Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Things had just started going well for Jason. Of course, that’s why everything falls apart. 

It’s always like that. The second he thinks he can have something is the second he fucks it up.

Normally, he has an easier time letting things go when everything goes to shit. He’s used to it.

Okay, that might be bullshit. But normally he can move on. 

This, though? This is a fuck-up he isn’t going to forget about. It’s been four months, and it’s not getting any easier.

He’s in the middle of lying back on his bed, his head just about to hit the pillow, when he hears a noise.

It sounds almost like TV static. That little fuzzy noise from shutting the TV off? The one from back before everything digital was so… digital. He turns his head to the source of the noise, in the middle of taking a breath in. 

Then his lungs stop working. 

Tim is standing in his bedroom. 

Jason’s first thought — around the incredibly loud siren noise in his brain — is that Tim is too tall. He thinks it in the weird way that a person sometimes thinks a single rational thought in the middle of losing their mind, but still. Jason is certain that he’s an inch or two taller than he should be.

Taller-Tim frowns at the device in his hand, his eyes pinching in the corners. He shakes the thing once, twice, then taps it against his palm a few times, like maybe there’s something stuck in it.

“Damn it,” he mumbles, placing a hand on his hip.

“Tim?” Jason asks, his voice cracking right down the middle as the name slides out with the air that was stuck in his chest.

Tim’s head snaps up to look at him, and his face does something complicated. Not the kind of complicated that Jason is used to. Or, was used to. Before. Back when Tim was around to do things like look at Jason. Back when Tim was alive— 

Nope. He hasn’t let himself think that for four months and he isn’t about to start now. 

Especially not when Tim is looking at him. 

At first, his eyes go soft and warm, just for a second, like he’s happy to see him. Then they go distinctly alarmed, a little wide. Then they narrow suspiciously, an assessing look in them that Jason hasn’t seen in a long while. He didn’t miss that look. 

Tim’s eyes drop down Jason’s body, his brow furrowing as his gaze lingers a second too long on his bare shoulder.

“Shit—” Tim swears, and the way he huffs it is so familiar that the tense thing in Jason’s chest that’s been about to break since September goes slack. “—I’m too early,” Tim finishes, almost like he’s talking to himself, but his gaze flickers back to Jason’s face. 

There’s a look in his eye that Jason has never quite figured out, but there’s something playful about it. Like Tim is setting up a game of cat and mouse, but he wants to play the mouse.

Then Jason’s eyes catch on the curve of his lips, and he realizes that Tim really does look wrong. 

It’s not just the height. 

His face is sharper, the angle of his jawline a little more filled out than it used to be. He’s filled out everywhere, actually, lost that gangly, lanky quality in his limbs. He looks… older. 

Older than Jason. Which can’t be right. 

Jason is three years older than him. Tim can’t just go missing for four months and come back older than Jason. That’s not how it works. 

But honestly, Jason can’t quite be sure about that, because he only just became certain that Tim isn’t dead.

Tim doesn’t say anything else, he just finishes looking at Jason with a very catlike grin tucked into the corner of his mouth, and he drops his gaze back to the dial on his device, a little beat-up gold box, slightly smaller than a phone. 

He turns it like he’s entering in a locker combination and it dings like a toaster, which finally breaks whatever haze Jason has fallen into, his instincts kicking in at the understanding that something is about to happen. 

Tim winks at him as he presses down on the knob at the exact moment Jason gets his shit together enough to shout “Wait!” 

But before he can finish doing anything other than shooting up in the bed, there’s that static fizzy noise again and— 

Tim blinks out of existence. 

Jason stares at the empty space where Tim used to be for a long moment, an upsettingly familiar sinking feeling in his gut, and then he pinches his thigh, hard. 

He feels it. 

He’s awake. 

Jason does it again for good measure. Hard enough that he knows it’ll bruise.

Definitely awake.

He doesn’t pinch himself again. Instead, he does something he hasn’t done in months: he calls Dick. 

It rings out to his voicemail, probably because it’s 5:45 in the morning. Dick must be asleep. 

He calls again. This time, Dick answers on the ring right before it would’ve hit his voicemail.

“Jay?” Dick asks. His voice is groggy from sleep, but to his credit, he doesn’t sound annoyed. 

“I—” Jason starts, and that’s all he manages to get out. 

He didn’t think this through. It sounds crazy. He sounds crazy.

“What’s wrong?” Dick demands, and Jason can’t help responding to that tone, an instinct that comes out whenever he’s lost enough to actually ask Dick for help.

