Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Headlights, a screeching horn. A moment of inattention.

The impact is painless, for he is dead before he can feel his body come apart.

He jerks awake on a rooftop, of all places. 

Puppeteering himself from third person, with spectral strings attached to his own limbs.

A camera is clasped in fingers pudgy with youth, and the model is bigger than he ever remembers his own being. He is looking through the viewfinder with experienced precision, lens fixed on a distant figure dancing across the rooftops. There’s a second shadow following close behind, a larger, darker figure compared to the smaller one’s vibrant costume. Because that is what it is. A costume.

It is with a gradual, gnawing horror that he watches the multicoloured figure launch themselves from a roof, grapple outstretched, and flip.

One, two, three, four.

Robin.

It’s a costume he’d recognise anywhere, given the notoriety and the stories attached. For he’d seen it a thousand different times in fanart and cosplays, of Dick Grayson and Jason Todd flying through the Gotham skyline with Batman hovering protectively behind. They’re from a webnovel, a very famous one at that, but this feels too real. The city itself doesn’t feel right.

The yawning disconnect between his body and mind slams closed, and his vision blacks out for a split second, nausea retreating as quickly as it came, leaving something much worse in its wake.

Toxic green and impossibly real, the screen hangs a mere arms length away. Four damning sentences, stark against the lurid background.

[SYSTEM ACTIVATION SUCCESSFUL! WELCOME TO THE WORLD OF {Dark Knights of Gotham}. BOUND CHARACTER (CLASS: Cannon fodder/Minor villain): {Robin III} {Timothy Drake} LOADED. STARTING R-POINTS: 100.]

It’s only thanks to the gradually fading dissociation that he doesn’t immediately start having a panic attack large enough to send him off the side of the random building he’s found himself perched on. 

He was dead, and now he was alive.

Alive, and reborn in Dark Knights of Gotham, according to this… system.

Dark Knights of Gotham was a saga following the adventures of Jason Todd, an enterprising young street rat down on his luck, who steals from the wrong man. In a whirlwind of events, he gets adopted by the richest man in America, sucked into Gotham's underground vigilante scene, and debuts as one of the crimefighters he previously idolised. 

It featured characters such as the legendary Bruce Wayne as Batman, a terrifyingly competent vigilante set on a path to destruction with an iron-clad sense of justice, Barbara Gordon, determined daughter of the police commissioner who is terrifyingly good at computers, and Dick Grayson, the distant yet mercurial older-brother figure with a grudge to bear. 

In its early days, Dark Knights of Gotham was best described as a heartwarming tale between a jaded mentor and his plucky sidekick and their extended found family, melting hearts and kicking villain butt.

Of course, the writing was good quality, the characters were complex, driven and well-written, and the gallery of villains frantically seesawed between hilariously goofy and maniacally insane. Mix in the gradually strengthening found family dynamic, and was it really any surprise that Dark Heroes of Gotham rapidly gained a cult following?

That's fine and all, so where does Timothy Drake come in?

See, eventually the main issues were solved. Most of the main rogue plotlines were over, and there were only so many Arkham Asylum breakouts that could happen before the audience got bored. Most of them came for the angst, and then slow-burn found family. Which was fine. 

But with Bruce, Dick, Babs and Jason finally on good terms with one another, the story began to lose what had originally bought in so many readers in the first place, starting a period fondly known in hindsight as the 'filler arcs'. 

It gave rise to the popular saying, ‘if in doubt, Arkham breakout,’ because it happened so many times.

Put frankly, nothing really happened in the filler saga. Most considered it to be a shameless cash grab, trying to eke every last cent out of a dying story before it finally lost its appeal to wider audiences. Because it was losing its appeal with every aimless chapter. 

And just when everything was looking neatly wrapped up, ready for a nice, domestic conclusion before the author tied a bow on Dark Heroes of Gotham and moved on with their life-

The author killed Jason Todd.

A single chapter, and everything fell apart.

Jason was six feet under, and without him, everything devolved to how it had originally been in the prologue, but worse. Barbara was paralysed from the waist down and trying to rebuild her entire identity, Dick isolated himself in the neighbouring city once again and Bruce, drowning in his grief, doubled down on his crusade to end crime in Gotham at the expense of everyone in his path. Now there was a palpable absence where Jason used to be, and they’d never been too good at hiding their grief, especially in the absence of Robin.

It was a spiral to rock bottom, and Gotham wept for his absence.

And that's where the character Tim Drake steps in, and unknowingly makes everything much, much worse.

And that minor villain is now the character that he has been ‘bound’ to. What does that even mean, to be bound? What does the system want from him?

He barely has time to mentally verbalise the questions before another screen pops up, as acidic green as the last.

[YOU HAVE BEEN BOUND TO THE ACCOUNT {Timothy Drake}.] it says.

