had to send another ship. They lost hundreds of thousands of dollars and now have the government searching for their operation.
“Where,” Beard Guy snaps. “The fuck. Is the shipment?” her hand drifts towards the lump inside her coat. “We invested a lot, buying from you. The boss won’t be happy if ya lose him valued customers and thousands of dollars. If we don’t give our paying customers what they paid for, then, see, it’s us they’ll be goin’ after.”
Jackson shifts nervously and his gaze flickers at the van. Tim’s lips twist downward and he presses further into the shadows, flattening himself on the grating of the fire escape. He’s got a pretty good guess as to how this whole debacle’s gonna end.
“Tell your customers they’ll be compensated for the wait,” Harris rumbles, body tense, hands curled into fists at his side. “And so will you. Listen, man, we only take care of the cargo. We just got paid extra to give you the damn message. If you’ve got an issue, then you’ll have to take it up to the higher-ups. We don’t control any of that import bullshit. We just work the damn shipyard.”
Tim remains very still and very quiet. He hopes they’ll talk more before anything escalates.
His hopes are dashed when he sees quick movement in the corner of his eye before a loud shot rings out, echoing across the alley. Tim dumbly thinks that he expected the situation to unravel at least a little bit more before it turned into a shootout.
“I don’t think your boss understands the gravity of this situation,” Red Hair announces loudly, gun in hand. “The boss expected the cargo to arrive two days ago. Now, he’s invested a lot in your boss, and he wanted to talk it out before taking action himself. Lemme tell you, friend. He ain’t a man to piss off. He’s got friends you’d hate to have on your bad side, and he ain’t afraid to use ‘em to shut down your entire operation.”
“I don’t know what you’re expecting,” Jackson speaks up, voice tight. “We can’t magic up your shipment. It’s not here, end of story. You either wait, or you keep your damn money and your damn threats to yourself.”
Harris nudges Jackson and glares at him. Jackson closes his mouth and backs up a little, shrinking in on himself. It’s easy to assume he spoke out of turn, but from Tim’s vantage point, he can see that Jackson’s trying to make himself as unnoticeable as he can to allow him to pull out a small handgun tucked into the back of his cargo pants.
Red Hair grins. “I’m sure your boss might like a little incentive. Doubt he’ll miss you two assholes.”
Jackson takes that as his cue to pull out his gun and shoot at Red Hair. With the element of surprise on his side, he manages to down two people and hit Red Hair directly in the shoulder. Harris takes the smarter approach and ducks behind his van before pulling out his gun. Jackson is quickly shot down.
It happens quickly.
Tim’s eyes are snapping left and right, trying to keep up with it all when the van doors slide open and three more people spill out onto the alley. They’re wearing body armor and they carry heavy-duty rifles. They easily gun down most of the remaining gang members.
One of them manages to land a hit on Harris, still hiding behind the front of the van. It hits his forearm just as he pulls the trigger. His arm snaps to the side, the gun firing in Tim’s direction instead.
He ducks, face pressed into the grating.
The shot, by some miracle, doesn’t hit Tim.
But it hits the fire escape.
And man that thing is either far too old and rusty or the shot somehow manages to hit in just the right place, because it almost immediately collapses under Tim.
There’s a moment of weightless floating and Tim’s far too surprised to even scream. All the air is forced out of his lungs when his body hits the rusty landing under him, making that one buckle under his sudden weight, and dropping Tim directly onto the soggy alley floor. His body bounces and his chin hits the ground hard enough that his teeth sink into his bottom lip, splitting it open.
The sound of metal pipes falling over themselves is drowned out by the loud ringing in Tim’s ears and his own harsh breathing and wheezing coughs.
He manages to roll onto his back, one arm cradling what has to be bruised ribs. He stares up at the night sky as consciousness slips out of his grasp, no matter how hard he tries to hold on.
In a moment of clarity, he remembers his emergency button. He remembers patrol, and he remembers a gang and a shootout.
He uses his free hand to fumble around until he manages to find the chest piece and press the emergency button. His vision is fuzzing at the edges and the last thing he sees is a dark figure leaning over him, a gun pointed at his face.
Well fuck, is his last thought before everything fades to black.
When Jason pulls into the Batcave, he’s already tense. Oracle had sounded frazzled on comms when she’d barked at him to go to the Batcave for an emergency meeting. What he sees when he climbs off his bike only makes him more alarmed.
He sees Dick sitting in the medbay with bandages crisscrossing his torso, and Alfred currently wrapping one around his knee. His face is bruised and scraped. His stormy expression is doing little to hide the raw guilt underneath. That’s never a good sign on any given day.
Everyone else is crowded around the Batcomputer and Bruce in a semi-circle. Jason approaches carefully, trying to figure out what’s wrong. Everyone is out of their cowls and domino mask and Jason quickly unlatches his own helmet.
The most telling sign that something is deeply wrong is that Bruce is out of his cowl. He’s staring at the Batcomputer with a worried frown pulling at his features, his muscles occasionally spasming as if he wants to leap into action but doesn’t have anything to attack or chase down. Otherwise, the man’s standing stiff as one of Gotham’s gargoyles as if rooted to that spot on the floor, with his arms crossed and one palm pressed over his mouth.
“Y’all better get to explaining,” he drawls, scowling at Bruce and his miniature army of children. “It’s not even one in the morning yet, somebody better be fucking dead.”
He doesn’t expect any reaction. He certainly doesn’t expect nearly half of them to flinch and pale at Jason’s words. His scowl deepens and his heart jackhammers against his ribcage. He looks at everyone in the Batcave and--
"Where the hell is Tim?" Jason asks, already knowing the answer, dread curling in his stomach.
“He was taken,” Dick replies, his voice just barely concealing the real tremor of fear. “He called for help. I-- I came as fast as I could, but by the time I got there--” he trails off, eyes staring vacantly at the ground. Alfred puts his hand on his back. “I saw them put him in the van. I tried to fight them off, but they had guns and they were already starting to drive out.”
He falls silent and Jason refuses to acknowledge the way his heart squeezes painfully in his chest. He doesn’t want to kill his replacement anymore, but he certainly doesn’t like him. He doesn’t.
“Wasn’t he supposed to be doing a stakeout or something?” he growls, sitting down heavily in the forgotten office chair.
“That was last week,” Steph replies, arms wrapped tight around her middle. “Nineteen hours and sixteen minutes spent at the docks.”
Dick clears his throat and Jason focuses back on him. Alfred’s finished wrapping sterile bandages and helped him put on a cashmere sweater that must belong to Bruce, seeing as how it’s two sizes too big for Dick.
“Tim’s been following members of the gang and caught some of them leaving Iceberg Lounge. Days before, he caught four of them talking to some of Two-Face’s guys. I’ve been chasing down leads alongside him for the past few days to make sure--”
He trails off. Jason can piece it together easily enough. He knows the kid’s been on their trail for a while, and he’s crossed paths with him more than once while out on patrol, occasionally offering to buy him a burger and a coffee just because the kid is built like a fucking stick and always looks far too pale for it to be healthy. He knew about the gang and was letting Tim do his own thing. Really, Jason just wanted these fuckers caught because they were stirring up trouble in Crime Alley and dealing to kids and no matter how many people Jason gunned down, it didn’t seem to deter their leader one bit.
Jason hasn’t shown up to the Cave for a few days and somehow missed the fact that Tim managed to drag Dick into the case, too.
“To make sure the little goblin didn’t get himself captured or worse,” he says, finishing Dick’s abandoned sentence.
Dick shrugs with one shoulder in acquiescence. “We split up,” he says in a small voice.
“Tch, this simply proves that Drake does not have the sufficient training to patrol,” Damian snaps, arms crossed over his chest.
“Shut up, gremlin, you literally got kidnapped by Two-Face last week,” Jason retorts.
Damian snarls and Cass steps forward to cut off the impending argument.
“Not the time,” she says sternly.
“Cass is right,” Bruce agrees. When Jason looks at him, the man looks ten years older, the lines in his face look deeper and more prominent. “Patrol is over. Everyone, ch--”
The Cave dissolves instantly in loud protesting. Even Jason’s got to agree that not going out to look for Tim is heartless, even for him.
Bruce huffs in irritation and sends a pleading look in Alfred’s direction.
“This isn’t up for debate,” he says, voice thundering across the Cave loud enough to make a few bats flutter nervously on their perch. “They have Red Robin and Nightwing attacked them. If they spot another vigilante on their territory, this could force them underground or worse, get Tim killed. We need a plan of action and we need to know what we’re dealing with. I’ll look over Tim’s case file and I’ll have Dick debrief me and we will start looking for him tomorrow. For now, all of you need to get changed and go upstairs. Steph, I’ll have Alfred drive you home. Jason--”
Jason squares his shoulders, sinking into the defensive, ready to tell Bruce to fuck off and that he can’t tell Jason that patrol is over. He isn’t a Bat. He’s got his own patrol routes and Crime Alley needs Red Hood.
“I need Red Hood out tonight,” he says, catching Jason off guard. “You’re not affiliated with us and you know Crime Alley better than all of us. We need you to be our eyes and ears tonight.”
There’s a pained expression on his face and Jason scowls.
“Fine,” he snaps, latching his sweaty helmet back on. “You owe me, old man. I don’t do favors for free.”
The pure relief and gratefulness Bruce’s eyes betray only hurts as much as Jason’s willing to let it. He looks away and catches sight of the Batcomputer’s screens. Most of them are open on files of people Jason doesn’t recognize or on reports. The rest are paused on grainy CCTV footage and one shows Dick’s footage from earlier that night, frame frozen and showing a red blur being shoved inside a dark van by armed people, dead bodies covered in blood on the floor of the alley. Jason’s mouth twists. These guys may be new to Gotham, but they hardly look like amateurs.
Quickly, Jason turns and heads for his bike, suddenly feeling claustrophobic in the Batcave. Needing to breathe in Gotham’s polluted air instead of the earthy smell of the Cave.
“I’ll tell Alfred if I see anything interesting,” he tells Bruce, starting his bike.
Dick’s staring at the ground again and Bruce nods, mouth a grim line, watching Jason as he peels out of the Cave.
He’s only marginally surprised that Bruce didn’t remind him about the no-killing rule. Honestly, Jason’s pretty sure it’s most likely because there’s too much on his mind that it probably hadn’t even crossed it rather than Bruce suddenly condoning murder.
It’s not like Bruce is openly inviting Jason to put bullets inside those fuckers’ brains. Whether Jason does or not solely depends on the state in which he’s gonna find Red Robin.
He takes a deep breath of Gotham’s dirty air and forces his pounding heart to settle.
