Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Jason Todd knew the streets of Gotham like the back of his hand. Gotham wasn’t just a place he knew. It was a place that had written itself into him, carved into his marrow like graffiti etched into brick. He didn’t need maps or apps or Oracle whispering in his ear. The city lived in him, humming beneath his skin like a second, stubborn heartbeat. Gotham breathed, and Jason breathed with it.

The streets had a rhythm, a subtle percussion of tire screeches, police sirens, and muttered deals exchanged in half-lit corners. Jason could tell when a fight was about to break out by the way the air shifted—how voices went taut and clipped, how the scent of rain mixed with the acrid tang of fear and gun oil. Crime Alley especially had its own distinct sound: streetlights buzzing with a faint electrical whine, like an insect’s wings, growing louder just before a brawl erupted.

He didn’t just walk through Gotham; he moved through it like someone tracing the familiar grooves of an old scar. Every cracked sidewalk and broken bottle was a landmark. The back alleys were twisted veins in a diseased heart, and he could navigate them blindfolded.

Jason knew which corners belonged to which crews and which ones were neutral ground only until the next blood feud broke out. He could predict a gang war three moves ahead, like a chess master setting up pieces, because he’d lived among those pawns and kings. A single night of watching drop-offs and dead drops was enough for him to figure out which dirty cops were in whose pockets, who’d recently switched allegiances, and who was about to disappear into the river. Sometimes he didn’t even need to lift a finger. A well-placed rumor, a whisper traded in the right ear, and he could topple a smuggling ring like a house of cards. He’d seen enough men destroy themselves without him even having to light the match.

But Gotham wasn’t only grime and blood to Jason. In the tiny slivers of his childhood when he wasn’t fighting to survive, there were moments when the city had offered him scraps of something almost like wonder. A half-burnt library book scavenged from a trash heap. A secondhand shop’s clearance bin, where paperbacks with warped covers cost less than a stale pretzel.

He had devoured them greedily, crouched under flickering streetlamps or in the back of abandoned buildings where no one could take them away. The words had been his escape hatch, each sentence a key prying open a world bigger than the suffocating blocks of Gotham’s East End.

Les Misérables. The Count of Monte Cristo. Baldwin’s fire. Morrison’s ghosts.

These books weren’t just stories; they were proof. Proof that people had risen from injustice and rage to carve meaning out of their pain. Proof that vengeance could be art, that survival could be defiance. Jason had memorized whole passages like other kids memorized TV shows. Even now, years later, he could still recite them in the dark, each line etched into him deeper than any scar.

But none of that brilliance, none of that insight—mattered when he sat down in front of a standardized test.

The AP curriculum didn’t care about the weight of a story or the bruises of lived experience. It didn’t want him to understand. It wanted him to perform understanding, to reduce revolution and tragedy into neatly labeled boxes and thesis statements.

It wanted him to write essays about symbolism and conflict like he’d never seen either outside the pages of a book.

Jason could survive Gotham. He could outthink gang lords and assassins. He could quote Hugo and Baldwin until sunrise.

But none of that meant shit jack when it came to the AP curriculum.

Not because he didn’t understand it. Hell, Jason understood too much. And he was nineteen now, still without a high school diploma, even if he technically had a spectacular excuse for the delay: being dead.

He didn’t need a teacher to explain symbolism or injustice to him, he’d lived it. Gotham was one long, bitter metaphor, and Jason had been reading its subtext since the day he learned to survive on its streets.

The problem was how little the system wanted him to actually think.

The AP exam didn’t care about real connections, about how Les Misérables mirrored Gotham’s underbelly or how Sweat echoed the crumbling factories and broken lives he saw every night. It wanted a formula: a five-paragraph essay with a theme, a symbol, and the “right” interpretation, neatly packaged and sterile.

Jason could pour the truth onto the page, but if he didn’t phrase it their way, they’d mark him wrong.

Thursday nights had become a ritual.

Tim showed up like clockwork after his evening classes, a perfectly pressed uniform shirt rumpled from a long day, messenger bag slung carelessly over one shoulder. His dark hair was a carefully cultivated kind of mess; the kind that looked accidental but probably took ten minutes in the mirror to get just right. Tonight, a few stubborn strands had fallen into his eyes, softening the sharp angles of his face and making him look almost boyish, though Jason knew better. The flickering hallway light caught in his hair, turning it from ink-black to a deep, rich blue, and for a split second, Jason hated how annoyingly good it looked on him. He’d knock three times in a distinctive rhythm, and Jason would grumble about “uninvited pests” while unlatching the half-broken door to his apartment.

It wasn’t anything official. Tim had a room at Titans Tower, another at the Manor, and a penthouse apartment in the city if he really wanted to play the Drake Family heir card.

But for reasons neither of them felt like naming, he always ended up here on Thursdays, their unspoken study night.

Tim’s private boarding school was the kind of place most Gotham kids only ever saw on glossy brochures: sprawling green lawns, ancient oak trees, ivy crawling up pristine brick walls. The buildings had clock towers and stained-glass windows, the kind of architecture that looked like it had been lifted straight out of an old Gothic novel. Its students didn’t just attend school; they inherited a legacy. Their last names opened doors, their futures paved smooth by generations of old money and influence.

When Jason was younger, he used to linger outside its gates after running errands for Ma Gunn’s School for Wayward Boys. At the time, he thought she was just another tough old woman running a halfway house, someone who offered food, education and shelter in exchange for labor, no questions asked. Sweaty and dirt-smudged, he’d hang back in the shadows after a day of hauling boxes or delivering packages for her, pretending he belonged there just for a moment. He’d watch the kids file out in their immaculate uniforms, their laughter sounding impossibly bright, untouched by Gotham’s grime. Back then, before everything went to hell, he’d dreamed of earning a scholarship, of slipping inside those walls and proving he could stand shoulder to shoulder with them.

It wasn’t until years later, after Bruce had taken him in and he’d put on the Robin mantle, that Jason uncovered the truth. The errands Ma Gunn had sent him on hadn’t been harmless odd jobs; they’d been training exercises. The so-called “school” had been a crime academy, grooming kids for Gotham’s underworld.

But dreams didn’t last long in Crime Alley.

By the time he was old enough to realize what it would take, Jason already knew he’d never get close. Those halls weren’t built for kids like him, no matter how smart or stubborn he was. They were built to keep him out.

Now, years later, Tim crossed that invisible line every Thursday evening, leaving behind the polished world of legacy and privilege to step into Jason’s neighborhood — a place of cracked sidewalks, flickering streetlights, and the constant hum of danger beneath the surface. Jason never said anything, but he noticed the way Tim’s expression shifted every time, like he was shedding one version of himself at the border and slipping into another entirely.

It shouldn’t have been distracting — it was just Tim, the kid who drove him insane half the time — but Jason couldn’t get his thoughts to stop tripping over themselves. Every movement Tim made felt magnified, and Jason’s throat went dry like he’d swallowed sand. His palms itched. His heart beat too loud.

He forced himself to look down at the study guide, but the words swam uselessly on the page. His mind had wandered somewhere he hated himself for going: an alternate life, a stupid, ridiculous what if.

If Jason had gotten that scholarship, maybe he would’ve been the one stepping through those pristine halls with his head held high, instead of running errands for Ma Gunn and her crime school. Maybe he would’ve had real textbooks, real heating, real chances. And Tim would’ve been there too, a year behind him, the quiet, brilliant rich kid everyone admired.

Jason’s stomach flipped painfully at the thought. Tim would’ve probably looked at him like he was someone worth knowing; the sharp, clever scholarship student who didn’t quite fit but somehow belonged anyway. Maybe Tim would’ve stopped him after class to ask about homework, maybe they would’ve studied together in some sunlit library, sitting way too close, their knees almost touching. Maybe Tim would’ve smiled at him the way he did now, when he forgot to keep his walls up, and Jason wouldn’t have to pretend it didn’t make his chest ache.

Jason realized too late that he was staring. Tim’s head tilted slightly, eyes catching his across the table, blue and sharp and unbearably bright.

Jason’s face went hot so fast it was humiliating. He blurted, “Need more coffee,” and nearly tripped over his own chair as he stood up, grabbing the empty mug like it was a lifeline. His ears burned as he muttered something incoherent about caffeine and bad lighting, retreating to the tiny kitchenette before Tim could say a single word.

Get it together, Todd, he told himself savagely, scrubbing a hand over his face while the coffee machine sputtered to life. It’s just Tim. Just Tim, sitting there like he belongs in every life you never got to have.

Steam hissed from the old coffeemaker like it was mocking him. Jason leaned against the counter, willing his heartbeat to slow down. His hands were tense around the chipped mug, knuckles white like he was bracing for a fight instead of standing ten feet away from the one person who could make him feel seventeen again for all the wrong reasons.

Behind him, papers rustled softly as Tim flipped another page on the study guide, the sound sharp in the otherwise quiet room. Jason didn’t have to look to know Tim had tucked one leg under himself in that infuriatingly precise way, balanced like he had all the time in the world. Probably didn’t even notice the way the light caught in his dark hair, making it gleam blue-black, or how his rolled sleeves hit the exact same spot on each forearm like he’d measured it.

“Coffee break already?” Tim’s voice carried over, calm and faintly amused. “We’ve barely started.”

Jason grunted, keeping his back turned. “Yeah, well, maybe I like drinking my weight in caffeine before diving into whatever AP nonsense you’re about to throw at me.”
There was a pause.

“You don’t have to do this, you know,” Tim said finally, quieter this time. “You could just… get the diploma. Skip the AP exams altogether. No one’s forcing you to take the hardest classes they offer.”

Jason stared into the swirl of black coffee like it might give him an answer. Truth was, he had thought about quitting. It would be easier to just tick the box, get the basic diploma, and be done with it. But every time the thought crept in, something ugly and stubborn inside him snarled and clawed its way out.

Because lately, Jason couldn’t stop thinking about a different kind of “what if.”

What if he aimed higher? What if, instead of barely scraping by, he actually set himself up for something better—like getting into that university. The one Tim had been casually talking about for months, the one with the ivy-covered quads and the kind of prestige that opened doors Jason didn’t even know how to knock on. He didn’t care much about the name or reputation; what mattered were the opportunities, the networks, the connections he could leverage to help more people back home, to turn his knowledge and skills into something that actually made a difference.

Tim already had his path laid out: a Computer Science major with a minor in International Relations, the latter for the overseas training he always seemed drawn to. He was methodical, brilliant, and built for problem-solving on a scale Jason could barely imagine. Jason, though… Jason had been looking at their Mechanical Engineering program, paired with a minor in English Lit. It sounded ridiculous when he said it out loud—gears and thermodynamics in the morning, Shakespeare and Baldwin in the afternoon—but it felt like the perfect balance between the kid who fixed broken engines in Crime Alley and the boy who used to steal books by flashlight.

If he had the AP credits, maybe, just maybe, he’d have a shot at applying.

His extracurriculars weren’t typical but they were pretty strong portfolios. He’d spent months designing small mechanical projects for the kids in Crime Alley, turning scraps into bikes, pedal-powered water pumps, engineering small go-karts for charity events, and little DIY invention boxes that gave them something to tinker with instead of getting into trouble. It wasn’t flashy, but it spoke to ingenuity, resourcefulness, and a drive to make a tangible difference; which is hopefully the kind of initiative a prestigious mechanical engineering program would value.

And if he got in…

They’d both be there. Maybe not in the same courses, Tim would be in his coding labs while Jason was buried in machine schematics but they’d be close enough to share late-night study sessions in some sprawling campus library. Close enough to bump into each other between lectures, to grab milk tea that didn’t taste like a sack of sugar, to build something like a real future.

It was a stupid dream, but it clung to him like cold water on skin.

Jason turned, forcing a cocky grin over the raw ache in his chest. “Yeah, well. Maybe I like proving people wrong.”

Tim met his eyes across the table, expression unreadable. Then, so softly Jason almost missed it, he said, “I don’t think anyone doubts you could.”

And that—

That was the problem. Because Tim meant it. Because Tim believed in him, maybe more than Jason believed in himself. And Jason had no idea what to do with that, except drink his coffee like it was the only thing keeping him steady.

Tim adjusted his laptop so Jason could see the screen, its soft blue light casting sharp angles across his face. The table between them was cluttered with open books, study guides, and Jason’s scrawled notes, some of which were written on the backs of old takeout menus. A copy of Sweat sat dead center, dog-eared and heavily underlined—by Tim, of course. Jason’s copy looked practically pristine, save for a single doodle of a middle finger on the title page. Jason was more of a sticky note guy anyway, his copy littered with neon tabs poking out at odd angles, each scrawled with sharp, sarcastic observations that would probably make Tim sigh if he ever read them.

“Okay,” Tim said, his voice calm and maddeningly precise, like he was about to lecture a room full of board members instead of one highly impatient ex-Robin. “The AP English Lit exam isn’t about what you feel about the text. It’s about how well you can dissect it using their rubric. Structure matters just as much as content.”

Jason leaned back in his chair, arms crossed. “So it’s not about actually having opinions, it’s about pretending to be a soulless little academic robot. Got it.”

“Pretty much, yeah.”

Jason opened his mouth, then stopped. “…Wait, you’re agreeing with me?”

“I’m agreeing that you need to play their game to win.” Tim finally glanced up, his eyes catching Jason’s in a way that made Jason’s heart hiccup. “You can rage about the system later. Right now, you need to learn how to game it.”

Jason huffed, dragging his hand through his hair in frustration. “Fine. Teach me your dark magic, O wise and terrifying tutor.”

Tim ignored the sarcasm and pulled up a blank document.

“Let’s start with the prompt,” he said, picking up Jason’s copy of the practice exam and reading aloud in that infuriatingly even tone of his:

“Discuss how Lynn Nottage uses conflict and symbolism to portray the fractures within a community in Sweat.”

Jason made a face like he’d just bitten into something sour. “God, that wording makes my teeth itch.”

Tim didn’t look up. “Focus. You want to structure your essay like this: first, a clear thesis that directly answers the question. Then three body paragraphs, each focusing on a different piece of evidence. Symbolism, setting, character relationships—pick what works best. Finally, a conclusion that ties back to the broader theme.”

“Sounds like a paint-by-numbers project,” Jason muttered, flipping through Sweat. “Where’s the part where I get to call out capitalism for being a parasite?”

Tim’s mouth twitched, just barely. “Subtext, Jason. You let the symbols do the talking.”

Jason groaned and slumped forward, his forehead thudding against the table. “This is such bullshit.”

Tim reached over, nudging Jason’s battered notebook toward him. His fingers brushed Jason’s for a second—just a second—and Jason’s brain short-circuited.

“Let’s try an outline,” Tim said, perfectly calm, as if Jason wasn’t trying to remember how to breathe. “What do you think the central conflict of Sweat is?”

Jason dragged himself upright, glaring at the text like it had personally offended him. “Class warfare. The factory workers versus the owners. The way loyalty gets twisted when money’s on the line. People tearing each other apart because they think it’s the only way to survive.”

Tim’s gaze softened almost imperceptibly. “Good. Now narrow it down. Pick one symbol that represents that fracture.”

Jason tapped the book’s spine, thinking. “The bar,” he said finally. “It’s supposed to be their safe place, their community. But by the end, it’s just… wreckage. A graveyard for what they lost.”

Tim’s lips curved—just slightly, but Jason caught it. “That’s exactly the kind of insight the graders want. You just need to phrase it in their language.”

Jason’s stomach flipped at the subtle note of praise in Tim’s voice. He forced himself to focus on the page instead of the way his chest felt too tight. “Right. Thesis, three body paragraphs, one depressing conclusion. Got it.”

Tim handed him a pen, their fingers brushing again, and this time Jason nearly dropped it.

“Exactly,” Tim said, oblivious, or maybe not. His expression gave nothing away. “Now write your first sentence.”

Jason stared at the blank page, at the clean, perfect lines of Tim’s handwriting beside his own messy scrawl, and tried not to think about how badly he wanted this moment to mean something more.

It didn’t work.

Jason snapped the book shut, too hard, and Tim’s head jerked up.

“You okay?” Tim asked, eyebrows lifting.

“Peachy,” Jason gritted out. “Just—uh. Really excited to write about labor unions and symbolism.”

Tim gave him the kind of look that said you’re full of shit, but he didn’t push. Instead, he turned back to his laptop, the soft click of keys filling the room.

Tim’s fingers paused over the keyboard, his head tilting slightly as he studied Jason for a beat too long.

“If you’re the type who hates being watched while you write,” Tim said finally, voice carefully neutral, “I can sit on the other side of the table. Give you some space.”

Jason’s stomach flipped, and not in a good way.

Space was the last thing he wanted.

The thought of Tim moving even a few feet away made his chest tighten, like someone had reached inside and wrung his lungs dry. But if he said that out loud, Tim would look at him like he’d grown a second head, and Jason wasn’t suicidal enough to tank what little progress they’d made tonight.

He forced a smirk, leaning back in his chair like he wasn’t two seconds away from full-blown cardiac arrest. “Nah, it’s fine. You don’t distract me.”

Tim’s brows lifted, the faintest shadow of amusement flickering across his face, and God help him. Jason forgot how to breathe.

“That so?”

Jason’s mouth went dry. Oh, shit.

“Yeah” he croaked, scrambling for something—anything—to cover the crack in his voice.

“Besides, if you move, who’s gonna stop me from bullshitting my way through the thesis statement?”

That earned him a quiet huff of laughter, small but real. Tim shook his head and turned back to his screen, his profile lit by the cool glow of the laptop.

Jason stared down at his blank page again, pen clutched so tight his knuckles ached, and tried to focus on Sweat instead of the way Tim’s thighs brushed his every time he shifted. At some point, Tim had scooted closer, maybe to see his notes better, maybe by accident, maybe not, and Jason couldn’t decide which possibility was worse.

Jason hunched over his notebook, the page still mostly blank except for a half-formed thesis that looked like it was written by someone having a mild breakdown. Focus, Todd, he told himself savagely. Sweat. Class conflict. Symbolism. Not Tim sitting right next to him. Not Tim’s stupid perfect thighs brushing yours every five seconds.

“Alright,” Tim said, breaking the silence without looking up from his laptop, “start by connecting the characters to the bigger themes. Don’t just summarize. Show why their choices matter.”

Easy for him to say. Jason had a dozen ideas, but every time he tried to put one down, it tangled up with the sound of Tim’s voice, low and even, like it was cutting straight through his concentration.

Jason’s scrawl crept messily across the page. One paragraph, then two. His handwriting looked like a crime scene next to Tim’s immaculate notes, but the ideas were there, bleeding through in bursts of sharp, furious clarity. He wrote about Tracey’s rage, about the symbolism of the bar, about how systemic failure wasn’t just a backdrop in Sweat; it was the real antagonist.

