DCU FIC: Never a Hero (Part 2/3)
Title: Never a Hero
Author: iesika
Fandom: DCU
Rating: Mild
Pairing: None (unless you squint)
Summary: Sometimes, if a man is lucky, he gets a second chance to do the most important thing he's never done.
Notes: This is for floranna, who's been unbelievably patient. I'm sorry this took so long, and I hope it was worth the wait. This was written with utter disregard for continuity beyond about the start of Red Robin, which is when I stopped reading new DC comics. Thanks to kirax2 for a great deal of inspiration and repair work, and to batstalker for title help.
Part One here.
He's not hungry when lunch comes, either, pacing around the cell as the servant comes in and sets the dishes down. The smell of garlic and lemon makes his stomach roil. He does drink some water, while it's cold, and then he covers the dishes so he won't have to think about food.
Knowing what al Ghul wants from him makes the situation a little more terrifying than it was before. He's having weird flashbacks, and he can't stop thinking of Janet. He's always done his best not to think about Janet - about what it was like there at the end. Jack mostly tries not to think about Haiti at all. When he'd gotten home, when he'd woken up, he'd thrown himself into his recovery, into his relationship with Dana, into being a better father. It'd been so awkward, getting involved in Tim's life, but he'd chalked it up to missing six or seven months. Dana had been so sure that he just needed to give Tim some time, to keep reaching out...
Why Tim, anyway? Jack knows his son is smart and strong, and... and a lot of things, but... well, not that much of it can be genetic, can it? Tim got his nose from his dad, his eyes from his mom, but he sure as hell didn't get his ...hero-ness from his parents. He learned that stuff from Wayne, and it's kind of stupid for al Ghul to think something like that would carry over genetically. If it did, Wayne wouldn't keep recruiting other people's kids - he'd just have some of his own.
He's been thinking that the worst thing al Ghul could do would be to kill him. Torture is a different kind of threat, and so is making him an accessory to his son's...to Tim's... rape. Just the thought is making him sick. He won't be the reason Tim gives in to al Ghul's crazy demands, that's for damned sure. He passes by the bed on his circuit of the room and grabs the jump rope from his pillow, tugging it between his hands and twisting, pulling at the handles.
This will hurt Tim, but it will hurt him less than the alternative. Tim is strong. He survived Janet's death, and he was just a kid then. He's almost a man now. He's a superhero.
And he has another father figure. The one he chose when Jack just...couldn't cut it.
He gets the handles off the rope and starts twisting the thing into a knotted loop. His hands are shaking, though, and it's not coming out right. He moves to the door, to tie the rope through the bars on the window, to anchor the loop - but just before he can do it he sees the servant coming back down the hall to get his dishes.
Jack jerks back and rushes to sit on the bed, shoving the rope under his blanket and picking up a book as the door opens. He doesn't look up as the man lets himself in, turbaned head bowed in humility. He can see the dark-robed figure at the edge of his vision around his book as the man crosses to the table and hesitates before stacking up the still-full dishes.
Maybe... maybe Jack can take him down. He can get the key. He can make a break for it. If he's killed in the attempt, so what? It feels a little less like giving up. Maybe he can take a few of the bastards with him, and Tim won't have so many to fight.
He reaches under the blanket and closes his hands around the rope, pulling it into his lap without looking up from his book. If he can get the guy from behind...
A warning klaxon sounds.
Jack jumps, eyes jerking toward the door. The servant keeps cleaning the table, head bowed. Jack glances at him for only a moment before moving to the cell door, looking down the hall to the guard station.
There's only one man there still on duty. Jack is just in time to see two more disappear around the corner. On the security screen is the familiar rocky beige landscape, with one significant difference. Wonder Girl is standing on the largest boulder, dangling three men in dark masks over the desert floor. She's shouting something, but if the video has sound, Jack can't hear it over the sirens. Superboy swoops in a moment later dangling someone by his wrists - someone in a red and black with a cape and cowl.
"...Tim..." Jack stares at the figures hungrily as Superboy flings his son into the middle of a crowd of gunmen. This is obviously a full-frontal assault, then. His son brought some big guns. He can't help grinning as he watches Tim brain someone with his staff and then turn to kick someone else in the stomach. It gets harder to see after that as the heroes and bad guys get closer to the camera, moving in and out of the frame. Jack finds himself biting his lip as he watches, his whole body tense.
Something hard presses against Jack's back, just between his shoulderblades. "Don't move," a gruff voice orders into his ear.
The servant! He'd forgotten that the man was even there. Jack resists the urge to turn around, squeezing his eyes shut for a moment to curse at himself, instead, until he can't stand not looking at the screen anymore. Tim and the others are still fighting. There are far fewer bad guys on the screen, now.
The man behind him presses his weapon harder against Jack's spine, forcing him flat against the door. Jack slowly raises his hands and grips the bars, trying to show how very compliant he's being. "Not trying to go anywhere. I'm just watching the show."
