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“You’ll regret this!” The man screamed, loud enough to grate on Tim’s ears. The man continued to scream and shout as the security guards took him away and the sound was muffled by the doors.
“Alright, back to work everyone,”Tim called out to the people milling about that had stopped to stare. Tim turns, following his own advice and walking back to his office. Once inside he let out a breath, taking a moment to decompress.
Normally, Tim didn’t handle the hirings and firings of Wayne Enterprises, but Joshua Killingsworth had been more than an unpleasant coworker to many of their female staff, and Tim had had enough. The board had been willing to sweep it under the rug, but even one case was too many in TIm’s mind, and Tim wouldn’t condone the creep's behavior.
Still, he’d probably receive some flack for it from the board, and end up having to concede something else to appease them. Thinking about his employees safety though, Tim thinks it was worth it. Joshua had been simple, and after a while, Tim had forgotten about him.
That is, until nearly a year later.
“You what?” Tim hissed into the phone. A dark laugh followed through the receiver, further annoying Tim if not for the panic coursing through him.
“I’ve buried your boyfriend alive,”The voice repeats gleefully. Tim grit his teeth, but pulled out his second phone to text Danny. “Alive for now, that is, unlike my career. You made sure of that, Timothy.”
“Where is he?” Tim barks harshly into the phone. Despite his texts, Danny doesn’t respond. It isn’t out of the ordinary, but given the situation, it puts Tim on edge. It isn’t often that Tim is targeted by disgruntled employees, but it was a shock to his system that his boyfriend of five months had been caught up in it. “Where is Danny, Joshua?”
Joshua laughs, manically. Tim curses and switches gears, texting Bruce to check on Danny for him. He should have the day off, and Danny should have been safe at home working on a physics project. If Joshua had found out where Danny was living, how’d he end up burying him alive, Tim couldn’t help but worry.
“Oh don’t worry, he’s got about three hours of air,”Joshua says, and theres a text on his phone from Babs. She’s tracking Joshua’s number, and Signal was on his way to intercept the man. “You see Tim, I can take things you care about too,”The man hums.
“There’s a big difference from being fired for harassment and burying someone alive,”Tim spits out. “Tell me where he is, now.”
“Oh, you can’t make me do anything anymore, Timothy,”The man jeers, and then all Tim can hear is silence over the racing of his heart.
“Shit,”Tim curses, and pulls up Danny’s number on his phone. He hadn’t told Danny about his nightlife yet, and he definitely wasn’t expecting Danny to be the victim of Tim’s disgruntled employee from a year ago. He didn’t even know how Joshua could have possibly found out where Danny lived, much less that Tim had a boyfriend.
“Come on Danny, pick up,”Tim mutters, pressing call. The phone rang once, twice, and miraculously- picked up.
“H’llo?” Danny’s voice sounded, like he’d just woken up.
“Danny! Where are you?” Tim asks, typing out to the bats and alerting them of what’s going on. He transfers the call to his coms so he can get to the cave faster.
“Dunno,”Danny huffs, and Tim’s stomach sinks. “S’ dark.”
“Just- just stay calm okay? You-”Tim swallows, but trudges through. “You’ve been buried alive, okay, but you gotta stay calm.”
“Kay,”Danny says easily, and Tim lets out a breath. “What happened? Think I remember getting tased or somethin’.”
“Are you hurt?” Tim asks, heart still racing as he finally gets to his car.
“I’m okay, Tim,”Danny says, and Tim isn’t reassured at all. Three hours.
“How much battery does your phone have?” Tim asks, pulling together a plan. If Ooracle can trace the call somehow-
“Not much,”Danny admits.
“Okay, okay,”Tim says, trying to think. “Just stay calm. The bats are already on this and- and they’ll find you, okay? Just breathe slowly, you should have- about three hours of air.”
“Some guy I fired from WE a year ago,”Tim rambles,”He called and told me-”
“Tim, calm down, honey,”Danny says, and Tim nearly chokes with the audacity.
“Danny-”Tim tries, but Danny’s still talking.
“Hey, I’m okay waiting- not going anywhere down here,”Danny tries to joke, but it falls flat when Tim’s breath hiccups. He tries not to cry. Danny’s the first stable, normal relationship he’s had since Bernard and he doesn’t want to lose him too. “Sorry- but there's some oxygen tank thing by my leg- bet I’ve got more air than that guy said.”
That gives Tim pause. He hopes Joshua isn’t actually trying to kill Danny, but there’s no hints as to where Danny might be buried. Gotham is huge, they couldn’t search it all in three hours. “Okay, thats, that’s good.”
“I’ll be okay,”Danny reassures, and as if he knew what Tim was thinking he adds,”It’s not your fault, Tim. Only a crazy guy would kidnap their old bosses boyfriend.”
