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Tim was really good with languages.
He knew over 15 semi-fluently; nowhere near the amount that Batman knew, but definitely more than Nightwing did at his age. It was something he took a quiet pride in.
Some of them came from his parents. Arabic, Sanskrit, even Hieroglyphs--picked up during long childhood evenings spent sprawled on the living room floor while his parents debated over translations. Back then, they’d assumed he would follow them into archaeology.
Tim had assumed that too, once.
Since he’d started training to be Robin, he’d only learned more. His training and missions had taken him to France, Russia, Hong Kong, Turkey, and Spain- where he’d focused not only on sharpening his martial skills but also his mind.
Then there were languages that only Batman could teach.
The hand signs they used in the field, almost military-like. Their sound-based conlang--soft clicks, taps, and breath patterns designed to blend into the ambient noise of the night. Written ciphers only the two of them knew, tucked into casework margins and alleyway chalk marks.
And finally, there were the languages his friends taught him.
Kon spoke Kryptonian, technically, though he wasn’t very good at it. When Tim found out he was trying to relearn it with Supergirl and Superman, to reconnect with something he’d never really been allowed to have, Tim asked if he could study alongside him.
Now they shared a battered textbook with half the margins filled in with snarky remarks to each other.
Tim already knew French, but Anita had inspired him to pick up Haitian Creole too. He’d learned Ancient Greek in theory, but Cassie helped him fill in the gaps.
He even picked up a few curse words in…whatever language Slobo spoke.
Tim loved languages. Loved studying them, practicing them, letting them sit in his mouth until they felt right. They were a way to connect to people, to places, to memories. As a kid, he used to sit on the floor and pore over the same texts his parents struggled with while they were gone, even when he couldn’t understand the Tamil they were written in, just to feel close to them.
It’s also just a way to connect with friends, and as urban-legend-Robin-who-can’t-give-anything-away-about-himself, that’s something really hard to come by.
But there was one language he couldn’t crack. One that he just couldn’t figure out…
The one that, every now and then, he heard Bart curse in.
Not often. Just flashes of it, slipped out when Bart got startled or frustrated. Grife. Nass. Scroach. And the occasional, explosive “Sprock!” Usually matched with a quick slap to the mouth and panicked glance around-- as if waiting for a smack upside the head-- before shaking it off and moving on.
It was clearly his native language.
Bart’s English was good. Hell, it was really good. Almost native, with the faintest southern drawl he’d developed since living in Alabama. Anybody else would have written off the tiny slips-- the way he’d sometimes hesitate with an ‘r,’ or rounded an ah into an oh’--as a product of him speaking too fast.
But Tim wasn’t anybody else.
When he’d brought it up to Batman he learned that it was probably Interlac, the language of the 30th century. Apparently the Legion of Superheroes also spoke it.
Despite his familiarity though, Batman didn’t actually know the language.
For once, once, Tim had stumbled onto something Batman did not know. (Okay, that was an exaggeration. Batman didn’t know plenty of things. They had to order Chinese last night because Alfred had gone out with Leslie. But Tim had really, really expected Batman to know this one.)
“So…where can I learn Interlac?” Tim had asked, rocking back and forth on his heels as Bruce worked at the Batcomputer. Occasionally, Tim’s cape would get caught below his heels and he’d trip backwards a bit (a lot), but not even that would pull the brooding bat’s attention away from…
Filing taxes.
The man just grunted at him, scrolling through a W-2, completely unbothered by Tim nearly taking out the tea tray Alfred had set up behind them. “Why don’t you just ask Impulse to teach you?”
Tim regained his footing, bunched his cape in his fist, and frowned.
And see… that was such a simple answer.
Asking Bart about anything related to his life in the 30th century was like asking Batman to wash his own clothes. Like trying to get Nightwing to actually unpack the boxes in his apartment. Nightwing to unpack his apartment boxes. Like asking Kon to stop playing Hard Kore or Tone Ice Slamma Jamma during workouts.
Impossible.
Tim heard from Nightwing, who had heard from the Flash, that Bart’s cousin (a native speaker!) had visited from the 30th century. And that instead of speaking Interlac with her, Bart had taught her English.
Immediately.
If a native speaker couldn’t get Bart to talk in his own language, what chance did Tim have? What did Tim have that Bart’s cousin didn’t?
He mulled that over while staring at the dozens of case files scattered around the Batcomputer. He was supposed to be working through them, just some cold cases to sharpen his mind since patrol was slow. He’d already solved a couple, but there were quite a few tough cookies he couldn’t crack yet.
One such case caught his eye, the yellow label indicating that it was one of the few that wasn’t Gotham based.
His gaze wandered back to Batman, still locked in mortal combat with his annual financial records.
…Huh.
It was stupid. It was sneaky. Nobody else would fall for it.
It was absolutely going to work.
“I’m going to the Catskills.” He blurted suddenly, reaching over Bruce’s shoulder to grab his domino and stuck it to his face with some leftover sealant from patrol an hour before. Straightening his cape, he turned and headed for the hidden garage entrance, already whistling for the Supercycle.
Batman, a solid 5 seconds late, waved him off and told him to “be home” and “come careful by Sunday,” before returning to the daunting, Batman-defeating homicide case that is his taxes.
-----
Halfway into the trip, Tim realized that he had brought absolutely nothing with him.
