Chapter Text
Tim’s POV
Tim and Bruce started to work on their project of cleaning up Arkham. It didn’t take much for them to use Drake Industries to buy out Arkham Asylum and own it as a subsidiary of DI.
A week into their complete overhaul of Arkham as a whole, they were interrupted by an escape. No one too bad, none of the truly heavy hitters like Joker or Dr. Freeze. But several minor villains escaped and needed to be captured. Meaning an all hands on deck situation. So, for the first time since he had gotten home, Tim was in his Red Robin suit, on his own motorcycle flying down the streets of Gotham as he chased one of the villains down.
“Red, how’s it looking?” Batman’s signature growl came over Tim’s comm as he raced down the street.
“He’s fast but I’m faster.” Tim slammed his fist into a button on his motorcycle and the bike started driving itself as he pulled out his slingshot. He lined up his shot and let it loose then watched as the explosive round made contact and exploded into adhesive. The villain stopped as he was glued to the sidewalk.
Tim stopped his bike, hopped off and ran over to the villain so he could cuff him. As he pulled out the adhesive solvent, Nightwing and Red Hood dropped down next to him.
“Hell yeah, Little bird. First catch being back.” Jason smiled behind his helmet and clapped Tim on the back in congratulations.
“Good to see you back, Red. When the others said you were gone for personal reasons, a bunch of us got worried.” One of the officers smiled as they took the villain from Tim.
Tim smiled brighter than he had in a while. “Thanks. It feels good to be back.” He waved at the two officers then turned to Dick and Jason. “Was he the last one?”
“Yeah. Let’s head back to the Cave.” Dick winked as he aimed his grapple up toward the roof.
“I actually have something I want to grab from my nest but I will meet you guys at the cave.” Tim headed over to his bike.
“Are you sure, Red? Someone can go with you.” Jason asked, clearly concerned, fingers twitching at his sides. “You haven’t been back since..” He cut himself off, tone unsure.
Tim took a deep breath and waved his hand dismissively towards Jason. “I’ll be okay. If I need help I’ll call someone.”
Dick and Jason looked at each other then back at Tim and nodded, a bit hesitant. “Right.”
It was obvious that Tim wanted to go alone, so the older two took off as Tim got back on his motorcycle before riding off in the direction of his apartment where the Robin’s Nest was.
When he got there, he snuck into the building from the roof, slipping on a hoodie and sweatpants over his Red Robin suit in a blind spot in the security cameras on the way to his apartment. He pulled off his mask just before rounding the corner out of the blind spot and into the hall his apartment was in. Standing in front of his apartment door was his neighbor so he quickly slipped his domino mask into the pocket of his hoodie. “Can I help you..?”
The man turned around and spotted Tim. “Ah. So you are back.” He smiled and held out his hand. “I’m your neighbor. I don’t know if you remember me.”
Tim looked at his hand and flexed his own hand remembering his gauntlet was still on and politely declined to shake his hand. “I do... Is there something I can help you with?”
His neighbor looked around as if to make sure they really were alone then looked at Tim. “I heard the reason you’ve been gone was because you were in rehab or something?”
Tim felt his heart sink and felt sort of nauseous. “Excuse me..?”
“No, no judgment kid. I mean. Who hasn’t been to rehab living in Gotham, right?” The man was clearly trying to work his way into asking him something.
“Not that it’s really any of your business but I didn’t go to rehab, I went to a psych ward. If the only reason you’ve been standing here is to insult me and ask me for drugs, then you’ve severely misjudged this situation and my willingness to hand out drugs to people I barely know. If you’ll excuse me, I have to grab something and go back to my father’s house.” Tim pushed past his neighbor and unlocked his apartment door. When he opened it, the man behind him pushed him inside and followed him in.
The man pushed the door closed, but not quite enough, causing the door to be slightly ajar when Tim turned around to face the man. “You misunderstand me, kid.” The man pulled out a knife, malicious smile dancing on his lips. “This wasn’t me asking.”
Tim watched him and just sighed in frustration. “Dude. The pills I took weren’t even here. I stole them from someone.”
“Do you think I’m stupid or something, kid..?” The man lifted the knife to Tim’s throat. “You’re a Drake. Your family’s company deals in medical technology. You have connections.”
Tim looked at the knife unimpressed. “Really..?” His eyes flicked up from the knife when movement caught his attention behind the man and out the door for a fraction of a second before they settled back on the man. “Oh… for your sake, I hope you don’t have a silent heart condition.”
“Wha..?” Was all the man was able to get out before being tased by the end of one of Nightwing’s escrima sticks.
Tim kicked the knife away from the man, then huffed softly and glared at Dick, crossing his arms. “Really? You guys couldn’t just let me come alone.”
“Babs said that she’s been keeping an eye on your apartment. As soon as we said we were on our way back to the cave and you would meet us there after visiting the Nest, she said someone sketchy was hanging around your door.” Dick said, holding his hands up in surrender. His eyes checked over Tim’s body for injuries.
Tim sighed softly. “Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Close the door and come in then. I know you’re not going to leave until I do now..” He turned and walked further into the apartment. As he heard the door close behind Dick, he moved a bookcase, opened a door that the bookcase had been hiding and flicked a light on.
