Chapter Text
TWO YEARS AGO.
Tim.
It was already one of the worst weeks of his life. It was one of the worst weeks of a lot of people’s lives. The Watchtower was down. Blüdhaven was destroyed. No one could keep track of the rising death toll. No one could keep track of anything. There were crisis situations breaking out across the globe.
The Teen Titans had split up early on, Tim called home to Gotham, his teammates all called elsewhere. He didn’t know where anyone was or what anyone was doing. He had to ignore it every time he felt Kon take a hit; he had to trust that Kon knew what he was doing. Years of training prevented Tim from dropping everything and finding him, joining him, helping him. He couldn’t abandon his duty. What kind of a Robin would he be if he did?
He would regret this decision later. Of course he would. Even though, logically, rationally, he knew there was likely nothing he could have done to change the outcome. But he wouldn’t be a Bat if he didn’t torture himself over “what if” scenarios every time something bad happened to someone he loved.
When he felt it, it was the most intense pain he’d ever experienced. Tim was no stranger to pain; there wasn’t much he couldn’t power through. But this was something else. This was an agony beyond comprehension. He collapsed to the ground, and he might have screamed, or he might have been in too much pain to scream; he wasn’t aware of it either way. The only cogent thought that formed in his mind was, Kon.
The pain didn’t last. It was instead replaced by the briefest moment of intense relief, bordering on euphoria, a release of endorphins, a perfect counterpoint to what he’d just felt.
And then nothing.
He came back to himself on his hands and knees on the ground, gasping for air. He felt like he was in a nightmare, one of the ones where everything went to shit and it was somehow all his fault, and he woke up gasping for air, dread coursing through his veins. This couldn’t be real.
He heard Dick in his ear, trying to reach him over comms, but the ringing in his ears was too loud for Tim to make out any words. Through the combined force of years of training, he managed to get to his feet, because he couldn’t lay here and give up, no matter how much he wanted to. People were still counting on him. One less person than before.
“Robin here,” he choked out, so at least Dick would know he was alive.
“Superboy is down.”
The words passed through him like he had no solid form. They were merely confirmation of something Tim already knew. They couldn’t hurt him any more than he was already hurting.
“Robin, do you copy?”
He sounded drained of life when he answered. In a way, he was. “I copy.”
Somehow he kept moving. Afterward, he wouldn’t be able to say how. He felt empty, the essence of himself scooped out, leaving only a shell. But it was a shell that knew what to do in a Crisis, and that was all that mattered anymore.
He shut himself away in his room for days on end. Bruce was planning some big journey to “find himself” or some shit, and he wanted Dick and Tim to go with him. Dick was skeptical. “What, and just leave Jason in charge of Gotham? We’re going to come back and all the rogues will be dead.” Tim thought he had a point, but he didn’t bother to mention it. He would do whatever everyone else told him to do. He’d go where they wanted or needed him. It didn’t matter to him either way. Until then, Tim planned to keep to himself.
Of course, everyone knew something was wrong with him, and they all knew what. Well, they knew half of it. They knew Tim had lost his best friend, his closest teammate. They didn’t know the rest. Tim hadn’t told a single person who his soulmate was, though he’d known for a while. He hadn’t even talked to Kon about it. A few people knew Tim’s soulmate was a guy, but no one knew who. He supposed there was no reason to tell anyone now.
Dick was the first person to try to talk to him about it, because of course he was. Bruce wouldn’t know his way around an emotional conversation if someone gave him a map – though he’d surprised Tim with his response to Tim coming out, one of the few times he’d somehow managed to say exactly the right thing – and Alfred knew better than to try to force a grieving Bat to talk about their feelings, instead showing his love and support in other ways.
So of course it would be Dick. He knocked on Tim’s bedroom door one evening and, without waiting for Tim’s response, stepped inside, shutting the door behind him.
Tim honestly didn’t know why Dick would bother. He had plenty of his own shit to work through right now. But then again, wasn’t it such typical Dick Grayson behavior to avoid his own problems by trying to help someone else work through theirs? Superheroes tended to be self-sacrificial by nature, but Dick took it to a new extreme.
“Hey,” Dick began, crossing his arms and leaning back against the door, not intruding too far into Tim’s space.
Tim hardly glanced up at him. “No thanks,” he deadpanned.
“I didn’t even say anything,” Dick replied, though he didn’t sound surprised.
“You didn’t have to.”
Dick paused, likely debating the best way to approach the matter. “I get it,” he finally said. “You don’t want to talk about it.”
“I don’t.”
“I won’t force you to, then.” Wow. That was a first. “Not yet, anyway.” Ah, well, Tim should’ve known it was too good to be true.
