Chapter Text
Jason learns a lot over the following few hours, some by power of observation, some by listening to Tim, and some by being able to tell when Tim is clearly hiding something and drawing his own conclusions.
For example: when they enter the kitchen and Tim hops onto a bar stool by the massive kitchen island, pulling out his phone to check UberEats for a good pizza place, Jason pokes around a bit. He examines the calendar hung up by the wall, which has dentist appointments and grocery delivery dates neatly noted down in the margins, as well as Alfred’s vacation and Bruce’s ‘business trip’. On first glance, it looks just like Jason remembers it, with only the year being different.
But when he thumbs through it, making sure to quickly scan each month, he can’t help but notice that all of these appointments and check-ups are for Alfred and Bruce only. Dick had moved out before Jason ever moved in, so it’s no surprise that Dick’s name only appears a couple of times (Dick Moving Day, from February).
But there is absolutely zero mention of Tim anywhere in this calendar.
“Hey, when’s your birthday?” Jason asks.
“Hm? July nineteenth,” Tim replies absently, scrolling through his phone.
It’s September now (which really messes with his head because Jason remembers it being April). Jason turns the pages until he’s arrived at July. Nothing. No mention of a birthday.
Jason doesn’t know what that means, but it means something.
“The old man get you anything nice?” he asks, trying to sound casual.
Tim frowns at his phone. “Want to split one large sausage pizza?”
“Go for it.”
Tim puts in the order and then stops frowning at the screen in order to frown at Jason instead. “Why would Bruce get me a birthday present? He’s not my dad.”
“So you do have a dad,” Jason clarifies. “Your parents still live next-door, and you still live there, too, and you totally have a loving family and you only hang out at Wayne Manor and know all our secret identities because, what, we befriended you or something?”
Some weird expression crosses Tim’s face, but it’s gone too fast for Jason to identify it. “Yeah,” he says. “You, um. You and I both go to Gotham Academy, and we just started hanging out, and then, yeah.”
That sounds like a reasonable explanation, even though Jason has a hard time believing that Bruce would just be okay with him giving up their secret identities to this random neighbour kid. Except-
“But you said we don’t get along.”
There’s that weird expression again. “Yeah, um, you’re kind of mad at me at the moment.”
Mad enough to scare Tim badly enough that he gets a panic attack just from being alone with Jason, apparently. Mad enough to taser him when he so much as takes a step in Tim’s direction. Mad enough to try and kill Tim, maybe.
Jason decides to let that line of questioning go for the moment because it’s making him queasy, and takes another route. He sits down next to Tim (Tim notably tenses) and says, “And your parents don’t think it’s weird that you’re at our place this much?”
“They’re gone a lot,” Tim explains. “Travelling. They don’t come home much, so it’s not like they’d notice.”
Jason turns this over in his mind. “Your real dad get you a birthday present, then? Or your mom?”
“Of course,” Tim says immediately. “They took me out for my birthday, and we went to my favourite restaurant, and they got me a new camera and a huge cake, and my mom gave me the biggest hug.”
Jason turns this over in his mind, too, narrowing his eyes at Tim. Tim offers him a shaky smile.
“You’re lying,” he says.
Tim stops smiling. “What? I’m not!”
“Is that what you told Bruce? And he really bought that? I’d bet anything that your parents weren’t even home that day.”
“They were,” Tim insists. “Basically. It’s not their fault they mixed up the dates. I don’t mind celebrating a week late.”
“Uh-huh,” Jason says. “So your parents suck. Great. I’m surprised Bruce didn’t actually kidnap you.”
“He’s got a lot going on,” Tim says, sounding exactly as defensive as when he was talking about his family. “He went through kind of a crisis a couple years back, and he’s gotten a little better, but he’s still struggling.”
Finally, Jason thinks, some real information. “What kind of crisis?”
Tim frantically looks around the room. “Mutated, um, cereal.”
“Like, a serial killer?”
Tim’s gaze darts towards the cereal box that’s next to the coffee machine and blushes. “Yeah, that’s what I meant. A serial killer.”
Jason allows his scepticism to show on his face. “And that’s the big crisis that made Bruce still struggling to cope two years later? A mutated serial killer?”
Tim crosses his arms. “Yes. Exactly.”
“Uh-huh,” Jason repeats. There is, he thinks, absolutely no way on earth this is true.
The doorbell rings as the pizza presumably arrives, and Tim scrambles to get it. Saved by the bell, Jason thinks sourly. But he doesn’t want to start another argument, and he definitely doesn’t want Tim to get out the taser again, so it’s probably best to stand back for now. He can always look at the files on the Batcomputer later.
*
“Riverdale?”
“Still ongoing.”
“Gray Ghost?”
“Renewed for another season just last month. Bruce still gets fits over it.”
“Downton Abbey?”
Tim frowns. “You watch Downton Abbey?”
“What? Of course not. Just, you know, out of curiosity,” Jason says hastily.
Tim frowns harder. “Well, I’ve no idea, I think there was a movie or something. I wouldn’t have expected you to enjoy period dramas.”
Truthfully, just about everything Jason does enjoy are period dramas. Well, that, and books, obviously, but he’s quickly realised that there’s absolutely zero point in asking Tim about that.
