---- From chapter 34 ----

?: I lived, bitch

----

Gotham was a beautiful city from above. In the far distance, the urban outskirts, the world was a faint yellow blur, the fog painted caramel yellow from the streetlights. From the top of the highest steeples, the whole city was nothing but glass, fog, and light.

Tim had never appreciated it before, for all the hours he spent photographing it.

He'd always been too distracted by a restlessness bouncing in his ribcage, a closeness to the concrete. His perspective had changed, though. The beauty of Gotham was subjective. It could only be observed from the highest points; the CEO offices and private jets. A clinical distance between himself and everything else.

The air above the city was dead in all sense of the word and two years ago it's silence frustrated him. He bared his teeth and camera lens at the way the rain clouds floated above with their arching, scraggly passiveness, mute and mocking witnesses to it all.

Now, though, it's the only air Tim can breathe and feel in his lungs.

It's 3:37 am, according to the time since Nightwing's last patrol update and the lock screen on Tim's phone, and Tim's eyes are heavy. Crime doesn't sleep, but Tim does- more than he used to. Which was weird, given that he was Robin now. It was a scary kind of therapy, to arm his subconscious mind with snapshots of blood splatter and a villainous laugh that echoes. But it was better than the nightmares he used to have when his sleeping mind's only source of inspiration was his real fears.

It's good that it haunts you, Bruce had told him, it means you're still human.

Tim was still waiting for Batman to clear the Granton District and tell them they could move on to the next juncture. Twenty-five kilometres across the city, Nightwing was doing the same.

Tim shifted as he crouched on the rooftop to widen his view of his surroundings, keeping alert even as he winced at the clicking sound his ankle made. An old injury from when he was filled with grief in the flavour of rage. One bad landing and it never quite healed right.

His phone was on silent, tucked away in one of the inner pockets of his suit, and it's weight- just heavy enough to be noticed- was a reassuring familiarity. Dickie thought he had yet to grow accustomed to the cold stiffness of the night, but Tim found himself more than used to it. He was born to be Robin, he knew, just like Dick had been.

Jason, on the other hand, had been born to be something else entirely and Tim had never figured out just what that was before Jason died.

Six months later and that was arguably Tim's biggest regret. Though, those were beginning to pile up. His "biggest regret" was more an album of general decisions and entire years than one definitive moment.

A hand nudges Tim's back and he teeters on the ledge, only his own balance and preparedness keeping him from rocking forward right off the edge. His ankle clicks.

"Asshole," he says as he stands. He doesn't turn around until he's scanned the horizons twice more and confirmed they're not being watched. He's in charge of all security footage across the city and it all filters back to his laptop eventually, so there's little chance of this getting back to Batman that way. Anyway, he's standing in a blind spot that stretches for a good eight feet in any direction.

"Makin' sure you're not too cocky to pay attention," a heavily filtered voice says behind him. Then, "Waxen wings above your reach an all."

"That's not what that quote means," Tim says as he turns around, and it's obscure literary references like that that have Tim so utterly enthralled by this persona that he hadn't done much to disrupt it.

His conversation partner's facial expression is obscured by what's really just a glorified motorcycle helmet. His hands by heavy-duty nomex gloves. His body by a heavy leather jacket and his voice by that stupid filter.

But did Jason honestly think he was hidden? Tim could recognize him by the way his breaths came and went, by the way his feet struck the earth when he walked. Tim had practice recognizing him blind and deaf, fucked stupid and exhausted.

"I disagree," Red Hood, as he was called now, said, "it's a warning against overreaching, hence 'mount above his reach.'"

Tim couldn't keep his eyes fixed on any one spot. The air wasn't dead anymore. It was buzzing like it was made of bees instead of oxygen. It was a white-noise kind of buzz, like the silent "don't talk about it," they had agreed on was stuck on a loop. There were so many things they weren't talking about he didn't even know which one it was referring to anymore. He breathed it in and his body started buzzing, too.

Bruce would want him far, far away from this, but Tim was stuck in the gravity of it.

"Maybe so," he shrugged one shoulder, "but unlike Icarus, who's pride is self-destructive, 'heavens conspired his overthrow' hints at the intervention of a deity who conspires against Faust."