And every time he hit a wall, Tim would lean in slightly, murmuring, “You’re on the right track,” or, “Try pushing that point further,” his words soft and precise like he knew exactly how to keep Jason moving forward.

When Jason finally scrawled the last sentence of his draft, his whole body felt wrung out. His hand ached from gripping the pen so hard, the muscles in his forearm tight and sore, and there was a dull throb starting behind his eyes from staring at the same page for so long.

But beneath the exhaustion, there was something else—something sharp and strange and almost electric. A weird, shaky satisfaction hummed under his skin, the kind that came from pushing himself harder than he’d expected, from wrangling every jagged thought in his head into something coherent on paper. It wasn’t perfect, probably not even close, but it was his. His ideas, his words, his fight to prove he wasn’t just some small poor and pathetic kid punching above his weight.

Jason blew out a breath, forcing himself to sit back before he started second-guessing every line. His pulse was loud in his ears, a mix of pride and dread, and it made him restless. With a rough motion, he shoved the paper across the table toward Tim, the pages skidding over the scratched surface with more force than necessary.

“Here,” he said, his tone gruffer than he meant it to be. “Go ahead, tear it apart.”

Or tear me apart, Jason mused silently, because why not mix mild existential dread with essay anxiety?

Tim adjusted his laptop, sliding the essay toward him. His expression went blank in that terrifyingly neutral way of his as he started reading, red pen in hand. Jason’s knee bounced like it had a mind of its own.

The only sounds were the scratch of Tim’s pen and the faint hum of the desk lamp. Jason couldn’t take it.

“Well?” he finally blurted, leaning forward like a man about to receive a death sentence.

Tim didn’t look up. “Patience.” His tone was maddeningly calm, as if Jason hadn’t just poured his entire brain onto the page.

Jason groaned and slumped back in his chair, dragging a hand over his face. “You’re killing me here, Tim.”

Finally, Tim set the pen down and met Jason’s eyes. There was no smirk, no tease, just a quiet, matter-of-fact sincerity that hit harder than any backhanded compliment.

“This is good,” Tim said simply. “Really good. You’re not just summarizing anymore—you’re making connections. You’re thinking like the AP graders want you to.”

Jason blinked, caught off guard. Praise from Tim wasn’t rare, exactly, but it was never this… unguarded. It was like being handed something fragile and dangerous all at once.

He tried to smirk, but it felt thin. “Guess I’m not a total lost cause after all.”

“You never were,” Tim replied, so quietly, so gently, and so lovingly it made Jason’s breath hitch.

Tim had said encouraging things before, sure—sharp little bursts of praise hidden between corrections, the kind of thing that sounded like feedback more than feeling. Safe, measured, easy to ignore if Jason wanted to.

But this… this wasn’t that.

The way Tim said it now was different. Softer. Like there was something threaded through the words he couldn’t quite name, a quiet conviction that dug under Jason’s skin and refused to let go. It wasn’t just reassurance about an essay or an exam score—it felt personal. Like Tim was speaking directly to every ugly, broken piece of Jason he kept buried, the parts that still whispered he didn’t belong anywhere.

And for one dizzy second, Jason caught something in Tim’s expression he almost never saw—something unguarded, raw in its simplicity. No mask, no perfect composure, just a flash of truth slipping through the cracks before Tim could pull it back behind his usual walls.

Then Tim’s expression flickered. He cleared his throat sharply, the sound cutting through the charged air like a blade. His gaze dropped back to the paper, posture tightening, as if he could physically rewind the moment by sheer force of will.

“Anyway,” he said briskly, too briskly, his usual composure sliding back into place, “your introduction is strong, but your conclusion could use some restructuring.”

Jason’s lips twitched. It was almost funny, watching Tim scramble like that, pretending he hadn’t just dropped a verbal bomb in the middle of the room. Almost.

“Uh-huh,” Jason said, leaning back in his chair, fighting a stupid, giddy smile threatening to break loose. “Conclusion. Got it.”

Tim’s ears were faintly pink as he pointed at the closing paragraph with his pen. “I’m serious, Jason. You need to tie the symbolism back to the main argument. Right now, it’s just—”

“Flimsy?” Jason supplied, smirking now, because it was either smirk or combust.

Tim’s eyes narrowed. “Unfocused,” he corrected tightly.

Jason bit back a laugh, glancing down at the red-inked notes in the margins. His chest still felt weirdly tight, but for once, it wasn’t entirely painful. Because even with Tim retreating behind his walls again, Jason had heard it—clear and undeniable: You never were.

Jason sighed, pen hovering over the page, and forced himself to focus. He reread the introduction, then the messy linking of his argument, then the weak conclusion, rewriting, crossing out, and scribbling in the margins. Tim’s red-ink notes hovered like tiny beacons, guiding him, and Jason couldn’t help but notice the faint warmth in his chest every time his eyes flicked up and caught Tim’s steady, patient gaze.

Hours passed in a blur of words, coffee, and quiet typing. The apartment felt smaller, warmer, the world outside reduced to the occasional hum of a car engine or distant siren. Jason’s eyelids grew heavy. He rubbed them, blinked, tried to shake off the fatigue, but the combination of mental strain and emotional overload finally won. His pen slipped from his grasp, clattering softly against the table, and his head drooped forward onto the essay.

Tim glanced up from his laptop, brows knitting just slightly. Jason was out cold, deep into a rare, exhausted sleep, the essay unfinished but far better than it had been hours ago. Tim hesitated a heartbeat, then quietly slid out of his chair. He tugged his coat from the back of the chair, careful not to make a sound, and draped it gently over Jason’s slumped form.

Jason shifted slightly, murmuring in his sleep, but didn’t wake. Tim paused, hands lingering near the edges of the coat, and for a moment just stood there, watching him. Then, with the softest exhale, he returned to his own work, the lamp casting a warm glow over both of them. The room was quiet again, but now it carried the weight of something unspoken; something small, protective, and tethered entirely to Jason.

The essay could wait until morning. For now, Tim made sure Jason stayed warm.

Chapter Text

Jason never thought much about legacy when he was a kid. The streets of Gotham had a way of teaching lessons that textbooks could never hold: how to pick locks, how to dodge a stray bullet, how to make yourself small enough to survive in a world built for people stronger than you.

But at home when Willis Todd was around; Jason learned a different kind of lesson.

Willis wasn’t perfect. Not by a long shot. He had a temper that could flare suddenly, especially after Jason’s mother died, leaving him a young man drowning in grief he didn’t know how to handle. Some nights, his anger filled the apartment like a storm, slamming doors, knocking books off shelves, scaring Jason into hiding beneath the kitchen table or pressing his back flat against the wall.

Yet underneath it all, there was love. Pure, stubborn, unpolished love.

Willis loved telling the story of Jason’s first sunrise, even if Jason had heard it a hundred times. He’d hold Jason on his knee, rocking gently, and describe how the tiny newborn had cried and flailed in confusion as the first rays of light touched his face. “I thought you’d never stop,” Willis would chuckle, voice soft, eyes distant with memory. “But then… that second later, you calmed down. Just stared at the sky like he understood something bigger than me, bigger than either of us. You were barely a week old, and you already had that stubborn… awe. Like you were born knowing you’d do something important.”

Years later, when Jason was five, Willis brought him out again, recreating the tradition with a little more purpose and a lot more intention. They stood on the fire escape, the city still half-asleep beneath them, Jason bundled in a blanket, shivering but excited.

He must have been barely able to walk; Willis had lifted him up onto the fire escape, wrapped a blanket around his small shoulders, and held him there until the first streaks of gold painted the city rooftops. Jason’s tiny eyes had widened at the explosion of color across the gray concrete jungle, and Willis had smiled, the kind of full, deep smile that didn’t happen often anymore.

“You’re gonna be everything I never was,” Willis whispered, wrapping a hand around Jason’s small shoulders. “A damned prince of Gotham. And I’m gonna keep you safe. Be a dad you could look up to.”

Jason’s small arms would wrap around himself, half-asleep, half-resisting, but Willis’s hand would land gently on his shoulder, steadying him.

“And I meant it,” Willis continued, his eyes scanning the horizon. “That’s why I’m gonna teach you everything I know! Math, reading, fixing things, seeing how the world works; so you don’t just survive, Jason. So you can be the kind of man Gotham actually needs, someone who makes it through the cracks and comes out stronger.”

He wanted Jason to understand that knowledge and curiosity could be armor, tools to navigate a world that wasn’t always fair—or kind.
Even in the chaos of grief, Willis tried. He gifted Jason books, volumes with cracked spines, ripped pages, an unidentifiable blotch and folded pages. Sometimes it was a well-loved adventure novel; other times, poetry, math primers, science worksheets or history texts. He’d sit cross-legged on the living room floor, Jason perched beside him, reading stories until the words became more than letters but rather worlds.

Another instance was when Bedtime stories were a ritual. Willis’s voice carried softly through the apartment, rising and falling with the cadence of the plot, whether it was heroes and villains, princes and paupers, or simple stories about ordinary people trying to survive. Sometimes Jason barely noticed the plot, too absorbed in the sound of his father’s voice, the steady presence that made him feel like someone had stitched a patch of safety into the city’s unforgiving chaos. Tonight, it was the Little Prince.

Willis’s voice softened as he turned the page. “’It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.’ Remember that, kid. You can’t always trust what you see. The things that matter… you feel them.”

However, Math lessons were a different battle. Willis could be patient, but he could also lose his temper when Jason got frustrated. “You’re smarter than you give yourself credit for,” he’d snap once, then immediately sigh and pull Jason back onto his lap, showing him, step by step, until the numbers made sense. Those lessons were the foundation of Jason’s ability to problem-solve in the streets later, even if he didn’t realize it at the time.

Willis knew love couldn’t fix everything.

Not the broken streets, not the corrupt cops, not the injustice that Jason saw every day. And he made that clear, too. “Love ain’t enough, Jason,” he said once, gruff but tender, when Jason had asked why the city was so cruel. “You can give all the love in the world, but it won’t stop the system from chewing people up. You gotta be smart. You gotta be ready.”

It was that honesty, harsh and raw, that taught Jason the first rules of survival beyond the streets. If he wanted to help himself or anyone else, he’d need more than love. He’d need cunning, patience, and a willingness to take what he needed when it wasn’t given freely.

Which, naturally, led to him learning the subtle art of taking car parts from Willis’s garage without getting caught, under the guise of tinkering. A spark here, a bolt there, and Jason learned not just mechanics but discretion.

Willis might have been absent at times—work, exhaustion, the long shadow of grief—but when he was there, he tried. He tried to right wrongs in ways that mattered to a kid: showing up, gifting knowledge, offering protection, building a scaffold of security in a city that rarely offered it. He couldn’t fix the streets. He couldn’t erase the cruelty. But he could be a dad.

And for Jason, that was everything.

Every memory of Willis: the sunrises, the stories, the books, the patience, the anger, etched itself into him. He carried it quietly, tucked into the marrow of his bones. It became the lens through which he saw the world: sharp, cautious, a little scarred, but capable of love, capable of care, capable of surviving and protecting in ways his father could only hope for him to surpass.

Because that’s what Willis had always said: Jason was going to be everything he never was.

A damned prince of Gotham.

And maybe—Jason thought quietly, almost to himself—as he worked on another jury-rigged gadget from scraps and spare parts, maybe he could be the kind of man his dad tried to be, and more.

Jason barely set down the screwdriver when a sharp knock rattled the doorframe. Frowning, he glanced at the clock. Saturday. Not Thursday.

He opened the door cautiously and froze for a heartbeat.

Somehow, even though it was a dull, gray morning, it felt like sunlight spilled through the doorway the moment Tim stepped in. Jason’s chest gave a little lurch, a surge of something like excitement he wasn’t entirely willing to admit even to himself.

“Hey,” Tim said, voice casual. “Hope I’m not interrupting… or, well, maybe I am.”

Jason blinked, caught off guard. “Saturday,” he muttered, more to himself than to Tim. “Since when do you do Saturdays?”

Tim shrugged, shifting his weight. “Thought I’d shake things up. Study session?”

Jason let out a low groan, half-exasperated, half-relieved. “Figures. You and your schedule. Come in, I guess.”

Tim stepped fully inside, glancing around the cluttered workspace. “So… what’s all this?” he asked, gesturing at the scattered tools, scraps of metal, and half-finished gadgets littering the table.

Jason shifted, trying to sound casual though his pulse was still buzzing from Tim’s unexpected arrival. “Just… uh,” he began, dragging a wrench across a workbench, “working through AP Physics C: Mechanics.”

Tim raised an eyebrow. “Through… building stuff?”

Jason grinned, a little sheepishly. “Yeah. Figured I learn better by doing. You know, classical mechanics in action. I’m using this—” he gestured at a half-built go-kart frame, welded together from spare pipes, old bike wheels, and some scrap sheet metal, “—to understand motion, forces, energy… all that Newtonian stuff.”

Tim leaned in, curiosity piqued. “Explain.”

“Okay,” Jason said, rolling up a sleeve and grabbing a notebook with messy sketches. “So, I started with kinematics—position, velocity, acceleration. I rigged the front wheels with a pulley system so I can calculate angular acceleration. Then I moved onto Newton’s laws: force vectors, friction, torque… I can see how different weights affect acceleration if I load the frame with sandbags or shift the center of mass.”

Tim nodded slowly, impressed despite himself. “Clever. And energy?”

Jason tapped the pedals experimentally. “Kinetic, potential, rotational—everything’s in play. I’ve got a spring-loaded brake system to see energy transfer and conservation, plus I can measure mechanical efficiency. I even started calculating moments of inertia for the wheels to get more accurate predictions for angular momentum.”

Tim’s gaze swept over the contraption, then back at Jason. “So… basically, you’re turning a go-kart into a full-on physics lab. Not bad.”

Jason shrugged, trying to hide how proud he was of Tim noticing. “Better than just reading the textbook. You see the concepts, then you can feel them. If it breaks, and it will. I get to figure out why, then fix it. Forces, motion, all of it. Hands-on.”

Tim’s lips quirked into the faintest smile. “I see. So… you’re actually learning AP Physics C: Mechanics… by not really learning it the normal way.”

Jason laughed, a little bitter, a little triumphant. “Exactly. I guess you could call it… extreme applied learning.”

Tim shook his head, still smiling, and leaned against the edge of the table. “Well, I won’t lie… it’s kind of genius. Just don’t blow yourself up before I can help.”

Tim stepped closer, surveying the chaotic go-kart and Jason’s scattered notes. “Mind if I… sit?” he asked, nodding toward the bench. Jason blinked, caught off guard.

“Uh… sure,” he said, shifting slightly to make room, though his chest suddenly felt too tight and his hands a little clammy.

Tim eased down next to him, careful but casual, and for a moment just let his shoulders settle against Jason’s. Then, almost lazily, he tilted his head, letting it rest lightly on Jason’s shoulder. “Man… I am wiped,” he murmured, voice low. “Drafting college essays is brutal. So many words, so little brain power left. We have evening patrols soon too…”

Jason froze mid-screwdriver turn, the world narrowing to the weight of Tim’s head against him. Heat pooled in his chest, a chaotic mix of pride, panic, and something dangerously close to desire. He could feel the faint brush of Tim’s hair, the subtle warmth against his arm, the rhythm of Tim’s breathing; calm, steady, infuriatingly normal.

“Uh… yeah,” Jason spoke, trying to keep his voice steady while internally combusting. “College essays… brutal.”

Tim hummed softly in agreement, pressing just a fraction closer. “You ever get tired of… all the planning, the thinking, the… grinding?” he asked, voice muffled against Jason’s shoulder.

Jason swallowed hard, heart hammering, and tried to focus on tightening a bolt, on measuring the angle of a lever—anything but the weight of Tim’s presence. “Sometimes… yeah,” he admitted, voice rougher than he intended. “But… you figure it out. You deal with it. Especially as a Robin.”

Tim shifted slightly, letting out a soft sigh. “Yeah… but it’s nice to just… not think for a second.” He relaxed fully against Jason, and for the first time in days, Jason felt a dizzying sense of something he hadn’t let himself acknowledge: the way it felt to have someone completely at ease with him, leaning like he belonged there.

Jason’s fingers tightened on the wrench without meaning to, knuckles white. He tried to focus, tried to measure a spring tension or calculate torque in his head, but every thought kept circling back to Tim’s warmth, his quiet presence, the impossible softness in his voice.

“Tim… you’re—uh… heavy,” Jason said, voice awkward, trying to nudge his shoulder subtly.

Tim let out a small laugh, muffled against him. “Yeah… sorry. Just… tired.”

Jason was still frozen, wrench in hand, mind scrambling. Then, almost imperceptibly, Tim shifted slightly, sliding one arm around Jason’s upper arm in a casual, lazy sort of grip.

“Just… keep working,” he murmured, voice soft against Jason’s shoulder. “Pretend I’m not here. Don’t stop studying. I’ll… just be here.”

Jason’s chest tightened so suddenly it felt like it might stop him from breathing. His fingers twitched over the tools, clumsy and too deliberate at the same time, but he forced himself to focus on the go-kart’s axle, on calculating the torque, on adjusting the pulley system; anything to distract from the weight of Tim pressed against him.

After a moment, curiosity broke through the tension. “So… your dream school,” he asked carefully, wrench hovering over the axle. “Ivy University, right?”

Tim hummed softly, still resting lightly against him. “Yeah… I’ve been thinking about it for a while. Best in the country, strong programs, great connections, overseas opportunities and I’ve got a couple of my high school friends going… the usual.”

Jason’s mind raced. He needed to say something, anything, that didn’t make him feel like he was exposing too much. “I’m thinking of…Holliday College,” he said finally, forcing a casual shrug over the half-lie. “Heard they have a solid engineering program.”

Tim raised a brow, clearly unconvinced. “Holliday College?” he said slowly. “Isn’t that… a women’s college?”

Jason’s brain short-circuited for half a second before he blurted, “…Well… you know… I’m a big fan of Wonder Woman…”

Tim blinked, then let out a laugh, shaking his head. “You’re funny, but really—what’s your dream school?”

Jason froze, the half-lie falling away under Tim’s gaze. He swallowed, exhaling slowly. “…Ivy University,” he admitted quietly, almost to himself, almost afraid to hear Tim respond.

Tim hummed again, lightly nudging him with his forehead. “Ivy University, huh? Sounds like a plan. YYou’ll make it there, Jason. And it won’t just be about surviving or scraping by—you’ll thrive. You’ll walk into that campus and handle it like you handle everything else… like it’s yours. And don’t sell yourself short. You’ve got more drive in that head of yours than most people ever find in a lifetime.”

