A few things you should know before you read:
Dick Grayson and Barbara Gordon are gender-swapped. They are Rosella Grayson, and Brendan Gordon. Don't ask why, it just works better with the type of one-shot this is.
Tim is not a girl, nor is anyone else gender-swapped.
The whole point of this was because I thought Tim seems like the type of person who see's everything going on, makes observations and inferences, but never judges.
Thank you, and please enjoy the show.
Disclaimer: I do not own Young Justice.
I have seen things no other little boy should see. I have experienced things not even people twice my age could fathom. Yes, I am amazing, I know. There's no need to tell me. But there always has been something I could never get my head around, and that was the love life of my older sister Rosella Grayson. (Ross for short).
I was four when my future adopted sister was taken in by my next door neighbor, aka the billionaire Bruce Wayne. I would see her sometimes, and when I asked, she would show me a mini-acrobatic routine using a tree nearby. She seemed so completely awesome to me. Everything from her pose, to how she moved, to her, as I called it, "gypsy accent" seemed utterly amazing.
After I started attending school for a few years, my parents took that as a cue to start spending less time with me. Every day after school, they would drop me off at home with my hired babysitter, Ross Grayson.
She was always so nice to me. She would let me do practically whatever I wanted, (don't know if that was a good or bad thing), and sometimes she would take me out for ice cream. Other times, when I could talk her into it, she would take me to Wayne manor to show me one of her trapeze routines.
It was one of those times when I first met her friend Brendan Gordon.
I was 9 years old and she was fourteen. When I walked in my house, I heard her laughing at something; I didn't know what. I walked into my living room to see Ross sitting on our sofa with some red-headed boy. You could imagine the emotions coursing though me; Ross was mine, and I did not want to share her with anyone else, especially some soulless-ginger.
Ross must have heard me enter the room, for she turned her head towards me and smiled. "Tim," she called motioning me over, "I want you to meet my friend, Brendan. Brendan, this is my buddy, Tim."
I shyly walked over to the two adolescents and offered Brendan a meek "Hello." I may not have liked him, but that didn't give me a reason to be rude to him; he's never done anything to me except steal Ross away.
The older boy smiled warmly at me and said, "Ross has told me a lot about you. She's a fan of yours."
At his words, I immediately brightened up with pride. Of course he's heard a lot about me; Ross was practically my sister. (I did not know how true those words would become). I had nothing to worry about.
Throughout our evening we did the usual things we always did (play video games, go to the park, etc.). Everything seemed to be a lot more fun with another person with us, though.
I may have been only nine, but I was not stupid. I didn't fail to miss the times when Brendan would gaze at Ross with a smile, or whenever their hands came in contact he seemed to let it linger for a longer amount of time than a friend normally would. I also didn't miss Ross sheepishly tucking her hair behind her ear when he said something that made her laugh, or how she seemed to scoot as close to him as she could when they sat next to each other.
Eventually it was time for Brendan to go home.
After he left, Ross told me that I should start doing my homework. Reluctantly I pulled it out, quickly finished it (it was unbearably easy), and proceeded to stare at Ross with a smile on my face.
She ignored me for a few minuted before she couldn't stand it anymore and demanded to know why I was staring at her with a "big goofy grin on my face".
"Oh nothing," I replied.
She gave me a look that read, really? "Come on Tim, what is it?"
"Has he kissed you yet?"
He eyebrows shot up to her hairline as her face glowed bright red. "W-what? Tim! Brendan is just my friend!"
I rolled my eyes at her. "Sure he is," I said in the most disbelieving tone I could muster.
"He is!" she protested. "Nothing more, nothing less."
I pretended to grudgingly believe her as I turned on the television. "You know, I like him." I told her. "Can you bring him over more?"
"As long as you promise that you won't do anything like ask him when he's going to kiss me."
I put a finger to my lips, pretending to mull this over in my mind. "You know, I wasn't, but, now that you mention it, I think I just might."
She slapped down her pencil, looking up from her homework. "You wouldn't!"
I looked at her expression, and started laughing. "You do like him!"
"I'm going to stop talking to you right now..."
