Chapter Text
“Something’s wrong with Nightwing.” Barbara heard the sound of a soft thud behind her as Tim dropped from the ceiling, his swirling cape reflecting in the computer monitors.
Barbara looked up from the computer where she was walking Wendy through untangling the finances of a smuggling ring. “And you just now noticed? He’s been like that for months.”
“I didn’t know Nightwing was in town,” said Wendy, looking at Barbara in confusion.
Tim grimaced and shook his head. “I don’t mean how he’s been acting since…you know when. When he became broody. This is new.”
“And you came to me with it? Red Robin. I know you missed a lot when you were out of town, but we’re not really on the best of speaking terms right now.”
Tim sighed and hooked a chair over with his ankle, collapsing into it in a boneless way that reminded Barbara far too much of Dick. “Give me some credit. This isn’t me interfering in one of your arguments. He’s acting weird. Like he’s about to disappear on a long term undercover mission weird.”
Barbara swung her chair around and looked, really looked, at Tim’s face. She still wasn’t used to reading his expressions under a cowl, but the stubborn, mulish set of his mouth was familiar, like he expected not to be believed but was going to do something anyway. “Rob,” she said gently. He flinched. She winced. He clearly was only going to talk around the subject while Wendy was here. “Wendy, can you keep working on this? I think I need a cup of coffee.”
Tim followed her to the kitchen, cowl still up. Barbara poured two mugs of coffee, as Tim fidgeted with teaspoons and her favourite sugar jar. “After all this time, is this really a cowl sort of conversation, Boy Wonder?”
Tim tugged his cowl down so she could see his face, then accepted the mug she thrust into his hands. “Dick’s acting weird. And I’m not talking about anything regarding Damian!” he said heatedly, as Barbara sighed. “It’s fine. I know Damian’s his Robin now, I know every Batman and Robin relationship is different. But he’s not acting like Dick.”
“What happened?”
“There was a firefight at that warehouse down by the docks, the one we’re staking out for Intergang weapon transshipments. Batman and Robin had been checking it out but I heard the sound over comms and swung over to help. It was a mess, seemed to be a load of theme weapons, and a bunch of weird stuff went off. The henchmen didn’t seem familiar with a lot of it. But right near the end of the fight someone sent a golden boomerang at me and it just missed my shoulder before hitting the wall. We got everyone tied up, alerted the cops, and then Dick just…left. He just looked through me, Barbara. He said ‘Thanks for the assist’ and swung off.”
“And there was a boomerang stuck in the wall?”
Tim looked slightly paler than usual, and nodded. “Yeah. And he didn’t say anything. To me.”
“He didn’t check on you at all?”
“He just fussed over Damian.”
Barbara took a deep sip of her coffee. “You’re right. That is weird.” She looked sharply at Tim, who was staring down into his mug, as if it held the secrets of the universe. “Are you all right?”
Tim let out a slow breath. “I’d be better if I knew what was wrong with Dick.”
The next night, as Red Robin went out on patrol, Tim checked in with Oracle first about his plans for the evening, rather than talk to Alfred as he had been recently. It felt familiar, like slipping into a worn old jacket, even though the fit had changed. Tim almost expected to hear Dick making a joke on the line, flirting with Babs, while Cass smothered a giggle and Bruce grumpily reminded everyone to keep things professional on the main channel. But Cass was still in Hong Kong hunting Cricket and untangling what Lynx was planning, Bruce hadn’t spent more than a week in any one country for the past few months as he worked to establish Batman Incorporated franchises all over the world, and Dick? He was so focused on keeping Damian out of trouble and being Batman. He was serious in situations where he’d usually start with a lighthearted quip to break the tension.
“What are your plans for this evening? Patrol? Breaking up gang initiations? The drug trade? Tracking down someone out of Arkham?” Barbara sounded chipper in his ear. Maybe she had missed this too.
“Is there anyone out of Arkham right now that I should be keeping an eye out for?” Tim surveyed his surroundings and started roof-running to head off to his first destination for the night. If nothing else, spending the day working in Wayne Tower then leaving from the Bunker underneath made for a short commute.
“Well Zsasz is back inside, thank goodness. You know about the fact Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy are currently behaving themselves. Batman’s been tracking down Riddler and Two-Face recently…hmmm. Croc’s out but nobody has seen him.”
