Chapter Text
Tim is about to die. He’s gonna die. And his camera will be broken, and his neck will be broken, and he won’t have gotten the stupid blog post up in time to make tonight worth it, and it’s all his own fault.
When Tim started the blog, he never in a million years had intended for it to turn into something like this. But one thing just led to another, and somewhere along the road Tim crossed a couple lines, and the world didn’t end, and now. Now he’s regretting just about every life choice he’s made. Ever. How the hell did he convince himself running around Gotham at night was a reasonable idea? He took precautions, sure, but those only get one so far.
Normal cities, Tim complains regularly to Ives during their video calls, don’t have actual villains running around who don’t care about collateral damage. (Ives always laughs, and tells Tim he knows he loves it, really.)
Please, God, Tim thinks half-heartedly. If I make it through tonight, I’ll give up video games for a week. I’ll stop the blog, someone else can take it over who’s an Actual Adult or something, maybe I can blackmail Nightwing into doing it, I’m too young to die.
All in all, tonight is shaping up to be a pretty normal Tuesday in what Tim’s life has somehow become.
He’s running across the edge of the rooftop at frankly breakneck speed, and—okay so this may not have been his greatest idea ever, but listen—it’s not like he planned—
Tim catches and strangles the noise in his throat just in time to avoid shrieking as Killer Croc’s head and shoulders crash over the edge of the next building over. Under Croc’s claws, old concrete chunks have begun flying around in the air.
Tim hits the deck, flinging himself sideways off the roof ledge down onto the rough sandpapery surface a few feet below. Scrambles back into the nearest corner as fast as he can, clutching the camera like it’s going to be his One Great Saving Weapon. Against a crocodile monster. Because that makes sense.
God, he hopes Killer Croc hasn’t seen him in that moment. He’s really not planning to be human lunch meat tonight, thanks. He’s got a spelling test in the morning and if he misses it his grade is going to go down by six percent.
From the sounds drifting across the gap, Killer Croc is now definitely smashing up the other rooftop like it’s made of toothpicks. Tim has no idea what’s got him this riled up tonight, but he really hopes that Batman, or anyone really, comes soon and—
Wow, think of the devil and he appears, Tim supposes.
There’s the ever-so-faint chink-UNK of a grapple sticking into place, and then a loud THWUMP of boots on hard flesh. Tim winces. He can only imagine how much of a jolt it must be to slam into something as hard and solid as Killer Croc at high speed. But at least Croc is distracted now, which means it’s Tim’s chance to move.
One hand on his camera, one hand shoving himself away from the sandpapery roof surface, Tim is up and scrambling in half a second. He ducks behind the air conditioning unit he’d been originally aiming for when he dove off the ledge. Safely tucked behind it for the moment, Tim lifts his camera to his eye and aims--just so, there’s an art to it, of course, he’s gotta frame the shot at a pleasing angle,Yeah, like that, he thinks. Time slows down around him, Tim breathing slowly, Killer Croc and Batman tangled in a flurry of swipes and dodges on the adjacent roof. They’re weaving around each other, the bat symbol is flashing on the ever-present clouds overhead, and if Tim’s memory is correct, Robin should be sweeping onto the scene in three, two...there.
Tim’s finger snaps the button down, then releases. The shutter clicks, right as Croc lets out a particularly irritated sound that just. Ricochets around the whole area, and man, Tim did not miss Killer Croc, not one bit, Croc drives him almost as mad as Clayface does on the nights he’s running loose around Gotham. If Tim has to scrub mud spatters off his boots one more time, he’s going to sue for the cost of cleaning supplies and emotional damages. Or something. Can you sue a villain as a civilian? Maybe not the best idea, since he’d have to explain why he was close enough to the situation to actually get Clayface’s mud on him. Tim files that topic away for later thought. Right now, he’s got to snap a few more shots of the fight.
Batman and Robin make quick work of taking down Killer Croc after that. A well-timed distraction by Robin and a quick net shot, and Croc is tangled up enough that they’re able to tranq him. They secure Croc to the roof a bit more tightly, then slip away to a nearby roof to watch from the shadows as the villain is carefully removed from the area.
