Chapter Text
Here is the thing; Tim is no stranger to death. His parents are archaeologists and bring back pots and jewellery and bones, and he grows up listening to them talk about lost kingdoms and forgotten civilisations. In the early days, when they’re at home and not off on a dig or business trip, they take him to museums and let him look at some of their finds. His mother points out the grooves in a copper coin they found in Iran. His father lets him stroke a finger down a rib bone they brought back with them from Siberia. They teach him history, and inadvertently, death.
Here is the thing; Tim knows what death is. He’s from Gotham, and sees his first fresh corpse at three years old. His nanny had meant to take him grocery shopping. They get caught up in a robbery instead. The robber is middle-aged and sweating, face pale and eyes bloodshot. He shoots the cashier for being too slow. The white tiles of the supermarket turn red, and his nanny tucks his face into her chest a second too late. A year later, he watches the Graysons fall to the ground, bodies snapping and crunching while the crowd panics. Blood splatters the floor, and their son screams louder than the crowd.
Here is the thing; Tim drowns at five years old in the pool in his garden while waiting for his parents to join him. They had missed his birthday in July, and promised to spend a day with him in the summer sun as an apology. They tell him to go on ahead; that they’ll be right with him once they finish just this last task. He dives into the water and plays, not realising how close he is to the deep end until his muscles cramp suddenly.
He drowns quietly, waiting for parents who love him, but will never be there, to realise that something is wrong. They never show up, and he sinks into oblivion.
When he wakes up and claws his way out of the pool, the sun has set, and the lights of his house are on. He is cold and wet and his lungs burn.
But most of all, Tim is alone.
He drags himself inside and looks for his parents, shivering and dripping water everywhere. His father is in the living room, busy making last minute corrections to his latest journal article before sending it off. He doesn’t notice his son walking in through the patio doors. Tim continues onwards, and finds his mother in her study, trying to solve an issue with Drake Industries Japan over the phone. As he walks in, she glances up at him and frowns, eyes catching on the puddle he’s accidentally making.
“Timothy,” she whispers, phone tucked to her chest, “don’t just stand there dripping, you’ll ruin the hardwood floor!”
She does not mention the pool or the late time, instead lifting the phone back to her ear and pointedly gesturing at him to leave.
So he goes to his room and dries himself off. His lips are blue when he looks in the mirror, and his throat burns with the lingering taste of chlorine. He coughs, and water spills out.
Timothy Drake is five years old when he learns what it is like to die for the first time.
In the days after, he is clingy, much to his parents’ annoyance. His mother indulges him for the first few times, propping him on her lap as she takes him through spreadsheets and emails, but after ten minutes she shifts and complains of sore legs, shooing him away to go bother his father instead. Jack takes one look at his distressed son, and grimaces.
“Sorry buddy,” he says sympathetically, fingers tightening around his glass of scotch, “but I really need to finish making corrections. We can go play outside after, alright?”
It is an empty promise, but Tim nods and goes back to his room. He plays his violin obsessively, stumbling through piece after piece until he can play them perfectly. He overloads his brain with notation and correct finger placement, and the memory of drowning disappears for a while. His teacher actually gives him a few words of praise for the progress he has made, and his mother nods approvingly at the news.
But it isn’t enough. He gets nightmares and refuses baths, and after the third tantrum of the week, his parents snap. Janet scolds him with harsh, cutting words meant to bring Tim back in line. Jack just yells and yells. Tim is locked out of their room when he has a nightmare, and is dunked in the water at bath time despite his thrashing.
He learns quickly after that. When it’s time for a bath, he proclaims he wants to start showering instead, and Jack congratulates him for being a big boy. The first night he manages to swallow down his screams, his father ruffles Tim’s hair and watches a history documentary with him, and his mother asks him to play violin for her. Absentmindedly, she mentions that she would love to see him play Vivaldi’s Allegro non molto, and he vows to learn it for her. Janet is surprised by his declaration, but she gives him a soft smile, and kisses his forehead.
A week later, they leave.
In the months following his death, when he isn’t playing violin or studying, he researches. He reads through scientific articles and watches diving videos about the nature of drowning, even though it makes the nightmares worse. But he has to know. His nanny tuts and tries to limit his screen time after the second night he wakes up screaming, but he can’t stop. He swallows down words like hypercapnia and hypoxia, and wonders if his death was just a nightmare he had after falling asleep near the pool.
And then Tim slips in the shower and cracks his head open on the floor, unconscious before the pain can even hit. He wakes up hours later, blood coating the tiles just like it did at the supermarket. When he cautiously touches his scalp, there is no injury. Physically, he is fine. His head pounds and his body aches, but he is alive. The blood is still wet from the humidity of the shower, and he slowly cleans it up, eyes swimming and almost slipping again. He has to take another shower to rinse out the blood in his hair, and by the time he stumbles out of his newly cleaned bathroom, it is dark outside, just like the first time. Robotically pulling on his pyjamas, he goes to check on his nanny.
She is asleep on the couch, television on and an empty glass of wine on the coffee table, unaware of the events that led to her charge cracking open his head while under her supervision.