He’d left in such a rush that he hadn’t brought clothes, toothpaste, his staff, or even a single batarang-- and it was too late to turn back. (A Filing-Taxes Batman is a scary Batman!)
So instead he landed at the abandoned resort they used as HQ and slipped in through Kon’s window, silently stepping around piles of clothes on the floor like he was navigating a particularly lazy obstacle course. Kon himself was sprawled half off of his bed, one muscular arm dangling uselessly toward the floor.
Tim nearly succumbed to the urge to kick him completely out of bed, just out of spite, but instead moved towards the dresser to find some clean pajamas.
The result was a wonderful mix of a classic Superman S T-shirt and a pair of werewolf-themed pajama pants they’d gotten Kon as a joke Christmas gift a few months before. (They might not be official Wendy The Werewolf Stalker merch, but Kon wore them constantly anyway.)
Dressed and looking marginally more human, Tim crept back into the hallway, lit only by the low glow of the emergency lights he’d installed that lined the carpeted floor.
He wouldn’t see Bart tonight. The speedster didn’t usually arrive at HQ until 8am Saturday morning and it was currently 4am.
Tim was planning on crashing on his very comfortable, very large, Wayne Enterprises-funded bed and sleeping for the next 10 hours straight.
Instead, a familiar rush of wind and static tore past him as he passed the kitchen.
Tim jerked, turning just in time to see the speedster frozen mid-step, in full gear, caught like a deer in headlights and clutching a cookie jar.
They stared at each other.
“Uh.” Tim said intelligently.
“Mf- Hey Rob!” Bart greeted through a mouthful of cookie, his stunned look morphing into a cheery one. In a flash (ha) he swallowed and appeared at Tim’s side, eyes flicking over his outfit. “You here to sleep? Daddy Bats kick you out? Gonna finally have a sleepover with us?” His hands began to vibrate. “Koncameoverbut hewent to sleepfor somereason and Cassieisn’t hereyetsoIwasgettingbored--”
“Batman’s not my dad.” Tim automatically corrected, still a little bewildered at his presence and a few steps behind mentally. “Why are you here?”
Bart gave him a look, like that ‘I know you’re lying but I just can't prove it yet’ meme making the rounds on Tiktok, though it was slightly obscured by his massive mop of hair. He blew said hair out of his face and zipped back to the kitchen, guzzling down a glass of milk. “Argument with Max.” He burped, pumped his chest a few times, then gave Tim a cheeky smile. “He makes me sleep.”
“Uh-huh.” Tim said slowly.
His brain was still several seconds behind his body. After a full day of school, night of patrol, early morning of casework, and Bruce Wayne in Tax-Mode, his brain was really having a hard time keeping up with a speedster. Especially if said speedster was Bart Allen.
“Why are you in your suit?” Tim asked.
Bart squinted at him like he Tim was the slow one, which was deeply unfair. “Becaauuuse. I can’t sleep. Might as well save some people while I’m not-sleeping.” He flicked at one of his golden ear cuffs, eyebrow raised.
Tim raised one back. “It’s 4am.”
“Not in Japan.” Bart remarked smugly, crossing his arms and tapping his foot. He seemed proud of himself. “Or France. Or Russia. Or China. Or--”
“I get it,” Tim interrupted, rubbing his eyes.
He glanced over his shoulder at the pieces of his discarded suit littering the hallway (that he was definitely planning to pick up in the morning) and sighed, tugging mournfully at his pajama pants. “Want me to help you out then?”
The way Bart instantly brightened made the inevitable all-nighter almost worth it. “Would you?”
Tim gave him a tired smile, a little flutter in his chest as he pushed the domino back over his eyes. “Where to first?”
…
After stopping a few minor robberies in Hong Kong- a job either of them could've easily handled alone but had fun tackling together anyway- they ended up at a local dockside restaurant for breakfast at 7:54 pm. (They were getting weird looks for eating breakfast at this hour, but it was 7:54 in the morning their time, okay?)
It was a hole-in-the-wall joint wedged between a convenience store and an apartment that Tim had found when he was last in Hong Kong with Lady Shiva. The people there always gave him free milk tea. Whether for his heroics or his baby face, he wasn’t sure, but he enjoyed the favour nonetheless.
He watched Bart slurp on some cheap boba they had found a block away while picking at his own congee, waiting for it to cool down. “So…” he started, grimacing as a few tourists walked past, frowning at them and their outfits. Being perceived was uncomfortable. “Are you going to be really tired today or what? Will you need to take a nap?”
“Nope!” Bart said cheerily, downing an entire bowl of wonton soup in half a second.
He chewed for another half a second, swallowed, then flashed finger guns at a not-nearly-as-cheerful Tim. “Micronaps, baby! 10 minutes of sleep gives me, like, 8 hours of energy.” He started slurping another bowl of noodles as if Tim wasn’t glaring at him with burning envy.
Lucky.
Man, maybe Bart should take over my job, he thought bitterly, taking a bite out of his congee and sticking his tongue out after it was, expectedly, burned. “Yowch.” He muttered, ignoring Bart’s gleeful snicker in favor of blowing on his spoon dejectedly.
“啲嘢食得唔得?”
