A Hero's Causatum
Title: A Hero's Causatum or 5 Post-Robin Careers for Timothy Drake
Fandom: DC Comics
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: DC abuses them more than me.
Summary: Tim didn't want to be a hero, he just wanted to be Robin. But all Teen Wonders have to grow up. Four ways Tim retired from the Bat Family healthy and mostly sane, and one way he didn't.
Notes: This was written in March of 2007. It was after One Year Later so Tim was running around in the red costume. But still Dixon was so imprinted in my mind that I was sure Tim could make it out no matter what. That was before R.I.P. stuff, Resurrection of Ra's/Damian stuff, Battle for the Cowl stuff, Red Robin stuff, need I go on?
For context, Tim was still doing the school thing with Zoanne. Leslie and Stephanie hadn't returned yet. And Dick and the Outsiders had just wrapped up the Dr. Sivana and Mallah and the Brain storyline. And All Start Batman and Robin the Boy Wonder was stalled at issue 4.
.:R:.
1) Tim glared across the table at Bruce Wayne. It wasn't the half undone tie or the shoes on the table or the two minute phone conversation Bruce was having in his playboy voice while he absently waved his hand at Tim. It was all of it and how everyone in the conference room accepted the meeting interruption as the norm and how Tim knew it was all a lie. Finally, Bruce hung up his phone after a fake laugh and returned his attention to Tim.
"Is this going to be much longer? I promised the girls I'd pick them up in half an hour and I should really go change first."
"We heard you, Bruce. Twins this time?"
"Triplets actually. You know you should come along, Tim, get some sun in your skin. Let Lucius take care of the board meeting."
"Mr. Fox retired six months ago."
"Did he now? Well good for him. Brilliant business man, I should replace him soon."
"You hired me to run Wayne Enterprises in your stead."
"And a fine job you must be doing. You say Lucius hasn't been here in six months? I hadn't noticed the change. But really, dear boy, you should hire your own Lucius Fox and come along with Linda, Luna, and Laura, and me. Leave the business to the business men I always say."
"I am a business man. I have the degrees, Bruce. You were at the graduation."
"Right, right. Now I really must go pick up the girls. I trust you'll do fine without me."
"Of course."
His chair spinning, Bruce let the door slam shut behind him. Tim could feel the other board members' looks of pity and respect: pity because he had to deal with Bruce Wayne - billionaire playboy at any age - and respect because he had proven himself a worthy heir to Wayne Enterprises in a few short months. The looks from the other board members meant nothing to him. Instead he once again wondered if this was Batman's revenge on Robin's retirement; if the man somehow took delight in causing Tim pain with the persona Batman otherwise hated. But that contemplation couldn't last long as he had to remember where he had been in his presentation before the interruption.
The door creaked open and Bruce's head popped back in. "And next time bring more diagrams, colored ones even. Everyone loves colored diagrams."
Ah yes, this was Batman's revenge.
.:R:.
2) There was a time when only Dr. Leslie Thompkins was allowed into the back room of the free clinic at insane hours of the morning. Things had changed though, Leslie had changed, and the back room was all but forgotten until Tim began his residency.
Deft hands moved smoothly as they sewed the cut in Batman's shoulder, small stitches which would leave a minimal marking amid the sea of others. Tim glanced at the other puckers of dead skin as he worked, feeling the itch of a few of his own. He could recall the source of each of his own scars, as well as a few of the Batman's. None of Tim's scars were recent while Batman's were always new and never healing properly. The last time Tim had seen Batman as bruised was the reason he took up the Robin mask himself. The last time he had seen Bruce with more bruising was the reason he enrolled in med school.
His eyes traced a jagged line across Batman's left shoulder, a gift from a nameless thug early in Tim's Robin career. What was Batman's scar now had intended to be Robin's grave then. Tim had been allowed to treated the wound himself, a small way to return what he owed. But that was another lifetime ago, before war-practiced hands had been replaced by physician's hands. He allowed himself a moment of pride in his skill's improvements.