Now here is the thing; Timothy Drake is a precocious child. The word gifted and genius is thrown at him by various child psychologists, pleasing his parents to no end. He is signed up to various MENSA programmes designed for children like him, and his interests are indulged and financed by parents unconcerned with money and desperate to satisfy his never-ending curiosity, if only to stop him from bothering them instead. He is a mature child, is praised by parents and teachers alike for being so responsible, so serious, so unlike the other children. But as he huddles in his closet, trying to remember what it feels like to breathe, he is a scared child with too much information overloading his brain.
It makes him shudder, and when he finally goes to sleep that night, he dreams of his head cracking open like an egg, his brains spilling out from the cavity and blocking the shower drain. In the distance, he can hear the violin playing. He lies on cold hard tiles, red-tinged water filling the bathroom up and into his lungs. Tim opens his mouth to scream, to breathe, but all that comes out is Allegro non Molto. In the shiny reflection of his own blood, he spots his mother standing in the doorway. She is smiling and swaying as he wails out the last notes of Allegro.
And as the water begins to drag him back down, she turns to leave.
“Wait,” he gasps out, hand outstretched, “mom, mom, please-!”
But she just hums Allegro non Molto as she shuts the door and disappears.
She doesn’t come back.
No-one comes. No-one notices.
He dies alone again and again and again, Allegro shrieking in the back of his mind.
Tim stops trying to learn Allegro non Molto for a while after that, and his mother never asks after his progress when his parents pick up the phone. He tries to push all thoughts of death out of his mind by focusing on other things.
However, Tim is a detective at heart, and when presented with a mystery of his own body, he has to dig further. He is perhaps, just a bit too smart for his own good. His parents send him to science camp the summer he turns six, and his head is full of words like the scientific method and hypotheses. Despite being the youngest child there, he is quickly taken under the wing of the guest scientist, a biologist called Dr Emma Gibson. She lectures him on lab safety and allows him to watch her run different experiments. She even lets him write down observations, comparing them with her own notes. When the camp is over, she ruffles his hair and tells him to look her up when he becomes a scientist.
His heart is full, and despite the sadness of her leaving, Tim is confident in his budding abilities as a scientist. And so, just like Dr Gibson taught him, he begins to outline a research plan.
Fact: He has died twice now.
Fact: No-one has been around to see it and confirm whether he really is coming back to life.
Hypothesis: He is either having severe visual hallucinations or he is a metahuman of some sort.
Conclusion: Insufficient data, needs more testing.
The cold, clinical words are comforting in a way, and it makes it seem like he really is a scientist doing fun experiments. It almost helps him forget that he’s his own test subject, and that the experiments will require him dying in some way.
Almost.
But he needs to know more. He writes down various plans, wondering how big of a sample size he needs. He spoofs his IP address just like he learned at the computer safety course he snuck into at Gotham University instead of the MENSA children’s architecture course he was originally signed up for. He researches death and the best way to achieve it, ignoring the bleating warnings begging him to call a suicide hotline. He isn’t suicidal, and he won’t be dead forever, not like his grandma or the Graysons. This is for science.
Dr Gibson also said that experiments need to be peer-reviewed, but Tim isn’t really sure who he could ask. Maybe Batman? But he has a son, and Tim doubts that the caped vigilante would be willing to stand-by and watch a child die. Besides, there’s that whole thing about no metahumans.
It’s unprofessional, but he decides that the situation is exceptional enough that peer-review isn’t needed.
So he waits until his nanny goes to sleep, on a night when she’s drunk a little too much wine. Up in the attic, he swings a rope around a beam and ties a noose around his neck with shaking fingers. There is a note in his bedroom as a contingency. He stands up on a chair he found tucked away in the corner and trembles, trying to gather the courage to do what he has to do.
But suddenly the science doesn’t seem as fun anymore. He thinks of the forums where people recounted their unsuccessful suicide attempts, how they were stuck in limbo and pain until someone either found them or they managed to crawl their way to a phone. He thinks of jetfool78’s account of hanging in his closet for what felt like hours, choking and gasping until his wife found him and pulled him free.
In the end, Tim is unable to jump, and instead starts undoing the knot.
Unfortunately, his sudden movement causes the rickety chair to collapse, and he chokes, fingers clawing around his throat. He doesn’t know how long he hangs there until his vision fades to black, choking and gasping as he slowly dies. Unlike jetfool78 however, there will be no rescue.
And yet, he wakes up. He’s still hanging, and he can already feel his airways closing again, but this time he manages to yank his head out from the rope. He collapses to the floor with tears streaming down his face as he coughs and coughs and coughs.
His watch tells him it’s 4am. He’s been up in the attic for five hours. When he staggers down to his room, hiding the rope and burning the letter, he catches his reflection in a mirror. There is a purpling bruise around his neck, and his throat aches, but it isn’t as severe as one would expect from an actual hanging victim. Instead, Tim suspects that the bruising is from after he woke up.
He notes down his observations with shaking hands, the code he made up for this purpose looking unintelligible, even to his own eyes. He doesn’t sleep that night, and by the time his nanny comes in to wake him up for school, the bruising has faded.
Dr Gibson would tell him that he needs to follow up, but Tim really doesn’t want to. Instead, he shoves his notebook under his bed and with a mental apology to Dr Gibson, he decides that science isn’t really for him.
His decision lasts about two weeks before he conducts another experiment, alone in the mansion as his nanny has snuck out to go to a party.