Jason’s voice sounds wrong, distant, like someone else is speaking when he says, “I just saw Tim.” 

“What?” Dick asks, suddenly sounding wide awake. Jason can picture it, him shooting upright in bed, gripping the phone a little too tightly, his eyes wide enough that Jason would have laughed in any other circumstance. 

“Say that again,” Dick commands.

Jason complies instantly. He sort of wants to say you fucking heard me, but the angry thing that’s been snapping its jaws at people for the last four months is suddenly quiet, just as stunned as he is. “Tim, he was— he was here.”

“Tell me what happened.”

“I don’t know, he just appeared out of thin air! Literally! He didn’t come in through the window or anything, he was just here, and he had some device and he said he was too early and then he pressed down on it and disappeared again, and—” Jason breaks off. 

Until now, everything he’s said has been possible. This is… less possible.

“And?” Dick presses, an urgent tone in his voice.

“And he looked… wrong. Not hurt—” he hurries to add, “—but… he was— too tall?” 

“Too tall?” Dick asks, bewildered. 

Jason finally bites the bullet and spits it out. “He was older. More than four months older.” His throat is dry when he swallows. “Older than me.” 

Dick is silent, and Jason knows what he’s thinking because he’s thinking it too. 

Crazy. He’s crazy. Jason has lost it before and now he’s lost it again, which makes a lot of sense. Especially because when he loses it, he has a habit of losing it in Tim’s direction.

But when Dick finally responds, it’s not to tell Jason that he imagined it, or that he was dreaming, or any other dismissal. 

All he says is, “Okay.”

Jason feels the need to defend himself anyways, because he was so ready for those dismissals. And he might be afraid they’re true, too. “I wasn’t dreaming, he was here—”

“I know, Jay,” Dick says, and his voice is gentle when he adds, “I believe you.” 

“What do we do?” Jason asks desperately. He needs Dick to know what to do. He needs him not to say—

“I don’t know.” 

Jason hears a rustle, one that he knows is Dick running his hand through his hair, and even though Jason’s chest seizes at the idea of having to figure this out, at least he doesn’t have to do it alone.

“Did he look okay?” Dick asks, his voice soft and tentative. 

“He looked great,” Jason breathes out in a relieved huff.

He needs Tim to be alive so badly. To be okay. To come back. 

More than anything.

Jason hasn’t spent a single night in the last four months thinking about anything other than what he should’ve done. In a way that reminds him of Tim, actually, rerunning a scenario over and over and over in his head, trying to find the exact angle, the exact option that would’ve produced a different result. 

But it doesn’t matter. 

It doesn’t matter because what he did do was stand there, too surprised to do anything but watch Tim wink out of existence. 

And that’s exactly what he did again tonight. 

That’s when he’s hit with a sharp sense of clarity. 

All this time, when he wasn’t thinking about what he should’ve done that night, he’s been searching. And however hard he was looking, that wasn’t hard enough, because Tim is out there. 

This whole time, he’s been out there. 

And Jason hasn’t found him. 

Suddenly, the panic and grief and shock in his chest freeze, and the only thing left moving is determination.

He hasn’t found Tim yet.

“The device,” he says into the phone, a plan already forming in his head. He’s a trained detective, and he knows Tim well, better than anyone knew. The look in his eyes, the smirk, the wording. It wasn’t a mistake. 

It was a clue. 

“He had a device,” Jason repeats. “Gold, a little smaller than a phone, dial in the middle. Dinged like a toaster—” 

“—Like a toaster?” 

Jason barely hears Dick. Whatever sleep he was hoping to get is obviously out the fucking window, just like he’s about to be. He abandons his bed, snatching up the armor of the suit he stripped out of less than ten minutes ago.

Fuck the time. Fuck the sunlight. Tim is out there. 

“Maybe we can find it,” Jason says, half to Dick and half to himself. “We need to figure out what it was, at least. Meet me at the cave.”

“The cave?” he hears Dick ask, just as he presses end. 

Jason is equally surprised to find that he doesn’t care about going there. Normally he has to be dragged. 

Then again, the only person who ever managed to drag him there has been dead for four months.

Presumed dead, he corrects in his head as he yanks his boots on and slams the window open. 

He’s going to fix this. 

Chapter Text

Jason lets himself back into his safehouse, feeling exhausted in that wired sort of way. 

Dick sent him back to his place for the time being, with a reassurance that he’d be by soon. Neither of them thought it would do him any good to be alone, not really, but with the increasing number of concerned looks he’s received over the past forty eight hours that definitely have something to do with the increasing number of violent and asshole remarks he’s made, it’s not like he doesn’t get it.