“Moving on,” he says, getting back to business. “Twisted Hearts?”
“You watch Twisted Hearts?!”
*
Dinner goes down fine, but as soon as Jason announces that he’s heading to bed early, Tim becomes weirdly cagey again. That sucks, because it’s not even like Jason was actually planning to go to bed at 9 pm, he just wanted to get Tim off his back in order to access the Batcomputer. The plan backfires, because suddenly Tim finds a dozen reasons why Jason can’t go into his room.
“There’s a mice infestation,” he says as he has to jog to keep up with Jason’s fast strides down the hallway, “and also you – future-you – set off a car bomb or something in there, and also-Alfred-had-to-clear-out-your-room-last-week-to-clean-up-so-don’t-be-surprised-if-it’s-empty- oh.” Tim finally seems to have run out of words as Jason throws open the door to his room.
“Looks fine to me,” Jason says. “No mice.”
Tim is staring at the inside of Jason’s room like he’s never seen it before. “Yeah,” he says slowly, “yeah, I think it should be okay now.”
“Great.” Jason makes a show of kicking off his sneakers and flopping down on the bed. He closes his eyes and yawns exaggeratedly. “I’m really tired, so I’m just gonna sleep now, if it’s all the same to you.”
“Sure,” Tim says, sounding very unsure indeed. “You just- okay. Call me if you need me. Okay. Bye!”
The door falls shut. Jason silently counts to ten before sitting up and taking a closer look around.
Everything is like he remembers it. Perfectly-made bed, books sorted alphabetically, a stack of half-finished homework on his desk, a photo of him and Bruce hanging on the wall, a pair of concert tickets on his bedside table.
Huh.
Everything is exactly how he remembers it.
He picks up one of the tickets. Dick got them for him, a surprise gift for no particular occasion, just because he remembered Jason talking about a band he likes and saw that they’re coming to Gotham. The concert is next month, early May, which of course means that the concert is long over now, but- but the thing is, Jason remembers placing these tickets on his bedside table so that he could look at them every morning and feel excited.
It's strange that future-him would still keep them here more than two years later. Surely there were other concerts, other things to get excited about.
Without quite thinking about it, he gets up and walks to his desk, examines the homework. He sees exercises for Maths and Biology, and an essay for English that’s nearly done. He remembers that essay: it’s going to count for a big part of this year’s grade, so he’s worked hard on it.
In Jason’s memory, he worked on that essay yesterday.
Why would future-him keep around homework from when he was a freshman? And how come the essay is ungraded? Didn’t he hand it in?
Jason is starting to feel really, really bad about all this.
The Superman-themed calendar on the wall (a gag gift from Dick last Christmas): set to April, two years ago.
His clothes in the wardrobe: all fitted for a scrawny fifteen-year-old who hasn’t hit a growth spurt yet. Jason’s not sure what size he is now, but he is certain that none of these clothes would fit him now.
The slip of paper on his desk that just reads ETHIOPEIA with a big question mark next to it: undated und unfamiliar, but for a second there, Jason felt a weird flicker of something in his mind, not quite a memory but not not a memory, either.
Something is really really wrong here, and Jason is going to find out what it is or die trying.
When he steps out of his room, he half-expects Tim to be camped out in the hallway, preventing him from leaving. But there’s no one here. No one but him.
Absently, Jason thinks about how by all rights and according to himself, Tim should’ve gone home for the night, since apparently he does not live here. He thinks about how unlikely that is, how certain he feels that Tim is still somewhere in the manor right now, guarding Jason or watching him or something more sinister.
He goes to the kitchen. Turns on the lights. Goes back to the calendar. Flips it back one page and searches until he finds August 16th.
There’s nothing there. No note, nothing.
This could still be excusable. Tim’s birthday wasn’t in here either, after all. But when Jason goes to March, just to be sure, he sees Dick’s birthday highlighted with a bright yellow marker. And when he goes to April, there’s Bruce’s birthday, highlighted in orange.
So the calendar is up-to-date. It’s got the birthdays of the main family members. Tim isn’t in there, because he’s only the neighbour.
Jason isn’t in there, and he doesn’t know what to make of that.
He sits down heavily at the kitchen table and buries his face in his hands. Christ. Just – fucking Christ. He can hear Bruce’s voice in his mind, telling him to observe, to note every detail, to put together the clues and figure out the big picture. But whatever bigger picture there is here, it’s really messed up, that’s for sure.
He turns off the kitchen lights and goes to the living room, where he sets the big grandfather clock in the corner to display 10:47, and goes down to the Cave.
He means to access the Batcomputer. But instead he freezes right at the entrance, staring at something that he couldn’t see earlier from the cell. There’s a memorial there, with the Robin uniform – Jason’s uniform – inside. The plaque reads ‘Jason Todd, a Good Soldier’.
He throws up. His heart is beating so fast that he’s convinced it’s going to shatter his ribcage and tear itself out of his chest.
“Shit,” someone says from right behind him, “shit. Jason, it’s okay. Just breathe.”
Jason is shaking, which he only realises when the person puts a steadying hand on his arm. It is, of course, Tim, who has grown pale and is watching him with wide, worried eyes. “You- you knew,” Jason rasps out, once he’s gotten his breathing under control a bit. “That I died.”
