Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The city hummed like it always did—sirens weaving between the noises of traffic, laughter spilling from alleys that weren't kind of places laughter belonged. Gothams heartbeat was chaos, but Tim had learned to keep step with it. Camera slung around his neck, hoodie too thin for the bite of the autumn winds, he drifted where he wanted. Nobody at the Drake townhouse noticed he was gone. Nobody ever did. 

The streets gave him something his home never did, something to focus on. Light fractured through rain puddles, neon signs smeared into color, shadows twisted into stories, caped crusaders jumped from rooftop to rooftop. His photographs caught it all. 

He crouched by a broken lamppost, snapping a shot of a graffiti-splattered wall, when he caught movement along the rooftops above. 

His chest tightened, he knew that silhouette. 

Not Batman— no the shape was too lean, the movements too fluid. Nightwing.

Tim's heart raced the way it always did when he saw him. Nightwing had been the first Robin, the perfect Robin, the one Tim read about and traced patterns of Gothams vigilantes until the truth had clicked into place. That Dick Grayson the circus kid turned ward of Gothams prince, was Robin. He was everything Tim wished to be. Everything he wished someone would notice he could be. 

But the graceful motion faltered. Nightwing staggered across the rooftops above ledge, clutching his side. Tim froze, his camera halfway raised, watching as the hero missed his footing— then crashed down into the alley with a sound that made Time stomach lurch. 

For a moment, all Tim could do was stare at the crumpled figure across the way in the dark alley. Nightwing didn't move. Gotham kept breathing, careless, but Tim's own breath hitched in his chest. 

He should run, he should call someone. 

Instead Tim's sneakers were already slapping against the wet pavement as he scrambled towards the alley, heart in his throat. He reached the shadows of the alleyway and dropped to his knees when he reached Nightwing side. The black domino mask was still in place, but up close Tim could see the blood staining the hero's uniform, the shallow rise and fall of his chest. 

"Hey—hey, it's okay," Tim whispered, though his hands shook as he pressed them to the wound. He didn't know if he was taking to Nightwing or himself. "I've got you, I..." 

His voice broke but he didn't stop. 

Tim's hands were already slick with blood. Panic burned the edge of his vision, but his body moved on instinct. He couldn't leave Nightwing here— not in an alley where Gotham could eat him alive. 

"Come on, you've gotta help me out," Tim muttered, slipping an arm under the hero's shoulders. He stirred faintly, a groan escaped through clenched teeth, but didn't resist. He was heavier than Tim expected— muscle and armor weighting down his lean frame— but adrenaline gave Tim the strength he needed. 

The camera bounced against his chest as he hauled Nightwing upright, dragging him step by shaky step out of the alley. Every corner he turned felt like a spotlight was on him, like someone was going to see this skinny kid lugging a half-conscious vigilante down Gothams backstreets and call the GCPD. 

But no one did. Gotham never looked too closely.

Tims arms screamed from the effort, but he didn't stop. Every staggered step dragged Nightwings weight further from the alley and to one of the places Tim trusted. 

The city barely noticed them– shadows moving through shadows. Gotham had a way of looking the other way, especially when it mattered. 

By the time he reached the back door of the abandoned building, his chest was burning, and his fingers were covered in slick red blood. 

He kicked the rusted frame until it gave, then pulled Nightwing through, letting the heavy door slam behind them. 

The room swallowed them in silence. It wasn't much– just the skeleton of an old apartment building, forgotten years ago. Dust coated everything, cobwebs stitched between pipes, the floor littered with broken glass. There was no more furniture, all moved out a long time ago. But to Tim, it was safe. It was where he came when he didn't want to return home and deal with his parents, or even when they locked the doors forgetting Tim wasn't home and Tim needed a place to sleep. He came with his camera, to be alone and away from the too loud or too empty home. 

And now it was where Nightwing might die. 

Tim lowered him as gently as he could onto the cold flooring. Nightwing groaned faintly, head lolling, one gloved hand twitching as though trying to push himself up– but his body wouldn't follow. 

"Don't," Tim whispered, crouching beside him, "Don't move. I'll–I'll fix this, I'll..." his voice trailed, breath catching. There was no first aid kit here. No blankets. Nothing but rubble and shadows. 

Think. Think Tim. 

Tim's eyes darted around the room. Nothing useful. Nothing except—

His hands flew to the hem of his hoodie, yanking it off and tearing at the fabric until it split. He wrenched one sleeve free, teeth gritted, and pressed it hard against the bleeding wound at Nightwings side. Blood spread hot and sticky through the cotton, but he leaned his weight into it, desperate. 

"Stay with me," Tim pleaded, glancing up at the masked face. Nightwings eyes flickered under his closed lids, his breaths shallow and uneven. "You can't— you can't just... not here. Not like this. You're supposed to be the one who makes it,"  

The words tumbled out, shaky and raw as his fingers knotted the rest of the hoodie into the makeshift bandage. He tied it tight, pulling until his hands shook from the strain. 

"Please live, Gotham needs you," 

-

The hours crawled. Tim didn't dare close his eyes. He sat cross legged on the floor, hoodie ripped and useless except where it bound Nightwings side. Every time the man's breath hitched, Tim's stomach clenched, certain he was about to stop. 

The first hint of morning crept through a broken window– grey light painting long shadows across the floor. Dost motes drifted lazily, as if the world didn't know or care what had happened here last night. 

Tim rubbed his tired eyes, camera still hanging around his neck like a comfort object. He'd pulled all nighters before, but this time adrenaline had burned away any chance of sleep. He just.. Watched. Because someone had to. 

A low groan broke the silence. 

Tim jerked upright, heart pounding, as Nightwing stirred. His head shifted against the floor, brow furrowed under the mask. Then slowly— painfully— his eyes blinked open. 

For a second, he looked lost. Then his gaze focused on the scrawny kid sitting a few feet away, knees drawn to his chest, exhaustion carved into his face. 

"... kid?" Nightwings voice was hoarse, rough with pain. 

Tim swallowed hard, "Uh—hi," 

Nightwings hand went instinctively to his side, fingers brushing the torn fabric pressed against his wound. He looked down at the makeshift bandage, then looked back at Tim, "... you did this?" 

Tim nodded, suddenly self-conscious, "I–I didn't have anything else. Just... my hoodie. Sorry if it's not—" 

"Hey," Nightwings voice softened, though weak. His lips twitched into the faintest shadow of a smile. "Don't apologize. You... you probably saved my life," 

The words hit Tim harder than he expected. His throat went tight, but he managed a small shrug, eyes darting away. "I couldn't just leave you," 

Nightwing studied him for a moment— this pale, underslept kid with messy hair, dirt smudged across his cheek, watching him like the world depended on it. Whoever he was, he wasn't ordinary. 

"Whats your name?" He asked quietly. 

Tim hesitated. He hadn't planned for this part, "... Tim" 

"Tim," Nightwing repeated it like he was memorizing it. He shifted, wincing, but kept his gaze steady on the boy, "Thank you,"

Nightwing shifted, wincing as he tried to push himself up on one elbow. The makeshift bandage tugged at his side, but it held. His gaze swept the dusty room—broken glass, cracked walls, nothing but shadows and a kid watching him like a guard dog.

"Not the Batcave," Nightwing muttered under his breath, then looked back at Tim. "Where are we?"

Tim hesitated, thumb worrying at the strap of his camera. "Just... a place. No one comes here. It's safe."

Nightwing studied him a beat longer. The kid looked wiry, clothes too big, eyes red-rimmed from no sleep. But it wasn't just tiredness in his face—it was something sharper. Familiar, in a way Nightwing recognized from too many patrols and too many kids who slipped through Gotham's cracks.

"Do you live here?" Nightwing asked carefully.

Tim's head snapped up. "No. No, I—I have a house." His voice was too quick, too defensive, like the words needed to hit hard enough to convince both of them.

Nightwing nodded slowly, not pressing. "Okay. You've got a home. Parents?"

"Yeah," Tim said. Then, softer, eyes dropping to the floor: "They're around."

The silence stretched. Nightwing didn't miss the gap between the words—around wasn't the same as there.

His voice gentled. "When's the last time you ate?"

Tim blinked, caught off guard. He opened his mouth, shut it, then shrugged, fidgeting with the loose thread on his sleeve. "I don't know. Yesterday? Maybe." He said it like it didn't matter. Like he didn't want it to matter.

Nightwing's stomach twisted. The kid was all bones and shadows, trying to make himself small even while holding someone else's life together. He didn't push harder—he knew what defensiveness felt like—but he let his gratitude show in his voice.

"You did good, Tim. Better than most adults would've. You kept me alive."

Tim's face tightened at that, like he wasn't used to hearing words that carried weight. He ducked his head, muttering, "Didn't really have a choice."

But Nightwing heard what he didn't say—that no one else would've done it if he hadn't.

He let the silence linger, not breaking the fragile trust. Still, something settled between them: Nightwing had bled in this kid's safe place, and the kid hadn't let go.

-

Nightwing leaned back against the wall, forcing a breath through gritted teeth. "I can't... patch myself up here," he muttered, fishing inside one of his gauntlets. His fingers found the tiny communicator tucked there, smeared with his own blood.

Tim watched, wide-eyed, as he lifted it to his mouth.

"Batman," Nightwing rasped, voice low but steady. "Northside. Old building off Kane Street. Got clipped bad. Need extraction."

Tim's heart leapt into his throat. Batman. The Batman. The figure who stalked Gotham's rooftops like a living shadow, the one every criminal whispered about and every kid dreamed of seeing just once.

"You—you called him?" Tim's voice cracked, somewhere between awe and panic.

"Relax," Nightwing said with a faint, tired smile. "He's on our side."

Tim hugged his knees closer, pulse hammering. On their side. His hero had just included him in that. Batman was coming. For the first time in his life, Tim felt like maybe he was about to matter.

Minutes bled into eternity until a shape appeared at the broken window. A cape. A cowl. The room seemed smaller suddenly, the air heavier, as Batman dropped silently inside. His presence filled the shadows like they belonged to him.

Tim couldn't breathe. He stared, camera strap tight in his grip, eyes wide.

"Nightwing." Batman's voice was gravel. He crossed the space in seconds, crouching at Nightwing's side, gloved hands already assessing the makeshift bandage. "Talk to me."

"I'll live," Nightwing said with a wince. "But I didn't do this alone." He turned his head toward the boy—

But the corner of the room where Tim had been sitting was empty.

Batman's gaze swept the room. No sound of footsteps, no whisper of movement. Just dust and shadows.

"He was right here," Nightwing said quickly, struggling to sit up. "A kid. Tim. He found me—dragged me here, patched me up. He stayed the whole night."

Batman's jaw tightened. "And now he's gone."

Dick let his head rest back against the wall, frustration and disappointment twisting in his chest. He'd wanted Bruce to see—to see the kid who had saved him, the one with too much in his eyes for someone his age.

Instead, all that remained of Tim Drake was the scrap of torn fabric tied around Nightwing's ribs and the ghost of small, stubborn hands that had refused to let him bleed out.

-

By the time the sun was high enough to burn through Gotham's haze, Tim was dragging his feet up the back steps of the Drake townhouse. His ripped hoodie sleeve was balled in his fist, the other sleeve hanging loose around his wrist. Every bone in his body ached from hauling Nightwing's weight, and his head still buzzed with the image of Batman in the warehouse—tall, unshakable, terrifying.

He hesitated with his hand on the back door. The house looked still, shutters drawn, cars gone from the drive. They're not home, he told himself. Relief loosened his chest. He could slip in, shower, maybe grab some food before collapsing in bed.

The lock clicked, the door swung open—

And voices cut through the air.

Tim froze. His parents.

Janet's sharp tones carried from the kitchen, clipped and impatient, while Jack's deeper rumble answered. Tim's stomach dropped. He stepped inside anyway, as quiet as possible, shoes squeaking faintly on the tile. If he could just make it to the stairs—

"Timothy?" Janet's voice cracked like a whip.

Tim flinched. She stood in the doorway, coffee cup in hand, her eyes sweeping over him. His hair was a mess, his clothes streaked with dirt and dust, knees scuffed from the warehouse floor. Her lips pinched.

"Look at you," she snapped. "Filthy. Absolutely filthy. Do you have any idea what you look like right now?"

Before Tim could answer, Jack's voice thundered from the living room: "Where the hell were you last night?"

Tim's throat tightened. His fingers curled against the strap of his camera, the weight of it suddenly heavy. He opened his mouth, but nothing came out.

Janet shook her head, disgust cutting sharper than anger. "God, Timothy, you can't even be bothered to come home and when you do, you drag dirt all over the floors I just had cleaned."

Jack stepped into view, his glare like a fist. "You think you can sneak in after being gone all night? You think we don't notice?"

Tim stared at the floor. They hadn't noticed—not until he was right under their noses.

"I—I was out," he said softly, voice breaking before he could steady it.

"Out?" Janet scoffed. "Out where? With those... gutter kids? Honestly, Timothy, I don't know what's wrong with you."

His chest constricted, the words cutting deeper than they should have. He gripped his camera tighter, wishing—just for a moment—that he was still in the warehouse with Nightwing, where being seen hadn't felt like punishment.

"Enough," Janet snapped, her tone final. She waved a hand toward the stairs like she was swatting away a nuisance. "Go upstairs. Shower. And for God's sake, clean yourself up. I won't have you dragging this filth around my house."

Jack muttered something under his breath, shaking his head, but neither parent waited for a response. They'd already turned back to their coffee and their own conversations as if Tim had dissolved into the wallpaper.

Tim's feet felt heavy as he climbed the stairs, each step creaking under his weight. His throat burned, his chest tight, and by the time he pushed his bedroom door shut behind him, his hands were trembling.

They hadn't asked if he was hurt. They hadn't even asked where he'd been, not really. Just accusations, complaints, sharp words that still echoed in his skull.

He slid down against the door until he was sitting on the carpet, curling his knees up to his chest. For a long moment, all he could hear was the blood rushing in his ears. He pressed his face into his arms, trying to swallow the knot in his throat.

And then—unbidden—his mind replayed the night before.

Nightwing's voice, rough but steady: You probably saved my life.

The way his masked eyes had softened when he'd said Tim's name. The faintest smile, gratitude that felt real in a way Tim wasn't used to.

Despite himself, Tim felt his lips curve upward. It was small, shaky, but real. His parents' voices still haunted downstairs, sharp and cold.

Chapter Text

Upstairs, the walls of the Drake townhouse seemed to close in tighter than the narrow alleys of Gotham ever did. Tim stood in the bathroom mirror, hoodie stripped away, his shirt streaked with dried blood that wasn't his. He ran cold water over his hands, scrubbing until the stains faded to pale pink, but no matter how much he washed, the tremor in his fingers stayed.

From downstairs came the muffled rise and fall of his parents' voices—sharp, clipped, like knives sliding against glass. Not shouting at each other. They never really fought with each other. They fought with him.

Tim caught his reflection and quickly looked away. His hair was a mess, dirt smudged under his jaw. Janet's voice rang in his head: Look at you. Filthy.

She was right. He was filthy.

He peeled off his shirt and shoved it in the trash under the sink. Better to get rid of it before she saw it again. If she found blood on his clothes—any blood—she'd only yell louder, say he was ruining things, embarrassing them. And Jack...

Tim winced as the memory flashed: Jack's voice booming through the house, his hand slamming against the wall just inches from Tim's head when he hadn't answered fast enough last time.

That hadn't been abuse. It couldn't be. His dad had been right, Tim should've been home, should've listened, should've been better. If he were better, they wouldn't be so angry all the time.

He turned the faucet off and stood there watching it drip, goosebumps prickling his arms. For a moment, he imagined Nightwing instead of his father in that reflection—Nightwing, smiling faintly, saying You kept me alive. The warmth of it pushed back against the cold knot of shame in his stomach.

Still, he whispered the words under his breath, almost like a prayer: "I'll do better. I promise."

He didn't even know who he was saying it to. His parents. Nightwing. Himself.

Maybe all of them.

Tim pulled on a clean shirt from his drawer—creased, too small, but passable. Then he wrapped his arms around his knees on the bed, back pressed into the wall. He hugged the camera to his chest, the only thing in the house that felt like it belonged to him.

And as the day passed, and his parents' voices rose and fell below him, he replayed Nightwing's thank-you again and again.

-

The glow of the Batcomputer filled the cavern, casting pale light over stone walls and steel. Bruce stood with arms crossed, eyes narrowed at the streams of data scrolling past. Dick sat on the med bay cot nearby, shirtless, the fresh stitches along his side a sharp reminder of how close the night had cut him.

Jason was perched on a railing above, legs swinging, his jacket hood pulled up. He looked equal parts bored and restless, as he watched.

"You should've come straight here," Bruce said, not looking away from the screen. His voice was low, steady, but the undercurrent of worry was unmistakable.

"I didn't exactly have the option," Dick replied, wincing as he shifted. "I barely stayed conscious long enough before I fell off the roof." His eyes softened despite the sting in his words. "And I wasn't alone. Someone helped me."

That got Bruce's attention. His head turned. "The boy you mentioned."

"Yeah." Dick sat forward slightly. "Scrawny kid, maybe twelve, thirteen? He found me in the alley. Dragged me off the street before anyone else noticed. Used his own clothes to stop the bleeding." He gave a faint, almost disbelieving laugh. "He stayed with me the whole night, Bruce. Watching me. Guarding me. Like it was his responsibility."

Jason dropped down from the railing with a thud. "And then he bolted as soon as you called Bruce?"

"Pretty much," Dick admitted. "I wanted you to see him. He saved my life. But he was gone before I could even say his name twice."

Bruce's jaw tightened. "You did get his name."

"Tim," Dick said softly. "Just Tim." He rubbed at his wrist, thoughtful. "There was something about him. The way he looked at me... like I was the only person who'd seen him in years. And the way he brushed off questions about home? He said he had parents, but—"

"But you don't believe him," Bruce finished.

"No," Dick admitted. "Not really. Not the whole truth, anyway."

Jason eyed him skeptically, "Gotham's crawling with kids like that,"

"This wasn't just any kid," Dick said firmly, looking between Bruce and Jason. "He didn't panic. He didn't scream or run. He just... did what needed to be done. And he stayed. That takes guts."

For a moment, silence settled over the cave, broken only by the hum of the computers. Bruce's gaze was far away, thoughtful.

"He saved you," he said finally, voice low. "That makes him important."

Jason crossed his arms, muttering, "Or stupid." But even he couldn't quite disguise the flicker of curiosity in his eyes.

Bruce turned back to the computer, already pulling up street-cam footage and school databases. "We'll keep an eye on him."

Dick leaned back against the cot, exhaustion dragging at him, but relief flickering in his chest. Maybe Tim had vanished from that building. But the Bats weren't about to let him disappear from Gotham.

-

The days blurred together at the Drake townhouse.

His parents' routines never shifted much: morning coffee, work calls, the occasional charity gala or museum event. They weren't cruel in the obvious ways. No bruises, no locked doors. Just sharp words and colder silences. But Tim had learned early that silence cut the deepest.