[AS THE {Plot} UNFOLDS, OPPORTUNITIES TO EARN R-POINTS WILL BE UNLOCKED. IF THE TOTAL AMOUNT FALLS BELOW ZERO, THE SYSTEM WILL ADMINISTER PUNISHMENT.]

“Punishment?”

[USER WILL BE DEPORTED BACK TO THEIR OLD WORLD, INTO THEIR OLD BODY.]

“But didn’t I die?” he asks.

The system’s silence is damning.

In front of him, Robin (Dick Grayson!) does another multi-flip, the guiding shadow of his mentor following close behind. Tim blinks after them, letting his camera fall to his chest. 

First of all, what the fuck.

Second of all, what the fuck.

Finally, fuck to the second power.

In literally any other context, getting transmigrated into a popular webnovel would be amazing! Changing his fate, taking advantage of plot points to come out on top, avoiding death flags and becoming OP! Sounds like a dream! Whether it’s into a villainess noble, mob character or beaten-down hidden talent-slash-protagonist, it’s time for them to shine!

According to the standard rules of isekai or transmigration, this would be the beginning of something new, something better than his previous life.

All that’s left is to write down everything he remembers from the original novel, complete with dates and timeframes before he forgets it all again, and plan extensively for what’s to come.

Ha ha. 

Or not.

Tim never actually read Dark Knights of Gotham. 

He definitely considered it, but that was before the author went positively batshit insane after Jason’s death and turned what was a perfectly good webnovel into angsty, rage-bait, room temperature IQ progfantasy drivel. 

Numerous plot holes, foreshadowing that ultimately led nowhere, gaps in logic large enough to confuse even the most stupid of readers and plot armour so thick it could be seen from outer space, all compounded by a protagonist whose previous morals, character development and entire personality got thrown out the metaphorical window, letting it turn into scrambled eggs on the pavement below.

Jason Todd went from an inspiring, interesting and complex character to Sonic the Edgehog.

Yup. 

The dude died painfully then un-died equally as painfully, had a certified Assassin Training Montage (TM), before proceeding to make it literally everyone else's problem.

And now Tim’s gotta deal with it.

The knowledge he has about everything is so superficial it can barely be counted as ‘foreknowledge’. It’s more like a vague chain of events, such as ‘Jason dies’, ‘Jason comes back to life’, ‘Jason training montage’, ‘Joker fight’, ‘drug bust’ and finally, ‘Gang war’. See? Very descriptive. Someone should get Tim an award for even remembering that much.

The main reason is because Tim's online haunting ground was three fandoms to the left of Dark Knights of Gotham, but it had a pervasive fan-culture that meant it popped up on his dashboard anyway. Crossovers, art, text posts, obsessed mutuals and memes alike, it was the kind of book where you already knew the ending, the plot twists and characters without ever interacting with the content itself, because you couldn't escape them as long as you were connected to the internet.

This didn’t mean that he was familiar with the plot or anything, only the vague outline and the poignant moments detailed in the very many rage-filled essays posted after the author decided that having a coherent plot was for losers.

He could have been reborn as someone else, literally anyone else, but instead, breaking every single isekai rule there was, he managed to get reborn into a minor villain that dies for the sake of someone else’s character development. Where’s his superpowers? What about his golden finger? He wants a refund on his afterlife!

The system doesn’t respond to his kind, patient requests for a new damn afterlife, so he’s left shivering on the roof of a random apartment building in a semi-foreign city after midnight. 

But, strangely, as he stands, he acclimates.

It’s like his soul is syncing with the soul of little Timothy Drake, merging the memories in a spiritual override. He can remember what he (Timothy) had for breakfast this morning, and the winding route he took to ascend to where he is now, camera clutched in eager hands. It’s his memories, but they’re strangely foreign in a way that he doesn’t like to dwell on. That being said, his past life is fading.

Logically, he knows he was someone else before this, before waking up in this familiar-unfamiliar body with memories that he didn't make, yet belong to him regardless. He knows that he lived another life entirely, went to school, grew up, had friends and a family, but the experiences are inaccessible to him, like trying to watch tv through an opaque window. He can see the fuzz of colours, hear the muffled voices if he presses his ear against the cool surface, but anything more than the fact that it exists in the first place is out of his reach.

Every second he tries to push through that wall they grow fainter and fainter to him, and the memories of this body grow more prominent, fluidly replacing everything that used to be him.

It would be disturbing, if he wasn’t so very, very tired.

Retracing his steps home is strange, not just because Gotham’s seedier district are akin to an obstacle course designed by a sadist, but also because this body is what, nine years old? 

He should have been playing video games, not stalking dangerous vigilantes through the dodgy parts of the city after sundown. This is not what the internet means when people say ‘touching grass’ is beneficial. Quite the opposite really.

