Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Navigating the apartment took some doing. There were boxes still strewn around, half unpacked, and tidying up after himself had never been one of Tim’s favorite things to do so he’d always left it to the last minute, which was fine normally, but now—

“Living on your own again, huh?”

Tim grimaced, hobbling on crutches with a bottle of water awkwardly held in one hand. He hated crutches, had more than enough experience with them to know how to use them, but that didn’t mean he enjoyed it. It was slightly different, actually needing the things.  

Red Hood sat on his windowsill, looking around at the still mostly bare apartment that had been Tim’s home since shortly after his return from captivity. “What the fuck did you do to your leg?”

“Did you want something?” Tim asked, more or less flopping back on the couch and grimacing as his broken leg was jostled. It had been a bad break. He still got nauseous if he thought about the moment it had happened, the wrong landing and the way it had sounded as he—

He unscrewed the cap on the water and took a drink, made himself not press down on the top of his thigh to soothe away phantom pain.

Red Hood took off the helmet, leaving Jason’s face unmasked. He climbed fully through the window and closed it behind him, drawing the curtains down before turning and regarding Tim with one eyebrow raised. “How long are you benched?”

“Too long.” Another thing that Tim very much did not want to think about. “How long have you been in town? I hear you’re back at the manor.”

“I hear you aren’t.” There was something very pointed in his tone.

“I can live alone, I’m basically eighteen.”

Jason’s other eyebrow joined the first, climbing towards his hairline.

“Close enough to it,” Tim said. “Surely you of all people know why I’m staying away.”

With a shrug, Jason flopped down next to him on the couch and grabbed the remote for the television, switching it on. “Do you not have a PS4?”

“Why would I have a PS4?”

“Can’t believe you think you can live alone.” The words were darkly muttered as Jason settled on a cartoon and made himself comfortable on the couch. Tim stared at him for a moment, confused, before letting it go.

It wasn’t quite comfortable silence, but it was as close as Tim had gotten lately. His relationship with Jason was strange. Better on a professional level—Red Robin to Red Hood—than personal. It was hard for Jason to let old resentment slide and it wasn’t like Tim was ever going to forget being attacked and overwhelmed by him, not so long ago. There wasn’t the ease between them that there was between him and Dick, but the heated animosity he and Damian exchanged was missing too.

“You all wrote me off,” Tim said, finally. “After Bruce—”

“I don’t think you want to play this game with me,” Jason said, voice raised in warning. He was tensed up all over.

Tim bit his tongue, holding back the flood of words he’d been about to unleash, and nodded. “No. Probably not.”

Jason dug around in his jacket and pulled out a USB, tossing it over to Tim carelessly. “Case files. Catch up, lend us your detective brain while the rest of you is busy being useless.”

“Wow,” Tim said, because it hit a little bit close to home. Particularly close to some of the things that Tim found himself thinking to himself, late at night when his leg was sore or he just couldn’t sleep.  

Jason glanced over at the leg, wrinkling his nose. “Seriously, how long?”

“Months.” The word was almost lodged in his throat. He didn’t like to think about it. “Fracture went right up the bone. They put a pin in.”

Jason stared at the brace around Tim’s thigh thoughtfully. “Bruce really let you out on the streets that quick?”

“I didn’t exactly give him a chance to give his opinion.”

It had been his decision. His own stupid decision. He had lost condition during his captivity, had barely noticed it at the time. Once he’d been back in Gotham he’d thrown himself completely into being Red Robin again, straight back to where he’d left off. It had helped work through some of the anger.

Now, he was still angry, but he got to direct some of it inwards instead.

“I was an idiot.”

Jason grunted, pushing himself to his feet. He glanced around the apartment again. “Go back to the manor, fool.”

“I’d really rather not,” Tim said, mildly. “I still can’t quite believe you’re back there.”

Jason shifted in place, looking over to the drawn curtain over the window. “I have a place.”

He probably had at least five, knowing him.

Tim smiled. “Alfred said you moved your stuff in.”

“Some stuff,” Jason said, jerking the curtain up so he could reach the window. “Not all of it. I barely stay there.”

Considering the how soft the expression on Alfred’s face had been, Tim was pretty sure Jason was lying through his teeth.

Things had changed while Tim had been gone.

There was a knock against the window and then it was slid up and Robin poked his head into the apartment. He gave it and Tim a disparaging look and then fixed his attention on Jason. “Hood, hurry up. We’re patrolling.”

Tim stared between them as Robin closed the window with a snap and disappeared, leaving Jason sighing and slipping his helmet back on and shrugging at Tim.

“I gotta go,” Jason said. “If I leave him alone too long he’s gonna go casing my safe houses again for his damn toy and I have some shit hidden there I don’t want Bruce to know about. Fucking tattletale.”

Tim stared blankly as Jason disappeared out the window, unable to find the words to even begin to ask the many, many questions that bombarded him.

Jason and Damian?

There was an uneasy feeling in his gut.

Things really had changed while he’d been gone.

Chapter Text

His unpacking went ignored in favor of the case files. They were all Jason’s, which Tim appreciated considering he was still avoiding even thinking about Bruce, let alone actually interacting with the man. It became clear very quickly that Jason gave the files over as some kind of pity move, because by the time Tim broke the case for half of them, Jason’s team had already blown the target sky high.

So Jason clearly didn’t actually need the help and Tim might’ve resented the obvious pity if it wasn’t Jason, who made gestures like it maybe once in a blue moon. At least the experience included an inside look at how his new team operated.