They’ve run test after test, search after search, and everything has come up empty. No residue from another dimension, no residue of magic, no evidence of anything out of place. No sign that it even happened.

But the strangest thing is how everyone believes Jason anyways. Just like that. 

Then again, Dick is backing him up, so of course they believe him. Everyone believes Goldie, all of the time. He just flashes that gorgeous smile like a fucking master key, and Jason’s always been a tiny bit jealous that everyone else turned out so goddamn endearing. 

Not that being intimidating doesn’t have its uses, but sometimes he can’t ignore how much easier certain things would be if his edges were just a little less sharp.

Jason drops onto his couch and stares at the wall, not bothering to strip out of his suit. It’s been a long two days. Three if you include the morning Jason saw Tim. 

One hundred and sixteen if you include every night since the one in September, because they’ve all been long.

At some point, he hears the door open and close, and he knows it’s Dick because he knocked his pattern into the door, loud-soft-loud-soft-loud, and Jason doesn’t look up. Dick settles on the couch next to him, throwing an arm over his shoulder. 

Jason doesn’t move. 

“You should get some sleep, little wing,” Dick says in a soft voice. 

Sleep isn’t going to happen. Jason doesn’t answer. 

“Or eat something. What was the last thing you ate?”

Jason doesn’t answer. Food tastes like ash. Food hasn’t tasted like anything but survival in three months and twenty four days.

And counting. 

“You should do something other than stare at the wall, then,” Dick sighs, and his voice is patient, but that’s only because he’s worried. Cass and Damian made him shower this afternoon, so at least Dick doesn’t have to tell him to do that.

He still doesn’t answer. 

The only thing he wants to do other than stare at the wall is find Tim, and that seems to be the one thing he can’t fucking do. 

At the exact moment he finishes having that thought, there’s a noise like a bit of water rushing out of a faucet, and something drops out of thin air in front of his nose, falling into Jason’s lap. 

He looks at it for a moment, his heart freezing in his chest.

It’s gold and beat up. 

There’s a dial in the middle. 

It’s a little smaller than a phone. 

“Jason,” Dick finally breathes out, his eyes locked on the device in Jason’s lap. 

This close, he can see a few things he didn’t notice before. The dial has numbers on it, almost exactly like a combination lock. And it’s scuffed, beat up. 

There are also words etched into it, clearly carved by hand with something sharp. His fingers trace the letters at the bottom as Dick asks, “Is that—”

A breath sighs out of Jason. “Yeah.” 

“Okay,” Dick says, his voice a little too high. “Okay.” He repeats, standing up and running a hand through his hair. 

Jason reaches for the device slowly. His fingers graze it gently, like he’s afraid that if he touches it too hard it’ll disappear.

It doesn’t. The metal is smooth and cold and solid. 

Dick is talking, pacing, trying to get his attention. 

Jason doesn’t hear him. His hand wraps around the device, still gentle, almost cradling it as he lifts it out of his lap. He looks a little closer at the etching. 

He knows that handwriting. 

That sharp clarity rings through his head again, and his grip grows more firm around the device as he looks up at Dick. 

“—and if they don’t know what it is, we’ll go see—” Dick’s voice cuts out as he takes in the determination in his eyes. 

“Jason,” Dick says gently, like he’s speaking to a spooked animal. “You can’t.”

Jason looks back down at the device, running his thumb across the words at the bottom. 

“Seriously, little wing, we don’t know what it does,” Dick says, and his voice is sounding more concerned by the second. 

“Tim had it,” Jason says. He means to be reasoning with Dick, just suggesting it, but it sounds certain, because he’s already made up his mind. 

He stares at the words for another moment, the message meant for him, before his eyes flash back up to Dick. 

“Jason, don’t,” Dick orders, frantic, and Jason gives him a half apologetic, half hopeful look as he presses the dial in. 

It rings like a shop bell and Dick lunges for him, but his hand starts dripping, then his arm, then his face and torso, and then the furniture around him starts melting, too. A wave of nausea rolls through him at the sight, so he focuses on the device, the only thing in his world that’s steady, and rereads the words carved under the dial over and over again. 

What are you waiting for?

Chapter Text

When the room stops melting, Jason’s more than a little confused. In his periphery, he saw the walls change color ever so slightly, saw the couch melt away to reveal a different one underneath, saw a desk pop up out of the ground.