The housekeeper comes by, and with it, she brings an opportunity. She’s easily distractible with a few questions about her grandchildren, and he pesters her as she’s packing up her things, watching as she forgets a bottle here and some powder there. It works, and she leaves behind industrial cleaning supplies, tucked away in the kitchen but not out of reach. His research indicates a certain sort of messiness, so he lays out the tarp he had bought under the guise of taking interest in painting. There was no need to explain himself really, since his parents just wave his excuse away and give him permission to use their card.
His nanny won’t be back until late, if she comes back tonight at all, and the housekeeper will be gone until Monday to take him back to school. His parents called him the day before to confirm that they would be stuck in Belize until next Thursday. With the confidence of an unsupervised child, Tim downs a mug of the nastiest chemicals he was able to mix together without creating chlorine gas.
It’s a bad death.
None of his deaths so far have been good exactly, but this one is the worst so far. There’s a lot more to clean after he wakes up, and even as the taste of chemicals burns his throat lining, he’s thankful for the resources he has to remove any evidence. But for weeks afterwards, the scent of lemons makes him gag and choke.
He decides that his experiments are over after that death, and goes back to the violin and ballet and gymnastics. It’s safer after all, and less likely to kill him.
Tim’s preference for safer hobbies lasts until he turns eight, when he gets a camera for his birthday. He watches a video of Robin doing a quadruple somersault soon after that, and figures out Batman and Robin’s identity. Before Tim even knows what he’s doing, he’s drawn up a comprehensive guide of their usual patrol routes, has tuned his ham radio to pick up the police scanner, and is sneaking out with his new camera to take pictures at night.
He asks his parents to sign him up to self-defence classes and krav maga, because you never know in Gotham he explains, and they absentmindedly accept, phone crackling with static as the reception in Cameroon fades in and out. He eagerly sends them the permission slips, and a few hours later, their secretary has signed them, and he’s enrolled in various courses that will teach him how to be quick and sneaky. Granted, it’s less a method to keep himself safe, and more a way for him to keep up with the Bats as they dart across the night sky, but he enjoys it nevertheless, especially as he gets more and more used to running across rooftops and ducking into shadows.
It is the most fun he has ever had.
He gets shot at, is chased down alleyways, and slips off of railings more than once, but by some miracle, he never actually dies during his excursions into the Gotham night. He comes close once or twice, and yet by the time Dick Grayson graduates from being Robin into Nightwing several years later, Tim has reached ten years old without dying once during his excursions.
He keeps an eye on Batman and the newly named Nightwing during his break, but he doesn’t sneak out to take pictures until the adoption of Jason Todd-Wayne is announced, especially since his parents finally decided to fire his nanny. They do not hire anyone else, but they send him to boarding school and call him two times a week, and he gets to come home on the weekends, when the housekeeper stops by to check in on him.
He joins the school’s orchestra, and finally forces himself to learn Allegro non Molto in its entirety. His fingers are blistered messes by the end of it, despite his callouses, but the way the orchestra teacher beams at him in pride makes it all worth it. When he tells his mother, she hums, and he can picture her pleased smile.
“Well done, Timothy. You’ll have to play for me when we come back. In the meantime, why don’t you learn Presto?”
Warm from her praise, he agrees, already pencilling extra practice sessions between ballet and self-defence. He can play most of it by the time his parents return, but Janet waves off his attempts to play for her, explaining that she has a headache.
They leave two days later, and Tim performs Presto for his orchestra teacher instead of his mother. His praise feels hollow, but it’s something at least.
Tim begins to go out at night again, waiting for a glimpse of the new Robin, even though he logically knows that it will take a while for Robin to be field-ready. If nothing else, it’s a good way to keep his skills sharp. But when the new Robin does appear, Tim finds himself shaking in excitement as he watches Robin cling to Batman’s back, a grin wide on the older boy’s face. And he dives back into photography, camera clutched with trembling hands as he snaps picture after picture.
Compared to Dick Grayson, the new Robin is bolder, but just as cheerful. There’s a wonder to him that Tim never quite saw with Jason’s predecessor, and as he laughs and quips and clings to Batman, Tim finds himself believing in the magic of Robin. He gets closer to the duo, taking more pictures in increasingly precarious situations.
It gets him into trouble one too many times, and eventually, not even his meagre training can save him from a bullet in his head. He crawls out of dumpsters more than once during Jason’s stint as Robin, and it’s sheer luck that no-one is ever around to see his resurrection. His notebooks get new entries however, and he realises that he’s been waking up quicker after his deaths. He spits out his fair share of bullets as he notes how fatal injuries will heal, but smaller ones won’t. If he has more than one fatal injury, the one that deals the death blow will be healed first. The other one won’t until he dies of it.
He learns that the hard way after having a cerebral haemorrhage only a few seconds after waking up from the stab wound that had taken him out the first time. Injuries that start out survivable but become fatal after insufficient treatment also heal (after dying), and there are far too many close calls at school where he’s had to pass off wound infections as the flu, hoping desperately that the school’s strict sickness policy will keep anyone from entering his room until he recovers.
At the very least, he thinks, Robin and Batman never see his blunders. He’s fully aware of Batman’s disdain for metas in Gotham, and he doubts his parents would be pleased if they have to move because Tim died in the wrong place at the wrong time.