Either way, after forty-five minutes tucked into the corner of a rickety bus and a mile-long walk from the stop to the unnecessarily long driveway of Drake Manor, Tim is ready to climb back in through his bedroom window and sleep on whichever horizontal surface he comes into contact with first, whether that is his bed, a cabinet or just the floor. He’s not feeling picky right now.

He scales the trellis below his window like he’s been doing it for years, and resolves that when he wakes next, he won’t take this second chance for granted. Starting with his parents.

Tim’s new parents sucked. 

For absent, negligent background characters that only existed as a paper-thin excuse to prevent Bruce from adopting Tim-as-Robin, he really isn’t sure what else he expected. They got mentioned by name a grand total of, like, two times in the entire series, the first being their introductions and the second being their deaths. 

The only reason Tim knows they die is because there were a bunch of angry posts about Tim Drake having perfectly alive parents and yet still trying to insert himself in Bruce’s family. And then after their death, they were mad about Tim moving on so fast and ‘not having respect’ for them before getting adopted by Bruce. Seriously. He can’t win. People on the internet could be crazy sometimes.

Either way, when Tim is fourteen, fifteen or sixteen (thanks to many conflicting posts about the absolutely scuffed chronological timeline) they die miserable deaths offscreen, Tim becomes an orphan, and then they’re never mentioned again. Classic.

In the book, they’d been negligent to the point of ridiculousness, somehow entirely missing their teenage son living a double life as a crime-fighting vigilante up until their deaths. And that is transferring across into real life.

He stares down the empty driveway, flabbergasted. 

They’d been home last night, home for the last week and a half, and they’d left without even a goodbye? No wonder why novel-Tim had latched onto the neighbours so hard, these guys sucked at being parents! They’d told him three days ago that their next trip was to Jamaica for at least four months, so they could’ve at least dropped in to say ‘toodles, chap, we’re off!’

There wasn’t even a housekeeper!

Of course, the previous Tim hadn’t noticed anything untoward about all this, priding himself in being responsible for his age. Current Tim, however, had the experience of another life, and would like to file a refund. He’s only beginning to understand the extent to which he’s been scammed in this new life of his.

The only good thing about the entire situation was that the pantry was stacked, and both previous-Tim and current-Tim had mastered the Art of the Microwave though, so breakfast was macaroni and cheese, minimum effort for maximum cholesterol. 

Standing in the empty kitchen, breakfast cooking in front of him.

“System?” he says aloud, feeling like an idiot for speaking to himself in an empty house. “Hello?”

[THE SYSTEM PERFORMS 24-HOUR SUPPORT.]

The box is as violently green as it was the night before, but now he has time to examine it properly, it appears to be more holographic than physical in nature. When he reaches out, his hand passes through it with only a chilled area surrounding the limb penetrating the screen.

But right now, he has more pressing questions.

“What do you want from me?” 

[THE SYSTEM IS DESIGNED TO SUPPORT USER AS THEY PROGRESS THROUGH THE PLOT.]

Tim pauses. Because that’s not entirely true. Last night, the system had mentioned both punishment and deportation, and the fact it had those options in the first place signalled something more concerning than the standard LitRPG level-up system. And most importantly, Tim doesn’t want to progress through the plot. In the plot, Tim dies.

[YOUR ROLE IS TO PLAY AS THE CHARACTER {Timothy Drake}. YOUR PRIMARY OBJECTIVE IS TO ENSURE COMPLETION OF MAJOR PLOT POINTS. FAILURE OF THESE QUESTS WILL RESULT IN DEDUCTION OF R-POINTS. TOTAL DEPLETION OF R-POINTS WILL RESULT IN ACCOUNT TERMINATION AND USER’S SUBSEQUENT DEPORTATION. YOUR CURRENT BALANCE OF R-POINTS IS 100.]

Ah. There it is. 

“How do I get these R-points?” His voice sounds youthful and plaintive to his own ears.

[R-POINTS, WHICH CAN BE USED AS A CURRENCY IN THE {Store} ARE USED AS A METRIC OF THE USER’S SUCCESS. USER WILL RECEIVE TASKS AND QUESTS TO COMPLETE, EACH OF WHICH WILL GIVE VARIOUS REWARDS.]

“There’s a store?”

[USER HAS NOT MET REQUIREMENTS TO ACCESS THE {Store}]

Well that’s entirely useless. All stick and no carrot. All he can really do in response to that is eat his macaroni and cheese, and sulk.

Here is a question.

What happens when you write over six hundred chapters of vigilante-themed found family fluff, reach the perfect ending, only to go SIKE before killing off the beloved protagonist?

As expected, the most common reaction was WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK BRO!?

Then the story went off the fucking rails.

Timothy Drake was supposed to be a deuteragonist, patching up the damage and letting the audience revel in the hurt Jason’s death had in those he left behind. He was supposed to be the second chance redemption, the outsider POV showing how much Jason’s absence really meant, before coming into his own as an independent character.