Most mornings, breakfast wasn't waiting. Sometimes Janet tossed a granola bar onto the counter on her way out the door. Sometimes not. Tim kept quiet either way. If he asked, it only led to her sighing—You're old enough to handle yourself, Timothy.

So he handled himself. A few granola bars swiped from the pantry, a bottle of water from the fridge, sometimes there were even leftovers. He told himself it was fine. He didn't need much anyway.

At school, he blended into the corners. Teachers rarely called on him; classmates rarely noticed him. That suited him. He slipped through hallways with his camera tucked under his jacket, always watching, always catching angles no one else saw. Behind the lens, he was steady, purposeful. Out there, he existed.

At home, he barely did.

Dinner was often served late, if at all. Jack might bark his name across the house, demanding why he wasn't downstairs, why he hadn't cleaned the mud off his shoes, why his grades weren't higher, that he shouldn't be on his computer so much. Janet might wrinkle her nose, telling him to sit straighter, dress better, "at least try to look like you're part of this family."

Tim would nod, apologize, shrink smaller in his chair. The words never bounced off him—they sank in, heavy weights dragging him lower. But he never thought to call it unfair. He thought: They're right. I should do better. I should be better.

When the pressure got too tight, he slipped out. Down the back steps, camera over his shoulder, sneakers scuffing through Gotham's streets until he found the places that belonged to him. His hidden hideouts. Rooftops with cracked skylights. Alleys where light fractured against puddles.

Sometimes, when he looked through his viewfinder, he caught Gotham's heros streaking past—the cape, the shadow, the impossible grace of them. And for a moment, he wasn't invisible. Because if he could see them, maybe one day they'd see him. Sometimes he would call himself stupid for imagining himself amongst them, in their capes... in their family.

Back home, though, the townhouse walls swallowed him again. The silence stretched. His parents' voices echoed. And Tim sat in his room, hugging his camera, trying to hold onto the one night when someone had said he mattered.

-

The dining room at the Drake townhouse gleamed like a museum exhibit. Crystal glasses. Polished cutlery. Janet's collection of china no one was ever allowed to touch outside these dinners. It was the kind of table meant to impress guests—except there were never any. Just three people, sitting in silence.

Tim sat at the far end, hunched a little in his chair, leaning on the table with his elbows. He'd slipped into the seat quietly, hoping not to be noticed, but his scuffed sneakers still squeaked faintly on the hardwood.

Janet's eyes cut to him instantly.

"Timothy," she said, voice sharp as glass. "Where are your manners? Sit up, get your elbows off the table. Do you ever think about the impression you make?"

Tim dropped his gaze to his plate, heat crawling up his neck. "Sorry," he mumbled.

"Don't mumble," Jack snapped, his fork clattering against the plate. He didn't even look up. "Speak like you mean it."

Tim tried again, louder this time. "Sorry."

The word seemed to hang there. Empty.

Dinner continued in silence for a while. Janet picked at her salad with delicate precision. Jack shoveled food between gulps of scotch. Tim barely touched his plate. His stomach growled, but the knots in it kept him from eating. He'd learned it was better to keep quiet than risk drawing attention again.

But attention found him anyway.

"You were out again last night," Jack said suddenly, his tone accusing. He leaned back in his chair, eyes narrowing. "Don't think I didn't notice. Slipping in through the back like a little thief."

Tim froze, fingers tightening around his fork. "I... I was just walking," he said carefully.

"At midnight?" Janet scoffed. "Do you think we're idiots? Where were you?"

Tim's mouth went dry. He settled for, "Nowhere.”

The air seemed to snap. Jack's chair scraped loudly as he pushed back from the table.

"Don't lie to your mother. You don't get to sneak out of this house like some delinquent. We raised you better than that!" His voice thundered across the dining room. "You think rules don't apply to you? You think you can do whatever the hell you want?"

Tim shrank back instinctively. "I didn't—"

Without hesitation Jack raised his arm. The back of his hand was too quick to flinch away from, it clipped Tim's cheek. Not hard enough to leave a mark that would last, but sharp enough to sting.

The world went very still.

Tim blinked, swallowing hard. His cheek burned, but he didn't cry. Didn't gasp. He just nodded, eyes down. "I won't do it again," he said quietly.

Jack loomed over him for a moment, chest heaving. Then he grunted and sat back down, grabbing his glass like nothing happened. Janet didn't say a word. She just picked up her fork again, as if the interruption had been no more than a phone ringing.

Dinner resumed in silence.

Tim sat very still, face burning, stomach knotted tighter than before. A small part of him whispered that it wasn't fair, that it wasn't right. But the louder voice in his head—the one that always won—told him it was his fault. He had snuck out. He had broken their rules.

So he chewed slowly, carefully, and told himself he deserved it.

-

The house was too quiet when Tim opened his eyes.

For a split second, he thought maybe he'd overslept—that his parents were still in bed. But as he sat up, blinking against the pale morning light, the silence had a different weight. Empty, not restful.

He padded downstairs in socked feet, careful out of habit to avoid the step that creaked. The kitchen was spotless, staged like something out of a magazine. Janet's perfume still lingered faintly in the air, a sharp reminder she'd been there.

The fridge door swung open on his touch. A lone half-empty bottle of tonic water. A wedge of cheese with mold creeping across the rind. Nothing else.

The pantry wasn't better. A box of crackers with crumbs rattling inside. A jar of instant coffee.

Tim closed the door slowly. His stomach twisted, but it wasn't the sharp pang of sudden hunger—it was the dull ache of something he'd learned to live with. This wasn't new. He'd gotten good at rationing, at pretending a couple crackers and water was enough to count as breakfast.

On the counter, a folded note waited under Janet's pen. He recognized her looping script before he even read it:

Business trip. Don't wait up. Back next week. Remember to keep the house in order.

No signature. No love, Mom.

Tim stared at the paper for a long moment, then set it back exactly where he found it. His chest felt hollow, but his lips curved faintly anyway because the absence meant freedom. No sharp eyes watching him, no biting words, no heavy hand across his face.

He took a deep breath, grabbed his camera from the hook by his door, and slipped outside. His stomach was empty, but the city wasn't. Out there, the streets were alive, the rooftops open.

-

The city was alive in smog and shadow, and Tim captured every flicker of it through his lens. He crouched by a rusted fire escape, snapping the way steam curled up from a grate like a ghost.

But the camera wasn't enough to distract him tonight. His stomach had been gnawing at him all day, sharp and insistent. By now, it felt like something twisting inside him, scraping raw.

He found himself drifting, eyes straying from graffiti murals and broken windows to convenience stores. To overflowing dumpsters behind diners. He hated the thought, but hunger was louder than pride.

Tim was hovering by the side alley of a bodega, eyeing a crate of produce left out, when a voice cut through the air above him.

"You've got an eye for angles, kid."

Tim froze. The voice was warm, teasing, but it carried weight. He tipped his head back and saw him—Nightwing, crouched on the edge of the rooftop, watching with that easy half-smile.

Tim's chest tightened. The camera nearly slipped from his hands.

Nightwing dropped down in a fluid motion, landing lightly a few feet away. "I was hoping I'd find you again." His gaze softened. "I didn't get the chance to say it properly the other night before you left, but thank you, again. I'm truly grateful."

Tim ducked his head, gripping the strap of his camera like a lifeline. "I just... it wasn't a big deal."

"It was." Nightwing's tone left no room for argument. He smiled, about to say more—when his eyes caught where Tim had been looking. The crate of bruised apples, half-hidden in the alley shadows.

His smile faltered.

"You hungry?"

Tim shook his head quickly. "No, I'm fine."

But right on cue, his stomach growled—loud, humiliating. The sound seemed to echo off the bricks.

Tim's face flushed hot. He clutched his camera tighter, like maybe it could shield him from the shame curling through him.

Nightwing didn't tease. Didn't press. He just tilted his head, thoughtful, then said softly, "Come on."

Minutes later, they sat on the lip of a rooftop overlooking a flickering billboard. Two takeout bags rustled between them, the smell of fries and noodles cutting through the night air.

Tim was hesitant at first, but the first bite nearly made his eyes sting. He ducked his head, shoveling food in carefully, like someone might snatch it away if he wasn't quick.

Nightwing leaned back, watching him—not with pity, but with something steadier. "Guess I ordered enough, huh?" he said lightly.

Tim swallowed hard, wiped his mouth on his sleeve, and glanced sideways. "...Thanks." His voice was quiet, but for the first time in a long time, he meant it all the way through.

-

The city hummed beneath them—sirens distant, a motorcycle revving down in the Narrows, the billboard below them cycling from toothpaste ads to a garish movie poster.

Tim sat cross-legged, a carton of noodles balanced on his knees. He tried to eat slowly this time, though every bite still felt like it vanished before he'd even tasted it.

Nightwing dug into his fries, glancing at him now and then with that easy grin. "You know," he said, "I've worked with some pretty impressive partners before, but not one of them managed to patch me up with a hoodie."

Tim snorted before he could stop himself, ducking his head as if laughing out loud was dangerous. "It wasn't... it wasn't great work, I just did what I've read about before."

"It kept me alive." Dick leaned an elbow on the ledge, studying him. "That counts for a lot in this city."

For the first time in weeks—maybe months—Tim smiled. Small, hesitant, but real.

They ate in silence for a few more minutes, the paper containers crinkling in the breeze. Dick let it sit, not wanting to spook him. But then he said, almost too casually: "You don't have to do this alone, you know. If things aren't good at home..." He trailed off, giving Tim a look that was meant to be gentle, reassuring. "There are people who can help."

The smile vanished from Tim's face. His fingers tightened around the carton until the sides bent. "I didn't—" he started, voice tight. "I didn't say anything about home."

"I know." Dick held up a hand quickly. "I just—"

But Tim was already shoving the carton aside, scrambling to his feet. His pulse thundered in his ears. Everything felt numb. He'd heard that tone before—polite, pitying, the kind adults used before they decided what to do with him. Before they called his parents. Before the punishment came down harder than before.

"No one needs to help me," Tim blurted, panicked.

His eyes flicked once to Nightwing's face—concern, not anger—but it didn't matter. His legs moved before his brain caught up.

One second he was on the ledge, the next he was running across the rooftop, disappearing into the shadows with his camera clutched tight.

Dick shot up, cursing softly under his breath. He started after him, but by the time he reached the far side, the boy was gone, swallowed up by Gotham's endless dark.

Nightwing stood there a moment longer, scanning the alleys below. His chest ached, not from his stitches this time, but from the look he'd seen flash across Tim's face.

Fear.

-

The Narrows were damp that night, rain having left everything slick and shining under jaundiced streetlamps. Tim crouched at the corner of an alley, camera raised, adjusting the focus to capture the fractured reflection of neon in an oil-slick puddle.

The world was quiet in the viewfinder. Controlled. It made sense.

He was so focused, he didn't notice the shadow closing in until something barreled into him from the side.

"Gotcha!"

Tim yelped as he was knocked sideways onto the wet pavement. His camera clattered against his chest, saved by the strap, as a figure bumped into him—red tunic, black cape, green gloves, domino mask. Robin grinned down at him, all cocky satisfaction.

"You're Tim, aren't ya?" Robin said, smirk tugging at his mouth. "The kid who saved my brother's life."

Tim froze. His arms instinctively curled around the camera, shoulders hunched, chin ducking like he was bracing for a hit. His lips parted, ready to deny everything.

But it wasn't the accusation that snagged him—it was the slip.

Jason blinked, realizing too late what he'd said. His eyes widened, and he rocked back on his heels. "Ah, shit." He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck, trying to play it off with a crooked grin. "Forget I said that, okay? Don't tell anyone. B want us to not spill any details about our identities"

Tim's head lifted slowly. His expression was unreadable in the shadows, but his eyes flicked over the vigilantes face like he was memorizing it. Then he gave a single, small nod.

Jason exhaled, relieved. "Good. That stays between us, yeah?"

Tim didn't answer aloud, just nodded again, more firmly this time.

Inside, though, his thoughts churned. Don't tell anyone.

Of course he wouldn't. He never had. Not when he pieced it together, of who was behind the masks, on his own all those months ago.

Tim had known. And kept it. Because secrets were something he was good at.

Robin studied him for a moment, trying to read him. The kid was jumpy, too quiet, eyes always darting away like he was waiting for a blow. Weird, sure—but Jason knew weird. He recognized it in the way kids on the streets carried themselves.

Jason stood, offering a hand to pull Tim up. "You're alright, kid. Better than alright—you saved Nightwing.”

Jason tugged Tim up by the arm, not too rough but not gentle either. "C'mon. I know a spot. Grab some air, hang out. You earned it."

Tim swallowed hard, his camera clutched tight against his chest. Hang out? With Robin?

His stomach twisted. Not from hunger, Dick had fed him earlier, but from something heavier.

"I—uh, I should... I should go home," Tim stammered, voice tight. "It's late. My parents—"

Jason cut him off with a scoff. "Kid, you look like you've been camping in an alley. Don't give me that 'home' line. Just five minutes, okay? You'll like it." He gave a lopsided grin, trying to be reassuring. "Rooftops beat four walls any day."

He doesn't get it. He doesn't know. Tim's thoughts raced. If I stay, I'm wasting his time. He's Robin. He's supposed to be fighting crime, not babysitting... not looking after me. He'll regret this. He'll see I'm nothing. A burden. Dead weight.

Jason kept talking, filling the silence with easy banter. "Bet you never thought you'd be hanging with Gotham's finest, huh? Well… second finest. Nightwing's got the looks, B's got the scare, but me? I've got charm. And charm's what counts." He nudged Tim's shoulder.

Tim flinched before he could stop himself. His head ducked lower. He noticed. He has to notice. He's wasting his time. I shouldn't even be here. He should leave me.

Jason didn't notice. Or maybe he pretended not to. He kept walking, tossing words back like breadcrumbs.

Tim's pulse hammered in his ears. Every step felt heavier. If I don't leave now, I'll mess it up. He'll see I don't deserve this. I don't deserve him being kind. I don't deserve anything.

Robin stopped ahead, scanning the street, body shifting into patrol mode. "Hang on a sec," he muttered, eyes narrowing at the shadows.

Tim didn't hesitate. The second Jason's attention wavered, he slipped sideways into the darkness, his small frame folding into the night as if it had been waiting for him all along.

By the time Jason turned back, the kid was gone.

He froze, then sighed through his teeth, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Dammit, kid..." He clicked his tongue, sharp and annoyed, but his expression softened almost immediately. He looked out into the shadows where Tim had vanished.

"...you gotta stop doing that."

Chapter Text

A week later Tim found himself dressed in a suit that didn’t quite fit, standing beneath chandeliers that glittered like constellations. The Drake name carried weight in Gotham, and Jack and Janet insisted on being seen. To them, Tim wasn’t a son—he was a prop. An accessory to round out the perfect image.

He stood near the back of the ballroom, clutching a glass of water while his parents worked the crowd. He’d taken a few photographs in his head—angles, lighting, faces he wished he could capture with his camera instead of committing to memory.

For a while, he was invisible. Until he wasn’t.

Someone asked him a simple question, a polite guest trying to make small talk with the Drake heir. “And what about you, Tim? What are your interests?”

Tim blinked, hesitated then answered honestly, softly: “I… I like photography.”

It slipped out before he could stop it. He saw his mother’s face tighten across the room, his father’s jaw flex.

The evening continued, but the air grew taut. Tim knew he’d said the wrong thing.

Later, as they left, Jack’s hand clamped down on his shoulder in the parking garage. Hard. Fingers digging deep, bruising. “You embarrassed us,” he hissed, yanking Tim closer as they walked. “Photography? Do you have any idea how stupid you sounded? Do you think anyone cares about your little hobby? You're supposed to represent us, not you”

Tim winced but didn’t answer. His mother walked a step ahead, saying nothing, eyes fixed forward.

The ride home was suffocating. Jack’s voice filled the car, each word sharp, hot. “Pathetic. I work my ass off, and you stand there like some scrawny nobody. You’re a Drake, Tim. Start acting like one.”

Tim pressed against the backseat, fingers knotted in his lap. He tried to make himself small, unnoticeable. Janet stared out her own window, silent.

The car slowed, then pulled into a gas station. Jack shoved the gearshift into park and turned to Tim, eyes cold. “Go inside. Tell the clerk pump two needs to be filled.”

Tim hesitated, confused. “But we’re not—”

“Do what I said.” Jack’s tone cut through the air like a blade.

Tim unbuckled, slipped out of the car, and walked into the fluorescent-lit station. The clerk looked up as the bell over the door jingled. Tim’s voice was quiet but steady. “Pump two, please.”

The clerk glanced past Tim through the glass storefront. His brow furrowed. “Kid… there’s no car out there.”

Tim turned.

The space where the sleek black car had been parked was empty. The pavement wet with oil stains, lit only by the buzzing station sign.

His chest hollowed out.

They’d left him.

Tim stared through the glass doors at the vacant space where the car should have been. His chest felt like it had caved in, but at the same time, nothing reached him.

The clerk’s voice wavered at the edge of his hearing. “Hey, kid—you okay?”

Tim blinked slowly, the words barely registering. Everything felt far away. The buzzing lights above, the smell of old coffee and gasoline, the squeak of someone mopping in the back—all of it blurred together.

They left me.

The thought drifted in, detached, almost clinical. Like he wasn’t really the one it happened to, just observing it happen to someone else. But it was odd, they’d always left him at home… why was this any different?

His hands felt numb as he tugged at his suit jacket, too tight, too clean for a kid who was never meant to fit into it. His throat closed. He turned away from the counter before the clerk could ask again, pushing out the door.

The night air slapped cold against his face, but even that didn’t break through the fog. He walked. One foot, then the other. Black dress shoes against the pavement, leaving little streaks of grime on once-polished leather.

He didn’t know where he was going. Didn’t think about it. Just kept moving.

He pulled the suit jacket tighter around his frame and walked faster. Down cracked sidewalks, past boarded-up shops, into the dark veins of Gotham’s streets. He tried not to think. Tried not to feel. But inside, everything pressed down heavy:

If they left… then maybe I was supposed to be left. If they didn’t want me…

He didn’t notice his legs carrying him toward the part of the city he knew best—the alleys, the hidden places where he sometimes watched and waited for the flicker of cape and shadow.

Without his camera, he felt exposed. Stripped of the one thing that made sense. But still he kept moving, small and silent in a suit that wasn’t his, until the city swallowed him back into itself.

The longer Tim walked, the more he stood out. A scrawny twelve-year-old in an expensive, tailored suit wandering through Gotham’s side streets was practically a beacon.

It didn’t take long before a group of older kids, teenagers with sharp eyes and sharper grins, spotted him under a flickering streetlight.

“Well, look at this,” one of them drawled, stepping into his path. “Rich boy lost his chauffeur?”

Tim froze, clutching his jacket closed. His heartbeat thudded in his ears. He didn’t answer, answering usually made things worse.

Another kid shoved him lightly, laughing. “That’s silk, isn’t it? Damn. Wonder what else he’s got on him.”

Tim’s chest tightened. He tried to step around, but a hand caught his shoulder and shoved him back against the wall. It wasn’t brutal, just enough to rattle him. He winced, his breath hitching.