But as time goes on and he turns twelve, tensions begin to rise between Batman and Robin, hushed arguments ringing out against the concrete as Tim watches. There is only one public screaming match before Robin marches off. The next few weeks are quiet, despite Arkham announcing the Joker’s escape. Batman goes out a few times before disappearing, but Robin is nowhere to be found. Batgirl stops appearing as well, and the news breaks that Barbara Gordon has been attacked in her own home, shot by one of the Joker’s henchmen.
And then, the Wayne family lawyers announce that Jason Todd-Wayne has tragically passed away. The official story is that he was kidnapped while on his way to meet with some friends, was held for ransom, and then killed during the process.
The sighting of Robin, Batman and the Joker in Ethiopia suggests a different story.
Tim has gotten used to death. He’s not comfortable with it and never will be, but it’s a song and dance he knows intimately. But he’s only used to it happening to him. Not others.
Jason’s death hits him in a way he hasn’t ever really thought about. Logically, he knows that most people didn’t come back to life, and he’s seen enough dead bodies to be mostly desensitised. But it’s different this time. He knew Robin, Jason, even if only from a distance, and it seemed like he would live forever.
He hopes he didn’t die alone. Not like Tim.
The news of Jason’s death is enough for his parents to call him before their usual scheduled time. They pull him from boarding school and give him the option of self-study or going to the local private academy, finding the commute to the boarding school too risky. Tim doesn’t quite understand how commuting to a local school is any safer, but it’s the thought that counts, and their concern is enough to make him agree to the academy. They have to hang up fairly soon, but they organise the instalment of a new security system, and increase the housekeeper’s hours to keep an eye on him.
It’s not much, but it makes him feel loved anyway.
He says goodbye to his music teacher, who firmly tells him to keep practicing and to join his new school’s orchestra.
“You have a talent, Mr Drake. Do not waste it,” he says seriously, squeezing his shoulder.
Tim dutifully agrees, fingers twinging with phantom pain. He goes to his new school and is placed with kids two years older than him. There is no school orchestra. He returns every day to an empty house and feels like he’s drowning all over again.
At the very least, his new schedule allows for more time outside at night, and it’s this freedom that lets him notice Batman’s gradual decline into brutality and passive suicidal behaviour. Petty criminals like pickpockets and shoplifters are beaten savagely, and Tim watches with increasing concern as Batman throws himself into dangerous situations over and over again. Every night. Even after taking blows that would have forced him to rest several days before.
Batman is killing himself, and no-one is stopping him.
And Tim realises that he has to step in.
Tim is fully aware that he is, as some people have put it, fairly insufferable. His classmates call him that when he talks just a bit too much during group projects, his teachers call him that when they whisper their complaints about him, and his parents have hung up on him before for asking too many questions. It’s hard not to be insufferable when you’re a genius who’s skipped two grades and you have the nosiness and curiosity of a child who has never really been told ‘no’. Add in the fact that his idea of ‘parental supervision’ is an email and a credit card, then you begin to realise that the deck of normality was stacked against him from the start. And that’s not even mentioning his interest in ‘girly’ hobbies like ballet and the violin. If anything, Tim’s fairly proud that he hasn’t turned out worse than he is.
But he doesn’t really mind being irritating, especially since it has its own benefits. It’s a lot easier to get people to agree to his requests when they want him to shut up. It also means that normal things like self-consciousness and embarrassment become a secondary concern when faced with someone’s business.
Business such as a grieving father who fights crime and is subtly trying to kill himself for example.
In hindsight, it is not exactly his proudest moment. But just like being obnoxious, his meddling is inevitable. He sends letters to the Justice League at such a rate that he gets a notice to cease and desist in his PO Box. It is signed by Wonder Woman, and he frames it, even though it’s addressed to a fake name. But his work isn’t done, and if none of the other heroes want to step in, then Tim is going to have to. So he wanders into Blüdhaven and Wayne Manor repeatedly, trying to force Nightwing and Batman to talk to each other, even if it’s about how annoying Tim is. He’s not even asking to be Robin; he just doesn’t want to watch Batman go into a battle he can’t come out from.
Gotham needs a Batman after all. And Bruce needs someone in his corner, even if it’s the excruciatingly insufferable kid from next door.
Except Bruce and Dick get captured, and Alfred chucks the Robin costume at him alongside a few words of encouragement.
When he puts on the Robin costume for the first time, Tim is expecting it to be a one-time deal only. It is exhilarating, even as he rescues Batman and Nightwing, but he has no intentions of forcing a grieving father to take on a new sidekick after the death of Jason. Bruce even bluntly tells him that he doesn’t want a new partner, and while it’s a bit frustrating, Tim accepts it without a problem. He isn’t that oblivious. But then the older man concedes that maybe he does need a Robin, and while he doesn’t outright give the mantle to Tim, he’s willing to try.
But Tim is very aware of his role. He is not a son or a friend or a protégé. He is a placeholder, a splint to keep Batman from shattering into pieces. As Alfred had said; Tim can follow orders. He can also nag with the best of them, which is certainly another point in his favour according to the butler. That and the fact that he knows Bruce’s identity are the main factors that make Bruce consider him as a possible candidate rather than sentiment.
So he trains and learns to be the best splint possible. Batman’s training forces him to change his usual style. Whereas before, Tim would just let himself be killed if he couldn’t win a fight, he can’t do that anymore. He isn’t fighting by himself after all. But more importantly, he can’t do that to Bruce. He won’t let Bruce watch another Robin die in uniform.
It is the main reason he never tells him about his particular ability.