“Is there an option where you don’t force me to talk about it ever?” Tim asked.
“No.”
Tim sighed. Of course not. He looked up at Dick properly, taking him in. He was still pretty beaten up, covered in greenish-yellow bruises and healing wounds, many of which looked like they would leave scars behind. He should have been shutting himself away in his own room in the Manor – seeing how he didn’t have anywhere else to go right now – feeling sorry for himself like Tim was. Tim didn’t know why or how he was still standing. What the hell was motivating him that Tim clearly lacked?
He decided to ask. “How do you fake it so convincingly?”
Dick immediately knew what he meant. “I have a lot more years of practice than you do,” he said. And Tim realized that Dick’s motivation was the same force that had gotten Tim back on his feet after he’d felt Kon die: Training. Duty.
Batman doesn’t take days off, which means Robin doesn’t either. Batman can’t show weakness, which means Robin can’t either. Batman can’t let his personal relationships or feelings interfere with the mission, which means Robin can’t either.
Dick uncrossed his arms and stepped away from the door. “When you’re ready to talk, you know where to find me.” Not in Blüdhaven anymore.
Bruce did end up trying to approach him about it eventually, not that long after Dick had. Tim wondered if Dick had told Bruce how their conversation had gone. He must not have, because if Bruce knew that Tim wouldn’t open up to Dick, then he would know there was no way in hell he would open up to Bruce.
Bruce at least had the good sense not to barge into Tim’s room to try to talk to him about it. Instead, he did it down in the Batcave, where they were both quietly working on separate projects. Tim was trying to construct a detailed timeline of the events of the Crisis that had just unfolded, specifically the events involving Kon. He needed to gain a better understanding of Kon’s death. If he could wrap his head around it, he could start to process it, at least on a logical level. He was going to try to avoid processing it on an emotional level, which was his typical course of action anyway.
Bruce was behind him before Tim had fully registered his presence. Tim shut his eyes for a moment, bracing himself. Somehow he sensed what Bruce was going to say. He could feel it in the air between them; there was a palpable awkwardness every time Bruce tried to have an emotional conversation, especially with Tim. If trying to get Bruce to talk about his feelings was like talking to a brick wall, Bruce trying to get Tim to talk about his feelings was like two brick walls trying to talk to each other.
“Before you ask,” Tim said, preempting the question he knew was coming, “I’m fine. So.” He took a breath. “Let’s just… not do this.” He avoided turning around to look at Bruce. Bruce wasn’t as emotionally incompetent as everyone made him out to be. He was at least emotionally competent enough to recognize how emotionally incompetent he was. He was self-aware. And Tim could tell he felt guilty about his shortcomings in that area. He wanted to be there for his kids, he did, but he didn’t know how. He didn’t even know how to learn.
“Do what?” Bruce asked.
Tim didn’t have the energy to phrase delicately, so he just came out with it: “You try to comfort me. I pretend it’s working. You can tell it’s not. Let’s skip to the part where we both give up. It’ll be easier for both of us.”
There was a long pause. Bruce was caught off guard by Tim’s frankness. Usually Tim would at least feign receptiveness to an emotional conversation with Bruce, because he knew how hard it was for Bruce to initiate one, but he didn’t have it in him to care right now. He felt dead inside. He felt like a robot, running purely on the logic of a computer, programmed to complete certain tasks, unimpeded by emotions, fulfilling its purpose with a single-minded efficiency. This was what he had to be to keep going. And he had to keep going. So this was what he had to be.
“You know,” Bruce tried to say, “I’ve lost teammates before. Friends.”
“Yes,” Tim said, “I know. And I’m doing exactly what you’ve always done when that happens. I don’t have time to get emotional about this. Especially if we’re going on that trip you’re planning.”
“Would you rather stay here?” Bruce offered.
“I’ll do whatever you want me to do.”
“That’s not what I was asking.”
Tim finally turned, exasperated. Bruce’s face was impassive, which meant he was feeling a feeling, and Tim couldn’t be bothered to investigate and find out which feeling it was. It used to be a fun challenge, solving the puzzle that was Bruce Wayne. Now it just felt tedious. “I don’t have any other answer for you. I don’t care if I go or if I stay. I don’t care. Now please, just… leave me alone.”
Bruce raised his eyebrows, and Tim realized, very abruptly, that he had fucked up.
And that was how Tim ended up grounded. Not in the traditional sense of the word. He was Bat-grounded. Benched. Because apparently “I don’t care if I go or if I stay” was a “red flag.”