One thing was certain; Jason having the loyalty of an Amazon and an imperfect clone of Superman was a terrifying prospect.

Tim wasn’t sure how Bruce could be so blasé about it, but even blowing up a warehouse in Gotham seemed to garner Jason no more than a half-hearted rebuke. Jason wasn’t killing and that compromise seemed to make everything else he and his team did roll off Bruce like water off a duck’s back.

And even that, judging by Black Mask’s ultimate fate, seemed to be something Jason was keeping to the letter of, not the spirit.

Tonight Tim had been patched into the Outlaws comms—something he suspected they were only even using because of his presence—as they took down a splinter group of Black Mask’s empire; the very existence of which the Red Hood saw as a personal affront.

Being on-comms with the Outlaws involved a lot of silence juxtaposed with sudden yet seemingly inevitable explosions.

“Judging by the blueprints I found they’re using the north end for security operations,” Tim said. He had the blueprints on the coffee table and was watching the operation in progress through a CCTV camera he’d taken control of on his laptop. Not the best vantage point but he worked with what he had available. Some distance was probably for the best; Jason might’ve been fine ignoring his suggestions when he didn’t agree with them, but Artemis seemed to actively dislike his input. “You could focus there and disable security to the entire complex.”

He was pretty sure he heard Artemis scoff over the ear piece.

“Why limit ourselves?” Red Hood asked, clear and amused through the helmet’s transmissions, no discernible ambient noise to muffle his voice.

“You know, just because you have teammates with superpowers doesn’t mean you should forgo stealth and actual planning.” Tim was fairly sure the words would fall on deaf ears, but felt compelled to say them anyway. Jason hadn’t led his own team as Robin, he knew. Running with Dick’s team a few times didn’t count, it was...different.

Jason snorted, a disparaging noise that sounded practiced, used for effect instead of a more genuine response. “If Artemis doesn’t meet her violence and property damage quota she gets cranky.”

“ My quota?”

Somewhere in the background Bizarro laughed. He’d forgone the earpiece as he could hear the conversation easily without one and he disliked Tim’s disembodied voice.

Tim listened to the Outlaws as they made their move and sipped at his soup. He’d mostly been living off the stuff for the last few days, once he’d run out of the meals that Alfred had brought by immediately after his accident.

There had been a pointed phone call about nutrition, but Alfred had enough on his plate without worrying about him, especially when Tim knew it was his own stubbornness that had landed him in this mess in the first place.

The Outlaws worked like a fire raged, leaving only smoldering ruins and devastation in their wake. What they lacked in subtlety they made up for in sheer competence and thoroughness. At least it made sitting on his ass on his too squishy couch slightly more bearable.

It was over all too soon.

“Still avoiding their phone calls?”  

Artemis had left the comms as soon as possible, leaving Tim to talk to Jason in relative privacy. Usually that didn’t happen, but tonight it looked like Jason had something to say.

Tim could hear sirens in the background, retreating rapidly as Jason took to the rooftops. He’d stopped monitoring the GCPD response to the Outlaws’ activities after the second burning building. What Bruce hadn’t taken care of, Jason himself had cleaned up in the aftermath, buying the properties up under various aliases. He probably knew that Tim was tracking them, so it was doubtful he’d risk turning them into safe houses—what he did end up doing with them remained to be seen.

He took another sip of his soup before answering. “I’m not avoiding anyone—but if you feel like lecturing me about that, can I just take this opportunity to remind you of your everything?”

“I don’t give a fuck what you do,” Jason replied. “I’d just like to stop hearing the constant whining, so if you could just hurry up and get over it already, I’d appreciate it.”

“That is the height of hypocrisy, coming from you of all people.”

“I’m pretty sure I'm the only one who can say this to you, actually.” Jason’s voice lacked the normal bite it had when he was truly angry or offended. He mostly sounded bored, which Tim wasn’t really sure how to take. “I don’t care if your anger is valid or not, but I swear to God I’m going to kill someone if Dick keeps moping.”

“Wow, I’m so sorry that my problems inconvenience you.”

“An apology means nothing. If you could instead stop your problems from existing near me that would be great.”

Tim choked on a disbelieving laugh. It might have been the first true amusement he’d felt since breaking his leg and he honestly wasn’t sure it was the emotion he should really be feeling. “I legitimately can’t tell whether you’re being this obnoxious to annoy me or to try and make me laugh.”

“Keep wondering,” Jason said, and then the comm went dead.

“Oh, you petty asshole.” For half a minute Tim sat stewing on his couch, thinking about doing something to piss Jason off in revenge, but he wasn’t an idiot. He knew where that would lead. Some drawn out war of attrition and Jason was far better at unpredictable than he was and practically fueled by spite besides.  

It would be like challenging Dick to a gymnastics contest.

Tim tugged the earpiece out and turned back to his laptop, closing the last of the files for the case with a sigh. At least arguing with Jason had been a distraction from the inevitable—

He was done with the last case file and the Outlaws were leaving Gotham again, on one of Artemis’ missions that she expressly wanted Tim to have nothing to do with.

Soon he would be back to having nothing but his physiotherapy appointments to look forward to and himself for company.

Chapter Text

Tim’s life after the Outlaws disappeared out of Gotham without a word—not that he had expected one, really—became doctor appointments, physiotherapy, and avoiding awkward subjects during Alfred’s increasingly pointed phone calls.

He was not shocked when there was a knock at his apartment door a day after his last call from Alfred, where he’d tripped over his own tongue trying to assure him he was eating healthy food and had adequate social interaction.