“Got any cash, Richie Rich?”

Tim’s fingers fumbled into his pocket. He pulled out the only thing he had left: a folded bill, crumpled and damp with sweat. His allowance for the week. He held it out without meeting their eyes.

The tallest kid snatched it. They laughed, muttered something about “easy mark,” and one gave him a shove to the side before peeling off down the street.

Tim slid down the wall, hands shaking. His shoulder ached where he’d been pushed against the wall, but he didn’t cry. He didn’t dare.

Instead, he pushed himself up and scanned the street. Across the way, a boy about his age, maybe a little older, sat on the curb. His clothes were baggy, worn thin at the seams, but functional. Survival clothes.

Tim swallowed, then crossed the street, heart pounding. He pulled the last of his money—a smaller bill, crumpled tight—from his other pocket.

The boy looked up, wary. “What?”

Tim hesitated, then held out the money. “I’ll… I’ll trade you. Clothes. For this.”

The boy squinted at him. “You serious?”

Tim nodded once. His throat was too tight for words.

A beat of silence. Then the boy shrugged, snatched the bill, and gestured to the alley. “Fine. Change there.”

Minutes later, Tim emerged in oversized jeans and a hoodie that smelled faintly of smoke and rain. The fabric hung heavy on his small frame, sleeves past his hands, but he tugged the hood up and pulled it close.

The suit now shoved in a cardboard box, abandoned by a dumpster. He didn’t look back at it.

- 

Tim drifted through Gotham’s veins until the ache in his legs outpaced the ache in his chest. That was when he saw it: a small group of kids huddled around the orange glow of a trash can fire.

He hesitated, then stepped closer. No one told him to scram, so he slid onto an overturned crate near the edge of the light.

For a long while, the only sound was the hiss and crackle of burning wood. The kids didn’t look at him, just kept their hands close to the fire, faces half-shadowed.

Finally, one of them—maybe thirteen, hair in a jagged cut like it had been hacked off with scissors—grunted. “You new?”

Tim pulled his sleeves down over his hands. “Kinda. Just cold.”

That earned a shrug. Acceptance, of a sort.

Another kid leaned in, rubbing his palms together. “Don’t let anyone tell you to hit up a shelter,” he said, voice bitter. “Theyre all traps, caseworkers and cops like to trap ya. It's worse than the streets.”

“Yeah,” someone else muttered, kicking at a bottle cap. “At least out here, you know who’s gonna mess with you. In the system, they smile at you while they break you.”

A girl with sharp eyes spoke up next. “My cousin was put into foster. Thought it’d be better. Her foster dad busted her lip, and when she told the caseworker? Nothing happened. They don’t care.” She spat into the fire. “None of ‘em do.”

A heavy silence settled. Then another voice, younger, asked, “What about… y’know. The Bats?”

That got a round of scoffs.

“Please. You think Batman gives a damn about us?” The jagged-hair kid barked a laugh. “Guy’s out for vengeance. He flies around punching clowns, but kids freezing out here? Not his problem.”

“Yeah,” the girl added. “If he really cared, he wouldn’t just beat up the freaks. He’d actually help people. Like us.”

“They don’t see us,” someone else mumbled. “We’re nothing to them.”

No one argued.

Tim sat perfectly still, the firelight flickering across his pale face. He wanted to speak—wanted to say no, you’re wrong. That Nightwing had thanked him, that Robin had smiled at him. That the Bat-family weren’t blind.

But the words wouldn’t come. His throat locked, his stomach twisting.

He thought of Bruce Wayne, all wealth and power, choosing to run rooftops at night. If a man like that could put on a cape and fight crime… shouldn’t he care about kids like this? About kids like him?

The silence stretched, the fire crackling.

And slowly, the kids’ voices seeped deeper. Shelters are traps. The system doesn’t care. The heroes don’t see us.

Tim lowered his head, tugging his hood further down.

They only talked to me out of pity, he told himself. Because I was there. Because I saved Nightwing. Not because I mattered.

The fire popped, sparks drifting into the night. Tim didn’t notice. He was too busy shrinking into the shadows, letting those words carve their place inside him.

- 

Tim learned quickly. He had to.

He learned which alleys were ‘clean enough’ and which rooftops he could climb without anyone noticing. He learned that if you kept moving, you stayed warmer, and if you sat still too long, you started to shake.

He learned to trade. A crust of bread for a favor. A half-dead flashlight for a blanket that smelled like gasoline but kept the cold out anyway.

He learned to sleep light, one eye half-open, back to the wall, because sometimes older kids tested how easy it was to pick pockets on the new one. The first time he woke to hands in his coat, his heart nearly exploded out of his chest. After that, he hid what little he had in the lining of his hoodie.

And he learned about hunger. The gnawing, dull ache that made the world fuzzy. Sometimes he’d stand outside a diner window just to watch people eat, pretending the smell of fried food was enough.

Through it all, Gotham’s guardians remained a distant shadow.

One night, perched under an overpass, Tim spotted the Bat’s silhouette cut sharp against the skyline. For a second, his chest tightened, that spark of awe flaring back to life. He almost waved. Almost wanted to call out.

But then he remembered the firelit words. They don’t see us. They don’t care.

So he ducked his head and stayed in the dark, letting the cape pass overhead.

Another night, he saw Nightwing land on a rooftop across the street, his figure haloed in a streetlight's glow. Tim’s pulse raced. His first instinct was to run toward him, to thank him again, to admit he was scared and hungry and tired.

Instead, he bolted in the opposite direction before Nightwing could glance his way. His breath burned as he ran, but he told himself it was safer this way. Less disappointing.

Even Robin—loud, brash Robin—showed up once in the alley where Tim was resting. Jason’s voice carried, teasing some kid he knew, his laugh echoing down the bricks. Tim pressed himself flat against the wall, holding his breath, waiting until the red blur was gone before he exhaled.

Avoid them. Don’t be seen.

He moved like a ghost through Gotham’s veins, smaller, sharper, harder. His camera was still hidden back at the Drake townhouse, but in his head, he was still framing shots: Gotham from the underside, gritty and alive.

But now, the heroes weren’t in the frame.

He cut them out.

- 

The night air was heavy with the scent of rain, slicking the rooftops of the Bowery in silver sheen. Batman stood at the edge, cape trailing in the wind, his gaze locked on the streets below.

Nightwing dropped down beside him, landing light, but his tone carried weight. “Still nothing?”

Bruce’s jaw tightened. “Not since that night.”

Jason arrived last, skidding over the ledge and stopping for a second, just enough to catch his breath. He crossed his arms, leaning against the low wall. “You mean the kid? Tim?”

“Yeah,” Dick said, eyes still scanning the street.

Jason tilted his head. “I saw him after that. Jumpy little guy. Ghosted me, though.” He gave a low, humorless chuckle. “Moves like smoke when he wants to. Guess I shouldn’t be surprised—I used to be the same way.”

Bruce didn’t move, but his voice was grave. “He’s vanished.”

“Vanished?” Jason echoed. “B, we’re talking about a kid, not some meta. He probably went home.”

“Home,” Dick repeated quietly. His eyes narrowed. “I don’t think so.”

That earned him a look from Bruce. “Why?”

“Because of how he was,” Dick answered. “How careful. How… small. He didn’t act like a kid who had someone waiting for him. He acted like he didn’t want to take up space.” His throat tightened as he remembered the way Tim had sat by him all night, eyes wide, refusing to sleep. “And if he had parents who cared? He wouldn’t be out here alone.”

Jason shifted, uneasy. He thought about the way Tim had nodded at him, silent but sharp, those watchful eyes that seemed to know too much. “Yeah,” he muttered, softer. “Kid wasn’t built for cozy dinners and story time. I can tell.”

The silence stretched, broken only by the hum of Gotham below.

Finally Bruce spoke, voice low but edged. “Find him.”

Dick looked at him, “B—”

“Find him,” Bruce repeated, turning from the ledge. “Before Gotham swallows him whole.”

Jason let out a low whistle. “No pressure, huh?” But beneath his usual edge, his expression was grim.

For the first time in a week, all three of them shared the same thought: somewhere out there, a kid with too many secrets and too little protection was disappearing further into Gotham’s shadows

- 

Tim crouched low in the mouth of a narrow alley, breath puffing white in the night air. His shoes were too big for him and his jacket hung off his shoulders like a borrowed shadow. Hunger gnawed at his stomach, but curiosity always pushed louder.

He hadn’t meant to stumble this close to them. The voices had drawn him—sharp, cocky, dangerous. A group of men in matching jackets spilled into the street, laughter curling around their words like smoke. Goons, the kind you didn’t linger near unless you wanted trouble… or to end up dead.

Tim froze when one of them kicked over a trash bin, the sound echoing. Too close. He’d wandered too close.

But then—movement on the rooftops.

A flash of blue. A cape catching the light.

Tim’s heart stuttered.

The Bats.

They dropped like shadows. Batman hit the pavement first, the impact rattling the air, Nightwing flipping in right behind him, and Robin—Jason—darting forward with a grin too sharp for his own face. The fight erupted fast. Punches. Kicks. The grunts of pain and curses of the men who thought they owned this corner of Gotham.

Tim’s fingers twitched where they gripped the bricks beside him. Every nerve in his body screamed to bolt, but he couldn’t look away. The precision. The power. The way they moved together like pieces of the same machine.

I wish I had my camera.

The thought ached. His throat tightened. Every angle, every blur of motion—he could already frame it in his mind. The city’s shadows, the capes caught mid-flight. No one ever saw them like this, not really. He wanted to forget the Bats, but seeing them in action made it nearly impossible to just push them aside.

A fist slammed into the wall a few feet from his hiding spot, spraying dust. Tim jerked back, biting the inside of his cheek to keep quiet. His chest heaved, every instinct screaming don’t be seen, don’t be seen.

The fight rolled past him, farther down the street, drawing the gang with it. Batman’s cape whipped around the corner, and just like that, they were gone.

Tim stayed frozen in place until the silence pressed in.

Then slowly, he let out the breath he’d been holding.

If I had my camera…

The thought wouldn’t let go. He could almost see the photos already, the proof. He needed it. Needed it like how his lungs needed air.

And before he could second-guess, Tim’s mind latched onto a single, dangerous idea.

I should go home. Get it. Just for a second. Just for the camera.

His heart pounded at the thought of stepping back into that house, but the pull was stronger.

For the first time in weeks, Tim turned his feet toward Drake Manor.

-

Tim’s shoes scraped against the cracked pavement as he hurried through the quieter streets. Every step closer to the townhouse made his chest heavier, his body instinctively recoiling. He hadn’t planned on ever coming back. Not tonight. Not maybe ever.

But the thought of his camera…

He could almost feel its weight in his hands. The way it clicked and whirred like a secret heartbeat only he could hear.

Tim scaled the side gate, sliding into the back garden where the lights in the windows glowed soft and golden. Too warm for the Drake house. Too staged. His stomach sank.

Please. Please don’t be home.

He pressed against the back door, eased it open just enough to slip inside. The smell hit him first—wine, perfume, something roasted and rich. The clink of glasses. Voices.

Tim swore silently in his head. Of course they’re here. Of course.

And not just them.

The sight that met him in the kitchen doorway made his heart drop. His mother’s manicured hand on a wine glass, his father’s loud laugh booming like a shotgun. Across the table sat a woman with a notepad and tape recorder, smile wide, pen poised.

An interviewer.

“Ah! And here’s our son,” Janet Drake said brightly, her voice pitched high in a way she never used when the house was empty. She set her glass down, rising just slightly in her chair. “Timothy, darling, come here.”

Jack’s eyes darted over, sharp as knives. His fake grin didn’t touch them.

Tim froze in the doorway, his throat tightening. He hadn’t expected this. He hadn’t prepared. His hands curled into fists at his sides, nails biting half moons into his palms. He didn't expect it to be this jarring, to see them acting like they hadn't dropped him off in the middle of Gotham. He wanted to be angry but couldn't muster the strength. 

Janet tilted her head, smile sharp enough to cut. “Don’t just stand there. Come say hello.”

Every instinct screamed to bolt back out the door, but Tim forced himself forward, every step stiff and careful. His parents didn’t want him right now—they wanted a prop. A picture.

The interviewer beamed. “Oh! I’ve heard so much about you, Timothy. Your parents speak so fondly of a bright young man, destined for great things.”

Tim swallowed, forcing his lips into the ghost of a smile. He didn’t dare glance at his parents, not with the weight of their stares burning into him.

“Y-yeah,” he muttered, voice barely more than air. “Nice to meet you.”

Jack’s hand clamped down on his shoulder. Too tight. Bruising tight. Still smiling for the reporter. “That’s our boy,” he said, his voice a rehearsed warmth. “Smart, polite—what more could we ask for?”

Tim’s chest hurt with how hard he was holding still.

Camera. Just get the camera. Then out.

He tried to catch Janet’s eye, as if silently asking permission to slip upstairs. Her wine-glossed smile widened instead, her fingers fluttering like a stage cue.

“Why don’t you go tidy yourself, Timothy? Our guest doesn’t need to see you looking like you’ve been—” her eyes flicked over his scuffed shoes, his rumpled jacket, “—wandering around like some street rat.”

Tim’s face burned. The interviewer gave a polite little laugh, oblivious to the weight behind the words.

He nodded quickly, already edging toward the stairs. His father’s grip tightened for half a second before letting go, and Tim practically bolted, heart hammering.

Halfway up, his thoughts ran wild, bitter and frantic.

Perfect. Just perfect. Of course they’re here. Of course they’re putting on a show. And of course I’m the mess that ruins the picture.

But he kept climbing, because the camera was waiting. 

Chapter Text

Tim’s hands shook as he closed his bedroom door behind him. The quiet pressed in, broken only by the rapid beat of his heart. He crossed to his desk, lifting the camera like it was a relic. Cool metal. Familiar weight. His fingers curled around it and for the first time in days, maybe weeks, he felt a tiny spark of himself.

He should’ve gone back out the window. Should’ve climbed down the trellis and vanished before anyone noticed. But the low murmur of voices downstairs kept him pinned in place.

Finally, silence.

Tim’s stomach dropped. Silence never meant good things.

He slung the strap over his shoulder, eased the door open, and crept down the stairs. The air was thicker now—wine and anger and something he couldn’t name.

At the bottom step, his worst fear came true.

The reporter’s coat was gone from the chair. The notepad, the pen, the too-bright smile. Vanished.

Only his parents remained.

Jack leaned against the mantle, jaw tight, swirling a glass of whiskey. Janet perched on the arm of the sofa, her lipstick smile wiped away.

Both pairs of eyes locked on Tim.

The camera strap bit into his neck.

“You embarrassed us,” Janet said first, voice flat, sharp. “Coming in here filthy, like—like some stray, you should’ve stayed gone.”

“I just—” Tim started, but the words tangled.

Jack’s glass slammed down, amber liquid splashing onto the rug.

Tim flinched, every muscle tensing. His chest rose and fell too fast.

Jack moved before Tim saw it coming. His hand struck across Tim’s face, hot and hard, knocking him sideways into the wall. The camera swung against his ribs. Pain bloomed sharp and sudden.

Tim cried out, clutching his cheek, eyes wide and wet. “Stop!” His voice cracked. “You—you’re bad parents!”

The words tumbled out before he could think, before he could shove them back down where they always lived.

Janet gasped like he’d cursed God Himself.

Jack’s face twisted. “What did you just say to me?”

Tim’s knees buckled. His breath came in harsh gulps. “You—you don’t even care about me! You never—”

The second hit came harder. A fist this time, sharp against his shoulder. The world blurred.

Tears spilled fast, unbidden. Tim’s voice broke into a yell he didn’t know he had inside him. “You only care when people are watching! When—when they believe your lies!”

“Shut your mouth!” Jack roared, hand raised again.

Janet stood now, her voice sharp but not to defend. “Jack—”

But Jack didn’t stop.

Tim scrambled back, camera clutched to his chest like a shield. His heart hammered so loud it drowned out everything else. His words, his cries—they only made it worse.

And deep down, under the sting and fear, a cold thought threaded through him:

I should’ve never come back here.

Jack’s face was red now, veins standing out in his neck. He didn’t hesitate this time. His fist drove into Tim’s stomach, hard enough to knock the breath out of him.

Tim folded over with a strangled sound, arms tightening around the camera. He gasped, wheezed, eyes burning with tears. “I—I’m sorry!” he choked, voice high, panicked. “I didn’t mean it—I’ll be good, I’ll be good—”

The words tumbled, desperate, instinctual. He wasn’t even thinking anymore, just pleading.

Jack yanked the strap of the camera from him, tossing it aside with a clatter. Then he gripped Tim by the collar, shaking him hard enough to rattle his teeth.

“You don’t talk to me like that in my own house!” Jack snarled, the reek of whiskey hot against Tim’s face. “You ungrateful little brat!”

Tears streamed down Tim’s cheeks, his voice breaking apart. “I’m sorry, Dad—I’m sorry—please—” His legs kicked weakly, shoes scraping against the floor. He wasn’t fighting, not really. Just crumbling.

The back of Jack’s hand cracked across his face again, splitting his lip.

Tim sobbed outright now, body curling in on itself, arms raised like a shield that never worked. The shame of it, the sheer terror, pressed down until his words were just hiccupped gasps of apology. “Please—I’ll be good, I swear—I won’t mess up again—”

Jack didn’t even answer. He grabbed Tim by the arm, fingers digging bruises into the skin, and dragged him up the stairs. Tim stumbled, tripping, barely managing to keep his feet beneath him as he was hauled toward his bedroom.

Janet followed a few steps, her voice sharp and cold. “For God’s sake, Jack, don’t let him be heard by the neighbors.”

That was all. No reaching hand. No defense.

Tim’s door slammed open, and Jack shoved him inside. The boy tumbled forward, hitting the floor with a thud.

Jack’s face loomed in the doorway, eyes blazing. “You stay in here. Maybe when you learn some respect, you can come out again.”

The lock clicked.

Tim stayed on the floor for a long time, gasping, cheek pressed to the hardwood. His whole body ached. His lip throbbed, his ribs burned where fists had landed, and his stomach cramped from the blows.

Slowly, he crawled to the corner, pulling his knees to his chest. He buried his face there, muffling the sound of his quiet sobs.

-

Morning came in a thin line of light across the floorboards. Tim blinked awake, eyes swollen, body sore in a dozen places. Every breath tugged at bruised ribs, and his lip still stung when he licked it.

For a moment he didn’t move. Didn’t want to. The ache wasn’t just in his body—it was in his chest, heavy and sharp, like something broken that couldn’t be put back together.

He pulled himself upright, sitting against the wall. His throat was dry, his stomach gnawed with hunger, but none of it felt urgent. It was… distant. Like he was watching someone else’s body feel it.

It wasn’t until he shifted and winced at the pain in his shoulder that thoughts started circling, cold and heavy.

I made him mad. I should’ve been quieter. Should’ve gone out the window. Should’ve just stayed gone.

His fingernails dug into his knees. The words looped in his head like a punishment: It’s my fault. I ruin everything. I deserve this.