When Tim finally comes to, he’s in a dark room. The only light comes from the boarded-up windows lining one wall. The smell of rust, motor oil, blood, and sweat hangs heavy in the cold air.
It’s easier than he thought it would be to wake up. He sits up and is immediately hit by a wave of nauseating dizziness. His hand shoots out to find something to hold before he collapses back down and finds a bar.
He’s startled out of his pained groan when the sudden movement jostles his bruised ribs.
He feels around with his hands and finds more bars. The realization is like someone tipping a bucket of ice-cold water over his head. It’s a cage.
Someone put him in a fucking cage.
It takes him far too long to realize that he’s also no longer in his Red Robin suit. The whole thing is gone, including the mask, instead replaced by thin fabric and short sleeves that do nothing to keep the chill away.
A door at the end of the room slams open, startling Tim. Bright light cuts a clear path through the dusty room, illuminating Tim like a spotlight.
The horror that rises up in his chest when Tim looks around and realizes that he’s not the only one in this room is unparalleled to anything he’s felt in a long time.
There are other people in cages bigger than Tim’s. Most of them aren’t occupied. The ones that have people in them are lined along a wall next to Tim’s. There are three people stuffed in each cage at least. All of them were small, most smaller than Tim. From what he can see in the light, none of them seem to look older than him, not counting the kids still hidden in the shadows that the light can’t reach.
None of the kids move or flinch when the door opened or when someone walks in. they’re all huddled close to each other, either not moving or ricking slightly and Tim doesn’t need to be a genius to know that it’s not just the fear of this place keeping them quiet and complacent.
Footsteps echo through the vast room and a man crouches down so he’s eye level with Tim.
“Looks like our little bird is awake,” he says.
His face is hidden, but Tim can see enough of him to realize he’s staring at Blake Malcolm, second in command of the Big Boss.
He grins at Tim. “Maybe he’s in a talking mood.”
Tim scowls in reply. “Fuck you.”
Malcolm grins and leans forward. Tim’s tempted to back away from him until his back hits the end of his cage, but he forces himself to remain still. His glare never eases up, despite how his heart rate spikes and how his stomach knots in fear. He’s not scared, but he’s definitely aware of all the things that could happen between now and when his family rescues him.
“You know,” Malcolm says. “I kinda wanted you to say that.”
Tim purses his lips, unimpressed. Like that’s not a line he’s heard a million times before.
“I love it when they scream and beg for mercy.”
Tim doesn’t move and doesn’t answer him. If the room wasn’t so dark, Tim would be able to actually make out more of the man’s features than just the shadowed outline of facial features and a scruffy beard.
He can’t see it, but he knows there’s a scar running down the man’s right cheek.
The man studies Tim for a few moments before sighing. “Not much of a talker, huh? That’ll change quickly.”
Not likely, Tim thinks. He’s been through this before. Many times. Probably too many times. Both as Robin and as Tim Drake and as Red Robin. Kidnappings were common throughout his entire life. Torturing was frequent during his run as Robin and surprisingly less so as Tim Drake, back when he'd still been important enough to kidnap.
Tim’s already decided that he isn’t gonna give this guy the chance to see Tim squirm and beg for his life. No one’s had the pleasure before, and he’s gonna keep it that way.
Malcolm finally tires of Tim’s unnerving glare and obstinate silence and stands up to walk away.
The heavy door slams shut and Tim sags against the wall of his cage. He stares in the direction of the door, his eyes once again unadjusted to the dark. He pulls his knees up to his chest and wraps his arms around himself in the mock semblance of a comforting hug.
How could he have been so stupid?
He looks around, lips pressed together, surveying the dozens of cages with dozens of kids in them. This gang doesn’t illegally sell only drugs and weapons. They illegally sell humans.
Tim braces his elbows on his knees and knots his bare fingers in his hair. He’s alone and there’s hardly anything more than the sound of breathing to fill the silence. He hopes that Batman and Nightwing get here in time to uncover this whole operation.
The night quickly gives way to a gloomy and gray morning as the sun rises behind the clouds, unable to pierce through the thick smog clogging the air. According to Jason’s watch, it’s just shy of six forty. Exhaustion weighs heavy in his bones, but he remains crouching, staring through a broken window of a half-demolished apartment building.
He's staring at the building across the street, carefully monitoring everyone coming in and out.
Earlier, he'd been sent Tim’s list of names and photo IDs of all the people he'd identified. Jason only saw a handful of people to match, the rest either belonged to other gangs or were simply people Jason didn't recognize.
Fifty-two people came in since Jason’s parked himself in the apartment to do some recon towards the end of the night when he should be back at his apartment and sleeping like he'd told Bruce he'd do.
Thing is, he'd checked every warehouse and building that Tim had marked down and they were stacked with wooden crates containing bags of white powder or high-tech guns that had no business being in Gotham. Most of them were entirely empty of people, and none of those people had been Tim.
Tim's running theory was that they based their operation in the same area and that their base of operations had to be some secured building somewhere in the Bowery. Problem was, the Bowery is big. And Jason knows that Tim doesn't have the time it will take for them to search the whole area.
Really, the only reason Jason’s even here is because on his way back home, he spotted a dark van with some sort of faded design he couldn’t identify on one of the sliding doors and a license plate matching the one of the van that took Tim. As long as he lives, Jason will never admit that he studied the footage of Tim getting kidnapped and committing the license number to memory. It’s simply a means to rescue the idiot.
Jason then shadowed the van from up above until it stopped in front of an old building that’s been listed as ‘for sale’ since Jason first showed up in Gotham again. He checked and the building hasn’t been bought by anyone, but it’s also no longer for sale.
And then, while they’d been busy unloading their van of mysterious boxes, Jason slipped inside through the second-story window and planted microphones and cameras on every floor. There’s only a single camera and two mikes on the first floor, but he did manage to plant one of both in every room on the upper three floors before leaving the way he came in and watching them from the abandoned building across the street, a gutted-out victim of some rogue attack that no one had bothered to renovate or fix-up.
Jason doesn’t really know what he’s waiting for. He’s been here since three-thirty in the morning. The only interesting thing he’s learned so far is that this building isn’t marked by Tim as one of their little hidey holes.
Maybe Jason just needs something to do, because going home and sleeping in his own comfortable bed while Tim’s getting tortured feels wrong. There’s so much to do, there’s nothing to do, and Jason hates playing the waiting game.
He peers back through the window just as he hears soft footsteps padding across the room. They freeze when they step on a creaky floorboard.
“‘Sup Steph,” Jason greets lazily.
She swears under her breath before coming the rest of the way and crouching beside Jason and glancing out the door.
“These our guys?” she asks.
“Yep.”
“Is this their base?”
“Nope.”
There’s a beat of silence.
"So it's essentially useless for us to be here."
"Actually, I don't about you but this is a very enriching activity for me,” Jason deadpans, glaring at Steph in irritation.
She’s in her civilian clothes, to Jason's surprise. He expected her to go back out as Spoiler despite Batman’s wishes or something. He’s not expecting to see her in a purple Gotham U hoodie and ripped black jeans.
She catches his eye and glances down at her clothes. “You ever seen a Bat hang around the Bowery during the day?”
Jason mumbles something under his breath and turns back to the camera feed on his computer. “You ain’t a bat,” he replies.
“I’m more closely associated with them than you.”
He can’t argue that one.
“So,” Steph says, sitting cross-legged on the stained floor and glancing through the broken glass still hanging onto the edge of the window. “If there’s no reason why you’re here, why are you here?”
“Real question is ‘why did you come looking for me?’” Jason shoots back, then holds up a finger to silence Steph when a man turns into the alley and jogs up to the door before knocking.
His clothes are dark and nondescript, making it easy to blend in with the regular Crime Alley crowd. Jason can see from here that his clothes are good as new, he’s wearing fancy and polished dress shoes and he spots a fancy watch on the man’s wrist when his sleeve pulls back enough to reveal it when he reaches to knock at the door. This is the third person of this sort he’s seen. Clients who clearly aren’t from Crime Alley and who probably belong to some real fancy neighborhood in Gotham who came all the way here to pay for some fancy drugs or weapons.
What really worries Jason is the fact that this gang only settles in Gotham about two months ago and already established links to the nicer and richer parts of Gotham. Something isn’t adding up.
"Shady business as usual," Steph whispers, crossing her arms on the windowsill and watching alongside Jason as he was admitted in.
Jason turns away. "If he does like the others, they'll be in there for a while and since I couldn't manage to install a mike in the room they talk in. A real waste of my time."
Steph doesn't speak for a while.
"I'm here because it turns out that trying to sleep while knowing that my best friend is probably getting tortured by those bastards is damn near impossible," she says after a few moments of silence. "I'm here because I can't just sit around and do nothing. I can't--" she closes her mouth and opens it a few moments later. "I can’t lose him."
Jason hums, keeping an eye on the camera feeds in the other rooms, monitoring the other people in the building.
“I get it,” he says. “Really. The kid may be annoying as hell most of the time, but I’ll admit I miss his incessant jabbering.”
She huffs and they lapse into silence. It’s not comfortable, but it isn’t as tense as it used to be. Small mercies, Jason thinks.
Jason’s microphones are only picking up meaningless chatter at this point. The street below becomes busier and busier as the day begins and Gothamites go about their morning business. Jason’s so tired that his mind is buzzing slightly.
“You do know there’s not much to do until B’s gone over the case at least three times and tells us about where he thinks the potential base could be, right?” he asks, breaking the silence.
Steph shrugs. She pulls her knees close to her chest and leans her head against the sill.
“Yep,” she replies. “But doing something with you, even if it’s clearly completely useless is better than pretending to sleep at home.”
Jason lifts a notepad with notes scribbled on it in pen. “Who says it’s useless?” he asks, without any heat in his voice. “I’ll let you know that I’ve currently got three new locations to check out and five new names as well as over fifty new faces to add to the repertoire.”
What Jason’s doing is probably useless and he doesn’t really think he’ll learn the name of the leader or the location of their base of operations, but the illusion’s worked so far and Jason just really needs to convince himself he’s still doing something to help Tim.
“Sure,” Steph replies, unconvinced, then checks her phone. “I have a class at nine,” she says, in a tone that clearly indicates she doesn’t plan on going.
“Well.” Jason takes a breath and scratches the back of his head, the words getting stuck in his throat. “I could call you if something comes up,” he offers eventually. “Or something. I sure ain’t pairing up with the Bat or Dickwing. And I’m pretty sure Damian’s still pissed I gave away that litter of kittens to my neighbor.”
She was a sweet lady who’d recently lost her husband and her fourteen-year-old cat. Jason thought she deserved something good. Gotham sure as hell wouldn’t be the one doing anything nice for anyone.