There are about a hundred more differences in the apartment that he isn’t cataloguing, because he looks up at the desk by the wall, and Tim is there.

He hasn’t noticed Jason yet, sitting at the desk, scrawling on a sheet of notebook paper as he looks up at his computer screen. Jason’s chest feels like it’s cracking open, and if he could make his throat work, he’d make that snide comment he always makes about his notes looking like a maze. 

There are loose papers scattered around the table and two empty cans of that red bull he’s always drinking, the one that makes his breath smell tangy and sweet. He has one hand wrapped around another can, and one of his legs pulled up to his chest, leaning in the chair like he doesn’t know how to sit up straight. A shirt that’s too big on him hangs off his frame, a loose pair of joggers hug his ankles, a pair of mismatched socks on his feet.

He looks comfortable, relaxed. Like he hasn’t been missing for four months, four fucking months of bad dreams, four fucking months of sleepless nights, four fucking months of sinking hope circling the drain, and Jason almost wants to scream because he’s just sitting there, like nothing is wrong in the world.

Tim’s hand stills in the moment before he looks over, and at first his face is neutral when his eyes land on Jason. He sees the deep under-eye bags that he was expecting, the way his eyes are a little lidded, and he has to push down the urge to tell him to go the fuck to sleep. 

He also has to push down the urge to grab him and wrap his arms around him, to crush him to his chest and never let him go. 

They don’t do that. 

He clocks the moment Tim’s face stops going neutral, and his eyes go warm in that same way they did the other night. Tim grins a little, and Jason’s stomach flips, his chest aching.

“Oh, you’re back! I didn’t even hear you come in,” Tim says, laughing a little, and he moves like he’s going to turn back to his computer for a split second, before he tilts his head to the side, his gaze narrowing on Jason. “You good? You look like you’ve seen—” 

He cuts off as his eyes narrow in on the device in his hand, and then they go a little sharp. 

“Oh, shit,” he mutters, and this one sounds far more sincere than the one from the other day. The pen in his hand drops to the floor, the clatter of it hitting the hardwood echoing through the silent room.

“Tim?” Jason asks, and his voice is weak, it cracks again, because Tim is in front of him. 

Alive. 

The wrong age again, but still. 

He’s okay.

Jason found him.

“It’s me.” The words are certain, but there’s a look in Tim’s eyes like he’s bracing himself. 

“You’re okay,” Jason breathes, too high, wrong again, a film of desperation clinging to the words. 

Tim nods, and—

Jason strides over to him and Tim stands to meet him, reaching out to him before Jason realizes that’s what he was doing too.

He grabs Tim and yanks him to his chest like he was trying not to, because they weren’t there yet, but Tim responds like they’ve been there for a while. Tim slides his arms around Jason’s waist and tucks his head under his chin like it isn’t the first time he’s done it, and now he’s the two inches taller he needs to be to fit there perfectly. 

Tim’s breathing and he’s warm and he’s solid in Jason’s arms, and the ache in his chest bleeds into a desperation that radiates through every nerve in his body.

“I can’t believe you,” Jason says, but it’s too soft to be angry. He leans his cheek on Tim’s head, clutching him tight.

“I was always going to do it.” Tim’s voice is strong and sure, even with it muffled in his collar. His breath is warm even through the armor of his suit, and the desperation subsides just long enough for Jason to get angry.

“I can’t fucking believe you,” he repeats, and this time it’s not soft. His arms tighten around Tim even more, his fingers digging into him.

“I know. You’ve never stopped giving me shit for it. Well, technically, you’ll never stop giving me shit for it.”

“Damn right I won’t,” Jason grunts, ignoring the way that didn’t make sense. Tim laughs again, and it’s like hearing a song he’s been trying to remember the name of for years, relief and nostalgia and affection warring in his chest. “Come on, let’s go.”

Tim starts to pull away, but Jason isn’t ready to let him go just yet. He loosens his hold just enough for Tim to look up at him, and his chest seizes at the apologetic look he’s being given.

“No. No, I just found you. You have to come back with me,” Jason demands, trying to be firm instead of pleading, but he already knows he’s lost this battle.

“I can’t, Jase.” Tim’s mouth tugs to the side, like he wishes he didn’t have to say it.

“You have to. You’ve been missing for four months. Four months, Tim!” His hands tighten of their own accord, like they think clinging to him might change things.

“You’re late,” Tim says gently.

“What do you mean—” 

“I’m 22.” Tim smiles, something in his apologetic grin that looks like it’s trying not to be smug.