He's expecting threats or demands. Maybe the man will move him to a new cell with more security. Maybe he'll tie Jack up, or make him go sit in the corner away from the door. He's not expecting the question that's growled in his ear. "What was the last thing you said to your son?"
The question catches Jack completely off guard. He doesn't remember. He doesn't remember how he got here, or what happened the day before he was captured. He doesn't remember any of it.
But... something about the way the guy says it - "the last thing" - it reminds Jack of what he's been trying not to think about. Of the pain he'd woken to, days before, like his body was being torn apart and put back together. Of the dead taste in his mouth, and the things al Ghul had said about graves and worms and keeping people alive. Ra's al Ghul has beaten death.
Beaten death.
"I hope..." Jack chokes up, and holds on tight to the bars to keep himself up on buckling knees, watching Tim whirl with his staff in hand. "I hope I told him how much I love him. How proud I am of him." There's no response, so Jack adds, "If you have any ounce of mercy in you, you'll kill me now before they can use me against him. Please. If you have a kid, you've got to understand..."
On the screen, Tim spins, raises his weapon -
A bullet rips through Tim's shoulder. Jack can actually see the spray of blood. Superboy swoops in but he isn't quite fast enough, and two more bullets catch Tim in the stomach and in the thigh. "No!" Jack shouts. He yanks stupidly at the door, trying to get out there, to get to his son -
"Dad, it's okay." The pressure on his back is gone, and someone is pulling him backward by the shoulders, trying to pry him away from the door. The voice is still kind of rough, and a little too deep, but... but...
"Tim?" Jack can't believe it. He turns in place.
The man in front of him is too tall to be his son. He's got too much stubble shadowing his jaw. He's too broad in the shoulders and too lean in the cheeks, skin too tanned and chapped, eyes too old and tired.
"Oh my god," Jack says, and lunges forward to wrap his son in an embrace. "Oh my god. What-"
"It's okay," Tim says, squeezing him back with painful strength. "It's a diversion. She's fine."
Jack is so, so confused. "She?"
"I'll explain once we're out of here."
There's a sharp, startling breeze, and then someone else is in the room with them. When the blur comes to a stop, Jack realizes it's Kid Flash. "So is he the real deal?"
"Yeah," Tim says. Despite his outward calm, he sounds just as choked up as Jack feels. "Take him back to base and meet me in five for extraction."
"Got it," Kid Flash says with a sunny smile and a salute, and then before Jack knows what's happening, everything is a blur for something just less than a heartbeat, and he's standing in a kitchen full of shiny steel fixtures. "Welcome to the Tower! I'm really glad you're the real Tim's-Dad, because if you weren't I was going have to drop you off a cliff or something so Tim wouldn't have to fight you." Despite the smile with which the words are delivered, Jack finds himself shivering at the undertone of menace. "Makeyourselfathome, I'llbebacksoon!"
And then Kid Flash is gone, and Jack is alone, and still very, very confused. He decides that sitting down would be an excellent idea, and finds a dining chair to fall into.
There's a clock ticking somewhere in the room. It seems far too loud. Jack hadn't realized just how used he'd gotten to the silence of his cell.
Kid Flash blurs back into the room, sparks flying off his heels, and leaves Wonder Girl standing next to the counter island. "Tim says he's for real," he tells her, and then he blurs away again. Wonder Girl just...stares at him, her expression wary.
She's very attractive, though far too young for him to be thinking that. The look she's giving him is also kind of terrifying. He watches her reach to the side without looking away from him and grab some paper towels. When she rubs them against the backs of her hands, they come away red. "Hi," she says.
"Hello," Jack says back, and swallows. "Ah. Thank you for helping to rescue me."
She snorts and rolls her eyes, then walks away to the sink to wash her hands properly and splash water on her dusty face. "If you're a shapeshifter or a body snatcher, there's going to be hell to pay."
"Um," Jack says after a moment, because he can't think of anything else.
The woosh and crackle of Kid Flash's arrival is getting to be familiar. This time he's dragging Superboy along, and Superboy is carrying...
"Tim-" Jack says, and jumps to his feet, but the man in red and black sort of...shifts. Melts. And Superboy is setting a very green, very unharmed girl onto her feet. "Oh."
She's really rather pretty, too, in a Star-Trek-alien-princess kind of way. Jack is starting to have stern, fatherly feelings about all the times Tim spent the weekend at this place.
Jack's line of thought is cut short when Superboy stalks over to him and grabs him by the shirt, using it to lift Jack off of his feet until they're eye to faintly-glowing red eye. "I'm not a fake!" he shouts defensively, grabbing at the man's wrist and pulling, twisting, trying to get down.
"Put him down," Wonder Girl says, sharply.
"I want to hear it from Tim," Superboy says. And then he just stays...right there. Holding Jack up. Staring at him. Promising violence.
The woosh and crackle passes again, stirring Jack's hair. Superboy doesn't so much as blink.
"Kon, put him down!" Tim says, and then his hands are over Jack's on Superboy's wrist, and Jack is being lowered to the ground. He's not sure how they got so high up. "You don't think he's had a rough enough day?"
