Chapter Text
Jason bathes quickly, determined to be dressed and out before Tim finishes. The situation really don’t need the somewhat skittish kid bolting on him with a quick goodbye note about not wanting to be a burden. Even with Jason’s scent plastered all over the pup, he’d rather the post-heat omega not go wandering around Crime Alley without an escort -- for the sake of his instincts, if nothing else.
I gotta get control ‘f those.
He sighs, running his towel through his hair a few times to squeeze up the worst of the water before fully dressing. Normally, he would be more casual in his own place, walking around without a shirt much of the time. Today, with Timmy’s unsettling ‘offer’ still fresh, he doesn’t want the puppy getting the wrong impression. Still, it’s important not to infantilize him either. It ain’t been that long since Jay was 16 himself and he knows that at that age -- with the All-Caste and their fucked prophecy about the Devour of Young Souls -- he was hella sensitive to any implication he was too young for shit. Teenage boys could be real touchy like that.
Pre-teens, too. Hopefully he ain’t as sensitive as the brat. An ache sets off in Jason’s chest and he adds calling T’s back-up satellite phone to his to-do list, even if they are ‘no longer members of the same pack, Todd’. A smile sneaks onto his face as he pads out towards the main bath.
Tim shifts around in there, so Jason calls, “Meet me in the kitchen. You need to eat.”
The pup groans. “I do know how to feed myself.”
He doesn’t bother answering as he keeps going, collecting the breakfast he already made to reheat it.
When Tim slinks out of the bathroom in borrowed clothing the food is hot and on the table. Aside from the shirt being a bit baggy it fits well and smells all wrong, scenting only of the mildly herby laundry detergent Jason uses and his scent-neutralizing soap bar. He manages, barely, not to growl, but shoves his chair back to go over and rub his wrist along Tim’s neck.
“Hey!” A hand grabs Jason’s wrist and now he growls, unsurprised by now when the younger teen’s response to that is to drop his grip and his head, giving Jason his neck.
Fuck. He does scent mark it, unable to fight the instinct if he wants to step away. Then he backs off, pinching his nose. Why does T always gotta be right? She used to tease about his preoccupation with scent-marking a testy Damian and requesting reciprocal marks from his alpha, laughing about how she could only imagine how Jason would be when he settled with a pack of his own. I guess now we know how I’ll be.
“You wanna mark me back? You don’t gotta…” He leaves the offer open for a minute, a bit surprised when the pup runs a wrist right below the right cuff of his shirt. A pleased rumble spills out of him before he focuses back on his goal. “D’you want the toast ‘n’ eggs or oatmeal and ham? Neither’s not an option, but I made both.”
Tim’s lip twitches up before he sighs. “What types of oatmeal do you have?”
“The type that comes in the big can.” Jason rolls his eyes as he strolls back up to the fridge and opens it. “I’ve got a couple types of fresh fruit and cream if ya want it that way. Or maple syrup and cinnamon. If ya eat it with fruit I’ll let you use one ‘f the big mugs for yer coffee.”
“Strawberries?”
“And banana?” His puppy nods and something settles in his chest, knowing the kid will get a solid meal. “Cream?”
“In my coffee, not my oatmeal. Did you make the ham like Alfred does?”
Jason snorts, going to his spice rack to hold up the paprika. “With garlic and onion? Or with this?”
“That. Or, it’s red at least. There’s a second red spice, too?”
He nods, unsurprised that Tim doesn’t know what Alfred adds to the ham. Neither Dick or B-- ever paid much mind to what specifically was done to their food to make it tasty, which was why during the one holiday the old man took during Jason’s childhood he hadn’t trusted either of them to cook for him. “Yeah. I made ham with paprika and red pepper.” He pulls out what he needs to add fruit to his pup’s breakfast and nods at the cabinet with the random tools. “I don’t got a coffee maker. Grind up some beans for the stove while I get food started.”
“Have you been making it on the stove the whole time?”
“Yeah.” He snorts. You wouldn’t find him buying a whole damn appliance only for making coffee, even if he had the money for it. That sort of waste pissed him off, was fucking terrible for the environment (ugh, so sue him, he lived with eco-terrorists for two years here), and made inferior coffee to the stronger cardamom brew he’d been taught to make by Talia. “Grab a cardamom pod, too, pup.” He gently taps the slide out spice rack with his foot as he grabs his favorite chopping knife.