“I’ll keep out of the sewers then,” Tim joked.
“The smell is better up on the streets. Never fun trying to clean a soaked cape.”
“It does cling to you all night. But fortunately for both our noses, I’m just planning to patrol and check in on a round of front businesses in Chinatown and the Upper West Side. Look in on a bunch of Golden Dragon and League locations.”
“League of Assassins?” Barbara sounded curious. “Do we know about all these safe houses?”
“Some of them are from information I brought back with me. I’ve been updating the data in the system as I check them out. Mostly I’m just tracking activity levels at the locations to see if Ra’s is aware we now know about these places and if he’s pulled people out. I certainly tried to hide the data trail of what I’d found when I left.”
“And I’m guessing you’re looking in on the Golden Dragons for Black Bat?”
“Hey, they were my enemies first! But yes, we’re working this investigation into the new Lynx from both ends; I’m handling the Gotham side. And I want to keep an eye out to see if Edmund Dorrance has popped back up.”
“Red Robin. I know you saw him as a Black Lantern. We both did.”
Tim sighed. “I know. I know. But I’ve seen King Snake come back so many times, I just want to be sure. The dead have been returning.”
“It’s not paranoia if they’re really out to get you?” Oracle quipped.
“I’ve seen him fall off a building and survive; I’ve seen him fresh out of a Lazarus Pit. I don’t trust that he’s dead unless I know where his body is, and right now I don’t.”
Barbara sighed. “Don’t let it become an obsession. I’ve been down that path and it’s not worth it.”
“So noted.” Tim paused on the top of a building on the edge of Chinatown and squinted a little as his Starlite lenses adjusted to the neon lights. “I’m close to my first stop. Talk later.”
“Good hunting.” The line went silent in his ear as Oracle switched her attention elsewhere.
The first three locations, all Golden Dragons businesses, turned out to be an importer’s storeroom containing crates with fake customs marks, a bakery with extensive coolrooms, and an underground casino full of people with triad tattoos. Pretty standard fare, all clearly active locations. A peek into the cool rooms at the bakery had shown a lot of rising dough and no surprise corpses quietly stashed in a back corner under a sheet.
The next stop was a League of Assassins base. To all appearances it was at a lull; a few bunk rooms fixed up in the office area of an import-export warehouse, likely used by groups of assassins travelling through town. A couple of the beds looked recently used.
A brothel, a restaurant, and then another well-lit basement storeroom. This one appeared to be a daigou business; even late at night people were checking orders and packing boxes, readying them for shipment to China. There were stacks of baby formula and various skincare brands all over the room. More concerningly though were the locked doors to the basement.
Tim clicked on the main line. “I think I have a forced labour business here. Locked exits including fire exits, guards openly carrying weapons, and the workers have that look around them.”
Oracle was brisk when she came on the line. “I’m noting it, Red. Can you confirm your location for me?”
“Two blocks south of Cameron Street; that tangle of businesses behind Cavalieri Close. Basement of the China Fair building.”
“Acknowledged.” Tim could hear the soft sound of typing over the line. “Are you in a position to do anything right now?”
“Not tonight. About to set up some cameras to check.”
Attaching small spy-cameras to the few windows at street level was a delicate operation of not being seen among the shadows and neon lights reflecting off every surface including damp puddles in the street. Tim was almost done when he heard a crash and yell far too close. He’d been spotted.
Several gang members who’d been loitering smoking on the nearby corner of the street turned and headed straight for him. Tim dropped any subtlety and started running in the other direction, aiming for the fire escape of the nearest high building. “O, I’ve been spotted. On the move.”
Tim saved his breath for dodging as shots rang out behind him, trusting his cape to conceal his body and help deflect any bullets that got too close. He jumped for the edge of the fire-escape and pulled himself up smoothly, then tapped his comm line again as he climbed the stairs rapidly heading for the roof and an escape route. “Red Robin to all; I’m under fire in Chinatown. Anyone able to assist?”
“I’m on the Upper East Side,” said Helena. “Too far for a quick hand, and Misfit unfortunately doesn’t know all the nooks and crannies in that end of town yet.”
“Burnley and on stakeout,” said Steph. “Is anyone nearer, Oracle?”