Both of them were distracted from their food by a waitress stopping by their table, giving them a polite smile. She glanced between them and her eyes lingered on Bart. The auburn hair, freckles, pale skin, and confused face.
She blinked. “Oh, English? Sorry-”
“Ah- 啊-不是不是，我会说广东话.” Tim reassured, not missing how the waitress sagged in relief as she turned her focus back to him. “食物非常好，谢谢你.”
Bart slowly put his bowl down as he watched Tim talk to the waitress. Tim could feel his eyes on him the entire time and it made him shiver a bit.
At least when it was Bruce watching him, he didn’t know about it!
Finally the waitress nodded politely, took several of Bart’s empty plates, and disappeared back into the little restaurant.
Almost immediately the boy spoke up.
“What language was that?”
Tim turned. Bart, for once with nothing in his mouth, had set down his bowl and was fiddling with the straw, twisting it between his fingers. There was a look of curiosity etched onto his face when he focused on Tim, one Tim didn’t see on him very often. (Usually he just looked bored in Tim’s presence.)
“The one I just spoke?” Tim said. “Cantonese. That’s what people speak here in Hong Kong.” He gestured vaguely to the street around them.
Bart tilted his head, leaning forward, eyes narrowing. “Are you from Hong Kong?”
“I- well, no.” He was. “No, I just know the language.”
Bart’s golden eyes narrowed, studying him for a second too long. Then he looked away, reaching across the table and stealing a spoonful of Tim’s congee.
Tim let him.
He sipped his milk tea instead, watching Bart with a thoughtful expression.
“What did she say?” Bart asked through a mouthful of congee.
“Just asked us how our food was. I said it was good and thanked her.”
“Oh.”
Bart looked a little unsatisfied with the answer, playing with the food absently.
Maybe Bruce’s plan could work? Tim mused, I could just ask him?
“Are you also into languages?” He probed casually, leaning forward in his seat, setting his tea down on the table to focus.
“Nah.” Bart emptied his boba and scowled at the empty cup, then disappeared and reappeared with another one (God, Tim really hoped he paid.) “Too confusing. I hate switching.”
Tim perked up. “Switching?”
Bart froze. Just for a beat.
“Switching from what?” Tim clarified, scooching his chair closer. Bart peered up at him, lips pursed. He was quiet for so long, Tim almost wanted to give him a medal. Then he sighed. “Max doesn’t want me to talk about it.”
Max? Max Mercury? Tim just frowned. “But we know your secret identity.”
“I don’t know what I can and can’t do” Bart whined half-heartedly, kicking at the table lightly. But there was something in his voice, a little hitch, that told Tim that there was something else he was purposefully leaving out.
Something that would need a little more…encouragement.
Tim considered his friend, who now wore a distant look while finishing his boba, leaning his chin on his fist with a grin. This could actually work.
“Ok but…” Tim said slowly, lowering his voice and leaning in. “You know… I kinda need help with a case.”
Bart perked up, distant look vanishing. “Yeah?”
“Actually--” Tim glanced around for effect, then whispered dramatically, “Batman needs help with a case."
Bart’s jaw dropped.
“You don’t have to help us or anything--” he teased, grinning as Bart looked at him like he was insane, literally shaking himself out of his stupor.
“Are youinsane? OfcourseIwanttohelp!” Bart rocked forward in his chair, nearly vibrated through it, then disappeared and returned 8.72 seconds later (Tim counted) with seaweed in his hair. “Sorry. Had to let off some steam.” He said breathlessly. “Are you serious?”
“Yeah.” Then for the kicker. “If Max will let you, of course.”Bart scoffed. “Fuck Max!”
Well that was easy.
Tim beamed, slapped down 1,000 Hong Kong Dollars, and stood up, his cape falling back in front of him. “Take me back then.”
Ten minutes later--ten very long minutes filled with Bart’s delighted hops and whoops, and Tim’s increasingly resigned sighs--they were back in the Catskills.
The trip itself was… a lot.
Hong Kong’s humid night air had vanished in a blink, replaced by ocean spray as Bart tore across the South China Sea, Tim clinging to his shoulders while saltwater stung his face and soaked straight through his gloves.
There had been a brief, disorienting stretch of pure darkness over the Pacific, broken only by Bart laughing over the roar of wind as if this were the best roller coaster ever. When Tim had yelled at him to slow down, Bart just climbed a large wave, jumped, and told him he was going slow. Tim had lost track of how many climates they’d passed through after that, freezing air, burning air, rain, snow, rain again, his cape snapping violently behind them like it was trying to file a formal complaint. Tim was a little surprised it stayed on.
Batman probably had experience with speedsters, he had thought amusedly.
By the time Bart skidded to a stop outside the HQ, Tim felt like he’d been pressure-washed, frozen, microwaved, and maybe a bit concussed just from air pressure alone.
Inside, nothing had changed. The lights were still out. Bart’s abandoned cookie jar still lay on the floor exactly where it had been when they’d left, cookies scattered like the scene of a tragic, carbohydrate-based crime.
Bart vibrated his feet and legs, water shaking loose in a fine mist as he stepped over the threshold, instantly dry and entirely unbothered. Tim had no such luxury. He hopped off Bart’s back and stomped his boots pathetically against the doormat with all the dignity of a soaked cat, then shook his hair out, saltwater droplets flicking everywhere.