Alas, the Jason-stans (who were already relatively feral pre-death) had to suffer through graphic descriptions of their blorbo having quality time with the business end of a meat tenderiser, which meant that they were well into rabies territory by the time Tim came along. They were looking for an outlet for their rage, and they found one. 

Tim Drake was originally written to be the near-opposite of Jason, presumably to show that anyone could be a hero, that it was the hearts that matter, not their origins. As all characters are wont to do, Timothy still had some growth left to do before he would emerge as a fully fledged character, but he never got that chance.

There was an imposter holding the mantle of Robin, an imposition stealing away Jason’s rightful place! Saying that the character Tim Drake was disliked was like saying the surface of the sun is merely lukewarm.

So, the author (TeenageMutantNinjaPurple) eventually held a poll.

Tim would either be shunted into the role of a villain or bloom into a true protagonist of his own right.

The final result was 15343 to 428. 

So, Timothy’s potential was scrapped, his character was carelessly relegated to minor villain, and all his character quirks became flaws to be used against him. His parents’ wealth became a justification for being spoiled and sheltered, his paranoia and stalking went from being prepared and observant to being creepy, and his pursuit of Robin was justified by greed rather than a genuine desire to help where no one else would.

Then Jason came back to life after an assassin training montage with the Assassin League? Elite Assassins? (there was something about a Tania and a demon too, Tim can’t remember), and returned to find he’d been replaced and Bruce had learnt nothing from his passing.

It shouldn't have worked as well as it did. 

But it did.

The fans went positively feral.

The genre changed abruptly (again), with the story taking on a much darker, grittier perspective on the streets he previously soared above, with gangbuilding and crime alley lore. A ruthless relentless protagonist taking on the mantle of his killer and doing some good, fueled by something called a Lazarus Pit (???) which granted him inhuman levels of speed, healing or whatever the hell he needed to be cooler than everybody else.

There was no logic to it. He needed to heal faster? Lazarus pit. Dodging a machine gun? Lazarus pit. Temporary flight!? Lazarus pit. Zero explanation and zero fucks given by the author. 

At this point, long-time fans were beginning to point out the larger faults, the endless plot holes, the cookie-cutter goons and villains because what happened to the original masterpiece? The ‘super-powers’ (because the author kept on denying Jason had any despite many paragraphs of her own writing suggesting otherwise) became known as the ‘Lazarus pit scam’.

What was once a good quality, well-written webnovel, had devolved into a pile of steamed shit in front of the eyes of its devoted fans.

The only good thing that stayed was the lack of a harem, thank FUCK. If the author had tried to pair off their little meow meow with someone, there would have been carnage.

Either way, Jason came back all pit-fuelled and super fucking angsty, killed Tim in a tower (???), and everybody cheered.

Quite frankly, it would have been better to be a cannon fodder than to be Tim Drake, because then he could have just skated under the attention of the Waynes entirely and lived a quiet, normal life far, far away from Gotham. 

Actually, what’s stopping him from doing that now? All he really needs to do is stop Jason’s death-

The system rectifies that misconception near-instantly. 

[THE JOKER IS CRITICAL TO {Jason Todd}'S CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT. DIRECT USER INTERFERENCE WITH {Warehouse Death} EVENT WILL RESULT IN TERMINATION OF USER.]

Nevermind.

But then, does he really have to be Robin? Batman doesn’t need an emotional-support twelve-year-old, right? He’s a grown man! He’ll be fiiiiiine-

[USER’S ROLE AS {Robin III} IS NECESSARY FOR {Jason Todd}'S CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT. FAILURE TO BECOME {Robin III} WILL RESULT IN TERMINATION OF USER.]

Does the System have a manager? Tim wants a refund for his transmigration experience, please.

Chapter Text

Tim stares blankly at the gently glowing System panel hanging before him. 

He’s got to become Robin? He’s got to sacrifice his mental, physical and emotional health as well as years of his life to play babysitter for a grown man? 

All for what? To become the plot’s punching bag? To conveniently die once he’s no longer needed? He may not know much about the original plot, given his general disinterest in such an absolute shitstorm of a novel, but one thing was clearer than Jason Todd’s death and subsequent blackening; nearly everything bad that ever happened to Timothy Drake was a direct consequence of the Robin mantle.

He wishes he was joking about this. Apart from the death of his parents, all injury to himself, to those around him, the sacrifice of his education, health, body and future was all a result of becoming Robin.

It’s not fair.

If this was a standard reincarnation-transmigration-isekai experience (as per the internet), changing his predetermined death would be beyond simple. Either total avoidance of the Waynes and all their drama, or perhaps integrating with them early, fixing relationships and death flags before they even appeared in the first place would easily result in a different outcome. He might not have comprehensive future knowledge, but he knows enough to at least cause multiple major plot deviations.