Tim nods, the picture of misery. “Yeah,” he says softly. “I’m sorry. I didn’t want to upset you.”
Too late for that, Jason thinks, but he doesn’t say it. Tim keeps his hand on Jason’s arm and somehow, that helps a little. “How?”
Tim lets out a little, resigned sigh, but his voice is steady when he says, “The Joker.”
“How’d he do it?”
“Explosion. And- he beat you with a crowbar, before. So you probably wouldn’t have survived even if he hadn’t blown up the warehouse.”
Jason takes a deep, shuddering breath. He wants to throw up again. “Bruce?”
“Tried everything humanly possible to save you. But he was too late.”
“Dick?”
“Off-world at the time.” Tim’s mouth twists into an ironic little half-smile. “They both blame themselves. Even now.”
“And – the Joker,” Jason says, even though that name tastes like ash in his mouth, “where is he now?”
Tim’s hand twitches, but he doesn’t let go. “Arkham.” He glances at Jason, like he’s worried about his reaction.
Jason – does not know how to react to this. He doesn’t know how to react to any of what he’s just been told.
“Okay,” he says finally, and opens his mouth to ask the next question, but Tim is faster.
“Okay? Really?”
The question takes Jason so aback that his mind blanks for a second. Somehow this, too, helps, like his body is happy it gets a quick break of all the drama and the panic and the adrenaline. “I- yes? Isn’t it?”
“Bruce didn’t kill him,” Tim confesses, rushing the words so that they’re nearly indiscernible. “He just locked him up. But it’s okay, because the security is super strong, and he’s not getting out, ever. Bruce made sure of that.”
Jason nods. His heart is still beating slightly irregularly, and he doesn’t love the idea that apparently he was brutally murdered by a laughing maniac, but also, now that he’s had a few minutes to adjust, the fact remains that he doesn’t remember all this. He’s been told something that must have been deeply traumatising, yes, but it’s not traumatising for this amnesiac version of himself.
“Good,” he says. “He should be locked up.”
For some reason, this makes Tim look at him really weirdly, like Jason has just committed some sort of faux pas. “Huh,” he says quietly, more to himself than to Jason.
“So- wait,” Jason says, desperate to get them back on track because for the first time, he’s actually getting answers out of Tim, and this seems like too good a chance to waste, and also, if he doesn’t find out more, he’s literally going to go insane. “So I died two years ago, and everyone was super sad about it, and then I just…came back? Did I just come back yesterday? Is that why Superboy attacked me, because you all thought I was a zombie?”
Tim says, “No, you came back a few months ago, but you took on a new identity as the Red Hood and you keep murdering people, and yesterday you hunted me down because I’m the new Robin and you got really mad about that, and also the Lazarus pit is almost definitely affecting your judgement, and so you tried to kill me, but then Superboy hit you on the head and, um, yeah. Here we are.” Tim offers a shaky smile.
There’s a lot to process here, and Jason’s mind is reeling with all the new information. He settles on the first thing that he thinks of: “You’re the new Robin and your birthday still didn’t make it into the calendar?”
A small, startled laugh escapes Tim. He gives Jason this weird double-glance, trying to gauge his sincerity maybe, and then he laughs again. “You just found out you were brutally murdered and got replaced by this random kid, and that’s what you focus on?”
“Oh, I’m focusing on the murder thing alright,” Jason says. “But that’s for when Bruce and Dickwing get back. No point yelling at you about it.” He hesitates, because he’s not sure how he feels about it, but this is something that needs to be said. “You really – replaced me? As Robin?”
Tim tenses. “Yes. But it wasn’t like you’re thinking! Bruce was, like, really messed up after your death. Someone had to step in, ground him, give him a bit of perspective. So that’s what I did. And it’s not like I didn’t try other ways first! But Dick didn’t want to come back, and Superman didn’t reply to my letters, and he just kept getting worse, so this was the only way.”
This doesn’t quite sit right with Jason – if he died at fifteen, it seems weird that Bruce would jump at the chance to put another kid into the costume –, but he also remembers what Tim said earlier.
Yesterday you hunted me down because I’m the new Robin and you got really mad about that, and so you tried to kill me. It makes sense that Tim is tense around him now. Why wouldn’t he be? This only shows he’s got a healthy sense of self-preservation.
Then again, Tim did let him out of the cell, so maybe those self-preservation instincts need a bit of work.
“I think,” he says slowly, “that future-me is an asshole.”
Tim’s mouth drops open in surprise. Then he laughs again. “God,” he says, “he’s the worst. He tried to slit my throat! He kept calling me Replacement and Pretender, which like, what does he think I’m even pretending, it’s not like you can pretend to be Robin, and also he kept going on and on about how this was a message to the Bats, but like, the only message attacking a teenager sends is that Red Hood has lost it.”
Something akin to guilt settles heavy into Jason’s stomach, but he pushes it down as he makes an executive decision to ignore it. It’s not him, he thinks. It’s him-in-two-years, after a lot of trauma and a healthy dose of Lazarus pit-induced psychosis. The Jason of today would never do any of what Tim just described, and he needs to hold on to that.
“God,” he says, making an effort to keep his voice light, “what a dick.”