Steph snorts but doesn’t make a snarky comeback. Instead, she shifts, trying to find a comfortable way to sit. Her eyes slide shut before she snaps them open, like she’s fighting sleep. There are deep shadows under her eyes and her smile is gone, replaced by a frown and a furrow between her eyebrows. Jason probably looks worse.
He looks at his computer screen with the camera feeds, the people standing there and chatting idly, the boxes full of weapons, ammunition, and drugs. It makes his skin itch knowing that less than fifty feet away there are unknown drugs that will be sold to kids and other vulnerable people who get in way over their heads and weapons that will most likely be used against innocent civilians and making the city even more unsafe than it already is. Jason wants to storm in, guns blazing, and shoot everyone down. He wanted to do that in every warehouse he staked out that night. Now, the green swirled at the edge of his vision, desperate for blood and carnage that Jason wouldn’t give.
He can’t stay here any longer.
Jason snaps the computer shut. “You know what,” he says, packing up his gear off the floor. “I’m sick of sitting around doing nothing. I know this great coffee shop a few blocks away. Coffee and breakfast are on me.”
Steph blinks at him, then down at his outstretched hand, before accepting it and letting Jason pull her to her feet.
“If you’re sure,” she replies uncertainly.
Jason waves a hand. “I’m seconds away from committing mass murder, yes I’m sure.”
First, he needs to change. He’s sweating under his suit and it’s starting to chafe uncomfortably and Jason just misses wearing normal people clothes. He leads the way down the rickety wooden staircase, carefully stepping over missing sections and parts that look like they won’t be able to hold Jason’s weight.
He takes a deep breath of Gotham’s dirty air when they step outside and spares only one glance back when they walk away.
The next time Tim wakes up, he’s chained to a chair.
It’s not the first thing he notices. The first thing he notices is that there’s an insistent and deeply annoying light that’s keeping Tim from sleeping.
He blinks, groans, tries to sit up.
He can’t.
His mind struggles quickly out of its daze only to realize that he’s already sitting up. He’s very much sitting up, his arms handcuffed to the legs of a steel chair, his ankles similarly restrained. His chin is resting on his chest and when he lifts his head, he winces when he feels an uncomfortable twinge in his neck. He tries to groan again, and it comes out muffled.
It’s like someone flipped a switch and Tim’s suddenly hyper-aware of his surroundings.
There’s a coarse fabric that tastes like motor oil and gunpowder shoved into his mouth, and secured by duct tape. It’s thankfully not wound all the way around his head, only taped right up to his ears.
His cheek throbs, he remembers getting punched there when he struggled too much when they came for him again. They had to sedate him, he remembers. Fuck.
His ribs ache dully, proving his theory that they were only bruised, not broken.
His arms ache and the moment his mind latches on to that fact, it only seems to make him more aware of it. Tim doesn’t care to know how long he’s been in this position, unconscious, with his arms pulled taut. It hurts. Tim’s so close to the end of his fraying rope that he thinks he might just start crying.
He hasn’t been having a good week to begin with and this whole ordeal is just the stupid cherry on top of the shit cake. If Tim gets out of this alive, he might just go find whatever thing is fucking with him for its personal amusement and fistfight it.
Pushing aside that train of thought, Tim glances around the room. The walls and floor are made of cement. Tim can see a steel door off to his left, a camera near the ceiling in the right corner, and a large mirror that he has no doubt is a two-way mirror. His skin prickles when he looks at it, feeling the unnerving feeling that someone’s watching him. He looks away quickly.
The rest of the room is sparse. Tim’s sitting in the only piece of furniture in the room and apart from the lamp hanging literally right over Tim’s head and casting its light over him like a fucking spotlight or something, the room is dark. The beam isn’t bright enough to fill up the room and there are dark shadows gathered in all four corners of the rectangular room.
Tim looks at the mirror again and glares at his own frazzled reflection. His Red Robin suit’s been replaced with a gray tank top and a matching pair of loose pants. (And no, the fact that his distress beacon is probably lying somewhere in a Gotham gutter, broken into a thousand tiny, useless pieces absolutely does not send a jolt of sharp fear down Tim’s spine because he definitely knows better). His costume being gone also means that his cowl is gone. He stares back into tired blue eyes in the mirror.
Tim presses his lips in a firm line at that, managing to keep his expression carefully neutral. His mother had drilled into his head at a young age the benefits of keeping his cards close to his chest and never betraying his emotions to other people. It gives him the upper hand, she used to say, because no one else can see or guess what he’s feeling or how deeply something is affecting him. Of course, she’d followed that by telling him to just keep his mouth shut and smile politely at people.
Tim hopes and prays that no one decides to image search him, because while he hasn’t made many public appearances and hasn’t been on the front page of a single newspaper since his parents’ plane crashed and killed Janet Drake, his face will still offer some very much identity revealing results. Tim would much rather actually not deal with that.
They’re from out of town and they’re new to Gotham, he reassures himself. There’s no way any of them were around a few years ago when Janet died and Jack ended up in a coma. Tim doesn’t think he can recall the last time he made the headlines. Bruce adopting him had been a quiet affair. No one had cared about little Tim Drake who lost his mother, and then eventually his father and Tim didn’t want any media coverage about his adoption. One day he was Tim Drake and the next Tim Drake-Wayne, and that was that.
He’s snapped out of his thoughts by the steel door wincing open. Tim carefully sculpts his face back into the look of quiet anger of a wronged vigilante.
It’s not the same guy from earlier, but Tim still recognizes him. Adrian Lenoir, some random petty criminal with a count of murder who was hired before the gang settled in Gotham. Tim’s only slightly disappointed it’s not their leader, but then again. A Bat’s been following them around. He’s sure their leader will make time to pay Tim a visit.
Lenoir stands in front of Tim, blocking his view of his own sorry sight in the mirror’s reflection. Tim glares up at him.
The man’s skin is a few shades lighter than Damian’s and his graying black hair is gelled back against his scalp. He’s clean-shaven, but Tim can see a five o’clock shadow across his jaw.
“Maybe those hours in a cage made you more willing to talk,” Lenoir says, voice deceptively pleasant.
They hadn’t, actually. They really, really hadn’t.
The man leans down and rips the tape off of Tim’s mouth in one quick swipe. Tim shouts through the gag, muffling the violent swear he spits out. Lenoir then quickly eases the gag from Tim’s mouth. He frowns and works his jaw, sore from being forced open for hours. His tongue is bone dry.
Which is probably lucky for Lenoir, because all Tim wants is to spit in his face, wipe that smug grin off the bastard. His glare darkens.
“We don’t want to know much,” Lenoir says, standing back up to his full height, forcing Tim to look up at him, straining his arms further. Asshole.
“Just what you know about us and who else you’ve informed.”
Tim sniffs. “No one,” he snaps, his voice hoarse. “Just my dear friend Nonya.”
The man’s grin fades. “Nonya,” he repeats, and Tim can hear the warning tone. He ignores it.
“Nonya fuckin’ business, you prick.”
Tim anticipated a hit. He didn’t anticipate the slap. His head snaps to the side, nearly pulling a muscle in his neck. His already bruised cheek stings and he sits there, his mind trying to understand what just happened.
“Dick,” he mutters when he gets his bearings.
“If you cooperate,” Lenoir continues, voice still just as pleasant though now slightly more strained. “We’ll let you go. Names and information, Red Robin. It’s all we want. It’s not that hard. Hell, if you stay out of our way, we won’t ever have to cross paths again.”
Tim’s lip twitches and he bites back the bitter laugh that bubbles up. Fat fucking chance. They’ll kill Tim before even thinking about letting him go free. He knows their track record. A trail of dead bodies follows this gang. Innocent bystanders who were at the wrong place at the wrong time and saw something they shouldn’t have.
“And what if I told you the Red Hood’s also hunting you down?” he asks instead, grinning up at Lenoir. “Even if I back off, you’re still impeding on his turf. And I’m sure he’s already figured out you’re selling more than weapons of mass destruction and drugs. Trust me. If people start disappearing in Crime Alley, Hood knows about it. If it’s human trafficking, then Hood definitely knows about it.”
This is mostly a bluff. Jason doesn’t know about the human trafficking. Hell, Tim’s only started to suspect this gang was connected to all the recent disappearances only a few days before they captured him.
But Jason knows about the gang. He’s allowed Tim and Dick on his turf to investigate as long as they didn’t interfere with anything. He even gave Tim bits of valuable intel from his various contacts.
There’s enough evidence in his files that Bruce will definitely be able to connect the disappearances to the gang, and then it’ll only be a matter of time until Hood busts their door down, guns blazing.
Hopefully, Tim will be alive to see it.
Lenoir’s smile waves, and there’s a nervous glint settling in his dark eyes. He studies Tim for a long time. Tim braces for another blow, his whole body rigid. He maintains eye contact despite how his shoulders scream at him to let up, to look down, to give them relief. He ignores the sharp burning pain along his arms.
No blow comes.
The man simply huffs, his smile sliding into something more calculated, more indecipherable, before turning and leaving out the door, leaving Tim alone once again.
He stares at the door in silence, unable to ignore the tense feeling that he’s just made things so much worse for himself and he’s going to regret it very soon.
He sighs and drops his head, allowing as much relief to his burning muscles as he can give them. He’s starting to lose feeling in his fingers.
He twists them around, trying to find a way to free himself, but with his hands forced apart, it’ll take twice as long. With the way he’s restrained, even longer. He chews on his bottom lip and glares up at the camera. Even if he managed to escape, too many things are working against him. He’s being filmed. There’s a good chance there’s someone watching him behind the mirror. He’ll have to pick the lock of the steel door. He doesn’t know how many people are beyond the door or if he’s even remotely close to an exit. He has no idea where he is, and Tim has no doubt that these people won’t hesitate to shoot him down.
They won’t kill him now, not when they think he’s told people about their operation. He just seriously doubts he’s valuable enough that they wouldn’t shoot him if he gave them a reason to. And attempting to escape is a very good reason for them to kill him.
He sighs and looks at his reflection, thoughts swirling. He stares at his own eyes, hidden under his mop of messy hair. The bruise on his cheek is a vivid purple against his pale skin. His face doesn’t betray any emotion. He likes to think his mother would be proud of how well he’s able to keep his face tactfully blank.
Then again, she’d probably be disappointed to see how her son turned out. He studies his face. He's always looked more like Janet than Jack, though his hair is darker than both of theirs.
His thoughts are interrupted by the door opening again.
He looks over, looking almost bored.
His derisive words die on the tip of his tongue when he sees not the man from earlier enter, but rather four people dressed all in dark and wearing dark camo pants. Two are currently carrying guns pointed at Tim. The other two have their heavy-duty guns strapped to holsters on their thighs.
