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It’s unexpected but maybe Tim had it coming, he is, after all, the only one who truly hasn't had a death yet… had he expected it to be him slowly dying in an alley? Eh, maybe. He'd hoped for something more glamorous but one just couldn’t predict death like that.
It's also not a surprise when he wakes up again. This time he’s at the bottom of the harbor, eyes stinging and choking on water that hasn't been safe for consumption in nearly a century. But Tim wakes up and that’s the important part.
He wakes up with a plan. He's gonna be the next Red Hood and Jason-or Gotham-won't know what hit him, them, whatever.
Maybe he's even been waiting for this, in a really shitty self-destructive kind of way. He was Red Robin and most importantly Tim Drake. He had contingency plans because he's a realist most of all. This doesn’t come as a surprise and he’s spent a frankly alarming amount of time thinking about his death. It’s part of the job description.
He wonders if the others have noticed by now. If they are searching for him or if they saw his tracker on the bottom of Gotham's River and figured it was no use fishing him out.
He heaves himself on land with a sigh and shivers. It’s march, but it’s early, early morning, the sun has barely even appeared on the horizon and it’s chilly. He needs to get somewhere warm or he'll catch his death -- hah! He gets why Jason jokes abut his death so much.
A passing thought goes to his surprise revival. How did it happen? Why? Tim doesn't have an answer, except for the fact that their universe doesn't run on logic and as such, it’s silly to assume anything is gonna happen logically. Why did Jason wake up? Who knows, they never investigated further. Maybe it’s Gotham herself, sentient in all her glory and might that just keeps on reviving her heroes. Maybe it’s destiny, or one of the hundreds of curses placed on their ground. Maybe Lazarus really does run below the surface here and it seeps out. Why does it only target heroes and the occasional villain? Who knows. Probably fate.
The wtaer still stings in his eyes and his uniform drips onto the unforgiving concrete with every step he takes. His boots make a terrible squelching sound and Tim reaches up to pull down a strand of his hair. It’s black as always, but he doesn’t have a mirror so he can’t be sure. It’d be fun if he looked even more like Jason—like his tiny, short-stack clone that just won’t leave him alone.
Although Jason’s death definitely beat his own in terms of drama. He didn’t have a fatal countdown, no betrayal by the people close to him, he didn’t even face a proper villain. Just some random thug with good luck.
Why is Tim suddenly in his anti-hero arc? Things had been fine beforehand, as far as he can remember. He doesn't really know in any case, but he can feel it in his bones. He needs to. He’d known it before his death, too. He’d come in contact with his future enough to know that Tim never stays a hero for long. He was probably overdue for a change in morale.
Or maybe it’s juts the universes way to push Jason forward, away from the mantle he's slowly growing out of. Tim hasn't had much a direction lately, maybe he'd just been expendable.
The security in his safe-house is easily dismantled, and judging from the heavy layer of dust on the furniture, nobody has been here to disturb the peace recently. He needs a new (old) outfit, he needs a plan and aims, and most of all, he's planning on haunting his family for just a few more months. Maybe he’ll start college, he's been aching to escape the role of CEO recently.
Maybe he'll even be allowed to age before Damian finally overtakes him, not just in height but in age.
The universe has been running on fumes and hand-wavy magic for years now and he's not sure how many people have noticed by now. He just remembers turning seventeen and staying that way for a long long time.
Staring at his very own, shiny new, helmet, he knows his future will be different.
RH was here-- he tags on a building on the edge of crime alley, a smiley as his only signature.
News articles about his death had been greatly exaggerated, Tim decides, as he leaves through different rags, ending on the Gotham Gazette. Vicki Vale had had a field day, claiming drugs, women, whatever else was probable for a young CEO. His family hadn’t waited long to announce his death, he discovers.
He’s been dead-officially speaking-for just thirteen days now but already the stories are starting to run dry. He never had been the most interesting of the Waynes.
As far as he can tell, the bats are in mourning and it gives him a sick sort of satisfaction to watch them as they slowly fall apart. He loved his family, but it seemed a reminder of his worth was something that had been desperately needed.
He did hurt for his friends though, who came and stared at his grave-Tim had a grave now!- and burst into tears. He hadn’t wished to cause them harm, but maybe they also needed a reminder. Him and Cassie had been on the rocks for years now and even Kon and him had grown apart recently.
Tim eats ramen on his couch and watches the news. It’s amusing as it is depressing, how quickly everything moves on. Red Robin, he notes, isn’t dead. They’ve called Cass back, and he finds it somewhat cruel to make her parade around in her dead brothers uniform. She makes a good Red Robin and he wonders how long she’ll keep the charade up.
Not everyone is as fooled as the Bats and soon Ra’s makes himself known. Of course the old bastard couldn’t leave him alone, even in his death.
Letters arrive on his kitchen table, and he has yet to figure out how the Ninja enter each time. There’s a time crunch, he realizes. Ra’s might humor him for now, but he’ll use this secret as leverage at some point. Tim’s days are numbered.