After that, they lapse into silence, each focused on their own tasks. Timmy keeps yawning, too, like without coffee he only manages to half wake up, while Jason wants to get some food in them both before they start talking. Neither of them breaks the silence, each watching their own tasks until Tim, pleased by the steaming pot of coffee, strains himself a drink mixed with cream in literally the largest mug Jason owns. It makes him snort.
“When I was watching you, I noticed that you survived on caffeine, spite, and Alfred prompting you to eat.” A flare of heat and fluttering contact like butterfly wings -- embarrassment, he knows from experience -- floods the bond between them. He doesn’t need to look to know the kid’s face must be bright red and he chuckles. “Sucks to be you, but I’m gonna enforce you sleepin’, baby bird. It’s fucking important for yer brain at yer age.”
“I don’t need a bedtime!”
He turns and stares the pup down, eye contact to eye contact until Timmy’s head dips in submission. “Prove that by getting a decent amount of sleep and you’ll stop having one.”
His gaze flicks back up, without lifting his head to make it obvious. Jason can tell when he’s being stared at, but he doesn’t call attention to it. “Why are you doing this?”
“Let’s get the food setup, then we’ll talk.”
By the time they’re sitting down at the kitchen table with a bowl of oatmeal and a serving of ham-off-the-bone sitting in front of him, Tim’s happily sipping his mug of coffee. This at least has some cream instead of being 16 straight ounces of caffeine. Jason decides he won’t take away the makings of a second cup, this time. Let the kid think he’s won something or got a condolence prize.
He takes a few bites of his eggs, glad he made enough oatmeal for himself too, and then gives the kid a once over. “Why… what? Why am I taking responsibility for you as pack rather than leave you at the whims of fostering and Bruce?”
Tim dips his head. “Yeah.”
“No pup deserves Bruce Wayne.” Jason blows out a breath at verbalizing it for the first time.
The revelation, made during the second day of heat when his omega clung desperately to all the human contact he craved, stunned Jason at first. The revenge he’s been focusing on for two years, at this point, not including the time fuckery of the All-Caste’s plane, all circled around Bruce. Even more than killing the Joker, Jason knows he wants his first Pack Omega -- the second man he ever trusted not to hurt him -- to prove he isn’t a liar. Realizing it didn’t matter if B was telling the truth had knocked Jason’s focus right off-center for half a day. Luckily the pup had been too heat hazy to notice.
“Bruce is --”
“A spoilt man who can’t, or won’t, put the needs of his sons in front of himself. The second his vision or wants or needs conflict with one of us -- Dickie, me, you -- he picks himself. The second we become inconvenient, he tosses us.”
“What? No. He loves you.” Tim half-stands as he protests. A buzzing anger builts in the back of Jason’s mind at the defense, but he does his exercises to tamp it down. He ain’t gonna make Bruce’s mistake of not listening.
“‘Snot about that. D’you he took Robin from Dickie after 10 years? There was a close call with the Joker.” His teeth grit in a grin that probably looks threatening. “First shot at a dead bird by that crazy fucker. B and Dick fought all the time when I was Robin, so I heard lots ‘bout it. B decided N was being too soft, wasn’t willing to do what needed to be done.
“Then I come ‘round. I ain’t soft. I get criticized for being too angry, too passionate ‘bout the victims’ circumstances.” Tim stares at him, blue eyes fixed intently on his own, food forgotten, and Jason tries to soothe the tension he feels through their bond. “Did he tell ya how I got caught by the Joker?”
Tim freezes, a frisson of fear and embarrassment driving through him as he breaks eye contact. “He said you were reckless and went after him,” he admits quietly.
A jagged pain plants itself in Jason’s chest, building up around the seed of doubt he began growing. The words, frustrating though they are, don’t surprise him enough. “He accused me of shoving someone off a roof. He was wrong. Wasn’t sad the shitstain was dead, but I didn’t kill him. I didn’t because I respected B ‘n’ I respected he had that code ‘f his, even if I didn’t agree with it. B didn’t believe me. He took Robin.
“I figured it was a matter ‘f time ‘fore he kicked me, so I went looking for my birth mom.” Jason circles his hands around a fragile teacup, his reminder of the fragility of this new Pack of his, and tells the story the same way that Ducra made him repeat until he could do it calmly. Lessons on keeping his temper, he’d been told at the time. Did she see this moment coming for me? “She was workin’ fer the Joker. I tried to get her out ‘n’ she tricked me into that warehouse.”
“You’re the one who defaced --” Tim slaps a hand over his mouth, all remorse and adorableness in a kid brother package.
“Sure am.” Jason gives a grin, even if this particular grin feels out of place without blood on his teeth. “One of these days ‘m gonna ask B what the fuck he was thinking with the public cemetery, with her grave, and the wrong fuckin’ name on my gravestone.”
