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Jason watched in both disgust and reluctant amusement as the younger boy dipped a chicken wing in his strawberry milkshake in front of him, before licking the milkshake off and eating the wing as normal. Obviously, Jason had very little room to judge the way someone ate food after the necessity of eating anything he could find when he was on the streets as a kid, but, still, there was certainly something wrong with the combination of flavours the Pretender was so eager to eat.
He wanted to clarify that he no longer felt uncontrollable rage and hatred when he looked at the replacement Robin, in fact, the kid had impressed him with his attitude and skill numerous times since he first attacked him at Titans Tower. It had just taken him a while to get to this point, or at least to no longer be reminded of Bruce not killing the joker and taking another Robin after he died whenever he looked at the kid. But, even then, it wasn’t like they had much of a relationship that wasn’t strictly related to patrol or when Jason needed some assistance on a case - the kid just happened to be the only acceptable compromise of working with the Bats.
So. He wasn’t quite sure why he’d invited the kid to eat with him after patrol. He had seen that the kid seemed a little downtrodden during patrol and had originally used the excuse for them to continue discussing a case they were working together on over food, but seen as though no words had been exchanged since Jason ordered food, that didn’t seem as feasible anymore. But whatever the reason, the pleasantly surprised look on Tim’s face made Jason glad he had at least asked. After all, it was nice that the kid who had every right to hate (or at least strongly dislike) him didn’t seem to care too much and was happy to join him for a meal.
Or, as he eyed another chicken wing be dipped into milkshake, there was a chance the kid was just too hungry to care who he was with.
Distracted by the monstrosity that was whatever was going on in front of him, he’d accidentally disregarded his own meal, and before he had a chance to react, the kid reached across the table to steal a handful of his own fries and begun dipping them into his milkshake. What the fuck?
He leant forward to slap the Pretender’s head, snarling in annoyance when he easily dodged it. Okay, Jason took it back, why was this kid no longer scared of him? And could he go back to being scared for the sanctity of Jason’s dinner?
Tim looked up at him, an annoying little smirk on his face, “If you’re not going to eat it I will. Stop looking so offended.”
“Offended?” He scoffed, “What’s offensive is dipping fucking chicken into your drink.”
“Hm, sure. Tasty though.” He slurped the remainder of his drink before dragging his notes out of his bag, “If you can handle multi-tasking, I’ll start talking through what we know so far and you can finish your oh-so precious meal, yeah?”
Oh Jason really wanted to wipe that shit-eating grin off the kids face now. But as he rolled his eyes and waved his hand for Tim to start talking, he had to admit it was nice to have this kind of camaraderie with someone again, especially as Roy had been busy elsewhere the past few months. It wasn’t that Jason missed his family necessarily…he just sometimes had to turn away when he saw Batman, Nightwing and Robin acting all buddy-buddy with each other. It reminded him of what he used to have just a little too much.
Maybe that was why he’d started approaching the Pretender more, especially once he was back from his little worldwide trip, because he seemed to be looking from the outside in just as much as him. And, if the sarcastic comments the kid sent his way eased the emptiness inside him a little, then that was for him and him alone to know.
“…So, the chemicals we found cut into the drug are hard to source, so I think there’s only a few possible suppliers they used. I’ve listed those locations and I think we should both take a few of these place each to set up surveillance for and then when we’ve got something, we bring the operation down together, sound good?”
He nodded, inspecting the locations he’d listed, “Well I think I should take those five and then you take the other three?”
He had pointed at the locations as he spoke as it made the most sense for him to take the ones both in and close to his territory and then Tim could take the others. But judging by the frown on the kid’s face, he disagreed.
“Why do you have more? We could literally split it in half?” Tim asked.
“Well those five are all pretty much in Crime Alley so it makes sense to do them myself.”
“But it makes sense for us to both do the same?”
“Well you’ll have to travel more in between the others so no, it doesn’t really make sense.” He defended himself, unsure what the kid was getting so worked up about.
“You don’t think I can handle it do you? Of course you don’t. No one does.”
The kid scoffed, and started packing his work up to leave. Jason really felt like he’d missed something.
“This was a mistake. I’ll just do it all myself then you can report back to Dick that you tried to take stuff off my plate or whatever he fucking asked you to do.”
What? When did Dick come into this? And how dare the kid turn whatever was going on with him onto Jason.
He grabbed the kids wrist as he hurried out of the booth they had been sat in, “Pretender, I couldn’t give a flying fuck what’s got your panties in a twist, but if you’re gonna act like this and make me the bad guy in your life, don’t bother working any more cases with me. Got it?”
Tim wrenched his arm away, “Yeah, whatever makes you sleep at night.”
A second later he was out of the door, the ring of the door bell the only sound left echoing in the space.
What the actual fuck? He seethed, he thought they had been getting along recently - what was with the complete 180 in personality? It had been a while since so much of his anger had been aimed at the younger boy, but it was better to feel angry rather than confusion and the feeling of his stomach dropping when yet another family member decided to see the worst in him and leave him behind. Fuck.
Thirty minutes had passed before he had calmed down enough for the poor part-time waiter to feel safe enough to approach him for the bill to be paid. Of course the rich little shit left that to Jason too, even if it was originally meant to be his treat.