Jason let out a short, nervous laugh, trying to brush it off. “Ha… yeah, sure. Like that’s even gonna happen,” he muttered, spinning the wrench a little too quickly.

Tim tilted his head, not buying it. “What’s so funny? I’m serious! You’re going to get in,” he said softly, still pressing lightly against Jason. “You’ve got this. I know you do.”

A faint smile tugged at the corner of his lips. “Honestly… I’m kinda glad you might end up at the same uni as me. Hell, we could even be roommates,” he added casually.

Jason’s mind betrayed him, conjuring a fleeting, chaotic vision of the two of them in a cramped dorm room, textbooks piled high, the faint smell of old paper and coffee in the air, sunlight slanting through the blinds, and somehow, impossibly, him and Tim leaning too close over a scattered notebook, the thought of their lips meeting making his stomach knot even as he tried to shove the image away.

He cleared his throat, forcing a nonchalant laugh. “Yeah… uh… terrible roommate, you’d be,” he blurted, shaking his head. “Messy, night-owl… probably steal my snacks.”

Tim just laughed softly, the warmth of it brushing against Jason’s shoulder. “Messy, loud… maybe. But you’d survive it,” he teased. “I think you’d even like it.”

Jason felt heat rise to his cheeks, a mixture of embarrassment and something else he didn’t have a name for. He tried to focus on the axle again, but the laugh lingered in his throat. “Yeah… maybe,” he admitted, voice low, trying to sound casual. “Guess we’ll see if they’d even accept me.”

Tim chuckled, nudging him again. “I don’t doubt it for a second. You’ve got the brains, the drive… and hey, maybe a little stubbornness to carry you through. That counts for something.”

Jason’s fingers tightened on the tools, a small smile tugging at his lips despite himself. “Stubborn, huh? Sounds like you’re describing someone you know,” he said, glancing at Tim with a teasing smirk, even though his heart was still doing somersaults.

Tim grinned softly, letting the forehead nudge linger. “Maybe. But that’s a good thing. You’ll need it.”

Jason’s small smirk faltered when Tim shifted just a fraction closer, his arm brushing more firmly against Jason’s. “Hey… careful,” Jason murmured, wrench paused mid-turn. “You’re getting… uh… distracting.”

Tim hummed, almost lazily, resting his forehead lightly against Jason’s shoulder again. “Am I?” he asked, voice soft, teasing. “I thought I was just… supporting you.”

Jason felt heat rise to his cheeks, heart hammering. “Supporting… sure,” he said quickly, trying to sound casual while every nerve in his body was screaming otherwise.

“Very… supportive.”

Tim let out a low chuckle, his arm tightening imperceptibly. “You’re adorable when you get flustered,” he murmured, voice almost lost in the quiet clatter of tools and the faint hum of the city outside.

Jason’s hands trembled slightly on the axle. “I’m… not flustered,” he said, trying to hide the rapid thudding of his heart. “Just… focused. Totally focused.”

Tim hummed again, clearly unconvinced, and leaned just a little more, letting his cheek brush against Jason’s shoulder. “Sure… focused,” he teased, a hint of a smile in his voice. “Keep telling yourself that.”

Jason flinched slightly as his phone buzzed against the workbench, breaking the fragile bubble of warmth and tension. He fished it out, squinting at the screen.

“Oracle,” he muttered, voice tight.

Tim tilted his head, lifting it just enough to peek at the phone. “She’s calling both of us?”

Jason nodded, tension threading through his shoulders. “Yeah… patrol starts in fifteen. Same sectors as usual.”

Tim pushed off slightly, giving Jason room to breathe, though he lingered close enough to make it impossible for Jason to completely relax. “Guess physics and go-karts are officially on hold,” he said lightly, voice teasing, “for crime-fighting.”

Jason exhaled sharply, adrenaline kicking in, mixing with the lingering warmth from Tim’s shoulder. “Yeah… gotta finish calibrating the steering first, but… then we head out.”

Tim smirked, leaning just enough on the edge of the table. “I like how you multitask: save the city, build machines, and still manage to look flustered.”

Jason’s fingers tightened around the wrench. “I’m… focused,” he said, voice rough, though the memory of Tim pressed against him made him doubt his own words.

Tim chuckled, shrugging. “Sure… focused. Let’s finish this up, then. Gotham doesn’t patrol itself.”

Jason glanced at the clock and then at Tim. “…You ready?”

Tim grinned, already grabbing his gloves and jacket. “Always. Let’s make it a clean sweep tonight, partner.”

As they stepped into the stairwell, Jason couldn’t shake the feeling that Tim’s unusually easy demeanor was deliberate.
The teasing, the light nudges, the soft hums against his shoulder—it all felt like more than casual camaraderie, more than the comfortable closeness they usually shared. Jason’s chest tightened at every little touch, at every glance that lingered just a fraction too long, and he couldn’t decide if it was flattering or infuriating. He caught himself analyzing the tilt of Tim’s head, the way his voice softened when he laughed, the small gestures that should have been innocuous but now felt loaded with intention.

Even the casual way Tim leaned against him, something Jason had learned to read as relaxed friendship, now seemed deliberate, like he was aware of Jason’s every reaction and enjoying the effect it had. The more Jason tried to dismiss it, the more his skin prickled with awareness, his thoughts fracturing into a million possibilities: was Tim just tired? Playful? Or… was he being deliberately extra, aware of Jason’s flaws, maybe even pitying him for being the kid who always had to claw a little harder to keep up?

He pushed the thought down, telling himself it was nothing, just Tim being Tim. But deep inside, an all-too-familiar ache bloomed. Maybe… Tim was being extra friendly because he felt sorry for him.

Jason’s jaw tightened. He hated the thought, but he couldn’t ignore it. The truth was, he had always felt like he was one step behind everyone else. His schoolwork had been patchwork, his education half-baked from skipped lessons, chaotic nights, and an apartment where survival often mattered more than algebra. Tim, on the other hand… Tim had been precise, organized, polished. He’d read more books than Jason could name, lived in a mostly stable home, and now he was here, leaning on him like it was natural, like he didn’t notice Jason’s mess of rough edges.

Jason’s fingers flexed around the edge of the stair railing. Inferiority had a way of whispering truths he didn’t want to admit: All those years of feeling “less than” carved deep grooves into him, grooves that flared whenever someone like Tim, a natural, effortless genius looked at him with something that could almost be warmth.

Almost.

“Hey, snap out of it,” Tim said suddenly, elbow nudging him lightly. “The city’s not gonna patrol itself, Jay.”

Jason blinked, caught off guard, and for a moment the fading sunlight caught Tim just right. The glow traced the sharp line of his body, lit up the curve of his cheek, and made his eyes glinted wonderfully. Even in the shadowed stairwell, Tim’s hair seemed to catch fire in streaks of copper, and the faintest smirk played on his lips, easy and effortless.

Jason exhaled, gripping the railing, trying to shove the chaos of his thoughts aside.

Tim’s smirk was easy, teasing, but steady. “Come on. We’ve got streets to run, and I don’t plan on doing it solo.”

Chapter Text

The motorbike hummed beneath Jason’s hands, a low vibration that matched the impatience in his chest. He idled on the curb outside the high school until the light over the entrance flickered—gold, then green—and the stream of students began to pour out like something rehearsed: elbows, backpacks, a scattering of laughter. Teenagers were noisy in a way the city never quite managed to be; they filled the street with sound and motion and the ordinary mess of living that Robin always had to stand at the edge of and watch.

A clump of theatre kids bolted past him, arms full of flats and paint cans and one single, ridiculous, glittering prop that caught the last of the afternoon sun like a small accusation. They moved like they were fleeing rehearsal rather than going to gather supplies; they were elated and frantic and entirely unconcerned with anyone who might be loitering at the curb in a jacket with elbows worn to a shine. One girl with a nose ring, hair in the sort of messy bun that never survives a summer—caught her shoe on the curb and swore exquisitely loud. The whole group laughed in a chorus that sounded like applause for an unseen director.

Jason wanted that. Not the flailing, not the glittery prop; he wanted the permission to be messy, to be ordinary, to be a boy who could lose himself in a character and then walk home with paint smudged on his clothes. He pictured himself backstage, hands sore from shifting heavy flats, lighting cues scrawled in pen along the inside of his wrist. For a moment he could almost smell the sharp tang of stage glue and sawdust, and his boot twitched against the pavement like his body was remembering a different kind of beginning.

Theatre had been the one thing Jason wanted when he was younger. Everything about it had drawn him; the lights, the scripts, the chance to step into someone else’s skin and make it real. He’d wanted to audition for a school play once, to learn lines, hit marks, hear applause that was for him. But Robin didn’t leave room for stage calls or dress rehearsals. It taught him precision instead; how to move quietly, how to vanish between shadows, how to make himself useful instead of loud.

It never taught him how to laugh with the cast after curtain call, or how to sit in the front row and feel a story rather than study it like evidence. Watching those kids now, running with paint-streaked arms and scripts fluttering under their elbows, Jason felt every version of himself he’d traded away stacked up inside him like unspoken lines, unsung roles, all the pieces of a story he’d never been allowed to perform.

He thought about the night his father had said it; the way a single sentence can be enormous when you’re small enough to hold it in your fist. His father’s voice had been raw with a hope Jason had at that age swallowed straight: “We do something that matters, Jay. Not for us—because someone has to.”

He remembered the look in his dad’s eyes then, the same look that had made him lift his chin and accept a uniform and a name and a place at Batman’s side. At fourteen the world was a simple map. There were wrongs and there were people who could right them, and if you wanted to be part of the righting you put on a symbol and stepped into the margin.

Watching the theatre kids, Jason felt a dull, aching regret settle in his chest; not anger, not quite longing, but a wistful ache for something he’d never let himself have. Being Robin didn’t make anything change the way a kid thinks it will. It wasn’t a solution so much as a glare you could aim at the night. It kept him out of auditions and away from opening nights; it kept him from being a mess in a dressing room where someone might hand him a cigarette and a line and say, “Play him honest.” Instead he learned to play him clipped: efficient, useful. He learned to keep his real edges under Kevlar.

He thought of Bruce in that abstract way children think of adults they respect—familial, caring, a pronouncement of rightness. To Jason, Bruce wasn’t just an adult he respected; he was the embodiment of certainty itself, a fixed point in a world that never stopped shifting. Once, Jason remembered, they’d sat together in the manor’s darkened media room, half a bowl of popcorn between them, watching some old black-and-white movie Bruce swore was a classic. Bruce had laughed, quiet, real and for a brief, startling moment Jason had felt what it might be like to just be someone’s kid in a stable household.

He thought of the way Bruce moved through rooms with a sort of calibrated gravity. Perhaps that was what Jason had wanted when he’d taken the Robin mantle: not Bruce’s money or name, not the polite things a Wayne could buy, but the way a single presence could make a room follow. He wanted to change things. The possibility of changing things had been a promise; he’d bargained for it in short, urgent sentences and then traded away the small, messy freedoms that might have made him whole.

But as much as Bruce had felt like a father, Batman had never been family. Batman was the mission stripped of warmth, the mask that turned care into command.

He knew Batman differently; never familial, never caring, but sharp and immediate, like the edge of a blade you couldn’t ignore. Batman wasn’t a fixed point the way Bruce was; he was motion, momentum, a storm bottled inside a mantle. Where Bruce entered a room and commanded it with gravity, Batman consumed it entirely, bending shadows and silence to his will.

Jason had admired that once, maybe even loved it in the way a kid loves the idea of being unstoppable. Batman didn’t just change things, he forced the world to its knees through sheer will. But standing beside him, Jason had learned the cost of that kind of power. Batman didn’t leave space for softness, for hesitation, for the kind of messiness that made someone human.

If Bruce was a promise, Batman was a demand. And when Jason put on the Robin mantle, he hadn’t realized he was signing up to meet that demand every night, carving himself into the shape Batman required until the boy he’d been didn’t fit anywhere anymore.

The worst of it came later, when Jason understood the rule beneath all the others—the one Batman would never bend, no matter who bled.

No killing.

Even when the monsters they hunted would keep coming back. Even when stopping them for good would have saved lives. Jason had believed, with the raw, desperate certainty of a kid who wanted to make the world better, that they could change things. But Batman’s refusal to cross that line had felt like betrayal, like a cage disguised as morality.

The night that truth sank in, something inside Jason cracked. He’d thrown himself at crime with a fury Batman couldn’t redirect, couldn’t leash, until finally it broke him. Until finally Bruce—Bruce, not Batman—had made the call to have him locked in a psychiatric ward for his own safety.

Jason had never quite forgiven him for that. Not because of the walls or the meds or the endless days of sterile quiet, but because the man who’d once felt like a promise had turned into another set of bars.

And then came the end. The warehouse. The crowbar. The bomb. Jason had died believing that, at the very least, his death would be enough to make Batman see; make him finally understand that some monsters couldn’t be caged, only ended. But when he came back and found nothing had changed, when he learned the Joker still walked free while Batman’s hands stayed clean, it hollowed him out worse than his own grave had.

It wasn’t just betrayal anymore. It was proof. Proof that Batman would rather let the world burn than stain himself to save it. Proof that Jason’s blood, his life, his everything, hadn’t been enough to move the man who had raised him. And from that moment on, Jason’s love for Bruce and his hatred for Batman were bound so tightly together he could no longer tell where one ended and the other began.

Jason shifted his weight, trying to look relaxed even though a restless energy buzzed beneath his skin. He hooked his thumbs into his jacket pockets, gaze drifting over the school’s front steps, the crowd thinning as kids peeled off into cliques and carpools.

The bike rumbled softly behind him, a steady undercurrent to the jittery anticipation he couldn’t quite shake. Tim had suggested they should go to an arcade run to blow off some steam and Jason had agreed before he’d even thought it through. Now, standing here while the last of the theatre kids spilled out, he felt caught between two worlds: the one he’d never really gotten to live, and the one Tim, somehow, still seemed to straddle so effortlessly.

He almost laughed at the thought. Tim Drake, by all rights should’ve been easy to pin down. With his sharp eyes and sharper mind, you’d expect him to be one of those geeky kids hunched over a laptop in the back of the library, or maybe the kind of wiry skater kid who smelled faintly of asphalt and rebellion. But Tim didn’t fit into either box.

On the track, he moved like someone born to run, lean muscle and long strides giving him the kind of body more at home with the jocks than the chess club. And yet, even with that edge, he never seemed to belong exclusively to them either. Tim had this quiet, deliberate way of slipping between groups like trading stats with the athletes, dissecting comic book lore with the nerds, or even tossing a sarcastic remark at the art kids that made them laugh like he’d always been part of their circle. He simply clicked with people, like he was fluent in every unspoken language high school had to offer.

Jason couldn’t decide if it was natural charisma or sheer calculation, but whatever it was, it made Tim impossible to ignore.

Suddenly, a glittering prop tumbled from a girl’s hands and rolled toward Jason’s boot; he nudged it back to her with the toe of his boot, pretending it was no big thing. She blinked at him, grateful, and for a beat the two of them shared a look that was neither polite nor performative, just an entry-level human exchange. The bike hummed under his thighs; the air smelled of warm rubber and hot engine and the faint tang of someone’s perfume.

He thought of the fourteen-year-old version of himself again, the one who had said yes to a uniform in order to be important. That boy had believed things could be simple if you named them and stepped into a role. He was still true, in small ways: Jason still wanted to be important. He wanted to be noticed. But the notice he craved now was complicated—less about applause and more about being seen for the parts that made him hard to like.

The bell outside gave a second warning and now a slow trend of students funneled toward the parking lot. And then he saw him: Tim Drake.

Tim came flying down the front steps, sneakers pounding against the concrete, hair a little mussed from running, track jacket unzipped and flapping behind him. There was a flush high on his cheeks, not just from exertion but from the frantic energy of realizing he was late.

“Jason!” he called, weaving through a group of kids like he’d been built for speed. His stride didn’t falter until he skidded to a stop in front of Jason, breathing hard but grinning sheepishly. “Oh my god, I’m so sorry—I totally forgot we had extended track and field today. Coach sprung it on us last minute.”

Jason crossed his arms, cocking an eyebrow, trying to look more annoyed than he felt. “You ditched me to go run laps?”

“Not on purpose!” Tim said quickly, shoulders hunching like he was ready to absorb Jason’s irritation. “I swear, I was halfway through warm-ups when I remembered you were coming to meet me. I figured I’d just… sprint extra fast and maybe shave some time off.”

Jason snorted despite himself. “Yeah, sure, track star. Guess I’ll just go stand in the parking lot for an hour while you get your cardio fix.”

Tim’s face lit up with an idea before Jason could turn away. “Wait! You don’t have to just… hang around like some creep. Why don’t you come watch? I mean, it’s boring as hell, but at least you’ll be inside, and—” he hesitated, almost shy, “—it’d be kind of cool to have you there.”

Jason caught the tiny hitch in his voice, the way Tim’s usual smooth, unflappable facade slipped for just a second. It was rare to see him break that cool guy act he always wore like armor, and the glimpse of something genuine beneath it sparked a quiet, unexpected warmth in Jason’s chest.

“You want me to sit in the bleachers like a soccer mom?”

Tim rolled his eyes but his grin didn’t fade. “Yes. Exactly like a soccer mom. We’ll even get you a foam finger.”

Jason groaned, but there was something about the way Tim was looking at him—bright-eyed, hopeful—that made it hard to say no. “Fine. But if anyone asks, I’m your bodyguard.”

Tim laughed, tugging Jason’s sleeve and dragging him toward the main office. “Deal. Come on, we’ve gotta get you a visitor’s pass or Coach’ll have a heart attack.”

The security guard at the desk looked up as they approached, eyes narrowing slightly at Jason. “ID, please.”

Jason didn’t even blink. He slid a wallet from his back pocket and flipped it open with a practiced ease, revealing a pristine, official-looking driver’s license. Tim leaned over out of curiosity and froze when he read the name.

Jason Rowan Blake.

The photo was perfect, the holographic seal glinting under the fluorescent lights. It looked real, down to the scuffed edges, like it had been sitting in a wallet for years. If Tim hadn’t known any better, he would’ve believed it without question.

The guard gave the ID a cursory glance before grunting, “Alright, you’re good,” and handed Jason a bright yellow VISITOR sticker.

Jason peeled it off and slapped it onto his jacket with an exaggerated scowl, glaring at the sticker like it had personally offended him. “Happy now?”

Tim was still staring at the name, trying to reconcile it with what he knew—or thought he knew. “Rowan Blake, huh?”