Hope blooms, like warm sun on his skin after a rainy spell, from Tim’s side of the bond. “You plan to tell him you’re alive?”
“S’not like I can avoid the Batman’s radar forever, pup.” He blinks rapidly when Jason reaches over to ruffle his spiky hair. Do not coo. “Tenemos cosas de las que necesitamos hablar. Tú. Territorio. Not your worries to hold, okay? That’s between me, as yer Pack Alpha, and B.” Tim bites his lip, as if he disagrees, and Jason counters with a raised eyebrow. “You’re a Robin. It’s supposed to be B’s job to look after and care for you, but he clearly isn’t doing that.”
A fidgety hand rubs the back of Tim’s neck before he picks up his discarded fork again. “I work independently of him a lot. I like working independently. And I know I can go to B or N or O if I need help.” He turns his most earnest expression on an unmoved Jason. “It’s not like you and Dick, Jason. I’m not his son. I volunteered to be Robin because someone needed to, but it’s a… business partnership.”
“‘Tween a 12 year old and a then 38 year old?” He lifts his chin. “Hey, tell me this. If you heard a 12 year old boy had a partnership he wasn’t ‘llowed to talk about with a 38 year old rich, secretive man in any other circumstance, would ya let that be?”
Tim winces. “It’s not like that.”
“No.” In 4, out 3, in 8. “But it sounds like he was rough with you.”
“But I know he has bad nights! I know better than to spar with him on those nights usually. I was being stupid and got my wrist sprained because of it.”
“Tim. Timmy. Replay that in yer head. What’s it sound like?”
A cold weight settles in the bond and he stares at his plate as he mutters. “It’s not like that.”
“Eat yer breakfast. D’you want me to reheat it fer you?” Jason stood, lifting his own plate with the plan to do that. He had invested in a microwave, despite the cost, for the little cost and time cutting things it helped with.
“Please.”
They fall into silence until the plates, now steaming, return to the table and Jason sits. “We’re a Pack now. You and me. Luckily, we look enough alike to be brothers.” Another burst of sunshine hits the bond from the kid who’s had no one looking out for him for far too long and Jason nudges him into eating a bit more. “The official story will be orphans. No one’ll question that in the Alley. I’ll used my Head alias ‘cause it stands up to the most scrutiny. Timothy Head don’t sound bad, yeah?”
Tim, flushed pink, shakes his head. A boiling splatter of nerves rises up in the bond between them, but Jason forces himself not to investigate, prod, or dissect any of it for now. Once the pup has some training on how to control his empathic sharing, then it won’t be such an invasion of privacy. As far as he can assess now, any semi-strong emotion from Tim manifests inside Jason’s mental workspace in some way. This particular one keeps building, waves of nerves turning into the upheaval of mortification.
Then, Tim asks, “Are you sure? We could still mate. I’m not in heat anymore, so I can consent.”
“You can consent,” Jason repeats dryly, popping a strawberry top in his mouth. “That don’t sound like ‘I want to mate’ or even ‘I want to see if we’re a good match’, Timmy.”
A deeper, purple flush fills the younger teen’s skin from the collar of his shirt to his hairline. “Um.”
“In fact, it kinda sounds like how you were talkin’ to yer dad or how you talk ‘bout tiptoeing around Bruce’s moods so he don’t hurt you.” Jason puts down his silverware so that he can reach over and squeeze the pup’s scent gland. Making sure to take the left wrist -- paperwork says he is right-handed -- he keeps his grip loose but hopefully reassuring. One pack member reaching out to be scent-marked by another. “Yer a pup, Tim, and dependent on me. It’d be wrong ‘f me to mate you.” After another squeeze, he lets go and returns to his food. “Little brother sounds pretty good, though? If yer okay with that.”
A booming pleasure in the bond made it clear that, yes, he was okay with that while Tim smiled almost shyly. “I’d like to have a big brother.”
“Glad that’s settled. Now. We gotta talk about yer abilities. You lost the fight bad.” Black eyebrows furrow at the change of subject, but he waits Jason out without interruption. “Put me in nothing but sweats, you in armor, and you’d still lose that fight by a mile because you’ve been taught to use half, and only half, of a skillset. I don’t like the idea of you on the street. I fuckin’ hate it with you out there as a traffic light, a distraction to take fire until B can knock ‘em down. But yer too trained for containment and too close ta being a legal adult for gettin’ ya to agree to stay home to be anything but a stop-gap measure. Unless you agree to giving up vigilantism?”
