Chapter Text
Tim has many regrets. Accidentally selling a working alien gun to Lex Luthor, challenging Bart and Kon to a hot dog eating contest, calling Rose’s father an ephebophile to her face—all things he would do differently if given the chance.
What he doesn’t regret is pissing off the most dangerous man alive in order to keep Dick Grayson’s shiny butt safe. For all the grief he gives him, Tim genuinely loves and adores Dick; he’s the older brother Tim’s always dreamed about. Little Tim even made flowcharts on how to get adopted by Bruce Wayne to make it official.
Father-slash-mentor figure or not, Deathstroke will not touch Dick Grayson. Unfortunately, he also will not suffer his defeat and subsequent undesired trip to Norway without taking vengeance.
To keep from having to drink through a drip in a full body cast, Tim comes up with Plans A-J. Plan A is to hunker down in the Batcave for war; Plan J is fake his death and leave for a new planet.
Plan E, in particular, is just crazy enough to succeed; while working on Red X’s teleportation device, a scientist contractor accidentally built a volatile dimensional portal gun. If it can be stabilized, Tim might be able to either lure Deathstroke into a portal or toss himself in as a last resort.
Naturally, the test run the scientist puts on for the portal gun goes so wrong that it leaves Tim stranded in another dimension.
He only has enough time to text Batman—Kaiser the AI seems fine, if a bit confused about being cut off from the main server—the general gist of what is happening before a Batman seemingly on steroids is looming over him with an animalistic growl.
“Who are you?”
He looks up at the very muscular Batman, looks left at the mean-looking Robin holding a sword threateningly, before looking right at the taller Robin holding a bō staff, who seems oddly familiar. Each face is set in the same stony expression.
“Uh,” Tim says eloquently before tucking his phone away. “You wouldn’t happen to know how dimensional travel works, would you?”
This Batman does, in fact, know how dimensional travel works and even has a protocol for it. The good part is that it’s easy to prove who he is and where he’s from. All it takes is removing his mask, a blind-folded trip to the Batcave, and offering up an arm for analyses.
“You’re Tim Drake,” Other Batman says in disbelief as a machine confirms both his identity and his out of place energy signature. The test runs a second time to be certain.
The Tim Drake of this dimension, the taller one who somehow ended up as Robin of all things, gawks at his tinier self. Tim glares with a scowl, knowing exactly what is about to come out of his mouth.
“I’m tiny,” Other Tim says in something like shock. “You’re barely taller than Damian! How old are you?”
“I’m turning sixteen in a couple of months!” He says a touch too defensively.
Fifteen, Other Tim mouths at him before turning to Other Batman. An entire silent conversation goes down between them, and Tim tries not to shiver at the strangeness of it.
“Are all the people in your dimension runts, or is it just you?” Damian sneers, body tense for the first sign of dangerous movement.
“I’m a professional thief!” He throws his hands up. “I need to stay as slim as possible!”
This somehow sets Damian off, and Tim rolls out of his chair to avoid the fist going for his head. Sometimes he accidentally triggers his clients into a murderous rage; it’s because of this that his body moves for cover instinctively instead of fighting back.
“Damian!” Other Tim moves quickly to separate them.
“It’s clear he is a supervillain!” Damian argues as Other Tim grabs his arm.
“Damian!” Other Bruce barks out.
Tim peeks out from behind the identity machine and gives the gremlin a cheeky wave. Damian attempts to yank himself out of Other Tim’s hold. Batman looms threateningly but doesn’t do anything else.
“Just look at his outfit!” Damian growls. “Does the skull mask not scream nefarious?”
“Nefarious,” Tim repeats, mulling over the word. “The Nefarious Red X, I like that.”
“I bet you do, Criminal Timothy Drake,” Damian says frostily.
“Keep an eye on him. Report any misdeeds to me, but do not do anything else,” Other Batman orders before turning to the computer and ignoring them all.
The bad part is that this Batman is currently having a psychotic meltdown and has no time to send Tim back to his dimension. He’s stuck in Wayne Manor with a tracker on his ankle until Other Batman gets sick of him and sends him home.
“Bruce is going through some things,” Other Tim tells him as they settle him in one of the guestrooms. “Losing Dick, then the love of his life, along with the evil Batman from another dimension, and Bane taking control of Arkham—it gets to be too much to handle at once.”
“Mhm,” Tim hums disbelievingly.
Other Alfred is quick on the update because there’s already clothes for him in the dresser. He appreciates the gesture, but he’s not sure he really wants to walk around in what are probably the gremlin’s clothes.
“We’ll get you home once we figure out whether Bane is preparing to take over Gotham or not.” Or if it’s all in Bruce’s head, Other Tim doesn’t say. “It might go faster if you help.”