Frustrated he rips the newest letter apart, worrying at his lip. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go!
Jason is feeling properly haunted though, and it brings Tim great joy. It’s not that he’d been mad at the man when he died. But never let it be said that Tim doesn’t hold grudges. He does. And a lot of people should count their blessings Tim never actually returns the favor.
For now, he’s satisfied moving furniture the slightest bit, leaving out treats on occasion. Haunting someone fits extraordinarily well with stalking, it turns out, and Tim has always loved that.
He has his fun with it too. Once, he writes on the mirror, making sure that a slit will appear right on throat level, the next time Jason leaves the shower.
Then, he pulls off a single wheel off Jason’s new ride, and installs a clock that keeps on ticking in a vent above Jason’s bed. Tim is vengeful as he is mean, he can still feel the phantom ache where his bones had broken as he slowly bled out.
Soon, Jason becomes too boring. He moves on to bigger, better targets.
He haunts Dick for a hot second, leaving candy wrappers all over his apartment, restocking his fridge, only to leave the card of the therapist Dick had recommended on the table. The card follows Dick, and Tim watches as Dick begins to panic. He adds a smiley in the corner for good measure.
The coffee at Dick’s regular place mysteriously always turns out just how Tim preferred it, no matter what Dick orders and one morning all the shirts Dick has, have been replaced by Hawaiian ones, specifically like those Tim always used to make fun off.
Dick has never been the most level headed person, and so it’s fun to watch him freak out, looking over his shoulder at every turn. 15 years later and he still hasn’t learned to look up, Tim chides.
All of Dick’s CD’s mysteriously play Midwestern Emo, the kind Tim still likes to hum and every book in his apartment suddenly has a tiny message, like the kind Tim used to text Dick when he just started out as Robin.
Predictably, Dick drives himself and the people around him insane, and somehow proof always disappears just before he can show it to someone. It’s a fair bit of work to keep up but it brings him a sick sort of satisfaction to know people look at Dick like they looked at Tim when they called him insane.
Steph is a satisfactory target for a while. It’s fun to make reminders on her phone pop up, as if Tim had prescheduled them years ago, always just a tad bit too specific.
“Don’t forget to eat today! You’re gonna need your strength“ - on the day Steph has a big presentation in class.
“You’re perfect just the way you are, xo T“ - minutes before Steph has to leave for a gala.
“I’m so proud of you :)“ appearing shortly after she finishes her run with a new best-time.
The first time, Steph smiles sadly and goes on. By the fifth time, she is seriously concerned and Tim can tell. Good, she should be. He has never quite forgotten what she put him through after her death. He doesn’t think he ever will. Then again, he supposes he’s doing precisely the same now. He’s always been a bit of a hypocrite.
He tags buildings because it’s honestly kinda fun to see the bats freak out, but eh does it especially often on random desks or walls at Gotham U, knowing that Steph’ll have to see them whenever she goes to class.
One more step and he can admit that by now it’s just kinda mean, but that doesn’t stop him. Pushing back important meetings in her calendar is easy, and soon enough Steph is inexplicably late and in trouble everywhere she goes. Even the other bats start viewing her as unreliable. Steph is so frustrated she screams into her pillow for half an hour and Tim just watches, satisfied.
Damian is easy. He enters the batcave when nobody is home, and alters uniforms, makes them too big or too small, exchanges his boots for the wrong size, and even oils up some of the training-weapons Damian has stashed here.
Then he hacks into Damian’s computer and puts on a slideshow filled with pictures of Tim smiling, some with their eyes x’ed out. (Tim does have a bit of a sense of humor, thank you)
He takes away strategic photos, so the manor is filled only with those taken by Tim. It’s a bit more difficult, but with a few targeted reminders, his teachers start talking about him in front of Damian and he watches with a grin as Damian becomes increasingly more frustrated.
But honestly, the last act he wants to accomplish before coming back to life is easy; torment Bruce Wayne. Because maybe he actually was slightly annoyed that nobody came to search for his body, that Bruce seemingly went on as normal. Batman didn’t become more brutal and Bruce might’ve looked depressed but that wasn’t enough. His mentor had ruined him and shaped him and Tim would teach him a lesson. It would all peak on his birthday, now only a few short weeks away. But before that, he had a plan.
Bruce couldn’t turn without being reminded of Tim. In his bedroom, Tim hid speakers, and played himself whispering messages whenever Bruce went to sleep. The right bandages were always laid out pristinely for Batman in the medbay, and Tim’s clothes just seemed to appear randomly.
Then he started planting hints. Clark sending Bruce a message and then doing the opposite, a meeting with Diana where Bruce was stood up, Selina no longer answering his calls.
His equipment was filled with green MnM’s , just how Tim liked them and Tim’s reports were always there when Bruce opened his laptop. The already paranoid man was only getting worse with time and he was enjoying it. Tim’s birthday had been a shit show in itself and Bruce knew that. Maybe he was even starting to suspect something, new reports of two separate Red Hoods came out with increasing frequency, until finally Jason just stopped going out in the disguise. Tim had successfully pushed him away.