There are history books written with the sole purpose of warning people of the mistakes of their predecessors, and there are so many sayings about history repeating itself etcetera, etcetera.

The lines of survival are drawn clearly in the sand, and yet Tim’s going to have to trample over them in the name of Not Dying.

Thanks, System. Really.

So much for the benefits of foreknowledge if he can’t use any of that to change the actually  life-threatening events.

But. He should make sure.

“System,” he says out loud, feeling like a fool for speaking to himself. “The original Tim died at the end. Is it even possible for me to survive the plot?” And then, more quietly, “Is it possible to send me home?”

[ONCE THE MAIN PLOT IS COMPLETE, USER IS GIVEN THE FOLLOWING OPTIONS: TO LIVE OUT THE REST OF THEIR DAYS WITHIN THE WORLD OF {Dark Knights of Gotham}, OR TO RETURN TO THEIR HOMEWORLD IN THEIR REVIVED BODY.]

Huh. Interesting. 

So the System can revive his old body, but conditionally. And if he finds a satisfactory ending here, he has the option to stay, should the vigilante life prove that appealing.  Tim almost scoffs at that thought. No way is that happening. He might be feeling a little unhinged right now, but he’s not that crazy. 

And the other pertinent question…

“How much can I affect this world without impacting the major plot points? I mean, are there any limits to how far I can change things outside of big events?”

A new System panel materialises beside the first one.

[USER MAY ACT AS THEY WISH, WITHIN THE BOUNDS OF THE MAJOR PLOT POINTS. IF USER’S ACTIONS IMPINGE UPON MAJOR EVENTS, EVEN UNINTENTIONALLY, USER WILL HAVE TO MANUALLY RE-ESTABLISH PLOT EQUILIBRIUM OR FACE TERMINATION.]

Despite it all, Tim feels himself grin. That was exactly what he needed to hear.

With a couple clarifying questions, Tim confirms exactly what he suspected. There are no penalties to his actions outside of main quests, no character or behaviour locks outside specific actions. He’s effectively unimpeded, so long as he doesn’t directly attempt to interfere with the Plot, something he intends to take full advantage of.

The next thing on the list: R-Points, transactions and the store.

The System confirms that R-Points are only deducted as a punishment for failed quests, something which appears to be inherently linked with Tim’s canonical impact on the Plot. Tasks are optional, and are not associated with punishments or point deductions.

R-Points themselves appear to be a carrot and stick mechanism of control over his actions. He has one hundred at the moment, but without a metric of comparison, he has no idea how large this sum is actually worth.

For that, he needs access to the System Store. 

Which…

[USER HAS NOT MET REQUIREMENTS TO ACCESS THE {Store}.]

Which just so happens to be locked behind unknown requirements. Great.

With a bit of further prodding, the System reveals new information.

[REQUIREMENTS TO ACCESS THE {Store}: FINISH QUEST: {Tutorial}. OPEN THE QUEST MENU TO SEE MORE DETAILS.]

He waits for further instruction on how to open this ‘Quest Menu’, to no avail. That’s as helpful as the System gets apparently. It threatens deportation and death, introduces an arbitrary currency, informs him that he has no choice but to spend his second childhood playing as an unpaid kung-fu intern to a guy dressed as a bat, then refuses to explain further.

Shouldn’t that kind of thing be covered in the tutorial? Where’s his comprehensive guide to the System for dummies?

After an additional minute or so of prodding at the luminous panel and thinking the words ‘quest menu’ really hard to no avail, he eventually gets it to work with verbal commands, which is terrible for subtlety if he needs to access the System around other people, and kind of really inconvenient. 

[QUEST MENU]

[{Tutorial} CHAIN QUEST #1: WAIT UNTIL SUNSET.]

Well. He hopes the rest of his quests are this descriptive.

A glance out the window reveals heavy clouds, a pale circle betraying the sun’s position behind them. Mid-morning. He’s got seven or so hours to kill.

Tim’s first day in Dark Knights of Gotham is spectacularly uneventful. 

Putting together the pieces of the original Timothy’s life feels less like an intrusion and more like he’s re-familiarising himself with past events, like going through a well-made scrapbook of a past holiday. Facts slot into place as he explores the house-manor, leaving little doubt in his mind that yes, he did live here, and yes, he has well and truly become Timothy Drake.

That is, if Timothy Drake was aware that he lived in a shitty webnovel, and had fuzzy memories of another life entirely.

The worksheets for various school activities and extracurriculars are carelessly scattered around his bedroom. A quick inspection reveals only basic fractions and spelling activities, something the current Tim could literally do in his sleep. The rest of his schooling equipment is similarly average, and for someone who was most of the way through an advanced computer science degree before being unceremoniously shunted into the body of a literal preteen, Tim realises that boredom is about to become an even greater enemy than the plot ever will.

School is about to become a nightmare. 