“I meant it literally,” Tim tried to argue. “As in, I don’t care if I go on your trip around the world or if I stay here in Gotham.” But no one would listen. Bruce wouldn’t budge on the matter. Alfred said something vague about “reasonable precautions.” Dick called it “a little overprotective, but understandable.” And when Jason found out about it, he laughed.
“You sure learned that the hard way,” he said over the phone when Tim had called to inform him that he was unavailable for team-ups until he was “cleared” for missions again. “Rookie mistake, kid. You gotta watch your wording when you’re depressed.”
“I’m not depressed,” Tim insisted.
“Uh-huh,” Jason replied skeptically. “Hide it better next time.”
At least Jason didn’t try to make him talk about his feelings.
Tim’s family weren’t the only people trying to get him to open up. His friends did too. Cassie was the first, searching for someone she could lean on, who was grieving with her. Tim lied and said he was leaving on a year-long trip with Bruce, even though he wasn’t sure that the trip was even happening anymore, not just because of the mental health crisis everyone thought Tim was going through (he wasn’t), but also because Jason had caught wind of it and responded a little too enthusiastically to the idea of being left to his own devices in Gotham with zero supervision from Batman.
He felt bad about pushing Cassie away like this. She needed support just as much, if not more than Tim did. But Tim couldn’t be the one to provide it. He couldn’t be there to support Kon’s grieving ex-girlfriend. He knew it would tear him apart inside, and there was only so much of him left to destroy.
Kon had been the best thing in Tim’s life, something Tim hadn’t even realized until it was too late. He’d been too caught up in what they hadn’t had that he hadn’t appreciated what they did have.
After Tim’s brief conversation with Jason, he got a call from Roy, who Jason must have given a rundown of the whole situation.
Tim liked Roy. He was a more seasoned vigilante, like Dick, but importantly, he wasn’t Tim’s brother. He was nicer than Jason, though it was hard not to be. He was logic-minded, like Tim, though he’d actually been to therapy, which put him leagues ahead of anyone in Tim’s family emotionally. He was bisexual, also like Tim, and had been out for years and years, which made him a useful resource. And he was Jason’s soulmate, which meant any time Tim wanted to get in Jason’s good graces, he had the perfect in.
Tim let his phone ring. He liked Roy, but he didn’t want to talk to him right now either. Roy was too good at reading people. He would see right through Tim, and probably figure out that Kon was Tim’s soulmate, and Tim really didn’t need that right now. Plus, Roy was always advocating for people to go to therapy, so far to no avail. Tim wasn’t interested in therapy. A therapist would make him feel his feelings, which sounded awful.
Tim’s phone stopped buzzing. And then immediately started buzzing again. Another thing about Roy was that he was persistent.
After Roy’s sixth attempt, Tim finally picked up. “Jesus Christ, what?” he snapped.
“Seventh time’s the charm, huh?” Roy said dryly. “I need to tell you something.”
“I don’t want to talk to you,” Tim insisted. “Or anyone.”
Roy was undeterred. “Are you not listening to me? I said I need to tell you something. Not the other way around.”
Tim glared into his phone. He knew Roy had to have some kind of trick up his sleeve. He always did. But he’d piqued Tim’s curiosity, and now Tim needed to know what Roy was planning to tell him. (This was consistently the easiest way to reel in a Bat, which Roy clearly knew.)
“Fine,” Tim relented.
There was a brief pause, during which Tim heard Roy take a breath. And then, “I was with Dick when it happened. At the Tower.”
Before Tim could ask what “it” was, Roy kept going. “I woke up in the middle of the night to some of the worst pain I’d ever felt in my life. It felt like someone invisible was beating the shit out of me.”
Tim was beginning to understand where this was going.
“Dick was awake,” Roy continued flatly, relaying facts, leaving emotion out of it entirely. “He was trying to get a hold of Bruce on the other side of the world. I told him I was feeling this random pain out of nowhere. I didn’t know if it was mine or my soulmate’s. I didn’t know who my soulmate was. We decided to go to the hospital, just in case. The pain had already faded by the time we left, but we went anyway.
“On the way there, I got hit by a brief moment of the most intense pain imaginable. I felt like I was dying. I thought I was dying. And then, immediately after, I felt a rush of equally intense euphoria. Then nothing.” Exactly the same as Tim’s experience. Intense pain, rush of euphoria, then… nothing.
“We went back to the Tower and tried to take our minds off of what had just happened,” Roy explained. “That’s when Dick got the call.” The call that Jason was dead. “That’s how I found out who it was.”
Tim felt a bit sick. Roy had told him, briefly, what it had felt like to feel Jason die – intense pain, rush of euphoria – but he’d never gone into any more detail than that.