“yeah,”Tim adds weakly. He arrives at the cave, and sees Bruce at the batcomputer, already recording Tim’s call. “Listen- Danny, can you hear anything around you that we can use to find you?”
A moment’s pause, and Tim thinks Danny’s phone has run out of battery when he speaks. “I can hear cars, I think. Something else- like a clanging sound?”
“Okay, that’s good- anything else?” Tim asks, now standing beside B.
“No, that’s it,”Danny says after another pause.
“Can you give a description of your surroundings?” Batman asks, and Tim shoots him a grateful look.
“...Was that Batman?” Danny asks, and its so incredulous that Tim nearly barks out a laugh.
“Yeah, it’s Batman,”Tim adds, but they don’t have time.”Danny-”
“Right, got it,”Danny says, and his voice sounds echoey as he turns to speakerphone. It's a second before he says anything. “I just see wood. It’s like, a dark brown color? And besides the oxygen tank thing the coffin’s empty.”
Tim swallows at the words. It’s one thing to know he’d been buried alive but another to imagine his boyfriend in a coffin. “Are you laying on the wood?”
“Yeah,”Danny says, then scoffs,”Not even a blanket. Rude.”
Tim lets out a weak chuckle at that, trying to keep Danny from panicking, but it seems he’s handling it better than Tim already. He hears a sharp intake of breath on Danny’s end and freezes. “Danny?”
“Um, my phone’s almost out of power,”Danny admits, and Tim closes his eyes.
“Danny, just, stay calm and- and the bat’s will find you,”Tim promises, willing himself not to cry, but he knows the odds in this situation are slim.
“Don’t worry, Tim, I know you guy’s will find me,”Danny says, sounding so genuine over the phone that Tim nearly does cry. “Love you, Tim.”
“L-Love you too-”Tim chokes out, but the beep that sounds off lets him know that there’s not going to be another response. He stares at his phone, and his anxious heart turns to anger at the situation. He’ll find him. He has to.
“Get suited up,”Batman says, patting his shoulder almost comfortingly and Tim nods, running for the locker rooms.
Tim’ll find Danny, he promises.
Danny’s bored as hell.
With his phone out of battery, he can’t even play games to pass the time. Danny sighs again, kicking his socked toe against the heavy wood of the coffin. There wasn’t even much room for him to move positions, even with nothing else in the coffin. He wonders if he could take a nap, but decides against it.
Danny had lied to Tim earlier, when he said there was an oxygen tank next to his feet. There wasn’t any, but Danny didn’t want Tim to think he’d die after three hours. He could last a lot longer with no air, and making up the oxygen tank would give them a longer time limit to work with. He hoped, at least.
The phone call kinda sucked, especially hearing how panicked Tim was. It was sweet, that he was worried about Danny. It was just that Danny didn’t actually need to breathe. He’d honestly be fine as long as he didn’t think about having to go to the bathroom. Tim didn’t know he was a halfa though, and if Batman was involved then Danny still couldn’t tell him.
Hiding from Batman was his top priority, and if that meant staying in a coffin for the day, then he’d do it. Reluctantly, but he’d do it. Honestly, if the bats hadn’t been called, Danny might have just told Tim the truth and phased out of here. It would be a lot to explain, but he’d been meaning to tell Tim when they’d been together for six months anyways.
Danny sighs again. Three hours was a long time when you were stuck in a coffin. Knowing Tim though, Danny might be out sooner. His boyfriend was wicked smart, and some disgruntled employee had made a grave mistake messing with him. Danny snorts at his own pun. Then he sighs. He wished he could check his phone.
Three hours was a long time.
Danny startles awake to the sound of wood creaking and dirt flecks falling into his face. His hands come up to cover his face as more dirt falls onto him, and as much as he wants to get out of his grave, this was by far a worse method than phasing. He had dirt everywhere now.
“Danny-” Someone was saying, but Danny’s eyes were shut tight to keep the dirt out. He reached his hand out blindly though, and something grabbed it.
Whatever grabbed his hand pulled, and Danny found himself hoisted out of the box and into someone’s arms. They were too big to be Tim- despite being twenty three, Tim was still tiny. He raised his hands up to wipe his eyes when someone stopped him.
“Here,”Someone familiar said, and passed something wet and thin to one of his hands.
“Thanks,”Danny croaks, wiping his eyes free of dirt. He opens them, surprised it was as dark outside as it was in the coffin. He blinks, trying to get some flecks of dirt out, and sees the blurry forms of the bats crowded around him.
“You alright?” The guy holding him asks, and Danny nods.
“Yeah,”Danny says honestly. He wonders how long it’s been though, and tries not to cough. The fresh air felt nice.
