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The Butler and the Master of Death

Chapter 4: Chapter 4: J, T

Summary:

SOME BAT POVsssss!!!!!

Warning: ...liberal cursing :3

Notes:

I'M STILL IMPATIENT AHHHHHH
This story is just so fun to write I just keep spewing out chapters
I really ought to be studying ;-;

Hope you enjoy!!!!!
And again, I L.O.V.E.D ALL THOSE GLORIOUS COMMENTS THANK YOUUUUU

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

For Jason, it started with - of all things - flowers.

 

Now, flowers weren’t all that uncommon to the Wayne household - couldn’t be with the fucking humongous gardens out back. And hell, Jason even recognized the specific blue ones in the vase from those out in Alfred’s private plot. 

 

The weird thing was that these flowers were inside. 

 

Sure, when they had guests over or parties in the Wayne ballroom, Alfred and the hired staff would bring in real pretty ones (usually lilies or those red ones if it was near Christmas - what were they called? Pointies?) to decorate the tables and whatever, but, apart from that, there was practically an unspoken rule about not bringing flowers in the house. Probably ‘cause Tim had seasonal allergies or something, the little shit. But the reason why not didn’t really matter.

 

What mattered was that, for whatever reason, there were flowers in the house now, and they weren’t just anywhere, either: they were in the kitchen. As in, the one place where only Alfred and Jason were allowed into. And Jason sure as hell wasn’t the one who brought the damn plants in. 

 

He didn’t bring it up to the others though, ‘cause even he knew what a fucking nutjob he’d sound like if he did. Like, ‘oh no, there’re flowers in the kitchen, whatever shall we do?’ Yeah, thanks but no thanks; he’d prefer not to get laughed outta the room. And he couldn’t bring himself to mention it to Alfred either, not after he’d accidentally spied the man carefully rearranging the stems while wearing this… weirdly soft smile that Jason’d never seen before and immediately felt like he’d been intruding on for having done so. 

 

So.  

 

It started with the flowers.

 

It sure as hell didn’t end there, though.

 

No, next came the letters. Alfred’d been real busy recently - basically since the flower incident less than a week before - ‘cause a buncha different Wayne-family mandated events got clustered together like they always did in early August, and, whenever Jason’d happen to bring the mail in ‘cause he was driving by the box at the entrance to the manor anyways, he started finding letters addressed to Alfie mixed in with theirs too.

 

And hell, he wasn’t saying Alfred didn’t ever get letters or that - god forbid - he wasn’t allowed to get letters or anything like that, but they all seemed to be coming from the same person, some H. Potter - whoever the fuck that was.

 

Which was also weird as hell. Sure, obviously Alfie had a life outside of them - every damn Bat had a life outside the others - it was just… unexpected, maybe, to finally get some tangible proof of it. Jason guessed he hadn’t realized how much he’d thought of Alfred as kind of an extension to the manor, which probably sounded shitty as hell, but he didn’t mean it in a bad way - just… like, for a while, the manor meant home for him. And that meant Alfred was home for him. And even after the manor stopped being home for him for a while, Alfie still was.

 

Which was besides the point. Back to the real important stuff, the letters, Jason’d never opened them himself, because of course he didn’t. He always left them on the counter for Alfie to grab ‘cause knew better than to invade his sorta-gramp’s privacy just like the rest of the Bats did too.

 

Didn’t mean it didn’t eat at him, thinking about those letters, about what was in them, about whoever the fuck this H. Potter was to be sending their Alfred all these goddamned letters.

 

He couldn’t even say why it bothered him so much. He felt petty as hell getting all worked up over Alfie apparently enjoying hearing from some random girl or guy that Jason didn’t know anything about; it was like he was some rotten kid whining about losing his parent’s attention just ‘cause now they’ve got a second kid too. And it wasn’t even like that either, since - as far as Jason knew - whoever H. Potter was hadn’t ever invaded the sanctity of the manor with their presence.

 

Jason paused, then shuddered in revulsion, taking a second to also toss away that particular spoiled kid comparison back into the hellhole it belonged.  

 

Still, it didn’t get rid of his shitty thoughts over those letters, always signed in a real loopy font with the same H. Potter, H. Potter, H. Potter, over and over and over again - there was practically a letter waiting for Alfie every other day!

 

God, it gnawed at Jason’s damn bones, the need to know, and he found his fingers just itching to snatch up one of the envelopes and tear it open to reveal its tantalizing secrets for his eyes to see, but he always held himself back by the skin of his teeth. Imagining the look on Alfred’s face if - when - he caught Jason always helped. 

 

-

 

Tim already knew something was going on long before Jason confronted him (and by ‘long,’ he meant about six days). Of course he did: the others always seemed to forget that Tim spent multiple years stalking them without detection before finally inserting himself into their midst. 

 

In fact, Tim had even known something was up with Alfred in particular. He’d restrained himself from digging into it - for the most part - but just barely. Respect was such a burden, he lamented, even if Alfred obviously deserved it.

 

Anyways, when Jason came up to him, Tim could tell right away that the nineteen-year-old was just as close to tipping over the edge into satisfying his no doubt burning curiosity over what was going on with Alfred as Tim was. Which, obviously, wasn’t at all acceptable, since this was Alfred’s personal matters they were talking about. 

 

That didn’t mean they couldn’t gossip about what they already knew to ease each other’s burdens.

 

“So you caught on too, huh,” Jason grunted, not even having to elaborate on what. 