“Why are you telling me this?” Tim asked.
“Why do you think?” Roy countered.
Roy knew. Roy knew Kon was Tim’s soulmate. Roy knew Tim had felt him die.
“How did you figure it out?”
“I notice things,” Roy said simply. “I haven’t told anyone, and I won’t. Not even Jason.”
“Thank you.” Tim paused. He had a lingering question, also based on Roy’s experience with Jason. “He’ll come back. Right? We didn’t end up together. That’s how it works.”
Roy’s hesitation spoke volumes. “I don’t know. I can’t promise anything.”
“He has to,” Tim insisted.
He had to.
ONE MONTH AGO.
Tim.
They were in France, chasing a lead on Bruce. Tim was doing most of the talking, because Jason, while technically fluent in French – as they all were – had the most obnoxious American accent that Tim swore he leaned into on purpose, because, to quote Jason, “Fuck the French.”
Jason, meanwhile, was serving as their liaison to the League of Assassins and, by extension, the League of Shadows, who were helping them, because, again, to quote Jason, “Not only do I have a longer history with them, but also, Ra’s is way too fucking interested in you and it makes me uncomfortable.” Jason would never admit to having protective older brother instincts, and would probably kill anyone who implied that he did, but he definitely did.
They were grabbing something quick to eat for lunch – Jason insisted on ordering for himself, probably because of how embarrassing it was for Tim – when Tim felt it the first time. At first, he couldn’t be sure it was real. It could have been psychosomatic. And it was gone as quickly as it came.
Jason elbowed Tim. “Hey. You’re paying, right?”
Tim rolled his eyes and withdrew a few notes from his back pocket, paid the cashier behind the counter, took the change, and waited with Jason for their meal.
He felt it again.
After Tim’s soulmate bond with Kon had formed, around when they’d transitioned from Young Justice to the Teen Titans, kickstarting Tim’s sexuality crisis and forcing him to reckon with the crush he’d been viciously repressing, Tim had found that being bonded to a half-Kryptonian was a… unique experience. Kon didn’t feel pain often, so when he did, it was a big fucking deal. He felt pleasure, and that was always a fun time for Tim, wondering if Kon was by himself or with Cassie, and if it was the latter, how guilty should Tim feel about the fact that he could, to a certain extent, feel two of his best friends having sex, even though he couldn’t help it.
But there were additional sensations Tim received from Kon that anyone with a human soulmate would never feel. If Kon was particularly drained, Tim could sometimes feel him “recharging” via sunlight, which felt fucking awesome. And he could sometimes feel Kon using his powers, like when he took off with a burst of super speed, when he hit something really hard, or when he used his heat vision.
And right now, Tim could have sworn he’d just felt Kon taking off, and then breaking the sound barrier.
His shock must have shown on his face, because Jason shot him a strange look and asked, “The fuck is wrong with you?” (This was Jason for, “Are you okay?”)
“I just felt…” Tim trailed off. If he said it out loud, it would feel real, and he couldn’t let it feel real, not until he knew it was real.
“Felt what? Spit it out.”
“It might’ve been nothing,” Tim said.
“I swear to God, kid—”
“I just thought I felt something from my soulmate,” Tim told him, because he could tell Jason was winding up to go off on him and he didn’t want that to happen in the middle of a Parisian café in front of all these unsuspecting bystanders.
Jason made a face. “Oh. What’s the big deal about that? Are they hurt or something?”
Tim blinked. “Wait, you don’t know?” Roy had promised not to tell anyone, not even Jason, but Tim was kind of surprised he’d kept his word.
“You have ten seconds to explain this entire situation to me or I’ll get us arrested.”
“Roy knows who my soulmate is,” Tim said quickly. “I didn’t tell him; he figured it out. He promised not to tell anyone, but I half-expected him to tell you anyway, although I guess I should have known that he didn’t, because you haven’t teased me about it, ever, and you definitely would.”
“I would,” Jason confirmed. “And Roy and I are allowed to keep secrets from each other as long as they’re not the other person’s business. Case in point…” Jason held out his arms, indicating their mission to track down Bruce, which Jason hadn’t told Roy about because he knew Roy would tell him he “wasn’t coping with loss in a healthy way.” (Jason also, apparently, wasn’t supposed to be working with the League of Assassins anymore after he’d used them to track down Prometheus and kill him for what he’d done to Roy. Apparently Roy had given Jason quite the lecture about that. Jason seemed unrepentant.)
“Right. Well, my soulmate is Kon.”