Jason slid the ID back into his wallet before Tim could get another look, a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. “What can I say? Bureaucracy’s a bitch when you’ve been, you know…” He flicked his fingers in a vague gesture, like he was shooing away smoke. “Legally unavailable for a few years.”

“Come on, Tim,” Jason said, jerking his chin toward the field. “Let’s go watch you run in circles before your coach decides to bench you for good.”

They pushed through the heavy glass doors, the late afternoon sunlight spilling across the polished hallway tiles. Outside, the air was warm but sharp with that faint chemical tang of freshly cut grass. Jason shoved his hands into his jacket pockets, the yellow visitor sticker glaringly bright against the black leather like some kind of cosmic joke.

A girl with curly blonde hair bumped gently into Tim, cheeks flushing as she looked up at him shyly. Her eyes lingered on him for a beat before flicking to Jason. “…Is that… your bodyguard, Tim?” she asked, voice soft, almost dreamy.

Jason raised an eyebrow, smirking. “Yep,” he said simply.

Tim’s face burned crimson. “He’s joking, he’s my very close friend,” he mumbled, his gaze secretly flicking to Jason, who leaned casually nearby, perfectly aware of the effect he had. The girl gave a small, lingering smile, before scurrying off.

The field stretched wide and green ahead of them, surrounded by a chain-link fence and dotted with clusters of students warming up. Some were jogging, others were bent over tying shoes or stretching in ways that made Jason’s joints hurt just looking at them. A low hum of chatter and the rhythmic slap of sneakers against the track filled the air.

Jason glanced sideways at Tim as they walked. Tim had already fallen into a comfortable stride, his posture loose in a way Jason didn’t often see. Out here, he wasn’t Robin, wasn’t the detective kid who always seemed three steps ahead. He was just… a teenager. A little flushed from running, his hair sticking up at odd angles from the wind, laughing as one of his teammates called his name and waved.

Something warm brewed in Jason’s chest. He’d forgotten what Tim looked like—unguarded. The cool, collected “smartest guy in the room” mask was nowhere to be found. And damn if it didn’t make Jason like him even more.

Tim slowed as they reached the fence, his sneakers crunching on gravel. “You can sit over there,” he said, pointing to a set of small metal bleachers pushed off to the side. “It’s not exactly prime seating, but at least you won’t have to stand around.”

Jason raised a brow. “What, no VIP box? No complimentary peanuts?”

Tim rolled his eyes but grinned. “Sorry, private school budget doesn’t cover those.”

Jason snorted and started toward the bleachers, boots thudding against the metal steps. He dropped down on the top row, sprawling like he owned the place. From here, he had a clear view of the track and the football field beyond. Tim lingered for a moment, shifting on his feet like he wanted to say something, then just gave a small, almost shy smile.

“Thanks for waiting,” he said, softer this time. “I know this isn’t… super exciting.”

Jason shrugged, trying to look casual, even as that tiny flash of vulnerability from Tim hit him square in the chest.

“Go on,” Jason said with a lazy wave. “Show me why you ditched me for an extra hour.”

Tim’s mouth curved into a quick, crooked grin, his usual cool slipping for just a beat.

“Careful,” he shot back, jogging backward a few steps toward the track. “Call me out like that and I might just embarrass you, pretty boy.”

Jason blinked, caught off guard by the words and the teasing lilt in Tim’s voice. By the time he’d thought of something to say, Tim had already turned and sprinted off to join his teammates, leaving Jason sitting there with a stupid, startled half-smile tugging at his mouth.

Tim huffed a laugh and jogged off toward his teammates, his stride smooth and confident. Jason leaned forward, elbows braced on his knees, watching as Tim fell into line with the others. The whistle blew, and they were off—an arc of motion against the fading sky. Tim ran like he was born to it, fast and precise, every movement efficient without looking forced.

Jason’s lips curved into a slow, private smile.

Yeah, he could sit through an hour of this.

The coach’s voice cut through the hum of chatter: “Runners, on your mark. Ready… set… go!”

The starting gun cracked, and Tim exploded off the line like a shot, a blur of motion that left the others scrambling to keep up. Jason’s breath caught despite himself, eyes locked on the sharp, sure power of Tim’s sprint. Tim ran like the track was nothing but a suggestion beneath his feet.

Watching Tim sprint across the track, Jason felt his breath catch in a way that had nothing to do with surprise and everything to do with him. Tim moved like the world wasn’t closing in around him, like there wasn’t a past nipping at his heels or a weight dragging at his shoulders. Each stride was clean, purposeful, not fueled by anger or vengeance or some heavy destiny. It was just Tim, running because he wanted to.

And that—God, that was why Jason liked him.

Jason had always believed that being Robin didn’t change anything the way a kid thinks it will, that it was just a symbol you threw at the dark and hoped it stuck. But Tim… Tim challenged that. Tim made Robin mean something again, not because of the mask or the name, but because of the heart behind it.

Tim wasn’t like the rest of them, forged in fire and tragedy, molded into something sharp and unyielding. He hadn’t been forced into this life or cornered into a role. Tim had chosen it. Chosen to become Robin. Chosen to be a hero simply because he wanted to do good. There was something almost painfully pure about that, and Jason, who had only ever been shaped by loss and expectation, couldn’t help but fall for it.

Tim Drake knew how to be Tim Drake even while wearing the mask, a seamless balance between his civilian life and his life as Robin. He could run track, laugh with his friends, ace his classes, and still step into the shadows at night without losing himself.

Jason couldn’t do that.

He’d never been able to untangle where Jason Todd ended and Robin began—and later, where Robin ended and the Red Hood took over. Each name felt like a different skin he’d worn until the edges blurred, leaving him unsure who he was when the gear came off. It wasn’t envy exactly—more like a hollow ache, a gnawing reminder of everything he’d let slip through his fingers.

Tim was out here sprinting toward a future, moving effortlessly between his civilian life and his life in the mask, while Jason was still trying to rebuild his own from the ground up. He’d spent so long being Robin, then dying, then the Red Hood, that Jason Todd had gotten lost somewhere in the rubble.

Now he was clawing his way back, one step at a time; starting with his diploma. It was embarrassing, sure, sitting in night classes surrounded by kids who’d never died and come back with blood on their hands. But the Thursday study sessions with Tim made it worth it, hours spent hunched over textbooks in some quiet corner of his apartment, Tim’s sharp focus and dry humor turning even the most mind-numbing assignments into something Jason almost looked forward to. Those nights made the grind feel less like a penance and more like a step toward something real, something that was his. However, Jason wanted more than to just catch up; he wanted to stand on the same ground as Tim.

If he could get there—if he could finally learn how to just be Jason Todd—maybe he wouldn’t feel like he was always watching life happen from the bleachers while someone else sprinted ahead.

Jason stayed on the bleachers long after the final whistle blew, watching as Tim slowed to a jog, chest rising and falling, his cheeks flushed from the effort. There was something almost unfair about how good he looked like this—sweat-damp hair sticking to his forehead, uniform clinging in all the right places, grinning as his teammates clapped him on the back. Jason forced himself to look away, to school his face into something neutral before anyone could read too much in it.

The crowd of parents and students at the school thinned as practice wound down. Jason made his way toward the edge of the field, leaning against the chain-link fence while Tim waved at him, promising he’d be there in a minute. Jason stood around doing his best to look casual, like he hadn’t just spent the last hour silently marveling at every damn step Tim took.

“Nice bike,” a voice said beside him.

Jason turned, finding himself face-to-face with a lanky kid about Tim’s height, probably a little taller. His pale blond hair was a shade too neat to be accidental, and his smile was open in a way Jason didn’t quite trust yet.

“You the guy Tim’s been talking about?” the kid asked, nodding toward the parking lot where Jason’s bike sat gleaming under the field lights. “Sebastian Ives. Tim and I are in AP Physics together.”

Jason raised an eyebrow, a little wary, but extended a hand. “Jason. Jason… uh, Blake.” He caught himself just in time, using the name on his forged ID.

Sebastian’s handshake was firm but not overbearing. “Man, Tim wasn’t kidding. That thing’s a beauty. You mod it yourself? Or did you take it to some specialty shop?”

Jason’s mouth twitched into a grin, pride sneaking past his usual guardedness. “All me. Couple of salvaged parts, a whole lotta late nights.”

“Damn,” Sebastian said, clearly impressed. “Wish I had that kind of skill. Tim said you’re basically a wizard with engines, but I figured he was exaggerating.”

Jason’s smirk faltered, his mind raced at the thought of Tim talking about him. Talking about him to his friends. “Yeah, well, Tim likes to make me sound cooler than I am,” he muttered, trying for nonchalance and probably failing. “I’m just a guy who likes bikes.”

Sebastian chuckled, not noticing Jason’s discomfort. “You should’ve seen his face when he mentioned you were coming today. Thought he was gonna sprain something trying not to smile too hard.”

Jason didn’t have an answer for that. Heat crawled up the back of his neck, and he was saved only by Tim jogging over, hair damp, towel slung around his neck.

“Hey, Seb!” Tim greeted, slightly breathless. “You two met?”

“Yep,” Sebastian said easily. “Was just telling Jason here how jealous I am of his bike.” He gave Tim a knowing smirk. “You’ve been underselling him, man.”

Tim rolled his eyes, clearly catching the tone but choosing not to rise to it. “Come on, Seb, don’t embarrass him.”

Jason shoved his hands deeper into his pockets. “Yeah, don’t embarrass me,” he echoed dryly, though there was a faint grin tugging at his mouth.

Sebastian shrugged, all easy charm. “Anyway, see you in class tomorrow, Tim. Later, Jason.”

Before Jason could respond, another figure, this time with blond sunkissed hair jogged toward them from the track, still in his practice gear but somehow managing to look like he’d just walked out of a catalog. He wore sleek sunglasses despite the fact that the sun had already dipped below the horizon, his easy, lopsided grin practically radiating confidence.

“Tim!” the guy called, slowing to a stop beside them. “You were insane out there, man. Like, superhero insane.” He tilted his head toward Jason, sizing him up through those ridiculous shades before extending a hand. “Bernard Dowd. You must be the mysterious Jason I’ve been hearing about.”

Jason blinked at the offered hand, caught between bemusement and suspicion, before shaking it firmly. “That’s me. And, uh, mysterious, huh?”

Bernard smirked. “Oh, totally. Tim’s way too cagey when he talks about you, so I figured you had to either be a total badass or some kind of secret agent.” His gaze flicked over Jason’s outfit, pausing at the worn but undeniably cool leather jacket. “Speaking of—dude, that jacket is suuuuuuuper sick. Where’d you get it? Mine’s, like, cheap faux-leather junk from a clearance rack, and it’s already peeling. Leather jackets are so in right now ever since Superboy’s ad campaign with Prada, and I’ve been basically dying to upgrade.”

Jason raised a brow, half-amused, half-wary at Bernard’s enthusiasm. “Uh, thrift shop in the city. You’ve gotta dig a little, but you can find the good stuff if you’re patient.”

Bernard’s grin widened. “Figures. Only a guy with a bike like that would have a jacket to match.” He gestured toward Jason’s motorcycle gleaming nearby. “Man, you’re really living my dream aesthetic.”

Tim groaned, dragging a hand down his face. “Bernard, please.”

Jason chuckled, low and rough, watching Tim flail. “Tim, it’s all good” he said, amused despite himself. “Thanks Bernard.”

Bernard laughed, though there was a hint of nervous energy under it.

“Yeah, uh—guess I’ll have to hit up some thrift shops this weekend, see if I can find something half as nice.” His gaze flicked back to Jason, lingering a second too long, a mix of awe and curiosity. “Seriously, though… you’ve gotta hang out with us more, man. Tim’s been holding out! Didn’t tell us you were basically, like, the guy. Bike, jacket, cool scars, awesome boots, y’know the whole vibe.”

He shot Jason a quick, almost sheepish grin—like a kid catching sight of his favorite action hero in real life, before jogging off to catch up with the rest of the team.

Jason risked a glance at Tim. The glow from the track lights caught in Tim’s hair, softening his features, and Jason felt that hollow ache again, sharper now.

Man, Tim really had a type, didn’t he? First Sebastian, now Bernard—hell, even his ex, Stephanie, was blonde. Jason’s mouth twitched at the thought. Maybe he should bleach his hair, see if that bumped him up Tim’s roster of favorites. He could practically hear Tim’s unimpressed deadpan already: “Please don’t.”

The ridiculous image almost made him laugh, but it didn’t dull the ache sitting heavy in his chest. Tim was sprinting toward a future that seemed impossibly bright, while Jason was still fighting to catch up—fighting to be someone worthy of standing beside him.

Tim reappeared a few minutes later, hair damp and curling at the edges, his track bag slung over one shoulder. He jogged the last few steps toward Jason, cheeks still flushed from the run and the hot shower, and Jason had to forcibly drag his gaze away before he got caught staring.

“Ready to go?” Tim asked, sounding a little too casual, like he hadn’t just spent an hour sprinting like a pro.

Jason handed him the spare helmet, watching as Tim slipped it on and swung onto the bike behind him with practiced ease. Tim’s arms circled his waist, light but steady, and Jason swore he could feel the warmth through his jacket.

He started the engine, letting the rumble cover the way his pulse kicked up. “So,” he said, voice rougher than intended, “do you, uh… talk about me a lot to your friends or something?”

Tim froze for a fraction of a second, then his grip tightened just slightly. “…Why do you ask?”

Jason huffed a laugh, leaning back just enough to glance over his shoulder. “Because Sebastian practically called me a legend, and Bernard’s over here gushing about my jacket like I’m some rock star. Makes me think you’ve been telling stories.”

Tim groaned, thunking his helmet lightly against Jason’s back. “Oh my God, no. I mean—maybe a little.” His voice went defensive, quick. “They’re just… curious, okay? You show up to practice looking like that—” he gestured vaguely at Jason’s outfit and motorcycle “—and what do you expect? You’re like a walking mystery novel.”

Jason smirked, revving the engine just to hear Tim huff. “A mystery novel, huh? Guess that makes you the nosy detective.”

“Please,” Tim muttered, half amused, half exasperated. “If I’m the detective, you’re the guy who makes my life unnecessarily complicated.”

Jason eased the bike forward, the rumble softening as he fell into the rhythm of the empty streets. “You know,” he said, a casual edge to his voice, “it’d be… nice to hang out with your friends sometime. They seem… cool.”

Tim’s grip on the waist tightened almost imperceptibly, and a faint groan escaped him. “…Uh—no. No, that’s—no,” he said quickly, a little too sharply, head ducking. “I mean, it’s not a bad idea, it’s just… complicated timing, you know? Everyone’s got, uh… stuff going on.”

Jason raised an eyebrow, half-smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “Complicated timing, huh? That sounds like a very convenient excuse.”

Tim flushed, looking anywhere but at Jason. “Yeah… convenient. Totally.” His voice had that tight edge that gave him away—he was lying. Not badly, but enough.

Jason chuckled low, the sound vibrating through the seat between them. “You don’t really want me around them, do you?”

Tim swallowed hard. “…I mean, it’s not that I don’t want you around them. It’s… logistics. Yeah, logistics.”

“Uh-huh,” Jason said, mockingly patient, revving the engine again just enough to tease him. “You sure you’re not just… embarrassed that I’d steal all the attention or something?”

Tim’s helmet bumped against Jason’s back again, harder this time. “Nooo… nooooo,” he whined, voice tinged with panic, flailing in that way he only did when he was cornered. “It’s nothing like that. Seriously.”

Jason smirked, leaning closer. “Mm, sure. I’ll take your word for it… for now.” He let the bike hum beneath them, enjoying the way Tim’s silence filled the space, all soft exasperation and subtle denial. “Unfortunate, though,” he added, a teasing tilt to his voice, “I’m planning to apply to the same uni as you. Which means your friends will be there… which also means I’ll already have people I know. But oh well, I guess you think I can’t get in.”

Tim’s grip tightened instinctively, a strangled noise escaping under his helmet. “…W-what? That’s—n-no! You’re exaggerating…” His words tumbled out in a rush, cheeks heating, and Jason felt the small, frantic flinch that came whenever he pushed just the right buttons. He let out an exaggerated sigh, slumping a little against Jason’s back. “…Fine. You can meet them,” he muttered, voice tight but defeated.

Jason’s grin widened under his helmet. “Great. This weekend should be fun. We can grab food afterward—diner, maybe? Classic pancakes, greasy fries, the works.”

Tim’s fingers tensed for a moment, then relaxed just slightly. “…Or… we can figure out the logistics after we, uh… play at the arcade first,” he said, trying to sound casual, but the little stutter in his voice betrayed him.

Jason chuckled, the sound low and warm in Tim’s ears. “Arcade first, then hangout plans. Got it. Sounds like a plan.”

The arcade lights flickered and buzzed around them, casting a neon glow over Jason’s flushed face as he chased high scores and dodged Tim’s teasing comments. The sounds of pinball machines, racing games, and the occasional victorious beep filled the air, mixing with the laughter that bubbled up from both of them.

By the time they left, cheeks sore from grinning too much, Tim’s nerves were shot in the best possible way. Back in Drake’s penthouse, he grabbed his phone, fingers shaking just slightly as he texted the group chat with Bernard and Sebastian.

Tim’s fingers hovered over the keyboard for a beat before typing:

“Jason asked to hang out with us."

He stared at the message for a second, then hit send, knowing full well the chaos this would unleash.

Chapter Text

Tim hadn’t planned to show up early.

He told himself that all the way there; through the steady roar of Jason’s motorcycle still echoing in his head from last night, the phantom vibration of it rattling along his bones as if he were still standing too close, watching the red taillight vanish into Gotham’s dark like a promise he couldn’t quite keep. Through the half-hour he’d spent pacing his room like a trapped animal, counting every step with military precision while his thoughts spun out of control in a dozen different directions, each one circling back to Jason. Through the fifteen minutes he’d stood frozen in the dim, flickering lobby of Jason’s building, pretending to scroll through his phone, pretending he wasn’t timing his breathing to the rhythm of his heart as it pounded so loudly he swore the old woman checking her mailbox could hear it too.

By the time he forced himself to knock, his carefully constructed reasons for being there: practical, reasonable and logical.

It was fine. Rational, even. There was no harm in arriving an hour ahead of schedule. Maybe Jason would need help with something before they left for the hangout. Maybe there’d be traffic later, and this would keep them from being late to meet Bernard and Sebastian. It was logistical, perfectly explainable, not weird at all. Besides, he’d even taken public transport to get here. If he’d wanted to make a statement, he could’ve just called a driver and had a car waiting outside Jason’s building like some kind of grand gesture. But Jason had shown him how to navigate the city buses and subway months ago, and now it was just… cost-effective. Completely normal. Nothing about it screamed desperate.