"You are a pretty smart bird," Red Hood said, in lieu of disagreeing. The helmet makes his voice deep and robotic when he chuckles. Something about it reminds the primal, animal part of Tim's brain that he is soft and squishy, urgently poking at him and telling him he needs to go.

And he should go. Jason could be so cruel these days. Really, Tim ought to tell the teacher or something.

Instead, he grins, "A pretty smart bird or a pretty comma smart bird?"

"I said what I said."

At that moment, a siren wails in the distance and Tim is reminded of the fact that he's never seen Red Hood unmasked, that Jason is dead and that Red Hood has a loaded gun strapped to his thigh.

Just because this wanted murderer reminds him of Jason doesn't mean he is Jason, Bruce would say. Bruce would be worried, if he knew the kind of thoughts Tim was having, standing around alone with the newest costumed baddie out for bat blood. His therapist would probably discourage this as well, but she didn't have the whole story anyway.

Red Hood picks up on his mood change, because he knows him, Tim wants to believe, but it's more likely it's because he's being manipulated. Either way, before they can come up with a way to go back to Not Talking About It there's a scream from two rooftops over.

Tim turns toward the sound on instinct, moving to jump into action before his brain can catch up with him. His thoughts skip ahead, and he's already thinking through every possible situation.

By the time he reaches the rooftop where he can peer down into the alley he's got a batarang in hand and his body is trapped between singing with adrenaline and methodically assessing every detail.

There are two people cornered in the alleyway, being backed farther into the garbage-ridden space by a man wielding a knife. He's already covered in blood, and if Tim had to guess he'd say the two innocents were witnesses to the man's most recent murder.

A murder that already happened, that Tim can't stop. Another life he can't save.

But he doesn't have time to think about that. Right now there are two lives he can save, and that's what he was taught to do.

There is enough distance between the would-be-victims and attacker that he doesn't have to risk putting himself between them. Two flicks of the wrist and the man is slumped unconscious at the threshold of the alley, a batarang-shaped dent in his skull and a cut on his hand where Tim had knocked the knife out of his grip. Tim holds his hand out and presses a button on the side of his glove and the two batarangs littered around the alley tremble, rising into the air and flying back into his hand. Another button and the closest police patrol was en route to the location.

The two innocents searched the skies and caught sight of his figure, ducking their heads and leaving the scene. Not unusual; most people don't want to be involved with the cops or any of the trouble that comes with being anywhere near Tim and the R patched on his chest.

Tim knew Red Hood was gone, but he still turned to check, forcing himself to accept it when he returned to an empty rooftop.

----

?: I lived, bitch

Tim thumbed over the message on his screen, now four weeks old. It felt like a relic from another time, from before Tim knew- hoped- Jason was alive, before the Red Hood had appeared in Gotham. Before Tim had spoken to the man himself.

It was cold in the batcave, but Tim had long grown used to it. He rarely wandered upstairs anymore. The cave was the only place he could wear his mask- Jason's mask- outside of patrol without risking his secret identity.

The mask fit smoothly against his face like a second skin. It was easy to disappear into. It was light. The cape was the heavy part. The weight of it forced his shoulder's back, his spine straight. A few short months of being Robin had undone a lifetime of slouching and he knew he made for a looming shadow, even with his short stature.

Across the room, Bruce was reviewing a piece of footage from the night's chase with Red Hood. He and Dickie had been talking as Alfred bandaged Dickie's knee, a stark white that stood out against the black of his suit. Dickie's phone buzzed periodically.

Dickie winced as he tried to stand up and Tim looked to him on instinct, seeing Bruce do the same out of the corner of his eye.

"It's fine," Dickie said, appeasing them by accepting the pair of crutches Alfred held out to him, "I can still help."

"You already have helped. Thank you." Dickie's phone buzzed again and Bruce sighed, "Now tell Wally you're okay before he has a heart attack."

Dickie's reply was said to Alfred and the two hobbled toward the change room, Dickie giving them a two-fingered salute before disappearing, the bright blue finger-strips of his costume making the action stand out.

With Dickie and his chatty nature gone, the room was filled only with the shifting of the bats throughout the cave and Bruce's quiet typing. Tim was zoning out where he was laying on the training mats, still staring at the words on his screen. He'd done everything he could to track where the message had come from and in the end all he'd been left with was a broken burner phone.

He could feel sleep hooking its talons into him, his eyelids growing heavier by the second until his thoughts got hazy and he lost his grip on consciousness.