He had neither and Alfred knew that, which was probably why, after wrangling the crutches and slowly making his way to the door, he opened it to find Dick Grayson standing on his doorstep holding tupperware containers full of food. Homemade food. Alfred’s homemade food.

Well, he’d known from the start it was futile trying to avoid Alfred’s caretaking.

“Shouldn’t you be in New York?” Tim didn’t actually know where Dick lived these days. He seemed to ping pong between three different cities, and why he’d chosen to even entertain the idea of going back to Bludhaven was still a mystery to Tim.

Dick shrugged, a small smile twitching his lips up at the corners. “I’ve been in New York. Just got back.”

Tim opened the door wider to let Dick into the apartment. It was just as messy as it had been when Jason had dropped by, although he’d long since moved the boxes around to make proper pathways to hobble through on crutches after nearly face planting too many times in the dark. He was not graceful by nature.

Unlike Dick, who navigated through to the kitchen with ease, not even glancing around at Tim’s haphazardly stacked boxes.

“I’m fine,” Tim said, following along behind him. “Just so you know.” His leg was still a pain and occasionally in pain, and his physio was giving him a very sound and realistic outlook for recovery that Tim was very much not thinking about outside the sessions that mandated he did so.

Dick was standing in front of his fridge, stacking the containers of food inside. “I heard.”

“I know it was you who made Jason give me the case files.” Tim carefully set the crutches aside, leaning his weight against the kitchen counter.

Dick frowned at some of the bowls Tim had left in the fridge, full of days old soup that he had no intention of finishing but no intention of cleaning out until he really, really needed more bowls. He glanced over his shoulder at Tim and raised an eyebrow. “You severely overestimate my ability to get Jason to do anything.”

It wasn’t an outright denial, which made it a confirmation.

Tim dropped his gaze to the counter, frowning. Before Tim’s...disappearance, Jason and the family had barely been on speaking terms. Red Hood would work with them, rarely, when needed, but he could count on one hand the number of civil conversations they’d had back then.

Now Jason and Damian, who’d had nothing to do with each other before, were running around Gotham, patrolling together and fighting over some toy. Damian even had access to Jason’s safe houses.

“Does it bother you that Jason and Damian are getting on so well?” Tim asked, the words falling out of his mouth before he could halt them.

Dick frowned. “Bother me? My little brothers teaming up against me? Why would it?” He closed the door to the fridge and made his way to the pantry, throwing that open and rooting through Tim’s barely stocked shelves. “I’m relieved. Damian needs a normal sibling relationship, and it’s good for Jay, too.”

“You don’t ever get jealous?”

Dick laughed. “This is what happens when you make a family out of only children. Nothing’s changed between me and Damian just because he and Jay are getting along.”

“Yeah.” Tim picked up a pen he’d left discarded on the counter and fiddling with it. “Of course.”

“Besides, Damian and I have a very different relationship than he and Jay do,” Dick said, tossing some old boxes out from the pantry. Tim had no idea what they were or how they’d gotten there, so he assumed he wouldn’t miss them. “Just like my relationship with Jay is much different from his—they’re not interchangable.”

No, they weren’t. Jason only had one older brother, after all.

Something in Tim’s chest tightened. Dick sounded happy. He’d tried so hard to bond with Tim in the beginning because he’d been so guilty about Jason. Now he had his real little brother back.

“I’m glad.”

Dick glanced over at him again, head tilted to one side.

Tim licked his lips and attempted a smile. “I’m glad you got your little brother back.”

“Speaking of little brothers.” Dick closed the pantry doors and came over to the counter, leaning on the side opposite Tim. “Let’s talk about you.”

“Let’s not.” Tim grabbed his crutches up and made his way inelegantly over to the couch, sitting down on one side and propping the broken leg up on the coffee table, on top of a Hello Kitty pillow that Steph had given him for his birthday one year. His laptop was on the couch cushion next to him. He snatched it up and huddled behind it.

He had no work left to do, but appearing busy might make Dick go away.

No such luck.

Dick sat down on the coffee table, right next to Tim’s leg.

“If you break the table I’m going to laugh.”

“Is that supposed to be a crack at my weight?” Dick asked, laughing. “Because I’ll have you know I’ve lost a shit load of muscle since I gave back the cowl, Tim. We’re good.”

“You’re still nearly two hundred pounds of muscle on my poor coffee table, be fair.” Tim kept his eyes on his screen. There was nothing on it except the last case file for Jason, but Dick didn’t know that.

Well, he might. He knew Tim pretty well.

Used to. Probably still did? It was hard to tell these days.

“Are you here for something in particular, Dick?”

He had to rear back when the laptop was forcefully closed. Dick slapped down a USB on top of it.

“Y’know, looking at files on a USB is pretty hard with a closed laptop.”

Dick stared back at him, impassive. “You can look later.”

“What is it, then?” Tim picked it up and turned it over in his hands. “You’re dropping more case files in my lap now your gopher is out of town?”

“I’m going to tell him you called him that,” Dick replied, voice mild. It actually meant that Tim was managing to get to him. Dick closed himself off when annoyed, made it harder to get a read on him. It was a different kind of mask than the one he wore for civilians, but just as effective. Dick was only truly open for trusted friends and family, and he was quick to shut people out when he wanted. “Bruce is out of town and the Riddler’s out of Arkham. Oracle has a busy case with the Birds of Prey. So, are you interested in running with me for this one or should I call my ‘gopher’ and see if Bizarro is as good at riddles as he says?”