Tim turned the words over and over in his head, a desperate incantation, as his knuckles rapped against the door.

Jason opened the door, and every carefully stacked excuse in Tim’s head collapsed like a house of cards in a hurricane.

He wasn’t ready for this.

Jason stood there barefoot, skin flushed faintly warm like he’d just rolled out of bed, sweatpants slung indecently low on his hips in a way that felt almost… calculated. A faded gray hoodie was tied loosely around his waist, the sleeves knotted with careless laziness, soft fabric slouching low and drawing the eye downward like some kind of visual trap.

In one hand, he held a black t-shirt, rumpled and dangling loosely from his fingers like he’d been interrupted mid-change. The casual, almost thoughtless grip only made it worse; it wasn’t just that Jason was half-dressed, it was the implication that he could have been fully dressed, that there was a universe in which Tim didn’t have to see this much skin and wasn’t about to experience a catastrophic neurological meltdown. Moreover, his bare chest was unfairly distracting—sharp collarbones tapering down to broad muscle, pale skin marked with the faint traces of old scars like ghost maps of violence and survival.

His hair was an unholy mess, sticking up in erratic tufts as if he’d been dragging his hands through it while swearing at some stubborn problem for hours. A pencil clung stubbornly behind one ear, like he’d shoved it there and forgotten about it mid-thought—a tiny, absurd detail that only made the whole scene more destabilizing.

For one disorienting second, Tim’s brain didn’t just go blank, it crashed. Total system failure. Flatline. Static. The full blue screen of death flashing behind his eyes while every process in his head screamed and shut down.

01000101 01010010 01010010 01001111 01010010 00111010 00100000 01010101 01001110 01000101 01011000 01010000 01000101 01000011 01010100 01000101 01000100 00100000 01001001 01001110 01010000 01010101 01010100 00101110 00100000 01010000 01001100 01000101 01000001 01010011 01000101 00100000 01010010 01000101 01000010 01001111 01001111 01010100 00101110

When his mental operating system finally lurched back online, it spat out a single, wildly unhelpful word: Domestic.

Domestic? Really? That was all it had?

But it was true—Jason looked like someone who lived here, someone who did completely ordinary things like drink tea, maybe pay a utility bill, maybe forget to put on a shirt before opening the door and casually ruin Tim’s entire week. Normal. Ordinary. An entirely different person from the man who stalked Gotham’s alleys in Kevlar and leather and rage, framed by the neon glow of crime scenes like some myth carved out of violence and bad decisions.

The contrast was so extreme it felt like being hit with a bucket of cold water… and then immediately electrocuted. Tim’s thoughts didn’t just stutter—they screamed, a silent internal klaxon wailing: OVERRIDE. OVERRIDE. OVERRIDE.

The contrast short-circuited Tim’s composure entirely. He was supposed to have control here—over himself, at the very least. Instead, his mouth opened on autopilot and produced a string of sounds that weren’t even words.

“Uh—yeah—hi—I just—uh—mmmghf—rruhh—uhhhbb—mmmff—hhghhh.”

Jason stared at him, eyebrows climbing higher with every garbled sound. “Tim? It’s—uh.” His gaze flicked to the clock on the microwave. “It’s one. Why’re you here so early? I thought we weren’t heading out till two.”

Tim wanted to dig a hole and disappear into it. His internal processes were still frantically trying and failing to reboot. He opened his mouth, closed it again. His carefully organized words scattered like playing cards in a storm.

Jason stepped aside, the motion smooth and unthinking, like he was oblivious to the small, localized apocalypse he’d just triggered in Tim’s nervous system. “C’mon,” he said, waving vaguely toward the inside of the apartment. “You can come in while I finish getting ready. Shoes off, though. Floor’s still drying—I, uh, may have mopped like five minutes ago.”

He scrubbed a hand over the back of his neck, looking almost sheepish. “Figured if I couldn’t beat the stress from studying, I’d at least murder some dust bunnies instead.”

Tim moved on autopilot, slipping past him like a ghost while desperately willing himself not to glance down again, not to make things worse. Of course, that resolve shattered immediately. Because Jason turned as he shut the door, and in doing so, lifted the black t-shirt he’d been holding to pull it over his head.

Tim’s vision caught on the glimpse of sharply cut muscle and the deep V-line dipping into the waistband of Jason’s sweatpants. A perfect, unholy geometry. The kind of thing sculptors in Ancient Greece would’ve committed sacrilege over. His entire body went rigid, then hot, then unbearably restless.

Nope nope nope nope nope.

He jammed both hands deep into his pockets so fast it was almost violent, fingers curling tight around his phone like he could physically anchor himself there. If Jason noticed the sudden, sharp movement, he didn’t say anything; probably too busy wrestling his shirt over his head.

By the time Jason’s face emerged through the neck hole, Tim had managed to arrange his features into something passably neutral, the kind of detached calm he normally used in his everyday life. The kind of expression that suggested nothing to see here, just a normal human being with normal human thoughts.

“Nice mop job,” Tim said, his tone dry and practiced, like he hadn’t just suffered a catastrophic internal failure thirty seconds ago. “Real domestic of you. Should I check for freshly baked cookies while I’m at it?”

Jason froze mid-adjusting his sleeves, his mouth quirking into something halfway between a smirk and a grimace. “Cookies? Seriously?” He snorted. “You’re lucky I don’t throw you back out there for that one.”

“Please,” Tim said smoothly, even as his pulse thundered in his ears. “You’d miss me too much.”

Jason’s expression flickered—there and gone in an instant—before he rolled his eyes. “Yeah, keep telling yourself that, Tim,” he muttered, his tone gruff in a way that didn’t quite hide the faint hitch of fluster underneath.

Tim’s lips curled into the barest hint of a smirk as he sank against the counter, watching Jason bend over his work. Math, by the look of it. A few neatly stacked assignments were tucked to the side, color-coded sticky notes marking pages. Jason was more disciplined about his classes than he’d admit.

Tim’s mind, however, was anything but disciplined.

Tim’s gaze lingered on Jason longer than he meant it to, caught on the steady, deliberate way his pencil moved across the page. Jason didn’t even seem to notice he was being watched. He was bent over the counter, posture loose but focused, brow furrowed in concentration. A stubborn little crease formed between his eyebrows whenever he hit a tricky problem, and it made Tim’s chest ache in a way he didn’t want to examine too closely. Jason’s lips moved faintly like he was sounding out the formulas under his breath, his voice too soft to hear but warm in Tim’s imagination.

It was… unbearably endearing.

Tim shouldn’t find it so fascinating. It was just homework. Just Jason, doing something perfectly ordinary. But there was nothing ordinary about the way Jason was. He didn’t have to be here, grinding away at night classes after spending his evenings running through Gotham’s crimes, taking punches and breaking up fights. He didn’t have to be here, grinding away at night classes after spending his evenings running through Gotham’s alleys, taking punches and breaking up fights. He could have let the world keep him in the box it had tried to shove him into—the exact words written in cold, sterile font on one of the Red Hood profiles in the Batcomputer database: highly volatile, unpredictable, a liability if not handled with extreme caution. Tim had read that file more times than he’d ever admit, the description so clinical it almost stripped Jason down to nothing but a list of threats and risks.

But sitting here now, watching Jason barefoot in his cramped kitchen, hair messy and sticking up in every direction, brow furrowed over some math problem like it was a puzzle only he could solve… it didn’t fit. None of those words fit.

Instead of one of Gotham’s most dangerous wildcard, Jason looked like someone who chose to fight for something beyond violence. Someone building himself up piece by stubborn piece, carving out a future with nothing but grit and raw determination.

Tim’s chest went unbearably warm, pride and longing tangling so tightly he couldn’t tell where one feeling ended and the other began. And God, it was stupid—so stupid—but all he could think was how badly he wanted Jason to look at him the way he looked at those pages, with that same unshakable focus and care.

It made something in Tim go soft and gooey in a way that felt almost cockeyed.

Jason’s determination was magnetic. He didn’t just do things, he threw himself at them, all-or-nothing, like there was no other way to be. Watching him now, head tilted in concentration, pencil tapping a restless rhythm against the counter, Tim felt… proud. Ridiculously proud, like he had any right to feel that way. Like he’d earned even a fraction of Jason’s trust, let alone the right to sit here quietly and witness this.

Tim’s heart fluttered wildly in his chest, and he had to grip the counter to keep from doing something stupid—like reaching out and tucking the stray pencil behind Jason’s ear into place, or brushing his knuckles along the warm skin of Jason’s forearm just to see if it felt as solid and real as it looked.

He could almost see Jason’s reaction if he actually went through with it—first, a quick, startled blink, those sharp green eyes going wide as his whole body went tense. Then, in the very next breath, Jason would scowl, cheeks flushing faintly pink as he jerked back like the touch had burned him. He’d grumble something gruff and defensive, maybe snap, “What was that for?” while very obviously avoiding eye contact. The kind of reaction that wasn’t rejection so much as embarrassment barely covered by irritation, like Jason didn’t know where to put the feeling and defaulted to snarling about it instead.

Tim knew, because he’d seen it happen before.

He thought of that day in Jason’s warehouse, the warm smell of brassy metal in the air, Jason bent over his bike and trying to look composed while Tim leaned casually against him, resting his forehead against Jason’s shoulder like it was nothing.

“Is this fine?” Tim had murmured, teasing, his voice all soft edges.

Jason’s wrench had frozen mid-turn, his ears turning bright red. “You’re—uh—supportive,” he’d muttered, way too fast, like the word could cover the way his hands shook just slightly on the tools.

The memory made Tim smile now, warmth curling in his chest. He hadn’t done it just to tease; he’d wanted to see that vulnerable, unguarded side of Jason, proof that the chaos he felt wasn’t one-sided. Proof that Jason could be rattled by him, too.

But instead, Tim ducked his head, trying to smother the smile creeping across his face. It was so stupid. So teenage crush, the way his chest squeezed just from seeing Jason hunched over his work like that. But he couldn’t help it. Jason was trying so hard, building a future for himself piece by piece, and all Tim could think was how badly he wanted to be part of it.

“Stop staring, I can’t focus…” Jason said suddenly, not even looking up from his notes. His voice was rough but not unkind, and Tim swore he heard the faintest thread of amusement woven through it.

“I’m not staring,” Tim lied instantly, way too fast. His ears burned.

Jason huffed a laugh, shaking his head. “Sure you’re not.”

Tim bit down on his lip, trying to will away the blush creeping up his neck.

Jason capped his pen and stretched with a groan, his back cracking audibly as he arched. “God, finally,” he muttered, rubbing a hand over his face. “If I have to look at another equation today, I’m dropping out and becoming a professional street brawler. At least then I won’t have to calculate interest rates.”

Tim’s lips twitched, amusement bubbling in his chest. “Wouldn’t recommend it. The pay’s terrible, and I’m pretty sure the benefits package includes free concussions.”

Jason snorted, grabbing his jacket from the back of a chair. “Like I don’t already get those for free.”

He glanced at the clock. “C’mon, Tim. We’re gonna be late.” His tone was casual, but there was a faint thread of anticipation beneath it. Jason wouldn’t admit it out loud, but Tim could tell he was looking forward to this: Bernard and Sebastian had somehow convinced him to play doubles tennis, of all things. It was absurd. Jason, who regularly fought drug lords and rooftop snipers, had never even held a tennis racket before—yet here he was, about to step onto a court like some tennis player and pretend he knew the rules.

Tim’s chest gave a strange, warm squeeze at the thought. Jason deserved more of these kinds of days, boring, ridiculous, safe days. Days where the only thing at risk was a bruised ego and maybe a sore shoulder.

Jason shoved his arms into his jacket sleeves and shot Tim a pointed look. “Are you bringing your extra fancy little racket for me, or will I have to rent one out?”

“I have two,” Tim said, grabbing his bag and slinging it over his shoulder. “Though I’m starting to think I should’ve brought a helmet too. I’ve seen your backhand.”

Jason smirked, his eyes flashing with a quick, competitive gleam. “Oh, you’re gonna regret that comment later.”

Tim rolled his eyes, pretending like the sight didn’t make his pulse skip as he chuckled. “We’ll see.”

They headed out together, Jason locking the door behind them. The elevator ride was quiet except for the faint creak of the old machinery. Tim could feel the brush of Jason’s arm against his in the cramped space, a solid, grounding warmth that made his stomach flip like some badly timed acrobatics trick. He told himself it was fine. Completely fine. It wasn’t like he was standing here cataloging the way Jason’s hair curled slightly at the nape of his neck, or how his breath fogged faintly in the cool air, or how he smelled faintly of laundry detergent.

When the elevator dinged at the ground floor, Jason stepped out first, throwing a casual glance over his shoulder. “You spaced out back there, Tim. What, already scared you’ll lose?”

“Not scared,” Tim said smoothly, falling into step beside him. “Just strategizing how to beat your ass.”

Jason’s laugh was low and warm, curling around Tim like smoke. “Uh-huh. Sure.”

The tennis courts were nestled deep in one of Gotham’s wealthier neighborhoods, a pocket of manicured perfection that felt almost alien compared to the chaos of Crime Alley. The asphalt gleamed smooth and flawless beneath the afternoon sun, not a single crack or stray weed daring to mar its surface. The white boundary lines were so sharp they practically glowed, freshly painted and unscuffed, while the tall chain-link fence surrounding the court stood perfectly straight, its metal coated in a sleek, dark finish that didn’t even have a hint of rust. Even the air felt different here: crisp, filtered somehow, carrying the faint scent of cut grass from the nearby park.

Bernard and Sebastian were already waiting when Tim and Jason arrived. Bernard was the first to spot them, his sunglasses perched low on his nose, faux-leather jacket slung over his shoulders despite the warm weather. He leaned against the net with the exaggerated casualness of someone who wanted to look like trouble, but his bouncing leg and barely contained grin ruined the effect completely. Sebastian, by contrast, stood beside him with a quiet ease, hands in his pockets, posture relaxed but sharp in a way that said he actually knew how to play this game.

“Finally!” Bernard shouted, throwing his arms wide like a rock star stepping onto stage. “I was about to file a missing persons report. Do you know how long we’ve been standing here? My soul almost died of boredom.”

Sebastian rolled his eyes but didn’t rise to the bait. “You’ve been complaining for all of five minutes,” he said evenly. “And we were early. Which, by the way, is a good thing when reserving courts in this neighborhood.”

“Yeah, yeah, tell that to my sunburn,” Bernard muttered dramatically, rubbing his arm despite not looking remotely sunburned.

“Blame Jason,” Tim said automatically, even though they’d left right on time.

Jason snorted, giving Tim a mock-glare. “Traitor,” he muttered under his breath as he stepped onto the court.

Bernard’s eyes practically sparkled as he took in Jason, moving as if he couldn’t believe his own luck. “Whoa—holy—okay, I mean—ridiculously ripped, insanely cool, I-mean-seriously—rugged biker vibes mixed with underground-boxer energy, and that smirk? Don’t even get me started! You’re basically a living action figure!”

Tim groaned, facepalming. “Bernard.”

Jason raised a brow, half-amused, half-wary. “...Thanks?”

Sebastian stepped in smoothly before Bernard could dig himself any deeper, tossing a racket toward Jason with an easy underhand throw. “Ignore him. He gets like this whenever he meets someone new.”

“I do not!” Bernard protested, already handing a racket to Tim.

“You do,” Sebastian said simply, his tone dry. Then, to Jason and Tim, “Teams? Me and Bernard versus you two?” He bounced the tennis ball lightly against the court, his movements casual but practiced.

“Aww,” Jason drawled, his grin sharp and a little too pleased. “But Tim was just telling me he was looking forward to beating me.”

Tim shot him a flat look, but Jason only slung an arm loosely over his shoulders, leaning in with deliberate weight.

“Guess we’ll have to work together instead,” Jason added, tone mock-sympathetic as he squeezed Tim’s shoulder. “Tragic, huh?”

Tim opened his mouth, ready to argue that he hadn’t said anything of the sort, but the words stuck in his throat. Heat prickled at the back of his neck as Jason’s teasing grin turned squarely on him, like a spotlight he couldn’t dodge. He forced his expression into something neutral, adjusting the grip on his racket with more focus than necessary.

Before he could summon a response, they all moved to their sides of the court. Tim exhaled slowly, trying to shove the flutter of frustration—and something else—down deep where no one could see it.

As they all took their positions, Bernard frowned suddenly, smacking his racket against his palm. “Wait, hold up. Maybe we shouldn’t have picked tennis for this. I mean, look at us—we’ve got a whole cool, dangerous vibe going on.” He gestured between himself and Jason with a flourish. “Should’ve been, like… street basketball. Or a rooftop duel at sunset.”

Sebastian didn’t even glance up as he deadpanned, “You’re the one who suggested tennis, Bernard.”

Bernard froze, blinking. “…Okay, fair. But still.”

Jason’s smirk sharpened, a spark of challenge lighting his eyes. “You’re on.”

Tim felt a strange, ridiculous little thrill at those two words—you two. Him and Jason. A team.
He shifted his grip on the racket, forcing his voice into something cool and cutting to hide the sudden warmth in his chest. “Try not to get in my way,” he said, like it was all sharp edges and banter instead of something dangerously close to vulnerable.

Jason huffed a laugh. “You wish.”

Bernard let out a low whistle, grinning like he’d just tuned into the best soap opera of his life. “Okay, wow. The vibes here are unreal. You two wanna maybe save the flirting until after you lose?”

Tim’s ears went pink. “We’re not—”

Tim’s heartbeat slammed in his chest as the first serve went up. Jason moved with a surprising ease, pivoting, leaning, striking the ball with enough force that Tim blinked in mild shock. The ball zipped across the net, landing just inside the boundary with a satisfying thwack.

Tim had braced himself for sloppy swings and missed returns. Instead, he was facing a version of Jason that moved like liquid steel—athletic, unpredictable, perfectly controlled. His grin as he bounced on the balls of his feet made Tim’s chest thrum, the adrenaline mixing with something far more distracting.

“Not bad,” Tim muttered under his breath, stepping forward to return the serve. He kept his eyes on the ball, forcing his chest to settle, reminding himself: It’s just tennis. Just tennis. Don’t think about him.

Jason called out, casual but teasing, “Focus, Tim. I’d hate for you to embarrass yourself in front of Bernard and Sebastian.”

Tim shot him a sharp look. Focus, he repeated mentally. And yet, his fingers tightened around the racket as if the tension in his chest had a physical manifestation. He returned the ball with precision, though deliberately dialing back the force. Not too hard… can’t smash him across the court and blow our cover. Pretend it’s a game, Tim. Pretend.