“He is a dick,” Tim agrees emphatically. “And the worst thing is that I’m pretty sure Bruce and Dick know his identity, but they didn’t tell me because they never tell me anything, and so when he came to the tower yesterday I was like, who is this weird dude in a Robin costume-“
While Tim continues ranting, Jason gets some water and a rag from a nearby cupboard and cleans up his sick, then washes his hands just as Tim is saying, “-and then he took off his mask and was like, I’m your biggest nightmare, and I told him that that’s not really saying much, and then he took my bo staff and-“
Jason puts an arm around Tim’s narrow shoulders and gently guides him towards the staircase that leads up to the main house. By the time they’re in the kitchen and Jason starts a pot of hot chocolate, Tim has moved on towards Bruce.
“-and to be honest, I’m not even completely sure that Bruce wouldn’t take Jason’s side, I mean your side, because if Red Hood just stopped killing people Bruce would probably take him back with open arms, and I don’t care about that, I think it’s really nice if Bruce gets his son back, and Jason can have Robin back too if he wants, but Bruce should at least acknowledge my accomplishments, too. That’s only fair, right? I mean, I went to Europe for him, and I had to go through all this effort of creating an entire fake exchange program in case my parents asked any questions, and then my parents didn’t even realise I was gone so all that work was for nothing, and then when I finally come back from my extensive training, all Bruce says to me is, work harder, Jason was a faster learner, and like, is he serious?”
Jason slides over a mug of hot chocolate towards Tim, who finally stops his monologue long enough to take a sip, only to immediately put the mug back down, staring at Jason with betrayal in his eyes.
“I burned my tongue!”
“I- sorry?” Jason says, uncertain. “Have you never had a hot drink before?”
Tim frowns at him like Jason has asked something very stupid, pointedly shoves away the mug, and then, he’s off again.
Jason patiently listens to Tim’s complaints for the remainder of the evening. It’s weirdly cathartic, even though there’s so much concerning shit there, because in Jason’s memory, he was Robin literally two days ago, and sure, he gets into arguments with Bruce a lot, but he never laid all his grievances out on the table like that.
Not like Tim is doing. Clearly, this has been a long time in the making.
It's well past midnight by the time Tim finally runs out of steam. “Sorry,” he says, “I think I went on a little longer than I meant to.”
“Wasn’t that long,” Jason says, puts down the half-finished scarf he’s spent the past couple of hours knitting after going through Alfred’s supplies, and reaches out to ruffle Tim’s hair, because they might be the same age but Jason is also so big now and he needs to make use of this while he can. “What do you say we head to bed now, though?”
Tim’s eyes are already drooping. “Yeah,” he mumbles, “good idea.” He obediently follows Jason up the stairs, but when they get to the family wing, he stops. “Good night,” he says. “See you tomorrow?”
“Um,” Jason says. “Aren’t you spending the night?” He knows Tim has a house only two miles away, but he just assumed that since Tim got stuck with babysitting duty and apparently has the world’s most absent parents, he’d stay in the manor until either Jason regained his memories or until one of the adults returned.
“No, I am,” Tim says, and then colours. “I mean, if you want me to? I know this is technically your house, so-“
“It’s fine,” Jason says gruffly, feeling supremely awkward. He’s spent the past few years feeling wrong-footed and out of place at the manor, and it’s strange to think that he’s not the only one.
“Oh,” Tim says. “Well, good. In that case-“ He points in the directions of the guest rooms. “I’ll just- yeah.” He gives Jason a weird little half-wave and walks away.
Jason frowns after him. No birthday marked in the calendar, no room in the family wing, sent to Europe to train because Bruce couldn’t be bothered to. Christ. Jason’s reasons to yell at Bruce have just had one more added to the list.
Before he yells at Bruce, though, he really wants to yell at his future self first.
*
“What about, like, Gotham? What’s been going on these past couple years? Did I miss anything interesting?”
“Not really. I mean, there was the plague of mutated spiders.”
“Oh.”
“And that weird cannibal cult that lived in Gotham’s sewers for a while has been contained. Oh, and you can swim in Gotham River again. I mean, you really shouldn’t, but there was this big clean-up effort last year that Dick and I helped with for PR-reasons even though B said he’d literally rather die than cater to the media, and we removed all the corpses, so, yeah. Companies still do totally dump their toxic waste in the water though, so maybe you should just go to a public pool instead.”
“Right.”
“Then again, there was this big public pool scandal a few weeks ago. Although it really wasn’t that big a deal. Nothing like when Gotham was shut off from the rest of America for a few months and the army came to build this big wall around us, and we were declared a sovereign state or something-“
“What?”
“I don’t know, it was a weird time. Oh hey, we have a new donut shop now! It’s really good. So you missed that, too.”
*
Now that everything is out in the open and there are no more secrets, Jason feels more relaxed than he has since he first woke up in his bedroom. He knows the deal, there’s nothing to be nervous about anymore, and yes, it’s super creepy that his bedroom still looks exactly the same, but again, it’s not creepy to Jason, to whom this is just His Room, even though it’s most definitely a really weird shrine to everyone else.
Two days after he loses his memories, he breaks into Dick’s room – this one, thankfully, has changed a little, even though Dick no longer lives here –, rummages through his things and eventually finds what he was looking for: a can of spray paint.