A glance at the kitchen clock told him it was 9:30 a.m.
The others should be up soon.
Tim peeled off his domino mask, rubbed at his eyes, and leaned against the kitchen island, exhaustion finally catching up with him just as Bart bounded back into the room, looking like he could do the whole trip again for fun. Looking down, Tim saw the cookies previously scattered on the floor gone. When he glanced back up, he saw Bart cheerfully eating them. (Gross!)
“So where’s the case!?” Bart had changed into a Sherlock Holmes costume, hat, pipe, and everything--something Tim had learned to stop questioning--and was hopping over to his side. “Where’s Batman?! Is he here? Are we going to the Batcave? Do I get to drive the Batmobile?”
“It’s here,” he said instead, nodding toward the yellow file sitting on the kitchen island where he’d discarded it the night before. “Batman, uh… he left it to us.”
“Cool.” Bart plopped on top of the island, his hair bouncing as he did, reaching for the case and flipping through it in superspeed, pages blurring beneath his fingers, all while sticking his tongue out in that ridiculously cute way he did. While he read, Tim went to the bathroom and changed back into the PJ’s he stole from Kon, draping his wet costume over the heater. After taking his mask off and wiping the sticky solvent off his face, he emerged to see Bart still dead focused on the case. Tim was a little impressed.
Two seconds later, Bart yanked out a photo and held it up triumphantly. “Eureka, my dear Watson!”
Tim didn’t have the heart to tell him that Eureka wasn’t a Sherlock Holmes thing.
Bart grinned at him cheekily, his eyes glowing an eerie golden even through his fake glasses, his excitement buzzing off him in waves almost like electricity. “Rob, look! The wife literally confessed to murdering the husband. Sorta. But it’s still clear. How’d Batman miss that?”
Tim blinked, then jumped up to perch on the island so that he could peek over Bart’s shoulder. “Where does it say that?” He had already looked through the case…there was nothing that said that at all- the reason he wanted Bart to look at this was the-
Oh.
The photo.
“Right here.” Bart jabbed his finger at the image. “It says ‘This is your fault, bitch’ and there's blood on her fingers! Which is so gross, by the way. Why would you write in blood? I’m sure there was a pen somewhere. Or, like, anything. And if she did it, then why is she dead too? Hey, Rob, were you there? What--”
Tim let Bart’s rapid-fire questions fade into background noise as he focused on the photograph.
It was a crime scene shot, centered on the wall directly behind the victim. A man in his late twenties lay sprawled on the floor, a gunshot wound evident even through the grainy image. The gun was still in the frame too--lying a few inches from the wife’s hand, not his.
His wife was curled beside him, her body pressed close, already stiff in death. The report had mentioned the difference in rigor mortis--she’d died later. Much later. Long enough to let her get creative.
When Tim leaned closer, squinting, he could see the woman’s hand over the man’s chest, a coat of red around her pointer finger. Behind them, the pale wall was splashed with blood from the gunshot—and dragged through that splatter were several streaks, forming a deliberate line of symbols in Interlac.
On the floor, just in front of the bodies, lay a diamond ring. Spotless. Untouched. Like the murderer took it off before committing the crime.
No evidence of forced entry. No overturned furniture. No sign of a struggle. And according to the report, Tim remembered, the husband had been a former member of the Legion and was found cheating with another member. The message was obviously meant for that member.
A murder-suicide. A proud: ‘I have the last word’ to the mistress.
Huh.
It was the wife.
Like. Obviously the wife.
But back to the more important part, like learning the language.
“Is that what it says?” Tim questioned, squinting at it, gears already turning on how to piece the language together. What symbol would represent the pronoun ‘you’, for example? How did they conjugate the possessive tense for ‘your fault?’
Bart glanced up at him through his lashes, frowning like Tim had just asked the dumbest question imaginable. “Duh. Can you not read?”
Tim pressed his lips together, fighting a smile, and raised his eyebrows pointedly. Bart huffed, mumbled something about Tim being a smartass under his breath, and looked back at the photo.
A second passed.
Then another.
Bart blinked.
“Oh.” He said dumbly. “It’s in Interlac.”
“Aha!” Tim sprung off the island and pointed at Bart, who slapped his hands over his mouth. “You DO speak Interlac!”
“Ack!” Bart scrambled off the island and appeared in the corner of the room, hands in his hair, eyes blown wide. “No! No I don’t!”
“You do!” Tim shot back. “You read the message!”
“No I didn’t! I didn’t!” Bart screamed, speeding around the room in panic, pointing at him, stomping his feet, and occasionally nearly vibrating through the floor. Tim halfmindedly wondered how Kon hadn’t woken up yet. “You’re crazy! You made it up!”
Laughing, Tim put his hands on his hips and gave Bart a grin. “I knew it! That's why you say ‘Grife’ so much! That’s Interlac!” Then, testing. “What does it mean?”
“That's an Alabama phrase! I’m from Alabama! It means ‘I’m from Alabama’ in Alabaman!”
“Yeah, an Alabama 1,000 years from now, maybe!”
The speedster covered his face, wailed: “Noooo!” Then immediately ran blind into a priceless vase, sending a sharp crack into the room as it shattered against the tile.