Tim learns to wield a staff, is sent to Paris to train after making Bruce promise to look after himself, and comes back with new scars but no deaths. A month later, Tim is deemed ready, and is launched into his Robin career with little fanfare.
For the first time, he stays alive not out of luck, but skill. Even after being beaten half to death by the Joker, he clings on.
However, as cordial as Bruce is to him, it is clear that he does not want a partnership of banter and familiarity like the previous Robins. Not when Bruce accidentally calls him Jason multiple times, when resentment gleams in his eyes as he looks at him on particularly bad days. It’s easier for both of them to keep a distance, and after patrol and a check-up, Tim wanders back to the emptiness of the Drake mansion. He doesn’t really mind. He’s used to being independent, and it isn’t like he’s a normal child. Being Robin and looking after Bruce gives him something tangible and real to do, and it’s better than sitting on the computer all day trying to teach himself ancient Sumerian Cuneiform.
Dick, however, is very different. After getting over the shock of a new Robin, he throws himself into Tim’s life without hesitation. He pulls him into hugs and ruffles his hair, he invites him to the movies and to Blüdhaven for sleepovers, and he loudly and openly calls Tim his little brother. It is absolutely delightful and Tim can’t help but soak up the attention lavished upon him by the first Robin. He introduces him to the Titans, encourages him to work with Bart and Cassie and Kon, and listens to him ramble about his day without ever hanging up or groaning. Tim can safely say that he adores Dick, and even if he’s doing it to rub it into Bruce’s face, he doesn’t mind. He’ll take vindictive affection over nothing any day.
But Dick’s open warmth seems to crack something in Bruce, and he begins to hesitantly invite him to stay the night after patrol, even when Tim hasn’t been injured.
Alfred is a genial presence, and while not as open or cuddly as Dick, there is an undeniable fondness to the older man that Tim is eager to lap up. He makes him treats and tuts when Tim forgets to eat. He’s always moving, always doing something, and he never gets irritated when Tim bombards him with questions. If anything, Alfred is delighted to regale him with various tales as he trims the roses or prepares dinner. His favourite moments are when Alfred fixes his clothes, tutting over rumpled trousers and wrinkled shirts, lingering close enough that Tim realises that this is how the old man shows affection. His version of an embrace is straightening clothes, and while Tim has never known his grandparents, he’s fairly certain that Alfred is what a grandparent should be.
For a few years, Tim is happier than he’s ever been. Bruce has begun to thaw even more, giving him smiles that are more than just a twitch of his lips, and ruffling his hair in a way that feels distinctly paternal. His parents haven’t been home in Gotham for almost seven months, but for the first time, he doesn’t care. He has the Titans, has Dick, Alfred and Bruce, and for the first time in years, he feels loved.
Of course that’s when things go to shit.
The year he turns fourteen, his mother dies, his father falls into a coma, and a new player in Gotham causes Bruce to shut down, even as he manages to get temporary custody of Tim while they try to sort out who should look after him.
It’s funny. No-one’s ever cared about his living situation before.
Tim buries an empty casket because there is no body to bury, and while neither he nor his mother actively practiced, it still feels wrong that she hasn’t been properly laid to rest. He doesn’t recognise the rabbi presiding over the ceremony, and he barely hears what the man says as he fixes the black ribbon to his right lapel.
“Do you want someone with you as you perform keriah?” he asks kindly, and Tim shrugs. The rabbi’s eyes soften, but he stays as Tim numbly tears the ribbon apart and mumbles a prayer.
He barely notices the rest of the funeral, staring blankly ahead as well-wishers try to talk to him. They’re all acquaintances and work colleagues, and it’s very obvious that none of them have researched what to do at a Jewish funeral before, let alone attended one. Someone brings flowers without having consulted the rabbi, and Tim wants to punch them. Judging by the rabbi’s frown as he spots them, he isn’t impressed either.
Dick and Bruce take him back to the Wayne Manor afterwards, and the trip is silent.
He sits shiva for his mother alone, in a dazed state. Even if Jack Drake wasn’t in a coma, Tim knows the man wouldn’t join him. He hadn’t converted, nor had he ever really been interested in partaking in the few Jewish traditions Tim and his mother did observe. Bruce offers to join him, but the appearance of Red Hood and a car bomb distracts him.
Tim doesn’t know how to feel. He never played Allegro non Molto for her in the end. Or Presto or November or Salut d’Amour. Or any other pieces she asked him to learn. A part of him is expecting her to tell him that their trip has been extended the next time he calls them. Another part of him dully points out that technically, death is an extended trip for most people. And his parents- his mother- was always very good at those.
He hasn’t cried yet. He doesn’t know if he wants to.
The worst thing is that nothing feels different. There is no real piece missing, like the grief pamphlets said. He doesn’t turn to talk to her, because she was never there in the first place. He isn’t expecting a phone call, because Tim was always the one who called first. Drake Manor has always felt empty, and he hasn’t lived there for almost a year, even before his mother died.
He doesn’t feel lost, because to be lost, someone has to realise you aren’t there.
On the last day of shiva, he gets angry. Because his mother is dead, and she will never get to know him. She will never want to get to know him. She will never have the chance to want to be a part of his life beyond phone calls and a credit card and violin requests she will never listen to.
It’s such a waste.