“What the fuck?” Jason blinks at him. “No you’re not, I’m 19, I’m three years older than you—”

“Here, you’re 24.” Tim makes a little considering face, tilting his head to the side as he adds, “—Ish. It’s sort of hard to give our exact ages now.”

And that confirms it for Jason. He probably should’ve figured it out sooner, but he can forgive himself for being a little distracted. 

“Time travel?” he asks tentatively.

“Time travel,” Tim sighs.

Jason groans, and Tim laughs in his arms. His anger dries up into frustration, and he loosens his hold just a little.

Tim is laughing in his arms. He’s alive. He’s okay. 

Or, he’s going to be okay. 

God, this is already fucking confusing. 

“You can’t just come back with me? Not even to tell everyone that you’re okay?” Jason pleads.

“Not even if I wanted to.” Tim draws a hand back from around Jason’s waist and tugs the device from his hand. He didn’t even realize he was pressing it against Tim’s skin. 

Jason almost lets him go, because now he’s realizing that they’ve been holding each other a bit too long to be considered just friendly, but Tim leaves his free arm around him, stepping to his side and pillowing his head on his shoulder. “It’s only good for one at a time, and I don’t have mine anymore.” 

His face is fond as he examines it, like it’s something he found buried in his closet. He flips the device in his hands, looking at the back and running his thumb over the etchings there. 

“What are those?” Jason asks.

“Directions. You’ve got to go find me. The right one, this time.”

Jason’s head is spinning. He hates time travel. 

Then Tim’s hand is on his face, resting on his cheek, feather light, and Jason closes his eyes. He can think about his disdain for time travel and the rest of the fucking universe later. 

Right now, Tim’s hand is soft and warm and gentle, cradling his face as if he’s earned an ounce of tenderness.

“You look like shit,” Tim sighs, like it could be funny, but isn’t.

Jason gives a self-deprecating laugh. “I know.” He squeezes his eyes shut harder for a moment, then opens them to look back at Tim. “Haven’t been sleeping much,” he shrugs.

“You’ve been looking for me.” The guilt is plain in Tim’s eyes.

“Of course,” Jason says, his voice going a little tight, a little hoarse. And he doesn’t know why the confession falls out of him now, but it does. “I’m always going to come for you.” 

But it doesn’t seem to be much of a confession, because Tim gives him a complicated smile. “I know.” 

Jason swallows hard, suddenly a little panicked at how much Tim seems to know about his feelings, and how very much on the same page he seems. 

“Find me,” Tim orders, and Jason wants to fight with him because he wants this to be over. He’s suffered enough over the past four months, and he’s found Tim, and why can’t this be it? 

But right now, he’d do anything any Tim asked of him, and he’s right anyways.

This Tim isn’t his Tim. 

“What do I do?” Jason asks, his voice tight with determination, and Tim gives him an approving look as he pulls away. 

“Well, first, I have something for you.” 

Jason’s hand resists letting him go, lingering on him as long as it can before he finally steps out of reach. He watches Tim walk into the bedroom until he disappears through the door, and then he actually takes a change to look around the apartment.

This is very obviously a place that Tim is living now. There are tech projects on every table and files all over the place, the recycling is full of takeout boxes and there are a few framed photos of him and his young justice crew on the bookshelves—

Next to a framed photo of Jason and the outlaws. The books filling the shelves are Jason’s. The kitchen is spotless, which is very unlike Tim, and the shoes by the door are lined up in a neat row, and are obviously in two different sizes and styles. The couch has a blanket folded up on it that Jason recognizes from his own apartment from his own time, and the plant in the corner is his, but about three times as big—

Tim walks back out of the bedroom, towards him, and Jason’s eyes fall on that too-big shirt he’s wearing, which reads I bite my thumb at thee, sir, and it’s faded and worn and looks about five years older than the one Tim gave to Jason for his birthday five months ago. 

“—a spare helmet, since I know you forgot yours, and field dressings and rations. I also packed you a book or two, since I know you’re going to get bored, and a chess board, since I’m going to get bored, ha ha, and— what?” Tim asks as he stops walking one step away from Jason, making a confused face at him. 

“You’re wearing my shirt,” Jason says stupidly. 

Tim’s face burns a little, like he’s been caught. 

“…sorry?” he says like a question, like he’s confused about what’s wrong with that. 

And it isn’t that there’s something wrong with it. It’s just—

“Are we—?” Jason can’t even get the question out. 

Tim’s face burns harder, the pink on his cheeks spreading across his whole face. Jason’s stomach squeezes tight with a lot of confusing feelings.