“Oh, come on, you’re holding back,” Jason said, leaning forward slightly, letting his next serve fly fast but not lethal. “I can see it in your grip.”

Tim forced a glare. “I’m… conserving energy,” he said, the lie tasting bitter on his tongue.

Jason arched an eyebrow, then smirked knowingly. “Ohhhh,” he said, a hint of amusement in his voice, and adjusted his own swing.

The match began in earnest. Tim’s swings were deliberate, almost surgical—angled returns, measured force, every pivot and shoulder turn calculated to keep their skill in check. He focused on precision over power, nudging the ball just enough to stay inside the lines, every movement rehearsed in his mind like choreography he couldn’t afford to improvise.

Jason mirrored him effortlessly, coiled and fluid, each return smooth and controlled. A playful gleam in his green eyes belied the intensity, silently daring Tim to push harder while staying restrained. Volley by volley, their movements became a silent conversation, a razor’s-edge balance of mirrored precision.

Bernard and Sebastian were the opposite: unrestrained, explosive. Bernard lunged dramatically, arms flailing, shouting triumphantly after every successful hit. “A real champion hits like this!” he hollered, every movement exaggerated and exuberant, a stark counterpoint to Tim and Jason’s quiet precision. Sebastian’s style was subtler, calm and efficient, placing shots with near-clinical accuracy. He read the court with uncanny anticipation, his minimalistic swings devastatingly effective, gliding across the court in silent harmony with Bernard’s theatrics.

The contrast was hypnotic. While Tim and Jason moved in controlled synchronization, attuned to each other’s restraint, Bernard and Sebastian operated like a tempest: unrelenting, unpredictable, daring them to slip up. The ball flew back and forth, alternating between finesse and explosive force. Tim adjusted constantly, anticipating Bernard’s lunges, recalculating mid-step to keep his own shots measured, masking the reflexes honed from nights of training and crime-fighting.

Jason caught the hint of Tim’s careful calculations, tilting his head in a faint half-smile. His swings remained precise but now carried subtle awareness, a modulation that matched Tim’s restraint perfectly. It was almost a silent dialogue, volley for volley. Bernard’s shouts punctuated the court with wild energy, while Sebastian’s quiet precision exposed every tiny gap, exploiting the limits of Tim and Jason’s carefully tempered power. The disparity left Tim constantly on edge—pulled between the exhilaration of the match, the effort of restraint, and the subtle awareness that Jason shared it all.

By the fifth rally, sweat pricked at Tim’s temples. Each return required rapid calculations: how hard to hit without revealing their strength, how quickly to move without giving away agility, how subtly to shift footwork to mask reflexes. Jason mirrored each adjustment perfectly, a ghostly shadow in sync, the faint teasing of his grin the only clue he, too, was holding back.

Bernard and Sebastian, oblivious to the silent subterfuge, interpreted the controlled movements as a challenge, ramping up intensity, hurling the ball with wild abandon at every angle. Their unrestrained energy began to dominate the match, forcing Tim and Jason into a constant dance of careful, deliberate strategy, raw potential cleverly concealed beneath a veneer of sportsmanship.

The rhythm began to crack under relentless pressure. Tim and Jason moved in near-perfect harmony, but restraining themselves was draining. Every swing, pivot, and volley demanded conscious moderation; muscles that wanted to explode now protested, joints ached from tension, and even their lungs burned from effort. Fatigue came not from exertion alone, but from the discipline of holding back power they both knew they had.

Bernard, fueled by audacity and sheer confidence, lunged for a particularly daring cross-court shot, sending the ball spinning at an angle that forced Tim to stretch and twist far beyond his comfort zone. He lunged, fingers grazing the racket; but the ball slipped past him entirely, bouncing just out of reach. Jason twisted mid-step, eyes flicking to Tim in a flash of frustration and surprise, but it was too late. The ball landed firmly on their side of the court. cut this to 600 words

“Point!” Bernard shouted triumphantly, pumping a fist into the air, while Sebastian’s calm smile betrayed the quiet satisfaction of a well-earned advantage. Jason let out a low huff, shaking his head, a wry smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. Tim exhaled sharply, cheeks warming with embarrassment, silently cursing both Bernard’s audacity and his own overcautious restraint.

One after another, volleys slipped past Tim and Jason, grazing the edge of the lines, bouncing out of reach despite their practiced agility. Each lost point tugged at Tim’s pride, but he refused to overcommit. Every muscle and reflex was throttled to avoid the sort of force that could look “superhuman” in front of their friends.

Tim jogged back to the baseline after missing another shot. “I swear I’m doing my best,” he muttered, adjusting his grip.

Jason raised an eyebrow. “Your best seems… tiring.”

Tim groaned. “I’m taking one for the team. Can’t have us scoring too hard and blowing our cover.”

Jason smirked, sending the next serve over. “Fair enough. But I’ll admit; it’s kind of funny watching you suffer through it.”

Tim huffed, chasing the ball. “Funny isn’t the word I’d use.”

“You guys holding back or something?” Bernard called over.

Tim wiped sweat from his brow. “No… totally tapped out,” he muttered, shoulders heavy, feeling the sting of every missed return.

The next rallies were sluggish, each swing deliberate but lacking their usual edge. Despite their practiced form, Tim and Jason couldn’t keep up with Bernard and Sebastian’s unrestrained energy. Balls zipped past them, sometimes grazing the edge of the lines, sometimes bouncing just out of reach, and each miss drew a mix of frustration and reluctant amusement.

Finally, the last ball hit the line. Bernard pumped his fist triumphantly. “Match! OMG! Sebs we won! We won! We won, we won, we wooo-o-o-o-on!”

Tim let his racket fall to the ground, chest heaving, muscles sore from the effort of restraint. “Yeah… I’m done. Completely tapped out.”

Jason shook his head, smirking, but there was a hint of fondness in his expression. “Fair enough. You held your own better than I expected.”

Tim let out a breathy laugh, brushing a hand through his damp hair. “Better? Barely. That was… exhausting.”

“Exhausting?” Jason teased, nudging him lightly. “You mean secretly thrilling, right?”

Tim rolled his eyes, but the corner of his mouth twitched into a small smile. “Yeah, let’s go sit before I collapse. I know a diner not far from here. Coffee, fries… maybe some pie.”

Jason stretched out a hand toward Tim, a casual gesture that carried more warmth than he probably intended. “C’mon, Let’s get moving before you start melting into the court.”

Tim looked at it for a heartbeat, then let a small, genuine smile tug at his lips. He took Jason’s hand, feeling the surprising warmth and strength in the grasp. With that simple touch, something inside him clicked—suddenly, the idea of being by Jason’s side, really being there, felt not only possible but inevitable.

Jason gave his hand a reassuring squeeze, then tugged gently, helping Tim to his feet. “There we go. See? Not so bad, being upright.”

Tim chuckled, brushing off imaginary dust from his sweatpants as he stood. “Yeah… not bad at all.”

The diner was a cozy chaos of clattering plates and low hum of conversation, neon signs buzzing softly against the walls. The smell of sizzling bacon and salty fries curled into every corner, mingling with the faint sweetness of freshly brewed coffee and sticky syrup. Vinyl booths squeaked under shifting weight, and the chrome-edged tables reflected the warm glow of overhead lights, casting lazy golden streaks across the floor. Tim and Jason slid in side by side, the vinyl sticking slightly to their clothes, Tim careful to set his bag beside him while Jason stretched his arms over the back of the seat like he owned the space. Bernard and Sebastian occupied the opposite booth, leaning back with quiet amusement, exchanging subtle glances as they watched the two of them settle in, noting the easy closeness that already hummed between Tim and Jason.

They ordered quickly: coffee, fries, burgers, waffles, a slice of pie—and settled into the kind of easy, casual rhythm diners seemed to invite. Jason reached for the ketchup just as Tim went to grab it from the opposite side, and their hands brushed. Both froze for a fraction of a second before Jason smirked, and Tim ducked his head behind his napkin, trying not to smile.

Under the table, their knees brushed. Jason leaned slightly closer as Tim slid the sugar toward him, the smallest gestures carrying a weight neither could fully articulate. Tim found himself laughing more easily than he should, teasing Jason lightly, and letting the small touches linger just a moment too long. He caught the faintest flicker of pink along Jason’s jaw and thought, Wow… total virgin energy, and muttered under his breath, “Relax, it’s just a knee. Not like I’m attacking or anything.”

Across the table, Bernard and Sebastian exchanged a glance, subtle but knowing. Their smirked acknowledgment was enough.

Tim caught himself in the reflection of the window, watching Jason grin at something he’d said. Heat rose to his chest, his stomach twisting in a way that made his rational mind stumble. It was ridiculous. He knew it was ridiculous. But even as he tried to shove the feeling down, it only grew warmer, heavier, and insistent. And in the quiet, chaotic hum of the diner, as waffles steamed on the table and Jason leaned casually toward him, Tim admitted something to himself he couldn’t ignore: that all the pacing, all the rehearsed excuses, all the careful timing of his arrival earlier—it had led him here, to this exact moment, and he really, really liked Jason.

Chapter Text

The night punched—gasoline and wet concrete and the metallic snap of someone trying to make a living off other people’s quiet. Jason had tracked the truck through three nights; he’d told himself tonight would be quick. In. Out. Burn the shipment. Go home, knock out, and wake up early to cram for the AP exam breathing down his neck next week.

The van’s side door slammed open with a metallic shriek, and men spilled out like a junk drawer overturned: cheap masks, cheaper rifles, the kind of muscle that thought a trigger finger was a personality trait. The berth filled with the acrid sting of powder, every breath catching sharp in his throat. Overhead, the lone fluorescent buzzed and flickered, throwing everything in fractured slices of light, making the scene look less like Gotham crime and more like some school play gone off the rails. And Jason, in the middle of it all, thought with bitter absurdity that in seven days he’d be sitting under another set of bad lights; only instead of rifles aimed at his chest, it’d be an exam booklet waiting to gut him just as efficiently.

“Red Hood—drop him! Aim for the head, don’t waste the bullets!” the lead barked, voice sharp as the rifles cocking in unison.

Jason moved. There was no thought, only motion: a shoulder forward, a blade of momentum. The first shot exploded like a punctuation mark. Metal screamed past his ear. He answered with a pair of precise, ugly movements: two bodies down, a man choking on the pavement. Boots slid on spilled oil. A crate toppled, tin cans skittering like a thrown handful of coins.

“You shouldn’t have come tonight,” one of them snarled as he recovered, voice muffled through a plastic mask. “Boss is gonna want you—”

“Yeah? Tell your boss Amazon does free returns,” Jason shot back, and then there was a crowbar arcing where a hand had been.

The world shattered into fragments: fists, shots, crowbars. The copper sting of blood slicking his tongue, the air so thick with gunpowder it scraped down his throat like sand. Boots hammered the pavement in discordant rhythm, shouts colliding with the sharp cough of gunfire until it all blurred into a single, jagged roar. Bullets snapped through the air, harsh little wasps cutting past his ear, ricocheting off brick and steel, trading fire back and forth until every muzzle flash felt like lightning in a storm. The slap of wet fabric against skin, the crunch of a nose breaking under his knuckles, the grunt of impact that rattled through his bones.

A crate toppled sideways, wood splintering as it hit, tin cans spilling and skittering across the asphalt like a shower of coins tossed into chaos. Someone screamed; someone else laughed too high, too wild. The berth stank of oil, sweat, and fear. Every second narrowed to breath and instinct—close, twist, strike, break. No room for thought, no room for hesitation. His body moved on patterns drilled in blood and repetition, every muscle tugged along the edge of exhaustion. The berth spun around him like a loaded roulette wheel, red and black flashing, odds never in his favor but never enough to stop him from betting anyway.

A shadow lunged from the blind side of the van—too close, too fast, steel flashing. Knife. He pivoted, but late—half a beat off. The blade slid in with a terrible, surgical certainty. Cold first. Then fire. His shoulder lit up, nerve-deep, like someone had jammed a wire straight into him. Arm slow. Dead weight. Useless. Stabbed. Shit. Shit—stabbed. He hadn’t expected anyone to actually bring a knife to a gun fight.

Jason sucked in a breath that tasted like rust and forced his body forward anyway. Pain could wait. Exams could wait. Right now, survival was the only subject he couldn’t afford to fail.

“Shit!” the attacker cursed, surprised. “Got him—got him—” His voice cracked between triumph and fear.

Jason spat blood into the air. He tasted iron. “You picked the wrong night,” he said, voice low and flat, the words breaking ragged through the crackle of his helmet’s modulator.

The knife had nicked muscle, not bone. It had sliced shallow and mean, smart enough to make him feel betrayed by his own body. His jacket darkened where the fabric soaked. The weight of his arm felt like it belonged to someone else.

“Hold him!” another thug yelled, panic scraping the edge of his bark. “He’s bleeding—call it—”

“He’s bleeding—pin the arm!” another snapped.

“Shoot him!” someone else shrieked, panic splitting the word.

The shot came wild and loud. Jason wrenched a dented crate off the ground and dragged it into the bullet’s path. The impact screamed against steel, sparks spitting as the force jolted up his arm. Sloppy, desperate cover, but it kept him standing.

Jason ignored the orders. The world moved too fast for orders. He shoved off a crate, slammed a knee into a man who’d been too confident, and the thug folded with a sound like a neglected shirt. A rifle cracked, one of the henchmen dropped, and Jason’s hand closed on the knife-hand’s wrist as the attacker tried to pull back.

“You done?” Jason breathed, more tone than thought.

The man’s eyes were wide under his mask. He tried to twist. Jason twisted harder, and bone and muscle remembered a thousand fights older than both of them. The knife skittered to the ground. Jason struck hard, real hard, and the attacker went down.

“Burn it,” Jason rasped suddenly, grabbing the van driver without ceremony. He dug his good hand into the man’s jacket and hauled him out toward the leaking jerrycan they’d stashed for secondary shipments. The driver coughed, nodding like someone surfacing from bad dreams.

“Jesus—” the driver rasped. “You’re crazy.”

“Not tonight,” Jason said. His left arm flared as he moved; a thin, precise agony. He pressed his palm to the wound until the red blurred. The pressure did not stop the ringing in his ears but it narrowed the world from an avalanche to a single, manageable task.

One of the henchmen had found a lighter and was backing away toward the berth mouth. “We’re out—boss will kill us—” he chuckled, fearful and stupid.

“Good,” Jason said. “Tell Roman to pick better cronies.”

The berth had gone thin with silence with just the hiss of gasoline spilling, the groans of men trying not to move. Jason shifted his weight, his left arm screaming, and almost missed the scrape of metal dragging over asphalt.

One of them was up again—broken nose, jaw slack with swelling, eyes glassy but full of desperation. He staggered forward with a length of pipe clutched in both hands, murder simmering through the haze. Jason caught the shadow at the edge of his vision but his body lagged behind the thought. His bad arm wouldn’t lift in time.

The pipe lifted—

A sharp thhk cut through the air.

Wire snagged around the metal with a brutal snap, jerking it sideways out of the thug’s grip. The man barely had time to look confused before another shadow landed, clean and precise, boots colliding with his face in a crack that sent him sprawling back into the dark.

Jason blinked through the pain and blood haze. A familiar figure straightened in the light, retracting the grappling hook in one smooth motion. Red Robin across his chest. Hood up, cape settling like it had weight of its own.

“It’s Thursday,” Tim said, exasperatingly flattening every word. “Thought you could use a study buddy.” He kicked the pipe aside.

Jason exhaled hard, a cough scraping up his throat. He turned back to the van driver still frozen by the jerrycan, lighter trembling in his hand.

“You deaf or somethin’? I said "burn it.” Jason ordered again, voice shredded raw.

This time the driver obeyed.

Flame touched gasoline with a hungry whoomph, fire racing along the trail and swallowing the van in an orange bloom. Shadows lurched and warped across the walls as the heat tore the air open. The henchmen scrambled, dragging their wounded with them, shouts breaking against the crackle of fire.

Jason stood there bleeding, helmet tilted toward the blaze, and for a long moment it looked like he might collapse into it too. His knees buckled, weight sagging sideways—

Tim caught him, one arm snapping under his good shoulder with a precision that made the move look rehearsed.

“Unbelievable,” Tim muttered, exasperation stretched thin across every syllable. “You’re about to bleed out in a berth on a Thursday—a week before AP exams. What, planning to turn in a doctor’s note for that one?”

Jason huffed through blood and static, a sound that might’ve been a laugh if it hadn’t hurt so much.

“Didn’t know you cared this much about my grades,” he rasped, voice ground down by the helmet’s modulator until it came out rough, almost intimate.

The tone—not the words—hit Tim like a sucker punch.

Heat flickered high across his cheekbones, mercifully hidden under the shadow of his hood. His grip on Jason tightened a fraction too hard before he forced it steady.

“Well, how are you supposed to get into Ivy if you can’t even sit for your exam?” Tim shot back, the words sharp, exasperated—too quick. It came out like a scolding, but the edge in his voice did nothing to disguise the flush creeping up his neck.

Jason chuckled again, broken and thin, but the modulator had excruciatingly dragged it out.

Without waiting for another word, Tim hitched Jason’s weight tighter under his arm and started hauling him toward the closest building. He didn’t stop until Jason’s boots scraped over familiar flooring and the two of them crossed into the dim, cluttered sprawl of Jason’s apartment.

Jason sagged hard into the couch when Tim all but shoved him down, the springs complaining under the sudden weight. The room smelled faintly of energy drinks gone stale and gun oil, walls cluttered with books and half-finished notes spread across the counter. Jason’s vision swam at the edges, pulse thudding behind his eyes, but something sharp caught against the blur.

Tim’s bag—unzipped, carelessly for once—slumped against the floorboards. Jason’s gaze snagged on the corner of a medkit peeking out, not some cheap pocket kit either, but stocked heavy, like it had been packed for this exact kind of bloodbath.

He let out a ragged noise, half scoff, half disbelief. “You came ready,” he rasped, words dragged raw through the modulator. His head tipped toward the bag. “Medkit and all. Kinda funny, Tim—how’d you know I’d be in that berth tonight?”

Tim didn’t answer right away. He crouched in front of Jason instead, fingers tugging at the latch of the helmet. The modulator crackled one last time as he worked it free, Jason too spent to fight the intrusion. Metal scraped, seal giving way, and then the helmet came off with a heavy click.

Cool air rushed over blood-hot skin. Jason blinked, bare-faced, suddenly too aware of how close Tim was—close enough that the sharp, clinical focus in his eyes left nowhere to hide.