Jack Drake has always been straightforward. The man is attracted to the idea of fatherhood, but not very invested in the reality of it. His presence has always been decided on a whim, promising Tim to take him to the finest photography museums or concerts or restaurants, before changing his mind without warning to something else. Jack Drake likes to talk about the things he wants to do, but has very little interest in putting the work in to achieve said things.
But his mother was different. She didn’t try, not really, but there was a cursory presence. She was the one to encourage his interests, even if she herself never wanted to hear about them outside of the violin. She never promised him anything she wouldn’t do, not like Jack, and in that way, she was reliably unreliable. Jack Drake would promise to pick Tim up from school and leave him waiting for three hours in winter until Tim finally called a cab home.
Janet Drake would have never made that promise in the first place.
Neither of his parents really wanted or expected children. Apparently his mother didn’t even know she was pregnant until she was already several months along, and at that point, most of the upper society knew about the future Drake child, so she couldn’t get rid of him, not without a scandal.
She hadn’t wanted him, but she had made sure he was comfortable.
Janet Drake was not a good parent, or a parent at all really, but she hadn’t abandoned him to the wolves.
Somehow, it still feels like an excuse.
Tim meets with the family lawyer and accountant shortly after he finishes sitting shiva, and they offer him their condolences. The lawyer explains his parent’s will, explaining that he has inherited everything, but will not have access to the Drake company’s share-holds until he is either 18 or legally recognised as an adult. He does have a trust fund however, to be dispersed as needed, so he hasn’t been left destitute.
Not yet at least, according to his accountant.
His mother’s life insurance policy is enough to cover most of the medical fees, however there is no certainty as to whether Jake Drake will ever wake up.
“You can afford to keep him on life support for another three years,” she explains, “but after that, you will have depleted most of your available funds.”
The lawyer clears his throat, and gives him a smile that tries to be kind.
“There is also the matter of custody. Bruce Wayne has temporary custody at the moment, but he has offered to foster you with the possibility of something more permanent. We still need to talk to your social worker, but given that Mr Wayne lives next door to you and you are familiar with him, a court will likely find him the most suitable candidate,” he explains.
Alfred drives him back to the Manor after that, and gently promises him that whatever happens, Tim won’t be alone. He will have a home with them no matter what.
Bruce formally fosters him three days later, but the whole thing is mostly a formality and a way to keep him out of social services rather than any actual desire for a son. With the way Bruce and Dick focus on solving the case of the Red Hood, the Wayne Manor is as empty as the Drake’s used to be more often than not.
But he’s used to looking after himself, and despite the strange knot of grief in his chest, time goes on, and Tim continues on as he always has. He keeps his father on life support, because he doesn’t really know what else to do, and he donates most of his parents finds to various museums.
Tim is not petty. But he does take great glee in sending off the precious artefacts his parents loved out of his old house. He doesn’t sell Drake Manor, but he does close it down, only sending a cleaning company once every couple of months for generic upkeep.
Just like that, he settles into Wayne Manor. The numbness begins to fade, and when he isn’t out as Robin, he plays his violin obsessively, almost out of spite. He turns fifteen, and begins to feel okay. He gets hit in the face by a brick and makes a new friend because of it. Stephanie is loud and cheerful and unafraid, even in the face of her own father, and Tim falls just a little bit in love. Cassandra slips into their lives silently, and he can’t help but adore her, playing violin for someone other than a teacher or a distant audience for the first time.
And then the Red Hood makes overt threats towards Robin, Tim gets benched, and eventually is sent to the Titan’s Tower for his own protection. It’s irritating, but at least there are more people at the Tower, so he begrudgingly agrees. A break from Gotham will do him some good, he thinks.
Two days later, he wishes he had never left the Manor at all.
Now, Tim isn’t really a literature buff. He’ll read, but things like allegory and irony and satire fly over his head. So when the Red Hood breaks into the Tower and beats Tim half to death, he isn’t quite sure what to call it. Dramatic irony perhaps, when he takes off his helmet to reveal the face of Jason Todd. Then he stomps on Tim’s fingers, and all thoughts of literary devices flee his head.
“Should have thought harder before putting on the mask, Pretender,” he mocks, eyes glinting with malice.
Tim tries to crawl away, and is shot in the thigh for it. Agony lances through his body and he chokes back a scream. He prays it hasn’t hit anything important, but it turns out that bleeding out is the last of his worries, as three minutes later, Jason punts him down the stairs. Tim only has enough time to swear violently before his neck snaps quietly against the cold tiles of the tower.
It is the first time he has ever died as Robin, and it feels a little bit like a betrayal.
He wakes up several hours later, alone in the tower, body aching from numerous bullet wounds, fractures, and bruises that haven’t been healed by his death. With clouded eyes, he notes a bloody message written on the wall. But before he can properly decipher the letters, his thigh throbs, and he bleeds out.
Everything is a bit of a blur afterwards, and the next time he wakes up, he’s in the Cave’s medbay, Alfred at his side.
“Welcome back, young master Tim,” the old man greets him dryly as he hands him a bottle of water. “You gave us all quite a scare.”
“Sorry Alfred,” Tim croaks out, gingerly grabbing the water with his unbroken hand and taking several sips. “What’s the damage?”
“Several broken fingers and a splintered left wrist, a fractured shoulder and broken ribs, and your femoral artery was dangerously close to being nicked by a bullet. It’s through sheer luck that you didn’t bleed out before you were found.”