Bart’s wail dissolved into breathless, nervous laughter, and for a few seconds the room was nothing but a flurry of chaos, Tim’s snorting laugh, Bart’s feet skidding uselessly against the floor as he desperately tried to hide the evidence, the faint hum left behind every time Bart moved too fast to track. Eventually, the chaos burned itself out. Bart slowed, then stopped, hands still clamped over his face like he could hide from his own embarrassment. The floor stopped trembling. The air settled. The porcelain vase was gone.
Tim watched him for a moment longer than the moment probably deserved. His grin lingered, but it softened at the edges, curiosity creeping in where amusement had been. Bart always did this--deflected with speed and awkwardness until no one could tell where the funny moment ended and the truth began. It worked, most of the time.
Tim shifted, climbing back onto the kitchen island and propping his chin in his hand, letting the moment stretch instead of filling it. The quiet felt different now--less awkward, more tentative. Bart peeked through his fingers, biting his lip, caught somewhere between laughing it off and bracing for whatever came next.
Tim’s voice, when he spoke again, was gentler. More careful.
“Bart,” Tim prodded gently, his voice a little crackly after laughing for so long. “Why are you so insistent on hiding this if we already know your secret identity? We already know you come from the 30th century.”
Bart gave him a flat, unimpressed look, his previous humor gone in an instant. “Yeah,” he said dryly, “‘cause Red Tornado told you.”
Tim just rolled his eyes. “Bart, everyone knows that about you. That’s, like, the first thing Wally mentions when telling people about you.”
Almost immediately after the name ‘Wally’ came out of his mouth, the energy of the room shifted. Bart’s mouth pressed into a thin line as he looked away, jaw set. Unsure what to say, Tim, confused, reached out to his friend but was met with a quick step back.
The kitchen went quiet.
They sat there for a beat, the silence stretching awkward and heavy. Then Bart stepped back again and blurred. The air cracked softly, and when he reappeared, he was in his Impulse suit, mask conspicuously absent so that Tim could see the hard look in his gaze. All humor previously present was gone.
Cringing, Tim shrunk a bit in his cape, wanting to retreat into the shadows like his mentor usually did when faced with an awkward situation that was entirely his fault. “Bart, I’m sorry-”
“It’s fine,” Bart cut in, curt and clipped in a way that didn’t sound like him at all. “I just… I don’t like Wally.”
“We know, he sucks.”
Bart’s head snapped toward him. “I meant how he talks about me.”
Holy defensive, Batman! “I know-- Bart, I was being genuine!” Tim raised his hands up in surrender, baffled. Where was this coming from?!
Bart dragged a hand through his hair and started pacing, restless energy seeming to vibrate off his skin. “Look. He always talks about me, right? You just said so. He talks about me. A lot. And he talks about my past. A lot.” He whirled around and pointed accusingly at Tim, who straightened. “You just said so!”
“Uh-huh.” Tim confirmed slowly, unsure where the conversation was heading.
“But he doesn’t know,” Bart continued, voice rising. “Nobody does--well. Max does. And Grandma does—but he doesn’t! He doesn’t know what that-what that does--”
Tim should have stopped him earlier. He realized that now. Sense had flown out the window like Superman clocking in for work about five sentences ago.
“Bart,” Tim said carefully, trying to slow the spiral, “slow down. He doesn’t know… what?”
Bart threw his hands up, exasperated. “Everything!”
Right. Touchy subject.
Tim should drop it. He should nod, back off, learn Interlac from the Legion like a normal person and call it a night. Morning. Whatever.
…Nah.
Though the idea was tempting. He really didn’t like seeing Bart like this. Honestly, he rarely ever did. When they were playing baseball in space, he had noticed Bart to be a bit off kilter, even quiet sometimes (say it ain’t so!), but it seemed like Cissie was taking care of him so nobody really mentioned it. Bart was back to being his happy-go-lucky self within minutes.
Almost every single time Bart got upset, he would be fine in minutes.
And suddenly, Tim felt like a really bad friend.
They’d always assumed Bart just processed emotions faster than the rest of them, that it was a speedster thing. Faster brain, faster feelings. It had seemed logical enough at the time.
Clearly, they were wrong.
And now Tim was seeing the repercussions of the past year or so of knowing Bart and not talking about anything deeper than video games and mission reports with him.
Now Bart stood in front of him with his hands clenched into fists, eyes bright and wet, and Tim--for once--had no idea how to help.
So instead of thinking it through, instead of planning, Tim opened his mouth.
“Bart…” He starts, fidgeting with his fingers, then with the fabric of his pants. “Does Wally have something to do with why you don’t want to talk about Interlac?”
Bart was silent for a bit longer, choosing instead to climb onto the island next to Tim and dangle his legs over the side, staring at his feet.
Finally, he muttered, not quite meeting Tim’s eyes, “Sort of.”
Tim waited.
He was good at that. He had to be--Bruce did half his detective work in total silence. There would be times they’d stand quietly for an hour while Bruce thought.
Tim was patient, so he waited.
The apartment creaked softly around them. Somewhere down the hall, a door opened and closed; muted footsteps followed, then another door. A few moments later the sound of a shower hissed to life. From the lightness of the steps, Tim guessed it was Kon, probably still half-asleep and floating on instinct.
Bart shifted on the table, drawing Tim’s attention back to him. He kicked his feet, then visibly deflated.
“Do you know where this suit came from?”