Tim set the helmet aside with steady care, but when his gaze lifted again, it pinned Jason like a target under glass.

“Well,” Tim said, voice low but edged with exasperation. “You weren’t at your apartment. And under your calculus textbook, you’d stashed a hand-drawn map of Black Mask’s distribution routes. Not exactly subtle. This berth was circled three times.”

Jason’s mouth twitched, half a smirk, half too much blood loss. “Didn’t know you were snooping through my study guides.”

Tim’s eyes didn’t leave his. “I’m your tutor,” he said. “Of course I snoop around.”

Tim’s expression didn’t change, but his grip on the helmet lingered too long, knuckles pale. His face was close enough now Jason could catch the faint hitch of his breath—exasperation, or something else entirely.

Then Tim’s gaze flicked down. Blood smeared at the corner of Jason’s mouth, dark against his skin. Without thinking, Tim reached out, thumb dragging firm but careful across Jason’s jaw to wipe it away. The touch was quick, clinical in intent, but his hand didn’t pull back right away.

For one suspended second, they just looked at each other: Jason’s gaze heavy, dark and unreadable, Tim’s sharp and startled, too sharp for someone who was supposed to be in control.

Tim’s hand finally jerked back as if he’d touched an open flame. He coughed once, too loud, too forced, and spun on his heel. His cape flared with the motion, a shield as he dropped to his knees by his bag. The medkit snapped open with a hard click, tools rattling like punctuation.

“Don’t—” his voice cracked, and he pressed it flat again, detachedly, brisk. “Don’t move. You’ve already lost too much blood.”

Jason smirked faintly through the haze, but it faltered when Tim’s back stayed stubbornly turned, shoulders set too stiff.

Tim busied himself with disinfectant and gauze, pulling them free with clipped efficiency. “I mean it, Jason,” he said, softer this time, something raw slipping into the edges. “You have no idea how—” He cut himself off, jaw tightening.

“I was worried.”

The words hung there, bare. Tim’s hands stilled, fists clenched white around the gauze. He sucked in a breath like he could press the slip back into his lungs, bury it, but instead his voice came low, rougher.

“I should’ve been faster,” he muttered, almost to himself. “If I’d gotten there sooner, you wouldn’t have—” His throat locked around the words. He forced them out anyway. “You wouldn’t have taken that hit.”

Jason blinked at him, blood haze or not. He’d expected anger, maybe a lecture dripping with smug precision—but not this, not Tim’s voice scraped raw by guilt.

Tim shook his head once, sharp, frustrated. “I knew you’d come here. I knew, and I still—” He bit the rest off, shoulders curling in. His hands were trembling just enough that the metal instruments rattled when he set them down.

Jason let out a rough breath that scraped at the edges of a laugh. “You blaming yourself for me getting stabbed?” he asked, voice rasping but steady. “Newsflash, Tim—guys with knives don’t exactly send RSVPs.”

Tim’s jaw flexed, but he didn’t turn around. “I should’ve been there before they ever touched you,” he said tightly. “That’s on me.”

Jason just stared at him—at the set of his back, the sharp line of guilt strung tight in his shoulders. Then, despite the fire in his arm, he leaned forward, voice low, a thread of something almost gentle curling in it.

For years, Jason had carried the ache of being left behind.

First by his father—absent even when he was home, shackled to bars and debts until the streets swallowed him whole. Then by his mother, gone in the cruel silence of addiction. Later, by Batman himself: the one man Jason had thought would never walk away, who instead buried him in shadows and expectation, who replaced him like a broken tool rather than a son laid to rest.

And by death, most of all. His own harrowing past had abandoned him, too—dragged him down into darkness, spit him back out into the world half-formed and furious, left him clawing for meaning with blood on his hands. He had been discarded over and over, always too much or not enough, always a step behind the people who mattered.

And then there was Tim.

Tim had been the one sprinting forward, outpacing him with every headline, every victory, every neat, perfect answer. Clean where Jason was jagged, precise where he was brute force, untouchable in a way Jason had never been. Jason had convinced himself he was running to catch up—not just with Gotham, not just with the mantle, but with Tim Drake himself. To prove he could stand in the same ring, to prove he could be worth the space beside him.

But looking at him now, shoulders stiff, words raw with guilt over him—over Jason, bleeding and reckless—something in that old story cracked.

Tim wasn’t sprinting ahead to leave him behind.

He was looking back. Waiting. Reaching.

For the first time in longer than Jason could admit, it didn’t feel like he was choking on someone else’s dust. It felt like someone saw him, not as a mistake to outpace, not as a cautionary tale to forget— but as an equal, worth the worry.

But looking at him now—Tim’s shoulders hunched, his words sharp with self-reproach—Jason felt the thought shift, fracture.

Tim didn’t see him as someone beneath.

He saw Jason as someone worth saving.

The realization burned hotter than the wound. Jason let out a rough breath, almost a laugh, bitter at the edges. “You’re sitting here blaming yourself for my screw-up,” he rasped. “If that doesn’t prove you’re outta your mind…”

Tim’s grip on the gauze tightened until his knuckles paled, but he didn’t turn. Jason caught the smallest flicker in his posture—the kind of quiet that wasn’t dismissal but something else. Something heavier.

Jason leaned back into the couch, blood in his throat and fire in his chest, and for once, it didn’t feel like he was chasing Tim’s shadow. It felt like Tim had stopped, turned, and was waiting for him to catch his breath.

The thought cracked something loose inside him—something reckless.

Before Tim could press the gauze to his shoulder, Jason’s good hand shot up, closing around Tim’s wrist. The movement was fast, almost violent, but the grip wasn’t. He tugged, sudden and unyielding, dragging Tim just close enough that their faces were inches apart.

“Jason—” Tim started, startled, but the rest burned out of him when Jason leaned forward and kissed him.

It wasn’t clean, wasn’t careful. Jason tasted of iron and smoke, blood slick on his lips, and Tim jolted like he’d been struck. The kiss was harsh at first, driven by the same desperation that had kept Jason standing in that berth, but it lingered—slowed—until it was almost unbearable in its steadiness.

And then Jason pulled back.

The sight that met him nearly undid him all over again.

Tim sat frozen, lips parted, his breath shallow and uneven. A thin smear of red stained the corner of his mouth—not his blood, Jason realized with a jolt, but his own, transferred when Tim had reached up to wipe it away earlier, now smudged where Jason’s kiss had pressed too close.

Worse, or better, or both: a thin line of fresh red welled at Tim’s nose, beading into a small, absurd trickle.

A nosebleed.

Jason’s brows drew together. His voice came rough, rasped raw.
“Shit—Fuck. I didn’t mean to—You—uh. You good there, Tim? You’re…bleeding.”

Tim made a sound. Not a word—just noise, scrambled syllables spilling out of his mouth like his brain had short-circuited.

“Whhh—mmghhf—nnnrrhh—uhhhmm—fhh—hhgghh—”

Jason’s hand darted to the side table, snagging a crumpled tissue and leaning forward to dab at Tim’s nosebleed. The paper pressed gently against the fresh line of red, but Tim jerked back instinctively, flailing one hand as he scrambled to cover his face.

“Nn—uh! Mmph—y—you’re supposed to let me take care of you first!” he sputtered, words mangled and breathless, caught somewhere between frustration and fluster.

Jason blinked, tissue paused midair. “Huh.… what?”

“You—uhhh! Your arm! Your wound! I’m supposed to patch you up, not sit here bleeding while you fuss over me!” Tim stammered, voice tight, eyes sharp despite the flush creeping across his cheeks.

Jason blinked at that, caught somewhere between incredulity and a pulse of heat that ran straight to his chest. His good hand twitched, half tempted to grab Tim’s, half knowing he shouldn’t. Instead, he let himself stay still, letting Tim work his magic.

Minutes stretched, each one measured in the rhythm of shallow, uneven breaths and the faint, metallic scent of blood mingling with the lingering tang of gunpowder and smoke. Tim’s hands moved with careful precision, the gauze pressing against Jason’s cut, darkening as it soaked through, fingers steady despite the tension coiling in his shoulders. The scrape of cloth against skin, the soft drip of blood pooling into the tissue, and the faint rustle of clothing were the only sounds that dared to fill the cluttered apartment. Every motion carried weight, every touch a negotiation between urgency and care, the quiet intimacy of a life being held together one careful movement at a time.

Finally, Tim leaned back just slightly, tilting his head to appraise the work. The cut along Jason’s arm was jagged but clean enough; the bleeding had slowed, the edges approximated neatly, the wound stabilized. It wasn’t perfect—not by a long shot—but it would hold. Jason’s chest rose and fell in shallow, trembling bursts, his body still taut with adrenaline, but Tim could finally allow himself the smallest exhale: the worst was over, and Jason would survive tonight—at least physically.

Tim’s hands lingered for a moment in the air between them, gauze clutched loosely. Then, soft but deliberate, he asked, “Jason… do you… like me?”

The words hung there, brittle in the small, cluttered room, vulnerable and heavy all at once.

Jason’s chest tightened, a flash of heat crawling up his spine. His fingers ran through his hair, smudging streaks of blood against his palm. “Tim… I—shit. I didn’t mean to—” His voice hitched, raw with guilt. “That kiss… I should’ve asked. I didn’t… I wasn’t thinking. This isn’t the romantic moment I wanted. Not the way I wanted to tell you how I feel.”

He paused, eyes softening, earnest and a little desperate. “I just… I realized how I feel about you, and it hit me all at once. But I can’t tell you everything right now—not like this. Please… wait until I get my high school diploma. Then… I’ll tell you properly. I promise.”

He glanced at Tim, a rueful half-smile tugging at his bloodied lips, the weight of his affection and apology folded into every word.

Tim’s chest tightened, heart hammering as if it had learned a new, frantic rhythm. Every rational thought jostled for space and lost. He wanted to scold Jason, tell him he was reckless, that he couldn’t just—just act like that—but all of that logic drowned under the pull of raw, thudding heat. The smell of iron, blood, and Jason’s faint smoke-scented cologne was too close, too sharp, and his fingers itched to brush along the line of Jason’s jaw again, to wipe away the stain of crimson that stubbornly clung there.

Guilt prickled in the back of his mind—he was supposed to be the careful one, the responsible one, the one who made sure Jason didn’t bleed out on his couch in a weeknight chaos storm. Yet now, the thought of Jason looking at him like that, sincere, vulnerable, confessing even in half-words, made Tim’s chest swell with something he wasn’t entirely ready to name. Desire? Affection? Something older, heavier, threaded through with adrenaline and fear and… tenderness?

His hands itched to move, to cover the small distance between them, but he froze, aware of the fragility in Jason’s posture. The apology, the half-smile, the way his eyes glimmered in the dim light—it was like walking on glass over fire. Every impulse screamed at him to bridge the space, to tell Jason everything he felt, but reason, discipline, and the lingering shock of the fight held him taut, rigid.

And yet… his fingers twitched toward the hem of Jason’s shirt, almost unconsciously, as if testing gravity, testing fate. His pulse throbbed like a drumline in his ears. He could see the tension in Jason’s shoulders, the hesitant warmth radiating from him, the way the blood-streaked smirk barely masked the boyish hope he always carried under the Red Hood.

Tim’s fingers hovered a moment longer over the jagged line of blood and bruised skin, tracing it lightly with the gentlest pressure he could manage. His pulse hammered, a frantic drum in his ears, but his mind narrowed to a single, sharp focus: the wound, the line of red that had haunted the berth, the heat of Jason’s blood under his touch.

Slowly, deliberately, he leaned forward, lips brushing the cut with the lightest pressure he could muster. The taste of iron was immediate, sharp, and real. He held the kiss there, barely more than a whisper against Jason’s skin, an almost silent apology, a quiet vow—an acknowledgment of pain, and of care, and of something he hadn’t yet found words for.

Jason’s breath hitched, a small, ragged sound, and the tension in his shoulders flickered but didn’t vanish. Tim pulled back just enough to meet his gaze, eyes wide, raw, and electric with the rush of proximity.

“If… if you can tell me how you feel now,” Tim said, voice low and strained, “I’ll… show you how I feel.”

The words weren’t clean. They weren’t confident. They weren’t complete. But they were enough to hang between them, heavy, charged, and undeniably true.

Tim’s fingers lingered over the jagged line of Jason’s arm, tracing lightly, memorizing, before he leaned forward. His lips brushed Jason’s forehead, soft, careful, an almost silent benediction—an acknowledgment of pain survived, of trust given, of something unspoken yet profound.

Jason’s breath hitched, a small shudder passing through him, but he didn’t resist. Tim’s hands were steady now, firm yet gentle, as he slid under Jason’s arms, lifting him with surprising ease. Jason’s head lolled against his shoulder, weight heavy but safe, and in that simple, unspoken motion—the careful way Tim held him, the way he didn’t hesitate or falter—it struck Jason like a quiet, undeniable sign. Every small pressure of Tim’s grip, every measured step as he carried him, spoke volumes louder than words ever could, weaving safety, care, and a tender promise into the fabric of the moment.

“Alright,” Tim murmured, voice low but threaded with warmth, “Time to rest. You’ve done enough tonight.”

He carried Jason across the apartment, each step measured, careful not to jostle him too much. Once at the bed, Tim eased Jason down, tucking him under the blankets with the precision of someone who both cared and couldn’t quite stop fussing.

“Rest well,” Tim whispered, brushing a stray lock of blood-smeared hair from Jason’s forehead. “Tomorrow… I’ll be back. Every single day until your exams are done and dusted. You won’t get away from me that easily.”

Jason blinked up at him, a faint, blood-tinged smirk tugging at his lips. The exhaustion and adrenaline made his voice rough, almost a whisper: “You… really gonna stick around, huh?”

Tim’s own lips quirked, a mixture of exasperation and fondness. “Yeah. Don’t make me start counting your study hours while you sleep, too,” he teased lightly, though his fingers lingered for one more gentle brush.

Jason let himself drift into the embrace of the blankets, the tension in his chest softening, anchored by the certainty of Tim’s presence.

Chapter Text

Jason woke to the weight of his own pulse in his arm. The pain came in waves — not sharp, not screaming, just deep enough to remind him it was still there, still waiting. The kind of pain that lingered because it had nowhere else to go.

The room was dim. The kind of morning dim that felt reluctant to exist, soft gray light pooling through half-closed blinds and slicing the air into pale, hesitant bars. Dust drifted lazily through the shafts, catching on the edges of clutter: a half-cleaned sidearm still slick with oil, a bloodstained glove collapsed on the table like something discarded mid-motion, a chipped tea mug gone cold beside an untouched stack of case notes. The faint scent of smoke lingered beneath antiseptic, sharp and medicinal, the aftertaste of fire half-scrubbed from the air.

His arm ached in time with his heartbeat. The bandage was clean, methodical — gauze wrapped firm but not cruel, the edges smoothed down with a precision that didn’t belong to him. A strip of medical tape ran across the crook of his elbow, pinned with handwriting too neat for this place: “Change daily. Will check on you this evening.”

He stared at it longer than he meant to, the words ghosting under the light, edges lifting just slightly with the heat from his skin. The neatness of it — the steadiness — looked out of place against the chaos of the room. It was too careful. Too gentle.

He’d been patched up more times than he could count. By medics, by Alfred, by himself with a bottle of vodka and a needle — but this was different. The sight of it knocked something loose in him, a sharp, wordless ache that caught behind his ribs and refused to let go.

Because it wasn’t Tim he saw at that moment. Not yet.

It was another night. Another wound. The same suffocating quiet.

He’d been fifteen then. Bloody, furious, and running on adrenaline so raw it made his hands shake. The mission had been a disaster from the start: a warehouse near the Narrows, the air thick with frost and chemical vapor, ice blooming across the concrete like some living thing. Mr. Freeze, he remembered — a cornered animal in a cryogenic suit, his voice echoing through the dark like shattering glass. Jason had gone in too fast, too close, convinced he could end it before Batman even got there.

He’d been wrong.

The freeze gun’s blast had caught him across the ribs, the impact like a hammer of ice, knocking the wind and the fight out of him in one breath. The world had tilted blue and white; he remembered the crack of his body hitting the floor, the sickening crunch beneath his armor, and the way the cold bit through even the Kevlar, numbing first, then burning.

By the time Batman reached him, Jason had already dragged himself upright, chest heaving, blood bright against the frost that coated his gloves. He’d been shaking; not from fear, but from the effort of holding himself together. Pride, anger, pain, all tangled, indistinguishable. He remembered snarling that he didn’t need help, that he had Freeze right where he wanted him. That was a lie, and Batman had known it.

They’d made it back to the Cave in silence, the echo of their boots on stone louder than either of them dared speak. When Batman pressed him to sit, Jason fought it — jaw set, shoulders squared, trying to look unbreakable — until the pain finally won. The suit came off in pieces, armor plates clattering to the floor, steam rising where frost met body heat, the air around him thick with the scent of metal and antiseptic.

He sat on the medical cot, skin raw and mottled with cold burns, a bruise spreading like spilled ink over his ribs. Each breath stung; each movement sent lightning through his chest. His hands were balled so tight the knuckles went white, and when Batman reached for the bandages, Jason flinched away — not out of anger, but out of the sheer effort of keeping himself together.

His eyes were wet before he realized it. Not the defiant tears of rage he was used to, but something smaller, more human — the kind that slipped out when you stopped pretending you were fine. He blinked fast, trying to hide it, swallowing hard against the lump in his throat. But the more he fought it, the worse it got.

When Batman touched his shoulder, the dam broke. The tears came hot, blurring the edges of the Cave, his breath hitching in sharp, embarrassed gasps. His voice cracked when he tried to speak, and the words stumbled out, raw and uneven:

“I don’t know why you made me Robin.”

It wasn’t defiance anymore. It was heartbreak. A confession ripped from somewhere deep, the sound of a kid asking why me when he’d already decided he wasn’t enough. And then he was crying — not the soldier, not the partner, not the mistake he thought he’d become: just a boy, barely fifteen, sobbing because it hurt and he didn’t understand why being good always had to mean being in pain.

It hadn’t been Batman who answered him.

It was Bruce. Quieter, rougher, the voice of a man who didn’t always know how to be gentle but was trying anyway. He didn’t argue, didn’t lecture. He just steadied Jason’s shaking hands, wrapped the bandages tight enough to hold but not to hurt, and said simply, without armor, “Because you needed someone to believe you could be more than the streets made you.”

Bruce’s hands lingered a moment longer than they needed to, fingertips brushing the gauze before settling on Jason’s shoulder. The kid was trembling — from exhaustion, from pain, from the rawness of having nothing left to hide behind. For a moment, Bruce hesitated. He’d never been good at this — comfort, affection, any of the quiet things that required more heart than control. But Jason looked so small then. Too small for the armor, too small for the mask, too small for the weight the world kept dropping on his back.