"Okay, okay, I'll quit." I really should have quit after I said that. I just had to get myself in more trouble by saying- "Does he at least know you're Robin?"
Now I had done it.
Predictably, I was sworn to secrecy after that day. They wanted to know how I found out, or who told me, but all I could tell them was that I was very observant. That, and I'm a kid genius, but hey, I thought we already covered that topic.
The troubling thing wasn't when I figured out who Batman and Robin were, but when Brendan Gordon figured out who Robin was.
I don't know all the details really, and I only knew how Brendan found out because he told me a few years later. I will tell you what I did know, or rather, what I overheard.
It was a clear, sunny day in Gotham city, just the slightest bit overcast. (A real rarity for a city that seems to brood itself). Ross seemed a little distracted. I would often catch her staring off into the distance, sighing like she was some damsel in distress in a Disney movie. I didn't question her about it, because I figured she wouldn't tell me anyways.
I saw a familiar flash of red hair walking by and recognized Brendan at once. He would know what's wrong with Ross, I though. They're practically married. "Brendan!" I called waving him over.
I noticed that as soon as I said the guy's name, Ross's head shot up, and she started to sprint over to the red-head. As soon as he saw the acrobat charging towards him, he mumbled a quick "Bye Tim," to me, and started to walk away.
"Brendan, wait!" Ross grabbed his arm, forcing him to face her. "Please, would you just talk to me?"
"What's there to talk about?" he snapped. "You've been lying to me for the past five years I have known you! Every time when you were busy because of some lame excuse you made up, you were really going out and risking your life. You can't expect for me to be happy about that information!"
"I don't!" Ross was getting frustrated now, slipping back into her original Romani accent; she did that whenever she was really angry, sad, or happy. It was always kind of funny. Except when she was mad; it made her sound like a blood thirsty vampire, and that was just scary. "I understand that you are upset, but you can't ignore me forever. I haven't talked to you in two weeks, you ignore all my texts and calls, not to mention you've been skipping the classes you have with me. Can you just find it in yourself to forgive me?"
Brendan studied her face with his light green eyes suspiciously. Breathing out a sigh he said, "Ross, I tell you everything. I have never once lied to you, and never hid anything from you. I thought you did the same. I need some time to come to terms with everything."
Ross narrowed her eyes at him, and visibly gripped his arm harder. Brendan winced a little at the sudden increase in pressure, but didn't say anything. "I know you, Bren," she said, using his rather feminine nickname she had for him. "Something else is bugging you. Come on, talk to me about it. I'll be damned if our friendship ended over this. I promise on my family's grave that I will never lie to you again, just please talk to me."
At that moment, Brendan got the most determined, yet nervous, expression I have ever seen on anyone's face. To this day, I still marvel at that facial expression. He leaned down close to her face, and I could see a faint blush bloom on Ross's cheeks. "This," he replied softly as he leaned in and pressed his lips to hers.
Ross's eyes widened a fraction of a second before she wrapped her arms around his neck and angled her head to deepen the kiss.
I smiled and reminded myself to tell her later that I told her so.
Ross became a play-girl, as all of Gotham's magazines and newspapers dubbed her. The only reason I hadn't heard her refereed to as a "whore" or "slut" (as most girls who did what she did are called) was probably because she was "Gotham's own Princess".
As time went on Brendan accepted the fact that Ross slept around. His original reaction, however, was much different.
We both hated Bruce's charity galas, so naturally the both of us would stand awkwardly to the side together watching the rich snobs such up to Bruce. Now, apparently, the young men at the gala sucked up to Ross. That fact did not sit well with Brendan.
Ross was currently on the dance floor, chatting rapidly with a handsome blonde. She was putting on her usual display of fake smiles and laughs reserved especially for the social elite. The blonde didn't seem to be paying any attention to what she was saying. His eyes were fixated on her breasts as his hand slid lower and lower.
While I thought this was humorous, Brendan thought something else. He didn't make a big show out of it (like most guys would), but he was jealous. His eyes seemed to burn holes in the oblivious blonde male, and his jaw tightened more with every centimeter the guy's hand strayed south down Ross's back.
I looked from him to Ross dancing, and back to him again. "Jealous much?"