“No,” Tim said, clutching the USB tighter as something like excitement lit up inside him. “I’m in.”

Chapter Text

Tim stayed up so late going through the files on the USB that he missed his physiotherapy appointment in the morning. He only noticed because they called to tell him and asked if he wanted to reschedule.

“Oh, right.” Tim stared down at his leg. It hadn’t bothered him all night, but even the thought of leaving the files behind to go to another appointment had it twinging. He rubbed his hand along his thigh and considered, actually considered, just not going. He shook himself. “I’m sorry, I overslept. I can come in at any time.”

Every single moment he spent away from the case files was agony. Tim barely managed to pay attention during the appointment and the exercises they were gently putting his leg through.

His physio frowned at him at the end of the meeting. “I understand that you want the rehabilitation process to be quicker, Mr Drake, but the break was very serious. Care needs to be taken so that you have a full recovery without complications.”

Right. The very long and horrendous list of ‘complications’ that could potentially impact his ‘prognosis’. The ones he wasn’t thinking about ever.

“I understand,” Tim said, and shoved the entire thing to the back of his mind the second he was out of the appointment and could turn his attention to the case.

The Riddler was going to be disappointed that Batman was out of town; his primary motivation these days was less about the actual crimes he was committing and more about proving he was smarter than Batman.

When Tim got back to his apartment he settled down on the couch with his laptop and the case files. It was important they dedicate time now, before the Riddler finished setting up his games. If they caught him quickly enough they could have him back in Arkham with not one riddle or trap to deal with. If they couldn’t do that, they were in for the long haul.

His phone rang just after ten that evening. Tim looked away from the screen, blinking and rubbing at his eyes. He grimaced when he saw Dick’s name on the display and answered. “Hey, are we out of time?”

“Game’s started,” Dick replied, sounding just as enthused about it. Tim had heard that Dick used to like working out the riddles back when he’d been Robin. At some point the shine had worn off.

“What are we looking at?”

“The usual; solve the riddles or face the consequences, Dark Knight.” Dick snorted. “Switch over to the comm, Red. We’re in for a long night.”

“What a time for Batman to be out of town.” Getting set up with everything he needed in arm’s reach took a frustratingly long time with his leg, but at least once he was settled he could get to work and forget his leg even existed. From the howling wind that came over the comm line, he was in for a more comfortable night than Nightwing at any rate. “Okay, time to get to work. Riddle me up.”

Nightwing coughed over the line, which didn’t do much to disguise the laugh. “Really, Red. Okay: I am peaceful but distribute weapons to thousands. What am I?”

Tim frowned, typing the riddle out so he could look at it on the screen. “It probably has to do with location, if we’re being led somewhere. You’ve had it longer, any ideas?”

“Nothing good,” Nightwing said, with a false cheer. “Snow.”

“Snow?”

“Snowballs are a weapon,” Nightwing said, and started laughing.

Tim closed his eyes. “It’s not winter.”

“I said it was nothing good.”

“Please tell me you’re not trying to make me feel needed by acting like you’re incapable.”

“No, Red.” Nightwing’s voice turned serious, laughter dying away. “I need you on this. I just came off a mission with the Titans and I’m running on zero sleep because my little brother was sent from hell to torture me, okay, and I do not have the capacity at the moment to give even a single fuck about solving a riddle.”

“Which brother? Not me, right?”

“Oh my God.” Nightwing sighed. “No, Red, not you.”

“It’s Damian, isn’t it?”

“Focus.” For a moment all Tim could hear was the howling wind before he heard Nightwing’s motorcycle starting. “Got an answer yet?”

Tim glanced over at the map of Gotham he had spread out on the coffee table. Sometimes, having something real to touch helped him think. He leaned forward, zeroing in on the map. “Library. Try the library.”

The motorcycle roared away.

“Knowledge is power,” Nightwing said, fainter now over the sound of the engine. “Makes it a weapon. Man, I can’t wait to punch Riddler in the face.”

“I was waiting for you to make a crack about books being weapons and I’m glad you didn’t because I would’ve thrown the comm away.” Tim sat back and turned his attention back to his screen, just in case he was wrong and a second option was needed. “Do you need me to call in the GCPD?”

“Nah, I got it.”

The waiting was the worst part, just because he had nothing to do in the meantime. If he’d had another open case he could have multitasked. At least he had the option, here in his warm apartment. Nightwing was stuck outside in miserable weather doing all the leg work, and then coordinating the GCPD search of the building once they arrived at the library.

Half an hour later, Nightwing let out a relieved sigh. “Okay, we got it. Nice little button to disable a bomb, which I’m handing over to the bomb squad because we still haven’t actually found the bomb, and a new riddle.”

“I want the button,” Tim said, frowning.

“You don’t even have equipment set up,” Nightwing replied. “I asked Oracle to monitor, we’ll hear the second they have something. I’m not the Bat, they wouldn’t be happy about me just running off with their evidence.”

“Wouldn’t stop you doing it,” Tim muttered. “Fine. At least give me the next riddle.”

Nightwing cleared his throat.

“What knows all of the past, is changed by the present and is reborn again in the future?”

Chapter Text

Tim frowned and look over at the map spread out on the coffee table. “Past, present, future—something to do with time, clearly.”

There was a pause across the line. “You don’t think he means the Clocktower, do you?”