So Bruce pulled him close. No words, no lectures — just an arm around his shoulders, solid and steady. Jason froze at first, caught off guard by the unfamiliar warmth, and then sagged against him, the sobs turning quieter, smaller, until they were nothing more than the hiccuping breaths of a boy too tired to keep fighting.

“It’s alright,” Bruce murmured, low, almost to himself. “You’re alright. You did good, kid.”

Jason’s hands fisted in his cape. The sobs came softer now, tapering into hiccuping breaths. Bruce stayed until they stilled, until the only sound left was the mechanical hum of the Cave and the steady rhythm of a boy’s breathing finally slowing against him.

He was just a child.

And for the rare moments, Bruce let himself hold him like one.

But then Tim came along and everything changed.

Bruce had learned to be softer by then. Not with Jason — never with him — but with the kid who came after. Tim didn’t just wear the suit; he repaired it, refined it. Where Jason had fought against Batman’s darkness, Tim moved through it like he’d been built for it, quiet and deliberate, the kind of calm Jason had never been allowed to have.

He’d said what Jason never showed: that Batman needed a Robin, not as armor, but as a reason to stay human. And somehow, Bruce had listened.

The man who once threw Jason to a ward, started teaching again — not the way he had with Jason, with drills and commands and silent disapproval, but with patience. He spoke gentler. Waited longer before giving orders. It was as if the city had rewritten him through Tim; as if Gotham had decided that someone else was worthy of the softness Jason had always been denied.

Jason used to hate him for that. The easy way Tim seemed to earn what he’d bled for and never gotten. Dick had been the golden standard, the one Bruce compared everyone to without saying it out loud. Jason had spent years trying to chase that shadow, to prove he could shine just as bright.

But then Tim came along and didn’t have to chase anything. He just fit. Like he’d been made for the space that used to belong to Jason, slotting into the silence between Bruce and Dick as if he’d always been there.

But over time, he understood it. Because Tim had that effect — the same quiet gravity that pulled people toward steadiness, even him. There was something about the kid that made anger lose its edge, made you want to believe you could be better, if only for a moment.

He could see why Bruce changed. He’d felt it himself.

It was proof, Jason thought, that Batman had always known how to be kind. He’d just chosen not to be — not with him.

Years later, after death and resurrection had turned that same boy into a man with blood on his hands and a gun on his hip, Bruce found himself staring at him again: the same eyes, same temper, same impossible hurt.

In the damp chill of Crime Alley, Bruce found himself standing in nearly the same position — but the boy was gone. In his place stood the Red Hood, taller now, broader, armor gleaming under the harsh streetlight. The air was bitter with the sharp, chemical scent of Mr. Freeze’s weapon discharge, frost still smoking on the cracked asphalt.

Jason’s chest heaved, one arm pressed to his side where the ice blast had torn through the plating. He’d been faster this time, smarter; but still bleeding, still burning. Some part of Bruce wanted to reach for him again, to check the wound, to help — but the rest of him knew how that would end.

“Don’t,” Jason snapped, catching the movement. “Don’t touch me.”

Bruce stopped where he was, shadow pooling at his feet. His voice came out low, even, but tight. “You don’t belong out here anymore.”

Jason laughed, sharp, bitter. “Yeah? Newsflash, neither do you.”

The sound echoed off the brick, cold as the air around them.

Bruce took a step closer. “This isn’t who you are.”

Jason’s smile faltered just slightly — the briefest flicker of something pained before it twisted back into defiance. “You think you still get to decide that?”

Bruce’s jaw locked. He could see it now — the tremor in Jason’s hand where it pressed to his ribs, the unsteady set of his stance. He wasn’t invincible; he was hurt, human, just like the boy who’d cried on that same shoulder years ago.

“You’re still a child,” Bruce said, voice breaking on the words before he could stop it. “You don’t have to keep doing this. You could still go back — finish school, build something for yourself. You’re not too far gone.”

Jason stared at him like the words were a weapon. “A diploma?” he said, hollow. “You think a piece of paper fixes this?”

“It’s not about that,” Bruce said quietly. “It’s about proving to yourself you’re still capable of more than this.”

Jason’s jaw clenched. “I already proved that. I survived you.”

That landed like a hit. Bruce didn’t move — didn’t argue, didn’t reach for him again. He just stood there, watching as Jason turned, staggered into the alley’s shadows, smoke curling off the frost that still clung to his armor.

And for the second time in his life, Bruce watched him walk away; the same boy he’d once held on a medical cot, the same boy who’d asked, “Why did you make me Robin?” — and felt the same answer echo back inside him:

Because you were worth saving.

He just didn’t know how to say it anymore.

Bruce sat in the dim stillness, the empty cot before him still faintly smelling of antiseptic and smoke. The footage from Crime Alley lingered on the screen — Jason walking away, blood on his jacket, pride in every step. Bruce’s hand hovered over the keyboard but didn’t move. He’d told the boy once that he was still just a child, that he could still turn back, still choose something gentler. School. A future. Jason had only stared back, eyes cold through the helmet’s red lens.

Now, staring at the frozen frame, Bruce felt the words ring hollow in his chest.
The cave hummed with its usual insomnia. Servers whispered in a language of LEDs and cooling fans, the Batcomputer’s low thrum threading through the stone like a pulse that refused to die but instead, patient and perpetual, a machine heartbeat that had learned the tempo of Bruce Wayne’s restless nights.

Bruce moved through it with mechanical precision: his hands never idle, eyes scanning each stream of data line-by-line, checking logs and indices for irregularities such as a missing timestamp, a scrubbed feed, a file left half-erased.

Batman trusted Red Robin with the catalogue more than most, Tim’s logs were tidy, methodical, the clean handwriting of a mind that liked order and evidence. Bruce assumed those “study sessions” were exactly what Tim said they were; the boy would graduate in June, and a protector must not be the one to stifle a life preparing to leave the nest. Tim’s diligence was plain in every report: color-coded notes, annotated surveillance stills, time-stamped revisions, a true work ethic that read like a promise.

What he hadn’t known was where those sessions took place. He didn’t know Tim had been slipping into Jason’s apartment on Thursdays. That fact lodged in him with the awkwardness of an unexpected bruise. If Tim was studying with Jason, what did that look like behind that closed door? Or were those evenings a cover for something else: patching wounds, scrubbing evidence, poring over maps of smuggling routes while a kettle hummed on the stove? Maybe Tim’s presence kept Jason anchored to small, ordinary things: reminding him to eat, coaxing him through bandage changes, reading aloud while Jason rested.

The conjectures multiplied because the truth had been shut behind a door Bruce hadn’t thought to open.

And then there was Jason himself. He’d told Bruce, once and with more finality than either of them had wanted to admit, that he didn’t plan to finish school, that the world had already marked him dead. It explained Jason’s reckless choreography with danger, his contempt for schedules and gentle things.

Still, the pattern sat in his mind like a smudge on glass: Thursdays off-limits, a door that kept closing on questions.

He didn’t expect the wound report.

He hadn’t gone looking for it.

Tim had uploaded the usual weekly batch: status checks, field reports, adjusted patrol routes, case summaries. Bruce skimmed them the way someone might read a heartbeat monitor — detached, scanning for irregularities. And then he saw it.

Subject: Red Hood — incident: moderate laceration, left deltoid.
Status: stable. Treated off-site.
Follow-up required: N/A.

It was dated a night ago. And it wasn’t written by Hood. It was written by Red Robin.

Bruce’s hand stilled on the console.

If “study sessions” didn’t fit the data, then the data had to be read for what it was. He ran the threads like a case file, assembling a picture from hard fragments until the domestic story unraveled into something else: a recruitment, not a study arrangement — Jason dragging Tim into an operation involving a smuggled shipment and a burned van, with Tim helping to scrub the traces afterward. It wasn’t a comforting conclusion, but it fit the evidence better than anything else.

Pieces of evidence (as Bruce saw them):

• Deleted surveillance clip (attempted): Video of a berth at 02:37 on 2025-10-05 showing a van, figures unloading crates, then Jason at the center of a violent encounter and a jerrycan being set alight. Deletion initiated from Tim’s workstation; progress bar shows three files queued, one stuck at 71% before Bruce cancelled the purge.

• Metadata cross-reference: Tim’s tablet authenticated to Jason’s apartment Wi-Fi at 01:50–03:20 on multiple Thursdays over the past six months. GPS pings from Tim’s comms place his physical device at Jason’s address during the same windows. Those sessions coincide with gaps in patrol logs and with redacted entries in Tim’s mission briefs.

• Photo stills: Alley cameras show Jason handling a jerrycan near a van; later frame shows lighter in someone else’s hand. Tim arrives within minutes on at least two occasions.

• Intercom/chat transcripts: Internal logs appear innocuous but reveal a pattern when combined. Snippets Bruce pulled:

```
[2025-04-09 20:12] RedRobin: "Got a long night — AP study, will be offline Thurs."
[2025-06-11 01:45] RedRobin → RedHood (private): "Bring the kit: flashcards, caffeine, and the white powder. We'll run routes after."
[2025-08-20 02:01] JasonTodd → RedHood (private): "Wear gloves. Don't bring the bat-kit. Keep solvents sealed and the 'good stuff' in labeled vials (lab reagents only)."
[2025-09-10 23:47] RedRobin → JasonTodd (private): "Dropped off the 'white stuff' and the indicator. Also got you phenolphthalein."
```

The “study” vocabulary appears in public logs; the private channels contain logistics, not lesson plans.

From the summation of those threads, Bruce formed a working hypothesis: Tim’s Thursday visits weren’t benign study sessions. They aligned with smuggling activity and footage of a deliberate van burn. The deletion attempts and private comms suggested concealment. The simplest conclusion: Jason had been quietly recruiting Tim to assist in operations that bordered on sabotage and arson, all without Batman’s knowledge. Whether Tim was an equal partner, an idealistic assistant, or a pawn, Bruce couldn’t tell: but the pattern was clear enough to demand attention.

He called up the mission log timestamps. Tim’s notes were cleaner than usual. Too clean. No location data, no coordinates, just a vague “incident managed, no external casualties.”

Sanitized. Deliberately.

Bruce didn’t need to look up from the console to know when Tim appeared. He could hear the quiet footfalls before the boy said anything.

He stopped at the edge of the light cast by the monitors, just shy of the console’s glow. The boy’s reflection appeared first — a faint outline in the black glass of a dormant screen, posture straight, arms loose at his sides but not relaxed. The distance between them wasn’t large, but it felt like miles of silence.

“Patrol report?” Bruce asked, voice even.

Tim hesitated. Finally, he said, “Wasn’t much. Routine night. Cleanup, a few small fires.”

The irony hit Bruce quietly behind his ribs. Small fires. He studied Tim’s face — exhaustion under his eyes, the same determination that could be dangerous: faith weaponized into secrecy.

“Sit,” Bruce said, motioning to the chair. Tim glanced at the wound report hovering on the screen, shoulders tensing, then lowered himself.

Bruce folded his hands, letting the weight of the question build in the pause before he spoke. “You were at Jason’s apartment,” he said finally. No accusation in his tone. Just fact, flat as a detective’s report. “You’ve been there most Thursdays for the past six months.”

Tim’s throat worked around the words he didn’t yet say.

Bruce’s gaze didn’t waver. “You want to tell me why?”

Tim’s fingers stilled. “I… just like studying at Jason’s apartment,” he said finally.

Bruce didn’t speak, and the silence pressed in.

Tim added, keeping his tone even, “It’s quieter there. Easier to focus. That’s all.”

The math didn’t add up, not with the timing, not with the messages. It made no sense. The pattern was too deliberate to be coincidence.

Bruce turned his chair slightly, the motion small but sharp. “You weren’t studying.”

Tim’s mouth pressed into a line. “…It wasn’t what it looked like.”

“You were trying to erase evidence,” Bruce said.

Tim’s jaw tightened. “I was trying to protect him.”

Bruce’s eyes narrowed slightly. “Protect him from what, exactly? From accountability? From me?”

Tim’s silence was enough.

“By falsifying mission data?” Bruce’s tone was even, calm in a way that meant the opposite. “That’s not protection, Tim. That's an obstruction of important data.”

He leaned back just slightly, voice lowering. “You know the protocol. Every incident gets logged. Every injury is reported within the hour. Mission reports are filed before sunrise, and footage is archived — untouched — for review. That’s how we keep the line between what we do and what we become.”

His tone carried that restrained gravity that came from years of command. “If someone gets hurt, it goes on record. If a lead goes bad, it’s documented. No exceptions. Not for allies. Not for family.”

He caught the stiffness in Tim’s shoulders, the way his chin dipped — not in guilt, but in something quieter, more resigned. The moment hung between them, edged with a familiarity Bruce didn’t name. He realized, distantly, that his tone had shifted — too formal, too clinical — but the words kept their shape.

He looked at Tim again, the edges of his voice sharpening in self-defense. “You start concealing evidence, and the entire system fractures. We stop being accountable. We stop being better than the people we chase.”

Tim’s face softened, some of the steel easing from his posture as he said, “He’s injured, not a threat.”

“I never said he was a threat.”

Tim crossed his arms, his face schooled into the same impassive mask Bruce had taught him years ago. “He wasn’t picking a fight. He was stopping one. The van was running Roman’s supply line — fentanyl, probably worse. He burned it to make sure it didn’t hit the streets. That’s not chaos, that’s containment.”

He hesitated, then added, “That berth’s under Red Hood’s territory. We agreed a year ago to leave it alone as long as he kept the area clean and shared intel. You signed off on that, Bruce. All he did was enforce the boundary you set.”

“Cutting it off by burning it down,” Bruce said. “And getting himself stabbed in the process.”

“He neutralized the threat.”

“He escalated it,” Bruce countered. He leaned forward, eyes narrowing. “And you helped him cover it up.”

Tim didn’t flinch. He met Bruce’s gaze head-on. “He doesn’t need you showing up to play interrogator when he can barely move. He needs time to recover. You going there won’t fix anything — it’ll just make it worse.”

Bruce’s jaw flexed, the muscle ticking in his cheek. “You think I’m the problem here,” he said evenly. “That my interference makes things worse.”

Tim’s expression softened, but only slightly. “He’s trying to prove something to you,” he said quietly. “Even now. You don’t see it — you see the reports, the messes, the patterns. But he’s still that kid who thinks every mistake means you’ll stop believing in him.”

He hesitated, then added, “Why do you think he still shows up for Saturday patrols when you’re out of the city? He doesn’t need to. He could walk away any time. But he doesn’t.”

“That pattern saves lives,” Bruce replied, voice clipped. “It’s why we don’t cross the line he lives on.”

“He’s not crossing it,” Tim shot back, sharper now. “He’s trying to hold it together. You think Crime Alley listens to capes? They only listen to him. You send anyone else down there, they scatter or start shooting. But with him, there’s order. He keeps it clean. You should be thanking him, not building a case file.”

Bruce’s voice cooled like steel dropped in water. “Order built on fire and intimidation isn’t stable. It’s controlled by fear. You know what comes after that.”

“I know what came before it,” Tim said.

The silence that followed wasn’t heavy, exactly — just full. Thick with everything unsaid. The hum of the Batcomputer filled it again, sterile and steady.

Bruce exhaled through his nose. “You’re defending him because you think he needs it. But Jason doesn’t need protection — he needs rules and boundaries. He always has.”

Tim hesitated, then said, almost too fast, “That’s not what this is about.”

“Then what is it about?”

Tim’s gaze flicked toward the shadows edging the Batcomputer screens, then back to Bruce. His hands were still, clasped tight against his side as if holding the words in place. “You want to know why I was there every Thursday?” he said finally. “Why I erased the footage? Why I didn’t tell you?”

Bruce didn’t move. Didn’t blink. Just watched — the way he did with suspects who’d already confessed, waiting for the shape of the lie.

Tim swallowed, and when he spoke again, his voice was quieter. “I’ve been tutoring him.”

The words hung, awkward, human, impossible in the quiet of the Cave.

Bruce blinked once, as though the word itself didn’t make sense. “Tutoring,” he repeated, each syllable weighed and tested.

“He’s trying to get his diploma,” he said, daring Bruce to call him a liar.

“That’s what the chats were about: AP study nights, flashcards, caffeine… and the ‘white stuff.’ It’s just sodium bicarbonate and citric acid. We were running a simple acid-base reaction, testing indicators and phenolphthalein. Applied learning. He wanted to see the reaction in real time, not just on paper.”

Disbelief fractured the silence. Bruce’s face stayed still, but a quiet, almost startled happiness stirred in him: Jason had cared enough to try.

A diploma.

Of all the things Jason could have wanted — revenge, validation, blood — Bruce hadn’t imagined this. Not the stubborn hope of finishing something the world had told him he’d never get.

And the truth hit harder than he expected: he was glad. Quietly, genuinely glad that Jason still wanted something better for himself, that he hadn’t entirely given up.

But the happiness twisted sharply. Jason hadn’t told him, not once in months, not in any of their careful, brittle exchanges. He’d told Tim. Trusted Tim. Left Bruce outside, like a shadow too heavy to bring into the light.

Somewhere else, in the quiet of the morning, Jason sat back at his dining table. The bandage pressed against his arm, tender but secure, each pulse reminding him of the wound and the night that had brought it. The pain throbbed insistently, but he hunched over a stack of past papers, pencil scratching across margins, equations and chemical structures filling the page.

Light pooled through the apartment, falling over notes and formulas, illuminating the small, deliberate acts of someone determined to keep moving forward. He winced with each shift, but he pressed on, jaw tight, fingers clutching the pencil as if sheer will could override the ache.

Each solved problem, each neatly checked answer, was a quiet rebellion against the chaos of his life: a way to prove to himself that he could still claim something ordinary, something steady.

Jason wasn’t invincible. He wasn’t unbroken. But in this moment, with past papers spread before him and the world paused just beyond the window, he was simply working, learning, surviving.

His pencil paused mid-scribble when a small sticky note fell from between the pages. Tim’s handwriting, tidy as ever, scrawled a cheer: “You got this, J!” Below it was a doodle: a stick-figure superhero with three arms, a triangle for a head, one giant, uneven eye, and a cape that looked more like a jagged lightning bolt. It was… objectively awful.

Jason stared at it for a long beat, trying not to laugh. Despite the ugly drawing, despite the lopsided grin on the paper, something about Tim’s ridiculous little cheer warmed his chest. He smirked, shaking his head, and went back to solving the next problem, feeling a little less alone.