"Did you run DNA tests or whatever yet?" Superboy asks, still not looking away from Jack's face. Tim tugs at his hands, but Superboy seems determined to keep his grip on Jack's shirt.
Tim makes a frustrated noise. "Did I run any on you? I think I know my dad, Kon. Please."
The glow fades out of Superboy's eyes, and he stops looking like an alien and starts looking like some kid. He lets Jack's shirt go and rubs the back of his neck sheepishly as he steps away, toward where Kid Flash seems to be making sandwiches. "Sorry, man. Just...had to be sure."
"No hard feelings," Jack makes himself say. He realizes he means it. "Thank you for looking out for my son."
"Someone had to," Superboy mutters without looking up from the bread he's buttering. It's hard for Jack to be sure, since it happens so fast, but he thinks that Kid Flash elbows Superboy in the ribs.
"I'm sorry," Tim says beside him, sounding embarrassed. "Everyone's kind of grumpy, I guess. I've been dragging them all over trying to find where he took your- where he took you." Jack turns to stare at his son, trying to process the changes he's seeing. He watches as Tim wipes a smudge of soot from his cheek with the back of a gloved hand, looking down at the floor. It's such a...a young gesture, something he'd seen Tim do a hundred times when he was caught waiting up for his parents to get in from the airport. There's only one thing Jack could ever do back then, and it's the only thing he can do now.
He puts his hand on the back of Tim's shoulder and presses, putting his son closer as he steps forward and wraps his arms around him, holding on tight. Tim gasps and squeezes him back just a little too hard to be comfortable. The only sounds in the room now are the ticking clock and Tim's suddenly ragged breathing.
"Dad," Tim says. He sounds about twelve.
Jack can't help holding on a little tighter. "Thank you for coming for me," he says.
"God," Tim chokes, "how could I not? Ra's knew. He knew the perfect f-fricking bait. Dad, I missed you so much."
Jack looks up, over Tim's shoulder. Everyone has left the room but Superboy, who's leaning against the sink eating his sandwich and not looking directly at them. Jack decides that if Tim doesn't mind that the boy is there, Jack won't let it bother him. He presses his lips to Tim's hair and rubs his back. "I'm here now. Everything's okay, son. I'm here."
Tim sobs just once before going so quiet he must be holding his breath.
Jack just holds on.
*
He feels a lot better after a shower and a shave, and a change of clothes. Tim and Kid Flash give him a brief tour of the main parts of the tower - the kitchen, the common room, a gesture toward Tim's door, and finally an empty bedroom about the same size as his cell but furnished like an upscale dorm room, with bunk beds, a desk, and a bean bag chair. Superboy follows along just behind them, not saying much. Jack doesn't know much about the boy, but he has vague memories of him being a lot more talkative, on TV. Maybe it's a sort of stage persona.
After the tour, Kid Flash says something about pizza and vanishes between one blink and the next. Jack is exhausted, and the bed is all but calling his name, but he finds himself staring out the window. "Can we go out in the garden?"
"Oh! Of course!" Tim looks like he's mad at himself for missing something obvious. Jack finds himself wincing. "We can walk around to the other side of the tower, if you want, by the ocean."
Jack smiles, trying to be reassuring. "That sounds great. I always did like California. Your mom and I talked about moving out here, once, but she decided she couldn't handle all the hippies."
Tim chokes, as if his own laughter had caught him by surprise. Jack decides to count that as a victory. They take an elevator down to the ground floor, Superboy standing in the back corner of the tiny space with his arms crossed over his chest. Jack is starting to feel like he's being chaperoned, but Tim doesn't seem to mind the other boy's presence.
The sun is just starting to set when they step outside. They walk a curved path around the base of the tower, through grass and trees and flowers and other things that smell like heaven after several days in a closed cell with no way to bathe properly. He breathes deep of the green smells and the ocean breeze and feels a little bit more like himself again.
Once they get to the western side of the island, Jack finds a rock to sit on and watches the golden evening light dance and shimmer on the water. "It's beautiful here." He rubs at his arms as the sea-chill starts to sink in, but it's not enough to make him want to go inside again.
"You could live here," Tim says. Out of the corner of his eye, Jack see's Superboy's startled glance at them. "Not here, here, I mean," Tim corrects himself. “But, maybe California. It's a lot nicer than Gotham."
There's so much in that statement that leaves Jack floored. Al Ghul had said Tim wasn't Robin anymore, but... wanting to live this far from Gotham? Their home is there, and their friends, and Janet's grave. And... "Dana loves Gotham."
Superboy reacts first, his spine straightening as he turns to Tim who...just bows his head.
"What?" Jack asks. How long was he... stupid question. Tim is a grown man. "She moved on."
Tim shakes his head without looking up.
Something cold shoots through Jack. He rubs at the goosebumps on his arms and watches Superboy step closer to his son, until their shoulders brush. "I tried to find her," Tim says, and... he sounds almost exactly like he had when he broke the living room lamp playing superheroes, back before Janet had made him stop.