“Like Oracle doesn’t have that place completely secure.” Tim tapped his fingers against his good leg as he thought. The Clocktower wasn’t a bad guess, really, it was certainly prominent enough in Gotham, but it didn’t seem quite right. Time, certainly, but that wasn’t specific enough to answer the riddle. “History,” Tim said. “History studies the past, the events of the present become new history and thus change it, and then the process starts all over again.”

“Where would—the museum.”

Tim could hear the wind and Nightwing’s breathing as he left to begin the hunt. He sighed. “That one was pretty easy.”

“Sorry to disappoint you.”

He hated thinking it but it was a little disappointing to go back to waiting. “I don’t suppose you have any other cases I can look at while waiting?”

“Got bit by the detecting bug, I see.” Nightwing laughed. The motorcycle revved. Tim could imagine Nightwing zipping through the streets on it, dodging traffic and breaking the speed limit. It used to be thrilling.

“I’ve missed it,” Tim replied, with a glance at his leg. “While I was gone there wasn’t a lot to occupy my mind. It was like being stuck in class with the most boring teacher imaginable and learning about something you have absolutely no interest in.”

“So your entire high school career, then?”

“Pretty much.” If there was one thing Tim didn’t regret, in hindsight, it was dropping out. College was appealing for the normalcy, the experience, the expectation. He had always been destined for it because that’s what his parents had expected of him, and while Tim had somewhat craved a normal life on and off for years, college was mostly a means to an end.

His greatest love was solving puzzles, finding things out, being a detective. In that respect, Bruce had been the greatest teacher that Tim could ever have had.

But he wasn’t thinking about that.

It took longer this time for Nightwing and the GCPD to locate the button and the next riddle and Tim spent the time in tense anticipation, on the edge of his seat and trying to distract himself with idle research and tasks and finding himself unable to concentrate.

“Got it,” Nightwing said. “Another button, still no idea what’s up with the bomb, but we have the next riddle.”

Tim sent off a quick message to Oracle about the bombs, hoping she’d heard something from the GCPD. “You sure I can’t have the button?”

“Positive,” Nightwing said cheerfully. “Remember that time you got distracted and nearly dropped an explosive? You’re at the bottom of the bomb squad list, Red.”

“That happened once and there were extenuating circumstances.”

“Sure, sure.” Nightwing cleared his throat. “Next riddle—yikes, he really left the best for last: I am cold as death, always drinking, all in mail never clinking; even when armed with blades a shield of glass can stop me.”

“Oh boy.”

“Is that ‘oh boy we’re fucked’ or ‘oh boy this is gonna be fun’?”

“Mostly the second, with some added ‘finally I get to use my brain’ added in for flavor.” Tim quickly typed the riddle out and began to separate the parts on the laptop screen as he thought through each section. His eyes drifted over to the map spread out on the table. “Shield of glass…”

Nightwing stayed quiet over the comms, letting him think.

“Shield of glass, location,” Tim muttered, leaning back on the couch. “Swords, clinking, drinking.” He closed his eyes, frowning. “Cold, water, mail...scales. Fish.”

“Fish?” Nightwing asked. “What, like a swordfish?”

“Or a shark.” Tim looked back at the map. “I don’t think it’s got anything to do with fishing. Shield of glass, that sounds like an aquarium to me.”

“Let’s hope so.”

Tim kept half an ear on the comm and turned his attention back to the map. If any of the riddles was going to trip them up, it would be the last one. The Riddler was always pulling things like that, and everything had come together just a little bit too easily.

“Do you think it’s strange?” Tim asked, some time later once Nightwing had begun the search of the aquarium. “We’ve not heard from the Riddler and it’s all come together really well.”

Nightwing grunted. “I hope not. I’ll keep an eye out.”

“I have some alternative locations if nothing turns up at the aquarium.” Tim had thought it was a little strange that all three locations had been reasonably close to each other. It had made the time it took Nightwing to go through all three, in a clockwise circle, much faster than he would’ve if the Riddler has spread them out further across Gotham. Tim wasn’t sure what he was playing at.

“Oh, you have got to be kidding me.”

Tim tensed, sliding forward in his seat and wishing once again that he had eyes on the situation. “What’s wrong?”

“Well, we found it.” Nightwing sighed. “Another button, no bomb, and...another riddle.”

His laptop pinged as Oracle sent him a message.

No bombs. Wiring is a dud.

“Oracle says that the buttons didn’t do anything,” Tim said, frowning and rubbing at his forehead. “There were no bombs.”

“Well that’s fantastic,” Nightwing replied. “It’ll go really great with our next clue, which is nothing.”

“Nothing?” Tim asked.

“Zilch, nada.”

“Like...a blank page? The Riddler can be sneaky, anything he left could be a cleverly hidden clue.”

“‘Dear Dark Knight’,” Nightwing said, in an imitation of the Riddler that had Tim’s lips twitching. “‘Congratulations on getting this far, there’s only one mystery left—I’m not giving you any more free clues.”

Tim sighed. “Maybe there’s a code.”

“Maybe I’m gonna beat the crap out of him when I get my hands on him.”

“Don’t worry, Wing.” Tim linked his fingers together and cracked his knuckles. Time to begin the real work. “I’ve got your back.”

Chapter Text

The comm crackled in Tim’s ear.

“You said you had my back like ten minutes ago and I’ve not heard a word from you since.” Nightwing’s voice was nearly drowned out by howling wind. “The bombs at these places might have been duds, but if anything is actually going to be rigged to explode, it’s this last one. Don’t go all quiet on me now, Red.”