All of them are wearing expressionless white masks. It’s a part of their uniform. This he knows from spending countless mind-numbing hours staring at grainy footage from city cameras.
The two without guns in their hands immediately crouch and start uncuffing Tim’s hands. The others are holding their guns inches from Tim’s face.
"Move and I shoot you in the head," one of them growls.
Tim hears footsteps and his eyes snap back to the door. A woman wearing a neatly pressed suit steps inside the room. She’s also wearing a mask identical to the others, though hers is black instead of white. She clasps her hands behind her back and watches Tim.
He's forced to look away when one of the men pulls Tim's arm back, twisting the sore muscle enough that he cringes.
He doesn't relent, instead pulling both his arms behind his back and handcuffing them together.
"Isn't this a bit much?" he asks the woman, nodding at the men holding guns.
"We're not stupid enough to let our guard down in front of a vigilante," she tells him, an almost imperceptible accent in her voice. "Where one of you shows up, more are bound to follow."
Tim can't argue that logic. He's just disappointed she's done her research on the vigilantes of Gotham.
His ankle is finally uncuffed and Tim is forcefully pulled to his feet.
A gun is shoved into his back. "No funny business."
Tim scowls but complies. He walks forward as he's guided out of the interrogation room and into the rest of the compound.
He keeps his head still but catalogs his surroundings, already making a list of anything he could use as a weapon or as a distraction if he were to attempt an escape.
The place is big, but not noticeably so. Tim can't see a staircase but that doesn't rule out a multiple-story building. The walls are cement and there are fluorescent light fixtures in rows along the ceiling. There are hundreds of stacked boxes pushed along the walls and bright tape on the floor.
There are two forklifts that Tim can see. Not very useful in most cases. There's also a stack of wooden planks and a pile of metal pipes and unevenly cut steel rebar, which already seems much more useful to Tim. If he can grab one of them, he might stand a fighting chance.
Tim briefly wonders if they're taking him back to the room where he'd been kept previously. He hopes so, though he seriously doubts it. They want answers, he didn't give them, he knows what the next step is.
The woman stops in front of a steel door and unlocked it. When Tim is shoved inside, his heart sinks when he realizes that no, it's not the room where he was previously kept.
The room is square with cracked cement walls. It's much smaller than the interrogation room-- hardly large enough for the six people currently standing in it.
There are two fluorescent lights that flicker only occasionally and in the very center of the ceiling is a rusty metal hook bolted into the cement and a chain dangling down. It ends in two thick manacles and Tim doubts the brown staining them is rust.
His heart stutters in his chest when his handcuffs are once again unlocked and removed. The men with guns turn their heads briefly and Tim doesn't care if he dies. He lunges for the door, ducking under the armed people.
He makes it out the door.
And then he's immediately tackled to the ground. His ribs groan when he hits the ground harshly and he's sure he can feel them bend under the additional weight on top of him.
There's yelling, there's a hand pressing his face down onto the cement ground. He's roughly pulled off the ground, two pairs of hands gripping his arms in bruising holds. His cheek scrapes against the floor.
The woman is standing in front of him when they pull Tim upright. He glares at her, his composure crumbling. She studies him, her dark eyes glinting behind her mask.
"You won't escape," she says, less like a threat and more like an obvious fact.
Tim's scowl twists into something sharp and dangerous. "That's never stopped me before. I’ve escaped from worse places than this."
He's dragged back into the room and his arms are forced over his head. They have to lift him clear off the ground to secure his wrists to the chains. His toes barely brush the ground. They step back when they're done and leave the room.
One of them jabs the butt of his gun into Tim’s side and mumbles something in a language Tim doesn't speak.
The woman stares at Tim through her impassive mask for a moment longer before leaving too and closing the door behind her.
He hears the latch lock and her footsteps fade and then Tim is truly alone in a tiny room that smells like blood and damp earth.
His arms are still sore from their previous strained position, and Tim knows they’re not strong enough for him to pull his weight up. His fingers are clumsy when he tries to see if he can pick the lock. He hums in frustration when he realizes he can’t escape. He has to wait for the rescue.
He takes a deep, steadying breath and ignores the note of fear thrumming through his body.
They’ll find him.
Tim refuses to let himself think about what’ll happen if they don’t.
Tim is woken up by a cattle prod.
He gasps breathlessly, eyes flying open as his body convulses under the violent shocks of electricity. The prod vanishes and he gasps, sagging in his chains. Moments later, the prod is back.
“Good morning,” the person shocking him says after they pull the prod back. Someone yanks his head back by the hair and he winces. His eyes focus and he finds himself staring at the same man from yesterday.
“You,” he spits. “Great.”
Lenoir smiles sharply. “Are we feeling like talking, today?”
Tim scrunches his face, pretending to think about it. “Nah. Not really. Somehow, I don’t really feel like a welcomed guest.”
His hair is released, but the prod doesn’t come back. Tim lifts his head in time to see Lenoir tip over a bucket of water over him. He gasps and flails under the shock of cold water. And then the prod is back. With the water, the electricity stings worse and crackles across his whole body. Lenoir brings down the prod again and again until Tim lets out a choked whimper, refusing to give him the satisfaction of screaming.
His hair is yanked back once again. “I have all day, my friend. No one is coming for you. Now.” he releases Tim and steps back. “What do you know about us?”
“That you’re all a bunch of fucking assholes,” Tim spits out in between gasps.
The prod is jammed in between his ribs for several minutes. When the man pulls it away, Tim can feel his skin pulling along and tearing. He bites back a scream of agony.
He pants harshly, unfocused eyes staring at the cement ground. He tastes copper in his mouth where he’s bitten through his scabbing bottom lip in an attempt to swallow back the screams.
Any movement jars his sore arms painfully.
He can’t seem to catch his breath.
The prod is shoved into his burned side, again and again, questions he refuses to answer swirling around in his head, the prod burning away any other thought until Tim’s body can’t handle it anymore and he passes out.
The next time Tim’s forced awake, he’s no longer tied to the ceiling.
Instead, his head is being shoved under ice-cold water. He flails and struggles, his lungs burning, screaming for oxygen.
He’s pulled out of the water by his hair. Drops roll down his face and he coughs weakly.
“Are you feeling more talkative?” Lenoir asks, kneeling in front of Tim.
Tim coughs. “Yeah,” he croaks out. “Your hospitality skills fucking suck, man. Didn’t your mother teach you any basic manners?”
Lenoir’s smile is sharp and dangerous. His hand reaches forward to grab Tim’s sore chin and twist his face up to consider Tim with careful eyes. Tim struggles, trying to twist away, but Lenoir’s grip is firm and unyielding, his fingers dig painfully into Tim’s bruises.
The grip tightens until Tim groans.
“Now come on,” Lenoir says sweetly. “There’s no need to be like that. What do you know about us?”
A lot.
“Wouldn’t you like to know, weather boy?” he replies with a sharp grin of his own.
His head is shoved right back into the water. No matter how much he struggles, the grip on his hair remains firm and bruising and his head stays under. They only pull him out moments after his body stops struggling.
He coughs out water and glares at the man again.
“What do you know about our operations?” he asks.
Tim doesn’t reply. He goes back under. This time, they keep him under a few seconds longer, to make him panic a bit.
“Who do you know?”
He doesn’t answer. He goes back under.
“Names.”
No answer, back under.
They only stop when all Tim can do is weakly cough through a swollen throat. His vision fizzes in and back out and he can’t catch his breath. The back of his head aches where his hair’s been constantly yanked back. If they end up ripping out a chunk of his hair, he’s gonna be so pissed.
Tim isn’t shoved back under. Instead, Lenoir reaches forward and grabs his limp left arm, and studies his hand contemplatively. Tim scowls, bemused.
“No one’s gonna find you, Red Robin,” he says, pulling out a kris blade and observing it thoughtfully. “Boss took extra steps to ensure that no Bat will ever find this place. Anyone who comes here either works for her or never leaves the place alive. You will die here and the rest of your little friends will find your body floating in the Gotham Harbor.”
He traces Tim’s palm with the tip of the blade, sending shivers down his spine. He tries to struggle out of the grip, but the man’s hand tightens.
“Listen, if this is your way of trying to scare me into blabbing,” Tim pants, glaring. “It’s not working. You haven’t lived in Gotham long enough if you’re still scared of it.”
Lenoir twists Tim’s pinky finger, breaking it with a wet snap. The flare of agony that follows is startling enough that Tim yells in pain.
“This would just be so much easier if you told us what you know,” Lenoir says in a mockingly sympathetic that doesn’t match his flinty eyes. “Want to try again?”
Tim grits his teeth and keeps quiet. His body is completely limp and the only thing holding him upright is the hand fisted in his hair and tugging painfully at his scalp.
“No?” the man asks, twisting and breaking Tim’s ring finger.
He groans but keeps his mouth shut. Lenoir looks disappointed.
“I like it when they scream,” he says.
“That’s what she said,” Tim mutters, somehow finding the strength to give him a wicked grin.
Furious irritation flashes across Lenoir’s features before he schools it back into a mask of calm. It’s too late, Tim already knows he’s getting under his skin. He doesn’t see the knife until it’s plunged into his abdomen.
He gasps and can’t stop the scream that rips out of his abused throat when the blade is twisted. The blade is smoothly pulled out, eliciting another broken scream from Tim.
Lenoir stands up and waves a hand dismissively, wiping his bloody hand on his white button-up shirt.
“Take him back to his cell,” he says. “We’ve got customers coming soon.”
The hand in his hair disappears to Tim’s great relief, and he’s hauled to his feet. He lifts his head and spits at Lenoir. He’s not sure what he’s aiming for but he grins smugly when it lands on his cheek.
The room freezes. It’s like the other gang members aren’t sure how to react to someone spitting in the face of one of their bosses.
The guy stares at Tim, then pulls out a handkerchief from a pocket and wipes the spit off with a sigh.
“Well now,” he says. “You really shouldn’t have done that.”
Tim’s sluggish mind sees the gun but doesn’t react until after he’s shot in the thigh. His arms are released and he falls right onto the tub of icy water he’d been dunked into earlier, spilling it everywhere and soaking Tim’s clothes.
His blood mixes with the water under his hands. The pain is too jarring for his already pain-addled brain and the best Tim can do is just stare at the bleeding hole in his pants dumbly.
“Oh,” he says, lips numb. “Great.”
The hands are back around his arms and they pull him to his feet, forcing him to put pressure on his shot leg. It gives out completely underneath him and he almost falls right back down to the ground. He lets out a noise that sounds far too much like a sob for Tim’s liking.