“Dick used to spray?” Tim asks as he follows Jason into the Batcave. “I never knew that. Does Bruce know? This is so badass. Wait, what are we doing?”
“It was his three weeks of teenage rebellion,” Jason answers, heading straight to the Robin memorial in the corner. “Alfred told me. Apparently, Dick even got arrested. Bruce must’ve been pissed for weeks. Hey, hand me that crowbar.”
Instead of obeying, Tim keeps hovering, throwing him an anxious look. “Um, why? What’s happening? It’s just that future-you has this weird thing about crowbars, it’s part of what you kept shouting at me when you attacked me-“
“Fine, I’ll get it,” Jason says, gets the crowbar, hits the glass case with enough force that it breaks into a thousand tiny shards, then shakes the spray can and holds it out to Tim. “He didn’t adopt a fucking good soldier, he adopted a son. God, what an asshole.”
Tim says slowly, “You want me to spray paint something on the Robin costume?”
Jason grins. “No, I want you to do it to the Batmobile. Don’t tell me you’ve never wanted to.”
Tim hesitates, but when his eyes slowly light up, Jason knows he’s won. “I’ve got a better idea, though. When he comes back, he’s going to see it immediately.”
“Yes, that’s the-“
“Wouldn’t it be way cooler if he took out the Batmobile like he does every night, thinking nothing of it, and then when the moonlight hits, the paint shows up?”
“He’d drive around with MORON on his stupid car all night long without realising,” Jason says, awed. “Can you do that?”
Tim returns his grin, suddenly seeming way more excited than Jason has ever seen him. “Of course I can. I’ll take care of the paint, you think of something we can put on the back of his cape, too?”
Jason shakes his hand. “Deal.”
*
“Alright, let’s get to the real stuff. Got any gossip on what Dickie’s up to? He still live in that shithole of an apartment?”
“He moved, actually. His new place still sucks, though. He and Bruce got into his huge argument about it, except they got into it during patrol, so they had to keep yelling in metaphors, it was painful to watch.”
“Let me guess – Bruce wants to pay, Dick would literally rather jump in front of a moving car?”
“Pretty much. Bruce kept saying how he wants Nightwing to have a safe space without worrying about cash, and Dick said that he’s his own man, so the next day, there were rumours everywhere about how Batman is Nightwing’s sugar daddy.”
“Oh my god. Oh my god.”
“I know. Here, I’ll show you some of my favourite tweets-“
*
The third day post-amnesia is a Monday. On Sunday evening, Jason watches Tim like a hawk, but the kid shows zero inclination to go back to his own place. Alright then.
Sunday night, Jason, whose last memory of Gotham Academy is less than a week old and who remembers perfectly well how long it takes to get there from the Manor if you take the bus, sets his alarm clock to 7:00.
Monday morning at 7:15, Jason, newly showered and dressed, knocks on the door to the guest room and then barges in without waiting for a reply.
Tim is still in bed, and he barely twitches as Jason comes in. “Wha’s it?” he mutters, head buried in his pillow.
“School day,” Jason says, “up, up, up. I said up.” He tears the blanket away from Tim, who clings on to it with the desperation of a dying man.
“You don’t have school,” Tim complains when Jason has succeeded in depriving him of the blanket. “I thought that was obvious when I said you died two years ago.”
“I know. But you still have school.”
Tim doesn’t miss a beat. “No, I don’t. It’s a school holiday.”
“No, it’s not,” Jason counters. “I checked the website, moron. Listen, I know you don’t trust me to be here on my own, but I promise not to burn anything down in your absence. Now hurry up or you’re going to miss the bus.”
Tim does not miss the bus, but he does complain the entire way through getting ready (“I don’t understand why I can’t just skip one single day”), eating breakfast (“I don’t even usually eat breakfast, so if I vomit that’s on you-“), putting on his shoes (“also I don’t have any of my school stuff here, so I’m going to get reprimanded for that and it’s your fault”), and leaving the house (“I hate you”). Jason watches him leave through the kitchen window, torn between fond exasperation and envy. Man, he really wishes he could’ve accompanied Tim. He hopes future-him at least got his GED after he got resurrected.
He waits a few minutes to make sure that Tim gets on the bus and doesn’t just sneak back into the house. Then, once he’s certain that the kid is safely on his way to school, he puts on a pair of Bruce’s heavy boots and Bruce’s fancy expensive coat and starts walking in the direction of the Drake estate.
He's driven past the Drakes’ house on his bike a few times. To this date, he has never seen a car in the driveway and he doesn’t see one today. Breaking in is laughably easy, too. Zero cameras, zero security and, worst of all, zero people inside.
Jason decides to treat this like a mission. He searches the rooms systematically. Kitchen: empty fridge, freezer stacked to the brim with ready-meals. Living room: pristine. Dining room: pristine. Master bedroom: bed made, looks like a hotel. No family photos anywhere in the entire house. Finally, after going through a couple identical guest rooms, he opens the door to what must be Tim’s room.
Tim’s room: like Jason imagines the inside of a trash can. Yikes.
At least, he reasons, this room is clearly lived in. There are clothes on the floor, there’s homework on the desk, there’s a backpack thrown into one corner and there are some of those glowey plastic stars glued to the ceiling. Tim’s put up a few posters, mostly of movies Jason doesn’t know and also, hilariously, of Batman.