Tim stared at the door, at the faint glint of the lock. His parents hadn’t come up. No footsteps. No voices. The silence was thicker than the night before.

Hours passed. He could hear faint sounds below—doors shutting, heels on tile, the hum of a car engine. Then silence again.

Tim crept to the window, careful, and peeked through the curtains. The driveway was empty.

Gone.

They’d locked him in and left. No food tray, no water, nothing. Just him in four walls with the echo of their anger.

He sank back onto the floor, curling against the bed frame. 

He drew back, pulling his knees tight again. His eyes burned, but the tears wouldn’t come this time. Just a hollow, gnawing emptiness.

By the time the sun dipped low again, Tim hadn’t moved from the corner. The hunger clawed sharper now, but he barely registered it. He just kept thinking the same words, like they’d been carved into him: I don’t deserve love. I don’t deserve anything.

-

The next morning bled into afternoon without Tim really noticing. His stomach cramped sharply now, dry mouth sticking to the roof of his tongue, but even that was dulled by the fog that wrapped around his head.

He sat in the corner again, back pressed to the wall, knees to his chest. He didn’t bother trying the door anymore. It was locked. He knew it would stay locked until they decided otherwise.

Except—they weren’t coming back. He hadn’t heard the car. Hadn’t heard the door. Nothing.

By the time the sky outside his window had turned pale gray with the start of another day, the sound startled him so much it made his whole body flinch.

The front door opening.

“Hello? Tim?”

A woman’s voice. Not his mother’s. Not sharp or cold, just… normal.

His heart thudded hard against his ribs. He crept to the door, ear pressed close. He knew that voice—Mrs. Ellison, the neighbor across the street. She’d always smiled at him in a way that felt different than the way his parents did when people were watching. She had a key to the house so she could bring in mail when the Drakes were gone.

Her shoes taped softly as she stepped into the foyer. “Drakes?”

Tim’s breath caught. He hesitated, panic racing through him. If he answered, it would be admitting he was there. If he stayed quiet, maybe she’d just leave—

But his throat hurt too much from being dry, and the words slipped out in a rasp before he could stop them.

“I—I’m upstairs.”

There was a pause. The sound of footsteps turning.

“Tim?” she called, softer now, like she wasn’t sure she’d heard him right. “Are you alright?”

Tim pressed his forehead against the wood of the door. He wanted to lie. To say yes. To keep everything quiet like he always did. But the silence pressed too heavy, and his voice cracked when he answered, “I… I can’t get out.”

There was a sharp inhale. Then faster footsteps, up the stairs. The doorknob rattled, tugged, stopped by the lock.

“Tim, sweetheart, are you locked in?”

His chest tightened. He nodded before realizing she couldn’t see it. “…Yeah.”

A soft curse under her breath. Then, firmer: “Hold on, honey. I’ll look for the key.”

Tim sank back against the wall, pulse racing. He didn’t know if he wanted the door to open or not.

-

The lock clicked, and the door eased open.

Mrs. Ellison stood framed in the doorway, the light from the hall outlining her. She wasn’t dressed up, just in a sweater and flats, her hair pulled back. Her eyes widened the second they landed on him.

Tim stayed pressed against the wall, knees pulled to his chest. He ducked his head quickly, eyes fixed on the floor. His hair hung over his face, hiding the bruises as best it could.

“Tim…” Her voice was low, soft in a way that made his stomach twist. Not pity. Concern. Real concern.

He picked at a loose thread on his sleeve, shoulders tight. “M’sorry. I didn’t—didn’t mean to…” His words trailed off into nothing.

She stepped closer, crouching a little to get on his level. “Hey. No, sweetheart, don’t apologize.”

Tim’s heart raced. His gaze flicked up for half a second, then dropped again just as fast. He couldn’t hold her eyes. Couldn’t stand the weight of them. His mind spun with thoughts—She sees everything. She knows. She’ll tell them. She’ll be angry too.

Mrs. Ellison seemed to notice, because she didn’t push him to look at her. She just reached out slowly, palms open. “Why don’t you come with me, hm? My house is right across the street. You don’t have to stay here alone.”

Tim’s fingers twitched. “Parents’ll be… mad,” he whispered.

Her face tightened at that, but she only said, “We’ll worry about that later. Right now you need to eat. And rest. Okay?”

His throat burned. He couldn’t find words, so he just gave the smallest nod.

Mrs. Ellison stood and offered her hand. For a long moment Tim stared at it, overanalyzing—If I take it, I’ll seem weak. If I don’t, she’ll think I don’t trust her. What if she lets go? What if she holds on too tight?

Finally, he pushed himself up without touching her hand.

“Alright,” she said gently, as if that was enough to answer.

They didn’t speak as she guided him down the stairs. The house felt too big, too empty now, every shadow pressing close. He flinched when she unlocked the front door, but followed when she stepped out.

The evening air hit his face, cool and sharp. Across the street, her porch light glowed warm. It felt impossibly far away.

But she kept her pace slow, matching his small steps, not rushing him.

Together, silently, they crossed the street.

-

The door clicked shut behind them, sealing out the empty street and the cold. Mrs. Ellison’s house smelled like cinnamon and laundry soap, warm and lived-in. Family pictures lined the entryway wall—her and her husband smiling, her grown daughter on graduation day. It was cluttered, but in a way that felt safe.

Tim froze just inside the doorway. His shoes felt too dirty for the carpet, his bruises too loud for the softness of the place.

“Take your time,” Mrs. Ellison said quietly, slipping off her own shoes. She didn’t crowd him, didn’t touch him. Just set her keys in the bowl by the door and moved toward the kitchen.

Tim hovered, eyes flicking over every detail. The framed photos. The lamp with the multicolored shade. The faint hum of a dishwasher. Don’t break anything. Don’t touch anything. Don’t take up too much space.

“Hungry?” she called gently from the kitchen.

His stomach cramped at the word, but his mouth answered before he could stop it. “…No.”

It came out clipped, defensive. He regretted it instantly.

Mrs. Ellison didn’t argue. A moment later, the scent of grilled cheese hit the air, followed by the whistle of a kettle.

Tim shuffled a few steps deeper into the living room, lowering himself onto the edge of the couch like he might break it if he sat wrong. 

When Mrs. Ellison came back, she set a plate with a sandwich and apple slices on the coffee table. Steam curled from a mug of tea beside it. “You don’t have to eat if you don’t want to,” she said simply. “It’ll be here if you change your mind.”

Tim’s throat tightened. He kept his eyes on the floor, his words small. “Thanks.”

She sat in the armchair across from him, not saying anything else. Just sipping her own tea, giving him space.

The silence stretched, but it wasn’t sharp like at home. It was… soft. Bearable.

After a while, Tim’s hand twitched toward the plate. He hesitated, overthinking, he couldn’t stop his mind—If I take it, I’ll look greedy. If I don’t, she’ll think I’m rude. What if she’s watching every bite?

But hunger won. He pulled the sandwich into his lap and took a small bite. The cheese was warm, the bread buttery and crisp. His chest hurt with how good it was.

He ducked his head lower so she wouldn’t see the tears that pricked his eyes.

“Bathroom’s down the hall,” Mrs. Ellison said gently, as if she’d noticed without saying so. “Fresh towels on the rack. Shower if you want.”

Tim nodded, swallowing fast. He wanted to say thank you, but the words stuck.

Instead, he took another bite of the sandwich,, as if it was the only thing keeping him tethered.

-

Tim sat on the couch, staring at the carpet fibers. The half-eaten sandwich sat on the plate in front of him, steam long gone. He didn’t move, didn’t fidget, didn’t even blink much—just quiet, too quiet.

Mrs. Ellison stood slowly, setting her tea down with care. “I’ll just be in the kitchen, sweetheart. You sit tight.”

He gave a small nod without looking up.

She padded into the kitchen, checking over her shoulder once to make sure he hadn’t followed. When she was certain he was still on the couch, she picked up the phone from its cradle and dialed, her voice low, careful.

“Hello, yes… this is Caroline Ellison, I live across from the Drakes on Crestview. I… I think there’s a child in danger.”

She turned her body slightly, glancing toward the living room. Tim hadn’t moved an inch. Her chest ached.

“It’s their boy, Timothy. He’s—he’s here at my house right now. His parents left town, I think. They didn’t take him. He was locked in his room for at least a day, maybe more. He looks… bruised. Malnourished. And he—he isn’t speaking much.”

Her voice cracked. She pressed her hand over her mouth, then lowered it, steadying herself.

“I think his father hit him,” she whispered. “I don’t know for certain, but… I’ve seen that look before. He flinched at the sound of the door shutting. He’s just… he’s not okay.”

Silence on the other end, then the operator asking for details. Mrs. Ellison gave her name, her address, the Drakes’ names.

“Yes. Please. Just… please send someone. He can’t go back there.”

Her hand trembled as she hung up. For a long moment, she leaned against the counter, eyes stinging, listening to the faint noises as he shifted in the other room.

When she returned, her face was calm again, voice steady. She wouldn’t let him see her fear or pity. She walked back into the living room and sat down in the armchair across from him.

“You doing okay, Tim?” she asked softly.

He nodded once, quick, automatic, not meeting her eyes.

-

Mrs. Ellison had guided Tim into her guest room the night before. He’d sat stiffly on the edge of the bed at first, hands knotted his sleeves, eyes darting to every corner of the room like he didn’t belong. Eventually, after she set a blanket gently across him and turned out the light, exhaustion won. His small frame curled in on itself, breath evening out.

-

In the pale hours before dawn, the knock came. Firm. Low. Unmistakably official.

Mrs. Ellison froze at the kitchen counter where she’d been making coffee. Her heart pounded as she crossed the house, careful not to let her footsteps echo too loudly. She cracked the door open, and the cold air bit her cheeks.

Two officers stood on her porch, their uniforms dim against the gray sky. One of them, a broad man with tired eyes, removed his cap and held it in his hands. His face was grim, lined with the kind of sorrow reserved for delivering the worst kind of news.

“Mrs. Ellison?” he asked quietly.

She nodded, throat tight. “Yes. That’s me.”

He glanced past her shoulder, as though making sure no little ears were nearby. “We’ve confirmed it. Jack and Janet Drake. We’ve found them,” 

There was a pause, one that stretched a little too long. The officers shifted on their feet before sighing, “There was a car accident last night. Severe impact. Both were killed instantly.” His jaw tightened. “They were intoxicated. The hospital had them down as John and Jane Doe at first—their injuries were too severe for ID. We only made the match a few hours ago.”

Mrs. Ellison’s hand flew to her mouth. For a moment, all she could hear was the rush of her own pulse.

“And the boy?” she whispered, careful, afraid the sound might carry down the hall.

“He’ll have to be informed,” the officer asked gently.

She shook her head. “He’s… he’s asleep. Poor thing—he finally fell asleep.”

The officer sighed through his nose, lowering his gaze. “We’ll need to make arrangements. Social services, immediate placement…” His voice faltered just slightly. “It’ll be hard on him.”

Mrs. Ellison pressed her hand to the doorframe, grounding herself. “Please—don’t wake him just yet. Let him have a little longer. Just a little more time before the world breaks over his head.”

The officer studied her face for a long moment, then gave a small, solemn nod. “We’ll give him that. We can have a caseworker be sent over”

From down the hall, the faintest sound drifted down, the creak of Tim shifting in the bed, restless even in sleep. Mrs. Ellison’s chest ached.

She closed the door softly, leaning against it, eyes wet. She knew when he woke, she’d have to tell him. And she didn’t know which would hurt worse—Tim’s tears, or the way he might not cry at all.

-

When the caseworker arrived Mrs. Ellison ushered her inside quickly, voice hushed, glancing toward the guest room at every other word. The woman introduced herself as Ms. Carter, papers in hand, hair pulled back so tight it looked painful. She spoke low, but Tim’s ears were sharp from years of listening for trouble. Even in sleep, some part of him had stayed awake.

By the time he stirred, the house had gone still again. The floorboards under his bare feet creaked as he pushed the guest room door open. He stood at the threshold, staring into the living room.

The adults sat in stiff postures. Their faces were wrong. Mrs. Ellison’s hands twisted the hem of her cardigan. The woman—Ms. Carter—wore a careful, neutral expression, the kind people use when they’re about to hurt you with words but want to pretend they’re not.

Tim froze, breath caught in his chest. Something in his gut twisted. Something’s wrong. Really wrong.

He didn’t step forward, didn’t say anything. Just watched. Cataloguing: Mrs. Ellison avoiding the workers' eyes. The way Ms. Carter's lips pressed into a grim line, already angling her body as if she had rehearsed this moment. He hated it. He hated knowing before they even opened their mouths.

It was Ms. Carter who finally noticed him. “Tim?” she said softly, her voice pitched in that gentle way adults use when they’re about to drop something heavy.

Two pairs of eyes turned to him. Tim’s stomach dropped. His fingers dug into the doorframe. He didn’t move closer, but he didn’t retreat either. He stood there, waiting for the blow.

“Why don’t you come sit down?” she asked.

He shook his head, sharp, almost panicked. “No. I’m fine here.”

Mrs. Ellison shifted uncomfortably, but it was Ms. Carter who pressed on. “Tim… I’m so sorry to have to tell you this. Your parents… there was an accident last night. A car crash.” She hesitated, watching his face for cracks. “They didn’t survive.”

The words landed like bricks dropped into a lake. Heavy, sinking, spreading ripples through the air around him—but never reaching the center.

Tim just stared. His throat felt tight, but nothing came out. Not a sound. His expression didn’t move, didn’t change.

The silence stretched until Mrs. Ellison rushed to fill it. “Oh, sweetheart,” she said, rising halfway to her feet. “It’s okay, it’s alright, you’re in shock. It’s normal not to feel anything right now.”

The caseworker nodded along. “It can take time. Everyone reacts differently. You might feel it later.”

Tim’s grip on the doorframe tightened until his knuckles whitened. Inside, his thoughts twisted. Shock. They think I’m in shock. But I’m not. I know I should feel something. They were my parents. I should care. I should be crying, or yelling, or—something.

But there was nothing. Just a cold, empty space where grief was supposed to be. And the realization terrified him.

What’s wrong with me? Why don’t I care?

The adults kept talking, their voices a blur of reassurance and explanation, but Tim barely heard them. His chest felt hollow, his skin too tight. He forced himself to nod once, quick, jerky, like he was agreeing just to make them stop looking at him.

But inside, he was unraveling. They’re right. I’m broken. I’m not normal. I should care that they’re dead.

-

Everything after the words they didn’t survive felt like static.

Voices blended together, stretched thin and distant, like they were underwater. Ms. Carter said something about “arrangements,” Mrs. Ellison kept touching his shoulder and murmuring words he couldn’t track.

Tim just nodded when people looked at him. It was easier. Nodding was safe. Nodding meant they’d stop staring.

At some point—minutes or hours later, he couldn’t tell—he was walking again. His shoes scraped on the pavement as Ms. Carter guided him across the street. The Drake townhouse loomed like a mouth about to swallow him whole. His chest went tight, but he followed because that’s what you do when an adult tells you to.

He barely registered Ms. Carter talking, something about “gather your essentials,” and “we don’t need much right now.”

Tim’s hands moved before his brain did. A backpack from his closet. The zipper stuck halfway, so he yanked it hard. Random clothes stuffed inside, no thought for what matched. Socks, a hoodie that still smelled faintly from the night he bought it off some random kid.

He froze at his desk. Empty. His fingers twitched. The camera wasn’t there.

Then he remembered—Jack had grabbed it, had snarled something as he yanked Tim upstairs and left it on the counter in the kitchen.

Tim padded down the stairs, every creak of the floorboard sounding too loud. The kitchen was silent, hollow. And there it was, pushed against the wall, exactly where he remembered.

His chest loosened just slightly as his hands wrapped around it. Heavy, solid, his. He slid it carefully into the backpack, making sure the strap wouldn’t snag in the zipper. If everything else vanished, he’d still have this.

Then they were outside again. The house locked behind them. Ms. Carter’s hand was warm and firm on his shoulder, guiding him toward a dark sedan at the curb.

The ride blurred, city blocks rolling past the window. He stared at them without seeing. Neon signs bleeding color into the dark. People huddled in doorways. A man smoking on the corner, his eyes following the car.

Words hummed in the air—placement, temporary housing, guardianship. Tim caught them in fragments but they slipped right through, leaving no weight behind.

All he could feel was the camera pressed into his ribs within the backpack

-

Eventually the car slowed, pulling into a squat brick building with peeling paint and a buzzing streetlamp out front. The sign on the door said Gotham City Child Services, but the letters looked tired, as if they’d given up years ago.

Ms. Carter killed the engine and gave Tim a thin smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “I just need to run inside and grab some papers. Won’t take long. Stay here, alright?”

He nodded automatically. She got out, heels clicking against the sidewalk, and disappeared through the door.

The silence in the car pressed in on him. His backpack dug into his lap, camera heavy inside it. Tim stared out the window, but all he could see were the words the street kids had thrown at him around the fire:

Shelters are traps. The system’s broken. They’ll chew you up and spit you out. Heroes don’t care. They only come around when they want to feel good about themselves.

His chest tightened, pulse hammering in his ears. He imagined being shoved into some strange house with strangers who wouldn’t want him. Imagined being forgotten in a room again, this time by people who weren’t even his parents. Imagined never being free to slip into the shadows, to chase the city lights with his camera. 

The thought clawed at him until his breath hitched.

No. No, I can’t. I won’t.

He glanced toward the door of the office. No sign of Ms. Carter. His eyes darted to the sidewalk, the street. The city stretched out like an open maze.

Tim’s fingers twitched on the door handle. He hesitated—once, twice—and then yanked it. The click of the latch was deafening in his ears, but the street was empty.

He slipped out.

Then he ran.

Faster than he thought his legs could carry him, heart slamming against his ribs, backpack thumping against his spine. He didn’t dare look back. Didn’t dare breathe until he pressed himself against an alleyway wall, eyes darting, waiting for shouting, for footsteps, for the drag of a hand on his collar. But nothing came. The street remained dark and indifferent.

Chapter Text

The low hum of the Batcomputer filled the cavern, screens awash in blue light. Dick leaned forward in the chair, one elbow braced on the console, the other hand absently rubbing the back of his neck. His eyes stayed fixed on the article splayed across the main monitor.

“Prominent Gotham Couple Killed in DUI Crash”

A smaller line beneath: Jack and Janet Drake, survived by one son.

Dick exhaled through his nose, slow, steady, like he was trying to wring the anger out of himself before it could burn too hot. Still, his jaw was tight when he finally turned his head.

“They’re gonna put him in the system, Bruce.” His voice was low, rough with something between fury and worry.

Across the cave, Batman didn’t move right away. He stood in shadow, arms folded, gaze hard on the same screen. The cowl gave nothing away, but Dick knew him too well—Bruce was thinking, calculating, running through outcomes. Always calculating.

