find me flightless
Sep. 17th, 2025 04:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
softpunksdick grayson & tim drake // ~2.5k
> written for the Tim Drake Flip Zine; Canon Divergence.
“You’re mad at me,” Dick says, in that sad tone he always uses when he can tell one of his siblings is upset with him. It’s always a little condescending.
"You sound like a child,” Tim replies, for lack of anything better to say. He doesn’t mean it to come off as harsh, but maybe that’s how it sounds, based on the wounded look on Dick’s face. But Tim can’t help but feel slightly unapologetic for it. And this doesn’t feel like a conversation they should be having now, regardless of whether Tim wants to avoid having it or not. “We need to find a way to get out of here.”
It’s easy enough for them to undo the bands that cuff them in place while managing to not trigger the disc connected to their necks that set off electric shocks to their system, thanks to the years of experience they’ve had getting into this situation and the fact that none of the goons had thought to take their utility belts, but it feels just as embarrassing that they had gotten caught just as easily. They’re supposed to be better than this. There had been nothing alarming about this League of Assassins hideout besides the fact that it wasn’t registered in their files back in the Batcave, so it was new and they didn’t have much intel about it, and that it was Dick’s last spotted location, so Tim thought to go there despite going by himself.
Then again, it’s not every day that Tim runs into a Lazarus Pit. It’s not every day he falls into it in the middle of an ambush by Assassins members while trying to search for Dick—who had been dodgy about contact with the rest of the family before going completely AWOL for the past month—and thinks, seconds before drowning: this has happened before.
“Why were you tied up with me anyway?” Tim asks, because that’s the part he missed given that he was knocked out cold from the Pit; one second submerged into its waters and the next hanging midair in a cellar and tied up. “I thought you were here doing a ‘favor’ for Ra’s. You’re supposed to be on the same side.”
“I’m not on their side,” Dick says, as they dash out of the cellar. They knock down the guards stationed by the entrance and dash through the hall. Even without words they know what they need to do—find a way to make the Pit inaccessible. The smart decision would be to call for Bruce because he knows the most on how to handle the Pit, but he’s off-world, and it’s a touchy subject with Jason and Damian. Destroying the compound seems like the next best thing until they find a better solution. “And neither are they on mine. I just did something for him. But the moment I fulfilled that favor and attacked them, the truce was over.”
There was no relief when Tim had come to, even if he should’ve been, regardless of whether he was caught or not—Dick was there, after all, and he seemed more or less safe, in the same amount of peril Tim was, being tied with him, and that was all Tim was supposed to care about: Dick’s well-being, because that was why he went all the way here, when no one else was that concerned about Dick’s whereabouts because Dick had his own life and his own issues and could more or less take care of himself. But all Tim felt was soaked and awfully cold. It was a feeling that extended past physicality; it was an emotion that left him nearly numb, and the first thing he said to Dick was not are you okay or what’s going on with you or are you in trouble, but, “What did you do to me?” because Tim was smart. He understood that these events—Dick’s disappearance, his assumed-turned-true involvement with the League of Assassins, and the familiarity Tim felt being exposed to the Pit, even if unintentionally—were all interconnected.
And Dick had replied, “Do you remember how your fight with Ra’s back when Bruce was still lost in time went? You fell.”
Tim said, “I did. You caught me.”
“That’s the thing though,” Dick said, “I didn’t.”
Ra’s had always been a little obsessed with Tim’s potential, in a way no one else had ever been. It made sense, of course, that he had lingered in the aftermath of that battle, that when he saw what happened, saw Dick’s failure, and the cost it made, he made that offer to Dick, no matter how horrifying. The Pit to revive him, but Dick would do something in return.
Ever since Bruce came back, they never really got to talk about how being Batman was like for Dick, only that he was clearly capable of taking up the mantle. Nothing about how it weighed down on him, and how it did the same for every decision he made, every emotion he felt as a result of it.
“I can’t ask what Ra’s asked you to do, can I,” Tim says now.
“No,” Dick says, a little regretfully. “But don’t worry about it. Whatever the consequences are, I can deal with it. I didn’t just fulfill my end of the bargain without thinking it over and being careful about it. Just don’t tell Bruce.”