Jason brought a bag, so he packs what he identifies as books and folders needed for Gotham Academy, and he also brought a phone (future-him’s phone’s, which is a newer model than Jason is used to, but he’s able to work it just fine) so he uses that to snap pictures of all the empty rooms. The entire house has a mausoleum-like feel to it.
The trip doesn’t take more than two hours. Back in the manor, Jason finally accesses the Batcomputer. He starts researching the Drakes and compiles all the information into a file, adds the photos, and then, just out of curiosity, he pulls up his own file.
There’s all the stuff in there that he’d expect, but what’s interesting is the secret identity bit. It lists him as Robin (former), but it also says Red Hood (suspected). Huh. So Tim was right about how Bruce already knew.
Jason isn’t sure how he feels about that, just like he isn’t sure about a whole lot of other things right now, so he does what he does best: he compartmentalises the hell out of it.
When Tim returns home, he isn’t happy when he realises Jason broke into his place and stole his stuff, but he doesn’t seem too upset about it, either. He does sulk throughout all of dinner (pizza again), but Jason has spent the entire past year sulking, so he knows the deal, and he does what Bruce always does with Jason: he ignores it.
It takes him a couple of tries, but he finds his angle quickly enough. “So,” he says into the oppressive silence, “how’d you become Robin?”
Tim throws him a quick glance. By now, Jason has learned that this is Tim checking whether he’s going to go into a murderous rage. To reassure him, Jason gives him a thumbs up and chews obnoxiously.
Evidently satisfied, Tim stops brooding and launches into a complicated story that Jason already knows parts of, but that he's hearing in full for the first time now. Essentially, it can be broken down to this: Jason dies, Bruce starts losing it, Tim’s attempts to help culminate in finding Dick, Dick refuses to become Robin but suggests Tim take up the mantle, and then there’s a long bit about Batman and Tim-Robin’s first case together.
Except, wait a minute.
“Hold up,” Jason interrupts, “how’d you know Dick was Nightwing?”
The pizza forgotten on his plate, Tim starts another story, this one about Haley’s Circus and that stupid show-off trick Dick always insists on doing (Jason always knew that Dick would be the one to give up the game eventually). By his own account, Tim essentially stalked Batman for years afterwards which, wow, super creepy.
“And your parents were just chill with you running around with a camera at night, following around two vigilantes?” Jason asks, but he already knows the answer.
“Oh, they didn’t notice,” Tim says, just like Jason suspected, and now he finally does take another bite of pizza. Mouth full of cheese and tomato and sausage, he adds, “I used to think that if I got killed, too, how lucky that’d be, because there’s no way anyone would connect my death to Robin’s death, not like they could yours. No one even knows I know Bruce Wayne.”
Jason stares at him. “And now? Do you still think it’d be lucky?” he asks slowly, trying to hide how much he’s panicking because, Christ, so many red flags here, what the hell, Bruce-
Tim starts speaking, frowns, swallows, and then attempts it again. “Nope,” he says blithely. “Now I’ve just made up my mind not to die. Can’t be that hard, right? Like, I don’t want you to take this the wrong way, but I think your death probably could’ve been avoided, too, if you’d been a little smarter about it. No offense!”
“None taken,” Jason says dryly. His heart is beating regularly again. Good to know Bruce’s new kid isn’t suicidal, he’s just a bit of an ass. Thank God. The file Jason is slowly compiling on Timothy Drake is already thick enough as it is.
*
“So, the Teen Titans, huh? You know, I joined them myself. You’ve probably seen my statue in the memorial hall.”
“…”
“What? Oh, come on.”
“To be fair, you were only a member like, super briefly! They didn’t exactly have time to bond with you.”
“Dick did! Unbelievable. Next you’ll tell me that he didn’t show up to my funeral, either.”
“...”
“Oh my God. Oh my fucking God.”
“He’s really sad about it, though! Got into a fight with Bruce about it and everything. Apparently Bruce didn’t even invite him.”
“This is so typical. Did you know that Bruce only told Dick he had adopted a new kid when Dick saw an article about it online?”
“Really?”
“I swear. This whole family is insane. Hey, at least we’ve got each other, right?”
“Right.”
*
Tim likes this version of Jason. That’s the worst part of it. He likes ‘thinks he’s fifteen and never died’, non-traumatised, non-murderous psychopath Jason.
That is a problem, because obviously, this Jason is not going to stick around forever.
It’s stupid. Tim is so stupid. He never should’ve gotten attached. He knew this going in. And yet he got attached anyway, like an amateur. Damnit.
Which is why when Bart tells him that he found a cure for the amnesia, Tim seriously considers just telling him to go away.
“And Zatanna said that obviously you could just wait until the memories return of their own,” Bart says, out of breath, “but she also said to give you this-“ He presses a smooth metal disc into Tim’s palm. “-and that you should just touch it to Batman’s forehead and he should remember. Um, I might have told her that this is about Batman.”
“Right.”