“He lied,”The shortest one piped up from where he was inspecting the grave. Inhis hand was Danny’s phone, which he appreciated. “There was no oxygen tank.”
“What?” The familiar voice choked out. “We were late-”
“What- why’d you say there was an oxygen tank?” The guy holding him askedd, shaking Danny by the shoulders in a way he didn’t appreciate.
Danny shrugs, wiping his face again,”Didn’t want to worry Tim.”
The vigilates stare at him for a second before groaning.
“That’s very sweet, but never do that again,”The blue and black guy holding him says sternly.
“I’ll remember that if I ever get buried alive again,”Danny says wryly, and the guy- Nightwing, Danny thinks- huffs.
“Too soon,”Nightwing sniffs.
“The ambulance is here,”The familiar voice says, and Danny looks over to see another vigilante with a full cowl over his head- minus the earsies.
“Um,”Danny says loudly, at what the guy said and the dawning realization that his boyfriend might be here after all. “I don’t want to go to a hospital.”
“What?” THe three vigilantes exclaim in various ways. Danny winces, but tries o gently extract himself from Nightwing.
“Yeah, um, I’d rather just go home,”Danny says, backing away,”And shower, and cuddle my boyfriend.”
“No- no you should really get checked out,”The guy who Danny thinks is Tim argues.
“You were in there for nearly four hours,”Nightwing reminds gently.
“I’ve got a first aid kit at home,”Danny protests. He’s debating running off if not for the fact that he’s sure they’d catch him. “I’m sure I’ll be fine. Besides, medical bills in America? No thanks.”
“Your boyfriend is literally rich,”The youngest one says disdainfully. Danny ignores him.
“I’m not consenting to medical care!” Danny shouts, backing up and out of grabbing range. “I will start running if one of you tries anything.”
“Oh my god,”Vigilante Tim mutters.
“Okay- Danny, we’re not going to force you to go in the ambulance,”Nightwing placates, holding up his hands. Danny doesn’t trust it. “Just- can we check your vitals in the batmobile, or somewhere you’re more comfortable?”
“No,”Danny says, surprising the trio. “Thanks for the save and all, but I’m going home. Bye,”He says awkwardly, turning to leave the- oh he’s in a graveyard, yikes. He tries not to trip and fall on his way out through the pitch black night. As he walks out he feels the trio following him, and hears them talking heatedly at each other. He walks faster.
Danny reaches the entrance to the graveyard and thankfully the ambulance lights can be seen from the other entrance a ways to the left. Danny absolutely does not want anyone examining him, he thinks with a shiver. He walks the opposite direction to what looks like a sidewalk. Glancing at the street sign, Danny squints, adding some ghostliness to his eyes to see in the dark. Harrison Street, the sign says.
Sighing, Danny glares at the road. He doesn’t want to admit that he’s lost, but he will walk in a random direction until they stop following him. He hears footsteps, and sees Tim the vigilante approaching with Danny’s phone in hand.
“Need help?” Tim Robin asks, handing the phone over. Danny pockets it when he remembers its out of battery.
“Which way to Crime Alley?” Danny asks tiredly. He’d just had a nap, but the whole situation seemed to age him a few years.
Tim hesitates before pointing. “It's a few miles that way. Or… I could give you a ride.”
Danny squints into the distance before sighing. “That’d be nice,”Danny says softly. He can’t say no to Tim that easily, even if he did look ridiculous with that cowl on. “Just, no hospitals. I just want to go home.”
Tim pauses, and he must see something in the way that Danny looks, all covered in dirt after a not so near death experience that the vigilante just nods. He leads Danny to a motorcycle, and the other two vigilantes seemed to have disappeared. Not that he cared much. He could still hear the tinny of voices coming from Tim’s cowl, so he suspects they’re still in communication. Still, he gives Red Robin his address even though he knows they’ve both been there before.
The ride is quiet, and Danny’s grateful for it. He has time to think on the drive over to his apartment, and despite him trying to hide from Batman, he can’t bring himself to skip town after this. Tim was amazing, and now that Danny was seeing it, he could understand perfectly how Tim could be a vigilante. No doubt Tim would track him down if he’d left without a word, but Danny didn’t want to.
Danny steps off the motorcycle when it stops in front of a familiar building, and he tries valiantly not to stumble. “Thanks, for the ride,”Danny says, and leaves quickly to get home. He wasn’t lying about needing a shower. The dirt was somehow in his shirt and pants, and it wasn’t comfortable.
Not only that, but the coffin did not, in fact, have a bathroom.
After all, he was staying in Gotham, meaning he had time to think things over with Tim. It was nearly their six month anniversary after all- why not air out their secrets then?