The hard line of Tim’s jaw answers that well enough. Somedays Jason regrets not setting off that car bomb more than others. “I want to help people.”
Yeah. Today’s definitely gonna be a car bomb day. “Eat sumthing.” He sinks some command into the words, satisfied when his pup takes a bite of food. “There are other ways to help people, puppy, but if you’re determined to do it this way then you and I are gonna spend every free moment we’ve got drillin’ yer skills.”
“It’s not as if he allowed me on to the streets untrained,” Tim says, a scowl gathering on both his face and the bond between them. “Fighting hasn’t never been my strongest point, I know, but I’ve always taken my training seriously whether it was with Bruce or Lady Shiva.” Annn’ put a pin in that one. “After a certain point, I hit physical limitations. I’m not built like, well, you or Bruce are.”
“Nah. Yer more like Dickie. I know. I watched you fer awhile before the Bats knew ‘bout me.” How much he’d been surveilled wouldn’t comfort him and Jason pushes on. “What I see is that Bruce didn’t give you nearly the amount of fight training that he could’ve. ‘M gonna patch that up, fill out what yer missing.”
A wary purse of Tim’s lips and lifted brow shifts onto his face before he slowly takes a bite to eat, the tension of unfinished thoughts in the air. Jason waits it out. “I don’t want to be bit again, but I really can take care of myself.”
He strangles the growl in his chest and tenses at the uncomfortable thought. When he thinks he can speak without growling, he starts with an apology. “I said it before, but ‘m sorry. Never shoulda bit ya like t’at.”
“Thanks.”
For a minute, they both eat. He needs the time to think.
Of all his problems with Bruce as a kid, B’s inability to talk about his fuckin’ feelings must be the worst of them. At least until he went unavenged. With Talia, her tendency towards secrets -- even when keeping them didn’t benefit her, even when they came back to bite her in this ass -- drove Jason to distraction. And, for all the two of them aren’t his biological parents (not that Catherine Todd was either), they are his best, healthiest role models: a man who deals with his grief by dressing up as a furry to punch crime and a woman who can do anything except stand up to her father.
Don’t lock the kid out. Don’t keep unnecessary secrets. The bar is in hell.
Downing the last of his oatmeal, he washes it down while pushing feelings of safety and dependability towards the bond. “You also need lessons on managing Pack bonds. Kids usually learn it as they grow. Right now, most of what you feel is filtering to me.” Humiliation bursts up, a crawling sensation up his spine, as Tim registers the words. His face flares with heat. “There are tutors for this. I can hire one to work with us or I can teach you alone. A tutor might be good for this, puppy.”
“A tutor for small children,” Tim says, picking that up quickly. He shakes his head. “I’m fine learning from you, Ja -- Alpha.”
Deadman walking, Jason promises himself. “Jason’s good, kid. I’m yer big brother now.” He smiles softly, though he knows how different that could have been.
During his initial trip to Gotham scoping out the organized crime, which had been in the middle of a gang war, he’d surveyed his replacement Robin nearly as much as he did Black Mask. Despite that, nothing broke through the hurt and betrayal, or his feelings Tim Drake was a cuckoo and a thief, not even in the fact he was clearly a pup, until hiding his omega status turned out to be one vulnerability too many. Jason refuses to be the sort of man who’d test an omega pup in his own den by scaring him into thinking he was in a fight for his life.
So fucking glad I decided not to go through with it. The kid would definitely be fighting me now, if I had.
“Is that all?” Tim asks, pursing his lips. The creep of uncertainty comes across the bond. “I -- Batman has been a lot better in the last six months. There haven’t been any of those days. He would take me in if I explained what my father did. I don’t need to be your concern. He’d also recoup your money. I know you growled at me for suggesting that before, but you were emotional due to protecting an omega in heat. You don’t know me. And we could still be brothers, if you wanted, then.”
In 4, out 3, in 8. Don’t growl. Jason takes a couple of minutes to breathe before he responds, ignoring the bundle of nerves sitting across the table while he very precisely cubes his piece of ham. Explain your reasoning. Don’t lock the kid out. Don’t growl. “Tim, I wouldn’t have brought you into my pack if I didn’t want to. I’ve been packless for about eight months now and it’s not a lot of fun but I can’t justify Packing-In anyone not already in the lifestyle. I want you here.”
To his surprise, he finds that this is true. He, and his Lazarus Pit driven extremities, feel steadier after even a few days of having a tiny Pack. Despite the potentially fraught history, he knows that Bruce is the one to blame for putting another Robin on the street. Even if tiny Tim here demanded it, there were choices Bruce could have made. To find out he has neglected his new Robin so badly adds insult to outrage.