Jason’s eyes widened, then he tilted his head to the side and looked thoughtful, and then he nodded. “In Roy’s defense, he shouldn’t have needed to tell me that. I should have probably figured that one out on my own.”
“Come on, it wasn’t that obvious,” Tim insisted defensively.
“It was,” Jason countered. “He’s your soulmate and your first gay crush, though, so it’s gonna be obvious.”
“Oh, like you with Roy?” Tim teased, because he happened to know Roy was the first (and only) person Jason had ever been in a relationship with.
“So you felt something from Kon, then?” Jason asked, redirecting the conversation away from his own lack of romantic experience, something Tim happened to know he was sensitive about. (Tim had to collect these details just in case Jason ever went too far and Tim needed to put him in his place. But the good thing about Jason was that he could dish it out and he could take it. Usually.)
“I’m not sure,” Tim admitted. “It happened too fast.”
Jason took out his phone, and Tim saw him navigate to Twitter and search “Superboy.” And then he held up his phone for Tim to see. “You felt him alright.”
The tweet Jason had pulled up was a blurry photo of a flying figure. The caption was in French, but it translated to, “is Superboy back???”
Despite the low quality of the photo, it did look like Kon: same dark hair, same suntanned skin, same black t-shirt and jeans.
Still, Tim tried not to get his hopes up. “We don’t even know if that photo is real, let alone if it was taken today.”
“There are more where that came from,” Jason said, scrolling through dozens of tweets, most of them in French, several of them with photos. “Apparently he’s here. In Paris.”
Tim’s heart skipped a beat.
“What are the odds, right? I think the universe is trying to tell you something,” Jason was saying, but Tim hardly registered it.
Kon was alive.
Kon was back.
Kon was here.
“Do you want to, I don’t know, find him?” Jason offered.
“We’re in the middle of a mission,” Tim said, mostly because he knew it was what he was supposed to say. His actual answer was yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. And he was pretty sure Jason knew it.
“Come on,” Jason said. “B isn’t going anywhere. Probably.”
“What about our food?”
“Are you not made of money? We’ll grab something somewhere else.”
However, with impeccable timing, their order was served. Tim grabbed the bag and Jason scrolled through Twitter looking for clues to Kon’s specific location.
“Hey, why do you even have a Twitter?” Tim asked, curious, and also trying to distract himself from the fluttering in his stomach, a blend of excitement and anxiety. “That website sucks.”
“Firstly, for times like these,” Jason said, “And secondly, I’m on every social media platform. I run an account called ‘The Batman Truther.’ I wanted to see if I could singlehandedly spread some wild conspiracies about our family and now I have over a million followers across Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram. Plus a dedicated subreddit.”
“Wait, that’s you?” Tim gaped. “Isn’t that the account that started the theory that Batman is an actual vampire, the Robins have all been his thralls, and the reason he looks different and younger now is because he’s uncovered an ancient blood ritual that de-ages him?”
Jason chuckled. “Yeah. Come on, he was just spotted near the Louvre.”
They suited up, at Tim’s insistence, because, “Tim Drake can’t be seen talking to Superboy.”
“You take your secret identity way too seriously,” Jason complained, putting his helmet on.
“Not all of us are legally dead.”
“I can fix that.”
It was never that difficult to track down a Super – they weren’t exactly known for their stealth – and Kon was no exception. Tim felt like he hadn’t taken a breath since he’d seen that first photo of Kon, and when he laid eyes on him, hovering in the sky, it felt like he had come back to life too.
He looked exactly how Tim remembered him. Not a single thing about him had changed.
And Tim became abruptly aware, standing there in his new costume, with his new alias, next to Jason, of all people, that in the time Kon had been dead, for Tim, so much had changed.
Tim didn’t have time to mull over the implications of this. Jason had already called out, voice distorted by his helmet, “Hey, Superboy!”
Kon’s head turned, and he saw them, and Tim could tell Kon didn’t recognize him. His heart was thudding in his chest. He tamped down his rising anxiety.
Change was a natural part of life. It could even be a good thing. It didn’t have to mean things between Tim and Kon would be different, somehow ruined.
And yet… Tim’s personal experience with change had taught him that it was rarely for the better. Most of the life-altering changes Tim had experienced had been negative ones: his mom dying, his dad dying, Kon dying, Bruce dying.
Tim had to remind himself that this was different. No one was dead. The opposite, actually. Kon was alive. And no matter what had changed, that was undoubtedly a good thing.
Kon landed in front of them, though not too close. He looked skeptical of Jason. And to be fair, Jason was standing in perhaps the most intimidating possible manner, arms crossed over his chest, a litany of weapons strapped to his chest and hips. (No firearms, though. “For Christ’s sake, Jason, you can’t open carry in Paris.” Though Tim was sure he had at least one handgun hidden somewhere on his person.)