"I'll tell him," Superboy says.
"No, I should-"
"Tim."
"You weren't even there."
"It's okay," Jack interrupts, cutting into the argument. "I believe you. You tried. I know you tried your best." Dana is dead.
Dana is dead.
He'll never see her again. It's like Janet all over again, but it's also not, because-
He'd loved Janet. He had. She'd given him Tim and he will always love her for that, despite all the fighting, and the way they'd drifted apart over the years. But Dana had been his...his best friend. His partner.
"I'm tired," Jack hears himself saying. "Do you mind if..."
"No, of course," Tim says quickly, sounding relieved. "I'll-"
"I'll take him up," Superboy says. "Go eat something before you fall down."
There's a staring contest between the two boys that leaves Jack feeling like an outsider, but Tim eventually nods. "Goodnight, Dad. I'll see you in the morning."
Jack nods and watches his son walk away. Tim turns to look back once before he reaches the doors. Jack is both relieved at the reprieve and angry at this kid, this stranger, for putting himself in between Jack and his son.
"Let's go in, then," Superboy says, offering Jack a hand up off of his rock. "We need to talk."
Jack hesitates, looking up at the boy and remembering the way he'd been dangled earlier in the kitchen, and the way Superboy has been following him ever since he got here. "I really am Tim's father."
"I know," Superboy says. "That's why we need to talk."
*
"I don't suppose this can wait until tomorrow?" Jack asks as he watches Superboy sprawl in the beanbag chair beside Jack's borrowed bed.
"No." Despite his relaxed posture, Superboy's voice is completely serious. "Look, I'll be upfront here. Tim's an emotional wreck right now. A lot happened after you died. Bludhaven was utterly destroyed. Like, the crater is still radioactive."
"God," Jack whispers.
"That's where Tim's stepmom was. She had a breakdown after you died and Tim sent her to some place to get better. The whole city was rubble by the time the Titans got there. Superman put Tim in charge of evacuation and containment, but I know he went looking for his stepmom himself, because he's Tim." Superboy sighs and runs his hand through his short hair. "I wasn't there. I died the same day-"
"What?"
His shock earns a smile. "You and me are in the same club. I only got back a few weeks ago. Kid Flash, too. Tim's lost a lot lately, but he's finally getting people back. Things are rough, but I think they're fixable. Tim says Batman isn't really dead-"
"Batman's dead?"
"No. There was a thing," Superboy waves a hand like this isn't important. "Space tyrant. Superman says Batman died, but Tim says he didn't, and I believe Tim. Nightwing doesn't. He's Batman now, and he fired Tim as Robin and put the grandson of the guy who dug you up into the tights, so they're not really talking much. Tim was running around looking for the real Batman until he found out what the ghoul did."
He has been wandering the world, heartbroken, lost and alone.
"What...was that, anyway?" Jack asks. "It sounded like he wanted Tim to..." He can't finish.
"Marry his daughter and take over the family business, yeah," Superboy says with a shrug, as if that's perfectly understandable. "He's a creep."
Jack nods in wholehearted agreement.
"Anyway, if you've got questions about stuff that happened, ask me first. I wasn't here to keep the bad stuff from happening, but I can keep him having to live through it again."
Oh. Jack sits down on the bed and looks at the boy, who seems tired. When he's not flying and his eyes aren't glowing, he's just a kid. A good kid. "Superman raised you well."
Superboy snorts. "Superman didn't raise me. If anything, Tim kind of did. He's been the most solid thing in my life since I was eight months old. He's been there for me through...a lot. Anything I can do to help him, I'm going to."
"Thank you," Jack says earnestly. Tim's life will never stop terrifying him, but if Tim has people like this looking out for him, maybe he'll be okay.
"Oh, don't thank me yet," Superboy says, sitting up from the beanbag. "If you hurt him, I'm going to...to do really bad things to you."
"You said you believed me about really being me," Jack says, surprised.
"No," Superboy says, frankly. "I believe Tim. But if you're really his dad, that gives you even more power to hurt him than if you weren't. He told me a lot, after you died, about how lonely he was as a kid. He made it sound like it was because of something he did wrong." Jack swallows back an automatic defensive response. "And I saw him after you made him give up Robin, and after that got his girlfriend killed."
The shock is so intense, after learning of Dana's fate, that Jack finds himself speechless again. "Stephanie?" He manages, his voice a creak. She was such a sweet girl, if a little crass. Jack hadn't noticed that she wasn't coming around anymore until he hadn't seen her for months, and then it had been too awkward to ask Tim when they'd broken up.
"Oh," Superboy says, quietly. "I guess he didn't tell you."
"She-"
"She's back, too," Superboy says quickly, cutting him off. He hesitates, then adds, "you probably shouldn't mention her, though. It got ugly."
Jack puts his head in his hands. "Anything else world shattering I should know about?"
It's quiet for a long minute. When Jack looks up, Superboy has a strange, uncertain look on his face, like he's bracing for Jack to react badly. "His last name's not 'Drake', anymore."