He was awoken roughly eighteen hours later- a side effect of not sleeping for the second night in a row and being drop-dead exhausted- to an alert on his phone reminding him his patrol started in twenty minutes.

By the time he was ready for briefing, Bruce was already waiting for him.

"A17702 tonight," Bruce said, handing Tim a small computer chip less than an inch long with all relevant information to any points of interest he would cross on his patrol route. Bruce had chosen a pattern with frequent check-ins that kept them within fifteen kilometres of each other. It was a circuit they hadn't run since Tim had first donned the costume. It was the safest, but they covered very little ground. It meant Bruce was worried.

Tim inserted the chip into a small port in his glove, the information popping up on a holographic computer. He scanned through it quickly, taking note of the point where his and Bruce's routes would overlap at 03:00 hours.

The next time Tim had a conscious thought, something other than patrol-drawl and the subconscious monitoring of his own heartbeat registering with him, he was standing on top of a fire escape watching as Red Hood was thrown against a wall.

Tim's mind went blank. The only thing he could think was Jason is going to die again.

A minor explosion rattled Tim's balance and it was only then that he realized he'd joined the fight. Red Hood was a strong presence next to him, hand still out from throwing the small explosives against the chest of one of their opponents.

It was the only second of awareness Tim got before his training took over, the fight becoming a sharp slideshow of movement as his mind raced to anticipate the next move of his opponent. The Fearsome Hand of Four, a heavily teched-out group of assassins. Bruce had known they were in Gotham for a few days, and they'd finally surfaced. Working for Black Mask, since Red Hood seemed so damn determined to piss him off if Tim had to guess.

"I was expecting Batman," Red Hood called to him, blocking the attacks of the leader and her laser blades with a dagger, "but you'll do."

Tim didn't reply, busy avoiding laser shots from the metallic mask of his own challenger. Until he was cornered by the biggest fighter- the one who'd thrown Jason against the wall- at least.

His vision blurred as one of them struck him over the head, the other delivering a punch to his face and leaving him to slump down on the hard ground as they gathered to surround Red Hood. Tim's head pounded as he tried to stand, making it to his knees before dizziness and nausea overcame him. When he looked up, he found Red Hood staring at him, even as the one of the Fearsome Four raised his weapon above his head to strike the final blow.

Tim's heart seized up in his chest, cold dread sliding alongside blood through his veins up until the moment Batman dropped in from the dark sky. He managed to stagger to his feet as Batman and Red Hood fought side-by-side, his vision swimming until it was Batman and Robin he saw, Bruce and Jason. Bruce had to believe him after this, after fighting next to Jason like he used to, he had to realize that it was Jason under the hood.

By the time Tim had limped his way to the nearest building, resting his head against the cold concrete, three of the four had been defeated. He tried to summon his voice, to warn Batman as the metallic mask-wearing villain snuck up on him, but Red Hood beat him to it, pushing Batman aside and getting a laser to the chest for his efforts.

More lasers followed and the villain had Red Hood pinned in seconds. Tim was too far aware to hear what was said, but the low rumble of Red Hood's distorted voice made it clear he was taunting his attacker.

"Let him go," Batman ordered, threatening the hired gun with a high-voltage taser.

Tim's head was clearing and he was becoming aware of the uncomfortable reality that they were in a hostage situation, the villains gloved, knife-like nails hovering over Red Hood's throat.

"A taser?" the villain remarked, "hit me and you'll electrocute us both."

Tim was closer, edging along the side of the building in an attempt to get behind the villain when Red Hood slipped a taser into his hand.

"Maybe that's what he has in mind."

The metallic mask short-circuited when Red Hood tasered the man in the face. He let go of Red Hood, stumbling back and clutching his head. His screaming only stopped when his blood splattered on the wall, a plume of smoke drifting into the air as his body collapsed to the ground, dead.

"Be happy I only killed one of them," Red Hood said, towering over the body.

He said more, but Tim couldn't focus on it. He was desperately trying to stop thinking about how it could have been Jason's body on the ground, Jason's blood dripping down the wall.

He tried to take a deep breath, his body suddenly remembering he had to breathe, but found his lungs filling up with smoke instead of air. He coughed, blinking and trying to see through the dark smoke. It was too effective to be something off the market- Red Hood must be making his own smoke bombs, like Batman.