From the staircase that wound down to the floor, Jason’s voice cut in. “The system,” he scoffed, heavy boots echoing as he descended. He tugged his domino mask up to rest on his forehead, dark curly hair falling into his eyes. “Yeah, great idea. That’ll fix everything.” His tone dripped with bitter sarcasm.

Dick shot him a look. “Jay—”

“No, don’t ‘Jay’ me,” Jason snapped, pointing toward the screen. “You and I both know how this plays out. Shuffle him through foster homes, group placements, whatever overcrowded nightmare they can find. Kid’ll get eaten alive. That’s if he’s lucky.”

Dick’s hand curled into a fist against the console. “He’s twelve.”

Jason’s voice dropped, less sharp but no less raw. “I was younger.”

That shut the cave up for a beat.

Bruce finally spoke, his voice low and deliberate. “We’ll monitor the situation. If he surfaces, we’ll find him.”

Dick’s head whipped around. “Monitor? That’s not enough, Bruce. He’s not just some name in a file—.” His hand gestured sharply at the article, then back at himself. “That kid dragged me out of an alley bleeding to death.”

Jason leaned against the railing, arms crossed, expression tense. “And you think dumping him into Gotham’s social services is payback enough? Puh-lease.”

Dick’s voice broke, not in volume but in sheer conviction. “We can’t just let him vanish, Bruce. He’s out there. Alone. And I don’t know how many more hits that kid can take.”

The screens flickered, casting light over their faces—Bruce’s stoic shadow, Jason’s hardened scowl, and Dick’s open desperation. 

-

Morning light poured pale and cold through the tall windows of the Wayne Enterprises tower. Bruce sat behind his desk, jacket draped over the chair, tie loosened. A stack of papers—Drake property, custody forms, system intake reports—spread in front of him. His phone lay face down, another call from Child Protective Services already ended.

Across the city, in the cramped, paper-stuffed bullpen of Gotham Central, Dick Grayson leaned against a detective’s desk. No mask. No suit. Just the charm and grin that every cop in the building knew belonged to Gotham's favorite son-turned-Blüdhaven cop. He tapped his fingers against a manila folder while his old friend Detective Morales muttered at a terminal.

“Come on, Morales,” Dick urged softly. “Just give me the intake info. You know I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t important.”

Morales sighed, shot him a long-suffering look, then typed. “You didn’t get this from me, Grayson.”

“I never do,” Dick said with that easy grin that hid his tension.

The detective shook his head and turned the screen slightly. “Drake. Timothy. Age twelve. Scheduled intake, caseworker Angela Carter. Placement: St. Luke’s Transitional Home. File says he was supposed to arrive yesterday afternoon.” Morales scrolled further. “Except… he didn’t. There’s no record of him checking in. The caseworker logged him as ‘in transit,’ then nothing.”

Dick’s stomach sank.

Back at Wayne Enterprises, Bruce hung up another line, jaw tight. His contact at CPS had confirmed the same thing. “No arrival,” they’d said. “No check-in. The boy… simply never got there.”

Hours later, Bruce and Dick reconvened in a quiet diner booth downtown, their ties loosened, coffee cooling between them. Jason would’ve mocked how normal they looked—two men in nice suits blending in with Gotham’s rush—but right now, neither felt normal.

Dick leaned forward, voice low. “So that’s it. He never made it. Carter went in to get papers, he was supposed to stay in the car… Bruce, he ran.”

Bruce stirred his coffee absently, though his eyes never left the swirl of black liquid. “He’s smart. He’s resourceful. He knows how to disappear.”

“That’s not good news,” Dick shot back, heat creeping into his voice. “He’s twelve, Bruce. Twelve, and he’s been living like a ghost already. We don’t even know where to start looking.”

Bruce’s eyes finally lifted, heavy and dark. “We start where he feels safest. Patterns. Habits. Children like him…” He hesitated for the briefest moment. “…children like Jason… they return to what they know. Street corners. Safe spots. Shadows.”

Dick’s hand clenched around his mug. “We owe it to him to find him.”

-

The Cave buzzed with quiet activity as the sun slipped beneath Gotham’s skyline. Jason fastened his cape, impatience written all over his face. Dick adjusted his escrima sticks, eyes flicking between monitors. Bruce stood near the Batcomputer, cowl in place but cape still folded back, his voice steady.

“Tonight, we maintain standard patrol routes. But—” his gaze cut across all of them, sharp, deliberate. “Keep an eye out. Alleys. rooftops. Transit stations. Any place a kid might hide. If Drake is still out there, we’ll find him.”

Jason muttered something under his breath about the system screwing kids over, but his shoulders eased a fraction. Dick gave a single, firm nod, resolve written in his face.

As the others scattered to prepare, Bruce paused to lock a file on the Batcomputer. He turned just slightly at the sound of approaching footsteps.

Alfred, hands neatly folded behind his back, regarded him with that knowing, measured look that could see straight through armor. “You must care a great deal, sir. To dedicate your attention to one boy, when Gotham is so vast.”

Bruce’s jaw shifted beneath the cowl. He glanced at the empty space where Tim Drake’s name had sat on the monitor only minutes ago. “Care,” he said after a pause, “has nothing to do with it.”

Alfred tilted his head, unconvinced.

Bruce’s eyes softened, just for a moment. “He knows how to make an impression.”

Alfred’s mouth quirked—half a smile, half sorrow. “Indeed.”

-

The nights were getting colder. Tim could feel it in his bones before he even opened his eyes. He’d wedged himself between a dumpster and the brick wall of some old tenement, cardboard pulled over him like a thin blanket. It didn’t do much. His breath smoked in the air when he shifted, stiff and sore from the frozen ground.

Food was harder to find now. Less trash left out, less people lingering to drop something. He’d learned to stash whatever he could, but it was gone fast. The edge of hunger never left his stomach anymore; it gnawed at him constantly.

He moved during the day when the shadows of tall buildings gave him cover. Always looking up. Always listening. He’d heard the batarangs slice the air more than once at night, close enough that he knew Batman or Nightwing were on the rooftops nearby. He ducked further into alleys whenever he thought he caught a cape’s silhouette against the sky.

They only pity me. That’s all it was, he reminded himself when his chest tightened at the thought of them searching for him. I don’t need them. I don’t need anyone.

Still, sometimes he turned to his camera. To frame the world, to put distance between himself and everything else. But all things come to an end, and he eventually ran out of storage. It now was just a heavy memory in his backpack. 

Without it, all he could do was stare. And staring meant noticing the way people in shelters coughed through their sleep, the way rats crawled over the weak ones who didn’t move anymore. He never stayed long. The kids around the barrel fire were right: shelters weren’t safe.

His fingers ached as he tried to rub life back into them, cradling them under his armpits as he walked. His clothes weren’t enough—not for Gotham’s winter. The cold always found its way in.

And every time he heard sirens, every time he saw a flash of red and blue reflected in a shop window, he ducked lower, heart hammering. He couldn’t go back. Not to the system. Not to pity.

-

Word spread fast on the streets. Faster than Tim ever thought possible.

A week ago, he’d been able to slip into certain alleys, certain corners, where kids kept warm together and watched each other’s backs. Now, the minute he walked up, the air changed. Conversations cut short. Heads turned away.

“Don’t sit here,” one boy muttered without looking at him. His face was shadowed by the firelight. “We don’t need that kind of heat.”

Tim froze, halfway lowering himself to the ground. “What heat?”

The boy finally glanced at him, eyes sharp. “Robin’s been around. Asking. Saying he’s looking for a kid. Guess who that sounds like?”

A couple of the others snorted, bitter laughter crackling like the fire. “Youre trouble, that’s what. Don’t want a cape sniffing around here—means cops ain’t far behind.”

Tim swallowed hard. “I didn’t—” His throat closed on the words. He didn’t know what to say.

“You brought it on yourself.” A girl with matted curls tugged her blanket tighter. “You stick around, they’ll think we’re hiding you. Then we all pay.”

He stood there too long, heat from the barrel on his body, the weight of every stare pushing him away. Finally, Tim turned and left without another word, each step loud in his ears.

The streets weren’t safe in the best of times. But this? This was worse. The places he could once slip into for a little warmth, a little shared silence—they were gone now.

He wrapped his arms tight around himself as he walked, replaying the scene over and over. They’re looking for me. Of course they are. Because they want me back in the system. Because I’m a problem they need to fix.

He ducked into an alley, crouched low against the wall, and pressed his forehead to his knees.

If Bruce Wayne really cared, he wouldn’t just be sending Robin around to scare everyone off. If Nightwing cared, he wouldn’t let them spread my name like it’s a warning. They don’t want me. They just want me out of sight.

-

The wind bit sharper than it had the week before. Tim pulled his hoodie tighter around himself, but the fabric was thin, the sleeves frayed. It did little to stop the cold from cutting straight through. His hands were stiff, red and raw, fingertips cracked where the skin had split. He tucked them under his arms as he walked, shoulders hunched, breath puffing white into the dark.

He’d tried sleeping in an alley earlier, wedged where the walls blocked some of the wind. But the chill sank into the concrete, into him, until his bones felt like ice. He couldn’t stop shivering—couldn’t stop the way his teeth chattered no matter how tightly he clenched his jaw. Eventually, he gave up. He wasn’t going to sleep tonight.

A cough rattled in his chest, sharp and wet. He froze, afraid it would give him away if anyone was nearby. No one was, but the sound echoed in his ribs anyway, making him wince. His throat burned, his nose runny, his head heavy. He wondered if it was just a cold or something worse, but the thought of doctors, hospitals, questions—that was worse than the sickness.

He wandered until he found a subway vent on the corner of Seventh. Warm air gusted up through the grates, carrying a sour, metallic tang. Tim dropped down beside it anyway, curling his knees to his chest and pressing his body as close to the vent as he dared. The warmth seeped into him, slow and fragile, like water through a cracked cup.

He closed his eyes, trying to focus on it, on staying awake. His stomach cramped from hunger, growling loud in the quiet street. He pressed his forehead to his knees, breathing against his legs, pretending it was enough.

In the distance, a siren wailed. Somewhere above, a shadow leapt across a rooftop—one of them, maybe Batman, maybe Robin. Tim tilted his head up just enough to catch a glimpse, a flicker of a cape against the stars. For a second his chest ached with something almost warm. Then he remembered the whispers of the other kids. The bats don’t care. They’ll never care. They’ll forget you.

Tim swallowed hard, tucked his head down again, and curled tighter around himself. The vent hissed beneath him. He tried to imagine it was a blanket, or someone holding him tight like they actually cared.

-

Snow drifted down in thin, swirling lines, the kind that didn’t stick but still managed to soak through clothes. Gotham felt smaller at night — quieter, except for the distant hum of traffic and the occasional siren bouncing off brick.

Tim huddled closer to the vent, the warmth barely enough to fight off the deep chill burrowed under his skin. His body shook with shallow tremors, arms locked around his knees. He could hear the faint echo of boots somewhere above him, soft but rhythmic. Familiar.

Then — voices.

“South sector’s clear,” a voice crackled through a comm. Batman.

And another, lighter, warmer one: “Negative here, too. You think he’s even still in this part of the city?” Nightwing.

Tim’s heart stuttered. He tilted his head, squinting through the blur of rising steam. A shadow moved across the roofline — dark, sharp-edged, framed by the faint blue flash of police lights far away.

He wanted to say something. Here. I’m here.

But the thought stuck in his throat like ice.

They were searching for him. He knew that now — everyone on the streets knew. The whispers said the bats wanted the kid who disappeared, and nobody wanted to be near him because of it. Trouble followed him. That’s what they said. And maybe they were right.

Nightwing dropped to a lower ledge, just across the street. His face turned slightly, scanning the ground below. For a breathless moment, Tim was sure he was looking right at him. His heart pounded, so hard it hurt.

But the vent’s steam gusted up again, blinding both of them in a wave of heat and vapor. Nightwing frowned, turned away.

“Nothing,” he said quietly into his comm. “Just shadows.”

And then he was gone. A leap, a line shot, the whisper of movement fading into the wind.

-

Later that night, back in the Cave, the glow of the Batcomputer painted blue across Dick’s face. His hair was damp from melting snow, his hands still raw from the cold.

“Pulling up thermal maps from the sector you swept,” Bruce said, his tone even. “If he was nearby, we’ll—”

But Dick’s eyes had already caught something. A small heat signature, faint, almost lost in the white noise of the city’s background warmth. Near a vent on Seventh. Stationary.

The timestamp read ten minutes before they’d moved to the next block.

His stomach twisted. “No…” He zoomed in, jaw tightening. “Bruce—he was right there. We were right there.”

Jason, leaning against the railing, raised an eyebrow. “You’re kidding. You mean the kid was under your nose the whole time?”

“Don’t,” Dick snapped, sharper than he meant to. He ran a gloved hand through his hair, pacing a step back. “He was freezing out there. I saw the steam and didn’t even— I just—”

-

The glass door clicked softly as it shut behind him. The convenience store was dark except for the low hum of the freezer lights and the faint green glow from the “EXIT” sign. The power had gone out hours ago, but the door hadn’t locked right — Gotham wasn’t kind to corner shops in winter.

Tim’s hands shook as he reached for a bag of chips and a small pack of jerky. He felt bad about stealing but his stomach didn’t care anymore. He shoved the food into his backpack, guilt gnawing right alongside the hunger.

The streets outside were empty, slick with cold. A layer of frost painted the edges of the windows, catching the faint light from the streetlamps. Tim adjusted the hood of his sweatshirt and started to move, his breath coming out in little clouds.

Then something shifted above him— a sound he couldn’t place at first, like the wind bending wrong.

He froze.

A shadow dropped from the rooftops, huge and fluid, the shape of wings catching the air. For a heartbeat, Tim thought he was dreaming. But then the figure landed on the street just a few yards away. Black cape, sharp silhouette, the familiar pointed cowl.

Batman.

Tim’s pulse raced. He instinctively pressed himself back against the brick wall, clutching his bag to his chest.

The Dark Knight wasn’t alone. He was carrying someone, a small figure bundled in a pink coat, crying quietly. Batman knelt, his cape folding around them like a shield, and set the girl gently on her feet. His voice, when he spoke, was low but calm.

“You’re safe now,” he said. “Your mom’s just across the street. ”

The girl sniffled, nodding. Batman placed a steady hand on her shoulder, waiting for her to breathe.

Tim couldn’t look away. He’d always thought Batman was all steel and gravel, all anger and armor— the boogeyman criminals whispered about. But this version of him, kneeling in the street, voice soft enough not to scare a child? That was something else entirely. Something human. It was one of the many factors that led Tim to placing Bruce Wayne behind the mask years ago when he was in an alleyway where Batman was soothing a crying child.

The little girl ran across the street, shoes splashing in a puddle. From the doorway of an apartment building, a woman rushed out — crying, calling her name. She scooped the child up, holding her close. Batman stood at the curb, silent, cape brushing the ground.

He didn’t leave right away. He just stood there, making sure the girl reached safety. Making sure she was okay.

Tim’s throat tightened. His heart hurt in a way he couldn’t name, part awe, part longing, part disbelief. He’d just watched Batman—Bruce— be gentle, human, kind. The image wouldn’t leave him. But reality crept back in fast. He was still out here. Still cold. Still hunted by the city that forgot him.

He took one step back, then another, his sneakers crunching softly on frost. He should go. Before Batman turned around. Before—

His heel caught a loose lid.

Clang!

The sound tore through the quiet like a gunshot. A pair of metal trash cans rolled into the street, rattling against the curb.

Batman turned instantly.

Their eyes met.

Tim froze, breath catching in his throat. He didn’t need to see the face under the cowl, he knew. Even with the shadows cutting across the black armor, he recognized the shape of Bruce’s jaw, the way his shoulders squared, how his eyes seemed to burn right through the dark.

“Tim,” Batman said, low but unmistakable.

Tim’s stomach twisted. His legs screamed to run, but his body wouldn’t listen.

Bruce took a step forward. Then another. The cape dragged softly across the pavement.

“Tim, wait.”

That broke the spell.

Tim spun on his heel and bolted. His shoes slapped the ice-slick street, heart hammering in his chest.

“Stop!” Bruce’s voice cracked through the night, louder now, sharp.

A gloved hand caught his wrist mid-stride. Tim gasped, jerking back, but Bruce’s grip was firm — too firm.

“Don’t run,” Bruce said, voice rising again. “You’ll get hurt—”

But all Tim heard was the echo of every raised voice, every hand that grabbed too hard. His body trembled, breath shattering, chest tight. His vision tunneled.

He wasn’t on a Gotham street anymore. He was cornered.

And before he could stop himself, the words ripped out of him — raw, instinctive, panicked.

“Bruce Wayne is Batman!”

The name hit the air like a thunderclap.

Bruce froze. The grip loosened instantly. For a second, neither of them moved, both stunned by the sound of it echoing off the brick walls.

Tim yanked his hand free, stumbling backward, chest heaving. 

Bruce reacted the moment Tim bolted, “Tim!”

He sprinted after him, cape flaring behind like a shadow on fire. His boots struck pavement in heavy, steady rhythm— trained, relentless, but Tim was smaller, faster, and desperate. He darted between alleys and chain-link gaps, hurdling overturned crates, his breath fogging in the freezing air.

“Tim, stop!”

That voice again — commanding, echoing off the bricks.

He can’t catch me. He can’t.

Tim’s heart beat so fast it hurt. His limbs burned, but adrenaline kept him moving. He ducked through a narrow space between dumpsters, scraping his shoulder on rough metal, then burst out into a back alley. He could still hear Bruce’s boots pounding behind him, closer than he wanted.

The noise of the city bled in— sirens somewhere distant, wind screaming through gutters, the hollow clang of Bruce vaulting over a fire escape. Tim skidded left, then right, weaving through streets he knew better than anyone. He’d memorized the cracks and corners of this part of Gotham.

Then he saw it, a narrow alley between two abandoned buildings, just wide enough for him to slip through.

He dove inside, sprinting until the shadows swallowed him. Batman’s silhouette hit the edge of the alley seconds later, but by then Tim was gone, swallowed by Gotham’s veins.

Bruce slowed, scanning rooftops, alley mouths, nothing but dark and wind.

And Tim—Tim kept running until his lungs screamed. When he finally stopped, he staggered against a wall, dragging in shaky breaths. His hands were trembling; his pulse thudded in his ears. He turned the corner into another alley, thinking he’d finally found space to breathe—

“Look what we got here,” a voice drawled.

Tim froze.

A small group of teens—late teens, rough-looking, layered in torn jackets and cigarettes— stepped out from behind a dumpster. One had a bat slung over his shoulder; another twirled a knife lazily.

Tim’s adrenaline spiked all over again.

He should back off. Say nothing. Move slow. But his mind was still locked in that high-speed fear, the echo of Bruce’s voice chasing him, and now this? Something inside him snapped sharp.

“Didn’t realize Gotham’s finest were having a convention,” Tim muttered. His voice came out cold, flat.

The one with the knife grinned. “You got a mouth for someone shaking like a leaf.”

Tim straightened slightly, masking the tremor in his legs. His hair hung in his face, his clothes torn, but his eyes burned. “Yeah? You gonna quote poetry next or just keep proving you’re all bark?”