They don’t relent. They force him to walk back to his cell. If he stops to catch his breath or if his leg crumples under him, they stop and pull him back to his feet, forcing him to put pressure on his leg, making the bleeding worse. He grimly wonders if he’ll feel the bullet digging deeper until it scrapes against bone. Then he wonders if he’ll bleed to death before rescue arrives.
When they make it back to the steel door leading into the tiny square room, the entire bottom half of Tim’s left pant is soaked with blood and he’s got sweat and tears mixing with the drops of water dripping off his chin.
He’s almost relieved when they pull his arms over his head and take the pressure off his shot leg.
They leave the light on and lock the door. Tim lets his head drop and stares at the ground and tries to force away the headache and the tears of despair and hopelessness.
“Are we positive it’s our guy?”
A collective groan echoes through the comm line.
“For the last time, Dickwing, if you don’t shut your mouth I’m gonna turn right back around and shut it for you,” Jason snarls.
A small hand settles on his shoulder and Jason forces himself to take a deep breath and calm down.
Everyone’s been on edge. It’s been four days since Tim was taken and their progress was slow. Too slow. Far, far too slow. Jason didn’t sleep. He hasn’t slept more than one hour each night, and he doubts anyone else has been sleeping well. Even Duke’s patrolling with them at night in search of Tim.
“Red Hood,” Batman’s gruff voice sounds over the comms.
“Yeah, yeah, be nice and all that shit. I’ll be nice when we find Red.”
Oracle explains in triumph over the comms. Jason’s too exhausted and wrung-out from trying to reel in the Pit licking at the edge, trying to claw its way out to really feel any hope soar. Cass next to him perks up.
Jason just gazes down the street, lip curled.
“I found him again,” she says. “And yes, Nightwing. It is our guy. Facial recognition says it’s indeed Blake Malcolm, seen exiting a black car in front of a warehouse and leave it minutes later.”
“There is nothing there,” Robin huffs out indignantly. “Searching it was a complete waste of my time and energy.”
Even Damian’s scathing remarks have tapered down significantly. Jason can hear the note of worry highlighting his voice. It’s nice to know the little gremlin cares. And maybe it isn’t fair to Damian to think that, because Jason knows the kid’s been trying his best to bond with Tim. and maybe it’s even a little hypocritical, because isn’t Jason also trying to mend a relationship that was broken before it even started?
“Yeah,” Oracle replies drily. “I know, Robin. But I found him again. Hood, Black Bat, he’s the closest to you. A camera at a CVS caught him on tape a few minutes ago. Corner of Washington and Woodland. I’m doing my best to track his car.”
Jason knows she can only do so much. There aren't a lot of cameras in Crime Alley, and the ones there are old and haven’t seen an update since the last time someone cared to check, which was probably around the time they were first installed. Which was probably long before Jason was born. Jason and Cass would have to be quick to catch up to the car or they might lose their only lead that hasn’t gone cold.
“We’re on our way O,” Jason replies, quickly firing off his grapple.
Cass reaches to take his hand and gives it a quick squeeze. “We will find him,” she tells him.
Jason’s lips twitch into something dangerous and bloodthirsty. “We better.”
With that, Jason’s swinging away, hoping they don’t lose Malcolm. Hoping the guy will lead them to their base. Hoping he’ll lead them straight to Tim. Tim, who’d better be alive for his sake, because Jason’s not above going to the underworld himself and dragging Tim back out.
Jason doesn’t let himself consider what he’ll do if Tim is already dead by the time they get there. Jason doesn’t think he’ll be able to control the Pit’s maddening rage. Even now the simple thought of finding a dead body instead of his breathing brother is nearly enough to make Jason tip over the edge.
He stumbles the next time he lands on a roof and hears Cass land lightly behind him.
“Little brother,” she says.
“I’m fine,” he grumbles, resisting the urge to run a hand through his hair. He’s wearing a helmet, he reminds himself. He’ll embarrass himself. “I’m in control.”
He hears the thwick sound of her grapple being fired. He looks up to see her staring at him through white lenses.
“Do not focus on the rage,” she says simply. “Breathe.”
Jason takes a deep breath of filtered air and feels himself calm down a little. The green hisses but releases its vice-like grip and retreats further, far enough to clear Jason’s mind. He opens his eyes.
“Let’s go,” he says. “We’ve got an asshole to catch.”
Tim doesn’t sleep.
He’s gone days without sleep before. Of course, he’s never been horribly tortured by a gang any of those times, but whatever. It’s not for lack of trying. They’ve had Tim for days now (he thinks three. He can’t tell.). Tim’s headache is persistent and won’t leave, even if he manages to pass out from sheer exhaustion for an hour or two.
Since his little waterboarding session, he hasn’t been dragged out of his cell. He’s sure his leg got infected, if the hazy pain and the tremors are any indication. There’s also a nasty cough and itch in the back of his throat he’s never gotten rid of.
Since then, his problems only seemed to have doubled.
Yesterday, another member in a white mask came in carrying a baseball bat with pieces of broken glass glued to it and hadn’t hesitated to slam it into Tim’s side, demanding to know who else knew about their operations.
It’s laying in a corner of the room now. Simply thinking about it makes Tim’s shredded side and back ache more.
They brought back the cattle prod several more times and someone stabbed a knife into his infected gunshot wound. His arms have long since gone numb.
Tim doesn’t have the energy to lift his head and mostly stares blankly at the cement ground, now tinted red from the growing pool of red spreading under him.
This is probably worrying, part of his brain tells him with alarm.
Tim’s too tired to really understand.
The door grinds open. The noise alone is enough to make him flinch violently.
He looks up, startled, when he doesn’t hear the familiar sound of combat boots on the hard floor, but rather the click-clack of heels.
The woman-- the leader of the gang, Tim reminds himself-- walks in. He barely has the energy to lift his head to glare at her through a curtain of stringy hair. His weak glare and deplorable state probably don’t convey the seething hatred he’s got for her and her entire organization.
She studies him for a long time, and he maintains eye contact the whole time.
Then, she reaches forward and grabs his aching jaw in her hand, and tilts his head to one side and then the other.
She hums. “You’re pretty enough,” she muses. “Could probably rack up a few thousand with those pretty eyes.”
He scowls. “Fuck. You,” he hisses before he starts coughing.
She tuts, tilting his head to the side. “Truly a shame they got you good. That face is a real seller.”
The words send shivers down his spine and make his blood boil.
“When Hood catches you, he’ll make you eat your fucking words,” he spits out.
She laughs, tilting her head back. “Sweetie,” she starts, tone condescendingly pleasant. “The Red Hood’s got no idea who I am or what I do. Even you didn’t know.”
Tim snorts. “Sure. I was close to figuring it out, though.”
He got captured before he got the chance to. That though tastes bitter when he thinks about it.
“Pretty clever for a little bird,” she says, sounding amused.
Tim coughs and blood drips on the ground. “Like I haven’t heard that one before.”
“Adrian was right about you,” she says, stepping back, crossing her arms over her chest. “Can’t seem to know when to hold your tongue. I should cut it out for you.”
“Heard that one, too.”
Tim wrinkles his nose. Several times, in fact. Ra’s was fond of telling Tim he’d cut his tongue out for his smart replies.
She doesn’t get to say anything else because a woman in a white mask steps into the room and murmurs something in her ear. Tim can’t see her face, but he can tell from the way her shoulders tense and her body stiffens that it’s not good news.
It’s confirmed when she leaves the room almost immediately, slamming the door shut behind her but not bothering to lock it. If Tim strains his ears, he can hear her barking orders. He thinks he hears yelling and faint gunfire, but it’s not anywhere close to him. He thinks grimly, that it leaves them all plenty of time to kill Tim before anyone reaches this part of the compound.
He sags in his bindings, trying to push aside the crushing hopelessness.
He can only hope they’ll find and save the kids first.
There are so many kids here, Jason realizes, his stomach curdling with horror, the pit whispering in his ear, excited to see spilled blood. He represses a shudder.
“Spoiler,” he says, his voice tight and not quite his own. “I need a hand here.”
Over the comms, he can hear the sounds of fighting and Spoiler replying with an affirmative. With Cass, he’d followed Blake Malcolm to an old graffitied building that according to what Oracle found, had been bought by a private buyer from out of town some months prior.
When they’d arrived, Batman had told them to stay still until he got there. Fine with Jason, who’d immediately climbed on the roof of the building opposite to survey their target. Cass followed close after him and crouched beside him. It was crawling with armed people wearing ridiculous white masks Jason was sure they’d bought at Party City. through the windows, Jason had also caught sight of movement, and sight of windows completely covered with wooden planks.
The moment Jason heard the familiar roar of the Batmobile, he ventured into the building via a second-story window, Cass quickly on his heels.
The room they found themselves in was mostly empty, nothing really interesting about it except for unlabeled boxes that probably contained more cargo.
The next room was where all the business was at. The Pit had sung in his veins, excited to be unleashed, to spill blood, to revel in the carnage. His body shook with the effort of keeping the demon at bay.
He held back until Batman and Robin entered through the front door, effectively reducing it into kindling. Spoiler, Nightwing, and The Signal burst in soon after the shooting started. Jason held back the reigns right up until he slipped through a door and his flashlight beam had lit up dozens of cages, less than half of them containing prone figures in them.
The Pit rears back in glee, sinking its claws in deep and Jason lets it. Spoiler can call for backup when she gets here.
Jason’s gonna go find the leader of this gang and rip open their guts.
He doesn’t bother staying hidden in the shadows. He pulls out his guns and fires at anyone who crosses his path. An alarm starts blaring at some point, but Jason’s too lost in his own rage to notice.
It feels good to let himself lose control. The Pit howls in glee and does not hold back. His mind is clouded in a vicious green. The green of destruction and death and rejuvenation. The same green that once drove him to nearly murder Tim years ago. It feeds on the screams of agony, on the coppery smell of blood that overpowers that of rubber and motor oil, on the palpable fear around him when they see him-- red helmet and clothes drenched in blood, guns still smoking. There’s the taste of copper and bitter gunpowder in his mouth and Jason doesn’t stop or slow down.
Gunfire dies slowly but surely and Jason comes out of the gree haze, focused on a single goal. Finding Tim.
Tim has no idea how long it’s been since he’s been left alone. This time, the woman in the black mask comes in followed by two armed men. One of them releases Tim from the chains keeping him upright, and he crumples to the ground on legs that refuse to carry his weight. It’s such a relief to release the agonizing tension on his arms that Tim could start crying.
He doesn’t.
It takes whatever scraps of energy he has to keep the tears away.
The woman leans over him, pushing him onto his back with her foot.
“Pathetic,” she mutters. “A shame we can’t sell you. In your condition, you wouldn’t last long. No one buys damaged goods.”
He glares at her and only coughs weakly when he tries to snap something back at her.