Tim blinked at the question, caught off guard. “What?”
Bart didn’t look at him. His shoulders were hunched, and his gloved fingers worried at the fabric of his costume. “My suit,” he said again. “Do you know where it came from?”
Tim frowned, eyes tracing the familiar lines of the Impulse uniform. A dozen guesses flickered through his mind, but he swallowed them back and waited.
Eventually, Bart turned. His yellow eyes were wary as they met Tim’s.
“The lab I was raised in.”
For the next ten minutes Bart talked. And talked. And talked.
Tim didn’t interrupt. He just listened, eyes tracking the way Bart’s hands never quite stopped moving--fingers twitching, sketching shapes in the air as if the thoughts were too fast to stay contained. Words spilled out in uneven bursts, sometimes tripping over themselves, where Tim could tell Bart was trying not to speed-talk, and sometimes deliberately slow.
Bart talked about being a refugee. About being raised in a lab that never cared that he’d be dead in days. About how his entire childhood had been a VR simulation, sterile and endless and ‘false’, until his Grandma had rescued him and dropped him into a world that made no sense.
“Imagine you were raised in the universe of Star Trek,” Bart said, gesturing vaguely up at the ceiling, like the brittle popcorn paint might back him up. “Then imagine being yanked out of that and dumped into the Middle Ages. By yourself.”
Tim reached out and squeezed his hand.
Bart glanced down where their fingers were linked, gave a tight, crooked smile, then sighed. His shoulders sagged, like that small contact had let something drain out of him
He talked about expectations. About how a century’s worth of morals, social rules, and unspoken norms had been dumped on him all at once, with no grace period and no room for mistakes. About how every day felt like walking on eggshells, because any tiny misstep could set Wally off. Could upset someone. Could disappoint someone further.
He’d come from a world where he controlled everything--where he understood everything. Where he was right by default.
Now every choice was made for him. Everything was regulated. There were rules. So many rules. Things Bart Allen could do. Things Impulse could do. One could be odd, and the other could be normal. There was an invisible line between civilian and superhero identities that everyone else seemed to understand instinctively but that Bart struggled with.
“But I am Bart,” he said, frustration seeping into his voice. “And I am Impulse. I don’t understand how you--how everyone--split themselves in two like that.”
So if Bart couldn’t do something, Impulse didn’t do it either.
That included being different. That included Interlac.
“Iris and Wally taught me not to speak it,” Bart said, quieter now. “Said it wasn’t normal. That it would make people curious. That it’d risk my secret identity. Make me weird.” His mouth quirked up a bit. “Like everything else about me doesn’t already do that.”
It was a thing that Bart Allen could not do. But Bart was Impulse, so Impulse didn’t do it either.
“Wally loves telling people that I’m from the 30th century.” Bart went on bitterly, jaw tightening. “But he hates it when I act like it. When I don’t get a reference. When I forget an English word. When I don’t slow down enough to do chores.”
His hands curled into fists on his lap.
“I hate being reminded that I’m not normal,” he said. “But every grifing time he meets someone new, that’s all I am. The future kid. The weird kid. The wrong kid. It doesn’t matter how normal I am as Bart, Impulse is never enough.”
“Bart,” Tim said softly. “None of us are normal.”
Bart barely seemed to hear him.
“I can’t be taken seriously,” Bart said, the words tumbling out his mouth like they’d been on his tongue for years. “And no matter how hard I try--how perfect my English gets, how many ‘normal’ friends I make, how much I try to be like my Grandpa--It’s never enough.”
His voice wavered. That caught Tim’s attention more than anything else.
“The way Wally talks about me,” Bart said, quieter now, “it’s like I’m still that same 12 year old who just crashed on Earth.”
He laughed once. Short and humorless.
“Even in a team full of detectives and clones and girls blessed by gods,” he said, “I’m still the odd one out.”
“But--there are time-displaced heroes all the time,” Tim said quickly. “Booster-”
“I was raised in a grifing VR, Rob!”
Bart shot to his feet so fast that sparks appeared at his feet. His whole body was tight with it--anger, hurt, years of being talked over finally boiling out in one sharp, undeniable burst.
“You don’t get it,” he said, voice sharp and shaking. “Interlac isn’t just a language. It’s a sign. The second I use it, people look at me different. Like I’m a problem they need to solve. Like it’s all I am.
“With strangers it's fine. With Wally it's-- fine.” He grit out. “They already expect me to be weird. Wrong. Whatever. But you guys-” he set his gaze on Tim, his position standing below Tim making him look even smaller than usual, more vulnerable. Tim’s heart broke a little at that. “If you guys think I’m…wrong. Then I- I don’t think I can handle that.”
An angry Bart was not too unusual. Tim saw that plenty, whether it was at something Wally said after a mission alongside the Justice League, or after a new rule put in place by Max.
A sad Bart was something less common. They’ve only seen it a few times, and like Tim thought before, they never engaged with it. Even though they definitely should’ve.
But right now, Bart was angry and sad. And he was hurting and vulnerable. And Tim was sitting on the island and realizing just how unprepared he was for all of this. He wasn’t exactly a model of mental health himself--but in this moment, he was all his friend had. Tim had started this conversation. Tim owed it to him to be present, to be a good friend.