By the time they leave the scene, Timothy Drake is long gone, vanished off into the city again like he was never on the rooftop at all.
The BatWatch blog has a fresh new post with some of the author’s best action shots yet, and Agent A sits in the batcave with a thermos of tea, scrolling through his family’s nightly adventures with a raised eyebrow. Then the Batmobile is roaring in and drifting into park with the theatrics that Batman loves, and A closes the window, turning to deal with whatever bruises, wounds, and joint pains his strange little family has accumulated this time.
Less than three miles away, Timothy Drake sleeps in his room with a still-open window. He’s sprawled out across his bed still half in his nighttime gear. One boot clings to the foot dangling halfway off the mattress. Tim dreams about his parents coming home early for once, and finding him gone, off and running in the city, and jolts awake with fear for a moment. Then he rolls over and drifts off, and sleeps like the dead until his alarm goes off a few hours later and he’s chucking it across the room.
As it turns out, Tim should have just slept in and not bothered to come to school after all, because somebody decided that today would be the perfect day to start trying to elementally attacking half the city, and Tim’s school was now an icebox. Literally.
Thanks, Gotham.
Another day, another villain, Tim types in the text box. Coming to you live from daytime Gotham, for once, I have a special update today! A Literal Warlock has been spotted in northern Gotham and has currently frozen at least three city blocks with solid ice, trapping hundreds of people inside buildings. People like his classmates, who were currently mostly headed for the cafeteria, figuring being frozen in with food was better than just sitting in a classroom getting cold and pretending to study bond angles.
Tim pauses to blow on his hands, trying to warm up his fingers a little. There are some scattered Twitter reports that he’s also set a few places on fire while chanting in a language no one understands at the moment, and also that Batman has been spotted on a couple buildings now, but waiting on official confirmation for both of those facts before I’ll list them for sure.
The ice, however, needs no official confirmation, seeing as I’m one of the ones currently stuck inside a giant ice cube. Will update more as things develop.
Tim hits the post button and sighs. Shoving his notebook out of the way, he kicks his feet up on the desk and tips his head back over the cheap plastic chair. If he’s stuck in here, might as well take the opportunity to catch up on some of his frankly outrageous sleep debt. It could be hours before emergency services manage to get a path through to the building’s door, depending on how quickly the warlock is taken down and how much they skimped on the ice melt budget for this winter.
Hurry up, Batman, is Tim’s last thought, before he starts to doze. The last thing he registers is a vague realization that there may be a reason he shouldn’t be taking a nap right now, but then Tim’s off and dreaming and the unease slips away like mist.
“Kid. Hey. You alive in there? Come on, wake up sleeping beauty. Last train to Clarksville, time to get outta here.”
Tim cracks his eyes open at the hard rapping on his forehead. He squints, trying to get his crusty eyes to focus properly on the person in front of him, who has wild hair, a strong Gothamite lilt, and—is that Jason Todd?
“Hi. It’s just me, Jason. You okay, kid?” That’s his Robin voice. The one he uses with people who just nearly got hurt or mugged, kids who are lost.
“Buh,” Tim says intelligently.
Jason frowns at him. “Are you even awake right now?”
“I—” Tim’s voice picks the absolute worst times to crack, puberty is a nightmare and he can’t wait till it’s over—”yes.” says Tim. He’s a little cranky, now, because he’s been caught off guard by...
Well.
Pretty much everything about the last several seconds, if he’s being honest. And he hates being caught off guard.
Tim scrambles to sit up properly, returning Jason’s frown. “What’s going on?”
Jason takes a couple steps back, leaning against a neighboring desk. “The principal sent us upperclassmen to round all the stragglers up from bathrooms and classrooms, all that jazz. Fire department finally got a path cleared to the door, so we can all go home. You’re the only one still in this half of the floor, apparently, and no offense dude but you’re like. Half a humansicle right now. Did you call your parents to come get you?”
“They’re in Egypt,” Tim mutters, slinging his bag on. He’s still shivering. “I’m fine. I’ll just get warmed up properly once I’m home.”
“That’s rough, buddy.”
Tim shrugs. “It’s fine.”
“We could drive you, if you want?”
“We?” Tim glances over as they file out of the classroom.