Continued here.
Author: iesika
Fandom: DCU
Rating: Mild
Pairing: None (unless you squint)
Summary: Sometimes, if a man is lucky, he gets a second chance to do the most important thing he's never done.
Notes: This is for floranna, who's been unbelievably patient. I'm sorry this took so long, and I hope it was worth the wait. This was written with utter disregard for continuity beyond about the start of Red Robin, which is when I stopped reading new DC comics. Thanks to kirax2 for a great deal of inspiration and repair work, and to batstalker for title help.
Part One here.
He's not hungry when lunch comes, either, pacing around the cell as the servant comes in and sets the dishes down. The smell of garlic and lemon makes his stomach roil. He does drink some water, while it's cold, and then he covers the dishes so he won't have to think about food.
Knowing what al Ghul wants from him makes the situation a little more terrifying than it was before. He's having weird flashbacks, and he can't stop thinking of Janet. He's always done his best not to think about Janet - about what it was like there at the end. Jack mostly tries not to think about Haiti at all. When he'd gotten home, when he'd woken up, he'd thrown himself into his recovery, into his relationship with Dana, into being a better father. It'd been so awkward, getting involved in Tim's life, but he'd chalked it up to missing six or seven months. Dana had been so sure that he just needed to give Tim some time, to keep reaching out...
Why Tim, anyway? Jack knows his son is smart and strong, and... and a lot of things, but... well, not that much of it can be genetic, can it? Tim got his nose from his dad, his eyes from his mom, but he sure as hell didn't get his ...hero-ness from his parents. He learned that stuff from Wayne, and it's kind of stupid for al Ghul to think something like that would carry over genetically. If it did, Wayne wouldn't keep recruiting other people's kids - he'd just have some of his own.
He's been thinking that the worst thing al Ghul could do would be to kill him. Torture is a different kind of threat, and so is making him an accessory to his son's...to Tim's... rape. Just the thought is making him sick. He won't be the reason Tim gives in to al Ghul's crazy demands, that's for damned sure. He passes by the bed on his circuit of the room and grabs the jump rope from his pillow, tugging it between his hands and twisting, pulling at the handles.
This will hurt Tim, but it will hurt him less than the alternative. Tim is strong. He survived Janet's death, and he was just a kid then. He's almost a man now. He's a superhero.
And he has another father figure. The one he chose when Jack just...couldn't cut it.
He gets the handles off the rope and starts twisting the thing into a knotted loop. His hands are shaking, though, and it's not coming out right. He moves to the door, to tie the rope through the bars on the window, to anchor the loop - but just before he can do it he sees the servant coming back down the hall to get his dishes.
Jack jerks back and rushes to sit on the bed, shoving the rope under his blanket and picking up a book as the door opens. He doesn't look up as the man lets himself in, turbaned head bowed in humility. He can see the dark-robed figure at the edge of his vision around his book as the man crosses to the table and hesitates before stacking up the still-full dishes.
Maybe... maybe Jack can take him down. He can get the key. He can make a break for it. If he's killed in the attempt, so what? It feels a little less like giving up. Maybe he can take a few of the bastards with him, and Tim won't have so many to fight.
He reaches under the blanket and closes his hands around the rope, pulling it into his lap without looking up from his book. If he can get the guy from behind...
A warning klaxon sounds.
Jack jumps, eyes jerking toward the door. The servant keeps cleaning the table, head bowed. Jack glances at him for only a moment before moving to the cell door, looking down the hall to the guard station.
There's only one man there still on duty. Jack is just in time to see two more disappear around the corner. On the security screen is the familiar rocky beige landscape, with one significant difference. Wonder Girl is standing on the largest boulder, dangling three men in dark masks over the desert floor. She's shouting something, but if the video has sound, Jack can't hear it over the sirens. Superboy swoops in a moment later dangling someone by his wrists - someone in a red and black with a cape and cowl.
"...Tim..." Jack stares at the figures hungrily as Superboy flings his son into the middle of a crowd of gunmen. This is obviously a full-frontal assault, then. His son brought some big guns. He can't help grinning as he watches Tim brain someone with his staff and then turn to kick someone else in the stomach. It gets harder to see after that as the heroes and bad guys get closer to the camera, moving in and out of the frame. Jack finds himself biting his lip as he watches, his whole body tense.
Something hard presses against Jack's back, just between his shoulderblades. "Don't move," a gruff voice orders into his ear.
The servant! He'd forgotten that the man was even there. Jack resists the urge to turn around, squeezing his eyes shut for a moment to curse at himself, instead, until he can't stand not looking at the screen anymore. Tim and the others are still fighting. There are far fewer bad guys on the screen, now.
The man behind him presses his weapon harder against Jack's spine, forcing him flat against the door. Jack slowly raises his hands and grips the bars, trying to show how very compliant he's being. "Not trying to go anywhere. I'm just watching the show."
He's expecting threats or demands. Maybe the man will move him to a new cell with more security. Maybe he'll tie Jack up, or make him go sit in the corner away from the door. He's not expecting the question that's growled in his ear. "What was the last thing you said to your son?"