There was silence on the line. Tim glanced back and could see the pursuing Dragons boosting one of the group onto the fire escape. He headed at a dead run for the edge of the building roof.
“Batman?” queried Oracle.
The line remained silent. Tim aimed his grapple for the next building and swung over, dodging behind a lift shaft to hide his change of direction as further shots rang out. Just a little further.
“I’m running a trace,” said Barbara.
“The Question?” asked Tim as he sprinted. Getting rescued by Montoya was embarrassing, but he’d known her long enough she wouldn’t laugh. Too much.
“Out of town still, as are Outsiders. Manhunter’s working late at the office on an upcoming prosecution.”
Tim jumped across to another building and swarmed up and over another wall, falling flat on his belly by a crenellation he could peek around. The Outsiders didn’t need to have people permanently based in Gotham now that Hush was in Arkham. The JSA were all currently across the country. Honestly, they were running low on additional support to call in across the city.
The pursuit behind him was headed in another direction. Tim carefully watched until they were out of sight.
“Thanks everyone, I think I’m clear now.”
Dick, finally, came on the line. “Batman. There was an assist call?”
Oracle sounded almost brusque, as she replied. “All clear now. Red Robin was under fire in Chinatown.”
“Glad to hear it’s sorted. Is there anything else?”
“Not now.”
“Batman out.”
Tim heard the click in his ear that signalled Barbara was shifting over to his frequency. “Okay, you were right. That’s not a normal response from him.”
“Glad to hear you believe me,” said Tim as he got up and dusted himself off, already plotting in his mind the route to his next stop. (It was better than thinking about why Dick had taken so long to respond to a simple assist request).
“Of course I believe you, why wouldn’t I…oh.” Barbara paused for a moment. “Are you sure you’re okay?” she asked.
“Completely fine, not a scratch on me,” said Tim, deliberately misunderstanding her question. “I’ve been running solo enough this year that I got pretty good at dodging.”
The thing was. It wasn’t that Dick had done anything wrong. Part of his role as Batman was to focus on his Robin and keep Robin out of trouble and danger. And keeping on top of what Damian was up to was a job and a half for anyone. Tim had heard about the incident with the Joker at GCPD headquarters, okay? And so for all of Dick’s insistence that Damian was doing better, he just needed acceptance and validation to reinforce his good behaviour, this was a level of doing better that still included locking himself in a room with the Joker and a crowbar. And getting away with it.
Tim had never physically assaulted a restrained Joker, was the point. Nobody had ever needed to tell him that that was unacceptable behaviour. (He’d even helped resuscitate the Joker once, all in a panic, in part because of the look of devastation on Dick’s face. Every life was important and worth saving. Leaving someone to die wasn’t Tim’s choice to make as a vigilante, if he had the ability to respond). But all Damian ever did seemed to be getting away with things that Bruce would never have let Tim do, even in his first weeks as Robin.
And so Tim got it. Damian took a lot of energy. A lot of attention. (All of Dick and Alfred’s it felt like, some days). But so much attention that Dick couldn’t respond to a call for assistance?
Maybe he was being unfair. Tim had been on Barbara’s frequency, not on Alfred’s. Dick would necessarily be focused on Alfred’s frequency, as that was the one his partner was on. But the call to the main line should have cut through anyway; it was for emergencies and overrode anything else. If Dick was listening to his comms, he should have received it immediately.
Perhaps Dick and Damian had been in the middle of a fight. Or a stakeout where they had to be silent, and Dick had needed to wait until the fight was over, or move away to where he could speak without being overheard. There were all sorts of reasons someone might not respond immediately on the comms line.
But usually if you couldn’t speak, you’d still click the line to let people know that you were unable to respond. And there’d been dead silence from Dick, even when Barbara specifically asked for his location.
And Tim knew what Dick was like as Batman. He was thoughtful and caring and ready with a joke and didn’t push a person past their limits. And he knew this because once upon a time, Tim had been Dick’s Robin. The Batman Tim remembered teaching him how to use a washing machine and cleaning his scrapes and bruises after patrol and letting Tim tap out when he felt overwhelmed wouldn’t have ignored a call for assistance.
This just wasn’t normal behaviour from Dick. Even when he was stressed.