His birthday was tomorrow and he was aching for the revelation.
(Tim still woke up gasping, choking on water that was no longer there, but that was neither here nor there, was it?)
He’d been working towards a deadline without a real reason—It was almost an out of body experience, the way Tim acted without really having any explanation besides petty revenge. Maybe he had more from his mom than he liked to admit.
But on the morning of his birthday-he was finally eighteen, and wasn’t that a relief in and of itself?-he wakes up with a grin and a heavy weight off his shoulders. This nightmare would be over soon and the future was open for once.
The piece of cake melts in his mouth as he watches birds pick at seeds on a bench in Ivy’s park. The redhead has been suspiciously quiet as of late, but it’s not really any of Tim’s concern, is it?
He sends messages to all of his friends—Anonymous, but they’ll know who it is.
The ninja that lurks behind a bush is pretty obvious, even for Ra’s, so Tim waves at him and watches as the lackey curses and visibly shrinks in on himself. It’s funny, Ra’s still underestimates him at every turn.
Tim visits a church, just for shits and giggles and wonders what Jean-Paul is up to. It feels like he’s damned as he walks on holy ground, but he doesn’t get burned and watching the people come and go gives him a sense of peace he usually lacks.
He doesn’t get time off normally, he’s always doing something and its like a breath of fresh air.
(Someone is tailing him and he would bet all his Justice League trading cards it’s Barbara. She’s always been smarter than she let on.)
The burner phone he’s taken to carrying around gets deposited in a trashcan somewhere right on the corner of crime alley, and Tim practically skips past the security cameras on his way back to his home base. It’s only a matter of time now. Idly, he draws smileys on his wrist in sharpie, just like he used to do in school. Maybe he should get a tattoo.
“Tim“
The roof the final confrontation takes place on, is shadowed from prying eyes but still gets just a bit of the bright-red evening sun. It’s warm, a sharp contrast to the day he woke up in the river, and Tim has known that Bruce was on his way for at least half an hour now. He’s come alone, something the others won’t like and Tim expected.
“B“
“Fake death or revival?“
His mentor has always been short, especially in the suit, but Tim does wonder why his confrontations never warrant the same kind of emotional outbursts that Jason’s or even Dick’s do. Maybe it’s the way he started out as Robin that’s the problem. In any case, it serves him well. He’s never understood the need for tantrums and bloody fights with Bruce.
“Happy Birthday Tim, it’s so good to see you’re still alive Tim“
He mocks, deepening his voice unnaturally. It hurts a tiny bit, he’s gotta admit.
“Why are you acting like this?“
Tim paces back and forth, sighing. “The better question is why are you too emotionally incompetent to ever connect with your children? Have you examined that? Do I need to sign you up for therapy?“
“I expected more from you, Red Robin“ Bruce chides. Ughh, he’s still not getting it.
“I am not. Red. Robin. Don’t you see, that’s the issue! I can never grow by your side. How long have I been seventeen, Bruce? Ever thought about that? What I’m doing-it’s called character growth. “
“You’re saying nonsense-“
“I’m not though—Admit it, I was a few short weeks away from being Robin again. But you can’t have it all B’, you can’t have two Robins, I am my own person! I am not Robin anymore, and to be honest, I don’t want to be him“
“So you take over another one of my mantles?“
Jason lands on the roof with a thud, in combat boots and a nondescript mask. Tim shrugs.
“It felt appropriate. You’ve been Red Hood forever. Also, I just thought it was funny.“ It was objectively hilarious, if they were being honest.
“I would’ve appreciated some kind of notice beforehand. Also, you’re too weak to actually be Red Hood.“
Tim snorts. “You haven’t killed anyone in like a year, if anyone’s weak, it’s you“
“You’ve been sabotaging us“ Bruce observes, and by now the sun has gone down enough that dramatic shadows dance over the masked face.
“If you want to call it that. I feel like I was just returning the favor honestly.“
“You’ve changed.“
Tim throws his hands into the air, “Finally, you get it! I’ve been stuck B’, stuck for way too long! I needed a change, and let’s just say; I got the perfect opportunity. “
Jason barks out a laugh, and Tim is sure the others are listening in over the comm-system. “I didn’t know you had it in you, Replacement“
The conversation is going splendidly, as far as Tim can tell, and he’s anxiously waiting for his grande finale.
He takes a few measured steps back and spreads his arms, “You can take me as an example, Jason. Just because you died, doesn’t mean the world revolves around you. And all of you have made it clear that I am nobodies first priority! I had to fucking crawl out of the river! Three days, and none of you bothered to fish me out! So yeah, I’m taking Red Hood, Adios“
And he jumps, backwards off the building, ignoring the surprised grunt Bruce makes, fully trusting his friends to catch him before his fall. And if not, well, he’s had plenty experience being dead.