“I’m running the riddles through some programs,” Tim replied. “Pattern recognition, some of my databases, I even tried Google. If the clues we need are all here, there’s got to be something that points to the right place.”

“Riddles within riddles does sound like the him,” Nightwing said. “Although he might consider your databases cheating.”

Tim snorted, switching quickly through his programs to check their progress. “He can cry about it after you punch him in the face.”

“Now that’s what I like hear.”

Results started coming soon enough and gave Tim frustratingly little. The sheer lack of anything was suspicious in and of itself. “I think we’re missing something.”

“Great, let’s call Riddler up and double check he set his game pieces out correctly,” Nightwing replied and then made a thoughtful sound. “Hey, you have a map, don’t you?”

“Of course.” Tim glanced at it, spread out on his coffee table. He always had hard copies of things spread out when he was working on this side of the action. Dick had even teased him about it a couple of times, back when things hadn’t been so awkward between them. “If you’re about to make a crack about tabletop games, I warn you that Duke likes them too and we will team up on you.”

Nightwing laughed. “No, just tell me if there’s anything interesting about how the locations of the three bombs were laid out.”

Oh. Of course. Tim resisted smacking himself in the forehead, stretching over to trace a finger between the library, aquarium and museum. He’d thought they’d been oddly close together, hadn’t he? The Riddler could have picked locations spread out across any of the islands of the city or even the mainland, but instead he’d chosen three notable locations that were relatively close and, when connected by straights lines, formed a near perfect triangle.

“What’s at the center?” Nightwing asked and Tim grinned because of course he’d already figured what the final clue would be.

“Gotham City Bank.”

“That sounds like a nice, real target for a crime while we’re running around in literal circles after fake bombs.” Over the comm, Tim heard the sound of an engine gunning. “On my way.”

“How disappointed do you think he’s going to be when Batman doesn’t show up?” Tim asked, leaning back on the couch and stretching his leg out. His lips pulled to the side at the twinge of pain. The leg felt stiff. If missing physio appointments weren’t enough, he hadn’t been keeping up with the exercises he was supposed to be doing either, not while he had the distraction of an actual, real case.

“I hope he cries,” Nightwing said, over the rushing of Gotham’s late night traffic.

Tim leaned his head back and stared at the ceiling, keeping half an ear on Nightwing’s progress and wondering if he could get more case files out of Babs. Maybe she had some cold cases or something he could try to take a crack at. Where Tim wasn’t intuitive he was methodical, combing through information and making use of all the tools at his disposal, including a couple of programs he’d put together over the years, some with Babs’ help, others just cobbled together on his own.

The idea of doing that made something that had been swimming around in his chest ease, and Tim held onto that feeling, even if he still wasn’t quite sure what it all meant, yet. Thinking about his leg, thinking about his future, thinking about the family...he didn’t want to think about any of it.

Going back to work on cases, though? It was like something had snapped into place and he wasn’t going to ignore it.

Over the comm, something that sounded like a flash grenade went off, and then Tim could hear the Riddler, panicking and loud and audibly disappointed.

“No, no, no, it’s not meant to be you!”

Tim grinned at the sound of flesh hitting flesh and what was definitely Nightwing decking Riddler in the face.

“Sorry to disappoint,” Nightwing said, and despite the fact that he wasn’t in the cowl, that was definitely a tone that rivaled Batman at his most gruff. “You’d think if you were so damn smart, Nigma, you’d realize that if you just let the nice people at Arkham rehabilitate you and then stopped committing actual crimes, you could spend your time messing with Batman and he couldn’t do a thing to stop you.”

There was silence over the line. Tim hoped to God it wasn’t because Nigma was actually considering it.

“Did you really just give him ideas?” Tim asked.

Nightwing snorted. In the background, sirens were wailing as the GCP made it to the scene.

Tim let his head hit the back of the couch again and sighed. “That was kind of anticlimatic.”

“Three out of ten, Nigma,” Nightwing said, because apparently he was in the mood to be mouthy. “Your antics didn’t keep my brother entertained for long.”

“I hate you so much,” Nigma replied. “You’re worse than the rest of your family put together.”

“I take that as a compliment.”

Tim rolled his eyes, reaching out to the computer. With his job done it was back to boredom and the healing. Before he could cut the comm, Nightwing cleared his throat.

“And as for you, Red,” Nightwing said. “Clear your schedule tomorrow, you and I need to have a talk.”

Well now, that wasn’t the least bit ominous.

“Uh.” Tim licked his lips and wished Dick didn’t already know most of his tells. “I have urgent business that can’t be cancelled.”

The sound Nightwing made was so skeptical that Tim was a little insulted despite knowing his lie had landed with all the grace of a tap dancing elephant.

“Avoiding the family and brooding alone in your empty apartment? I’ll think you’ll survive missing one day.” Ouch. “I’ll be there at noon.”

The comm went dead before Tim could reply.

“I hate it when he gets the last word.”

Damn brothers.

Chapter Text

Doom arrived at midday with takeout.

Tim eyed the containers of what was definitely not Alfred approved Chinese, but was certainly Tim’s favorite. “Is that a bribe so I’ll let you into the apartment?”

Dick’s lips barely even quirked. “Do you really think you could keep me out?”