He shot me a wide-eyed innocent look. "W-what? Of course I'm not! It's just...highly unpleasant to see groping in public. I mean, come on, get a room." Brendan must have realized what he said, for the next words out of his mouth were, "Actually, I really hope she doesn't do that."
"Lighten up Brendan, don't you have a little faith in-" my words died away as I spotted a familiar blonde in the gaggle of people. "Quick Brendan, hide me!" I dove under the food table we were positioned next to, peaking out from under the table cloth from time to time. "Is she gone?" I asked hesitantly.
Brendan got an amused expression on his face, as he proceeded to laugh at my antics. "Looks like little Timmy's got a crush," he teased. "Come on, you can't tell me that you're literally afraid to talk to, uh Serena Down. Didn't you just go toe-to-toe with Bane yesterday?"
I shot the fellow vigilante my best bat-glare and said, "Number one, her name is Stephanie Brown, and number two, I do not like her."
"Sure you don't. That's why you're hiding under a table."
I was about to retort, when I saw the blonde guy kissing Ross. I quickly changed my sour expression to a devious smile I seemed to have picked up on from Ross. "Well at least I'm not letting some stranger lip lock with my girl."
Brendan's head jerked to where Ross was, and I swear, he looked like he was going to kill someone. "You know what," he said, "I think I'm just going to go home and get some rest before I do something I regret." And with that, the red-head stiffly walked out of the room, avoiding eye contact with everyone.
I looked around, scanning for any familiar blonde heads, before I deemed that the coast was clear and crawled out from underneath the table.
"There you are, Tim!" I spun around only to come face to face with the one person I had been trying to avoid. My heart leaped in my throat, and my palms grew sweaty.
It was Stephanie Brown.
I already told you that I don't understand my sister's live life, and from the different scenarios I have just told you, you can see the reason why. But the most confusing thing of all was her on and off again slash friends with benefits relationship with Brendan Gordon.
I didn't get it...they were obviously head over heels in love with each other, yet they never seemed to just be together as boyfriend and girlfriend like normal people. The one time I asked either of them about it, they both replied with "It's complicated" and left it at that.
After the invasion, to my surprise and utter delight, they decided to get together. My guess is it had something to do with Wally dieing,(we found out he was alive and trapped in an alternate dimension two months later, but that's a story for another time) and a big long speech about how "this has made me realize that I don't want to lose you, and I want to spend as much time with you as I can" and all that jazz. I was just happy that I couldn't feel as much sexual tension between the two of them.
That all changed one fateful night as Brendan was visiting his father.
I was at the manor when I got the news, simply doing homework in my room. Bruce was the one that came to my room and told me Brendan had gotten shot by the Joker.
When we got there the doctors told us that Brendan was hit in his lower spinal cord, paralyzing him. They were unsure if he would ever be able to regain his ability to walk.
Ross showed up a few minutes after us, and let me tell you, that woman can be a real stereotypical Mediterranean woman. She was screaming up an angry storm at all the hospital workers in a heavy Romani accent. It surprised me, to say the least; Ross was normally a pretty cool tempered person. Only Bruce was known to make her that volatile. So, why was she acting like that, you ask? Let me explain;
Ross sneaked in through the hospital window; she didn't want to go through the wait of asking the people at the front desk like a normal person. When the nurse came back to refill Brendan's IV line and spotted Ross, she called in the security. When the security came and tried to get Ross to move out of the room, she slapped their hands away from her, and proceeded to scream at them in Romani. If the circumstances were different, I would've started laughing at the show she was putting on. At the time she just seemed frightening to me. Despite being a slight woman at 5'4'', the security guards also seemed slightly frightened of her.
Before things could get too out of hand, Jim Gordon walked into the room, saw what was going on, and told hospital security Ross was a family friend and to leave her be. Normally, the hospital staff would have made her check in at the front desk, but no one questioned the chief of police.
Later that night Bruce and I went home, but Ross told us she would stay with Brendan. The next morning, he woke up.
At first Ross was overjoyed, but quickly got dejected. Brendan was angry that she was there. Ross got confused, saying that of course she would be there for him, but he just asked her to leave. At first Ross got stubborn and refused to leave his side, but in the end, she reluctantly left.