He continued to grumble less than complimentary things about the kid as he walked out and headed towards the alley his bike was stashed in. And yeah, he was still very angry at him for turning on him like that, but there was a small part of him couldn’t help but wonder why he reacted so defensively. Jason truly thought taking the ones in his own territory made more sense because the kid would have to travel much further between all of the others. And then that comment about Dick. He knew there was a little tension between the two but did not know any details other than there was a fall out over Damian becoming Robin, which was a whole other thing that Jason had initially refused to touch on after his own reaction to someone else becoming Robin. Huh. Maybe when he was less angry and the kid cooled down he could go and bother him to see what that was about, but certainly not for another few weeks, he had his own shit to deal with, including the drugs they were meant to be investigating together.
He had just gotten to his bike when there was a quiet groan from somewhere in the alley. He scanned his surroundings but the alley was silent with no sign of whoever had made that noise.
Reaching for a gun on his belt, he called out, “I’m not in the mood, if someone’s there just fucking show yourself.”
No answer - maybe he’d imagined it? But once his gun had been put away and he was straddled on his bike ready to leave, he heard it again.
“Alright,” he muttered to himself as he walked up the alley and begun checking the dark corners more thoroughly, “someone better be dying cos I do not want to deal with this right now- shit! Tim?!”
On the floor behind one of the large bins, lay Tim face down and unmoving. Jason’s hands hovered in uncertainty for a few seconds before rushing into checking him for injuries, wishing there was actual light to make this easier for himself.
His hands were bruised, as if they had been stepped on, and there was a large gash to the back of his head, pieces of glass still embedded in the skin from where a bottle must have been smashed into it. A shit load of blood coated his hair and jacket, but from what he could tell that was the worst of it. Had someone got the drop on him because he was distracted from their argument? After all, Jason was originally meant to take him to his apartment on his bike, there was no reason for him to be walking on his own. That wasn’t even taking into account how long the kid had been laying here whilst Jason was still in the diner. Fuck, why didn’t he come out sooner. If the kid dies it will be his fault.
He tried to keep the kid as still as possible whilst he reached down to check the boy’s pulse and breathed a sigh of relief at the strong movement beneath his fingers. Of course, Tim still needed moving and medical attention, but Jason was not going to risk worsening the injury, so, the only option was to get the kid to wake up and tell him how he felt himself.
“Tim. Timbo. Timberlina. You need to wake up kid.”
Another groan was the only answer he received. Unsure what else to do, he put a little more pressure on the wound with the bandage he’d already been using to try to stem some of the bleeding.
“Hnnn,” Tim’s eyelids flickered, “What…Jason? What happened?”
Okay - he recognised Jason, that was one tick in favour of not dying in an alley outside a random diner.
“Blitz attack by the looks of it. How do you feel?” He asked.
“Um…dizzy? I- my head hurts.”
Dizziness but no mention of nausea or vomiting - another check.
“Yeah I’m not surprised, now I need you to lie still for a few minutes longer then I can take you to mine or Leslie’s - your choice”
“Yours please.”
“Great, and there’s no dying on my watch remember,” he joked, the last of his fear melting away as the younger boy continued to speak clearly, “and- wait- what are you doing?”
Tim sat up quickly, ignoring Jason’s protests, “My bag! Where is it?”
Shit, Jason hadn’t even noticed the missing bag - having to deal with missing case reports on top of Tim’s injuries would make his night so much worse.
“Lay down you little shit you’ve got glass in the back of your head,” he gently pushed him back down, “I’ll look for the bag, gimme a sec.”
Luckily, it didn’t take too long to notice the bag tucked behind some crates a few metres away. It was open as if someone had searched it for anything valuable, but fortunately there was no sign that whoever it was had noticed the more ‘sensitive’ nature to the documents. So at least it wasn’t targeted in a way other than a simple attempted mugging.
“Alright kid, it’s all still here, and you’ve been responsive long enough for me to move you, but we’ll take it slow yeah?”
“Okay,” he took in a sharp breath as they stood up, “oh yeah, definitely dizzy, I’m not sure I can get on your bike Jay.”
“That’s fine, I live close by remember? We can just walk very, very slowly.”
“Okay.”
They were a few minutes into the slow trek when Tim stopped suddenly.
“Jason I-“ Tim began, but trailed off before saying anything else.
“Yeah?” He prompted after a minute of silence.
“I’m…I’m sorry for storming out like that. It just felt like you taking more of the sites was because you didn’t think I could handle it and…it just reminded me of something Dick said recently. So. Sorry.”
The last of the weight finally lifted off Jason’s shoulders at hearing the confirmation Tim didn’t purposely turn on him, just a misunderstanding with emotions running high.
“Hey Timbo, I’m sorry too, I assumed the worst from your reaction and got defensive alright?”
A nod and a small smile met his reassurance.
“Glad we cleared that up, it would’ve made things much more awkward when I refused to let you out of my sight for a few days for concussion protocol if we were still arguing huh?”
The younger boy huffed a laugh before groaning in pain as his head moved too quickly.
“Yeah fuck that, I’ll carry you Timbers and we can continue this conversation when you’re no longer bleeding all over both our clothes.”