“I know you wanted to handle this on your own! But I just thought, Batman and Nightwing are returning soon, and this whole thing is kind of your fault, not that it’s your fault because obviously Red Hood attacked you first and you’re like, a victim, but who knows if Batman is going to see it that way, and also you always say that you’re not a victim, and anyway, I just thought it might be nice to have the option to fix this before Batman ever finds out about it, and-also-Kon-says-hi,” Bart says in a rush.
Tim’s hand twitches. The sharp edges of the disc press into his palm. If he applies any more pressure, he's going to draw blood. “Thanks.”
“Any time, Rob! By the way, movie night at the Tower on Sunday. Don’t forget!”
“I won’t,” Tim says, but Bart is already gone. Tim is left alone in the guest room of the manor, staring down at the memory disc (ha).
Okay. Bart is right, he knows that. Better to get it over with quickly, then.
Jason is not in his room. He’s not in the living room, either, nor in the kitchen. Tim thinks about it, then goes to check the Cave, where he finds Jason at the Batcomputer.
Jason tenses when Tim approaches, hastily closing whatever file he’d got open, then swivels around on his chair with his arms crossed behind his head in a clear attempt to appear casual. “Sup, Timbo?”
Tim considers the mysterious file and then the unasked-for nickname. “Um, okay. Anyway, I came to tell you-“
“Wait,” Jason says, “sorry, you can finish in a minute, but I just wanted to show you what I programmed earlier. Check this out.” He presses a few keys, and immediately, a deafening version of Happy Birthday sounds through the Cave, disturbing the bats above and making Tim put his hands over his ears.
“What is that?” Tim asks when the horror has finally stopped.
Jason grins at him. “The night of July 19th, this is going to start playing nonstop. Bruce is never going to forget your birthday again.”
Tim’s throat is tight suddenly, and he has to swallow several times before his voice cooperates. “Thanks. That’s really- thanks. Seriously.”
“Any time. Now, what did you want?”
For one second, Tim thinks about just dumping the disc in the garbage. Instead, he gives Jason a hesitant smile. “I’ve got a way to return your memories.”
This does not lead to the joyous reaction he expected. Jason just sort of frowns. “Oh.”
“So…here you go. Just put it on your forehead, and you should have all your memories back easy as that.”
He holds out the disc. Jason does not take it.
“What happens then?” Jason asks tentatively. “Do I still- am I going to remember the past few days?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. Do you…want to?” Tim asks, uncertain.
“Of course I do.” Jason laughs, but it sounds faintly hysterical. “You’ve spent all this time telling me about what a monster future-me is, about my crazy revenge scheme, about how I tried to kill you, and you want me to just go back to that? Are you insane? Forget about me for a second, what about you? What if the second I’m future-me again, I just murder you in cold blood?”
“You won’t. I won’t let you.”
Jason puts his head in his hands, breathing heavily. “You don’t know that. You have no idea what’s going to happen.”
“Jason.” Tim tries his best to make his voice sound firm. “You’re going to remember eventually, anyway. We always knew this was going to happen. This is just a way to speed up the process. And,” he adds, thinking fast, “isn’t it better to do this now, in a controlled environment, instead of just letting it happen randomly?”
“You say that now, until future-me slits your throat in five minutes.” Jason lets out another one panicky laugh. “Okay, fine. You’re right. But- I think you should restrain me. Actually, put me back in that cell. You don’t need to be in there with me, right? I can just use the disc by myself. So put me in the cell and make sure it’s locked. And- when I wake up. If- if I don’t remember anything. Tell future-me to look at the Tim Drake-file on the Batcomputer, okay? Not Batman’s file. My file.”
“Okay,” Tim promises, even though he’s not sure he’s actually going to keep his word. Depending on what’s in there, he doesn’t exactly want to tell the Red Hood more of his weaknesses. “And, if you’re really sure, I can restrain you. But I’m not leaving you alone in a cell.”
“I could-“
“Jason. You said we’ve got each other. So we’re doing this together, or not at all.”
Several seconds pass. Eventually, though, Jason nods. “Together,” he agrees. “Now, you’d better find some chains.”
Tim does. And then, once Jason is tied to a chair, Tim raises the disc.
“Wait.” Jason smiles at him, and abruptly, Tim realises how accustomed he has become to seeing this older version of Jason smile like the Robin he used to watch every night. “I just wanted to say that I’m really happy I’ve met you. And- I’m glad that the Robin mantle passed on to you. That’s, yeah. That’s all I wanted to say. Okay. I’m ready now.”
Tim nods, because he’s sure that he couldn’t speak right now if he tried. Jason smiles again and closes his eyes.
Gently, Tim touches the disc against Jason’s forehead.
For one nerve wracking moment, nothing happens.
Then Jason’s eyes open. They’re still blue. But they’re burning with rage.
“Get me the fuck out of here,” Red Hood snaps.
*
When Bruce and Dick return from outer space, Tim has had ample time to rid Wayne Manor of all evidence that Jason was ever here, including editing the camera footage of both the manor and several fast-food places that they went to together.
Everything looks exactly the way it always does. Everything is exactly the same.
Tim isn’t the same, though. He feels weirdly off-kilter. The feeling intensifies when Bruce and Dick go to a far-away corner of the cave to discuss Red Hood, all while sneaking worried glances at Tim, and it intensifies more when a few days pass and there is no record of Red Hood showing up anywhere, not in Crime Alley, not in Gotham, not in the world.
