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Damian has been avoiding Tim.
Nothing as bad as hiding away in a Tower for a month (“I said sorry!”), but between always having homework when Tim goes to the manor and switching his patrol routes so that he doesn’t cross paths with Seer on the nights Tim happens to be doing field work, it’s pretty obvious.
“Give the kid a break, baby.” Kon had said when Tim complained about it over dinner a few weeks later. “His grandpa did try to kill you.”
Tim scoffed and stabbed a piece of broccoli with his fork. “So did his mother, but there's no way that's the issue. I mean, come on you know Damian. The first time he met Stephine, he tried to run her over with a car, then demanded she teach him how to do make up.”
Kon snorts softly and points an accusing fork in Tim's direction. “ You say that like you didn’t dig up everything on my life well before we even met.”
Tim gives his boyfriends the fakest puppy dog eyes he can muster. “Aw, but that's my job, Superboy.”
“Sure, whatever you say, Seer. Look, just give the kid some time, I’m sure he’ll get over it.”
Tim sighs and looks down at his plate. “Fine, but he’s only getting a week.”
Kon chuckles again. “Sure, sweetheart, whatever you say. Now finish your food. The faster you eat, the faster we can get to the bedroom.”
As if Tim needed anymore incentive.
_________________________________________________
Tim runs into Damian three days later.
“Robin,” Tim said, voice coming out distorted due to his modulator. “I thought you had the other side of town tonight?”
Damian huffs.“Spoiler asked me to investigate a lead on her drug trafficking ring while she’s out of town. Of course, I was unaware you were already on the case.”
Tim resists the urge to snicker. Damian may have been unaware, but Steph certainly was not, since she also asked Seer to do a follow-up. Looks like the bat-family isn’t quite done meddling in his affairs.
“Well, two sets of eyes are always better than one. You go high, I go low?”
Damian nods stiffly and almost sprints to get away from Tim in search of a way onto the roof. Tim shakes his head and pushes the door open just enough to slip through.
On the outside, it’s pretty unassuming. A couple of crates that turn out to be empty when Tim cracks them open, some boxes filled with packing peanuts and what appear to be glass cups, and the odd rat, but nothing related to the new strand of ecstasy that’d hit Gotham streets two weeks ago.
Tim cracks open one more empty crate before calling it quits and turning toward the rickety stairs that lead to the second floor. Once he makes it to the top, he spots Damian in the corner rifling through a box. “Hey, Robin downstairs was a dead end. You got something up here?”
Daiman doesn’t answer right away, just keeps going through the box. Tim feels a twinge of irritation as he walks towards the younger hero. “Robin? Dude, are you-!”
Tim barely has time to dive out of the way when Daiman trunks around and fires a really fancy looking, definitely not bat-approved, laser gun straight at his face.
“Whoa, kid! Relax, what is going on!”
Damian just snarls viciously at him and continues to shoot at him. Tim curses and dives behind the nearest crate. He reaches into one of the inside pockets of his cloak to pull out a comm that he never uses. He’s got just enough time to put it in his ear before the crate he’s leaning against is shot at, and he has to move.
“Hey, Oracle, you there?”
“Seer? What’s wrong?”
Tim finds a support beam and starts climbing. He feels the heat of the lasers whizzing past him. “Robin is trying to kill me.”
“What?!” She shouts in alarm.
Tim gives a very abridged version of the night's events.
“Shit, okay. Hood is on route. Do you think you can get the gun out of his hand?”
“I mean, yeah, but not without hurting him! The kid isn’t stupid enough to loosen his grip.”
“Whatever you can do, do it, just try not to leave permanent damage.”
Tim curses and looks down at where Robin is glaring at him, still aiming the gun directly at him. The only way he’s getting that gun is by either breaking the kid's wrist or dislocating his shoulder. Robin shoots him again.
“Agh- Could you stop doing that!”
Robin, again, just snarls at him.
Tim takes a deep breath, prays that Hood will get there before he has to do something drastic, and jumps down.
________________________________________________
Tim had to break his wrist.
It sucked, the kid didn’t even scream, but Tim could feel the ice cold guilt creeping into his skin already. Especially when they test his blood and find traces of fear gas.
Seer paid Scarecrow a personal visit the next day.
And if Tim thought Damian was avoiding him before, that was nothing compared to now. It’s been a solid six weeks since he’s even caught a glimpse of Damian. Of course, he could find the kid if he put in just a little bit of effort, but after the look Damian gave him when the fear gas finally left his system? Yeah, Tim's content to let the kid hide from him.
Tim is poring over dig site reports when a cup of tea is set on the desk next to him, and he feels the familiar broad hands of his boyfriend landing on his shoulders. “You're sulking, Tim.” Kon says softly. There's no teasing undertone like there usually is, and Tim knows that he’s about to be lectured.
“I’m not.” He mumbles back.
“You haven’t left the apartment in a week.”
“I’ve been busy.”
“Oh? Drake Industries, which you practically let Duke run at this point, is keeping you too busy to go out as Seer? Or visit the Wayne's who won’t stop calling either of us?”
Tim groans and finally drops the papers on the desk, careful to avoid the mug. “What do you want me to do, Kon? The kid clearly doesn’t want to be around me.” Tim grumbles. Kon sighs and eases Tim's rolling chair back until he can slip into the space between Tim and the desk. He leans against it with his arms crossed, soft blue eyes meeting Tims ice cold ones.
“You won’t know that unless you try, sweetheart.”
“Weren’t you the one who said I needed to give him space?” Tim scowls, but it has no bite to it. Not when he’s face level with his boyfriend's crotch. Tim feels Kon’s TTK grab his chin and tilt his head up to meet his boyfriend's smirking face.