“Red Hood?” Kon said, sounding puzzled and more than a little suspicious, addressing Jason instead of Tim, who he still didn’t recognize. “What are you doing here?”
“I’m just supervising,” Jason told him dispassionately.
“Superboy, it’s me,” Tim cut in, unable to wait any longer. He could tell Kon recognized his voice instantly from the way his face lit up, bright blue eyes wide with excitement, a smile making its way across his lips, but for good measure, Tim added, “It’s Robin.”
“Told you the suit would confuse him,” Jason muttered, but neither Tim nor Kon were paying him any attention.
Kon took two big steps forward, entering Tim’s space, looking down at him with an inscrutable but unmistakably happy expression. “You have a new costume,” he said. He sounded the same. He looked the same and he sounded the same. He even smelled the same, like ozone.
“Yeah, I got fired,” Tim told him. “It’s a long story.”
“You have the same costume,” Jason pointed out unnecessarily. “It still sucks.”
Kon’s gaze flicked over to Jason, then right back to Tim. “And you’re with Red Hood.”
Tim smirked, and as he did, Kon’s smile widened, as if in response. “That’s a long story too.”
“No it’s not,” Jason argued. “B ‘died’ and neither of us thought he was actually dead, so we’re working together to find him.”
“And that’s been working out for you?” Kon asked Tim.
Jason answered for him, “He’s not the worst partner in the world. And the new look is good, right?” He gestured to Tim’s Red Robin costume.
“Yeah, I love it,” Kon said sincerely. “It’s badass. What’s the new name?”
“Red Robin,” Tim told him.
“Creative,” Kon quipped.
“That’s a bold claim coming from a superhero in a t-shirt,” Jason retorted. He gestured to Kon. “You know, you just came back from the dead. Take it from me; now’s the perfect time to change up your look. Red here could help you design it. He’s not half-bad. He designed this one and the one he had before it.”
“Yeah, I knew he designed the Robin costume,” Kon said. “That one was sick too. And I guess I could change it up a little.” He looked down at himself. “This does feel a little dated, but that might be because I just came from the future.”
That was a twist. “How far in the future?”
“Thirtieth century, baby,” Kon answered with a wink and a grin. “I’ll tell you all about it when we have time to catch up. And I expect to hear all about what’s happened in Gotham while I’ve been gone.”
“Oh, God, so much,” Tim said. He couldn’t stop smiling, even being reminded of all the crazy, awful shit that had happened over the past two years. “Yeah, we’ll talk.”
“Why not talk now?” Jason suggested. “I can follow this lead on my own. You guys grab some lunch.”
Tim looked at Jason strangely. “But we already—”
Jason snatched the bag from the café out of Tim’s hand. “This is my lunch. Go get lunch with Superboy.”
This was an unexpected turn of events. Tim would have thought Jason would want to hurry this conversation along, make Tim and Kon’s reunion as fast as possible so they could get back to business. He shot Jason a questioning look, trying to figure out what, exactly, he was playing at – he had to have an ulterior motive – but Jason’s helmet was, as always, unreadable.
Tim decided, perhaps foolishly, to trust Jason. So he turned back to Kon and said, “Do you have time for a quick rooftop lunch?”
Kon was still smiling too. He also hadn’t stopped. “For you, Rob? Anytime.” He paused, then added, “Red? Rob? What should I call you?”
“Either one works,” Tim told him. Instead of saying what he was thinking, which was, You can call me whatever the fuck you want.
“You two crazy kids have fun,” Jason said with a brief wave. “I’ll keep you updated on my progress, Rob.”
Tim shot him a glare, and Jason gave him two thumbs-up before sauntering away.
Kon grabbed them something to eat and met Tim on a rooftop with a view of the Eiffel Tower. They sat with their legs dangling, and Tim didn’t think he’d been this happy in, well, two years. He hadn’t realized until now just how low he’d been; he’d grown used to his new normal, to the constant numbness that kept the sadness and grief at bay. He’d almost forgotten how it felt to feel.
He couldn’t stop sneaking glances at Kon, recommitting his face to memory, that slightly crooked smile, blue eyes like the ocean, and perfect, unmarked skin. He had to physically restrain himself from reaching out and touching it, because it still didn’t feel real. If he woke up and this all turned out to be a cruel dream, he wouldn’t be surprised.
“I really do like the new look,” Kon remarked, gesturing at Tim’s new costume. “It’s a little Batman, a little Robin. It suits you. Especially since you’re eighteen now, right? Sorry I missed your birthday. Two of your birthdays.”