Batman gave a report on the night's activities, of the lives he saved, of the crimes he stopped, of the injuries he had sustained. And while outsiders might only see the positive, Tim could read the failure in what Batman didn't say. Such things didn't need to be said to a Robin. Each of Batman's personal failures would be outlined in the news tomorrow for him anyway.
The doctor in him wanted Tim to ask the Batman to slow down for a night, to take tomorrow off to heal, to find a better way to protect his beloved city. But those were not his words and they would both be needlessly hurt by them, so Tim showed his concern for Batman with the neat, tiny stitches and gentle hands.
.:R:.
3) Zoanne had waited for him despite the deceptions, half-truths, and excuses. Tim hadn't expected or asked anyone to wait. He had never admitted to the lies. There had been other girlfriends before Zoanne, but she was the only one to see the lies and wait for the day he would stop telling them. And despite her every characteristic which suggested otherwise, she had never asked Tim why he lied or for him to stop.
Zoanne had been with him the day Robin had been laid to rest and when Tim Drake began living. She was with him every day since.
They owned a modest house in a quiet suburb, with a white picket fence and a dog in the backyard. It was a short dive away from the center where he worked with minor felons who had agreed to rehabilitate instead returning to prison. And at the end of the day - after he had helped the clients there adjust to society and focus their rage and sometimes even force them to feel the fear they have inflicted on others - he drove home to be greeted by his two daughters, where he had the most important job of being a father.
Tim ensured neither Zoanne nor his daughters would ever have to wait for him again.
.:R:.
4) He had been taught to use simple strategies with multiple contingency plans for every stage. The contingency plans had been unnecessary in the end as the idea worked exactly as he first scripted. Tim was unsure if the methods themselves had been that clever or if he had been allowed to succeed, but he decided not to care.
Though the plan was simple the process still had taken years. Fortunately, most of the ground work had been set out by Dr. Sivana, Mallah and the Brain, and Batman himself. So it was no surprise when Batman was the first to find him after the missiles had struck all corners of the globe, from the JLA watchtower to Themyscira to Atlantis.
And it was still part of the original plan when Batman finally took him down. His bruised and bleeding body was gripped tightly as his former mentor shook him. "Why, Tim?"
There had only ever been one endgame in his design. Tim had never allowed any of the contingency plans to lead divert away from his goal. He almost smiled despite the pain as his plan completed. "No one died. No one was even injured. I even left everyone's memory intact."
"But you still hurt people."
"I took away the metagene is all; I got rid of the freaks and the experiments and the aliens. I took it from both sides. They can't hurt people anymore. They can't kill anymore of my family. They can't let any more of my family die beside them."
"My god, Tim, you know Dick wouldn't have wanted-"
"He would be wrong then, Bruce, and you were right about them. You were always right."
.:R:.
5) When his father had died, he had been lucky enough - if luck could be had in that situation - to have been old enough and have the resources to avoid the worst of the system. Dick Grayson had not been, an eight year old stored in the Gotham State Juvenile Detention Center and surely would have been lost if not for the efforts of Bruce Wayne. Other children might have envied Dick his new life in the millionaire's mansion, but the circus child had never thought about the money. Dick had only wanted to be safely away from the JDC and - though he hadn't understood it yet - to have a mentor and a purpose. For those reasons Tim had asked for his aid in the project.
Reorganizing an entire government system was near impossible, but Tim had used all his dedication and resources to get child welfare changed. His system was efficient and effective and his employees dedicated so that no child could slip through the cracks again. He helped run the orphanage he and Dick had designed, spending all of his time outside of paperwork and public relations events with the kids. He knew all their names, the names of their parents, even the names of their pets. He knew when they needed to be comforted, when they needed to be angry, or when they needed to be sad.
When Dick would show up weekly, the kids would watch in awe of even the simplest of acrobatic tricks and even get to learn some of their own. Tim wondered if he should share the larger training facility with his older brother, the one underneath the orphanage and unused except by himself. Tim was always actively watching his kids. One day he would find the blue-eyed, dark-haired little boy with youthful energy and unfocused anger or the blonde girl with that untamed spunk to share it with. And Robin would fly again.
.:R:.