After he got out of the hospital, he told her that he wanted to break up, breaking her heart in the process.
It puzzled me, to say the least. I would have thought that Brendan would want her with him most of all at that difficult time in his life. When I asked later, he told me it was a stupid and rash thing he did, but a needed one. At the time, he did it because he couldn't stand her seeing him that broken. She reminded him of everything he wasn't anymore; everything he couldn't do anymore. He said it was needed because it helped him rediscover himself in a new life. He came to terms with his condition on his own, and created Prophet (1) on his own.
To sum it up, it was a bad time for us all.
I don't, never have, and never will care to "give Damian a chance", and Ross keeps on explicitly telling me to do. Damian Wayne, Bruce's biological son, is a menace and a little demon child. He has no respect for anyone, is rude to Alfred, and never does what he's told. To top it off, I just hate his guts.
You cannot imaging the depth of absolute betrayal I felt when Ross told me that she was giving the Robin mantle to Damian. All he had done so far was try to murder me, and she deemed him fit to be Robin? The mantle from her family? That was something beyond my comprehension.
I did the only rational thing I could have thought to do at the time. I left. Ross begged me to stay, but if she really wanted me to, she send the demon spawn back to his mother, which she blatantly refused to do.
I tried to convince Ross that Bruce was still alive. Come on, he's Batman for Christs sake! He was worse that a cockroach. She didn't believe me, and told me to just let the dead rest. I still wasn't convinced; there wasn't enough solid proof that Bruce was deceased. (The body was fake, but no one believed me).
I spent the next year and a half away, trying to look for a ghost. Ross would call me occasionally, trying to convince me to come home. Jason being away is bad enough, she would say. Timmy...I don't want to lose you too.
I wasn't going to just abandon her forever; I wasn't that cruel. I simply was going to be away until she got her head out of her butt. Just saying.
Eventually I found out that Bruce was lost in time, proving to Ross that he was still alive. While Bruce was gone, Ross had been parading as a sort of gender-neutral Batman. She made her suit so she would look more like a man, but some still said she was Batwoman instead of Batman. Once Bruce was back, she hung up the whole cap and cowl thing, saying she would happily return to being Nightwing.
I have to admit, at that time I was still holding a grudge against her for what she had done. I hadn't really had a conversation with her, and every attempt she made to try to apologize to me, I gave her the cold shoulder. That was until I witnessed something I have the feeling I wasn't supposed to see.
I was passing my Ross's room, when I heard her talking to someone. It was Damian. Speak of the devil, I though. I stopped outside her door just to see what the brat was doing in her room so late.
I peered through the crack in the door, and my jaw literally dropped at the sight I was witnessing. Damian was sitting in Ross's lap, hugging her like she was a lifeline as his face was buried in her chest. Ross in turn had her arms wrapped around the 11-year-old, as she stroked his hair and tried to calm him.
"It's okay, Damian," she cooed. "You finally get to spend some time with your father. Aren't you excited?" Damian didn't answer, just simply shook his head."Come on, Dami. Just think, you won't have to deal with my incompetence anymore."
"I don't mind your incompetence, Grayson," came the muffled reply. "You don't have to go. You could stay. I'll even put up with the idiot Drake if it'll make you stay."
Wow, he'd put up with me. That's a hefty compliment there.
Ross sighed in the young boy's hair. "You know I can't stay. But, I will visit often, and you can come by my place in Bludhaven whenever you want. Also you can call and talk to me too when there's an emergency. So yeah, I won't live here, but it doesn't mean I'll be gone forever."
Damian gave a soft sniff, and looked up at her with large gray eyes. "Can we still patrol sometimes? I mean, you need someone around to keep an eye on you so you don't go and get yourself killed."
Ross laughed at this, and snuggled the boy closer to her. "Of course, Dami."
"-tt-, Grayson, how many times have I told you not to call me by that absurd nickname?"
I left after that, sensing their moment was over. I lied in my bed that night, mulling over what I had witnessed. Maybe she was right to take him in, and let him be Robin, I thought. Leave it to Ross to weave her way into a miniature assassin's heart.