“Like how you didn’t tell me?” Tim retorts, but he doesn’t wait for Dick’s response, doesn’t even look at Dick to see his reaction. “Do we have enough explosives to bring the compound down?”
“Hopefully,” Dick says. “I’ll call for backup just in case. If ever, we can set off enough to tear down the foundation, and then have the rest come in to make sure of it. Batman isn’t going to be happy though.”
“Yeah, well,” starts Tim, “He’s the one who decided to do off-world with the Justice League.”
Dick and Tim don’t often team up, but maybe because the quantity didn’t matter when from the start there was already an established complementary dynamic between them, one that didn’t require practice compared to other team-ups. They’re both good at non-excessive and playing smart instead, to know when they can evade a fight and when they have to face it. They do a quick work on comparing their knowledge on the compound and determining which are the best spots to plant the explosives to be able to maximize a powerful explosion despite how the damage that they’re equipment is capable of shouldn’t be big enough to tear down an entire building, and it’s a very natural, seamless conversation, one without carrying the baggage of what they really need to talk about it.
It means they’re good at dodging topics, which isn’t good, but it’s more than that too. Not talking past what they need to say to each other, keeping things strictly professional because this is a job they have to do clears Tim’s mind, helps him internally sort out his feelings on this revelation that shifts his entire perspective even though he has other priorities at the forefront of his mind.
It’s strange because even if it did happen, Tim doesn’t remember it. He doesn’t remember falling to the floor, doesn’t remember splitting his skull and bleeding out on the concrete. He doesn’t remember Dick cradling him in his arms and eventually following Ra’s to the Pit, carrying Tim his arms like he was a fragile thing, lowering him into its waters as if he was afraid it wouldn’t work. Tim doesn’t remember emerging out of the Pit either, he doesn’t remember leaving Ra’s premises. Somehow in between his lapses of memory during the incident, his mind had conjured up a different story that aligned with whatever fabricated lie Dick had in mind—that he was falling, that Dick caught him right on time, that he woke up in Leslie’s clinic, having been out cold long enough to recuperate nearly fully.
It’s hard to process that Tim really did die, when he doesn’t remember it. Knowing it isn’t the same. And knowing that Dick did it because he cares is just as difficult too. Tim knows it, and he has no reason to doubt it, and it’s why Dick had done that, that stupid thing that everyone always said to never do, because the Pit was never worth it, even if Tim didn’t have any side effects and Dick is clearly more scarred from the event than he was, but it’s hard still. It’s hard to feel that Dick did it out of love when something else overpowers it far more, and Tim is stuck on it.
Half an hour later, they’re a safe distance away from the compound, standing atop a grassy hill that Tim had previously sat at hours ago strategizing how he was going to sneak in to search for his brother. Dick sits down while Tim glances down at the timer on his wrists, which tells them they have about eight minutes, so all they can do is wait for everything to happen—for the explosives to go off, for the rest to arrive to finish the job. Dick says, apropos of nothing, “Cass told me about this dumpling shop I had to try if I was ever in Hong Kong. I’ve been here for three weeks and it’s all I’ve been thinking about to get me through everything.”
Tim doesn’t respond. He watches the League of Assassins flee the scene, intent on getting to safety and regrouping, and while Dick and Tim can intercept them, they choose not to go after them even if Ra’s will find a way to exact revenge on them for doing this. It’s a risk worth taking. Not all battles are meant to be fought.
And there are more important things to confront, things that Tim can’t avoid any longer.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” he finally asks.
“I thought you’d resent me for failing to save you,” Dick admits, not looking at him.
“I don’t,” Tim says. It feels a little more like betrayal, as opposed to resentment. He doesn’t like being lied to. It’s still difficult to untangle how he feels about the whole matter, but now he’s starting to realize that it may be inconsequential, because if he had actually died then, he wouldn’t have been able to help anyone like he did after that event. Of course Tim doesn’t resent Dick for failing to save him, for deciding to bring him back. How could he, when it’s a decision that helps everyone? “But you can’t save everyone. Especially if they’re important to you.”
“You didn’t do that with Bruce,” Dick points out.