“Your friends found the base,” she continues, and Tim recognizes the tightness in her tone as thinly controlled fury. “We’ll relocate. You will be dead.”
She steps back and one of the men steps forward. Tim flinches, waiting to get shot in the head. Instead, the man holds a piece of rebar. It takes too long for Tim to realize what he’s doing.
He slams the rebar into the fleshy part of Tim’s shoulder, piercing skin and muscle and pinning Tim to the cement ground.
White-hot agony flares all along Tim’s nerves and all he can do is scream. He screams until his voice cracks and his throat burns and he screams again until his vision goes black. When his vision comes back, the room is empty.
He must’ve passed out.
White spots dance across Tim’s vision and his ears ring dully. He feels sticky warmth along his shoulder and gasps when the pain fully pulls him out of unconsciousness. His voice is gone, his throat is dry, and he’s too dehydrated to cry. It doesn’t stop his body from trying. His frame is wracked with dry sobs of pain and despair coupled with the knowledge that this is how Tim’s going to die, in pain and bleeding out. He wonders if this was how Jason felt, in the moments before he died. The crushing knowledge that even if someone came, they’d never make it in time to make a difference.
Tim knows how pathetic he must look, but thinks he’s allowed to be vulnerable after days of keeping his guard up. No one’s going to find him here. No one will walk in on Tim dry sobbing in pain and despair.
He glances at the door and feels overcome by another wave of dizzy despair. It’s ajar. He’s pinned to the ground like a collector's butterfly, helpless and unable to move, and the exit is right there.
Tim bites his lip and closes his eyes. With his free arm, he reaches up, wraps his hand around the bar, and pulls.
He screams loud enough that his voice cracks right down the middle and he coughs hoarsely.
He releases the bar. His shoulder burns and his thoughts are reduced to ashes and pain and tears.
His mouth tastes like copper and salt and he knows that if he threw up, he wouldn’t be able to twist to the side. His stomach churns nauseatingly, but it’s been empty for days. The only thing he could throw up would be bile.
The door opens and Tim’s head lolls to the side. His blurry vision sees combat boots and his body aches with despair.
“No,” he mumbles. “Please. Please.”
He can’t handle any more torture.
The person kneels and turns Tim’s head up and he sees a red helmet. For half a second he’s frozen with terror. The last time he’s been in this position-- wounded and broken on the ground with Red Hood crouching over him-- Tim had been fourteen and took months to recover. But Tim’s eighteen, and he sees his brother, here, saying something Tim can hardly hear.
“Red,” Jason’s saying. “Red, are you with me?”
Tim winces. “Jay…” his voice is hoarse and broken.
“Yeah. It’s me. I’ll get you out, okay?”
Tim just whimpers. “C--can’t get it off,” he says, voice pathetically quiet. “Hurts.”
There are fingers carding through his hair and tears dribble down his temple at the soft sensation.
“I know, kid,” Jason says gently. Tim can hear a hard edge in his voice. “I have to pull it out, okay? It’ll hurt like hell, but tetanus sucks worse. ‘Specially for your dumbass and your stupid missing spleen.”
Oh. Tim forgot about that. He hums. The hands leave his head and he whimpers at the loss of comfort. A second later, his mind is bursting with agony. He screams through his shredded throat and breathes harshly.
He twists to the side and dry heaves. Hands are on him, pulling him off the floor and rubbing his back in soothing motions. They brush over the jagged cuts, but he doesn’t register the pinpricks of pain. His mind is too busy focusing on the flare of white-hot agony in his shoulder.
“Shit, kid,” the voice-- Jason’s, Jason's, Jason-- says. “You’re gonna be fine.”
He’s shivering, Tim realizes. With every shiver that wracks his frame and sends a jolt of agony through his abused nerves, he feels himself sink further out of consciousness.
“I can’t--” he licks his dry lips and takes a gasping breath. “I can’t breathe.”
There’s a hand in his hair and Jason’s worried face swimming in front of his eyes. Tim’s good hand scrabbles to find a hold, fingers scraping across tough Kevlar. His lungs don’t contract when he breathes and his head feels light, almost like he’s floating.
This is the second time he almost dies in Jason’s arm, he thinks as reality fades. Except this time, Jason’s the one rescuing him.
Jason’s concerned face disappears completely and Tim’s falling into the abyss.
The drive to Leslie’s Clinic is silent and tense.
Batman is breaking every single driving law possible trying to get them back before Tim’s heart stops again.
Red Hood is holding Tim in his arms, sandwiched in the backseat between Nightwing and Robin. Spoiler is sitting in the front seat, but she’s twisted around so that she can watch the slow rise and fall of Tim's chest. Black Bat and the Signal volunteered to hang back and talk to the GCPD and help take care of the kids.
Dick's hand rests against Tim’s chest, needing to feel his chest fall and rise. Proof he’s breathing and alive. The sight of Tim laying on the ground in a spreading pool of his own blood with Jason yelling at him to wake up while doing compressions on his still chest is something Dick won’t be forgetting for a long time.
Hesitantly, he looks over at Jason.
His eyes have been monitoring Tim’s breathing the whole time. They’re back to a softer greenish-blue now, shadowed with worry. When he’d looked up at Dick back in that horrible basement room, they’d been a shining, acidic green, wide with fear and the dregs of his earlier manic fury where he gunned down almost every single person in sight.
Dick’s eyes fall back to Tim’s prone form and there’s a familiar ache in his chest. God, Tim looks so small in Jason’s arms, skin ashen and marred with vivid bruises and scabbing wounds. It’s worse. Dick knows it’s worse. This isn’t the worst of it. He doesn’t even know what color his clothes used to be. The tank top and the pants are dyed brown with dried blood.
The Batmobile smells like blood.
Even Damian isn’t speaking.
He’s been prickly the whole four days they’ve been looking for Tim, but Dick knows it’s his way of trying to pretend he’s detached, that he doesn’t care. Things haven’t been great between Tim and Damian, but they’ve been trying these past few months. They’ve all been trying to get better at being an actual family.
The car screeches to a halt and before it’s fully stopped, Nightwing’s already out the door, Hood following moments later.
When they burst through the doors, Leslie’s just stepped out of her office. She freezes, mouth opening slightly, eyes widening with mounting horror as she took in Batman, Jason covered in blood and wearing neither his domino mask nor his helmet, a limp Tim in his arms.
“Oh my-- come. Bring him in here.”
She quickly holds a door open and Jason immediately rushes inside followed by Dick and the others.
“Don’t crowd,” she snaps, worry lines prominent on her forehead. “Wait outside.”
She looks older and much more tired. No one wants to leave Tim alone, but they still allow her to shut the door and can only hope that Tim will make it.
Dick looks over and sees that neither Bruce nor Damian nor Steph want to leave the room. Neither does he. Dick looks at his little brother, lying unconscious on the operation table, and swallows thickly.
He reaches over and wraps his arm around Damian’s shoulder.
“C’mon,” he says softly. “Let’s get some coffee.”
Steph reaches for his hand and he squeezes it comfortingly and leads them out of the operating room.
Tim doesn’t feel pain when he blinks open.
His vision is blurry and he’s resigning himself to the fact that he’s got to be dead when he becomes aware of a familiar gruff voice talking. It’s Jason’s voice, which means there’s no way Tim’s dead. Unless Jason also died.
Again.
He winces and opens his eyes.
The first thing he notices is that he’s in a hospital bed.
The second is that Cass is sitting in a chair at the foot of Tim’s bed. She’s still in costume but wears a large frayed hoodie over it that definitely belongs to Bruce. She’s literally swimming in it, and the sleeves are rolled back several times and still barely brush her knuckles. Cass’s eyes are on Jason, but flick to Tim and she smiles at him. She looks exhausted but otherwise relatively unscathed.
Jason’s sitting on a chair on Tim’s other side and reading a book out loud. His hands tremble where they hold the book open and there’s a waver in his voice. Tim recognizes the story but can’t quite place it.
Tim shifts which pulls sharply at his back and he winces before coughing harshly.
“Glad to see you’re back to the land of the living, kid. Thought we lost you there for a sec."
Tim's throat is swollen and drier than sandpaper. He tries to speak but all that comes out is a rough croak that tickles his throat and sends him into a fit of hacking coughs.
"Okay, okay," Jason says and there's a warm hand rubbing circles on his back. "Take it easy. Cass?"
Tim's dizzy and his abdomen contracts painfully with each cough but can't seem to stop coughing.
There's a steadying hand on his shoulder. "Little brother," Cass’s voice filters through Tim’s nebulous mind.
He looks up to see a straw and a small paper cup being shoved in his face. It’s probably the best water Tim’s ever tasted.
His mind clears and he winces when he slowly becomes aware of the fact that he has stitches and bruised ribs and they ache from his earlier coughing fit.
He’s laid back down on his pillows as he tries to catch his breath.
“So,” he wheezes. “Pneumonia?”
“Among other things,” Jason says flatly. “Many, many other things.” He reaches forward and flicks Tim on the forehead. “Idiot.”
Tim hums and looks down at his hands. There are thick white bandages wrapped around two fingers on his left hand and he’s got white gauze wrapped around each wrist. They don’t manage to hide the ring of vivid bruises creeping up his wrists. There’s an IV taped to the inside of his elbow. His left arm is in a sling and his fractured memories remember Jason’s red helmet, a black plastic mask, a pipe, red-hot agony. He shudders, feeling like he’s about to throw up.
“How long was I out?” he croaks, then clears his throat. It hurts to swallow.
“Two days,” Cass says.
“Killed most of the gang when we got you,” Jason adds flippantly, opening the book again.
Memories are slowly surging up out of the depths. He shivers when he thinks of that woman, staring at him like a predator ready to go for the kill, staring at Tim with those dark eyes, never once seeing him as a person.
“They unmasked me,” he says quietly, fiddling with the scratchy hospital sheets.
Calloused fingers lace with Tim’s and he looks up into Cass’s earnest eyes.
“Doesn’t matter,” she says with protective conviction. “Can be fixed. You are more important.”
“Cass is right,” Jason says. “We care more about your scrawny ass being alive than we care about your dumb identity remaining secret. Besides,” Jason leans back in his chair and crosses his hands behind his head, looking far too self-satisfied, “whoever saw your face is dead with a bullet in their skull. Trust me. I emptied like, two clips into their boss. The bitch better be fucking dead.”
“O got to ID her, too,” Jason adds as an afterthought. “Meredith Feyrer.” He catches Tim’s look of surprise and shrugs, a corner of his mouth lifting in a half-smile. “Dick told me how badly you wanted to find out who she was. Spoiler and the Signal took care of the kids and helped track down and arrest whoever remained. They’re gone, kid. For good.”