Tim braced himself as he walked in and heard Dick follow him, knowing he would get Dick’s sad puppy dog eyes. He took a deep breath as he got to the computer, he just knew that Dick stopped in the doorway and was looking around at the mess.
——
Dick’s POV
Dick followed Tim inside the room quietly and stood in the doorway. The room was dimly lit and had a computer that he thought must rival the Batcomputer. As he looked around he noticed it was really messy in there. Discarded coffee cups and energy drink cans, case files scattered across the desk and floor.
Finally his attention shifted back to Tim sitting at the computer. He watched him make sure everything was up and running properly. “Just get on with it, Dick.. I know you’re going to say something about the mess..”
“I wasn’t going to say anything.” Dick winced as his voice came out strained because he absolutely was going to say something. “Is this.. before you left.. you spent a lot of time here..?”
“Well you guys weren’t letting me use the Batcomputer because I was ‘obsessing over something impossible.’” Tim said quietly, then sighed in defeat because he wasn’t even mad at them anymore. He realized while he was in the facility that from their perspective he must have looked like he was losing his mind, no matter how correct he was in the end.
“Tim..” Dick said quietly, his voice thick with emotions. “I’m so..”
Tim waved his hand dismissively and went back to what he was doing. “Don’t be. I.. I can’t say I’m over it because I’m not. It hurt that you all treated me like I was insane but talking with the counselor, I realized that from your perspective I probably came off as insane. I was off my meds. I was consuming copious amounts of caffeine..” he finished what he was doing and pulled out a USB drive from the computer. “We can head back to the Cave. I’m done.
Dick nodded and went to the guy he tased and dragged him into the hallway and over in front of his door. “O..” he said into his comm.
“Already scrubbing the security feed.” Barbra’s voice sounded over the comms. “Is he okay..?”
“He’s fine. Hey… Do you think the girls would want to help him clean up..? His apartment is.. and the Nest..” Dick asked quietly into his comm as he waited for Tim to lock his apartment back up. “I think it’s making him feel like he failed somehow.”
“I’ll ask them. We'll talk about it later. Hurry back to the Cave.” Babs said as she typed on her computer.
“Right.” Dick smiled softly and headed up to the roof with Tim.
——
Jay’s POV
Jason looked up when he heard the familiar sound of Dick and Tim’s motorcycles pull into the Cave. Slipping a bookmark into his book he sat it down and headed over to greet them as they walked up to the Batcomputer. The first thing Jason noticed was the usb flash drive in Tim’s hand as he walked up.
“What’s that?” Jason asked, eyeing the drive as Tim plugged it into the Batcomputer and Dick walked off to go shower the night off of him.
“My mission reports on getting B back.” Tim said simply as he shooed Jason away to log into the computer and pull up the files.
“You did the whole report?” Jason asked, giving Tim a skeptical look.
“Several actually. Everytime I hit a dead end I would start anew.” Tim finished and all at once all the screens of the computer were filled with mission report after mission report.
“Holy shit, Timmy” Jason said in disbelief as he looked at all the files.
“Every case I worked while B was gone, every mission report, every crime scene photo I took.” Tim clicked on the last one to be updated before quickly switching back out of it with a slightly panicked look. “Actually that one isn’t done. Maybe don’t look at that one yet..” he swallowed thickly then cleared his throat awkwardly. “Let me um.. let me finish it first.”
Jason looked at Tim then at the computer screen then back at Tim with a suspicious look. “What does it say, Tim?”
Tim shuffled nervously, eyes fixed on the stone floor of the Batcave. “It’s nothing. It doesn’t matter.”
“It can’t be nothing and not matter.” Jason pointed out simply. “What does it say..?” His voice was firm but not aggressive.
Tim opened his mouth, then closed it as he looked up from the floor to meet Jason’s intense gaze, which he had to immediately look back away from. “Please..” his voice was barely above a whisper as he tried to plead silently for Jason to stop asking questions he didn’t want the answers to. “Please just drop it.”
Jason started to understand what must be in the file. “Is it.. what I think it is?”
Tim looked back up to search Jason’s eyes for a moment before nodding. “Yes..” again his voice barely audible, only barely louder than the sound of his shaky breathing. Suddenly Tim was wrapped in Jason’s arms tightly and he tensed for a moment before melting into the hug and hiding his face in his big brother’s shoulder as his arms came up to wrap tightly around Jason and his gloved hands gripped the back of Jason’s jacket tightly. “I’m sorry.. I’m sorry..”
Jason shook his head. “Don’t apologize. You have nothing to be sorry for.” Jason was-is-a good person. Deep down, under the heaping mountains of trauma that surrounded him in a thick layer of defensive rage, he was a kind and caring person. He made mistakes, mistakes he would never be able to make up for in a million years, mistakes that he would never feel truly worthy of being forgiven for, but he would be damned, dead in his grave again before he let Tim feel he needed to apologize for having a suicide note in a file he knew his family would eventually read after they found him dead in his apartment.
Jason pulled away from the hug and had Tim sit down. “Tell me what your thought process was.” he was determined to recognize the patterns if this ever happened again.
Tim looked at him skeptically for a moment but when he saw the sincerity in Jason’s expression he nodded slightly and started explaining his downward spiral to him. It wasn’t pretty and Jason hated most of what he heard. But he was grateful that Tim willingly shared it, told him what his signs were, what his triggers were, what usually helped him the most. And that was enough.