The group laughed, ugly and low. The one with the bat stepped closer. “Kid, you’re asking for it.”

“Maybe,” Tim said, lifting his chin, “but you’d better make it count”

The smirk that came with it was sharp, dangerous— almost feral. The kind of defiance that didn’t come from strength, but exhaustion. He had nothing left to lose, and it showed.

One of the older teens sneered. “Think you’re funny, huh?”

Tim’s reply was clipped, vicious. “Funnier than you.”

That did it. The bat-wielder lunged.

Tim moved, ducked, adrenaline slicing through his veins like fire. The wooden edge cracked against the brick wall behind him, splintering on impact.

He pivoted on his heel and threw a punch, wild but fast, right into one teen’s gut. The guy folded with a grunt, air wheezing out of him. But there were too many. Too damn many.

Tim backed up, heart hammering, eyes darting between them. The knife glinted, the bat was already rising again, and his breath came in ragged gasps. He could feel the cold air biting at his throat.

Think, think, think.

The alley stretched narrow and filthy behind him, one way blocked by the teens, the other leading deeper into the industrial maze of Gotham’s forgotten blocks. He took a step back, then another and ran.

“Get him!” one of them shouted.

Boots thundered behind him. Tim didn’t look back. He just ran harder, lungs burning, every step slapping against slick concrete. The city blurred, trash heaps, cracked brick, rusted metal, his pulse the only thing he could hear.

He turned sharply, trying to lose them, but the alley ended in a tall, chain-link fence. His stomach dropped.

“No, no, no—”

He skidded to a stop, breath clouding in the icy air. Behind him, the teens’ laughter echoed closer.

You’re boxed in, Tim. You’re screwed.

Then—a flicker of hope. The bottom of the fence, warped up just enough to leave a gap. Tim hit the fence hard, the chain rattling under his weight as his breath tore out in sharp, white clouds. He dropped to his knees and clawed at the warped section near the bottom, fingers shaking. The gap was tight, barely wide enough for a kid his size but it was all he had.

Behind him, the teens were closing in, laughing between their heavy steps.

“Where you goin’?” one of them jeered.

Tim didn’t answer. He hit the ground and shoved his arms through, ignoring the way the cold metal bit into his jacket sleeves. His heart was beating so fast it hurt. He pushed his head and shoulders under, twisting sideways, dragging himself forward with all the strength he had left. The fence screeched against his back and arms, tearing at fabric, scraping skin raw.

He got halfway through before the first hand grabbed his ankle.

Tim’s breath hitched, and then the world went white with fear. “Let go!” he yelled, kicking backward. His heel connected with a mouth, a grunt following the impact. For a second, the grip loosened—

Then three more hands grabbed him at once.

“Little punk,” one snarled, yanking hard.

The force nearly tore him in two. His ribs slammed into the metal frame; the twisted wires dug into his stomach and throat, pressing against the tender skin there. The fence held like a noose, biting deeper when he tried to push forward again while the teens tried to drag him back.

“Stop—!” Tim gasped, his voice cracking. Fear filled his entire body when he realized what would happen if they were to pull him back through. The metal poked and but his skin as he thrashed around.

The laughter only grew louder. They thought it was funny — watching him thrash, seeing the panic take hold.

The fence shrieked under Tim’s weight as the hands on the other side yanked harder. His chest slammed against the metal, the cold bite of it pressing into his collarbone and neck. The wire dangerously close to his jugular. He twisted, kicked, tried to get free, but the grip around his legs only tightened.

“Let go!” he gasped, voice cracking.

They didn’t even hear him— laughing, shouting over one another, rough hands pulling without realizing how much force they were using.

The pressure built until something tore— his jacket, his skin— and the sound that ripped out of him wasn’t a word, wasn’t even human for a moment. It was a sharp, terrified and pained scream that cut through the cold night air.

The laughter stopped.

He was yanked all the way back through, hitting the ground hard. His vision went white from the shock, his body curling instinctively as he grabbed at his neck, feeling warmth slick beneath his fingers. His breathing hitched, broken and uneven.

“Ah—ah, shit,” one of the teens stammered, stumbling back. “We didn’t—he’s—”

No one finished the sentence. They stood frozen, faces pale under the pale streetlight.

Tim couldn’t even try to sit up, the world spun violently. His heartbeat roared in his ears. He could hear the teens arguing, footsteps retreating and then another sound, heavier, closer.

A shadow dropped from the rooftops like it had fallen out of the night itself.

Batman landed in front of them with a thud. One look from him sent the teens scattering, their panic echoing down the alley.

Bruce’s gaze snapped to the ground, to the small, bloodied figure struggling to breathe. His heart sank before his brain even caught up — he knew that face, those too-wide blue eyes.

“Tim.”

He was already kneeling beside him, voice low but urgent. “Stay with me, kid.”

Tim blinked sluggishly, his lips parting. There was fear there and confusion. His mouth moved, barely sound. “Hngh…”

Then the cold crept in too fast. His eyes fluttered once, twice, and he went still.

But Batman was still there bending down to pick Tim up into his arms as his world turned to black.

Chapter Text

The Batmobile roared down Gotham's empty streets, its engine echoing off the wall of the Narrows. The city was half-asleep, unaware. 

Bruce's gloved hands were tight on the wheel, knuckles pale even under the black leather. In the passenger seat, Tim was slumped against the harness— far too still. 

“Stay with me, kid,” Bruce muttered, his voice low and rough. He kept glancing over, one hand leaving the wheel just long enough to press against Tim's shoulder, searching for any sign of response, “You're alright. Just hold on,” 

There was a faint sound— maybe a breath, maybe just wishful thinking. 

Red lights flickered through the windshield, bathing Tim's face in pulses of color. Bruce ignored every traffic signal. Leslie's clinic was close— closer than the Cave, closer than any chance at calling for help. He couldn't risk losing him on the way. 

He swung the car around the corner and stopped hard, the tires screaming against the pavement. 

Leslie was there before he even reached the door. She must’ve heard the Batmobile's engine from her upstairs apartment— the sound of something that only showed up when things were bad. Really bad. 

“Batman?” Her voice was tight as she hurried towards him, already pulling on gloves, “What—,” 

He was already carrying the boy in, the dark cape wrapped around him like a shield, “He’s bleeding,” Bruce said, words clipped by urgency as they made their way into the building, “Neck and shoulder— deep lacerations. Lost consciousness about ten minutes ago,” 

Leslies face widened as she saw Tim's face— pale, drawn, barely breathing. “Set him here,” she ordered, motioning to the exam table they came up to, “And get me gauze, pressure bandages— top shelf.” 

Bruce obeyed instantly, his usual stoicism breaking at the edges. His mind kept replaying the boy's scream, the way he looked up at him, bleeding in that alley, like he’d already given up. 

Leslie pressed cloth to the wound, her movements steady, practiced. His pulse is weak,” she murmured. “We’ll need to slow the bleeding before we think about stitching.” 

Bruce stood behind her, every muscle in his body locked. He couldn't look away. The feeling in his stomach, the heavy knot of worry, reminded him of when his boys would get hurt. It was an odd feeling to arise for this boy; he’d only heard of from his kids. 

“Talk to me, Bruce,” Leslie said without looking up, “Who is he?”

He hesitated, “Timothy Drake,” 

Leslie froze, glancing up at him, “The Drake boy? I thought—,” 

“I’ve been looking for him… we’ve been looking for him,” The words came out rough. “He saved Dick a while back. He's been living on the streets for a few months.”

She nodded once, lips pressed together, and went back to work, “Then hes lucky you found him,” 

Bruce's gaze softened for a moment as he watched her tend to the kid— small, still, barely more than a shadow of what he used to be. 

“Lucky,” Bruce repeated quietly, but his tone made it sound anything but. 

Leslie glanced up once more, meeting his eyes, “You care about him.” 

Bruce didn't answer. He didn't need to. 

-

Leslie worked in near silence, the rhythmic sound of her movements grounding the chaos that had come crashing through her door. 

Tim was stable— for now. She’d cleaned and wrapped the worst of the wounds and set an IV line to keep his fluids up.  His breathing was shallow, but even. 

Bruce stood in the far corner, cape and cowl discarded, gloves still streaked faintly with red. He was used to blood, used to injuries, but this still unerved him. The twelve-year-old boy lying in front of him. 

His tapped into his communicator, waiting a second before speaking, “Nightwin,g do you copy?” His voice was low enough not to disturb Leslie's concentration as she ran scans. 

Static crackled for a moment before Dicks voice came through, groggy and rough from fatigue. “Batman? You find anything?” 

There was a pause before Bruce replied, “I have him.” 

The silence that followed was heavy— the kind that says more than words could ever. 

“You found him?” Dicks tone was suddenly awake, alert. “Is he okay? Where are you?” 

Bruce looked toward the bed, where Leslie still bent over Tim's small frame. The boy's face was ghostly pale under the dim light. 

“I have him,” Bruce repeated, quieter. “But not in the condition that’s best,” 

“How bad?” 

Bruce didnt answer right away. He didnt need to, the silence told Dick everything. 

“Leslie’s clinic,” he finally said, “North End. Keep this off the open channel,” 

“Copy that,” Dick said, voice tight. “I’ll be there in ten.”

“Don’t,” Bruce interrupted, more gently than usual. “He’s stable, but he needs quiet. Leslie’s handling it.”

There was a beat of hesitation, then: “Bruce…” Dick’s voice cracked slightly. “Is he gonna make it?”

Bruce looked down at Tim— the boy’s fingers twitching faintly, the slow rise and fall of his chest.

“Yes,” he said. “He’s strong.”

Leslie peeled off her gloves with a soft snap, setting them neatly on the tray beside the bed. The clinic had gone still again—only the faint hum of the heater and Tim’s slow, unsteady breathing filled the air.

Bruce hadn’t moved from the corner. The shadows on his face looked deeper in the dim light. He kept his gaze fixed on the boy, watching for every tiny rise and fall of his chest.

Leslie exhaled softly, rubbing a hand across her forehead before turning toward him. “He’s stable,” she said at last. “But Bruce… he’s been in this state for a long time.”

Bruce’s jaw tensed. “Explain.”

She picked up a chart—more out of habit than need. “He’s severely underweight. I’d estimate at least ten pounds below where he should be for his age and height. Signs of prolonged malnutrition—low iron, muscle loss, dehydration. And that’s just what I can tell right now.”

Her voice softened. “You said he’s been living on the streets?”

Bruce nodded once.

“That tracks. There’s an old fracture in his wrist that never healed properly—likely from before he ran. Bruising along his ribs, too, but those look newer.” She hesitated, glancing at him. “And the marks on his back and arms… those aren’t from accidents, Bruce.”

For a moment, Bruce didn’t speak. His hands curled into fists at his sides, leather creaking faintly.

Leslie’s tone was gentle but firm. “You know what I’m saying.”

“I do.” His voice was low, steady, but cold with restraint.

She sighed, folding her arms. “This kind of damage doesn’t come from just living rough. Some of it’s older. Someone hurt him long before the streets did.”

Bruce’s gaze flicked back to the bed. Tim’s face was turned slightly toward the wall, his skin pale against the white sheets, a heavy bandage along his neck. He looked so small—fragile in a way Bruce hated recognizing.

Leslie spoke softly again. “The body tells you things, Bruce. This one’s been in survival mode for years. He’s exhausted, half-starved, and still—” She shook her head. “Still he fought to live. That says a lot.”

Bruce’s throat tightened. “It says he’s strong.”

“It says he’s been alone for too long.”

Silence stretched between them, heavy but not cruel. Leslie moved toward the counter, starting to clean up her instruments. “You brought him here in time,” she said after a while. “You might’ve saved his life.”

Bruce didn’t look away from the boy. “Might’ve.”

“Don’t do that,” she said gently. “You did.”

He didn’t answer. He just stepped closer to the bed, stopping beside the chair Leslie had pulled up earlier. For a long moment, he stood there, watching the faint rise and fall of Tim’s chest—proof that he was still here.

Leslie placed a hand on Bruce’s arm as she passed him. “He’s safe now. Let that be enough for tonight.”

Bruce’s gaze lingered on the boy, quiet and unreadable. “For tonight,” he echoed.

-

The world came back in pieces.

Light first, too bright, too sterile. Then the soft hum of a heater, the faint antiseptic sting in the air.

Tim’s eyelids fluttered open. For a moment, he didn’t remember where he was. Then the ache hit— deep and sharp in his throat, his collarbone, his jaw. The sterile white ceiling above him wasn’t familiar, and neither was the rough weight of a blanket tucked around him.

He swallowed instinctively and choked on the pain. A thin, hoarse sound escaped his throat, barely audible. Panic followed fast, his body tensing.

A voice, low, steady, controlled, came from the chair beside him.

“Don’t try to talk.”

Tim’s eyes flicked toward the sound. Bruce Wayne sat there, cowl gone but still in the black suit, forearms braced on his knees. The faint blue light from the heart monitor caught the lines on his face — tired, restrained, but unmistakably him.

Tim froze. His mind scrambled between panic and disbelief. Bruce Wayne. And—Batman.

Bruce watched him quietly, voice softer now. “You’re safe. You’re at Leslie Thompkins’ clinic. You’ve been here since last night.”

Tim’s fingers twitched against the blanket. He tried to speak, a rasp of air, nothing more. His throat burned like fire.

“Don’t,” Bruce said quickly, rising a little from the chair. “You tore up your neck pretty badly. You’ll make it worse if you try.”

Tim shook his head— tiny, jerky movements. His eyes darted around the room, searching for exits, for his bag, for anything familiar. He didn’t want to be here. He didn’t want him.

Bruce saw the panic before Tim could mask it. He lifted a hand slightly — not to touch, just to calm. “No one’s going to hurt you,” he said. “You’re not in trouble.”

Tim flinched anyway, shrinking back against the pillow. The IV line in his arm pulled taut. He tried to push himself upright, instinct clawing through pain and exhaustion.

“Tim—”

He shook his head harder now, breath quickening through his nose, chest trembling. Every part of him screamed, don't believe it.

Bruce took a slow breath, forcing his own voice to steady. “You’ve been through enough. You don’t have to go anywhere right now. Just rest.”

Tim’s hand curled weakly around the blanket, pulling it closer like a shield. When Bruce moved a step nearer, he tensed so sharply it hurt.

Bruce froze mid-motion. His voice dropped to something quiet, raw, “I’m not going to touch you.”

That stopped Tim for a moment. His gaze flicked up, uncertain.

Bruce exhaled slowly, lowering himself back into the chair, giving Tim space. “You don’t have to trust me. Not yet. But you’re safe here, and Leslie’s going to take care of you.”

Tim’s throat worked, an instinctive swallow that made him wince. His eyes stung, and he hated that. He didn’t know what he wanted, to run, to hide, to vanish.

Bruce stayed silent now. The faint hum of the monitor filled the space again.

Finally, Tim let his head fall sideways against the pillow, turning away. His breathing hitched once, but he didn’t move again.

Bruce sat there until his own shoulders eased, until the boy’s eyes fluttered closed from exhaustion.

-

The world blurred in and out of focus.

Every time Tim surfaced from the fog of sleep, the light was a little different, sometimes soft and gold from the window, sometimes pale and sterile from the overhead lamp. The steady beep-beep of the monitor never changed.

Neither did the man in the chair.

The first time Tim woke, his body was heavy, his throat a dull, aching fire. Bruce sat near the bed, elbows resting on his knees, still in the same clothes. His cape and cowl were folded on the table beside him. His eyes were closed— not asleep, but resting in that motionless way that meant he hadn’t left.

Tim drifted again before he could think too much about it.

The second time, the light slanted through the blinds. Late morning, maybe.

Tim’s chest rose and fell unevenly, the IV still taped to his arm.

Leslie was there this time, quietly checking vitals, adjusting something on the monitor. She spoke softly to Bruce, low, calm, professional.

“He’s stable,” she said. “The infection risk is the main concern now. You should go home, get some rest.”

Bruce only shook his head once.

“I’ll stay.”

Leslie’s sigh was quiet but fond. She patted his arm. “You always do.”

Tim didn’t open his eyes, but he heard it all. And he didn’t understand why it made his chest hurt worse than his neck.

Afternoon light filled the room next time.

Bruce was reading something, a case file maybe, or a thin manila folder with Tim’s name on it. His expression was carved from stone, eyes flicking over the pages in silence.

Tim stirred, and Bruce noticed instantly, setting the file aside.

“You need water?” he asked quietly.

Tim blinked at him, throat working, and managed the tiniest shake of his head.

Bruce just nodded, settling back in the chair.

Neither spoke again.

Tim’s eyelids drooped. The faint sound of turning paper followed him into another uneasy sleep.

By the time he woke again, it was night. The lamp was dimmed, the world washed in gold and shadow. Rain whispered against the windows.

Bruce hadn’t moved much— maybe he’d changed his jacket, maybe not. His posture was the same: still, composed, sentinel-like. His eyes were open, watching the rain.

For a second, Tim wondered if he’d slept at all.

The thought hit him strangely, that someone had stayed the whole time.

He shifted slightly, and the rustle of the blanket caught Bruce’s attention.

Bruce turned toward him, the faintest trace of relief flickering across his face.

“Hey,” he said softly, the word almost awkward. “Still with me?”

Tim nodded weakly. His throat burned, so he didn’t try to speak.

Bruce just gave a small nod back.

They stayed like that, silent, the storm filling the space between them.

Tim’s eyes fluttered shut again, but before sleep claimed him, he saw it clearly this time: Bruce was still there, unwavering. 

-

When Tim woke again, the world felt sharper, too sharp.

Every pulse of his heart sent a dull ache through his neck and shoulder, throbbing beneath the gauze. His throat burned when he swallowed. The pain crawled outward until his hands trembled against the blanket.

He tried to breathe through it, but the tears came anyway— silent, hot, and uninvited.

He turned his face toward the wall, biting down on a choked sound. He didn’t want to cry. Didn’t want anyone to see.

“Tim?”

The voice was low, careful, not gravelly like Batman’s, but still unmistakably him.

Tim froze. He hadn’t realized Bruce was awake.

Bruce leaned forward from the chair beside the bed. “Are you in pain?”

Tim hesitated, every instinct screaming don’t be a problem, but the pain flared again, sharp enough to make his breath hitch. He gave a small nod, quick and ashamed.

Bruce didn’t speak for a moment, didn’t scold or question. He just stood, moving with that slow, deliberate calm that always made the air around him feel steadier.

“I’ll get Leslie,” he said quietly, and crossed the room.

Tim watched from the corner of his eye as Bruce murmured something to Leslie near the door. She came over, kind eyes flicking from the monitors to Tim’s face. “It’s okay, sweetheart,” she said softly. “Just adjusting your IV a bit, help take the edge off, all right?”

Tim nodded faintly, eyes stinging again. The medicine burned a little at first, then slowly, the pain dulled.

He blinked hard, tears still slipping down his face, this time slower, tired.

Bruce returned to the chair but didn’t sit right away. Instead, he stood near the bed, watching Tim with quiet concern. “Better?”