Tim heard Batman call out to him, but before he could reply a hand covered his mouth, another sneaking around his waist and dragging him behind one of the buildings and away from Batman. He struggled, getting a few good hits on his abductor and nearly escaping the strong hold until he heard a hiss of pain.

"Knock it off, pretty bird."

Tim gave one last push, breaking himself free and turning to find Red Hood with one arm over his chest, clutching his bicep.

"You're injured and you still refused Batman's help?" Tim demanded.

"I might be bleeding a little," Red Hood replied, his shoulders slumping lower, "stop moving so much, will you?"

Tim marched to Red Hood's side to support him and take some of the weight off his injured side, huffing angrily. His heart was pounding, images of Jason bleeding out playing on the backs of his eye lids. They started down the alleyway, Red Hood little more than dead weight, and Tim was struck with the thought that Red hood smelled familiar. Like a hearty old book. Faint caffeine and turning pages and quiet mutters. The way Jason used to smell, only it was on fire and Tim was breathing in the smoke, holding a pile of embers.

"I have- safe house," Red Hood grunted, leaning in one direction when they reached an intersection, "'few blocks."

"Too far," Tim shook his head, pulling Red Hood in the other direction, "there's a zetatube two streets over."

"Zeta...tube?" Red Hood repeated, going easily in whatever direction Tim pulled him, having lost too much blood to put up a proper fight.

Still, Tim kept talking to him, engaging him, to keep him conscious, "Yes, a zetatube. You got stabbed which means Batman has a sample of your blood. We need to stitch you up somewhere he won't find you."

"...Right," Red Hood mumbled back, his distorted voice faint as Tim propped him against the wall to activate the zetatube. He opened the door of the rickety phone booth, typing in the activation code Dickie used when he wanted to sneak out of Gotham without Bruce knowing and a location. Then, he dragged Red Hood's unconscious body through the light.

----

When he was stitching up Red Hood's back, the silence was bearable. But eventually Tim had to move on to the injuries on his chest, kneeling between Red Hood's legs and poking at his ribs to see if any of them were fractured.

"Ow," Red Hood complained lightly, the consciousness long since roused back into after Tim first pierced his skin with a needle, "go easy on me, princess."

Tim froze. "What did you just call me?"

"What do you-" Red Hood started, then broke off mid-sentence, realizing. "Pretty bird. I called you pretty bird, like I always do."

"No," Tim shook his head. He wasn't sure if he was so hysterical he was numb, or if his sudden shortness of breath was raw fear. Red Hood tipped his head against the back of the couch.

"No," Tim repeated, then again and again, "no, no- you called me princess."

Red Hood was silent, before, "Ok, so what? Maybe I did. I don't see what it matters."

And oh, Tim realized, it wasn't hysteria or fear. It was anger.

"Fuck you," he said, standing so that Red Hood wasn't looking down on him. His ankle clicked as he moved and all at once he was the same person he had been four months ago. Like a gaping wound, raw and exposed. Full of grief and rage, only this time he could direct his fury where it belonged- at Jason.

"Fuck you, Jay." His hands curl into fists, nails on one hand digging into his skin and on the other the damp cloth he'd been using to clean blood off Red Hood's back. The anger was building in his chest, hovering on the edge of something else like a wave intistant on crashing. The blood in his veins felt hot, a sticky heat flaring inside him. It was wretched and unpredictable. It was grim and horrendous. His hands shook with the constant aftershocks of it.

"Tim..." Red Hood said quietly, distantly, like he's surprised that Tim is so enraged. Like he didn't think Tim had grieved him- was still grieving him.

The wave crashed and what escaped Tim was not rage but a sob, his knees giving out under him. All he can think about is that he finally heard Jason say his name again.

Red Hood moved, catching him before he could bash his knees on the floor. He winces as the movement pulls on his new stitches, but went still when Tim's hands come to rest on the sides of his mask.

"The last thing I remember you saying to me," Tim breathed, "is 'someone in need of a hero?'." Red Hood sucked in a breath, his hands resting overtop of Tim's and guiding them to the edge of his mask as Tim went on, "And after you- died. I remember thinking, yes, because-"

Their hands found the release button on the mask and click echoed through the apartment. The universe was dark and greedy in its expansion around them. Slowly, they pulled the helmet off together and Tim found himself closing his eyes.