“That’s different,” Tim says, “I’m smarter than you.”
It makes Dick laugh, at the very least, and somehow, that lightens the somber mood between them, something Tim is grateful for. He doesn’t want Dick to feel guilty about what he had done, even if Tim isn’t happy about it, even though no one would be, or be torn about how to feel, if they had known. And it already happened, regardless. It feels useless to dwell on it.
It’s a cool night out. The sky is too cloudy for any stars to be seen, but Tim lifts his gaze anyway. There had been stars that night he fell. For some reason, it’s the only thing he vividly remembers. Back then, striking out solo had been so lonely, even if there was a tinge of freedom too, of knowing that he was independent, that he was trusted to take care of himself, so it meant a lot that Dick came for him at the last moment, when Tim needed him most. Tim still feels that way, even with this.
But— “If something like this ever happens again,” Tim begins, “You should just let me go on my own terms. I deserve that dignity.”
“I know,” Dick replies quietly, reluctantly. He clenches his fist. “But you’re my little brother.”
Tim sighs, and bumps Dick with his foot. “Yeah, but we’re more than brothers, we’re equals,” he reminds Dick. “That’s what you promised me back then, right?”
“I did,” Dick agrees. He closes his eyes, as if recalling that same memory himself. “I still mean it.”
Tim believes him. This, he knows, is not a lie. “Okay,” he says. Dick opens his eyes when he hears a rustling noise beside him, and finds Tim sitting beside him. “Hey,” Tim starts. “Thank you,” because he knows, just because Dick wouldn’t have done it any other way, doesn’t make it any easier, and he knows, even if Dick is trying to hide it, that he’s exhausted. That it weighs down on him, whatever thing he had to do for Ra’s that he’ll have to confront later. But even if Dick can’t tell him, they’re equals. Tim will be there. He can do something. “We should go.”
“Steph isn’t here yet,” Dick points out.
“I know,” Tim says, standing up. “But I want to check out that dumpling place you mentioned. See if they’re still open at this hour. I’m having a craving.” He outstretches his hand to Dick. “Come on.”
After a moment, Dick takes it.
> written for the Tim Drake Flip Zine; Canon Divergence.
“You’re mad at me,” Dick says, in that sad tone he always uses when he can tell one of his siblings is upset with him. It’s always a little condescending.
"You sound like a child,” Tim replies, for lack of anything better to say. He doesn’t mean it to come off as harsh, but maybe that’s how it sounds, based on the wounded look on Dick’s face. But Tim can’t help but feel slightly unapologetic for it. And this doesn’t feel like a conversation they should be having now, regardless of whether Tim wants to avoid having it or not. “We need to find a way to get out of here.”
It’s easy enough for them to undo the bands that cuff them in place while managing to not trigger the disc connected to their necks that set off electric shocks to their system, thanks to the years of experience they’ve had getting into this situation and the fact that none of the goons had thought to take their utility belts, but it feels just as embarrassing that they had gotten caught just as easily. They’re supposed to be better than this. There had been nothing alarming about this League of Assassins hideout besides the fact that it wasn’t registered in their files back in the Batcave, so it was new and they didn’t have much intel about it, and that it was Dick’s last spotted location, so Tim thought to go there despite going by himself.
Then again, it’s not every day that Tim runs into a Lazarus Pit. It’s not every day he falls into it in the middle of an ambush by Assassins members while trying to search for Dick—who had been dodgy about contact with the rest of the family before going completely AWOL for the past month—and thinks, seconds before drowning: this has happened before.
“Why were you tied up with me anyway?” Tim asks, because that’s the part he missed given that he was knocked out cold from the Pit; one second submerged into its waters and the next hanging midair in a cellar and tied up. “I thought you were here doing a ‘favor’ for Ra’s. You’re supposed to be on the same side.”
“I’m not on their side,” Dick says, as they dash out of the cellar. They knock down the guards stationed by the entrance and dash through the hall. Even without words they know what they need to do—find a way to make the Pit inaccessible. The smart decision would be to call for Bruce because he knows the most on how to handle the Pit, but he’s off-world, and it’s a touchy subject with Jason and Damian. Destroying the compound seems like the next best thing until they find a better solution. “And neither are they on mine. I just did something for him. But the moment I fulfilled that favor and attacked them, the truce was over.”
There was no relief when Tim had come to, even if he should’ve been, regardless of whether he was caught or not—Dick was there, after all, and he seemed more or less safe, in the same amount of peril Tim was, being tied with him, and that was all Tim was supposed to care about: Dick’s well-being, because that was why he went all the way here, when no one else was that concerned about Dick’s whereabouts because Dick had his own life and his own issues and could more or less take care of himself. But all Tim felt was soaked and awfully cold. It was a feeling that extended past physicality; it was an emotion that left him nearly numb, and the first thing he said to Dick was not are you okay or what’s going on with you or are you in trouble, but, “What did you do to me?” because Tim was smart. He understood that these events—Dick’s disappearance, his assumed-turned-true involvement with the League of Assassins, and the familiarity Tim felt being exposed to the Pit, even if unintentionally—were all interconnected.
And Dick had replied, “Do you remember how your fight with Ra’s back when Bruce was still lost in time went? You fell.”
Tim said, “I did. You caught me.”
“That’s the thing though,” Dick said, “I didn’t.”
Ra’s had always been a little obsessed with Tim’s potential, in a way no one else had ever been. It made sense, of course, that he had lingered in the aftermath of that battle, that when he saw what happened, saw Dick’s failure, and the cost it made, he made that offer to Dick, no matter how horrifying. The Pit to revive him, but Dick would do something in return.
Ever since Bruce came back, they never really got to talk about how being Batman was like for Dick, only that he was clearly capable of taking up the mantle. Nothing about how it weighed down on him, and how it did the same for every decision he made, every emotion he felt as a result of it.
“I can’t ask what Ra’s asked you to do, can I,” Tim says now.
“No,” Dick says, a little regretfully. “But don’t worry about it. Whatever the consequences are, I can deal with it. I didn’t just fulfill my end of the bargain without thinking it over and being careful about it. Just don’t tell Bruce.”
“Like how you didn’t tell me?” Tim retorts, but he doesn’t wait for Dick’s response, doesn’t even look at Dick to see his reaction. “Do we have enough explosives to bring the compound down?”
“Hopefully,” Dick says. “I’ll call for backup just in case. If ever, we can set off enough to tear down the foundation, and then have the rest come in to make sure of it. Batman isn’t going to be happy though.”
“Yeah, well,” starts Tim, “He’s the one who decided to do off-world with the Justice League.”
Dick and Tim don’t often team up, but maybe because the quantity didn’t matter when from the start there was already an established complementary dynamic between them, one that didn’t require practice compared to other team-ups. They’re both good at non-excessive and playing smart instead, to know when they can evade a fight and when they have to face it. They do a quick work on comparing their knowledge on the compound and determining which are the best spots to plant the explosives to be able to maximize a powerful explosion despite how the damage that they’re equipment is capable of shouldn’t be big enough to tear down an entire building, and it’s a very natural, seamless conversation, one without carrying the baggage of what they really need to talk about it.
It means they’re good at dodging topics, which isn’t good, but it’s more than that too. Not talking past what they need to say to each other, keeping things strictly professional because this is a job they have to do clears Tim’s mind, helps him internally sort out his feelings on this revelation that shifts his entire perspective even though he has other priorities at the forefront of his mind.
It’s strange because even if it did happen, Tim doesn’t remember it. He doesn’t remember falling to the floor, doesn’t remember splitting his skull and bleeding out on the concrete. He doesn’t remember Dick cradling him in his arms and eventually following Ra’s to the Pit, carrying Tim his arms like he was a fragile thing, lowering him into its waters as if he was afraid it wouldn’t work. Tim doesn’t remember emerging out of the Pit either, he doesn’t remember leaving Ra’s premises. Somehow in between his lapses of memory during the incident, his mind had conjured up a different story that aligned with whatever fabricated lie Dick had in mind—that he was falling, that Dick caught him right on time, that he woke up in Leslie’s clinic, having been out cold long enough to recuperate nearly fully.
It’s hard to process that Tim really did die, when he doesn’t remember it. Knowing it isn’t the same. And knowing that Dick did it because he cares is just as difficult too. Tim knows it, and he has no reason to doubt it, and it’s why Dick had done that, that stupid thing that everyone always said to never do, because the Pit was never worth it, even if Tim didn’t have any side effects and Dick is clearly more scarred from the event than he was, but it’s hard still. It’s hard to feel that Dick did it out of love when something else overpowers it far more, and Tim is stuck on it.
Half an hour later, they’re a safe distance away from the compound, standing atop a grassy hill that Tim had previously sat at hours ago strategizing how he was going to sneak in to search for his brother. Dick sits down while Tim glances down at the timer on his wrists, which tells them they have about eight minutes, so all they can do is wait for everything to happen—for the explosives to go off, for the rest to arrive to finish the job. Dick says, apropos of nothing, “Cass told me about this dumpling shop I had to try if I was ever in Hong Kong. I’ve been here for three weeks and it’s all I’ve been thinking about to get me through everything.”
Tim doesn’t respond. He watches the League of Assassins flee the scene, intent on getting to safety and regrouping, and while Dick and Tim can intercept them, they choose not to go after them even if Ra’s will find a way to exact revenge on them for doing this. It’s a risk worth taking. Not all battles are meant to be fought.
And there are more important things to confront, things that Tim can’t avoid any longer.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” he finally asks.
“I thought you’d resent me for failing to save you,” Dick admits, not looking at him.
“I don’t,” Tim says. It feels a little more like betrayal, as opposed to resentment. He doesn’t like being lied to. It’s still difficult to untangle how he feels about the whole matter, but now he’s starting to realize that it may be inconsequential, because if he had actually died then, he wouldn’t have been able to help anyone like he did after that event. Of course Tim doesn’t resent Dick for failing to save him, for deciding to bring him back. How could he, when it’s a decision that helps everyone? “But you can’t save everyone. Especially if they’re important to you.”
“You didn’t do that with Bruce,” Dick points out.
“That’s different,” Tim says, “I’m smarter than you.”
It makes Dick laugh, at the very least, and somehow, that lightens the somber mood between them, something Tim is grateful for. He doesn’t want Dick to feel guilty about what he had done, even if Tim isn’t happy about it, even though no one would be, or be torn about how to feel, if they had known. And it already happened, regardless. It feels useless to dwell on it.
It’s a cool night out. The sky is too cloudy for any stars to be seen, but Tim lifts his gaze anyway. There had been stars that night he fell. For some reason, it’s the only thing he vividly remembers. Back then, striking out solo had been so lonely, even if there was a tinge of freedom too, of knowing that he was independent, that he was trusted to take care of himself, so it meant a lot that Dick came for him at the last moment, when Tim needed him most. Tim still feels that way, even with this.
But— “If something like this ever happens again,” Tim begins, “You should just let me go on my own terms. I deserve that dignity.”
“I know,” Dick replies quietly, reluctantly. He clenches his fist. “But you’re my little brother.”
Tim sighs, and bumps Dick with his foot. “Yeah, but we’re more than brothers, we’re equals,” he reminds Dick. “That’s what you promised me back then, right?”
“I did,” Dick agrees. He closes his eyes, as if recalling that same memory himself. “I still mean it.”
Tim believes him. This, he knows, is not a lie. “Okay,” he says. Dick opens his eyes when he hears a rustling noise beside him, and finds Tim sitting beside him. “Hey,” Tim starts. “Thank you,” because he knows, just because Dick wouldn’t have done it any other way, doesn’t make it any easier, and he knows, even if Dick is trying to hide it, that he’s exhausted. That it weighs down on him, whatever thing he had to do for Ra’s that he’ll have to confront later. But even if Dick can’t tell him, they’re equals. Tim will be there. He can do something. “We should go.”
“Steph isn’t here yet,” Dick points out.
“I know,” Tim says, standing up. “But I want to check out that dumpling place you mentioned. See if they’re still open at this hour. I’m having a craving.” He outstretches his hand to Dick. “Come on.”
After a moment, Dick takes it.