“Yeah,” Jason says, jamming his hands in his hoodie. “Alfie and me. Alfred’s our butler. He picks me up from school pretty much every day, unless I have a track meet.”
“You don’t even know me, though. I could be an axe murderer,” Tim points out, reasonably.
Jason looks him up and down, a little pointedly. “I think I’ll take my chances.”
“You don’t know where I live,” Tim tries.
“‘Course I do. You’re Timmy Drake, right? You’re literally next door. Well. As next door as mansions get. Fuck, they’re huge. It’s ridiculous.”
“Language, Mr. Todd!” a teacher calls as they pass, and Jason waves a hand in acknowledgment but not apology. Tim and Jason squeeze out the front door and through the tunnel the fire department has managed to carve through the ice. Maybe flamethrowers, Tim thinks. However they did it, Tim’s impressed--it only took them an hour or so, tops.
Then they’re out, and Tim sees Starfire standing outside his school building, and—”Oh.”
Jason laughs.
“Yeah,” he says, clapping Tim on the shoulder. “You kind of missed the show. It was amazing, watching her through the ice.”
“Please tell me people got it on their Snap stories,” begs Tim, and he’s too in awe of one of his favorite heroes ever standing there in the flesh to feel embarrassed.
“Fuck yeah we all did,” says Jason cheerfully.
“Language,” a distinctly British voice interjects, and then Tim is being grasped, and turned, and shoved directly towards a sharp-dressed man if he ever saw one.
“Tim, this is Alfred. Alfred, Tim. I said we could give him a ride home, since his house is right down the road from the Mannor. Is that okay?” Jason tilts his head a little sharply at the end as he asks this, like a bird. Like a robin. Tim furiously smashes down a nervous giggle. He can’t believe this is his life right now.
“Quite,” says Alfred. He holds out a gloved hand, politely shaking Tim’s with a firm grip. “Hello, Master Timothy. It’s a pleasure to see you again. You’ve grown a bit since the last time you were at one of Master Bruce’s galas.”
“Yes sir,” Tim answers, because that’s what adults expect you to say when they point out that you, a child, have in fact grown, as one does. “Are you sure it’s not too much trouble to drive me home?”
“Not at all,” says Alfred. He opens the back door of the shiny black car and Jason hops in. “It’s right on our way. And even if it weren’t, I couldn’t in good conscience allow you to travel home by yourself after being stuck in that ice. It will ease my mind to know you make it there safely.”
“Okay,” sighs Tim. He’s clearly not going to get out of a ride, so he tries to suck it up and put on a polite company smile as he slides in the backseat after Jason, and lets Alfred shut the door.
Jason Todd. Bruce Wayne’s newest son. Who is also the current Robin. Which Tim is definitely not supposed to know about, but he does , and Starfire herself is literally twenty yards away and taking off into the sky because that’s a thing she can do, and they’re being driven away from his literally-an-ice-cube school in one of Batman’s cars, as if any of this is remotely normal.
Except it kind of is, if you live in Gotham, and don’t happen to know secret identities that you shouldn’t. At this point, Tim doesn’t really know if knowing makes things better or worse.
“So,” Jason says next to him, flashing a grin. “What do you think about the all-school read they picked this year? I don’t like it as much as The Immortal Henrietta Lacks , but honestly it’s not that bad, the topic is pretty timely. Which I’m impressed by, not going to lie, I kind of thought the school administration was mostly a bunch of d—”
“Master Jason,” Alfred says sharply from up front.
“—underheads,” Jason finishes, sending an innocent expression in the direction of the rear-view mirror. “Alfie. What did you think I was going to say? I’m hurt.”
Tim can’t help but grin. How is this my life, he thinks, and he’s in the car with Robin, and he’s got more pictures to still import from his camera of this very boy fighting a giant crocodile man monster last night, and their school got frozen by a warlock today, and Gotham is just so weird sometimes Tim doesn’t even know what to do with himself.
Honestly, though, he wouldn’t have it any other way. And tonight, he goes back out. Justice never seems to sleep, so Tim often doesn’t either.
Worth it, he thinks, and turns to add his two cents to Jason’s monologue about school-mandated literature studies.