The question catches Jack completely off guard. He doesn't remember. He doesn't remember how he got here, or what happened the day before he was captured. He doesn't remember any of it.
But... something about the way the guy says it - "the last thing" - it reminds Jack of what he's been trying not to think about. Of the pain he'd woken to, days before, like his body was being torn apart and put back together. Of the dead taste in his mouth, and the things al Ghul had said about graves and worms and keeping people alive. Ra's al Ghul has beaten death.
Beaten death.
"I hope..." Jack chokes up, and holds on tight to the bars to keep himself up on buckling knees, watching Tim whirl with his staff in hand. "I hope I told him how much I love him. How proud I am of him." There's no response, so Jack adds, "If you have any ounce of mercy in you, you'll kill me now before they can use me against him. Please. If you have a kid, you've got to understand..."
On the screen, Tim spins, raises his weapon -
A bullet rips through Tim's shoulder. Jack can actually see the spray of blood. Superboy swoops in but he isn't quite fast enough, and two more bullets catch Tim in the stomach and in the thigh. "No!" Jack shouts. He yanks stupidly at the door, trying to get out there, to get to his son -
"Dad, it's okay." The pressure on his back is gone, and someone is pulling him backward by the shoulders, trying to pry him away from the door. The voice is still kind of rough, and a little too deep, but... but...
"Tim?" Jack can't believe it. He turns in place.
The man in front of him is too tall to be his son. He's got too much stubble shadowing his jaw. He's too broad in the shoulders and too lean in the cheeks, skin too tanned and chapped, eyes too old and tired.
"Oh my god," Jack says, and lunges forward to wrap his son in an embrace. "Oh my god. What-"
"It's okay," Tim says, squeezing him back with painful strength. "It's a diversion. She's fine."
Jack is so, so confused. "She?"
"I'll explain once we're out of here."
There's a sharp, startling breeze, and then someone else is in the room with them. When the blur comes to a stop, Jack realizes it's Kid Flash. "So is he the real deal?"
"Yeah," Tim says. Despite his outward calm, he sounds just as choked up as Jack feels. "Take him back to base and meet me in five for extraction."
"Got it," Kid Flash says with a sunny smile and a salute, and then before Jack knows what's happening, everything is a blur for something just less than a heartbeat, and he's standing in a kitchen full of shiny steel fixtures. "Welcome to the Tower! I'm really glad you're the real Tim's-Dad, because if you weren't I was going have to drop you off a cliff or something so Tim wouldn't have to fight you." Despite the smile with which the words are delivered, Jack finds himself shivering at the undertone of menace. "Makeyourselfathome, I'llbebacksoon!"
And then Kid Flash is gone, and Jack is alone, and still very, very confused. He decides that sitting down would be an excellent idea, and finds a dining chair to fall into.
There's a clock ticking somewhere in the room. It seems far too loud. Jack hadn't realized just how used he'd gotten to the silence of his cell.
Kid Flash blurs back into the room, sparks flying off his heels, and leaves Wonder Girl standing next to the counter island. "Tim says he's for real," he tells her, and then he blurs away again. Wonder Girl just...stares at him, her expression wary.
She's very attractive, though far too young for him to be thinking that. The look she's giving him is also kind of terrifying. He watches her reach to the side without looking away from him and grab some paper towels. When she rubs them against the backs of her hands, they come away red. "Hi," she says.
"Hello," Jack says back, and swallows. "Ah. Thank you for helping to rescue me."
She snorts and rolls her eyes, then walks away to the sink to wash her hands properly and splash water on her dusty face. "If you're a shapeshifter or a body snatcher, there's going to be hell to pay."
"Um," Jack says after a moment, because he can't think of anything else.
The woosh and crackle of Kid Flash's arrival is getting to be familiar. This time he's dragging Superboy along, and Superboy is carrying...
"Tim-" Jack says, and jumps to his feet, but the man in red and black sort of...shifts. Melts. And Superboy is setting a very green, very unharmed girl onto her feet. "Oh."
She's really rather pretty, too, in a Star-Trek-alien-princess kind of way. Jack is starting to have stern, fatherly feelings about all the times Tim spent the weekend at this place.
Jack's line of thought is cut short when Superboy stalks over to him and grabs him by the shirt, using it to lift Jack off of his feet until they're eye to faintly-glowing red eye. "I'm not a fake!" he shouts defensively, grabbing at the man's wrist and pulling, twisting, trying to get down.
"Put him down," Wonder Girl says, sharply.
"I want to hear it from Tim," Superboy says. And then he just stays...right there. Holding Jack up. Staring at him. Promising violence.
The woosh and crackle passes again, stirring Jack's hair. Superboy doesn't so much as blink.
"Kon, put him down!" Tim says, and then his hands are over Jack's on Superboy's wrist, and Jack is being lowered to the ground. He's not sure how they got so high up. "You don't think he's had a rough enough day?"
