Chapter Text
Tim couldn’t die.
That sounded a little silly when said in plain letters like that. But he couldn’t. The first time he heard that sentence Tim was four years old and clinging to the hem of his mothers dress. In a rare showing of maternal instinct she’d crouched down to brush his hair back from his forehead. Her fingers left stinging red lines in their wake against his pale skin. She’d smiled at him with their shared frigid eyes and cooed- for his hearing only- ‘you can’t die Timothy. You’re not allowed.’ Tim was too young to put much thought into it then. All he cared about was being told he wasn’t allowed, and he had to follow his parents commands.
The better of a child he was the more time they spent home with him. So, Tim couldn’t die. And for a few years he took that order to heart. He wasn’t allowed to die, so doing anything too terribly risky was automatically off the table. Any time his parents came home, or called, or even in emails, Tim always greeted them the same way. Timothy, still alive. It brought rare smiles to his parents' faces every time.
Tim didn’t think about disobeying until the fateful night he slipped out of his window and into the deep Gotham night. He stopped for a long time at the foot of the great oak tree that hovered outside his window. His mothers smile was the only thing he could see, her careful touch the only thing that he could feel. Not even the secret wishful knowledge carefully tucked away in his brain could wipe her order away. He stalled for long enough that his fingers and toes began to ache in the cold, no matter that he was wearing his thickest socks and gloves.
He didn’t go out that first night. Or the night after. It actually took another two weeks before he finally built up the courage to risk disobeying his mothers order. By then the first freeze of winter had passed and Tim was able to buy hand warmers again. They pressed as warm as his fathers grip against the palm of his hands. The ones Tim shoved in his boots went cold hours ago, but his toes had stopped hurting so they were probably used to the cold. He knew that the body could adjust, they’d studied it in science last year. Mrs. Rein said that it took time, but that was for regular people.
Tim was a Drake, they were better than anyone else.
He stayed crouched against the lip of a building not far from the Bowery for hours. He saw Batman and Robin swing by exactly four times, and he saw Robin sprint across a rooftop twice. Twice! He had to bite the side of his hand to keep from yelling in excitement. By the time the morning sun was beginning to rise Tim realized that he couldn’t feel his knees anymore. Everything from his hips down was just a dull aching buzz. And with the light rising the winter chill slipped away to become heat dripping down his spine. Tim pulled off his jacket and tied it around his waist before he tried to convince his legs that they could still hold his weight.
It wasn’t going very well. Every step felt like fire ants gnawing away at the thin skin of his feet. He managed to hobble around like drunk Bruce Wayne at a Gala before he lost his footing in the ice slicked gravel. The edge of the building banged against his hip painfully before the force of gravity fully caught him.
Dumpster meet Timothy Drake. Timothy, Dumpster.
The last thing that Tim has time to think (besides OW that is) is that his Mother is going to be pissed he disobeyed.