Archive of Our Own

Exhaustion was something that Bruce hardly felt these days. Not because he wasn't tired, but because he'd long ago trained himself to ignore the heaviness of his limbs, the feel of sandpaper in his eyes, and the glimpses of hallucinations teasing him from the corner of his vision. Usually, unless Alfred was haranguing him for not sleeping often enough for long enough, he didn't even realize he was beyond tired.

Except for those rare occasions when time slowed down for a moment and he wasn't juggling a hundred end-of-the-world scenarios simultaneously. Of course, the world hadn't truly been ending a little over a year ago just because Red Robin had perished gloriously. Even Gotham had endured, thanks to Red Robin's sacrifice. But Bruce's world… sure. He'd lost another Robin despite his best efforts, and it had felt like the universe that he centered had been rocked to the core once again.

Bruce found himself, exhausted, in a moment just like that as the electric blue portal fizzled out of existence, taking with it more proof of his failure as a mentor, protector, guardian… father.

"The boy is Timothy Jackson Drake. I'm his…" father-- "legal guardian."

He wasn't Tim's father. Jack Drake was still alive, somewhere in protective custody with his wife. Bruce often felt paternal pride for the young man he had legal guardianship over, but he'd classified that as the same feelings he had for Barbara and Stephanie when they succeeded. So why it had felt so right to think of Tim as his son as if he actually were the boy's father by law and Jack Drake didn't exist, baffled him. Even more odd, the feeling remained. His confusion was compounded by Tim's confession that he supposedly had a friend whom he knew in his heart but not in his mind. Was there a version of Bruce's world where Tim really was his? Was it the same world with the young man named Conner? Why was he being bombarded with half-memories and an irrational sense of loss?

Bruce shook his head slightly to push away the confusing thoughts and feelings. The bone-weary exhaustion that he'd forgotten about in the instant that Red Robin's distress signal had lit up the Batcomputer after a year of silence, crept up on him with all of the stealth of a speeding train. As he propped himself against the wall of the cave, he missed the adrenaline that had sustained him as he tracked down his lost Robin in the Gotham General Hospital emergency room and then faced the threat generated by his own misappropriated computer software.

Across the humid space, the sixteen (seventeen?!)-year-old in question let out his own tired sigh and slouched, bracing his hands on his knees. Tim only had a split second to try to catch his breath before he was grabbed from behind into a crushing hug. Tim's startled squawk was loud and clear. His subsequent protests were muffled in Nightwing's shoulder after the older vigilante released him, spun him around, and then hugged him properly from the front.

There hadn't been time earlier for the other three Robins to properly greet their long-lost brother-- teammate, thanks to the dark Batman that claimed to be from the end of the world that wasn't set quite far enough in the future for Bruce's comfort. Now, Damian and Jason stayed close, though they each gave Dick his time and space to react to Tim's sudden reappearance.

"You should get some sleep," came a female voice that sounded as tired as Bruce felt. He turned his head just far enough to catch Batwoman in his peripheral vision.

"You too, Kate," he said gruffly. She put a hand on his arm and gently but firmly pulled him toward the changing area of the Batcave which had miraculously survived their run-in with the future. He let himself be dragged away, his newly acknowledged exhaustion making him more compliant than was his norm. Besides, he'd failed to rescue his young partner and thereby avoid the mess that had followed Tim home. He didn't deserve the teenager's attention right then.

Bruce still felt exhausted when he woke up in the middle of the night after dreaming about staring down the barrel of the gun that had been used to murder his parents so many years ago. He hadn't meant to fall asleep at all, and he certainly hadn't been in the master bedroom suite of Wayne Manor before doing so. He blamed Dick and Jason (and no doubt Alfred's prodding) for his current situation. Still, the sleep had helped a tiny bit, though leaving it allowed the anxiety he'd felt since learning that Tim had been kidnapped and not murdered to fill him again.

"I've lost too much time already, Alfred."

"All this time he's been out there, lost and trapped, knowing that at the end of the day, his mentor was one of the greatest detectives on the planet. He would know that I was coming. But I wasn't. Dammit. I wasn't."