"Did you run DNA tests or whatever yet?" Superboy asks, still not looking away from Jack's face. Tim tugs at his hands, but Superboy seems determined to keep his grip on Jack's shirt.
Tim makes a frustrated noise. "Did I run any on you? I think I know my dad, Kon. Please."
The glow fades out of Superboy's eyes, and he stops looking like an alien and starts looking like some kid. He lets Jack's shirt go and rubs the back of his neck sheepishly as he steps away, toward where Kid Flash seems to be making sandwiches. "Sorry, man. Just...had to be sure."
"No hard feelings," Jack makes himself say. He realizes he means it. "Thank you for looking out for my son."
"Someone had to," Superboy mutters without looking up from the bread he's buttering. It's hard for Jack to be sure, since it happens so fast, but he thinks that Kid Flash elbows Superboy in the ribs.
"I'm sorry," Tim says beside him, sounding embarrassed. "Everyone's kind of grumpy, I guess. I've been dragging them all over trying to find where he took your- where he took you." Jack turns to stare at his son, trying to process the changes he's seeing. He watches as Tim wipes a smudge of soot from his cheek with the back of a gloved hand, looking down at the floor. It's such a...a young gesture, something he'd seen Tim do a hundred times when he was caught waiting up for his parents to get in from the airport. There's only one thing Jack could ever do back then, and it's the only thing he can do now.
He puts his hand on the back of Tim's shoulder and presses, putting his son closer as he steps forward and wraps his arms around him, holding on tight. Tim gasps and squeezes him back just a little too hard to be comfortable. The only sounds in the room now are the ticking clock and Tim's suddenly ragged breathing.
"Dad," Tim says. He sounds about twelve.
Jack can't help holding on a little tighter. "Thank you for coming for me," he says.
"God," Tim chokes, "how could I not? Ra's knew. He knew the perfect f-fricking bait. Dad, I missed you so much."
Jack looks up, over Tim's shoulder. Everyone has left the room but Superboy, who's leaning against the sink eating his sandwich and not looking directly at them. Jack decides that if Tim doesn't mind that the boy is there, Jack won't let it bother him. He presses his lips to Tim's hair and rubs his back. "I'm here now. Everything's okay, son. I'm here."
Tim sobs just once before going so quiet he must be holding his breath.
Jack just holds on.
*
He feels a lot better after a shower and a shave, and a change of clothes. Tim and Kid Flash give him a brief tour of the main parts of the tower - the kitchen, the common room, a gesture toward Tim's door, and finally an empty bedroom about the same size as his cell but furnished like an upscale dorm room, with bunk beds, a desk, and a bean bag chair. Superboy follows along just behind them, not saying much. Jack doesn't know much about the boy, but he has vague memories of him being a lot more talkative, on TV. Maybe it's a sort of stage persona.
After the tour, Kid Flash says something about pizza and vanishes between one blink and the next. Jack is exhausted, and the bed is all but calling his name, but he finds himself staring out the window. "Can we go out in the garden?"
"Oh! Of course!" Tim looks like he's mad at himself for missing something obvious. Jack finds himself wincing. "We can walk around to the other side of the tower, if you want, by the ocean."
Jack smiles, trying to be reassuring. "That sounds great. I always did like California. Your mom and I talked about moving out here, once, but she decided she couldn't handle all the hippies."
Tim chokes, as if his own laughter had caught him by surprise. Jack decides to count that as a victory. They take an elevator down to the ground floor, Superboy standing in the back corner of the tiny space with his arms crossed over his chest. Jack is starting to feel like he's being chaperoned, but Tim doesn't seem to mind the other boy's presence.
The sun is just starting to set when they step outside. They walk a curved path around the base of the tower, through grass and trees and flowers and other things that smell like heaven after several days in a closed cell with no way to bathe properly. He breathes deep of the green smells and the ocean breeze and feels a little bit more like himself again.
Once they get to the western side of the island, Jack finds a rock to sit on and watches the golden evening light dance and shimmer on the water. "It's beautiful here." He rubs at his arms as the sea-chill starts to sink in, but it's not enough to make him want to go inside again.
"You could live here," Tim says. Out of the corner of his eye, Jack see's Superboy's startled glance at them. "Not here, here, I mean," Tim corrects himself. “But, maybe California. It's a lot nicer than Gotham."
There's so much in that statement that leaves Jack floored. Al Ghul had said Tim wasn't Robin anymore, but... wanting to live this far from Gotham? Their home is there, and their friends, and Janet's grave. And... "Dana loves Gotham."
Superboy reacts first, his spine straightening as he turns to Tim who...just bows his head.
"What?" Jack asks. How long was he... stupid question. Tim is a grown man. "She moved on."
Tim shakes his head without looking up.
Something cold shoots through Jack. He rubs at the goosebumps on his arms and watches Superboy step closer to his son, until their shoulders brush. "I tried to find her," Tim says, and... he sounds almost exactly like he had when he broke the living room lamp playing superheroes, back before Janet had made him stop.