Excluding the entire social side of it (the idea of going through schoolyard politics again makes him cringe with distaste), Tim could do pretty much the entirety of the high school curriculum without much effort.  Faking mediocrity sounds a lot harder than excelling at the content, especially with the added emotional burden of sheer boredom. Hell, a lapse in concentration and he might accidentally out himself as a strange kind of child genius.

Outside, the rest of the house is uncannily neat compared the chaos of his private room and ensuite, evidently the results of  Mrs. McIlvaine’s work every weekend, and a general lack of human habitation for the most part. Most of downstairs feels like a showroom, permanently ready for guests to step inside at a second’s notice. It’s only the kitchen and the small adjacent living room that feels somewhat lived in.

The only real hiccup was in exploration of the upstairs exhibition rooms, containing grand displays of his parents’ archaeological findings, acknowledgements from museums and other grandstanding paraphernalia. Behind dinosaur fossils and vases from 700CE, the wall is lined with a massive mirror spanning the floor to the ceiling.

A turn, and staring back at him is a tiny, nine-year-old Tim Drake in oversized clothes and something about it all feels so very wrong.

It’s him. 

The boy in the mirror raises a hand to touch a cheek round with youth. The visage he wears is familiar, but not. There is a sense of dysphoria there, a half-remembered haptic memory that there’s a piece missing from this.

The system’s eerie green is reflected in his eyes, and he can almost make himself believe that they dimly glow in the darkness of the exhibition room. It is that glow, the glow of the System, that really makes his new reality sink in, hard, shattering through the carefully crafted layer of apathy he’d been using as a protective shawl against the truth.

Tim died.

He really died.

He’s stuck here, shunted into the shitty child body of a shitty character who makes shitty decisions and because of it, dies a painful lonely, shitty death. And it wasn’t even a good webnovel.

His breath stutters.

Body numb, his legs lose their strength, sending him to his knees before his reflection. A hand against cold glass catches him, and he presses it there, fighting the urge to sag against the icy surface. He looks at his visage. Looks harder. Tries to familiarise himself with it. Draws similarities between half-remembered familiarities and his current face. He feels completely at home in it physically. Because this is his body now.

But when he looks, really looks, there’s something niggling at the edge of his perception, almost imperceptible. He feels fine, if he closes his eyes. But in the mirror it doesn’t look like his own body, no matter how hard he tries to rationalise the changes away even though. 

He’s fallen headfirst into the uncanny valley, he notes slightly hysterically, watching every muscle twitch in barely-repressed panic with an eagle eye.

Sluggishly distant again, he feels akin to how he felt when he first found himself here in this world - a level of detachment only trumped by external stimuli and the inherent horror of the realisation that this was, in fact, real.

When the sun has finally receded behind the horizon, a tinny ding hastens the end of his sombre . The sudden noise makes him flinch, breaking the connection, tearing his line of sight away from his own foreign eyes. A glance, and the system’s Quest Menu has changed.

Pressing clammy palms against wooden floors, Tim pushes himself to shaky feet, casting one final look back to his retreating figure in the mirror. It still doesn’t feel right, nothing feels right, he doesn’t feel like him, but there isn’t anything he can do about that. Just. Not think about it. A good, long mental breakdown should have been sufficient to get enough of the feelings out of the way and let rationality put a foot in the door. 

[{Tutorial} CHAIN QUEST #2: RETRIEVE YOUR CAMERA.]

Tim does. It is with mechanical, stunted movements that he returns back to his bedroom, picking up the camera from where he’d carelessly discarded it the night before. A press of a button, and he confirms the charge is still mostly full, and the memory is sufficient for a good few shots. The System acknowledges this with a ding for quest completion.

[{Tutorial} CHAIN QUEST #3: GO TO THE FOLLOWING COORDINATES.]

Below are two sets of three-dimensional coordinates. One for the quest location, one for Tim’s current location.

Great. Some would disagree with the idea of giving a nine-year-old unfettered access to the internet or unlimited screentime, but Tim’s parents had gone above and beyond in that regard. He barely even has to think of his phone’s passcode before muscle memory has guided him through three-quarters of it, and accessing the GPS from then is simple. The coordinates the System gave are located smack-bang in the middle of the Bowery, near an overpass that strikes a chord in Tim’s memories for being notoriously popular with lurkers in the darker hours.

He’s about to get directions when he pauses.

“System?” He asks.

[THE SYSTEM PERFORMS 24-HOUR SUPPORT.]

He scuffs a toe against the carpet, “Is there a map function I can use for quests like this?”

[USER HAS NOT MET REQUIREMENTS TO ACCESS THE {Minimap}.] 

“And those requirements?”

[REQUIREMENTS TO ACCESS THE {Minimap}: FINISH QUEST: {Tutorial}.]

Classic. 