Tim shoves the backpack at Jason, flustered. “When you find me, do not let me have this. No matter what! I don’t get to touch this, I don’t get to hold this, nothing. If I need something, you will get it out for me. Okay?”

“Tim—” Jason has about a thousand questions he doesn’t know how to ask, but he doesn’t want to just let it go.

“—You need to focus. Listen to me. Don’t let me hold the bag. Ever.”

“Okay,” Jason says slowly, taking the bag this time as Tim pushes it at him again.

“I can touch anything in it, but the bag itself stays out of my hands.”

“Okay, but—”

“Jase. I’m not the one that you need to figure that out with,” Tim says, and his mouth is that thin apologetic line again, and that desperation that was hiding in Jason’s chest bursts back out again as Tim lifts the device and starts spinning the dial. 

“No, I’m not—

“It’s okay. It’s going to be okay. You’ll find me again.” Tim presses the device back into Jason’s hand.

“I’m not leaving you here!” Jason snaps, desperately. 

“Jase,” Tim sighs. “I’m not the one that needs this you, okay? He is.” Tim wraps both of his hands around Jason’s, dropping his eyes to the device.  

It’s not fair. He wants to stay here, where everything’s okay. Where he and Tim live together and Tim wears his shirts and looks at him openly, like he cares about him, like he—

But that’s not fair either. He hasn’t earned this. 

Yet.

“Okay,” Jason says, trying to swallow down his fear and frustration and everything else as he slings the backpack over one shoulder and plants his feet. 

And because he doesn’t think it’ll be rejected, he reaches a hand to Tim’s chin and tilts it up, looking him firmly in the eyes. 

“I’ll find you,” he promises. 

“I know.” Tim smiles softly, that warm, open look in his eyes as he squeezes Jason’s hand with both of his own. 

Then he slides his thumb over Jason’s and draws it to the dial, presses it down, and Tim begins to melt away. 

Chapter Text

Too-old Tim melts away, and then the rest of the apartment starts to slide and change until the room he’s standing in looks abandoned. Dirt and grime bubble up on the walls, dust collects on the desk once the papers and computer have dripped away, and the lights in the room dim until they go out with a pop. When it stops, he looks around the abandoned apartment with a sigh. 

Okay. 

He’s not going to find Tim here. 

Jason walks towards the door, the rotting floorboards creaking under his feet. When he grabs the handle, it slips open without him having to turn it, which makes his gut flutter with something uneasy. How long has it been since… 2017? 

He looks at the dial on the device to see if he can make any sense of it. The numbers go up to 100, and it’s stopped on 57 right now. It was stopped on 17 when he pressed it in his own time, but—

Oh. Tim had twisted it twice in his apartment. 

Easy enough to figure out. Idiot-proof, as Tim would say. 

2017- twenty, then seventeen. 2057- twenty, then fifty-seven. He might not be able to do exact dates, but he can definitely get himself to specific years.

Okay. That’s not the most comforting thought, but apparently this all sorts out by the time he’s 24, so— 

Maybe it’s better not to think about just how long he’s going to spend on this mission, because he's going to get Tim back.

No matter how long it takes.

He decides to head back to the first rooftop Tim got blasted onto. Maybe if Tim got sent straight to this time, he fell into the same place? Jason seems to stay in the same place even when he jumps to a new time, which might be a problem later, honestly. Shit, he hopes Tim packed him a few grapples—

Then he steps out onto the roof of his old apartment building and sees a body crumpled on the ground, and he stops thinking about anything at all.

And then Jason’s rushing over, his brain processing the black and red suit on the body he’s looking at before he manages to actually form any thoughts about it.

He drops to his knees, sliding the last inch to Tim’s side, and his hands fly up to his shoulders, somehow managing to be gentle as he rolls him to his back. 

Tim lets out a groan, his brows flexing in, and Jason has to hold back the relieved noise that wants to tear out of him.

Jason reaches for Tim’s domino, disarming it and peeling it off gently. His eyes flutter open, and Jason thinks the icy light blue of them might be his new favorite color.

“Tim?” he asks, the third time in the past three days to three different Tims, but thankfully, this time his voice doesn’t crack, even if it’s a little watery and thick.

“Jason?” Tim groans, his eyes finally fixing on him. “What are you doing here?” He shifts like he’s going to get up, but Jason’s presses a hand to his chest, holding him to the ground just in case he’s injured.

“Tim.” 

Jason’s voice is all relief. 

He did it. He actually did it. 