“Don’t really want to. I’d rather see how well skateboards work on the banisters here.” He needs to make sure Other Tim or Damian will be the ones to get in trouble for it before he tries though.
“You’re pretty annoying. Do you know that?” Other Tim asks with a grimace.
“I get told that all the time,” Tim says, flashing his taller self a bright smile.
There’s not much for him to do after stripping out of his costume for jeans and a dinosaur hoodie, so Tim and his other self decide to grab some snacks and work out the differences between their lives. A light tremble from the guestroom’s ceilings lets him know that Damian is most likely listening in above.
“I first became obsessed with Dick Grayson when I was three and saw his parents die at the circus,” Tim starts off.
“Same here.” Other Tim nods, typing down notes onto the computer attached to his arm.
“Shortly after, my parents had enough of my nightmares and hired Deathstroke to be my babysitter,” Tim continues.
The typing comes to a sudden stop.
“Excuse me?” Other Tim voice cracks for some reason.
“He was so good at it that he babysat me until I was thirteen. He forced me to be a Gotham Rogue, but I teamed up with B to spite him.” Tim smiles at the memory. The nostalgia almost covers up the trauma.
Other Tim makes a broken sounding noise, and there’s an ominous creak from the ceiling. Tim ignores them as it slowly registers that Mr. Dosletter is the reason Tim is stuck in this strange dimension.
“It’s all his fault,” Tim suddenly hisses. “He just had to make a move on Nightwing’s butt. Me saving that butt is what sent Deathstroke to Norway where he has sworn vengeance upon me! Of course, I got desperate!”
He only gets angrier as he thinks about how stupid it was to slip on the only part of the walkway that had no railing. Why did that scientist even have a portion of it with no railing? Was it Tim’s fault? Did he not pay enough?
“And if he didn’t teach me how to listen to customers and deal with trauma, I wouldn’t have become an unlicensed therapist to every freak in Gotham. I bet Deathstroke never saw that one coming though. I certainly didn’t,” he snorts before looking over his other self. “So how similar is it to your own story?”
Other Tim blinks then stares at him, fingers still frozen where they hover over his computer.
“Give me a minute,” Other Tim says before breathing in deeply. “Okay,” he breathes out before throwing his calm away. “What the hell?”
Both Tim Drakes were born to the same parents and experienced the fall of the Graysons. They stepped in to help Batman when he lost his Robin. That’s apparently where the similarities end.
The Tim of this dimension had no babysitter. He was sent to boarding school once he was old enough. He became Robin after Jason died, who came back wanting revenge for that.
His mom died while his dad went into a coma after getting caught in voodoo then poisoned. Once his father woke up, he gained a stepmom. Then they both bit the dust too.
After the gremlin took his place as Robin, Other Tim took up the name Red Robin because he never chose not to be Robin.
He’s also given up skateboarding in pursuit of justice.
The last one sounds fake but okay.
“Your parents are still alive. How are they?” Other Tim asks cautiously once they finish exchanging the weightier information.
“Don’t know. My parents may still be alive, but I have to look up their business portfolios to know what they look like,” Tim says, smiling bitterly. “They’re currently on extended vacation in Hawaii under assassin protection. Consequences to making sure they stay safe but out of the way.”
Tim will reiterate: the bad part is that this Batman is currently having a psychotic meltdown.
It’s not until he watches Other Batman punch Other Tim in the face for daring to say, “We know how you feel. Let us help you,” that he understands what Other Tim meant by Batman not handling things well.
This Bruce’s only outlet for his emotions is to scream or hit things, and he is done screaming. His children have the unfortunate position of being a moving target for his fists.
Damian and Other Tim walk out of the room without a word, leaving Other Batman with his Alfred. Tim follows their lead, suiting up and slipping out of the manor to go brood.
He’s wedged between two gargoyles and sending useless texts to his not crazy Batman when he gains company. He lowers the phone but doesn’t move from where his arms are hugging his knees which are pressing into his stomach. It’s an oddly comfortable position.
“So Other Me,” Red X begins, “how does it feel to be the victim of abuse?”
“I am not—he’s not,” Red Robin makes a noise in the back of his throat. “He’s going through some things right now.”
From what he gathers, this Bruce has been “going through some things” since his crime-fighting career began. That does not justify what he saw.
“Yeah? Dick’s been shot in the head,” and wasn’t that a horrifying discovery, “so where is Jason?”
He says it pointedly because they both know where Jason isn’t. He is not here while his father is having an emotional breakdown and thinks Bane is taking over the city. A freshly torn Bat symbol in the cave where Jason’s memorial used to be paints an ugly picture.
“He’s my father,” Other Tim whispers.
It’s said so desperately, so pleadingly that it breaks Tim’s heart. He knows himself well enough to hear the “He’s all I have left” being screamed in the silence.