A quick scramble down the trellis outside his window, a mile-long walk to the closest bus station, a ten minute wait for the bus and the subsequent half-hour ride into Gotham, and Tim finds himself alone, in the Gotham streets. The only silver lining to the entire situation was that Original Tim had been rather familiar with the entire process, having made night-stalking excursions a regular occurrence.

It is with great patience that Tim makes his way to the designated coordinates, camera hidden away in his rattiest backpack, dodging drunks and drug dealers alike. 

He reaches the designated area and pulls up the Quest Menu again, only to find that nothing has changed. No ding. He prods it again, hoping to see Chain Quest #4, only to realise that his personal coordinates are slightly off. Thirty-five meters off vertically, to be precise.

He looks straight up. Above him lies the world’s ricketiest fire escape. Tim’s too young to be having migraines, but he supposes it’s never too late to start.

“You’ve got to be kidding me.”

Tim climbs the fire escape.

[{Tutorial} CHAIN QUEST #4: ANGLE CAMERA SOUTH-EAST.]

He does, and gets a familiar ding as the quest is judged as complete.

[{Tutorial} CHAIN QUEST #5: PHOTOGRAPH BATMAN AND/OR ROBIN.]

His eyes widen, and he jerks his attention back to the skyline. Experience tells him that there will only be a tiny window of opportunity, and that’s if he manages to spot them in the first place, especially in the dark. 

The only mystery remaining is why.

Why has the System summoned him out here for this in an official capacity? Why make this the tutorial?

On the bus over, Tim had tucked himself into a back corner, squished against the wall to avoid making contact with a particularly large piece of gum plastered to the faux leather of his seat. Half an hour of desperately avoiding eye contact with strangers had given him plenty of time to try and piece together the familiarity of this trip. The only conclusion he can draw is that the Original had made this trip an even greater number of times than his memories suggested, the occasions blurring together in their monotony. 

He’d found the photo albums under a loose floorboard in his room; leafed through them with the careful reverence that the Original Timothy had pieced them together with. Comprehensive in a way that spoke of a long-held obsession, Janet and Jack Drake’s absent parenting was bound to come around and  bite them one way or another sooner or later, and this was it.

Original Timothy was starved for something, that much was true, and Gotham’s vigilantes were the proxies for that.

Summoned from the safety of bed to photograph Gotham’s infamous vigilantes soaring across the skyline, the cryptic instructions make a lot more sense now.

Maybe Original Tim continued to do this until the plot started, if his memories contain such a dedicated insistence of honouring Batman and Robin. Maybe that was why he knew Jason had died.

Yes, he realises, finger gently curled around the camera shutter, tense with apprehension, this is how he knew.

This stalking was the main reason the Original stepped in as Robin. How could he miss Batman’s deterioration, especially after Jason Todd’s public funeral, after Robin’s gaping absence at Batman’s side becomes unmistakeable? The Original would have witnessed it all through a camera lens, helpless. Talking to a third party was impossible, given the sensitivity of the information involved. And if all other methods failed…

Becoming a replacement Robin would have been the only thing the Original could do.

Turning his full attention to the direction the Tutorial indicated, he squints as he casts his eyes over the streets of Gotham from this vantage point.

And- there.  

Hours upon hours of memories fail to do them justice.

Robin, arcing over the streets with arms outstretched, glee unmistakeable. Batman, following with practiced, seamless movements, a hulking mass of protective darkness. 

A bubble of excitement begins to rise in his chest, and Tim’s not sure if it's his own roiling emotions or a remnant feeling from the original owner. It’s magical, watching them soar effortlessly, and before he knows it, Tim’s pressed the shutter button of his camera, capturing the moment in perpetuity. A piece of tonight, immortalised on film forever. His to keep.

They’re gone within a moment, and Tim barely hears the ding of a quest successfully completed.

Holy shit. Holy shit. 

After a moment of letting the excitement wash over him, he reopens the Quest Menu.

[CONGRATULATIONS! CONGRATULATIONS! CONGRATULATIONS! YOU HAVE COMPLETED THE {Tutorial}! TONIGHT WAS A SIMULATED VERSION OF YOUR PERSONALISED ‘DAILY TASK’ OBJECTIVE.]

[DAILY TASK UNLOCKED!]

[DAILY TASK: PHOTOGRAPH A GOTHAM VIGILANTE FOR 1 R-POINT. TASK RESET OCCURS AT MIDDAY.]

Oh no. 

He’s got to do this again? Every single night? For one measly R-Point? 

What about his sleep schedule? What about his sanity?

He wants a refund. No, he needs a refund, Tim is going to complain to someone’s manager about this. He only has a hundred right now, and if he can only earn a maximum of one a night, and that’s only if he can find and photograph the damn Bats every single time - notorious for being impossible to photograph - and even with three or so years before Robin, that’s not nearly enough points!