Bart felt outcasted. Odd. Alone. Kon had Superman--or Supergirl, if he wanted to talk clone issues. Tim had Batman, Nightwing. Cassie had Wonder Woman and the other Wonder Girl. They were never truly alone.
Tim didn’t necessarily ever think Bart had The Flash, but he figured he had at least someone who would understand him, be there for him. Let him be himself around.
But he was wrong.
“I’m sorry you feel so alone.” He muttered, mind racing through possibilities--ways he could fix this. Bart just made a noncommittal noise in response, scuffing his shoes against the tile.
Then. A lightbulb blinked over Tim’s head. (Metaphorically, of course.)
His eyes brightened, and he straightened, leaning forward toward Bart. “What if I was weird with you?”
Bart, who had been standing still and staring at the ground, finally looked up, confused. “Huh?”
“I’m good at languages.”
Bart rolled his eyes and huffed, a small smile threatening to break through. “We know.”
“What if I learned Interlac?” Tim didn’t mention that it was his original goal--he didn’t need to. This wasn’t about proving anything. It was about letting Bart know he wasn’t alone. He hopped off the island and, grinning, placed his hands on Bart’s shoulders. “It can be our code. You won’t be weird. Because, guaranteed, I’ll sound worse than you.”
Bart hesitated, leaning slightly away. “I-.”
“You clearly want to speak it. I hear you curse in it-”
“That was mostly out of habit-”
“-and now I can be your way out! Your excuse! If Wally shits on you for speaking it I can tell him to grife off!”
Bart’s lips twitched again. He stopped leaning away. “‘Grife off’?”
Tim blinked. “Is that not how it’s used?”
Bart’s genuine burst of laughter filled the room.
And Tim knew he had won.
--
When Tim was getting off of the table, he noticed Bart’s form blur only slightly before going back to full view, his windswept hair the only tell that he had been moving at supersonic speeds. Where before his hands were empty, now they were holding an…unfamiliar device.
“Where’d you just go?” Tim questioned, stepping closer while trying to peer at the mysterious object.
“Home.” He answered, waving the question away, then held the device out shyly. “It’s a translator.”
But before Tim could reach out to take it, Bart snatched it back. “Actually wait.”
Tim waited patiently.
“This is our thing.” Bart pointed between them. “At least for now. I can’t--I want to try this out first.”
“You don’t want to tell the others? Wouldn’t it be more fun if we all could speak this?” Tim wasn’t going to lie, he had already been thinking about the benefits of having a secret code during missions.
Bart shook his head. “I can’t risk Wally finding out, he’d be…ugh…and knowing Kon he’d…well…” he made a ‘yapping’ motion with his hand and gave Tim a pointed expression. “Which also means no talking to Nightwing about this. I don’t want-...just you, ok? Just for now.”
The unspoken was obvious.
I need to know this won’t hurt me first.
Tim hummed. So he couldn’t brag to Dick. Big deal. (He wanted to brag to Dick.) “Okay. No talking to anyone about this. Our little secret. Anything else?”
After hesitating a moment, Bart shook his head, then held the translator out again, this time letting Tim snatch it. “It’s totally not programmed to call you a nerd.” He rambled, eyeing Tim fidgeting with it. “I don’t know why it would do that. That’d be so weird and mean. But I stole it from my mom. When she was visiting.”
Bewildered, Tim took the device (that was weirdly shaped like a gun?) and looked down at it.
“Just point it at something and it’ll translate. There’s a keyboard uh-” Bart leaned over and pressed a button on the side. A hologram appeared, foreign symbols displaying in the air and floating around. “Oh. It’s from Interlac to English. I don’t know how to change that- sorry- right now you can just do Interlac to English sorry-”
Tim interrupted him with a hand on his shoulder, pulling him into a hug. Bart froze, then melted into it. “It’s perfect.”
“Mh.” Bart stuffed his nose into Tim’s shoulder.
“And Bart?” Tim asked gently.
“Mf?”
“I won’t make fun of you for this. I think it’s cool.” In fact, Tim was positively geeking out like hell about it. “You’re really cool.”
Bart was silent for a moment, arms tightening around Tim’s waist.
Then, a sigh. “Never could fool you.”
“Nope.” Tim sang and Bart breathed a laugh into his shirt.
The two of them stayed like that for a moment, swaying a bit while hugging. Tim worked through all this new information about Bart and wondered just how he could pay it back. Give Bart a little piece of himself to ease the ostracized feeling he had.
It wasn’t Tim’s name, but maybe…
“You know, speaking of fooling.” Tim started, looking up thoughtfully. Bart raised his head to look up at him too. God. Batman was going to kill him if the taxes rage didn’t first. “I lied this morning. I am from Hong Kong.”
“Yes!” Bart jumped so hard he smashed his head against Tim’s chin, ignoring Tim’s yelp to cheer and jump around the room. His hands were thrown up in celebration. “I knew it! I called it back at the tea place. I was right!”
“Well, sorta.” Tim winced, rubbing his smarting chin while glaring at Bart, who was ignoring him in favor of jumping joyfully onto the couch. “I’m half. My Mom was Chinese, my dad is American.”
Bart, now on the edge of the couch and eye level to Tim, peered up at him. “So you can teach me Cantonese.” Damn, he was like that stupid Shrek Puss in Boots meme.