He found him, the right him, he’s okay, he’s okay, he’s okay-

Then, between one second and the next, Tim is out of his arms, a batarang in one hand and his bo-staff in the other, three feet away. 

“Identify yourself,” he snarls. 

The irritated thing in Jason’s chest rises. Definitely the right Tim, if he’s getting on his nerves this quickly. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

“Do I sound like I’m joking? Identify yourself!” Tim snaps.

“Red fucking Hood! I think that’s pretty obvious!” 

“I’m not asking again!” Tim pulls the hand with the batarang back, ready to throw it.

“RH0-1627! You know, the one you shoved out of the way of a fucking beam of magic before you went missing for four months?” 

Tim’s body stiffens out of his defensive pose, his arm dropping to his side slowly. 

“Four months?” he asks, his voice tight. “No, I- it was last week, I- it’s only been a week.” 

He sounds a little shell shocked, and Jesus, he’s an asshole for dropping that on Tim, isn’t he. 

Before Jason can think any more about it, he’s across the rooftop and he’s clutching him tight, blinking against the stinging in his eyes. 

“What— what are you doing?” Tim asks, stiffening in his arms.

“I’m fucking hugging you, okay?” Jason snaps at him, cradling the back of Tim’s head and pulling him against his chest. 

Tim doesn’t loosen up right away, but after a few moments, he sags, tentatively turning his face so his cheek is resting on Jason’s chest instead of his nose smashing into it. Hesitantly, he clicks the bo-staff closed and tucks that and the batarang away, before he lifts his arms and winds them around Jason’s waist, his palms sliding to lay flat on his back.

“I don’t remember this being something we do,” Tim mutters.

“It wasn’t,” Jason says hoarsely. 

It wasn’t, because he’d been stupid, hadn’t pushed, hadn’t reached. 

He’s not going to repeat that mistake.

“…is it something we do now?” Tim asks, something hopeful staining his voice. 

“Yes,” Jason tells him firmly, his arms tightening a fraction around him, his fingers digging into Tim’s ribs, his hair.

They stay like that for a while, until Jason manages to blink back the tears in his eyes as his heart starts to slow to a normal pace, the adrenaline flooding back out of his system. 

His fingers loosen enough that Tim tries to pull back, but Jason isn’t ready to let him go yet, so he doesn’t.

Tim sighs when Jason won’t release him, dragging him down so they can sit on the rooftop. He shifts around so he’s leaning against Jason’s chest, worming his way to sit between Jason’s legs, curling himself in the space there and pulling Jason’s arms into a more comfortable position around him. 

“How did you find me?” Tim asks.

Jason scoffs, “You sent me here.” 

“No I didn’t.” 

Jason can picture the confused frown Tim’s making, the way his lips purse as he thinks. 

“You haven’t done it yet,” he mutters. “You will, though.”

“I hate time travel,” Tim groans.

“Really? Thought you’d love it, you little nerd,” he huffs, smiling a little, but the comment doesn’t sound as much like a tease as he wants, too fond.

“Not when it happens to me,” Tim bites back, but it doesn’t have any teeth.

“Then why did you push me out of the way?” Jason asks, his voice starting to harden as his anger rises back up.

“What was I supposed to do, let you get shot by the magic beam?” Tim scoffs.

“If the alternative was you getting shot by the magic beam, then yes!” Jason snaps.

“Oh, please, you would’ve done the same thing.” 

“And you would be as pissed as I am!” 

“Yeah. I would be,” Tim sighs, adjusting a little so Jason’s arm is wrapped more heavily around his shoulder. “When are we?” 

“2057,” Jason grumbles in a heavy sigh, and Tim snickers, each of them feeling the motion through the other’s chest. 

“Can you move?” 

“Of course—” 

“Through time,” Tim corrects. 

“Oh. Yeah.” Jason pulls out the device and shows it to Tim, who sits up a little straighter, pulling away from Jason’s chest an inch. Jason forces himself not to lean forward with him.

Tim examines the device, grabbing Jason’s hand by the wrist and turning it so he can see the back. The touch makes Jason’s skin tingle. After a moment, Tim pulls out a device that looks exactly the same at first glance—

Before he realizes it isn’t the same. It’s… newer. 

There are no dings, or scuffs. The metal is shinier, and the bottom of the front panel doesn’t have anything etched into it, and neither does the back when Tim turns it over.

“Huh,” Tim says, his head tilting to the side as he examines them. 

“Makes sense, actually. I think this one was… future you’s. Where did you get it?” 