It didn't mean I'd ever like the little demon spawn; no, it just meant that from then on, I looked at him in a different light than before. Thinking of the people who loved Ross brought to mind the subject of Brendan.
I thought about how their relationship went south so quickly, and the image of Ross holding Damian in her arms. At that moment, something clicked. Brendan hadn't broken up with Ross because "she reminded him of everything he wasn't anymore". That was only part of it. The main reason he broke up with Ross because she wanted to be a mother. She always wanted to have a family and children of her own. In Brendan's condition, he didn't think he could give her that. He knew that if he stayed with her and addressed that issue, she would stay with him anyway because she loved him. He didn't want her to sacrifice that for him.
I didn't confirm this with Brendan, but I didn't need to. The rare time when we were all in the Batcave together, I would catch him gazing longingly at Ross, but the moment she looked at him he looked away. It was sad to say the least, but there wasn't anything I could really do about it. I didn't want to get in the middle of their crazy, messed up love life.
Stopping escaped asylum patients were always the worst missions, in my opinion. You work all night to capture criminally insane people, who have no morals or sense of empathy and mercy.
To top it off, Nightwing (Ross) recently broke her foot in a drug exchange in Bludhaven. Even though she could still fight, (she's the best acrobat in the world, of course she could still do her thing), Bruce forbade her from helping on the field. Fortunately, Red Hood (Jason) was in a good mood, and agreed to help. (That probably had something to do with Ross's recent meltdown that caused her to kill the Joker).
I, unfortunately, had been notified that I was needed for the asylum break out on my flight to the manor from Princeton. Because of this, I got to the bat cave after Bruce, Damian, and Jason had left. Who I did find in the Batcave was Brendan and Ross, both monitoring computers. I was about to ask them where I was needed in Gotham as Red Robin, when I realized they were having a conversation. I figured that they almost never had time to talk anymore, so I would just wait for them to finish what they were saying before I decided to intrude. Also, it wouldn't hurt to listen in a little bit, right?
"-been with much more guys then I have been with girls," Brendan finished saying. His eyes were scanning the computer screen while he rapidly typed onto the keyboard. Ross seemed to be playing solitaire on hers.
Sighing Ross said, "That may be true, but most of them were meaningless flings. All of your relationships were real."
Brendan looked away from what he was doing to give Ross a puzzled look. "Not true; remember high school? I had a couple girl friends that I didn't care for."
Ross shot Brendan a surprised look as she won her game. "Really? You seemed into those relationships."
"I was just trying to make you jealous." Realizing what he just said, Brendan turned bright red, and rattled a location to where Poison Ivy was hiding to Bruce over the intercom.
A big goofy grin spread itself over Ross's face like wildfire spreading throughout a forest. "You know, I did the same thing."
It was Brendan's turn to get surprised. "Really?"
Ross laughed at his expression. "No. I just liked the attention, real or false." He face turned serious as she next said, "Though, if you ask me, the real thing is much better." She leaned over to him, touched his thigh, and turned his face to look at her. "Brendan, I miss you so much," she whispered. "Why did we break up?"
The ginger looked at her with a heart broken expression, and removed her hands from him. "I already told you why. Even if we were to get back together, I know we'd just end up disappointing each other, anyway."
"Bull shit."
"Ross-"
"Look," she cut him off, "Bren, I don't love you any less than I did when you first had your accident. If anything, being apart from you this way had made me love you more, as bizarre as that sounds. I don't care if you can walk or not, if you had all your limbs amputated, or what. I will always love you."
Brendan looked pained. He put his head in his hands and started rubbing his face. "That's the problem," he mourned. "I don't want you giving up anything else for me."
"What are you-"
"Look at me!" he yelled. "I am crippled and in a wheel chair! I can't go out on patrol with you as Batboy anymore, and I haven't been able to for a very long time."
Ross gave him a stubborn and cross look. "Haven't you heard me? I don't care about that. Even so, because the damage wasn't as extensive as the doctors originally thought, you healed up quite nicely. You aren't crippled anymore, Bren. You can walk now. All you need to work on his regaining your muscles."