Tim raised an eyebrow down at him. “Is that what you want?”
“Uh, duh!” Bart scoffed. “If we’re ever gonna go back to that restaurant I’ll need to be able to tell that waitress how much food I want! I don’t trust you!”
-----
Later they were curled up together on the living room floor, Bart sitting on Tim’s feet (they were cold) as Tim leaned against a couch chair. A chaotic pile of Interlac textbooks and notebooks were scattered around them in a cult-like circle that could probably freak out Zatanna. As for the origin of the textbooks…some Bart had written himself in the second Tim took to sit down, others…well, Tim suspected they had been “borrowed” from somewhere the second Tim took to blink. (Tim feared the Legion’s wrath eventually, but he was too happy to care right now.)
“So to tie a verb or adjective to the person you’re talking to,” Bart was explaining, pointing at one of the conjugation charts. “You add ‘ka to the end of it.”
“Isn’t ‘ka’...‘you?’”
Nodding, Bart switched to a notebook, tongue poking out as he wrote an example. “Yup. So to say ‘you stink’ you say…”
Chuckling at the example, Tim checked his notes.
Nose is skah.
To stink is skahvey.
To add possession…tying it to a noun. Add ‘t’ plus ‘ka’ to tie it to the specific person you’re talking to.
“Skahveyt…ka? Skahveyt’ka?” Tim tried, the word clunky and awkward on his tongue. He flushed in embarrassment as it left his lips. Accent was always a point of weakness for him.
But the beam Bart gave him was worth it. “Lo- exactly! Ma-Shahveyt’ka-seh!” Then he doubled over in a fit of laughter, rolling off of Tim’s feet.
‘Lo’ was yes. ‘Ma’ was no.
‘Seh’ was a way of saying ‘and.’
Bart just told him that no, he was the one who stank.
“You’re so funny.” Tim grumped, but there was no real ire in his voice. Poking Bart with his toe, he fought a smile as Bart gagged. “How do I say… ‘that’s because instead of being able to shower, I was dragged by my best friend halfway across the world to stop a robbery.’”
“Nasshead.”
“Scroach.”
They glared at each other, mock hate painted across their faces, until the facade cracked. Bart snickered. Tim grinned. And then they were roaring with laughter, rolling on the ground in bursts of giggles and squawks. Soon they transferred into wrestling, giggling while shoving the others’ faces into the textbooks and cussing each other out in Interlac.
“How do you… say fuck you… in Cantonese?” Bart asked between breaths, kicking Tim’s knees away from his chest, laughing again when Tim surged back to pin his shoulders.
“屌你” Tim gasped, almost choking as Bart aimed a jab at his neck.
“Dew nay…” Bart repeated slowly, eyebrows scrunched in concentration. When he looked up and saw Tim struggling to stifle a snicker he flipped them over and shoved Tim against the ground. “Shut up! Vlash’ka! I hate you!”
“Shh-” Tim whispered while giggling, stilling against Bart’s pin and shoving his finger into Bart’s face. “Kon’s here.”
The door to the combined kitchen and living room suddenly creaked open, a shirtless ghost with frizzy hair making its presence known. (Did Tim say ghost? He meant Kon.)
“Morning.” Kon yawned, rubbing his eyes while floating into the room. Despite the shower, he very much still looked like he just woke up.
Tim grinned, knocking his head back against the floor to peer up at him. “Morning Kon.” And grinned wider at Bart’s echoed ‘morning!’ from above Tim.
Blinking at them and their precarious position wearily, Kon frowned. “...Why are you two on top of each other surrounded by a pool of paper?”
In an instant, the stacks of notebooks, textbooks, pencils, loose sheets, even a half-eaten cookie, vanished as if they had never existed. Tim felt a gentle press of paper into his palm for a brief moment and fought a smile, blinking innocently at Kon. Bart had already settled on the couch, somehow mid-Mario Kart match, fingers flying over the controller.
“What pool of paper?” Tim asked innocently, standing up with a flourish and dusting himself off.
“I’ve always been over here.” Bart shouted, smashing his fingers against his controller.
Kon’s eye twitched, but he shrugged and floated over to the kitchen. “Whatever. Weirdos gonna do weirdo things.” From the fridge, he glanced back at Tim, frowning as he took in his outfit. “Rob, go change. Those are my pants, bro.”
Tim tucked a smile into his shirt and looked over at Bart, who was already looking at him.
They shared a wink.
Then, from the kitchen: “What the-who ate all the cookies, man!? There were 50 in here!”
And together started rolling in another fit of snickers.
---
When Tim closed the door to his room to change, he flopped down on his (very comfortable, very large, Wayne Enterprises-funded!) bed and uncrumbled the note Bart had slipped into his hand.
On it were some hand-written scribbled Interlac letters.
Sitting straight up, Tim quickly grabbed the translator Bart had given him and pointed it at the paper, hands shaking a bit with excitement. When the loading screen came on he set it down on the bed and leapt off the bed to find a suitable (safe!) place for the note Bart gave him.
After a few seconds the translator gave a cheery, high pitched, ‘nerd!’ and revealed the message.
Settling on putting the handwritten note on his nightstand, right by his belt so he’d know to keep it, Tim hopped back onto the bed and peered down at the device.
More cold cases next weekend?
Tim smiled.