Tim nodded, but didn’t look at him— couldn’t. His throat worked as he tried to form a word, but no sound came. Embarrassment flooded his chest. He turned his head further, hiding his face in the pillow.

Bruce hesitated, then squatted down beside the bed, leveling his gaze with Tim’s. His voice stayed low, softer than Tim had ever heard it.

“You don’t have to talk,” Bruce said. “Not if it hurts. You just rest.”

Tim blinked at him, eyes flicking up briefly — searching his face for something, maybe a trap or judgment. But Bruce’s expression didn’t shift. Just steady, calm, real.

And for the first time, Tim didn’t see Batman or the billionaire.

He just saw someone who stayed.

Bruce hesitated again, then slowly reached out. His hand rested lightly over Tim’s, careful not to startle him. His palm was warm, steady.

Tim stiffened instinctively, his body’s reflex but the warmth didn’t leave. Bruce didn’t squeeze or move, just stayed there, a quiet weight anchoring him.

After a long, trembling breath, Tim let his fingers shift just enough to curl faintly beneath Bruce’s. Not tight, not confident, but there.

The smallest act of trust.

Bruce felt it, and his expression softened, grief and relief threading together.

“Get some sleep,” he murmured. “You’re safe now.”

And this time, when Tim drifted off, he didn’t feel alone.

-

The light filtering through the blinds was pale and thin— morning, maybe. The world felt quieter than before, muffled except for the faint beeping of the monitor beside him.

Tim’s throat still ached, but the fog had lifted just enough for him to focus. He blinked slowly, vision sharpening, and realized he wasn’t alone.

Bruce sat near the bed, arms crossed but eyes heavy like he hadn’t slept. Dick leaned against the far wall, his posture easy but his expression troubled. Jason sat in the corner, hood down, legs sprawled out, tossing a stress ball between his hands.

They didn’t notice Tim was awake.

“Are you sure that’s what he really said?” Jason asked quietly, glancing up at Bruce.

Bruce nodded once. “Yes. Right before he ran. He screamed it— out loud.”

“Bruce Wayne is Batman,” Dick repeated under his breath, grimacing. “That’s… not exactly a secret we can afford to have floating around.”

Jason snorted softly. “No kidding. Kid’s got guts, though. Not that it’s smart to yell that kind of thing.”

“He wasn’t trying to expose us,” Bruce said quietly. “He was scared.”

Dick frowned. “Still… what if someone else heard? Or what if he decides to tell someone now? He’s not exactly in a stable headspace.”

The words sank like lead in Tim’s chest.

He stared at them, heart pounding against his ribs.

They were talking about him.

About the thing he’d screamed in panic — the thing he hadn’t even thought through.

And suddenly everything clicked in a terrible way.

Bruce hadn’t stayed because he cared.

He’d stayed because Tim knew.

He was only here because Tim was a liability.

Tim’s breath hitched, eyes stinging. That quiet warmth he’d felt —that fragile hope— shattered as fast as it had formed.

“—he’s been through a lot,” Dick was saying, voice softer now. “We just have to go slow.”

“Slow,” Jason muttered. “Right. Because the last time we went slow, someone still figured us out.”

Bruce didn’t respond, just pinched the bridge of his nose. “Enough. He’s—”

His head turned — and froze.

Tim’s eyes were open.

Three pairs of eyes locked on him in an instant. None of them said anything for a long moment.

Then Dick straightened, voice gentler. “Hey, uh… you’re awake. How’re you feeling, buddy?”

Tim swallowed, his throat dry and raw, the sound scraping like sandpaper. He didn’t answer right away. He just stared at them— at the three people who wore masks by night and secrets by habit.

Then, voice rough, cracked, and sharper than he meant, he rasped, “You’re only helping me because you don’t want me to spill your little secret.”

The room went still.

Dick’s smile faltered. Jason blinked, caught off guard. Bruce just looked at him— no anger, just quiet shock that cut deeper than any raised voice.

Tim clenched the blanket in his hands, tears threatening again but this time from something hotter—hurt, betrayal, fear.

“I get it,” he muttered, voice shaking. “You don’t have to pretend to care.”

No one moved—not until Dick took a hesitant step forward, hands lifted slightly like he was trying not to startle a wild animal.

“Tim,” he said gently, “that’s not true. We’re not—”

“Don’t,” Tim cut in, voice cracking mid-word. His throat burned but the panic burned hotter. “Don’t lie.”

He could feel all their eyes on him, heavy, sharp, suffocating. He couldn’t tell what they were thinking, and that terrified him more than if they’d just yelled.

Jason sat forward, eyebrows drawn. “Hey, kid, take it easy. Nobody’s mad—”

“Then why are you all staring at me?” The words came out louder and meaner than he meant, trembling on the edges of a sob.

The air felt too thick to breathe.

He shifted against the bed, back pressing to the wall like he could make himself smaller. His chest hurt; his head wouldn’t stop spinning. Every look, every word from them felt like it had layers of meaning, traps he couldn’t read fast enough.

He tried to slow his breathing, but his body wasn’t listening.

They’re cornering me, his brain supplied, fast and frantic. They’re angry, I know. They’ll make sure I don’t talk.

“Tim,” Bruce said finally, low but steady. That same voice that had been soft when he’d helped him before. “You’re safe. No one here is going to hurt you.”

Tim flinched anyway because people always said that before they did.

Bruce noticed, and his face softened. He didn’t move closer; he just sat back down in the chair, keeping his voice even. “You saved my son’s life. That’s not something we forget.”

Tim blinked hard, hands shaking under the blanket. “You don’t have to say that.”

“I’m not saying it because I have to.”

Dick crouched a little, lowering himself to Tim’s eye level without crossing the invisible line between them. “He’s telling the truth, kid. We were worried sick when you disappeared.”

Jason, quieter than before, added, “We’ve been looking for you for weeks, man. Even B didn’t sleep half the time.”

That didn’t sound like a lie. But Tim didn’t know how to trust what felt good — good never lasted.

His breathing hitched again. He pressed his palms against his temples, eyes squeezed shut. “Stop—please—stop talking, I can’t—”

The noise in his head was too much. Their words, their faces, the white walls, the memories, everything folding in on itself until his chest felt like it might burst.

Bruce stood halfway, then stopped himself when Tim jerked back.

“Alright,” Bruce murmured, quiet, grounding. “It’s okay. We’ll give you space.”

He motioned with a hand. Dick and Jason hesitated, but Bruce’s tone left no room for argument. They stepped back, moving toward the door.

When the room quieted again, Bruce sat back down in the same chair— not close, not far. Just… there.

The room had gone still again, the quiet kind that presses in around you until even breathing feels too loud.

Bruce hadn’t moved from his spot. He just sat there, shoulders broad but tired, the kind of calm that felt more protective than stern.

Tim couldn’t stand it.

The silence. The kindness. The waiting.

He turned toward the wall, fingers twisting in the blanket, voice coming out rough and splintered. “Why are you still here?”

Bruce’s answer was patient, same as before. “Because I told you. You don’t have to be alone.”

Something in Tim snapped at that— not anger, but something deeper, sharper, years of pressure giving way.

He whipped his head toward him, eyes glassy.

“That’s what everyone says,” he rasped. “Everyone says that and then they leave. Or they yell. Or they hurt me.”

His chest heaved. “So just—just do it now. Whatever it is. So I don’t have to wait for it anymore.” The words tumbled out like a dam bursting— quiet, broken, desperate.

He flinched as if expecting Bruce to stand, to shout, to walk out.

But Bruce only stayed still.

“Tim,” he said softly. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

Tim shook his head fast, eyes wide. “You will. Everyone does.”

Bruce’s voice didn’t rise. “I’m not them.”

Tim stared at him, trembling. His throat burned when he whispered, “You say that now. But when I mess up, when I say too much, you’ll—” He cut himself off, breathing too fast.

Bruce leaned forward slightly, elbows resting on his knees. “You think you deserve that. Don’t you?”

Tim blinked, confused, but didn’t answer.

Bruce continued, “You think if you get hurt, if people leave you, it’s because you did something wrong.”

That hit too close. Tim’s chest clenched hard. He looked away again, muttering, “Maybe I did.”

There was no judgment in Bruce’s reply. Only quiet understanding. “No one deserves that, Tim. Not you. Not any child.”

Tim’s throat trembled; tears spilled before he could stop them. He wiped at them roughly, angry at himself. “I don’t even know what I want anymore,” he choked. “I just—” He took a shaky breath. “I want to be loved. I want to be a part of something. I want—”

His voice broke. “I want someone to hug me, but I’m so scared.”

For a long moment, Bruce didn’t move. Then, carefully, he stood and sat on the edge of the bed, making sure Tim could see every motion.

“I’m going to sit here, alright?” he said softly. “You can tell me to stop at any time.”

Tim didn’t answer. He just nodded once, eyes darting between Bruce’s hands and his face.

When Bruce reached out, it wasn’t forceful — just a steady arm around Tim’s shoulders, light enough that Tim could’ve slipped away.

But he didn’t.

The first touch made Tim freeze, every muscle taut. Then the warmth hit —slow, steady, safe and all the air left his lungs at once.

He let out a soft, broken sob and turned into Bruce’s chest, curling in like he’d been holding that position inside his heart for years.

Bruce wrapped both arms around him, grounding and gentle, one hand at the back of Tim’s head.

“You’re safe,” he murmured, low and steady. “You’re safe, Tim.”

Tim cried until his body had nothing left — years of fear and loneliness spilling out in shudders.

And through it all, Bruce didn’t move, didn’t speak more than the occasional quiet reassurance. Just held him, steady and real.

When the shaking finally slowed, Tim stayed pressed against him, small and exhausted.

Bruce glanced down, voice softer than anyone would ever expect from Batman.

“You have people now,” he said. “You don’t have to run anymore.”

Chapter Text

When Tim woke, the room was dim again— dawn light slanting through the blinds, soft gray bleeding into gold.

He was warm. That was the first thing he noticed. The second was the slow, steady rhythm of someone’s breathing beside him.

He blinked blearily, the fog of exhaustion lifting enough to see Bruce still there. The man hadn’t moved far— sitting back against the headboard, boots off. One large hand rested lightly on the blanket near Tim’s shoulder, not gripping, just there.

He looked… tired. Eyes shadowed, jaw unshaven, the kind of fatigue that came from years of carrying more than one person should. But still, his gaze softened when he realized Tim was awake.

“Morning,” Bruce said quietly, voice lower than usual, almost human.

Tim didn’t answer right away. His throat still ached, and part of him expected Bruce to be gone, for this to have been a dream stitched together from wishful thinking and pain.

But he wasn’t gone. He was right there.

Tim shifted slightly, the movement making Bruce adjust the blanket for him. “You stayed,” he murmured, the words barely audible.

Bruce nodded once. “Told you I would.”

Before Tim could respond, the soft click of the clinic door echoed through the hallway. A moment later, Alfred appeared — dressed impeccably despite the early hour, carrying a tray with a steaming cup of tea and something light to eat.

His calm presence filled the room like a warm light.

“Master Bruce,” he greeted quietly. Then, spotting Tim awake, his expression gentled further. “And young master Timothy. It’s good to see you awake, sir.”

Tim blinked at him, unsure how to respond. The man’s voice was warm, polite, but not pitying, that alone made his chest ache.

Bruce shifted a little, making room as Alfred set the tray on the bedside table.

“Leslie sent word this morning,” Alfred continued, adjusting Tim’s pillow with practiced care. “She said you’ve been quite the fighter.”

Tim flushed faintly, unsure what to say. “I just… didn’t want to die.”

Alfred gave a small, approving nod. “A most commendable instinct.”

That earned a ghost of a smile from Bruce, faint, but there.

When Alfred poured the tea, Tim’s eyes followed the motion: the steam curling up, the way Alfred didn’t rush or push him to take it. Just offered it like it was normal. Like he was normal.

“Thank you,” Tim said, his voice still rough.

Alfred inclined his head. “You’re very welcome, Master Timothy.”

The “Master” part made Tim’s stomach twist awkwardly, a mix of confusion and something that almost hurt, being addressed with respect.

Bruce must’ve noticed, because he said quietly, “You don’t have to be anyone but yourself here. Alfred’s just… old-fashioned.”

“Timothy will do,” Alfred said smoothly, with a small smile that reached his eyes. “And please know, you are safe here. That’s not an offer; it’s a promise.”

Tim hesitated, then nodded.

The tea was warm in his hands, grounding. The silence that followed wasn’t tense this time.

After a while, Tim murmured, “You really didn’t leave.”

Bruce looked at him… not Batman, not the mask, just Bruce. “No,” he said. “I didn’t.”

Tim stared into the cup, throat tight. “…You’ll have to someday.”

“Maybe,” Bruce said. “But not today.”

-

The clinic room smelled faintly of antiseptic and tea. The machines that had once beeped in anxious rhythm were quiet now; only the faint hum of a heater filled the space.

Tim had been awake more often. Still pale, still weak, but slowly eating more. Leslie had checked him over that morning and said, with cautious optimism, that the worst had passed.

When Alfred returned a few hours later, he carried a folded stack of clothes— soft, dark, and clearly worn but clean.

Tim looked up from where he sat propped in bed. “Those… aren’t mine.”

Alfred gave a small, kind smile. “Indeed not. They belonged to Master Jason, though I imagine he won’t mind lending them until something new can be procured. They’re soft and warm, and you could use both.”

Tim hesitated, fingers twisting in the blanket. “…Oh.”

Bruce stood a little off to the side, arms loosely crossed, watching quietly, not looming, but present. The way he always seemed to be now.

Alfred placed the clothes at the edge of the bed: a soft gray t-shirt, a pair of sweatpants, and a hoodie that looked a bit big but cozy. “Do you feel steady enough to try changing?”

Tim nodded faintly, though the moment he tried to move, Bruce stepped forward before he could fall back.

“Easy,” Bruce said quietly, steadying him with a hand under his arm. “No rush.”

Tim tried to protest, “I can…” but his voice gave out, raw and hoarse. Bruce’s expression softened.

“Let us help,” Alfred said gently, already turning his back a little to give Tim privacy as he guided the IV lines out of the way.

It wasn’t until Bruce helped Tim lift the thin hospital shirt over his head that the silence grew heavy. The kid’s ribs showed clearly, the skin stretched tight across sharp bones and faint bruises.

Bruce’s jaw tightened. Alfred’s hand paused mid-motion.

The air in the room went still.

For a long moment, Alfred didn’t speak—just gave Bruce a long, knowing look. 

Bruce’s eyes dropped briefly to the floor before he helped guide Tim into the t-shirt. His touch was careful, reverent almost, as if afraid the boy would break.

When they got the hoodie on, Tim shivered a little and pulled the sleeves down over his hands. It was far too big, Jason’s arms had been longer, but the fabric swallowed him in warmth.

He murmured something quiet, almost embarrassed. “Thanks… it’s soft.”

Alfred straightened the hem, giving the faintest approving nod. “You’re most welcome, Master Timothy. It suits you.”

Tim looked at him curiously. “You don’t have to call me that.”

“Ah,” Alfred said with a gentle smile. “But I find that it reminds people they’re worthy of being addressed with dignity. You included.”

Tim blinked, unsure how to respond.

Bruce watched him pull the drawstrings of the hoodie tight around his face— a little boy in too-big clothes, hiding in cotton and fear— and something in his chest ached.

Alfred caught that look again. “He’ll fill out,” he said quietly, voice meant for Bruce alone. “With time.”

Bruce only nodded, jaw tight. “He will.”

Tim didn’t catch the words, but he saw the way Bruce looked at him— not pity, not disappointment. 

And when he sank back into the pillows, exhausted but clean and warm for the first time in weeks, Alfred adjusted the blanket over him with fatherly precision.

-

The soft rhythm of rain hit the windows again. Leslie had gone home to rest, leaving Bruce and Alfred to handle the quiet hours. Tim had dozed off for a while, curled up on his side in the oversized hoodie, the blanket pulled high over his chin.

When the door creaked open again, Bruce looked up.

“Hey,” Dick said softly, stepping into the room. He was in civvies: jeans, a hoodie, and that usual bright-eyed grin that dimmed the moment his gaze fell on Tim.

“Leslie said it was okay if I stopped by,” he added, quieter now. “Didn’t want to freak him out again.”

Bruce nodded once. “He’s been resting. You can stay. He should be waking soon.”

Dick moved closer, but when Tim stirred— blinking awake, squinting at the new voice— the boy instantly tensed. His hands clutched the blanket a little tighter.

Bruce leaned forward slightly. “It’s all right, Tim. Its just Dick.”

Tim nodded faintly, wary eyes flicking toward the stranger standing in the doorway. “… Nightwing.”

“Guilty,” Dick said with a small grin, raising his hands as if to say I come in peace. “But don’t worry, I’m off duty. Just me today.”

Tim said nothing. His eyes darted between Bruce and Dick— calculating, hesitant, every movement screaming quiet uncertainty.

Dick tried to keep it easy. “I heard you’re healing up. That’s good. Leslie’s the best there is.”

Tim gave a stiff shrug, eyes back on his blanket. “I guess.” His voice was hoarse still, a rasp more than a tone.

Bruce said nothing, just watched, letting Dick take the lead.

Dick rubbed the back of his neck, awkwardly searching for a way in. “I, uh, brought something.” He lifted a small paper bag and placed it on the side table. “Alfred said you’re finally allowed solid food. So— I got you some soup from that café down the street. Real stuff, not whatever Leslie’s feeding you.”

Tim looked at it, then back to Dick. He didn’t reach for it.

“Thanks,” he muttered.

“You’re welcome.” Dick smiled faintly, then pulled up the chair Bruce had been sitting in earlier. “Mind if I sit?”

Tim hesitated, then gave a tiny nod.

For a moment, neither spoke. The rain filled the silence.

Finally, Dick tried again. “You’ve been through a lot, huh?”

Tim’s eyes narrowed a little. “You don’t have to act like you get it.”

The words weren’t harsh — just defensive. Tired.

Dick blinked, then nodded slowly. “You’re right. I don’t. Not all of it, anyway.” He leaned back slightly. “But I do know what it’s like to have everything fall apart and to not know who’s gonna stick around afterward.”

That made Tim’s jaw tighten. He turned his face away. “Yeah, well… people don’t stick around for long.”

Bruce’s chest ached at that.

Dick’s voice softened. “Maybe not always. But some do. You just… haven’t met all of them yet.”

Tim didn’t answer. He pressed his knees up slightly under the blanket — small, protective movements, the kind you make when you’re trying to take up less space.

After a long silence, Tim asked, quiet and raw, “You’re only being nice because he told you to, right?” He didn’t look at either of them.

Dick blinked. “What? No. Tim, that’s not—a”

“It’s fine,” Tim interrupted, voice small but sharp. “You don’t have to pretend. I know how it goes.”

Bruce stood from where he’d been leaning on the wall, but Dick held up a hand, shaking his head slightly — let me try.

He leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “Hey,” he said softly, catching Tim’s eyes for the first time. “I’m not pretending, okay? You scare the hell out of us because you keep surviving things that most people wouldn’t, and you still look at us like we’re the dangerous ones.”