Tim reached the Bunker and let himself inside. Batman and Robin had clearly already returned earlier. Damian was still in full costume on the other side of the area, deliberately looking away from Tim’s entrance. Dick was at the main computer typing, working on what looked like a tracking program.
This was one of the weird things Tim had noticed, since his return to Gotham. Once, Dick would have asked Barbara or Tim to handle the programming for him. It wasn’t that Dick couldn’t code – they’d all had to learn so they could troubleshoot problems with the computer system – but Dick tended to be slower and more deliberate about it and so usually delegated the work elsewhere. But now he was doing it all himself, even when there were people around who could do it faster and more accurately.
It was like right after when Dick had moved to Bludhaven to assert his independence, but even then Dick had accepted help from Tim and Barbara.
Tim stripped off his gloves (which were looking worn and needed replacement soon) and then pulled off his cape and cowl. He sighed. There were bullet holes in it. Some of the shots had been closer than he’d hoped. “Alfred? I’m going to need some costume repairs.”
Alfred came over to look at the cape and clicked his tongue. “These are bullet holes. Were you getting shot at again, Master Timothy?”
“It wasn’t on purpose,” Tim pointed out. “I don’t do this for fun.”
“Sometimes I wonder. You didn’t call for help?”
“I did!” Tim protested, then paused. Well. He’d called in an all-points on the open channel Oracle maintained, not on Alfred’s line. Was that part of the problem?
“I certainly didn’t hear you,” muttered Damian, who was crouched on a chair halfway across the room, fingers flickering across a tablet screen.
Tim gritted his teeth to stop himself snapping back. Of course Damian hadn’t heard anything; he wasn’t on the Oracle line. Tim didn’t know all the reasons for why Barbara had excluded him, but it was clearly something revolving around the tension he’d noticed between Dick and Babs on his return to Gotham. “Sorry Alfred, I just realised. I was on comms with Barbara and forgot to include you in the heat of the moment.”
“Well the next time this comes up, I would appreciate it if you could find some time in your busy schedule of avoiding injury to seek assistance.” Oh Alfred was sounding sarcastic today. He must be worried. “Nonetheless, I believe you still have sufficient spares for your uniform while I get this repaired.”
“Might as well get my gloves replaced at the same time.” Tim handed them over. “The wear is starting to catch on my staff.”
Alfred bundled everything up in his arms. “There was a call for you from Master Bruce a short while ago. It would be convenient for you to return it now.”
Tim sighed quietly inside. It had to be important if Bruce wasn’t waiting for office hours tomorrow to call. “I’ll take it, Alfred. Which station is it set up on?”
Even if he had been back now for several months, the Bunker still felt like Dick and Damian’s space, rather than Tim’s. Dick had gracefully made sure there were enough workstations and had updated Tim on all the new passwords and system upgrades, but it was hard to overlook that the space had been established with the expectation that it was for two vigilantes, not three.
Alfred pointed to one of the side terminals. Tim headed over, running his fingers through his hair to fluff it up and get rid of anything weird from being in a cowl for the past few hours. The scheduled call was already lined up on the bottom of the screen when Tim logged in, so he activated it while suppressing a yawn.
Bruce’s face, in the suit but with his own cowl hanging down his back, resolved on the screen almost immediately. He’d been waiting, then. “Tim. You’re in later than expected.”
“My plans for the evening took a bit longer than I anticipated.”
“Anything serious?”
“A potential forced labour factory run by the Golden Dragons. Oracle and I are investigating it.”
“Hrn.” It was a very Bat noise. Slight disapproval of Tim’s priorities, but not enough to say outright.
“What did you need, Bruce?”
“I read your report on the Ünternet.”
That report had been pretty comprehensive, and Barbara had been over it in detail and already asked further questions that Tim had elaborated on. He understood her interest; the Calculator was one of her long term foes and so she’d wanted specific questions answered. “Is there anything that you’d like me to expand on?”
“Why are you working with Lonnie Machin?”
Tim sighed. “Lonnie was paralysed by Ulysses Armstrong while you were away. I found him, got him out of the situation he was in, and convinced him to work with me. Lonnie’s brilliant, and he gets bored easily, and I figured that it was better to channel his impulses to helping us out, rather than leave him on his own to create more trouble.”