“You alright, Tim?” Dick asks him one day, joining him at the kitchen table where he’s pretending to do his homework while secretly working on a case. “You’ve seemed a little off since we returned.”
“I was trapped in a time loop where my big brother asked me a lot of stupid questions and I couldn’t escape,” Tim replies. “It was horrible. Wait, I think it’s still happening, oh no- hey, nevermind, I’ve realised that I can just leave. So, bye.”
“Not funny,” Dick calls after him, but Tim is already halfway down the hall and chooses to ignore him.
He returns to his own house, which he really should have done ages ago instead of continuing to sleep in the guest room out of a weird hope that this way, Jason might come back. He won’t. So Tim should really stop hanging out with the Waynes so much and go back to his normal life.
He kicks off his shoes in the hallway, opens the fridge to get a soda only to realise that it’s empty – huh, did the housekeeper quit? Should Tim ask his parents about it? Would they even pick up the phone? –, closes it again, and goes up to his room.
He has only just closed the door behind himself, dropping his backpack to the floor, when a voice from a corner says, “Took you long enough.”
Tim whirls around. Jason emerges from the shadows in a very Batman-like move, baring his teeth in a threatening smile. Abruptly, Tim is overcome by a strange sense of disconnect, like part of him is here in his bedroom at his parents’ house and the other part is back in Titans’ Tower, fending off an attack from the Red Hood. Except this time, there will be no miraculous rescue.
“We can talk about this,” Tim says, holding up his hands, and, hey, this is what he said last time, too, right? They’ve come full circle. “We need to talk about it, okay?”
“Yeah, we do,” Jason snaps. Now that he has stepped into the light of the room, Tim can see that he’s wearing jeans and a sweatshirt. Somehow, that makes him feel a little bit better. “But first-“ Jason takes a very menacing step forward. Tim steps back until his back hits the wall. Jason continues to advance, and then, when he’s only inches away from Tim, he grabs Tim’s shoulders and pulls him forward roughly, trapping him in his arms.
“Um,” Tim says, voice muffled by Jason’s shoulder, “what is happening?”
“It’s a hug,” Jason says gruffly. “I’m hugging you.”
“But why?”
Finally, Jason lets go of him enough to flick his ear. “Because you’ve got zero self-preservation instincts and it’s pissing me the hell off, but now thanks to you, I’ve also got this voice inside me that’s telling me to take care of you and hug you and make you sandwiches with the crusts cut off.”
Tim frowns. “You’re hearing voices?”
Jason glares at him. “It was a metaphor. But of course you don’t get that, I’ve seen your English homework, it’s atrocious-“
“So you remember?” Tim interrupts. It’s the only explanation and, also, he just really wants it to be true. He’s usually not much for hope but, in this, for once, he can’t help it.
“It’s complicated.” Jason’s face twists in something like self-deprecation at the words. “I remember everything. But I also remember breaking into the tower and wanting to strangle you. I remember the rage I felt. But- it’s like it’s just gone, now. I can recall the feeling if I try really hard, but I can’t recreate it. The pit’s gone.”
“Okay. So you don’t want to strangle me anymore,” Tim says, deciding to focus on the important things first.
“I do,” Jason says, “but it’s different now. Now I just want to strangle you because when you took off my chains, you fucking tasered me again.”
Tim blushes. “I was, you know, taking precautions. You seemed really angry.”
“You dumped my unconscious body at Gotham Bay.”
“But not in Gotham Bay,” Tim says. “Even though Kon wanted to.”
There’s a pause, during which Tim thinks Jason might try to murder him again, even though he said he wouldn’t. Instead, Jason just laughs.
It doesn’t sound like how fifteen-year-old Jason laughed. It’s not as carefree, and there’s an edge of darkness to it. But suddenly, Tim can see that version of him inside the man standing in front of him now, and he realises that the Jason who died and the Jason who didn’t aren’t that different after all.
“Next time,” Jason says, “at least drop me off in my safehouse.”
“No promises,” Tim says, but he’s smiling.
Another pause. Jason looks at Tim. Tim looks at Jason.
“Also,” Jason says, now suddenly busy inspecting his shoes and fiddling with the hem of his sweatshirt, “your parents fucking suck, so I’m having Bruce adopt you. I can’t believe he didn’t already.”
“What?”
“Did you know, amnesia-me worried about you, like, constantly? Like all the fucking time? It was fucking annoying.”
“Oh.”
“But,” Jason says, sounding awkward, “I don’t mind. It’s fine.”
“Oh,” Tim repeats, more cheerful now.
Jason nods forcefully. “Right. So I’m going to go now.”
“Okay?” Tim says, unsure of what is happening.
Jason does not go. He stays, still not looking at Tim. “Want to come with?” he asks eventually. “I was just gonna go to the Manor and tell Bruce I’m a ghost. Dickie’s gonna shit his pants. Want to join?”
This sounds wildly unethical and also like just a complete asshole move.
Tim is onboard.
“We should use my mom’s makeup on you,” he suggests, “we can make it look like you’ve only just died, it’s going to be great.”
Jason laughs again. His eyes are blue, and they’re sparkling, and in that moment, Tim can’t tell which version of Jason he’s looking at. He finds that he doesn’t much care.