His broken leg had never been quite as inconvenient as it was in that moment, as Tim stood in the doorway and considered his grand total of zero exit strategies to escape his brother and everything he did not want to discuss. With a sigh, he turned around and hobbled to the couch, leaving Dick in the doorway to do what he liked. He’d missed his second physiotherapy appointment of the week that morning by sleeping through it. He’d not bothered to answer the phone when they’d followed up and was putting off rescheduling it, for reasons he hadn’t wanted to examine too closely. He wasn’t any more enthused about the idea of talking to Dick; about anything, but particularly about himself.

The apartment door closed with a thud and Tim listened to the rustling of plastic bags in the kitchen and tried to steel himself for what was to come.

Dick eventually appeared in the living room and sat down on the coffee table across from him, folding his arms and frowning.

Tim raised an eyebrow. “You forgot the food.”

“It’s for after our talk.” Dick grimaced. “I have a feeling that if we tried to have this discussion while eating, something would get thrown.”

Yeah, it would’ve been Tim throwing a carton of noodles at Dick’s head and he wouldn’t have regretted it for a second.

“Maybe you should take a hint,” Tim said, and he didn’t mean to sound so…blunt, but honestly the amount he wanted to not be having this conversation was enough that he had his right hand clutched around one of his crutches like maybe if he tried hobbling fast enough he could somehow escape. “I don’t want to talk.”

“You don’t even know what I want to talk to you about.”

“I don’t want to talk about anything.” Tim licked his lips. “And honestly, I’m pretty sure I know why you’re here and I suggest you leave and go find another brother to hunt down and interrogate about his feelings. I suggest Jason, he’s always up for that.”

Violence and explosions usually followed, but who the hell was Tim to judge how Jason chose to express himself?

“You need to leave Jason out of this,” Dick said, narrowing his eyes. “I can see what you’re doing, Tim. This is between you and me, little brother.”

Tim bit his tongue and looked away, glaring out the window.

“You’re isolating yourself again,” Dick said, like Tim didn’t already know that and hadn’t deliberately chosen to do so. “You’re also freaked out about your leg, which is understandable, I get that, but you’re not keeping up with your exercises and now you’re slacking on your appointments?”

Of course they were keeping tabs. “It was one appointment and I’m keeping up the exercises, I just got distracted by the case.”

Dick snorted. “Kid, maybe you can get away with such shitty lying with other people, but this is me. What’s really going on with you?”

Tim let his gaze snap back to his brother, scowling. “Why the hell do you even care all of a sudden?”

Dick’s eyebrows raised. “All of a sudden?”

“I didn’t mean that.” Tim pinched the bridge of his nose. “I know you care.”

“Then what did you mean?”

“I don’t get why you’re all practically smothering me,” Tim muttered, sinking further back against the couch. “I still remember when I was falling apart and you just handed Robin to Damian and acted like I was a crazy person—and now I’m back from being held captive and it’s like, what, guilt because you all just accepted I was dead? Was it easier or simpler? You’d think after Bruce—”

“—And Jason wandered around Gotham on the streets after crawling out of his own grave and we didn’t even notice.” Dick’s eyes were hard and flinty. “Or how about the time we discovered that his body was missing and somehow not a single one of us thought that maybe resurrection was involved, not until it was too late.”

“That’s not—”

“—Not everyone comes back to life,” Dick said, and rubbed a hand over his face. “God knows we all wish they did.”

“There wasn’t a body.”

“You think Bruce didn’t look into it at all?” Dick asked. “The tech used to take you was beyond us, Tim. Of course I hoped we’d get lucky yet again, but—” he shook his head, sharply, and then looked back at Tim “—that’s not what this is really about, is it?”

“You’re trying to change the subject.” But Tim could see that Dick wasn’t going to bite. Sometimes he was just as relentless as Bruce when he got an idea in his head, and more intuitive to boot.

“You want to talk through whatever issues you still have with me from when Bruce was gone, we can do that later,” Dick said, and the steel resolve in his voice meant that Tim could wave a white flag or get steamrolled. “I’m not the one you even want to talk to about what happened when you were taken—you’ve got beef with Bruce and that can only be resolved by fighting it out with him, good luck on that—”

Tim snorted.

“—but you’re my little brother and I love you, and I’m not going to sit here and watch you isolate yourself and destroy your health because you don’t want to talk about the real problem.” Dick leaned forward, nudging him in the shoulder. “Seriously. I know something is wrong. I want to help.”

“I don’t even know the problem!” Tim released the death grip he had on his crutch and let it fall to the ground. “I get it, okay. My life is a mess again, but my life is always a mess, you’d think maybe you guys would’ve picked up on that by now, and I came so damn close to losing everything when I broke this stupid leg and I still might! Who knows if I’ll recover fully from a break this bad. I lost so much condition beforehand and things don’t always heal right, okay.”

“And yet you’re hurting your own chances at recovery right now, Tim.”

“I know that.” Tim waved his hands to encompass the whole apartment. “Mess, remember? I am aware that I am literally sabotaging myself right now, thank you. I don’t need this talk, okay. If this is purely you checking in to make sure I am just this much of a mess, I can confirm that it is so.”

“Tim—”

“I could lose Red Robin,” Tim said, putting voice to the one thing above all others that he refused to think about. “And I’m not sure what scares me more—that part of me that doesn’t know who Tim Drake is without this life, or that part of me just doesn’t care. ”

Chapter Text

It took exactly five seconds for Tim to regret everything. He stood up from the couch, snatching up his crutches roughly and refusing to meet Dick’s eyes. “Forget it. I’m just in a bad mood. We’ll talk another time.”

Dick didn’t even let him take a single step. “Sit down, Timothy.”

He froze, jerking his head around to face Dick, blinking. “Did you just full name me?”