Tim smiles wanly at Jason, relief washing over him. “Aw. You care about me.”
Jason grunts. “I’ll pretend like you didn’t just say that because I very much can and will bash your skull in.”
Tim grins. It hurts his bruised cheek, but he doesn’t care. “Sure.”
Jason gives him the stink eye over his book before looking back down.
Cass squeezes Tim’s hand. “I will get Leslie.”
She gets up and slips out of the room, leaving Tim alone with Jason. Once upon a time, it would’ve sent him spiraling into a full-blown panic attack. But now they’ve reached a point where they relatively enjoy each other’s company. Occasionally they’ll be in the living room together, with Jason reading a book and Tim working on a case or doing work for his internship at WE.
“What are we reading today?” he asks, craning his neck to get a peek at the cover.
“First of all, it’s the book I’m reading,” Jason states. “You spent most of the time passed out. And it’s Watership Down.”
“Ah,” is all he says. “You’ve been reading to me the whole time?”
Jason shrugs. “Reading is a very healing experience.”
“Watership Down isn’t what I’d call a healing book.”
“Hm. And I take it you’ve read it?”
And Tim feels incredibly offended at Jason’s tone. Because no, he hasn’t, but Jason doesn’t have to mock him about it.
“I read the Sparknotes entry,” he says, wishing he could cross his arms. But his aching shoulders and the itching wound just under his clavicle are more than enough to dissuade him.
Jason looks at him, thoroughly unimpressed. Tim is saved from whatever Jason’s remark would have been by Doctor Thompkins walking in, followed by a very stressed-out Bruce, Dick following close behind. As Leslie shuts the door, Tim’s sure he catches sight of a blond ponytail and wonders if Damian and Duke are also outside waiting with Steph and Cass. and then he wonders how much time they’ve all spent at the clinic waiting for Tim to wake up.
“Tim,” Leslie says brightly. “I’m glad to see you up and talking. With the pneumonia on top of… your other injuries, I wasn’t expecting you to wake up for another day or so.”
Tim shrugs. “Must be my amazing and totally uncompromised immune system working double-time to get me outta here.”
The room is so tense that the joke falls flat. Tim clears his sore throat. “Sorry.”
Leslie smiles, but it’s tight and doesn’t reach her tired eyes. “Don’t you worry about it,” she tells him. “Everyone’s just stressed and running on little sleep.” She eyes Bruce. “Very little sleep.”
Tim hums again, and he’s back to fiddling with the covers. He tries to reach for the cup of water on the table next to his bed but winces when he shifts his aching shoulder and sends a spark of sharp pain down his arm.
If it’s possible, the room tenses even further. All Tim wants to do is burrow under the covers and pretend they’re not standing there, staring at him with those unreadable expressions. Even Jason’s lost his faux peppy demeanor.
Bruce rushes to Tim’s side and hands him the cup.
“Should’ve expected that,” Tim says, trying to laugh it off as he takes a slow sip. “Since I spent most of my time…”
He trails off. He doesn’t really think he needs to say anything. They all already know anyway, and Tim’s not in the mood to think about the past few days just yet. It’s too raw and he’s too tired and jittery.
“I’d just like to keep you overnight to monitor you and make sure your pneumonia isn’t going to get worse, but you’ll be able to go home in the morning. Sound good?”
Tim nods and Leslie smiles, still weak but a bit more genuine this time.
“I’m sure you’ve all got a lot to talk about,” she says, opening the door a crack. “Tim, if you don’t think you’ll be too overwhelmed, you can invite your guests inside.”
She opens the door wide and he sees Cass, Steph, Damian, and Duke standing outside, all of them having clearly eavesdropped on the conversation and none of them looking the least bit apologetic about it.
Tim smiles. “I’m sure I’ll be fine. Come in, guys.”
They all enter and Cass closes the door behind her. Tim’s trying his best to not retreat further into his shell. He hates being put on the spot. Anytime he was put on the spot by his parents, he’d get accused of mouthing off or doing something he hadn’t done and they would then proceed to lecture him and send him to his room for the rest of the day. He knows this is different. They won’t do that. They wouldn’t. They’re just concerned. He can see it clear as day on their haggard and exhausted faces.
It’s still daunting.
He’s twisting the sheet between his hands now, strangling it in his fists, trying to hide how nervous he feels.
The bed dips and he looks up to see Dick sitting down and smiling at Tim, eyes shining with unshed tears. His smile isn’t bright, it’s one of those duller, sadder smiles he reserves for when he’s feeling particularly guilty about something.
“Tim, I’m so sorry--”
He blinks. “Dick you can’t be serious. This isn’t even remotely your fault,” he replies.
Dick looks pained and Tim hears Jason muffle a snort with a cough.
“We were patrolling together,” Dick says, voice hushed. “We shouldn’t have gotten separated.”
Tim sighs, pushing back the exasperation.
“I’m eighteen, Dick. I know the risks that come with this job. I knew what the risks were when I split off to follow a lead,” Tim says. “You can’t be held accountable for a decision I made. I don’t need that. You don’t need that. Listen, it’s not your fault, okay? It’s not mine either.” He catches Damian’s raised eyebrow. “Okay, maybe a little for how close I allowed myself to get, especially since I saw the guns, but that is beside the point. I don’t need an apology. I just need--”
Tim trails off and leans forward for a hug but groans and sits back down, pain flaring in his abdomen and arms. “Okay, I was gonna hug you but I can’t so just hug me instead.”
Dick hesitates, staring at Tim’s open arm. He doesn’t look entirely convinced either, but Tim’s tired and probably winding down from a morphine high, so he thinks he’s allowed to not make grand, eloquent speeches. Dick eventually reaches forward and wraps Tim in a warm hug and he simply melts right into it, hugging back fiercely.
He shudders and finally, truly understands that he’s safe. A few tears slip down his cheeks and he buries his face in his big brother’s shoulder.
“I’ve been wanting a hug for days.” He laughs wetly.
He burrows deeper into Dick’s warmth, his heart singing with contentment and the crushing feeling of safety. Another pair of arms wrap around Tim and he tenses briefly before he smells Bruce’s peppermint aftershave and relaxes again. He feels another pair of tiny arms struggle to hug him without jostling him too much.
“Timothy, since you are clearly too incompetent to care for yourself--”
Tim laughs and reaches over blindly to ruffle his hair. “I love you too, Dami.”
He huffs but doesn’t make another jab.
He looks up to see practically all of them hugging him, making it look like a giant game of Twister gone wrong.
“This is nice,” Tim says, his body sagging with exhaustion, and closes his eyes for a few moments. “I really missed this.”
He’s not gonna fall asleep, he tells himself. He’s just warm and safe and getting hugged by his family. He’s just enjoying the moment.
Tim did fall asleep.
The next time he wakes up the room is still dimly lit and he’s more aware of the aches in his body, to his chagrin. He misses the morphine. Regular painkillers won't be as effective, and Tim knows he'll be feeling the gunshot wound and his aching arms for weeks to come.
He blinks. The only people in his room are Steph, her upper body sprawled at the foot of Tim’s bed, effectively trapping his legs under her head and crossed arms, and Damian, who’s sitting in a corner of the room engrossed in his sketch, pencil practically flying across the paper.
After staring at him for a few moments, Tim speaks up.
“What’cha drawing?” he asks, his voice a hoarse whisper.
It’s frustrating.
Damian doesn’t look up. “Nothing.”
Tim raises his eyebrows but drops the subject. Damian’s always been secretive about his art.
“What time is it?” he asks instead.
“Nearly eight,” Damian replies. “Father is talking with Doctor Thompkins.”
Tim blinks. “Oh. Oh, thank God.”
He cannot wait to get out of here. He’s suddenly grateful that he’s spent most of his time at Leslie’s clinic unconscious, because the room is far too small for Tim’s liking and the more he thinks about that, the more his chest tightens.
Damian glances at him, his face remaining carefully blank. He’s always been too good at hiding what he’s thinking and feeling. Damian studies him before dropping his scrutinizing gaze and going back to sketching as if nothing happened.
Steph stirs and sits up, stretching and making the joints in her back pop.
“Morning,” Tim says. “When we leave, can we get breakfast?”
Steph rubs the sleep out of her eyes. “I’m so down for that, but you’ll have to take it up to B-Man.”
“Boo,” Tim says, sticking his tongue out.
“Ugh, my back,” Steph complains. “What were you thinking?”
Tim shrugs. “Waffle House? I’d like waffles. I didn’t think I’d ever eat waffles again, so I deserve waffles. As a treat for not dying.”
Steph snorts.
“I’m serious! I was mentally saying goodbye to pancakes and waffles and Alfred’s cooking around, like, the second time they shot me.”
“This is hardly something to joke about,” Damian says.
“Sure it is!” Tim replies. “The alternative is having a breakdown.”
“We have so many issues,” Steph laughs.
Tim hums and sinks back into the bed, exhaustion washing over him and tugging him back under.
“Wake me when we go to Waffle House,” he mumbles, consciousness drifting away gently.
Dimly, he feels a warm hand wrap around his own. If the owner of the hand says anything, Tim doesn’t catch it.
He’s in and out of sleep.
Mostly because he’s too hot or too cold, or because his stitches itch or his neck hurts and he shifts before sinking back into sleep. He’s not aware of much except that he’s exhausted and tired of his sleep getting interrupted. Sometimes he’s aware of fingers threading gently through his knotted hair or aware of the distinct smell of jasmine, warm cinnamon, the feel of cool and clean sheets against his warm skin, but he’s out again before he can wake up fully and see what’s happening.
He feels safe, though he can’t remember why. If his instincts aren’t on high alert, then Tim believes he’s safe enough to sleep and drop his guard. He trusts his instincts because his hazy mind recalls a time when it had been his only companion and it had kept him alive.
He’s pretty sure he’s alive.
There’s a hand in his. And a voice that rumbles gently.
“Yes, Tim, you’re alive.”
Hm, that’s good. He likes being alive. His body and mind sink dizzyingly back into the warm embrace of sleep.
Tim wakes to the sound of birds chirping cheerfully and the morning sun shining directly into his eyes. His head hurts and he’s wracked with shivers. Dumb pneumonia, Tim’s sleepy mind thinks as he powers through a coughing fit that makes his sides ache. He tries to roll over with a sleepy groan but the moment he puts pressure on his shoulder, he hisses and rolls back to his previous position.
His arms, shoulders all the way down to his wrists, ache something fierce. It’s the most prominent pain in his body. There’s a dull thrum of pain in his leg (bullet wound, his memories whisper), and his throat aches but the swelling’s gone down. He feels the pull and itch of stitches and his torso and abdomen ache where his ribs ars bruised and where he got stabbed.
