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Tim put his Batman themed energy drink down on the coaster in front of him with a slight tremor. Despite being in this exact position for nearly a decade, nerves still wracked through his entire body inducing the disgusted mix of excitement and panic he felt.
He had been Red Hood for a few months now and frankly he couldn’t help but love it. He got to do things Robin couldn’t and while Red Robin would go to more extremes, he still held himself back because of a reputation he felt he had to uphold. Hood didn't have to worry about that, he could kill if needed, he could blow up buildings and instill fear in the scum of Gotham. His new found freedom helped him discover new skills too, as it turned out he's got a knack for archery, much to Jason’s dismay and Roy’s delight.
His mission to scare Bruce however, had fallen to the wayside and plateaued in progress. Sure, since two Hoods appeared on the streets B’s slowly gotten messier and messier, but for Tim it wasn’t enough. Batman’s actions became less refined, he became more unstable, more violent. While he got more aggressive, he eventually stopped attempting to corner Tim on patrol and began focusing all his energy into beating people nearly to a pulp. The first time he saw it, it made Red’s heart drop into his stomach. B started to regress, becoming the Batman he had met all those years ago, freshly hitting the streets after Jason’s death.
Tim wanted to make his former father suffer the way Bruce made him suffer for years. While people say revenge is moot, he had to disagree. His revenge was, yes, partially for self-satisfaction but also an attempt to make Gotham realize B is pulling the wool over their eyes. He needed to elevate his plan, bring it to the next step and that's what brought him to where he is now.
He sat in his gaming chair, a custom Razor that Jason and Roy had gotten him that Christmas, and booted up his smaller version of a Batcomputer. Jay had been waiting for him for about 15 minutes at that point, he had gotten distracted playing a game of Princesses and Knights with Lian. After a brief moment, his computer came to life and he was able to open the com line connecting him to the aforementioned man.
“Red, what took you so damn long?”, Jason’s voice blared through his headset followed by the sound of guns being fired.
“Fuck I’m so sorry Hood, Agent L held me back to do some… uhhhh… paperwork”
“Gotcha, now help me get the fuck out of this building, I keep running into dead ends”, the older boy said before setting off a smoke bomb and debilitating the two guards cornering him. Tim and Jason had gotten a few leads on a sex trafficking ring being ran out of a warehouse in rural New Jersey. It had taken Hood an hour to drive from Gotham to central New Jersey to bust it, let alone the time it’ll take to kill the leaders and steal information to make sure there weren't any other branches of the ring.
“You need to go to the left and jump out the window, you’re surrounded. You’re only two stories up so you shouldn’t really take any damage. The room you enter to get out looks like it’s the office, have you already downloaded everything to the hard drive?”
“Even better, I stole one of the guys' laptops.”
“Hood, you might have just beat Bern as my favorite person”. The older boy laughed as he charged towards the window, turning around mid jump and perfectly shooting the goon following him directly in the head.
“Get fucked!”, Jason shouted as he tumbled to the ground, rolling to distribute his weight properly before sprinting towards the unmarked car he hid in the woods. As a last minute treat, an extravagant way of saying “Bon Voyage”, he remotely detonated the building to explode. With a resounding boom the warehouse was engulfed in flames and smoke. The two boys simultaneously busted into a raucous fit of laughter at the sight of their latest triumph.
“Mission success Hood, stay safe and head back to base. I’ll keep an eye on you and let you know if you’ve been followed at all”.
“Gotcha kid, see you later, logging off.”
As Tim closed the line and started to take out his ear piece, he got interrupted by an alert for a private message from Babs. The boy had started doing more recon and remote work since the incident in the Batcave and, as a result, they developed a secure chat between the two of them for exchanging case information and Bruce updates on a more casual basis. Opening it up, he was greeted by a simple message, “Need your help, call asap”.
Sighing, he adjusted his ear piece and opened up a secure line to call her. She almost never asks for him urgently, the jitters that went away slowly crept back into his body.
“Red, good to hear from you so quickly,” Bab’s said, answering his call before the phone could even ring.
“You’re lucky, I had just hopped off the line with Hood. I had to help him try to get around some guards and find an exit on his mission. I was supposed to be there sooner but Agent L held me up for a while playing pk”
“Ahhh pk… she made you play the princess didn’t she? She always wants to be the knight.”
“She did, she gets it from her dad’s, always gotta be a knight in shining armor”, Tim said making the two of them giggle. The bond he’s developed between Roy, Jason, Lian and Barbara since moving in is unlike any other he’s ever experienced. He never expected to gain a family that actually loved him and cared for him, the type of people to bring him soup in bed when sick, or cover him with a blanket when he falls asleep on the couch and buy him gifts, even if it's as simple as a gimmicky headband with two red robin logos on springs. He has more people in his corner than he ever has, between them, Young Justice and Bernard, he felt set for life.
Clearing her throat and drawing Tim’s attention back to reality, she spoke, “I need a big favor from you. The birds of prey need me for a mission and I will be unable to perform as Oracle because of it. I’ll still be stationed in the watch tower but the Birds need my undivided attention to pull this off. Tim, it’s time… will you be my Oracle?”
Shock coursed through the boy's veins, they had discussed the possibility of this but he didn't expect it to come so soon. The two of them had spent the last week working on the next parts of Tim’s plan to take down Bruce. He didn't care if it made him a bad person, he wanted to take him down a few pegs. He wanted to start small, leave him bits and pieces to slowly, painfully, drive him crazy.
“H-how long?” he asked, stuttering over his words before clearing his throat.
“One week at most, I’ll be next to you the whole time”, said Barbara, reassuring him the best she could.
Taking a deep breath, and what felt like hours to Barbara, he finally responded.
“Yes, I will be your Oracle”.