Bruce couldn’t really blame him for this. Not after the number of times Bruce had worked with Selina or Harvey or Eddie. On the other hand, he’d never liked Tim’s tendency to team up with whoever was available. The number of times he’d been scolded for teaming up with Helena, for instance. Or Selina, even while Bruce worked with Selina himself.
“Machin is erratic and unstable and highly politically motivated towards violence. Working with him is a risk.”
Bruce Wayne, hypocrite.
“He’s actually been pretty stable since No Man’s Land ended,” Tim pointed out patiently. “Of everyone causing trouble in Gotham when you disappeared, he was the most cooperative and easiest to work with. There were far more dangerous and unpredictable people running around the city.”
Like Scarab. And Ulysses Armstrong. And Steph.
No. Steph was doing better, now she wasn’t trying to follow Bruce’s orders to toughen Tim up. Barbara had told him so. And she’d been a help when Tim returned to Gotham. He was not avoiding her so much as just avoiding further arguments. By staying out of her way.
“So I noticed in the logs. Ulysses Armstrong tried to blow up part of the city, using Machin for assistance.”
Why did Bruce always have to pick and needle away at this?
“He did. Because he was holding Lonnie captive. Sometimes people have to make compromises in situations like that, Bruce.”
“There is no excuse for unleashing someone like Ulysses Armstrong on the city.” Bruce’s voice was inflexible.
The worst part was that Tim, in the dark of the night, agreed with Bruce. Steph’s actions had been reckless and dangerous and hurt him. And yet… “You say that, but she was acting on your orders, you know.”
“What?”
“Stephanie. She was working with Armstrong. Because you told her to. To ‘make me stronger’, she said.”
“We are not talking about Batgirl right now.” Bruce’s voice shaded into a deep growl. “In any event, I never gave her orders to work with criminals.”
Tim felt the rage build up inside him. “No, you never do. You just put people in situations that they can’t escape, and then judge them when they screw up or can’t meet your high standards!”
“Timothy.” The dark growl in Bruce’s voice made Tim’s spine straighten. “We are not having this discussion. I do not expect you to question my methods.” Great. He was getting told off in front of Damian, and Dick hadn’t even come over to back him up. Dick had been in Gotham as much as possible during that period, and had seen what it was like. Bruce hadn’t. And yet there he was, on the other side of the room, tapping away at the main computer and not paying a single bit of attention.
“Bruce.” Tim gritted his teeth and tried to sound as calm as he could. “In that case, please do not question mine. I made a judgement call that it was better to have Lonnie and his keyboard and his MoneySpider pseudonym working for us and providing additional assistance, than to leave him in a medical facility where he might get creative in his boredom.
“You can change the world from behind a keyboard, according to Barbara. And look, isn’t this better than Lonnie spending his time writing long essays and books on the theory of anarchism?”
“Words and a keyboard can change the world,” repeated Bruce, suddenly sounding calmer and thoughtful. “I’d forgotten. I ran into a writer the other day who told me that. Who always carried a computer to type, because words could change reality.”
“Okay?”
“It had just been a long time since our last encounter.” Bruce shook his head. “If you are convinced that this is keeping Machin occupied with something other than causing trouble or writing polemics against the State, I will not interfere with your methods.”
“Okay Bruce. I’ll keep an eye on Lonnie, but at present, is there anything more I can do for you? I’ve got patrol notes to make and a meeting with Lucius at 9:30am.”
“Not for now.” Bruce ended the call.
Wonderful. Tim pulled up his draft patrol notes from earlier in the evening and started annotating his finds at each location. It looked like the League of Assassins were moving personnel around and pulling out of old safehouses; there’d been changes both in the locations that they’d known about previously (and that Ra’s knew they knew about in the never-ending game of cat and mouse he seemed to play with Bruce), and in the locations that Tim had found on the League computers before blowing up all that data. So Ra’s probably didn’t trust anything Tim had been able to access to have remained secret. That was useful to know.
Once he was done and Tim headed upstairs to bed, he suddenly realised that Dick still hadn’t said anything. Not about Bruce being a pain. Not even to twit him about dodging bullets better. Just sat silently at the main computer, working on reports and programming.
It was alarmingly Brucelike of Dick.