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Tim stumbled into his apartment. His clothing was rumpled and slightly musty, but that was to be expected after 52 hours in the office with only a 20-minute nap halfway through.
He was supposed to patrol in about half an hour. He tried not to think about the tension headache forming. He really, really did not want to go today. They were busting a weapons smuggling ring that seemed to have gotten its grubby little mitts on some highly experimental, hi-tech weapons. Tim was actually somewhat annoyed about this case. He has yet to figure out exactly what the smuggled weapons do. There was no information kept digitally, or at least none that he could reach. Perhaps an offline device was used for information storage…
Tim started pulling off his suit and doing some quick warm up stretches, shaking out his hands to get rid of any remaining tension.
A few minutes later, Red Robin hit the streets.
He heard his bro—… his coworkers bantering over the comms as he grappled towards their planned meeting point, ignoring the embers of want and subsequent stomping out of those embers. He already knew he was a product of practicality, only here to fill a need. Although at this point, he significantly doubted whether he was still even doing that properly.
He tuned back in to the comms just in time to hear Damia— Robin— complaining about the fact that Red Robin was late.
“Tt. Of course Drake is late again. First he has us work off of his incomplete and probably faulty information and now he cannot even be bothered to arrive on time to his own bust. Typical.”
Instead of correcting Damian’s mistake of using names in the field or defending Tim, Nightwing just sighs.
“He does seem to be late. Hey, Red Robin, what’s the holdup?” he asks over comms.
It’s at that moment Red Robin lands next to them on the rooftop.
“Had an important piece of work to finish at WE.” he said by way of explanation. “I’m sorry for being late.”
He was, in fact, not actually late. He was just in the nick of time, but he knew apologizing would make people less likely to act on their anger towards him.
(It never really worked with his parents, though.)
He heard Hood’s mechanical-sounding chuckle over the comms, but that was all he got from his wayward older b— colleague. Predecessor.
The one he replaced.
Jason was the only one Tim ever really spoke to nowadays, even though it was always somewhat stilted. There was still the occasional riffing about Tim being a Replacement, Pretender, but not nearly as bad as it used to be, and never accompanied by violence nowadays.
Nightwing he just never talked to outside of the cape business, and then sparingly too. After a few half-hearted attempts at reconnecting after Nightwing’s betrayal, he had stopped trying. He hadn’t referred to his oldest peer as anything besides Nightwing since then.
He avoided the new Robin like the plague. He wasn’t a masochist.
Batman… Tim doubted Batman—Bruce— even remembered he was alive. The man hadn’t answered any of his texts in about four months… actually, at this point it’s closer to a year, since Bruce hadn’t responded since before he got lost in time. Huh.
Tim shook his head slightly to shake off the slight daze of sleep deprivation when he heard Batman’s voice over the comms.
“—the plan for tonight, any questions?”
Tim blanched. He’d missed the entire plan.
“C-can you go over my part again?” he asked quietly, answered by a chorus of sighs crackling through their comms.”
Batman’s growl sounded a little deeper as he explained Red Robin’s role again.
“You are to remain on standby while Nightwing, Red Hood and Robin take on the enemies and create a distraction while I scan and either take or destroy the weaponry. See where you are most needed.”
What the hell am I doing here? Tim thought, but outwardly he confirmed his instructions and took his position.
He heard a snicker from where Robin was. “Useless as ever, Drake.”
“Names…” Tim responded quietly. Not for the first time, he glanced at the WE building, and subconsciously started doing the math for how long it would take for a body to fall from the roof to hit the ground.
He was pulled out of his reverie when his colleagues jumped off the roof and into the fray.
Red Robin quickly made his way into the warehouse where the bust was taking place, sticking to the rafters to have a bird’s eye view. The other vigilantes seemed to have absolutely no issues with the fight, taking out guys left and right, dodging their shots and retaliating swiftly.
Nightwing threw out cheerful banter, Robin was eerily silent and Red Hood mocked anyone who went down by his hand.
Batman snuck up to the table that held most of the weaponry, making scans and muttering softly to Bar— Oracle over the comms. They were trying to figure out what these things even did.
Red Robin, being the only one with a good view of the whole place, suddenly stiffened. One of the goons that had fallen behind a crate when knocked away by one of his b- colleagues… had gotten back up and was now aiming a funky-looking gun straight at Batman.
The next few moments seemed to be playing in slo-mo.
Red Robin… no, Timothy Jackson Drake’s only real purpose in life had been to protect and help the Waynes, the Bat Family, even if he was never part of that family. He had seen what happened the first time its Patriarch was lost. He could not let that happen again.
Within less than a second, Red Robin was launching himself at the shooter, shouting to get his attention. The shooter flinched and when Red Robin suddenly filled his vision, fired the weapon.
Red Robin felt an impact in his chest and the crunching of ribs, and a moment of feeling like his brain was on literal fire before everything went black.