“Sorry I missed two of yours,” Tim replied. “What are you now, five?”
Kon shoved him, not enough to throw him off balance, just enough to get his point across. “Shut the hell up,” he said, though he was still smiling. He still hadn’t stopped. Neither had Tim. “And I wasn’t in the future for that long, so I guess I’m closer to the age I was before, if we want to get technical.”
“Right, yes, the future.” Tim had almost forgotten that part. He was too distracted by Kon being here, being back, being Kon. “How did that happen?”
Kon told him everything, starting from the beginning: dying, being revived in the future, fighting Superboy-Prime again, getting sent back home to the twenty-first century.
“Holy shit,” Tim remarked when Kon’s tale was over.
“Yeah I know.” Kon shook his head. “My life is so weird. Okay, now you go.”
Tim told Kon everything too: learning about Damian, almost getting recruited to the League of Shadows, Darkseid invading Earth, Bruce “dying,” Dick becoming Batman and firing Tim from being Robin, Steph returning, Tim realizing Bruce wasn’t dead and starting the search he and Jason were still on.
“So you’ve had a terrible couple of years,” Kon summarized, eyebrows raised.
“I’m hanging on by a thread,” Tim said, half-joking, half-serious. “Or I was, before you came back. I missed you like hell.”
“I missed you too, T.”
Tim felt warm on the inside. At least for the moment, it felt like his unrequited crush on Kon didn’t matter. It was enough to have Kon back. Tim wouldn’t be greedy. This was already the best thing that happened to him in a very long time. He’d been adrift in his grief, unmoored. He hadn’t known what to do with himself. The search for Bruce had been the only thing giving him purpose lately, the aforementioned thread he was hanging on by. He was convinced he would have spiraled otherwise. He almost had.
Speaking of which, “I actually have to confess something,” he admitted, and Kon’s smile wavered, which sent a spike of anxiety through Tim’s heart. He quickly continued, “I missed you so much I… I thought about trying to clone you. I wanted to bring you back. I know that’s fucked up! I didn’t go through with it. It never left the idea stage. But I thought I’d be honest with you, since you’re always honest with me.”
Tim didn’t mention that Jason had been the one to talk him out of trying to clone Kon. That part wasn’t important.
“That is kinda fucked up, T,” Kon agreed, looking uncomfortable but sympathetic.
“I was desperate. I would have done anything to bring you back,” Tim explained. “But it wouldn’t have been you. I know that now.”
“I’m really glad you didn’t do that.”
“I probably wouldn’t have even been able to.”
“But imagine if you did, and I came back and there was another me, flying around, saving the day, taking my spot on the Teen Titans…”
“Stealing your girl,” Tim added, more as a reminder to himself that Kon was taken, Kon wasn’t his, no matter what the universe said. He had Kon back, but he didn’t have him. Not really.
“You mean Cassie?” Kon clarified, as though Tim could have possibly meant anyone else. “I don’t think she’s my girl anymore, T. I’ve been dead for two years.”
“She’d take you back,” Tim said, again, both to Kon and to himself. “She went about as crazy as I did when you died. Joined a cult.”
Kon’s eyebrows shot up. “Cassie joined a cult?”
“To resurrect you,” Tim explained. “Like I said, we both went crazy. She joined a cult and I was about to start an experimental cloning program. My point is, she’d take you back.” I’d take you, too, but I know that’s not what you want.
“Good to know,” Kon said vaguely, and less enthusiastically than Tim might have expected, which was odd. But Kon moved on before he could read too much into it. “Have you been seeing anyone? You said Steph is back.”
“Yeah, but we’re friends now. I think she has a soulmate. She won’t tell me who it is.” And it drove Tim crazy, which Steph, of course, knew.
“And you can’t figure it out?” Kon asked, surprised.
“I’ve been so busy with the search for B that I’ve hardly had time for anything else.”
“Yeah, you couldn’t even get your experimental cloning program off the ground,” Kon said cheekily. Tim shoved him right back, and Kon gamely let him, for fairness’ sake.
“So you’re not interested in Steph anymore,” Kon pressed on. “And she’s not interested in you. And there’s no one else?”
“There hasn’t been, no. Although, that’s something else I should confess. Cassie and I had kind of a… weird moment, when we were talking about you one time. About how we both missed you so much we went kinda crazy. Nothing happened, and it felt immediately weird after – I think we were both grieving and trying to, I don’t know, feel something – but we almost kissed.”