“But are you his son?” Tim sighs. “Your Batman needs help in a lot of ways. Love can go far, but it can’t heal or excuse bad behavior.”
Something cracks, and Other Tim takes off without a word. Tim waits until he can no longer see his other self swinging through the city to open his mouth.
“You can come out now, Gremlin.”
“Stop calling me that,” Damian grumbles before melting out of the shadows.
“Once you stop calling me ‘the Criminal Tim.’”
“Tt, you were the one who called yourself a professional thief.”
“Yeah, but I don’t need you following me around like a store clerk with a grudge,” Tim says dryly.
Damian moves until he’s standing in a menacing manner with one foot on the gargoyle next to him. The muscle in his jaw is tense, and his fists are curled. Tim recognizes it as something Bruce does to instill fear into the people who manage to get a glimpse of him.
“You believe my father is abusive,” Damian states.
“I do. He doesn’t mean to be, but he is,” Tim says softly.
Nothing has been said outright, but it never is. Tim has experience spotting the little tells, the signs that only seem obvious to an outsider looking in. And from what he can tell, this Bruce hurts his children in more ways than one.
“You are not going to stay out of this, are you.” It’s another statement, not a question.
“Nope.”
With Kaiser’s help and a familiarity with the system, Tim removes his tracker and sends false readings of him moving around the manor to the Batcomputer. With that done, he leaves Other Wayne Manor for greener pastures.
He first attempts to track this world’s Jason down. Other Tim was close-lipped on the matter, but he needs to know if Jason is another victim, needs to know how things spiraled out so differently. Tim is not important enough to cause such a monumental change.
What made Batman into this? What can he do to prevent this travesty from occurring in his own world?
Unfortunately, it seems Jason is currently in the wind, and he’s unable to find any answers.
He gives up and decides to chance an angry Batman by returning to Wayne Manor only to find it in lockdown. Turns out Batman wasn’t crazy. Bane really was preparing to take over Gotham, and now the villain is using the manor as his headquarters.
Horrifyingly, Alfred is being held hostage inside the manor, and no one is doing a damn thing about it. Damian comes after Tim with a message from Other Batman to stay out of Gotham and not to interfere.
“Bane has Alfred. Gotham is caught in an illusion so he can rule it unquestioned. Everyone is to stand down to keep A safe,” Tim runs a finger over his utility belt, “but here’s the thing. I’m not a Bat.”
Bane isn’t merciful. The only thing standing down will accomplish is giving Alfred some time before he winds up dead. There is no way Tim will stand back and let that happen to any Alfred of any dimension.
“Your other self refuses to devise a plan to overcome the situation,” Damian scoffs, looking at the manor in the distance.
“Other Me has had all his support systems yanked out from underneath him. He’s clinging onto B as hard as he can while trying to shy away from the truth of his situation.” Tim shakes his head at the thought. “I won’t be surprised if Other Me doesn’t fall into an addiction of some kind, assuming he hasn’t already.”
Not all addictions are drugs or alcohol. If it were him, personally, he could see himself easily becoming addicted to the adrenaline rush of near suicidal heists. To the feeling of whether he wins the roulette or dies trying.
“Either way, I’m going to rescue A, and you can’t stop me—” Tim declares before Damian cuts in sharply.
“Let me come with you.”
“Come again?” Tim blinks.
“If you are going anyway, I will need to be present to mitigate the worst of your mess,” Damian says, jaw tensing.
“Two people make it easier to get caught, and there goes Alfred’s life,” Tim points out.
“I know this Gotham, and you don’t,” Damian says, shoulders tensing as if ready to fight. His eyes never leave the direction of the manor.
It strikes him that Damian is willing to do whatever it takes to get Alfred back. All he needs is direction and a plan. Red X looks at Robin with new eyes and makes a decision.
He pulls of a piece of paper from a hidden pouch. Laying it against his gauntlet, he flicks the small pen out of his wrist guard and scribbles down his thoughts in a hurry.
“Sign this first.” Red X hands over the paper to Robin, who takes it like one would a frozen piece of dung.
“I, Damian ‘al Ghul’ Wayne, do hereby agree to the following terms that any and all Damian Waynes of any dimension must follow. The first is that I will do no harm towards the Timothy Jackson Drake who currently calls himself Red X and whatever alias he chooses to use unless in need of self-defense—” Damian stops to glare and bare his teeth. “I am not signing this.”
“Then I disappear, and you sit on the sidelines.”
“Amend the term that says I must refer to you as my superior. And the one that says that I must keep a respectful tone.” Damian grabs the pen and strikes out three more terms.
Tim takes the contract back and revises it on a new piece of paper. Damian reads over the next one carefully before signing and dating it at the bottom.
“What is this even for?” Damian asks with a huff.
“Contingencies.” Tim smiles underneath his mask.