“Eyes up here, pretty boy. And that was before you started avoiding him. Come on, Tim, weren’t you the one who told me that it’s not up to us whether or not our families forgive us?”
Tim rolls his eyes. “That was different-”
“Except it’s not Tim. Just because your problems are more on the mudery side rather than the misunderstanding side doesn’t make the words any less true. I know you know Damian isn’t mad at you for breaking his wrist, so what exactly is keeping you from talking to him?”
Tim sighs and rolls forward until he can lean his head against Kons torso. Kon brings one hand up to rest against the back of his neck and the other on his shoulder. “I’m just- I don’t know scared? Like maybe he blames me for the way his mother won’t talk to him, or resents the fact that I get so much attention from his grandfather, or hell, maybe he is mad about the broken wrist! He only tolerated me before because of Dick and Jason, but now that I’ve caused such a rift in his family- ow! What was that for?”
Kon had pinched the back of his neck, causing Tim to move his head so he could glare at the amused face.
“You were spiraling. Tim, I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but that boy damn near worships the ground you walk on, even if he’d sooner die than admit it. You’ve been protecting gotham and her citizens since you were twelve. Willingly Tim. No traumatic events until your parents. You know that you're the first one he goes to when he needs help with an art project? He considered you his brother, Tim. His Brother. You know how hard it is for that kid to even consider anyone a friend? I’m not gonna tell you your irrational, but you are overthinking just a little bit, honey. Talk to him.”
Tim is staring at his boyfriend with misty eyes. “How did I get so lucky?” Tim asks him quietly with a smile. Kon smirks but squeezes the back of his neck gently.
“Craigslist, babe.”
_________________________________________________
Tim spends weeks trying to catch Damian and almost manages it when he’s on the phone with Jon one day(Jon has always had a way of lowering Damian's guard). Unfortunately, the boy's dog barked at him, and the next thing Tim knew, Damian was gone.
It takes two painfully long weeks before he’s able to corner Robin on a rooftop in an abandon are of Chinatown.
“Robin.”
Damian scowls and reaches for his utility belt. When he can’t find said belt, he turns to glare at Tim, who has it dangling from one hand. “Return it.”
Tim sighs and reaches up to detach his mask, a new one with the voice modulator built in, and lets it drop to the roof before repeating the process with the domino mask. “Just listen to me, okay? You don’t have to say anything, but I need you to listen.”
Damian turns his nose up but nods anyway. Tim closes his eyes and counts to ten before he meets the whites of Damian's mask. “I’m sorry.”
Damian’s eyebrows scrunch up in confusion. “What?”
“I’m sorry. For breaking your wrist.” Damian scoffs and goes to say something, but Tim just holds his hand up.
“I’m sorry for your wrist and for the irreparable damage I caused within your family. I know your mother hasn’t talked to you in months, and I know your grandfather has been harassing you about me, and I’m sorry. I know that apologies don’t really mean much to you, but I wanted to say it anyway.”
There. He’d done it. Now for the part that might get him stabbed.
“And I need you to know that I’m not mad at you.”
That got Damian to scoff again. “Of course you are.”
“I'm really not Dami.”
“Then you are a fool!” Damian shouts before turning to the ledge of the roof. Tim tenses slightly. He doesn’t think the kid will jump, way too much pride for that, but he also wouldn’t put it past Damian to attempt it, thinking he could survive the fall just to get away from this confrontation.
“Okay. Why am I a fool, Dames?”
“Because I am an Al Ghul Drake. I am part of the reason you were kidnapped. Part of the reason you were on bed rest for weeks. Part of the reason you were being targeted for years. I am a direct participant in what Richard would call ‘your trauma.’ You should be furious with me. You should never want to speak to me again. You should….”
Even growing up with Bruce instead of the league, it was still hard for Damian to express emotions other than anger. So, Damian's not all that surprised that this revolution is coming out through a mess of snarls and angry tears. He is, however, very surprised when all that anger evaporates into thin air, and all that's left is a crying sixteen year old boy.
“.....You should hate me.” He whispers, finally dropping into a crisscrossed position, his back still facing Tim. Tim feels the utility belt he’d been holding hostage slip from his hands and onto the concrete as he crosses the roof in a few quick strides to drop down and envelope the vigilante in a hug from behind.
“Damian. None of that was you. None of that even had anything to do with you. Your grandfather and your mother, what they did to me, I don’t hold any of that against you, kid. You didn’t even know who I was, so how could you have been responsible?”
Damian sniffles but relaxes just a fraction into Tim's hold. “They are still my family. My kin.”
“If we were all responsible for something our families did, more than half the world would be in jail. You can’t hold that kind of guilt in your heart, it’ll just kill you. I don’t blame you, Damian. I never half and I never will. You're my brother, okay? I love you.”
Damian doesn’t say anything, but he does let his full weight fall against Tim, so he counts that as a win.
________________________________________________
“Tim! Kon! We thought you guys were avoiding us.” Dick said two nights later when they showed up at the manor for dinner. Kon laughed, but Tim elbowed him before he could say anything incriminating.
“Aw, come on, Dick, who could avoid Alfred's pie?” Dick laughed and led them through the foyer to the dining room. “An excellent point, Timmy!”
As soon as they step into the dining room, Tim is grabbed around the wrist and pulled toward the end of the table. “Drake! Tell Cain that swords are more efficient than fists!” Tim laughs and doesn’t even protest when Damian sits him in the middle of him and Cass, even if Kon pouts from across the room.
“For you, brat? Sure. For Cass? Not a chance.”
Damian immediately shouts in outrage as Cass laughs at him, but he only pushes his chair closer to Tim's before taking a seat. Tim smiles and doesn’t resist the urge to ruffle the kid's hair. Damian huffs and shoves his hand away.
“Drake! What was that for?”
“Nothing, kid. Nothing.”