“I stole it,” Tim says nonchalantly, and Jason snickers. When Tim shoots him a glance, the mischievous curl of his lip is the best thing Jason’s ever seen. “What?” 

“I missed you,” Jason admits before his brain can catch up with his mouth, and something in Tim’s eyes seize, his pupils dilating with something… almost afraid. 

Jason frowns a little at it. 

He’s being too forward. His fingers loosen a fraction around Tim’s shoulder, like maybe he’s ready to let him go, but Tim leans back into the touch, his hands slipping up to Jason’s face. He peels off his domino gently, taking in a sharp breath when it’s off. 

“I know, I know,” Jason says, looking away with a self-deprecating smile that doesn’t meet his eyes.

“Jesus, Jason,” Tim breathes out. His fingers trace down his jaw. “You look like shit.”

Jason lets out a sardonic laugh. “You already said that, too.”

“When was the last time you slept?” Tim asks, ignoring the comment.

“Few nights ago,” Jason shrugs, and Tim’s eyes skitter down his jaw, down his form. He knows his jacket is a little looser these days, he’s lost some of the padding of fat around his thick muscles, his uniform pants don’t hug his thighs quite as tightly as they used to.

“When was the last time you slept well?” Tim asks, and his eyes are skating around Jason’s eyes, taking in the deep bags under them that rival Tim’s, the purple bruised color that never seems to go away. 

“September,” Jason confesses. He balls his free hand into a fist around the device so he won’t put it back on Tim. “I thought you were dead.” 

Tim doesn’t quite know what to say to that, and when Jason’s eyes flicker back over to him, his throat is working, something deeply upset in his eyes as they track over Jason’s form again, taking in the physical toll of his mental state. 

“I’m not—” Tim starts.

“—I thought you were!” Jason snaps, the hand still on his shoulder digging in.

“I’m not,” Tim says, a little more firmly, a little harsh, and the tone grounds him instead of setting him off, for some reason. 

Tim leans in again, winding his arms back around Jason, holding him close. “You found me. I’m okay.” 

Jason’s throat closes on the words he wants to snap, his eyes stinging again, and he desperately wishes he wasn’t a mess right now.

But Tim’s holding him tight, rubbing a hand up and down the center of his back, like he thinks it’s okay to be a mess right now.

“Come on, let’s get inside. You need sleep.” 

“Building’s abandoned,” Jason manages to squeeze out. 

“I don’t want to be on the roof anymore,” Tim says, and Jason doesn’t believe him, he knows it's a lie, but he caves anyways, because he’ll do anything Tim asks right now.

Tim rises first, helping Jason up like he needs it, which he doesn’t, for the record. 

But he lets Tim do it because it means his hands stay on him. Tim lays a hand between his shoulders the whole walk back into the safehouse with the broken door. He makes Jason help him shove the rotting desk up against it, then drags him through the apartment to the bedroom. 

His hands press into Jason’s shoulders as he pushes him to sit on the edge of the mattress, and dust shoots up from the grimy, moth bitten covers as he drops onto it. 

Tim wrinkles his nose at it and makes Jason stand up again, finding them a corner of the floor that doesn’t have as much dust in it. He gets down on the ground and pats the space next to him for Jason to join him, smirking a little when he hesitates. 

“Do you think I don’t remember what it was like the last time everyone thought I was dead? I didn’t sleep alone for like, two months. I’d wake up next to Dick, or Kon, or Bart, or Cassie, or Steph, or Cass, or-”

“Alright, alright, I get it, you’re popular.” Jason grumbles, mostly so Tim won’t think he’s as pathetic as he really is. He tries not to let his gut sink at the thought of all the people who still think he’s dead as he drops the backpack in the corner and sinks to the ground next to Tim.

Tim snorts. “I even woke up next to Damian once. It’s fine.” He arranges himself next to Jason, tucking himself under Jason’s arm and sliding his hand around Jason’s waist before draping his cape over the both of them. It’s warm and heavy and familiar, and it soothes something in Jason’s chest as they wrap up together.

He takes a long while to settle down, and he thinks Tim does too, but neither of them exchange any more words. Tim just lets Jason hold onto him and listen to the rise and fall of his chest, to feel his heart beating against his side. Jason's brain isn't working right, too many disconnected thoughts rolling through his mind, but he decides none of them matter as much as having Tim in his arms, alive and okay.

Eventually, he must fall asleep, because he wakes up on the rotten floor of the safehouse, daylight pouring in through the cracks in the boarded up windows.

The empty space on the floor next to him is cold. 

Shit.