“How bad are my fingers? Can I still- will I regain full motor control?”
Alfred chuckles, but it sounds drained.
“It will take time and physical therapy, but yes, Tim.”
There is silence for a moment, before Alfred closes his eyes and steps closer, a wrinkled hand gently reaching out to stroke his forehead, fingers trembling as he smooths Tim’s hair out of his eyes.
“It was a very close call, my boy. Too close. This house can’t afford to lose another of its children,” he murmurs wetly.
Tim remembers the broken neck and the bullet he’s fairly certain did tear through his femoral artery. Given how quickly he lost consciousness after waking up from his first death, he has the sneaking suspicion that he may have bled out and died again shortly after.
But there’s no need to tell anyone that. Not with how shaken the normally unflappable Alfred is. So instead he lets the old man do his version of coddling and fussing over him, which mainly consists of checking over Tim’s bandages and making sure he has enough water. Before long, he steps back and clears his throat.
“If you are hungry, I have some soup cooking in the kitchen. I will bring it down shortly. Perhaps the other residents of this house would like to speak to you while I do so.”
Alfred pointedly raises his voice towards the last sentence, and Dick sheepishly shuffles in.
“Hey Timmy,” he says gently, reaching out to ruffle Tim’s hair, “how are we doing?”
“Like a spring chicken,” Tim replies drily, and Dick grins.
“Bruce is still at the computer,” he explains, sharing a commiserating look with the butler. “I tried to tell him to come by, but he’s... fairly obsessed with finding Hood. Given how he stuck to your side while you were asleep, I’m surprised he hasn’t bulldozed his way in here yet.”
Tim blinks. Bruce sat with him? But before he can even open his mouth to ask, Alfred mutters something derogatory under his breath and glides out of the room. Barely three minutes later, a disgruntled Bruce enters the medbay.
He pauses by his bedside, face worn and bags under his eyes, and it hits Tim just how tired Bruce is. He has seen the older man at his absolute worst, but there’s an exhaustion he’s never quite noticed before.
Dick leans over and gently ruffles Tim’s hair, before giving Bruce a harsh look.
“I’ll go help Alfred with that soup,” Dick tries to say lightly, and Tim gives him a crooked smile. Bruce shuffles forward, almost awkwardly, as his eldest son breezes past him.
Neither of them talk. For once, Bruce seems at a loss, hands clenching and unclenching at his side as he stares at the heart monitor and IV lines. He doesn’t perch on the bed like Dick did, or fuss with his sheets like Alfred. He just stands there, unable to look Tim in the eyes, and all of a sudden, Tim is angry.
Bruce isn’t the one lying in the medbay after being beaten up and shot at by Jason Todd. Bruce isn’t the one who has to go through months of physical therapy. Bruce isn’t the one who had his goddamn neck snapped.
He wants to scream at him, wants to yell and sob and ask why even now, he still can’t look him in the fucking eyes.
But Tim has always been a fixer. Has always cleaned up his own messes and the messes of others while he bites his tongue and hopes he doesn’t choke on it one day. Knowing his luck, he probably will.
“Red Hood claims to be Jason Todd,” Tim finally says, giving in to the unspoken stand-off just like he always does.
“I know.”
“He says you replaced him.”
“I know.”
“With me.”
“Yes.”
Tim kind of wants to punch him in the throat.
“So what’s next?” he asks instead, because if he doesn’t, he thinks he’ll have a breakdown.
Bruce is quiet for a moment, before he shuffles closer and hesitantly wraps a hand around Tim’s unbroken wrist.
“You rest,” he rumbles out, “and you recover. Red Hood will be- dealt with. He won’t hurt you again, Tim.”
Tim is too stunned by the blatant affection Bruce is showing him to say anything else, and instead nods numbly. They sit like that for a good ten minutes before the older man reaches up and strokes his hair, something soft and sad on his face.
“I’m sorry, Tim. I’ll do better.”
Tim wants to ask what exactly he’ll do better, but he’s too tired to try and navigate Bruce’s metaphors. So instead, he leans into the warmth offered to him and lets himself think he might be loved. Just for a little while.
He falls asleep with fingers carding through his hair, and it’s almost enough to make him doubt the distance between them before. Tim knows better though at this point, and when he wakes up alone, he isn’t disappointed.
It’s hard to be let down when you don’t expect anything, after all.
Unsurprisingly, Tim is benched again, but unlike last time, he’s practically chained to the manor. He is driven to school and doctor appointments, has at least seven trackers on his person at all time, and isn’t allowed to leave the house unsupervised. Given how busy Bruce, Alfred and Dick are, it means he rarely leaves at all. Stephanie and Cass drop by and try to entertain him, but there’s only so much they can do to stave the boredom. Alfred tries to be present, but the old man has his routine and tasks, and the last thing Tim wants to do is interrupt them, no matter how often he’s told he isn’t being a bother.
The worst thing isn’t the silence or the apathy or even the injuries. No, what upsets Tim the most is the fact that he died as Robin. It is telling that Tim is angrier about his streak being broken than Jason murdering him. Robin was sacred. One person dying in the suit was enough, let alone two more times. The only saving grace is the fact that no one has found out about it. Except, perhaps, Jason himself, but Tim isn’t rushing to ask him anything anytime soon.