"Because-" he repeated, "-you were my hero. And I needed you."

Red Hood didn't say anything, tightening his hands around Tim's and exhaling hard. For the first time, the sound wasn't distorted and it was that realization that made Tim open his eyes and look.

The first thing that struck him was that Jason's eyes were green.

Bright green. They swirled with something ancient and unnatural. Something that lingered on the edge of disturbing, when you looked closely. Like a fire that doesn't blaze. They almost seemed to glow in the dark of the room. The last time Tim had seen Jason- stared into his eyes, breathless- his eyes had been a dark blue.

"...So, how is everything?" Jason asked quietly, through clenched teeth. The air was too heavy, Tim had to take a noticeably deep breath before his lungs would inflate.

Everything was scattered around him, blown to pieces. His whole reality had crumbled around him, leaving him to stand in the wreckage. Was he meant to piece it back together? He felt like he had just woken up from a horrible nightmare, only the nightmare was reality and he- he wasn't quite sure what this was.

"I dropped out of school couple' months ago," Tim answered, after a moment. Easy. Take the easy route, he told himself. "Dickie too. He's going to the academy now, instead of business school."

"Academy?"

"Police academy." Jason didn't need clarification. They were trained to do their homework. Jason would have caught up on all that he'd missed before donning a new mask.

Still, Jason made a face, wrinkling his nose and furrowing eyebrows. Something like a laugh bubbled up in Tim's chest. It made Tim laugh, and then it made him cry, only he didn't have it left in him to cry, so he ended up squeezing his eyes shut and trying to remember how to inhale.

He opened his eyes almost as soon as he'd closed them, afraid to look away and lose the sight in front of him.

Jason was staring at him, transfixed on a bruise Tim could feel throbbing high on his cheek. Jason reached out, slowly, and cupped his cheek, brushing his thumb over the tender skin. His glove was wet and Tim knew when he drew his hand back there would be a bloody handprint left in its place.

The thought made Tim flinch. Jason drew back and Tim cleared his throat. Don't think about it, don't think about it.

Jason stared at the side of Tim's face, and then his hands.

The front door opened a few inches before sticking, and whoever was trying to force it open cursed before shoving their body weight against it. Roy stumbled into the room, bringing the cold December air with him.

"G'night guys," he slurred as he passed them, far too familiar with the sight of people who didn't live with him in his apartment at four in the morning, disappearing into his bedroom. It was impossible to tell if he was drunk or just exhausted.

He reappeared a moment later, eyes wide and staring at Jason.

"Hey, Timmy," he said slowly, over-enunciating like the words were too big to come out of his mouth smoothly, "call me crazy, but it looks like your dead boyfriend is sitting on my couch using my favourite bowl."

Tim looked at the bowl set precariously on the end table next to Jason. The water inside had been slightly bloody from Tim dipping the cloth into it, but it had spilled with all their moving around and sat empty on its side.

"I thought the green one was your favourite?"

"And I thought your boyfriend was dead. Things change, Timmy," Roy snapped, rubbing his eyes as if to clear his vision or banish a headache before turning back to his bedroom. "I'm gonna go to bed, let me know if he's dead or not in the morning."

"Is this really his favourite bowl?" Jason asked, "The green one is way cooler."

Tim sighed, picking up the bowl and rolling it in his hands, watching red water droplets left inside swirl around the ceramic middle. "You don't have any fractured ribs, but try and avoid being thrown against any more walls." Please, he didn't say, please don't get hurt anymore.

"Okay," Jason breathed, then "lay with me?"

Sometimes, Tim wondered if Jason was some trickled-down version of Apollo, armed with a right-hook instead of a golden bow. And maybe Tim was Icarus after all, because he fit himself against Jason's chest and sighed at the heat that surrounded him. Any wax wings wings he possessed had to have melted away, leaving only his back for Jason's chest to press against.

Jason reached up to the back of the couch, searching for a blanket. His hand found his leather jacket, discarded earlier so Tim could stitch up his stab wound, and pulled it down, using it to cover Tim more than himself. Tim considered telling him that his heavy cape was within arms reach too, but found himself perfectly content under the smokey-smell of the jacket.

"G'night, princess," Jason mumbled.

Tim shivered at the sound of the deep voice, closing his eyes tightly and refusing to open them again.

"Night, Jay."