Please let the tutorial have a couple freebies, maybe it’s merciful for once-

[{Tutorial} REWARDS GRANTED: {Store} ACCESS + A GREATER CHANCE OF SURVIVAL.]

And?

No additional rewards messages follow, leaving Tim to shiver alone on a rooftop in the dodgiest district of Gotham. 

“No points?” he asks the open air, honestly kind of insulted. “Not even a single measly point? I technically completed a task, if what you’re saying is accurate.”

[USER COMPLETED THE {Tutorial}, NOT A TASK. THE {Tutorial} DOES NOT HAVE A POINT REWARD.]

How stingy. 

“In video games the tutorial always has a reward. Y’know, getting the character ready for the main game.”

The system doesn’t respond.

“Come on,” Tim huffs. “It’s one point. And you have to admit, a reward being a ‘greater chance of survival’? Yeah right. It wants me to go to the most dangerous areas of a dangerous city, at night, by myself. As a child.” 

He drives the point home.

“It’s a blatant lie. Doing this task will kill me faster, if anything. A ‘greater chance of survival,’ sure. You should at least compensate me for the mistake on your part. Apologems, if you will.”

No response. Then:

[R-POINTS +1. CURRENT R-POINTS: 101]

He’ll take it.

There has to be some kind of additional benefit this damn system has to have, some kind of golden finger to make it all worth it. What functions did the systems in other media have? Other than the death penalty function, evidently. 

“Do I have, like, a stats page or an inventory?” he asks after a second of thought, running through his admittedly small mental library of other shows with a similar premise.

Surprisingly, the system does, in fact, do something.

It opens to the store.

[STORE | SYSTEM FEATURES]

[User Statistics Access … 200 R-POINTS]

[Inventory Access … 200 R-POINTS]

[Minimap Access … 250 R-POINTS]

[Quest Hint Access … 200 R-POINTS]

[Character Customisation Token … 500 R-POINTS]

[Direct Messaging Access … 200 R-POINTS]

[Gacha Access … 150 R-POINTS]

[Gacha Token x 1 … 160 R-POINTS]

[Gacha Token x 10 … 1599 R-POINTS]

Like most streaming services and other subscription-based technology, all the important functions are hidden behind a fucking paywall the size of the Great Wall of China, with the cheapest option available being the damn GACHA . Because of course the system has a gacha function.

He really should have expected this.

The other tabs in the store seem to be split up into various other categories including: [PHYSICAL ENHANCEMENTS], [SKILL UPGRADES + MASTERIES], [MAGICAL + MENTAL TECHNIQUES], [EQUIPMENT] and finally [PLOT DEVICES].

Tim instantly selects the Store’s [PLOT DEVICES] option, only to be blasted with options such as {Protagonist Halo} or {Plot Armour}, all of which had so many zeroes on the price tag that Tim felt physically sick having the tab open.

The [MAGICAL AND MENTAL TECHNIQUES] section unfortunately has similarly massive numbers plastered everywhere. Sure, {Instant Karma: Absolute Damage Reflection} sounded totally badass, but six zeroes was a little too much, even for something of that caliber. {Invisibility}, {Regeneration} or {Shapeshifting} also sounded awesome for Tim’s continued survival, but putting himself, his children, and the next six generations of his family into System-enforced debt simply wasn’t worth it.

He opts for the much more manageable sounding [EQUIPMENT] option, only to find {Excalibur} as the first option, immediately followed by something called a {DEATH STAR}. The price tags attached were as atrocious as expected.

“What the?” he mutters, scrolling through more overpriced options such as the {Blessed Orchid Physique} and {Grand Technomancy}, “Why are they all so expensive?”

Helpful for potentially the first time in its entire existence, the System responds rapidly. [USER HAS PRESET CHARACTER PARAMETERS. IN THE {Store}, THERE ARE ABILITIES AND TECHNIQUES THAT USER CANNOT LOGICALLY OBTAIN OR MAY HAVE NEGATIVE IMPACTS ON THE PLOT. AS SUCH, THE PRICES FOR THESE HAVE BEEN ADJUSTED ACCORDINGLY.]

Right. That actually makes sense, for once. A massive shame he can’t get them, he thinks as his fingers linger over {Spatial Magic Mastery} and {Heavenly Dragon Physique} longingly.

[WOULD YOU LIKE TO APPLY A FILTER TO YOUR SEARCH, LIMITING YOUR RESULTS TO THOSE WITHIN YOUR PRICE RANGE?]

Tim would love that, actually.

[STORE | SEARCH QUERY: R-POINTS<100]

[Hairband x 1 … 25 R-POINTS]

[Small Rock x 2 … 50 R-POINTS]

[Toothpick x 5 … 75 R-POINTS]

[Breath Mint x 5 … 75 R-POINTS]

[Tampon x 1 … 90 R-POINTS]

…Nevermind.