Bruce rose somewhat gracefully from his wide, lonely bed, and sought his dressing gown. He was achy from fighting the physical manifestation of one of his greatest failures, and from days without sleep as he searched for his missing Robin. It was a good thing that he was just as apt at ignoring such pains as he was at ignoring his fatigue. After donning his slippers, he trekked through his bedroom and its antechamber to the wide hallway. He then headed unerringly toward the grouping of doors where his sons… protégés had bedrooms. The second on the left belonged to Tim.

"I would go to the only place that ever felt like home."

Bruce hadn't given the comment much thought past agreeing that it was the best place to start looking for his dangerous alter-ego. Wayne Manor. It had felt right for the boy to call Bruce's ancestral property "home," despite the fact that sixteen year old Timothy Drake had been the apple of his parents' eyes and enjoyed their doting love in every aspect of his life until he'd tempted the Penguin to target them in a ruse to gain Batman's attention.

… Right?

He had stopped outside of the closed door to Tim's room in Wayne Manor when his puzzlement had brought him up short. What was this strange sense that the Drakes he knew now weren't the ones that his child-- ward was subconsciously remembering?

A faint sound from inside the room freed Bruce from his musings. The weary Batman let himself into the room silently and gave his swollen eyes a few seconds to adjust to the dimness after the brighter lights of the hallway. He immediately looked toward the bed. There hadn't been a lump under the thick duvet in over a year. That the hidden figure creating the bump under the covers was curled up so tightly was also new. Bruce moved to stand beside the bed and peered down at the teenager, looking for further signs of distress. Tim's brow was furrowed in sleep, and the thumb of his right hand pressed against bandages over the fresh knife wound in his lower left arm.

Bruce pulled the chilled fingers away from the white wrapping before Tim could unintentionally cause it to bleed again. The action woke his charge, who came to with a startled gasp. Bruce was fast enough to prevent the boy from hurting either of them, and the teenager calmed down immediately after Bruce whispered his identity into Tim's ear.

"What… what's wrong, Bruce?" he asked sleepily, as if he were about to nod off again despite the way that Bruce could feel Tim's heart racing through the thin material of his tee-shirt as the older man steadied him with a hand on his back.

Everything. "Nothing," Bruce replied.

"Is Kate--"

"She's fine. We're all fine." He gave in to his legs' aching to sit at the edge of the mattress. He moved his hand from Tim's back to wrap his arm around the teenager - in order to help with balancing as the mattress dipped toward the floor thanks to his substantial bulk compared to the boy's, of course. To his surprise, Tim relaxed into him, using the side of Bruce's neck as a place to prop his cool forehead and freeing his right hand from Bruce's restraining grasp to complete the hug with an arm around Bruce's waist.

"I knew you'd find me," Tim mumbled into the terry cloth covering Bruce's chest.

Bruce's battered heart skipped a few painful beats at the quiet admission. He closed his eyes tightly to stop the sting of tears and hoped that Tim didn't notice his painful swallow.

"But I wasn't. Dammit. I wasn't."

"I didn't," Bruce admitted, hating this particular failure more than most of those he shamefully claimed. He rarely felt the need to apologize or explain himself, and when the mood struck him, he didn't. Now, however, he couldn't stop the words from pouring out. "But I looked for you, Timmy-- Tim. I ran every test, double-checked every variable, until I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that you were gone. That you weren't going to come back like Jason, or Damian. And then I tried to be better. Stronger. I wouldn't let this happen again." His voice cracked. Dammit.

"I know," Tim said. "Mr. Oz-- Jor-El showed me."

A flare of anger helped Bruce burn off a fraction of his self-loathing and guilt. "I am never going to forgive that goody-two-shoes boy scout for his father taking you from me," he growled in his Batman voice.

"I'm pretty sure that Superman is pissed at him as well," Tim said, always in defense of one of his heroes. "The point is - I know that you were looking for me, and pushing yourself too hard in the process. And you were there at the hospital, mere minutes after I ended up back in Gotham. Corny Bond impression and all."

"It shouldn't have taken me a year," Bruce said, unwilling to forgive himself either. Superman was in good company. "I should have known without the help of a stupid magical orb. I should have torn apart time and space to find you."

You've done it for me.

The random, unfounded thought took Bruce by surprise. He had never been lost in time, or space…

Tim spoke again. "You were there, Bruce, when I needed you the most."

Bruce disagreed, though he kept that to himself. Tim had needed him the most when he'd faced down a fleet of drones by himself. Bruce wasn't there when Tim had been snatched out of time and space.

A shudder that felt like a sob shook the teenager's frame, snapping Bruce's mind back to the present. "I don't blame you for not finding me right away," Tim said earnestly and tearfully. "Once I knew how I was being held, I didn't expect you to find me for a very long time without an actual clue. I tried to give you that, but he intercepted it."

"He is gone, and he will never exist in this world again," Bruce promised, recalling the way Tim had been worrying the gash in his arm as he suffered a nightmare. He was certain that he would be revisiting this conversation before long, both to keep Tim's guilt and uncertainty from eating him alive and to learn what Batman could do to eliminate the chance of this promising genius ever having to bear the weight of Bruce's cowl.

He gave the boy some time to regain his composure. Tim didn't take much. "There was no time at the hospital to tell you this, Bruce," Tim said, his voice still shaky. "But I'm so glad you were there when I woke up. I missed you while I was away."

"So I am," said Bruce. He cupped the back of Tim's head with his free hand and squeezed the boy as tightly as he dared. "So did I."

"I love you, Bruce." Dad.

"I… love you too, kiddo." Son.

Tim finally pulled away and Bruce reluctantly let him go. He felt like he still hadn't had enough time with the newly found Robin, but he refused to overstay his welcome. He made to rise to his feet as the no-doubt worn out teenager shifted to find a comfortable position in the bed he hadn't used in such a long time. He was halfway off the mattress when an anxious admonishment froze him in place. "Don't… please."

Bruce hadn't curled up with one of his Robins since Dick had forced himself into Bruce's bed after dreaming about his parents' deaths at the tender age of twelve. "Okay," he soothed. He did finish rising in order to shed his housecoat and slippers. Tim pressed himself against the wall at the far side of his bed, leaving plenty of room for the much larger man to lie down. As soon as Bruce had awkwardly settled onto the cool mattress, he had his arms full of shivering teenager.

"I'm sorry, I just… I was alone for so long…"

"It's okay," Bruce repeated as he adjusted them both to be more comfortable. Tim's chilled fingers idly rubbed the backs of Bruce's scarred knuckles where the older man's hand rested over his heart. A quiet snort of tempered amusement prompted Bruce to ask curiously, "What are you thinking about?"

"I have this weird feeling that it's usually Dick who loves to cuddle, even though we're not as close as I once hoped to be." He was silent for a minute. "I'm so confused. Things feel… wrong with him and Jason, and even Damian. And then there's this Conner that I can't remember no matter how hard I try."

"We'll figure it out," Bruce replied. His eldest son-- partner did have his moments of extreme cuddliness, but these days those were usually reserved for Damian and he didn't really recall Dick being that close to either Jason or Tim. Of course Dick cared about the younger men who'd adopted his mantle, but Tim's words triggered in Bruce the sense that his boys' relationships should have been deeper. Especially Dick and Tim.

Tim wiggled briefly, wedging himself further into Bruce's warmth. "What would make the most sense is to find Stephanie - for whom, by the way, you still owe me an explanation - but right now, you're the one I want. You feel the most like home."

Bruce refused to let himself sniffle, or swallow too hard. Instead, he curled his fingers in the soft material of Tim's tee-shirt before relaxing them and the rest of his tense frame. "You are home, little boy, and I'm never losing you again." Tim's muted sound of contentment gave the older man enough peace to try sleeping himself. Bruce closed his eyes and matched his breathing to Tim's inhales and exhales as they evened out.

Bruce knew himself well enough to surmise that he'd probably never forgive himself fully for leaving his son-- partner in the clutches of a mad alien for over a year. For now, having what sounded like Tim's forgiveness and the teenager's slowly warming body in his arms was all he needed at the moment. Well, that and a few hours of sleep. Because when he woke up again, there was going to be hell for an un-dead alien to pay and lost memories to put back in their rightful places. He was going to need his energy.