Tim didn’t even like Cassie in that way, and he knew she didn’t like him that way either. But for a moment there, Tim had nearly convinced himself that he could find some semblance of comfort in Cassie, and she must have thought the same, before they both thought better of it. Grief wasn’t exactly a good foundation for romance, especially a romance between two people who weren’t even attracted to each other.
“But you didn’t kiss?” Kon asked. He didn’t sound too upset, let alone betrayed. He sounded confused, more than anything.
“It felt wrong,” Tim explained. “I don’t think we even really wanted each other like that. We both wanted—” You. “We both wanted you to come back.”
“I guess I can’t hold that against either of you,” Kon reasoned. “I was dead. I assumed Cassie would move on. I didn’t think it would be with you—”
“It wasn’t,” Tim cut in. “We both regretted it.”
Kon offered him a small smile. “T, I promise, I’m not mad.”
“I just need you to know. There’s absolutely nothing there.” Tim didn’t know why he was so insistent. He told himself it was because he was trying to be a good friend, to both Kon and Cassie, by not getting in the way of their relationship, even at his own expense. But that probably wasn’t it. Selfishly, Tim didn’t want Kon and Cassie to get back together, though he would never admit it, least of all to Kon. Even though Tim didn’t stand a chance with Kon either way. As far as Tim knew, Kon still identified as straight.
“I believe you,” Kon said, sounding sincere. Once again, he moved on. He didn’t seem to want to dwell on the topic of Cassie. “So you and Jason are cool now. What about the rest of your family?”
“Dick is pretty busy keeping Damian in line,” Tim told him, “And being Batman, obviously. Damian has gotten… slightly more tolerable because of Dick’s influence. He’s way less murder-y, though he still hates me, and it’s pretty mutual. Jason is in New York half the time, and the other half we spend searching for Bruce.”
“Why New York?” Kon asked.
“Roy lives there.”
“They’re still together?”
“Yeah, Kon, they’re soulmates.” Of course they were still together.
“So you guys are here searching for Bruce?”
“Yeah. And I’m glad we were. I’m really happy I could see you.” Tim leaned over and bumped shoulders with Kon, earning another smile. He was addicted to those smiles, and he’d been sober for too long. “What about you? What are your plans now that you’re back?”
“Apparently I’m getting a new costume,” Kon said, referencing Jason’s idea from earlier.
“Right, and I’m helping you design it,” Tim joked, though he would do it if Kon wanted him to. “Are you gonna get a new name too? You’re not exactly a ‘boy’ anymore.” He certainly didn’t look like one, but Tim didn’t know how to say that in a non-gay way.
“I could be Superman again, but I think Clark might have a problem with that.”
Tim didn’t particularly give a shit what Clark thought. “He can’t expect you to be Superboy forever.”
“Yeah, but he’s not gonna retire any time soon either,” Kon reasoned.
“So what? There have been multiple Supermen before. There are two Green Arrows. There are so many Green Lanterns, from Earth alone.”
“I’ll think about it,” Kon said noncommittally. “Maybe I’ll come up with my own name.” He pretended to think, then said, “Blue Superboy.”
“Go fuck yourself.”
Kon laughed, and it healed something else in Tim, something he’d thought was broken forever.
“You couldn’t think of a different bird?” Kon asked. “What’s another red bird… Oh! Cardinal!”
“Isn’t that a little, I don’t know… Catholic?”
Kon continued, undeterred. “Macaw. Woodpecker. Uh…” He trailed off.
“That’s all you’ve got, huh?” Tim remarked.
“Yeah, that’s it.” Kon shrugged. “We’ll workshop it.”
They ended up talking for two full hours before Tim realized how much time had passed. Jason hadn’t tried to contact him yet, but Tim couldn’t stay here with Kon forever, as much as he wished he could. He’d let himself get distracted long enough.
“I don’t think I can stay much longer,” he told Kon apologetically. “I’ve got to get back.”
“No problem,” Kon said easily. “We’ll talk more later.”
Tim nodded. “It was really great to see you, though. Like, really great. I…” Tim realized he was on the verge of babbling and cut himself off. “I missed you,” he said instead, succinctly. “Welcome back.”
“Happy to be back.”
They hugged for longer than normal, and Tim’s heart rate spiked in a way he hoped Kon wouldn’t read into, feeling Kon’s warm, strong arms around him for the first time in what felt like his entire life, even though they’d hugged plenty of times before. He breathed Kon in one more time, memorizing his scent again, and by the time Kon finally released him, he felt more infatuated than ever.
There were a million more things he could say, and they crowded Tim’s throat, and he had to shove them down somewhere deep and hidden and say, “See you around, clone boy.”
“See you around, T.”