“Yes.” Dick nodded to the couch. “Now sit the hell down.”

Tim swallowed, letting the crutches drop to the ground and flopping back down on the couch. With Dick in a mood like this, there was little chance of escape. He’d just have to weather the storm.

Dick was frowning, chewing on the corner of his lip. “You know, it’s okay if you can’t be Red Robin anymore. It won’t change anything with the family, and it wouldn’t even keep you out of the game if you wanted. Look at Babs.”

Tim took a deep breath. “I know that.” Something in his chest loosened all the same, hearing someone else say it out loud. The thought had been tumbling around his head since he’d realized how monumentally bad the accident had been.

“Or even if you don’t want to be Red Robin.”

Frowning, Tim gave Dick a sharp glance. “And what’s that supposed to mean?”

“Exactly what I said,” Dick replied. “Sometimes this family has a tendency to go all or nothing. We’re allowed to take breaks or bow out.”

Tim laughed. “That’s a little rich coming from you.”

“Yeah, well, that’s me.” Dick rolled his eyes. “I picked up all of Bruce’s worst habits.”

“You make up for it in other ways.” Tim rubbed at his eyes with the back of his hand. “Was it that obvious I was thinking about it?” Even alluding to the idea in his own mind made him cringe and avoid thinking about it. It’s not like it had been the first time he’d ever had thoughts about it, but he’d never entertained them for long, getting absorbed in a case again, and he’d always put it down over the years to a stress reaction.

Things got bad and Tim contemplated jumping ship for better waters.

“You had major crisis face going on,” Dick said. “But honestly I had a mental list and I’ve been going down it. Figured we’d get to it eventually even if you wanted to play at being a clam’s chastity belt.”

It was really hard to fight the smile. Tim narrowed his eyes at his brother and shook his head. “Sometimes you’re just...a real dick, you know?”

“I was aptly named.” Dick smirked. “And come on, in this family? We’re all a bunch of jerks, it’s like a pre-requisite. ‘Gotta be this much of a complete asshole to apply’.”

It was a prime ‘throw a carton of noodles at Dick’ moment and Tim once again cursed his brother’s foresight.

“It’s probably nothing,” Tim said. “It’s not gonna be the first time I look at this lifestyle and go ‘Tim, you’re an idiot, get out while you still can’, but then something always comes up, and it’s not always world-ending monsters and supervillains that mean I have to step up. Sometimes it’s just a really interesting case and I remember the parts of this job that I love and then I’m back to ‘why would I ever want to stop?’”

“You’re not the only one to think about getting out, or panic when you go down hard and have a long recovery ahead.” Dick got off the coffee table and picked up the crutches, handing them to Tim. “You don’t have to go through it alone, or decide right now. Just...let’s eat some noodles, resist throwing them at me, and then come back to the damn manor so Alfred can worry over you in person. You won’t even have to speak to Bruce.”

Tim took the crutches. “You know that for sure?”

“Jason’s on day twenty-seven of his vow of Bruce-silence,” Dick replied, face twisting into a particular grimace that Tim had long identified as his ‘vexed by younger siblings’ face.

“I thought they were on better terms.”

“They are,” Dick replied, pinching the bridge of his nose. “This is better. He’s not even mad, he just likes the twitch that Bruce is developing.”

Tim gave a short laugh. “I guess if he’s having fun.”

Dick rolled his head and made for the kitchen. “Damian’s on day five and Cass is restarting day one again. She, somehow, can’t manage to avoid speaking to him.”

“Cass is failing at being stoic and silent?” Tim asked. “Cass? Our Cass?”

“She feels bad for him.”

Tim took the carton that Dick held out to him. “I guess if I’m missing all the fun, I should come back.”

“Excellent.” Dick grinned. “That means I can call off Plan B.”

“What’s Plan B?”

Dick nodded to the window. “I have Jason waiting outside. We were going to just carry you off against your will.”

Tim nearly dropped the noodles. “You were going to what?”

Shrugging, Dick gave him a serious look. “Well, drugging you would be unethical.”

“Because being awake and able to protest and you both ignoring me would be so much better.” Tim sighed. “This family, I swear.”

“Would’ve been for your own good.” To his credit, Dick didn’t look surprised at all when Tim chucked the noodles at his head.

***

Thankfully, no one made a fuss when Tim and Dick showed up at the manor. Jason arrived ten minutes later and dragged Damian off before he could pick a fight with Tim, which he supposed was what counted for a ‘welcome back’ from Jason.

“I’ve taken the liberty of rescheduling your appointments,” Alfred said, with a pointed look.

Tim nodded. He’d already resolved to go back and make sure his leg healed as best as it could. When he back and fighting fit, then he could really examine his future and figure out how he really felt. There were parts of what they did that Tim couldn’t imagine living without, but that he kept coming back around to thoughts of giving the vigilante lifestyle up…

Well, maybe there were some changes that he needed to make to how he did things.

But that could wait. Today, he was home.

“Welcome back,” Bruce said, and Tim could let his lingering resentment drop enough to recognize the relief in his voice.

Still..

Tim glanced at Dick.

Dick sighed, giving Bruce a grim smile. “He’s on day one.”

Yeah, Tim was going to cherish that look of exasperation for many days to come.

“Of course he is.” Bruce sighed, rubbing at his forehead. He gestured towards the staircase. “Your room is just as you left it.”

Tim nodded, letting out a startled laugh as Cass popped out from behind him and wrapped her arms around him in a hug.

He was home.