 

Tim nodded firmly, glancing around surreptitiously despite knowing for a fact that everyone except for them was out right now. Bruce was at a Wayne Enterprises meeting (for once), Dick was in Bludhaven, Damian was at an after-school club (something with art, Tim was pretty sure), Cass was in Hong Kong, Steph didn’t live here (technically), Barbara also didn’t live here (also technically), and Alfred was… out. Where, exactly, he’d gone out to was still an unknown, but he always seemed to be conspicuously absent on Tuesdays and the occasional Friday too as of late at around three o'clock in the afternoon. 

 

Jason groaned, collapsing onto the sofa perpendicular to Tim’s in the manor’s library. 

 

“So you’ve also noticed how Alfred’s been smiling roughly four times more often compared to previous weeks?” Tim questioned, gesturing smoothly with his hand. Admittedly, it was maybe a little odd for him to have that statistic down to that much detail, but he had a few quirks about each of his family members that he tried to keep meticulous track of. You never knew when there was a mind control situation on hand, after all.

 

Jason stared at him incredulously, his expression then shifting into something vaguely affronted. “No, dipshit, I noticed the damn flowers and fucking letters,” he fired back, still giving Tim the side-eye.

 

“Oh,” Tim noted succinctly, blinking. Admittedly, he’d also noticed the letters for Alfred when he scoured through the pile for his own mail; he probably should have led with that. “I saw the letters too - from H. Potter, right?” 

 

“Yes,” Jason growled, slamming a fist down against the sofa. It lost some of its oomf factor given that the sofa was, as a state of matter, pretty soft. “You know who the hell that is?”

 

“No,” Tim reluctantly shot down, clicking his tongue in frustration. He’d even toed the line of invasion of privacy and searched on his tablet for any local ‘H. Potters’, but it was a surprisingly common name, so it didn’t narrow his results as much as he’d have liked. 

 

It almost made his skin crawl, not knowing, especially with how many letters Alfred was getting from that one person - and without showing any signs of being upset about it all. Tim’s parents used to get mad at him if he even sent a single text message at the wrong time of the month. 

 

Tim shook off that unproductive train of thought, his memory snagging onto something else Jason had mentioned. He perked up. “What’d you mean about flowers, though?” he asked.

 

Jason flapped his arm in the vague direction of deeper into the manor. “Alfie had a whole vase of ‘em in the kitchen about a week an’ a half ago. Kept ‘em ‘til the damn things wilted - wilted!” he exclaimed, squeezing his fist for added emphasis. “Like, I swear a buncha the lil’ pink ones even got all yellow and shriveled up!”

 

Tim’s eyebrows rose in his surprise, and he brought a finger up to tap thoughtfully against this chin, eyes narrowing in contemplation. That certainly didn’t sound like their meticulously impeccable Alfred. 

 

Jason leaned forwards closer to him, lowering his voice as if he were telling an important secret, and Tim couldn’t help but lean in too, his own curiosity piquing. “Get this - I saw ‘im smilin’ at ‘em,” the older teen whisper-hissed, eyes wide in disbelief at his own words like he’d just revealed Alfred drank tap water - something that just wasn’t done in Gotham if you didn’t want to risk lead poisoning, radiation exposure, Joker Toxin, Fear Toxin, or… well, the list really does go on.

 

Tim’s eyebrows continued their ascent towards his hairline, and he fell back against the sofa cushions, crossing his arms. That definitely didn’t sound like Alfred. Except, it sorta did. With how much more the Wayne family butler (and Tim meant that job title in only the most technical of ways) had been smiling around them as of recent, it really wouldn’t be that strange if he was smiling more at other things too. 

 

Wait. 

 

Other things. 

 

Tim practically shot up out of his seat and thrust an accusatory finger in Jason’s direction, ignoring how his brother jerked back in surprise.

 

“It’s connected!” he exclaimed, curling his finger in and shaking his fist with the realization. Oh gosh, it should’ve been obvious, but Tim hadn’t had all the dots to connect before. The letters, the flowers, the fact that Alfred was smiling more? 

 

Somehow, someway, he just knew that all of it must be related to whoever this H. Potter was! He could’ve smacked himself for not having seen it before.

 

It made so much sense. Of course there had to be a reason Alfred was smiling more, that was just common sense, but now the whole lump of reasons had landed themselves on Tim’s lap. He wasn’t exactly sure what the flowers meant since he hadn’t gotten the chance to see them himself and research possible meanings behind them, but the letters… Geez, obviously the letters were the biggest factor here. Tim resolutely ignored the little curl of jealousy that poked at his sides at the thought of some stranger to him making his honorary grandfather figure happier than he apparently was before. Tim definitely ignored that. Yeah.

 

And then another recollection struck him, and he fell back into his seat in shock, Jason still staring at him like he’d lost it - probably since Tim had jumped up out of nowhere and then proceeded to explain absolutely nothing at all. 

 

That didn’t matter though; what mattered was that Tim had just remembered the idle, admittedly unusual little detail he’d noticed on Alfred just before the man had left like he usually did on Tuesdays: his bow tie. It was just as solid black as his always were, but, unlike every other time, there was a gleaming, dark green gemstone embedded right smack dab in the center of it, splitting the two frills. Come to think of it, the gem matched with those on Alfred’s cufflinks - yet another thing the butler didn’t usually wear. 

 

“Jason…” Tim said slowly, tapping his fingers quickly against the cushions of the sofa. “Why was Alfred wearing a gemstone inlaid bow tie and matching cufflinks today?”

 

Jason stared at him blankly. “Why was Alfie wearing what!?”

 

-

 

Somewhere, in the silent space between dimensions, the self-restraining willpowers of two of the famous Bat brood could be heard snapping clean through.

Notes:

AhhHH, what'd you guys think of the new POVs?

Tim & Jason's self-restraint: