Brotherly Tough Love
((Summary: Potion-Genderswitched!Terry has a conversation with SBP-Pummeled!Tim. In the infirmary. Backdated by about 2 weeks. Back when Terry was a girl. Posted late because we both thought the other was going to post it. ))
All Tim knew for sure, right that minute, was the he never, ever wanted to have to grow his bones back ever again, ever. His stomach was in knots and his whole right arm was throbbing, while his hand healed. Tim had curled up on one side, and whatever he'd been curled up against wasn't there anymore, so it was his guess that Kon had ether been forced back into his own hospital bed, or sent back to the dorms.
Tim made a low, groaning noise in the back of his throat and shifted. His throat was bone-dry, his head hurt, and he couldn't sleep through it. It just felt too uncomfortable!
Someone held a straw up to his lips. There was some sort of unsweetened flower tea in the glass. "Hey TweetTweet. Heard you forgot which side of the family you're on." A soft hand pushed the mop of hair on Tim's forehead back, massaging gently down his scalp, while the other kept the straw stable for him to suck.
"Can't leave you on your own for two minutes before you find someone else to give you bruises? Please tell me you're not crushing on Clark too. Cause then we really have to talk about the birds and bees and the bondage belts."
"Very funny," Tim said dryly, grumbling before he took a sip. He would make a witty retort once he'd had something to drink. Oh man, that tasted so good. "That asshole is nothing like Clark, he isn't Clark, and I don't care what universe he's from, he isn't Superman. Not to me," Tim said firmly. "I can't stand him. That's something you don't gotta worry about."
Tim wasn't into Jason because Jason beat him up!
He. Well. He liked Jason for other reasons! For reasons independent from being beaten up! Yes.
Evenifhekindoflikedthat,yes.
"That's good to know. Cause Jason might kill himself going up against that guy, and that's not really the best way to test and see if he cares." There was a shift of light and then Terry pulled the drink away finally. "See if you can sit up, a bit."
She was seated on a chair pulled close to the cot, red hair mussed in curls around her head, her eyes very much Terry; Bruce's shade of blue. Bruce's shape.
"I've got to talk to Kal-el eventually anyway. But you want to tell me what exactly happened ?"
Tim sat up, blinked a few times, and frowned. He must really not be well, because he only just then realized that the pitch of Terry's voice was all wrong. Squinting at the red-haired girl, Tim frowned, and wondered if maybe the potion was having weird side effects.
"... Are you a girl?!" Tim couldn't really say it wasn't likely. He'd been stuck as a girl, yeah, but... but.. TERRY!
"The Curse of the Wicked House Elf. It's a Batfamily burden to bear. " He gave a wry smile and shrugged. "But you were the one getting a lecture. Don't try to change the subject. Since when do any of us, without a powersuit, go head to head against one of the Kryptonians ?"
Terry held out the drink again, but still lightly tapped Tim upside his head. Just enough to ruffle his hair, not enough to add to any feelings of pain or soreness. "I know you know how to think clearly."
"I... " Tim glanced over his shoulder, and saw that the bed across the way was empty. "... I don't think when Conner's in trouble. I just move. That sorry excuse for Mr Kent was eye-frying his chest and trying to smash his head in. I just.. went at him with some green k. He was trying to kill my best friend," Tim said firmly, his voice going all icy, as he leaned over to take another drink
of tea.
No, he did not regret going after Clark. Yes, he kind of wished it had gone better for him, but that was to be expected.
Terry sighed, running a hand through her hair in a likely familiar move and ending up having to flip it because it was just too long. "You and I are going to start training. The old way. You weren't thinking on your feet. You're the genius Tim, you couldn't have thought of a kryptonite gun? A bow and arrow? A sling little David?! Connor in trouble is no excuse and you know it. Doesn't look like you were much good to him, with half your bones snapped and passed out in pain. You were just a distraction. And Robin's are not cannon fodder." It wasn't quite Batvoice. But it was damn close for a girl.
Tim ground his teeth together, his face going very hard for a moment. "There are some people I would die beside, and Kon is one of them. I'll take the heat before I'll let him take it, no matter who it's from. I can't help that. It's how I work. Excuse or not." Tim's shoulders were stiff, and his voice was tight.
"It's not like I'm proud of it. But just because some ass shows up saying that he's Clark doesn't mean I'm going to take it from him that he's a good person. Especially not when the first thing he says is that my best friend is worthless."
What did Terry HAVE for that idiot fake Clark?
"Tim!" The name was snapped out, an unconscious command. And Terry would never have thought he'd picked something like that up from just being around Bruce. He didn't tend to think of himself as a command-lead person. She held Tim's gaze a moment, intense. "No excuses. You know the drill. You should know it better than I do." There was worry in Terry's voice, easy to hear with it's lighter tonalities. Her voice as a woman couldn't quite hide the fright behind anger.
"This has nothing to do with Clark. Fake. Real. Or whatever. This is you, letting things get personal, and rushing out without thinking or thinking on your feet. You got hurt. You got hurt for a stupid reason. If you weren't on school grounds, he could have killed you."
"And if --" Tim started, voice hot and sharp and fast, before he clamped his jaw shut and swallowed it. Whatever it was he was going to say, he just physically swallowed it, and exhaled. "It won't happen again. Not until the next time my indestructible best friend is about to get torn to pieces, anyway," Tim said firmly, and sank down against the mattress again, keeping his hands against his chest. He felt like he'd gone over this with Terry before.
There were people in the world that Tim would die protecting, however futile. Conner was one of them.
"I'm training again with Shiva, anyway. She'll give me this lecture, too." Tim swallowed again, and reached up with his good hand, rubbing his temple.
This time Terry did flick Tim one on the skull, right on the forehead, hard. Then said ow quietly, since her fingers as a girl apparently didn't like that one little bit.
"If what I've heard is true, she might break something to prove the point. I don't want that either. I'm not questioning your loyalty, twip. I'm questioning your brains. You didn't call for help. You didn't think of back up. Or an exit plan. You reacted. You played right into that Clark's hands, if he wasn't more focused on Connor, you would be as close to dead as this place gets."
She tugged on her hair in frustration. "Stop trying to defend your actions and think for a minute. Put the pride and guilt on hold. And yeah, I said guilt. If you can't be Connor's boyfriend, you'll be his self-sacrificing best friend. Which it's just...stupid in ways I won't get into. But if I did, they'd involve comparing you to people who wear jockstraps on their heads and drink too much beer."
She folded her arms, unintentionally propping and framing her breasts. "A sacrifice has to mean something. You don't do it because you feel guilty. And you don't do it cause it's the easiest choice. The hard choice, the smart choice would have been getting help, or contacting a professor, or using a broom to get Kon out of there. Or I don't know, making an appeal to Clark's sense of battlefield honor, if he had any. "
Her eyes narrowed. "When you start training with Shiva, killing blows will be the easy choice. Maiming will be the hard choice and sometimes letting yourself get hurt will be the wise choice, for us. We don't kill indiscriminately. And in your verse apparently we don't kill at all."
"This isn't about guilt," Tim said quietly. "It's about that, even before I got here, I'd have died for Kon. Just like I know he'd die for me. The truth is, when it comes to him there is no choice. I watched my girlfriend die, and my father die, because I couldn't get to them to help them in time. I will never let anyone that I care about take a killing blow, even if it's a no-kill campus, and even if it's from Clark Kent. "Nobody I care about is gonna get hurt that badly in front of me again, ever. If there is a way, I'll find it." Tim's voice wavered with intensity, and he clamped it shut again.
"The truth is, That's why I'm going back to Shiva. I'm going to be strong enough to protect him, or Bruce, or you, or Jay, or anybody. Because we aren't going to be here for always."
Tim added, firmly, "I'm not gonna lose anybody else. If you're going to try and talk me out of that, you're wasting your time."
"I'm Batman, Tim. You think I don't know about losing people ?" Terry said it quietly, then stood up, pushing back her chair. "Get some rest, you need it."
She paused a moment by the curtain around the bed. "Maybe Shiva will find a way of showing you how to pick your battles. Or who knows, maybe Connor will, maybe he's the one I should talk to. After all, he's the one that had to watch you get thrown around like a rag doll. In the mean time, I'll talk to Kent."
Tim shouldn't be getting mad at Terry because he'd been ineffective. He knew that. It didn't mean there wasn't an icy rage shifting around inside of him. "It's not a matter of whether or not I can win. It's a matter of whether or not I can keep the people who matter from losing." Tim wasn't going to explain it any further, because he didn't think he could. Not right now anyway, which was frustrating, because of all the people who needed to understand, Terry was probably the most important. Tim would go into fights he knew he couldn't win, if it meant that the people close to him would have a chance. He didn't have a deathwish, he wouldn't do it haphazardly or for just anything. Kon-El had been BLEEDING. And UNCONSCIOUS. He'd been helpless, and that asshole that Terry was defending was going to take it further.
The asshole that had been insulting and attacking Kon since he first applied.
Tim wasn't going to just watch his best friend get torn apart. Tim WAS, however, going to keep his mouth shut. He didn't want to say anything else to Terry. Tim didn't trust himself not to say something he'd regret.
All Tim knew for sure, right that minute, was the he never, ever wanted to have to grow his bones back ever again, ever. His stomach was in knots and his whole right arm was throbbing, while his hand healed. Tim had curled up on one side, and whatever he'd been curled up against wasn't there anymore, so it was his guess that Kon had ether been forced back into his own hospital bed, or sent back to the dorms.
Tim made a low, groaning noise in the back of his throat and shifted. His throat was bone-dry, his head hurt, and he couldn't sleep through it. It just felt too uncomfortable!
Someone held a straw up to his lips. There was some sort of unsweetened flower tea in the glass. "Hey TweetTweet. Heard you forgot which side of the family you're on." A soft hand pushed the mop of hair on Tim's forehead back, massaging gently down his scalp, while the other kept the straw stable for him to suck.
"Can't leave you on your own for two minutes before you find someone else to give you bruises? Please tell me you're not crushing on Clark too. Cause then we really have to talk about the birds and bees and the bondage belts."
"Very funny," Tim said dryly, grumbling before he took a sip. He would make a witty retort once he'd had something to drink. Oh man, that tasted so good. "That asshole is nothing like Clark, he isn't Clark, and I don't care what universe he's from, he isn't Superman. Not to me," Tim said firmly. "I can't stand him. That's something you don't gotta worry about."
Tim wasn't into Jason because Jason beat him up!
He. Well. He liked Jason for other reasons! For reasons independent from being beaten up! Yes.
Evenifhekindoflikedthat,yes.
"That's good to know. Cause Jason might kill himself going up against that guy, and that's not really the best way to test and see if he cares." There was a shift of light and then Terry pulled the drink away finally. "See if you can sit up, a bit."
She was seated on a chair pulled close to the cot, red hair mussed in curls around her head, her eyes very much Terry; Bruce's shade of blue. Bruce's shape.
"I've got to talk to Kal-el eventually anyway. But you want to tell me what exactly happened ?"
Tim sat up, blinked a few times, and frowned. He must really not be well, because he only just then realized that the pitch of Terry's voice was all wrong. Squinting at the red-haired girl, Tim frowned, and wondered if maybe the potion was having weird side effects.
"... Are you a girl?!" Tim couldn't really say it wasn't likely. He'd been stuck as a girl, yeah, but... but.. TERRY!
"The Curse of the Wicked House Elf. It's a Batfamily burden to bear. " He gave a wry smile and shrugged. "But you were the one getting a lecture. Don't try to change the subject. Since when do any of us, without a powersuit, go head to head against one of the Kryptonians ?"
Terry held out the drink again, but still lightly tapped Tim upside his head. Just enough to ruffle his hair, not enough to add to any feelings of pain or soreness. "I know you know how to think clearly."
"I... " Tim glanced over his shoulder, and saw that the bed across the way was empty. "... I don't think when Conner's in trouble. I just move. That sorry excuse for Mr Kent was eye-frying his chest and trying to smash his head in. I just.. went at him with some green k. He was trying to kill my best friend," Tim said firmly, his voice going all icy, as he leaned over to take another drink
of tea.
No, he did not regret going after Clark. Yes, he kind of wished it had gone better for him, but that was to be expected.
Terry sighed, running a hand through her hair in a likely familiar move and ending up having to flip it because it was just too long. "You and I are going to start training. The old way. You weren't thinking on your feet. You're the genius Tim, you couldn't have thought of a kryptonite gun? A bow and arrow? A sling little David?! Connor in trouble is no excuse and you know it. Doesn't look like you were much good to him, with half your bones snapped and passed out in pain. You were just a distraction. And Robin's are not cannon fodder." It wasn't quite Batvoice. But it was damn close for a girl.
Tim ground his teeth together, his face going very hard for a moment. "There are some people I would die beside, and Kon is one of them. I'll take the heat before I'll let him take it, no matter who it's from. I can't help that. It's how I work. Excuse or not." Tim's shoulders were stiff, and his voice was tight.
"It's not like I'm proud of it. But just because some ass shows up saying that he's Clark doesn't mean I'm going to take it from him that he's a good person. Especially not when the first thing he says is that my best friend is worthless."
What did Terry HAVE for that idiot fake Clark?
"Tim!" The name was snapped out, an unconscious command. And Terry would never have thought he'd picked something like that up from just being around Bruce. He didn't tend to think of himself as a command-lead person. She held Tim's gaze a moment, intense. "No excuses. You know the drill. You should know it better than I do." There was worry in Terry's voice, easy to hear with it's lighter tonalities. Her voice as a woman couldn't quite hide the fright behind anger.
"This has nothing to do with Clark. Fake. Real. Or whatever. This is you, letting things get personal, and rushing out without thinking or thinking on your feet. You got hurt. You got hurt for a stupid reason. If you weren't on school grounds, he could have killed you."
"And if --" Tim started, voice hot and sharp and fast, before he clamped his jaw shut and swallowed it. Whatever it was he was going to say, he just physically swallowed it, and exhaled. "It won't happen again. Not until the next time my indestructible best friend is about to get torn to pieces, anyway," Tim said firmly, and sank down against the mattress again, keeping his hands against his chest. He felt like he'd gone over this with Terry before.
There were people in the world that Tim would die protecting, however futile. Conner was one of them.
"I'm training again with Shiva, anyway. She'll give me this lecture, too." Tim swallowed again, and reached up with his good hand, rubbing his temple.
This time Terry did flick Tim one on the skull, right on the forehead, hard. Then said ow quietly, since her fingers as a girl apparently didn't like that one little bit.
"If what I've heard is true, she might break something to prove the point. I don't want that either. I'm not questioning your loyalty, twip. I'm questioning your brains. You didn't call for help. You didn't think of back up. Or an exit plan. You reacted. You played right into that Clark's hands, if he wasn't more focused on Connor, you would be as close to dead as this place gets."
She tugged on her hair in frustration. "Stop trying to defend your actions and think for a minute. Put the pride and guilt on hold. And yeah, I said guilt. If you can't be Connor's boyfriend, you'll be his self-sacrificing best friend. Which it's just...stupid in ways I won't get into. But if I did, they'd involve comparing you to people who wear jockstraps on their heads and drink too much beer."
She folded her arms, unintentionally propping and framing her breasts. "A sacrifice has to mean something. You don't do it because you feel guilty. And you don't do it cause it's the easiest choice. The hard choice, the smart choice would have been getting help, or contacting a professor, or using a broom to get Kon out of there. Or I don't know, making an appeal to Clark's sense of battlefield honor, if he had any. "
Her eyes narrowed. "When you start training with Shiva, killing blows will be the easy choice. Maiming will be the hard choice and sometimes letting yourself get hurt will be the wise choice, for us. We don't kill indiscriminately. And in your verse apparently we don't kill at all."
"This isn't about guilt," Tim said quietly. "It's about that, even before I got here, I'd have died for Kon. Just like I know he'd die for me. The truth is, when it comes to him there is no choice. I watched my girlfriend die, and my father die, because I couldn't get to them to help them in time. I will never let anyone that I care about take a killing blow, even if it's a no-kill campus, and even if it's from Clark Kent. "Nobody I care about is gonna get hurt that badly in front of me again, ever. If there is a way, I'll find it." Tim's voice wavered with intensity, and he clamped it shut again.
"The truth is, That's why I'm going back to Shiva. I'm going to be strong enough to protect him, or Bruce, or you, or Jay, or anybody. Because we aren't going to be here for always."
Tim added, firmly, "I'm not gonna lose anybody else. If you're going to try and talk me out of that, you're wasting your time."
"I'm Batman, Tim. You think I don't know about losing people ?" Terry said it quietly, then stood up, pushing back her chair. "Get some rest, you need it."
She paused a moment by the curtain around the bed. "Maybe Shiva will find a way of showing you how to pick your battles. Or who knows, maybe Connor will, maybe he's the one I should talk to. After all, he's the one that had to watch you get thrown around like a rag doll. In the mean time, I'll talk to Kent."
Tim shouldn't be getting mad at Terry because he'd been ineffective. He knew that. It didn't mean there wasn't an icy rage shifting around inside of him. "It's not a matter of whether or not I can win. It's a matter of whether or not I can keep the people who matter from losing." Tim wasn't going to explain it any further, because he didn't think he could. Not right now anyway, which was frustrating, because of all the people who needed to understand, Terry was probably the most important. Tim would go into fights he knew he couldn't win, if it meant that the people close to him would have a chance. He didn't have a deathwish, he wouldn't do it haphazardly or for just anything. Kon-El had been BLEEDING. And UNCONSCIOUS. He'd been helpless, and that asshole that Terry was defending was going to take it further.
The asshole that had been insulting and attacking Kon since he first applied.
Tim wasn't going to just watch his best friend get torn apart. Tim WAS, however, going to keep his mouth shut. He didn't want to say anything else to Terry. Tim didn't trust himself not to say something he'd regret.