"I'll tell him," Superboy says.
"No, I should-"
"Tim."
"You weren't even there."
"It's okay," Jack interrupts, cutting into the argument. "I believe you. You tried. I know you tried your best." Dana is dead.
Dana is dead.
He'll never see her again. It's like Janet all over again, but it's also not, because-
He'd loved Janet. He had. She'd given him Tim and he will always love her for that, despite all the fighting, and the way they'd drifted apart over the years. But Dana had been his...his best friend. His partner.
"I'm tired," Jack hears himself saying. "Do you mind if..."
"No, of course," Tim says quickly, sounding relieved. "I'll-"
"I'll take him up," Superboy says. "Go eat something before you fall down."
There's a staring contest between the two boys that leaves Jack feeling like an outsider, but Tim eventually nods. "Goodnight, Dad. I'll see you in the morning."
Jack nods and watches his son walk away. Tim turns to look back once before he reaches the doors. Jack is both relieved at the reprieve and angry at this kid, this stranger, for putting himself in between Jack and his son.
"Let's go in, then," Superboy says, offering Jack a hand up off of his rock. "We need to talk."
Jack hesitates, looking up at the boy and remembering the way he'd been dangled earlier in the kitchen, and the way Superboy has been following him ever since he got here. "I really am Tim's father."
"I know," Superboy says. "That's why we need to talk."
*
"I don't suppose this can wait until tomorrow?" Jack asks as he watches Superboy sprawl in the beanbag chair beside Jack's borrowed bed.
"No." Despite his relaxed posture, Superboy's voice is completely serious. "Look, I'll be upfront here. Tim's an emotional wreck right now. A lot happened after you died. Bludhaven was utterly destroyed. Like, the crater is still radioactive."
"God," Jack whispers.
"That's where Tim's stepmom was. She had a breakdown after you died and Tim sent her to some place to get better. The whole city was rubble by the time the Titans got there. Superman put Tim in charge of evacuation and containment, but I know he went looking for his stepmom himself, because he's Tim." Superboy sighs and runs his hand through his short hair. "I wasn't there. I died the same day-"
"What?"
His shock earns a smile. "You and me are in the same club. I only got back a few weeks ago. Kid Flash, too. Tim's lost a lot lately, but he's finally getting people back. Things are rough, but I think they're fixable. Tim says Batman isn't really dead-"
"Batman's dead?"
"No. There was a thing," Superboy waves a hand like this isn't important. "Space tyrant. Superman says Batman died, but Tim says he didn't, and I believe Tim. Nightwing doesn't. He's Batman now, and he fired Tim as Robin and put the grandson of the guy who dug you up into the tights, so they're not really talking much. Tim was running around looking for the real Batman until he found out what the ghoul did."
He has been wandering the world, heartbroken, lost and alone.
"What...was that, anyway?" Jack asks. "It sounded like he wanted Tim to..." He can't finish.
"Marry his daughter and take over the family business, yeah," Superboy says with a shrug, as if that's perfectly understandable. "He's a creep."
Jack nods in wholehearted agreement.
"Anyway, if you've got questions about stuff that happened, ask me first. I wasn't here to keep the bad stuff from happening, but I can keep him having to live through it again."
Oh. Jack sits down on the bed and looks at the boy, who seems tired. When he's not flying and his eyes aren't glowing, he's just a kid. A good kid. "Superman raised you well."
Superboy snorts. "Superman didn't raise me. If anything, Tim kind of did. He's been the most solid thing in my life since I was eight months old. He's been there for me through...a lot. Anything I can do to help him, I'm going to."
"Thank you," Jack says earnestly. Tim's life will never stop terrifying him, but if Tim has people like this looking out for him, maybe he'll be okay.
"Oh, don't thank me yet," Superboy says, sitting up from the beanbag. "If you hurt him, I'm going to...to do really bad things to you."
"You said you believed me about really being me," Jack says, surprised.
"No," Superboy says, frankly. "I believe Tim. But if you're really his dad, that gives you even more power to hurt him than if you weren't. He told me a lot, after you died, about how lonely he was as a kid. He made it sound like it was because of something he did wrong." Jack swallows back an automatic defensive response. "And I saw him after you made him give up Robin, and after that got his girlfriend killed."
The shock is so intense, after learning of Dana's fate, that Jack finds himself speechless again. "Stephanie?" He manages, his voice a creak. She was such a sweet girl, if a little crass. Jack hadn't noticed that she wasn't coming around anymore until he hadn't seen her for months, and then it had been too awkward to ask Tim when they'd broken up.
"Oh," Superboy says, quietly. "I guess he didn't tell you."
"She-"
"She's back, too," Superboy says quickly, cutting him off. He hesitates, then adds, "you probably shouldn't mention her, though. It got ugly."
Jack puts his head in his hands. "Anything else world shattering I should know about?"
It's quiet for a long minute. When Jack looks up, Superboy has a strange, uncertain look on his face, like he's bracing for Jack to react badly. "His last name's not 'Drake', anymore."
Continued here.