He takes up a position on coms as support for Oracle, despite Bruce and Dick’s repeated assurances that he doesn’t have to. Tim wants to, though. Because at least this way he can see them regularly. Cass and Steph both take up the Robin mantle while he’s recovering, and he swallows down the sharp flare of pain in his chest when he sees them.
Jason tries to go after them, but stops when he realises they aren’t Tim. And gradually, the older boy seems to slow down, softening back into an amalgamation of Red Hood and the Robin Tim once knew. Batman and Nightwing notice the change, and Tim watches as they begin to team up. The first few times are disasters, fizzling out into screaming matches and blood, but it doesn’t last. After a week to cool down, they try again, gravitating towards each other despite the pain.
And then one night, Tim goes down to the Cave and sees Jason. Alfred is there, fussing over his lost child, but Jason’s attention snaps to Tim the moment he turns up.
They stare at each other without blinking, without moving. And then suddenly, Jason gives him a slow nod. It isn’t an apology. It isn’t even an acknowledgment. But it must mean something, because that nod breaks the spell, and Jason turns away, ignoring him for the rest of the night.
His presence is never brought up, even when Batman or Nightwing are in the Cave, and Tim feels like he’s drowning all over again.
The fact that he can’t play violin certainly does not help. Despite Alfred’s prognosis of recovery, it takes Tim months to regain even half of the flexibility he used to have, and more than once, he has to stop himself from hurtling his violin against a wall. While the rest of his body heals suitably, his fingers remain stiff, and he finds himself unable to play Allegro or Presto or November. His playing sounds childish, and after the fourth time his fingers refuse to react with the speed they used to, he gives up. Or rather, Cass makes him give it up.
“Not healthy,” she tells him gently, prying his fingers away from the bow. “Dance instead?”
Tim stares at the thin lines decorating his shaking hands, looks at the tightness of the bow and the worn down strings on his violin.
“Yeah,” he says after a while. “We can dance instead.”
She helps him put the violin away, and it feels like a part of him is being torn apart. He doesn’t know whether he should laugh or cry at the fact that he feels more grief over this than his mother’s death. But then Cass is pulling him into the dance room and watching him with eager eyes, and he forces his thoughts away.
He hasn’t been in ballet for a few years now, but he’s still familiar with the stretches and routines, and his sister follows his movements with rapt attention. She mimics him, waving him away when he offers to show her the female parts instead. She wants to learn both, just like him, she explains. By the time he is healed enough to go back to being Robin, the two of them are like extensions of each other when they dance, switching between male and female roles without even thinking.
He returns to being Robin without much fanfare, but the months away have changed things. He kept up with his training, but there’s a familiar disconnect between him and Bruce. Jason’s presence doesn’t exactly help things, but Tim tries to stay cordial. It doesn’t exactly fix things, but he settles into this new status quo without much difficulty.
And then a little boy proclaiming himself to be the blood son of the bat shows up at Wayne Manor, sword in hand and head held high. Damian changes absolutely everything, entering their lives like a comet striking the earth. He does about as much damage as one too, though it mostly seems to be focused entirely on Tim.
Damian’s assassination attempts make Tim’s life a living hell for the sole fact that it makes keeping his abilities secret almost impossible to do. That, and Tim would rather eat a shoe than be killed by the snot-nosed brat he now has to cohabitate with. It’s a matter of pride, at this point, but the little shit is good at what he does, and there are multiple close calls. He’s tossed off Bruce’s damn dinosaur, is poisoned and stabbed, and on one memorable occasion, almost blown-up.
It is almost a relief when Jack Drake wakes up. Tim scurries back to Drake Manor as quickly as possible, ignoring Damian’s mocking and Bruce’s frown, and helps his father settle back into life. Jack mourns his mother with an absent-minded distance, and despite his complicated feelings about her, Tim can’t help but think Janet deserved better than this.
His father tries to be involved in his life, but Tim is far too used to this song and dance to fall for it again. He is pleasantly surprised the first few times he actually makes an effort to be present, but the moment he meets Dana, he knows that things will go back to the way they always were. And he is proven correct. He doesn’t hold it against Dana, and finds her a nice enough woman. She’s the one who drags Jack to celebrate Tim’s sixteenth birthday after all, and he appreciates the gesture.
It doesn’t last, because nothing good ever does in Tim’s life. His dad finds out about Robin and in some puffed up gesture gives him an ultimatum to either give it up, or have the whole Bat Clan be exposed to the press. Despite Robin being, quite frankly, the only good thing about his life currently, he goes to Batman, explains the situation, and leaves. Bruce does not stop him.
He does, however, put Stephanie in the suit.
And then she dies.
And so does Kon and Bart.
And then Jack is murdered in front of him.
Bruce picks him up and carries him home, wrapped in his cloak and uncaring of the blood staining the fabric. He doesn’t poke or prod. He doesn’t try and pry the story out of him. He just sits with him, and Tim wonders how Bruce is able to do the right thing at the worst possible moments.
He goes back to Wayne Manor, of course, and ignores the tension in the house. Tries to pretend that everything is alright, even as he boils with rage and grief in equal measure. It isn’t even about his father. Not really. Jack is a footnote in his life if Tim has to be honest, and had about as much impact as one too. But Steph? Kon? Bart?
He feels like someone’s torn a chunk from him, and it hurts more than all of his deaths combined. Or at least, he thinks it does, because somehow, things get worse.
Because Bruce dies.
And everything spirals out of control.