It takes a few moments for him to find the courage to push himself upright.
His mind spins and he groans, his good hand rubbing his aching head. His hair’s a tangled mess, but his body is no longer covered in the layer of grime and dried sweat. He tries to comb his hand through his hair but shouts in pain when it tugs painfully at his fingers.
He pulls away and stares at his hand. It’s swathed in white gauze, like his wrists, like his entire torso, like his shoulder. Two of his fingers are still slightly swollen and colored a fading purple from bruising.
Broken.
His bedroom door slams open and startles him. He looks up, eyes wide, to see Dick standing there, hair disheveled and eyes wide with panic.
“Uh,” Tim starts. “Hi?”
Dick deflates, the panic ebbing away. “Sorry, just--” he waves a hand in the hair, the other running through his hair. “Thought something happened.”
Tim blinks, then gestures at himself. “Yes, nothing happened, Dick.”
Dick’s jaw ticks. “Come on, Tim. You know what I mean.”
“Listen, let me have this, ‘kay? I got tortured for four days.”
Dick flinches at Tim’s light tone and there’s something painful in his eyes. Tim looks away.
“Sorry, forget it,” he quickly adds. “I just remembered how much broken bones suck.”
His eyes flicker to his bedside table and to the alarm clock sitting on it. The red numbers indicate that it’s nearly eleven in the morning. He can smell pancakes and his stomach rumbles.
“Isn’t it a bit late for Alfred to be cooking breakfast?” he asks, changing the topic.
Dick’s face splits into an easy grin that seems a bit too forced to Tim. He doesn’t make a comment about it.
“For breakfast, yes, but not for brunch.”
Tim’s eyes widen. “Oh, shit, for real?”
“And that’s one for the swear jar,” Dick says, laughing. “Okay, sleeping beauty. Since you’ve been shot in the leg I’ve been instructed to carry you down the stairs--”
“No,” Tim cuts Dick off. “No! I’m not giving Jason and Steph blackmail material.”
Dick takes a step back, arms crossed and eyebrows raised. “I’d love to see you try to walk.”
“I will, thank you.”
Tim flings the covers off and braces his good arm against the bed’s backboard and pushes himself off. In that split moment, Tim’s mind reminds him of several things. The first is that Tim was shot in only one leg. He hasn’t eaten in six days. He’s been allowed water to keep him alive. He knows the sleep he managed to get during his captivity wasn’t really restful. In those four days, he’s barely been allowed to walk.
He also forgot to take the last four things into account.
Tim’s uninjured leg buckles when he puts his whole weight on it and he falls. He would’ve hit the ground had it not been for Dick’s arms catching him halfway. The landing jostles the stitches in his shoulder and he grunts in pain through clenched teeth.
He glares at Dick who’s grinning slyly at him.
“You were expecting that,” he accuses.
Dick shrugs and doesn’t look the least bit apologetic. “Yes. I did. And it was just as funny as I expected it to be.”
Tim swats his arm. “Asshole. Help me down.”
Dick accepts the compromise and they make their way slowly down the stairs and to the kitchen. Their procession is slow and Tim’s gripping Dick’s arm in a way that’s bound to be painful, but he’s grateful that his older brother doesn’t ask Tim why he’d rather walk himself instead of letting himself be carried. Sure, it would be easier. Tim’s just glad to be able to walk around freely.
The closer they get to the kitchen, the more Tim’s stomach growls. God, he is so going to be enjoying those pancakes.
“For a second back there, I really thought I’d have to bid farewell to Alfred’s cooking,” Tim jokes.
He glances at Dick only to see the easy smirk gone, replaced by a stormy expression. Tim presses his lips together but doesn’t say anything.
“Too soon?” he asks, forcing a light tone.
Dick hums and the tension is back and it’s awkward. Tim’s rescued from trying to change the subject when they enter the kitchen and get caught up in the storm that is the Manor kitchen in the morning.
Or late morning, in this case.
Tim belatedly realizes he doesn’t even know what day it is and if Damian and Duke and Steph are missing class right now.
He sees Alfred and Jason cooking together and Duke apparently in charge of making the pancakes. The kitchen island is a mess. There’s a rolling pin and a mess of flour on one counter. Steph is kneeling in front of the oven and scrolling through her phone while occasionally glancing at whatever’s baking. There’s dry cat food spilled on the tile and everyone cleanly avoids stepping on the mess. It looks like Damian is making a salad, and Bruce isn’t in the kitchen. Tim wonders how long it took for Alfred to kick him out. He also wonders if Bruce is the reason why the kitchen smells like burnt toast and why the windows are open.
Damian looks up when Dick and Tim walk in.
“Drake is awake,” he announces.
The clamor stops for a moment as everyone looks up from their activities to look at Tim. he shifts uncomfortably before chaos once again overtakes the kitchen moments later.
Bruce pokes his head through the arch opening into the dining room. “Tim?” he asks and makes a beeline for them.
His smile is small and genuine. It’s not the polished smile he gives to the media. It’s the one he reserves exclusively for his family.
“How are you feeling?” he asks softly.
Tim frowns. “Head hurts. Body aches. I’m hungry and thirsty. But I’m just peachy otherwise.”
Cass enters after Bruce wearing a sweatshirt that looks suspiciously like Tim’s and makes her way over. The sweatshirt is black and sports a T-Rex riding a skateboard on the front.
"That is mine!" he exclaims.
His protest is swallowed by Cass’s fierce hug.
“Little brother worried me,” she says, like that explains the theft of his shirt.
Tim hums. “Fine. as long as I get this one back.”
He glares at Damian because he and Cass are the only two who like to steal Tim’s stuff and who can actually wear the stuff they steal. Cass laughs and ruffles his hair and steals him from Dick.
“We set the table,” she tells him.
And that’s what they do. Tim isn’t very useful, because he can barely move without leaning heavily on something for support, but Cass still hands him the silverware and the napkins. Neither she nor Bruce allow him to set the plates or the glasses though. When he still asks if he can be helpful, Bruce sits down in a chair and Tim sits next to him and he teaches him how to fold napkins in complicated shapes while Cass slinks back into the kitchen to see if she can help with anything else.
Tim’s stomach grumbles and he’s feeling more hungry smelling the food cooking in the next room than he did for most of his captivity. Then again, he had bigger things on his plate than thinking about food. Like potentially getting killed, or dying slowly of an infection.
“So,” Tim starts, trying to force his thoughts in a different direction. “Why aren’t you allowed in the kitchen?”
Bruce freezes, his hands still where he’s forming a swan with his napkin. He grumbles under his breath, sighs, lifting his eyes to the ceiling.
“I burned toast,” he admits.
Tim blinks. “Is that… it?”
Bruce sighs heavily. Makes another fold. Tim’s stopped folding, and he’s sure the poor, deformed swan he’s making is grateful for that.
"The toaster is broken," Bruce explains.
Tim frowns and remains silent. He knows that Alfred doesn't let Bruce cook or bake anything because every single time, it's ended disastrously. Bruce is hardly allowed in the kitchen anymore outside of meals. In his time as Robin and then as a Wayne, he doesn’t think he’s ever witnessed any kitchen incidents involving Bruce, but he did hear the stories from Dick and Alfred and later Jason, once he stopped trying to murder Tim.
“So I decided to microwave the toast,” Bruce continues. “I set it to two minutes to make it crunchy enough. Really, I can’t be blamed for the microwave malfunctioning.”
Tim can see where this is going. Bruce finishes folding the swan and starts folding another napkin.
“I was waiting for the microwave to beep! To tell me when it’s done! And it didn’t!”
Tim is definitely not about to laugh at Bruce’s betrayed tone.
He goes on, looking even more upset. “Instead, it kept going until the bread started to smoke and eventually Duke noticed the smell and the smoke and stopped the microwave.”
Bruce is folding the swan angrily and yet somehow still perfectly. Tim’s looks like a malformed slug.
“Hm, so that explains the smell,” Tim says.
Bruce nods miserably and puts aside the perfectly folded swan. He goes to pick another napkin only to realize they’ve all been folded. Tim wordlessly hands him his abomination and Bruce starts to fold it just as miserably. Tim’s struggling to hold in his laughter at the sight.
There’s a tickling in his throat and he forces it away.
The headache won’t go away and he thinks he might actually enjoy going back to bed and sleep the day away.
Their comfortable bubble of silence is burst by Steph walking triumphantly into the room, a plate piled with chocolate chip muffins in her hands.
“Made ‘em myself,” she proudly announces.
Tim immediately reaches for one. “Oh thank the lord,” he says, tearing through the warm muffin. “I’m so hungry I could eat a horse.”
The muffin tastes amazing. It’s still warm, so the chocolate chips melt wonderfully in his mouth.
“This is literally the best thing I’ve eaten in my entire life,” he tells Steph candidly as the other members of the household file in, each carrying plates of breakfast and lunch food.
“‘M not even mad that we didn’t get any Waffle House,” Tim says, finishing the muffin.
“We were gonna, but Bruce said no.” Dick glares at Bruce who shrugs.
“Tim needed rest.”
“No, Tim needed waffles,” Tim shoots back. “I haven’t eaten in four days.”
“Tt, Drake you were not in a position to give your opinion,” Damian replies. “And you are not in a position to give your opinion now, either.”
Tim huffs. “Fine. I’ll accept defeat only because this all looks absolutely amazing and I am way too hungry to care.”
“Damian made the pancake batter,” Duke says, setting the plate stacked high with pancakes down on the table before taking a seat next to Tim.
“Dang, I was looking forward to those,” he laments. “But I’d actually like to not die at the breakfast table.”
A muffin hits him squarely in the face and he glares at Damian.
“Damian’s throwing food at me,” Tim complains when Alfred walks in.
“Traitor!”
“Master Damian, I do not tolerate using food for anything other than eating.”
“I apologize, Pennyworth. Drake thinks I poisoned the batter.”
Alfred gives Tim a flat look. “Master Tim, I can assure you that Master Damian does not wish to poison you and that he did not do anything to the batter.”
“Perhaps the fever has made Drake’s brain melt.”
“Dami, that’s just mean,” Dick says, but the smile on his face disagrees.
“Maybe it did,” Tim replies.
With his fork, he slides two pancakes onto his plate. If he dies of food poisoning, so be it. The pancakes look absolutely delicious. Damian and Duke look identically pleased and Tim fights back a smile as he reaches for the maple syrup. He practically drowns his pancakes in the stuff and then adds several strawberries and blueberries on top of it to make it look a little fancy.
Everyone’s sitting down and engaging in conversation cheerfully and though Tim’s body aches almost everywhere and he’s still got a fever and a nasty cough, he thinks this might just be the best morning of his life.