Tim blinked — startled, caught between confusion and the sting of unexpected honesty.

Dick’s voice softened even more. “I don’t know what you’ve been told about people like us, but we don’t save someone just to leave them behind. That’s not how family works.”

The word family made Tim’s throat tighten. His fingers gripped the blanket harder.

Bruce stepped forward now, voice low and certain. “He’s right.”

Tim couldn’t look at him. “You’ll change your mind,” he whispered.

Bruce’s expression softened. “I won’t.”

For a long moment, all Tim could do was sit there, breathing unevenly, every instinct telling him not to believe it. To keep the wall up. To not let them see.

But Dick didn’t push further. He stood instead, giving a small, easy smile. “Alright, I’ll back off for now. You’ve got soup, you’ve got Alfred keeping you fed — that’s already two people on your team. You’ll have to get used to it.”

Tim didn’t smile, but he didn’t flinch away either.

As Dick headed for the door, he gave Bruce a knowing look — a silent he’s scared, but he’s listening.

Bruce just nodded once.

Tim stayed silent, eyes on the window and the rain that refused to stop.

But when Dick’s footsteps faded down the hall, Bruce noticed as he followed, that the paper bag of soup had been quietly pulled closer to the edge of the bed.

-

The door clicked softly shut behind them, the hush of the clinic settling around them like dust. Through the small window, they could still see Tim— head bowed, picking at the soup with slow, uncertain motions.

Dick leaned back against the wall, rubbing his face with both hands. “He doesn’t trust me at all,” he said finally. “Couldn’t even look at me for half the time.”

Bruce’s voice was low. “He doesn’t trust anyone. Not yet.”

Dick glanced at the window again. “You know, I kept thinking about when I first came to the manor. I was scared too, but not like that. He’s… it’s like he expects every word to be a trick. He's definitely different from that night he saved me.”

Bruce’s jaw tightened, the lines around his mouth deepening. “He’s been taught that love comes with punishment. Every kindness costs him something.”

“Yeah.” Dick crossed his arms. “And we’re the exact kind of people he’s learned to avoid— powerful, secretive, wearing masks. That can’t help.”

Bruce exhaled through his nose, the faintest nod. “He’s watching everything. Every word, every expression. Trying to predict what’ll happen next.”

“Classic hypervigilance,” Alfred murmured from where he stood near the door, voice gentle but weighted. “Children raised in fear rarely know rest, sir.”

Dick sighed. “Then how do we get through to him?”

Bruce turned his gaze back toward the small window, watching the boy inside quietly spoon at the soup. “We don’t push. Not yet. He has to decide on his own that we mean no harm, I’ve been going slow, just small things to try and help.”

“So what?” Dick asked. “Just… stay near? Let him see we’re still here?”

“Yes,” Bruce said simply. “Consistency is what he’s never had. If we want him to believe us, we show him we don’t leave.”

For a long beat, Dick studied him— really studied him. “You care about this kid,” he said finally. Not an accusation, just an observation.

Bruce’s expression didn’t change much, but his voice softened almost imperceptibly. “He reminds me of all of us, in different ways.” 

Alfred, as always, stepped in with quiet steadiness. “We give the boy warmth and patience. Time will do the rest.”

Dick nodded slowly, pushing off the wall. “Alright. I’ll keep coming by. No hero talk. Just… normal stuff.”

“Good,” Bruce said. “He needs that.”

As they turned to leave, Dick gave one last look through the window— the kid hunched under blankets, tiny against the sterile room.

“He really doesn’t know it yet,” Dick murmured, “but he’s already one of us, isn’t he?”

Bruce’s eyes softened. “He will be,” he said quietly. “If he wants to be.”

-

The sound of quiet voices bled through the door. The latch hadn’t quite caught when Bruce and the others stepped out, just enough space for sound to slip through the crack.

Tim sat propped against the pillows, the soup cooling in his lap. His hands were trembling again. Not from pain this time—though that still simmered in every movement—but from the ache in his chest.

He shouldn’t have said those things to Dick and Bruce earlier.

He shouldn’t have cried.

He shouldn’t still be here.

His mind whispered it all like a mantra. Because if he stayed too long, they’d get tired of him. They’d realize he wasn’t worth the effort. They’d do what everyone did— what they always did— and leave.

Then a voice cut through the static.

“He’s been taught that love comes with punishment. Every kindness costs him something.”

Bruce.

Tim froze. He shouldn’t listen. He really shouldn’t. But he couldn’t move either.

Dick’s voice followed later, after a few more words were exchanged, quieter, strained.

“Then how do we get through to him?”

There was a pause, long enough for Tim’s pulse to stutter, before Bruce answered, his tone steady and calm. “We don’t push. Not yet. He has to decide on his own that we mean no harm.”

Mean no harm.

The words felt impossible.

He’d heard adults say kind things before, right before they broke something in him. “We’re just trying to help, Tim.” “You made us do this.” “Don’t look at me like that, boy.”

But Bruce’s voice didn’t sound like that. It didn’t sound like lying.

Tim’s chest ached harder.

“Consistency is what he’s never had,” Bruce went on. “If we want him to believe us, we show him we don’t leave.”

The next voice was Alfred’s, warm and even. “Children raised in fear rarely know rest, sir.”

Tim bit down on the inside of his cheek until he tasted copper. They were talking about him. Not like a case. Not like a problem to solve. Just… a person.

He leaned forward a little, wincing as his healing body tugged. Through the small crack, he caught the faintest glimpse— Bruce’s broad frame, Dick leaning against the wall beside him, Alfred holding a folded blanket.

“He really doesn’t know it yet,” Dick murmured, “but he’s already one of us, isn’t he?”

There was a quiet moment. Then Bruce’s voice again, softer than Tim had ever heard it. “He will be. If he wants to be.”

Something in Tim’s throat gave out. He sank back into the pillow, curling the blanket up to his chin, his mind spinning but… quieter now.

-

The lamp by the bed glowed low and golden, softening the sterile corners of the room. Rain whispered faintly against the window, the kind of sound that made the world feel safer, like nothing could reach inside.

Tim sat on the edge of the bed, blanket around his shoulders. His pulse jumped every time Leslie’s gloved hand neared his throat. The bandages there were spotted with rust-brown, a fading map of what had nearly ended him.

“You’re doing great, sweetheart,” Leslie murmured, careful as she peeled the gauze back. “This one’s healing well. Just hold still a little longer.”

Tim didn’t respond. His jaw was tight, eyes darting to the far wall, fixed anywhere but on the hands near his neck. Every time she brushed antiseptic over the wound, his breath hitched and he flinched before he could stop himself.

Across from him, Bruce sat in a chair pulled close, not looming, not speaking, just there. His coat was gone, sleeves rolled up, forearms resting on his knees. The same man who could strike fear into Gotham’s worst criminals looked almost human in the quiet light.

Leslie paused when she noticed Tim’s hands curled against the blanket.

“Do you want to hold something?” she asked gently.

Tim hesitated. Then Bruce reached forward, slow enough that Tim could see it coming. He didn’t touch him right away, only offered his hand — palm up, open.

For a long, silent moment, Tim just stared at it. His brain screamed to pull back, to protect himself, to not need anyone.

But his body was tired. So tired.

Tentatively, he reached out and let his fingers curl around Bruce’s.

The contact was light, barely there, but Bruce tightened his hand just enough to anchor him. No pressure, no command. Just steady warmth.

Leslie worked in silence after that, her movements gentle but efficient. Tim flinched less with each touch. When the last bandage was secured, she gave a small, approving hum.

“There,” she said softly. “You’ll have a scar, but it’ll fade.”

Tim didn’t answer. His throat still hurt to speak, and maybe part of him just didn’t trust his voice not to break. But he gave a small nod— slow, deliberate — and didn’t loosen his grip on Bruce’s hand until Leslie had stepped away to clean up.

Bruce stayed sitting there even then, thumb brushing the back of Tim’s hand once, the motion careful and grounding. 

“You did well,” he said quietly.

-

The faint hum of the city drifted— traffic, someone shouting, the rustle of paper as Alfred tidied the side table.

Tim sat up against the pillows, more alert than the day before. His throat was still newly bandaged, and a faint tremor ran through his hands whenever he moved too quickly.

Bruce sat quietly in the corner, half-shadowed, reading something on a datapad.

The door opened with a soft knock.

“Hey, uh— we’re not interrupting, are we?” Dick’s voice was warm, cautious. He poked his head in first, followed closely by Jason, who was in his worn hoodie and sneakers, fidgeting with a loose thread on the cuff.

Bruce didn’t look up. “Come in.”

Jason entered first, trying not to stare at Tim but failing a little. Dick trailed behind, holding a tray of food.

“Brought lunch,” Dick said, voice light. “Figured you were tired of Alfred’s broth of eternal goodness.”

Jason shuffled over near the window, scratching the back of his neck. “Uh. You look… better,” he said awkwardly.

Tim didn’t answer— just gave the faintest nod.

Bruce’s eyes flicked up at the silence, but he didn’t step in.

Dick smiled a little and tried to keep the air from going stale. “So… how are you feeling?”

Tim’s gaze darted toward him, then down to his blanket. A shrug.

Jason shifted his weight. The quiet stretched long. 

Finally, Dick cleared his throat. “Hey. I’ve actually been wondering…” He leaned a bit forward, trying to catch Tim’s eyes. “How did you find out who we are?”

Tim froze.

Bruce looked up sharply. Jason blinked, surprised.

For a long moment, Tim said nothing. He just stared, eyes sharp, unreadable.

Jason groaned under his breath. “Ugh, don’t tell me it’s because of what I said that one time.”

Bruce frowned. “What time?”

Jason looked suddenly like he wanted to sink into the floor. “You know— when I talked to him on the street. Before he ran off.”

Dick blinked. “Wait, what did you tell him?”

Jason winced. “Uh— I just… thanked him for saving my brother and—”

Bruce’s expression darkened instantly. “Jason.”

“I didn’t mean to!” Jason said quickly, defensive. “It just came out, okay? I didn’t think he’d—”

“—It’s fine,” Tim rasped, interrupting before Bruce could scold.

Everyone turned to look at him.

Tim’s voice was soft but clearer than before. He even looked faintly amused. “I already knew before that.”

Jason blinked. “You did?”

Dick tilted his head, curiosity taking over. “Then how?”

Tim hesitated, the corner of his mouth twitching into something that was almost a smile. “You really want to know?”

Jason nodded immediately. Dick leaned in. Bruce watched quietly from the corner.

Tim drew in a shaky breath. “You,” he said, looking at Dick, “did this flip during a fight — one you only ever did once. During your Flying Graysons act.”

Dick’s eyes widened a fraction.

Tim continued, voice steadier now. “I used to watch old footage. You were the only one who ever landed it the way you did — half twist, one hand, knee bent in midair. No one else in Gotham could pull that off.”

Jason’s mouth fell open a little. “You— you figured it out from a flip?”

Tim gave a faint shrug. “Patterns.”

He looked toward Bruce then, quiet but unflinching. “You, uh… you talk to kids differently. At events, fundraisers. You actually listen. Same tone, same posture, even the same way you tilt your head when you’re trying to get someone to calm down.”

Bruce said nothing, but his brows furrowed faintly.

“And Batman,” Tim added softly, “does the same thing.”

The room fell silent again — not tense, but heavy with realization.

Jason whistled low. “Damn.”

Dick shook his head in disbelief. “That’s… that’s actually kind of amazing.”

Tim ducked his head, suddenly self-conscious. “I just notice things.”

Bruce’s expression softened in the quiet that followed. He didn’t say it aloud, but the look in his eyes said he’s special, this one.

Jason flopped down in the chair next to Tim’s bed, crossing his arms. “Remind me never to play poker with you, man. You’d wipe the floor with us.”

Tim almost… almost smiled. “Probably.”

-

Inside, the clinic was dim, the only light coming from the monitor at Tim’s bedside and a small lamp in the corner. Jason sat in the chair next to the bed, knees pulled up, scrolling idly through his phone as Tim slept. Bruce had gone back to the manor to shower.

Tim stirred. His breathing hitched.

At first, Jason didn’t notice— until Tim’s hand twitched against the blanket, his body tensing. A strangled sound left his throat, quiet but pained.

Jason’s head snapped up. “Hey— hey, Tim.”

No response. Tim’s breathing quickened, shallow and uneven, his face twisted like he was in pain.

Jason set his phone down and leaned forward. “It’s okay, you’re safe,” he said quickly, voice softening. “You’re here, at the clinic. Not outside.”

That only made Tim flinch harder, his chest rising fast, eyes darting beneath his closed lids.

Jason hesitated, then, remembering something Bruce once did for him after a bad dream, reached out and gently touched Tim’s shoulder. “Hey. You gotta wake up, okay? You’re not there anymore.”

Tim’s eyes flew open. For a second, they were wild and unfocused, his breathing sharp and desperate.

“Whoa— whoa, it’s me,” Jason said immediately, holding up both hands. “You’re okay. Breathe with me, alright?”

Tim pressed a trembling hand to his chest, trying to drag in a full breath.

“Slow,” Jason said quietly. “In… and out. You’re alright. You’re safe.”

It took a while, long enough that Jason could hear the second hand of the clock ticking like thunder. But gradually, Tim’s breathing started to even out. His hands stopped shaking so violently.

Jason exhaled a little, rubbing the back of his neck. “Nightmare?”

Tim nodded weakly. He still wouldn’t meet Jason’s eyes.

Jason hesitated, then moved to sit on the bed instead of the chair. The mattress dipped slightly. “Wanna talk about it?”

Tim swallowed hard. “It was… about the streets,” he rasped finally. “Being cold. Alone. Just… trying to stay awake all night ‘cause if you fell asleep, you’d wake up and someone would’ve taken your stuff. Or…” He trailed off.

Jason stayed quiet.

Tim’s gaze drifted toward the window, faraway. “When you guys started showing up, asking about me… everyone started treating me differently. Thought I was trouble. Said I’d lead the Bats right to them. I lost the only fires I could share.”

His voice cracked on the last word.

Jason’s chest tightened. “Oh,” he said quietly. “That’s… on us then, huh?”

Tim didn’t answer. He just shrugged, eyes glassy but distant.

Jason hesitated again before saying softly, “I get it.”

Tim glanced up at him — just a flicker.

Jason leaned back slightly, resting his arms on his knees. “Before Bruce found me… I was on the streets too. Long enough to learn how it screws with your head. You stop trusting everyone, and everyone stops trusting you first. My family was poor, my step-mother… Catherine was an addict. Died of an overdose. I was alone after that.”

Tim blinked, listening now.

“Didn’t matter how many times I said I wasn’t trying to steal from ‘em,” Jason continued, voice low. “People looked at me and saw a problem. A kid to move along, not a kid to help.”

There was a long pause.

Tim’s eyes fell to his hands. “Yeah,” he whispered. “Exactly that.”

Jason nudged him gently with an elbow. “You’re not there anymore, alright? You got out. You made it.”

Tim didn’t answer, but his shoulders loosened just slightly— like a tiny weight had lifted.

Jason shifted back next to Tim and, after a beat, pulled his phone back out. “C’mere,” he said. “I got a video of Dick faceplanting on patrol. You’re gonna love this.”

Tim blinked at him. “You— you recorded it?”

“Of course I did,” Jason said with a little grin. “What kind of brother would I be if I didn’t?”

A quiet, startled sound escaped Tim— something halfway between a laugh and a sigh. He scooted slightly closer, watching the screen as Jason started the video.

For the rest of the night, the two of them sat there— quiet laughter occasionally breaking the silence from Jasons mouth, Tim smiled faintly as he watched over his shoulder, the weight in Tim’s chest easing bit by bit.

It wasn’t warmth like a fire in a barrel, or the noise of the streets. It was softer, steadier. Something that felt almost like home.

-

The world outside had thawed just a little—ice still clinging to the curbs, the wind still biting, but sunlight finally spilling through the clinic’s windows.

Tim sat on the edge of the bed, his borrowed clothes hung a loose and the white bandages on his neck peeked above the collar of Jason’s hoodie.

Leslie’s words still echoed in his ears: “You’re healing well, Tim. A few more days of rest and you’ll be ready to leave.”

Leave.

The word turned cold in his chest.

Leave to where?

He stared at his hands— thin, they still had the tremor that never quite went away — and tried not to panic. The clinic wasn’t home, but it was safe, warm, quiet. Out there was… empty. He had no house. No key. No one.

His mind started racing again—faster and faster, like it always did when the ground shifted under him.

You don’t have anywhere to go. You’ll end up back out there. Cold. Alone again. Should’ve known this couldn’t last—

“Tim.”

The low voice startled him back to the present.

Bruce was standing in the doorway. Still in his dark sweater and heavy coat, unmistakable even without the cowl.

He crossed the small room with that steady, deliberate calm that never failed to quiet a space. When he stopped beside Tim, his shadow stretched long across the floor.

“I wanted to talk to you about something,” Bruce said.

Tim swallowed, glancing up uncertainly. “Am I— am I in trouble?”

That earned the faintest flicker of a smile from Bruce. “No,” he said. “Not at all.”

Bruce waited a moment before continuing, his voice softer. “Leslie says you’re recovering well. I’m glad to hear that. And I know she’s been keeping you comfortable here, but… she mentioned you’ll need a place to stay once you’re discharged.”

Tim’s stomach sank again. He couldn’t even look at Bruce — just nodded once, staring down at his shoes. “Yeah. I’ll figure something out.”

Bruce tilted his head slightly. “You don’t have to.”

That made Tim look up, confused, guarded.

“I’d like you to come stay at the manor,” Bruce said simply. “With me. With Alfred. And with those two idiots, I’ve somehow managed to keep alive.”

The corner of his mouth curved faintly at that, a rare self-deprecating smile softening his usually stoic features. “Between the three of us, we’ve managed to turn chaos into something resembling a home. I think there’s room for one more.”

Tim blinked at him, caught somewhere between disbelief and… something that almost hurt to feel. He didn’t answer right away. His throat worked like he was trying to find the right words, but they wouldn’t come.

Bruce didn’t rush him. Just stood there, calm and patient, like time itself had slowed to give Tim space to breathe.

Finally, Tim’s voice came out— quiet, wavering. “You… you actually want me there?”

“Yes.” Bruce’s answer came without hesitation. “We all do.”

Tim’s fingers clenched around the edge of the blanket. “I don’t want to… cause trouble. Or—”

“You won’t,” Bruce interrupted gently. “You already belong there more than you realize.”

Something in Tim’s chest cracked— not painfully, but in that way walls do when light finally breaks through. He didn’t cry this time. He just stared at Bruce for a long moment, searching for any hint of insincerity… and found none.

Finally, he nodded. A small, trembling nod, but real.

Bruce smiled faintly again, resting a hand on his shoulder, firm, grounding. “Good. Alfred will be pleased. Jason too, though he’ll pretend he’s not. And Dick’s been annoying me about it for days.”

Tim’s mouth twitched in a small, startled laugh.

Bruce’s expression softened further at the sound. "We'll head out in a bit. You can rest in the car. Welcome home, Tim."