He’ll answer for his choices.
“Oh.” Bright blue eyes, a few shades lighter than Dick’s, go wide, while the word is barely audible. The look in them and the shine they gain before Tim blinks that away, giving up more than he would likely be comfortable with, in Jason’s opinion. How clear it is that this pup thinks no one has ever wanted him before. Worse, he might be right. “Okay.” Tim swallows and collects himself. “The conditions for staying here include agreeing to a schedule for sleep, a regular diet plan, and additional training. Is that all?”
Jason considers the question with the seriousness it deserves. He works through his ham while he reviews all the things he knows about his pup. “Actually, I’ve got a suggestion. Yer struggling in school from a combination of attendance issues and boredom, right?”
“Yes.” Tim purses his lips and furrows his brow, the picture of suspicion about where this is going.
“Gotham Academy let students take some of their credits at Gotham Community College. I took some lit courses that way. Ever think of doing that? Or testing for your GED and jumping to GCC for courses you want to take.” Pup’s mouth drops right open and Jason snorts. “Safe ya a lot of boredom and me a lotta headache making sure you make attendance. I’m not lovin’ the idea of gettin’ up so early either.”
“I’m 16, so I can drop out, do my GED and start classes,” Tim says with wonder, like the idea has never occurred to him. Now that it has a happiness bubbles up in the bond and he shoots a bright grin at Jason. “That sounds great. Wait, do I still need a sleeping schedule, then?”
“Depends. You gonna sleep 8 to 10 hours a night on yer own?” Jason lifts an eyebrow. “You patrol during the week. ‘Cause why would Bruce repeat one of the things he did right.” A flicker of confusion finds him adding, “I wasn’t allowed to patrol on school nights.”
“I’ll make certain my courses begin late enough in the day that the two factors no longer influence each other,” Tim says quickly.
“Alright. Fer now.” Jason sighs. “Last thing for now, pup,” he says, putting away his native accent for a smoother one to discuss this as he knows that the Bristol accent he learned from Bruce reads as more ‘formal’ and ‘serious’ to people due to classism. The seriousness of the subject triggers the change without much conscious thought from him. Normally he would self-correct, ignoring the classist standard, but right now he needs Tim to understand how serious he is. “We need to talk about your father.”
An echo of chest pain -- hurt -- fills the bond space, conveying his pup’s feelings even as his face closes up to the point of neutrality. “What about Jack?”
“I don’t want us to start out with a secret between us, pup. That man is a threat to you and I won’t allow that to stand. He also abused you, if what I saw in the warehouse means anything, and I won’t let that stand either. You deserve to know you can go anywhere in Gotham without risking running into him.” Jason blew out a breath and centered himself. “I can kill him. Or I can convince him to leave town with his pathetic life.”
Blue eyes flew open, as wide as they went, as Tim shook his head. “You can’t kill him!”
“Wouldn’t be the first child abuser I’ve killed, Timmy. It won’t be the last.”
“Bruce--”
“-- Doesn’t get to decide my code of ethics. He chooses not to kill. That’s on him. That’s why the Joker’s still running around causing mayhem, maiming, and murder every time the revolving door of Arkham spits him back out again.” Jason grits his teeth, the edge of his vision tinting green. “That’s why kids keep dying on his watch, but, hey, they’re snatched from the Narrows and Crime Alley, so I guess they’re not a big loss to him.” In 4, out 3, in 8. He held up his hand to call for silence and prevent Tim’s well-intentioned defense of Bruce. “I can kill Jack. The question is what will make you feel safest.”
Tim swallows audibly. “Forcing him out of Gotham is enough. I don’t want him -- or Dana -- hurt. And I might be willing to or want to reconcile someday, which I can’t do if he dies.”
“Alright, pup. I’ll make it happen. Your step-mom is off-limits, don’t worry.” The tension in their bond relaxes and Jason rumbles quietly. He finished his food a minute ago and he takes it to the sink, washing it. “Finish up yer food, please. After that, there’s some options, but I was thinking we’d go get you supplies for your new room. While you’re doing some of that, I’ll get your electronics from your place? That way you won’t have to see him again.”
“That sounds good.” Tim offers back the tiniest, cutest chirp Jason has ever heard. Do not coo.
“Good. Good.” Jason stands and runs a hand through his pup’s hair again. “Finish your breakfast.”
Tim rolls his eyes, but he takes another bite. So, that’s a win.