"You didn't let me finish. It will take me years, years, to fully regain the ability to walk, Ross. Even then, I'll never be physically at the same level I was at when I was as vigilante fighting crime alongside you." Ross opened her mouth as if to argue, but Brendan stopped her with a hand motion before you could say anything. "You will let me finish, and then you can comment. Ross, since I've known you, you have always wanted children and a family of your own. I-" Brendan paused, trying to think of the right words to put what he was about to say. "Let's just say, I haven't slept with a woman since I was with you. I don't think I could ever give you children of your own, Ross. I don't think I can even preform anymore, if you know what I mean."
I was really wishing I hadn't stayed to listen to their conversation.
"I don't want you to give up your dream of having a family for me," he continued. "I can't, and will not be that selfish."
Ross simply stared at him. Brendan looked dejected, staring down at his lap. The computer gave a small ping, forcing Brendan's fingers to fly across the keyboard. He mumbled a, "He's on second street heading towards the doughnut shop," into the comm link.
Ross continued to stare at him for so long, I started to head out to the doughnut shop to help Bruce (and snag a doughnut). I stopped walking when I saw her position herself on Brendan's lap, so gracefully for having a broken foot that even I was impressed. (And I was used to all her flamboyant acrobatics).
She gave the man a sad smiled and whispered, "Being with you is my dream."
I had to roll my eyes at that. Seriously, could she be any more cliche? I was proud of her when she kissed him, though.
A month later, they moved in together at her apartment in Bludhaven.
The most hilarious thing about Brendan and Ross's wedding was, by far, was the fact that Wally was the maid of honor.
To tell you the truth, I think Damian was secretly jealous. Of course he didn't say anything other than, "-tt-, Grayson, that is so like you to do something as absurd as to put a male as the maid of honor. At least you picked a girlish male."
Looking back at the wedding, Damian was upset the whole time. My guess was because he was too used to being Ross's center of attention. (He had kind of adopted her as his mother/sister, though he would never admit that out loud). He would constantly point out all the flaws of them going on a honey moon. It got on my nerves quite a bit, but Bruce forced us to behave. The only reason I complied was because it was my sister's special day, and I didn't want to ruin it.
Wally constantly flaunted the fact that he was the maid of honor to all the other bridesmaids (who were all female). He even went to the bachelorette party (which he organized) instead of Brendan's bachelor party (which I organized).
He tried to talk Ross into letting him wear a dress at the wedding because she wore a tux at his (she was the "best man"), but that's where Ross drew the line.
The best thing about the wedding was Brendan was able to walk again. He couldn't do very much, granted, but it was so much better than not being able to walk at all.
It sucked having to patrol Bludhaven for a few months while Brendan and Ross got to mess around on their honey moon, but I wasn't complaining. I knew she's be back soon enough, and I didn't want to rush their happy time.
At first I was relieved when Ross and Brendan came back; it meant less work for me. That's when they told me the news. Turns out that nothing was wrong with Brendan's man parts, apparently. They worked just fine.
If you're one of those people who are a little spacy and have to be told everything bluntly, then I'll just go out and say it. Ross was pregnant.
"Wait, hold on a second." The girl of 15 years looked at me with a hopelessly confused expression. "Can you repeat all of that? I'm sorry, it was just so confusing, Uncle Tim."
She had long red hair she inherited from her father, with her mother's incredible blue eyes. I gave her a small smile. "You know, it is really confusing, isn't it? You'll piece it together eventually. God knows how long it took me to figure it all out." I looked across from me to see the front door open as Ross walked in the room
"Hey mom," the girl said.
Ross looked at her daughter and smiled. "Hi Mary. How was your day with Uncle Tim?"
Mary sent me a hopeless expression. "I have no idea," she answered honestly. "He talked about how you and Dad got together, and how you had me. I just can't seem to get my head around all the info he gave me."
I looked at my watch and realized I was late for my patrol with Damian. (I still didn't particularly like him, but I learned to work with him).
"Bye Mary, it was fun seeing you. Take care." I gave my niece and sister a quick hug and kiss, before I headed out to the Batcave.
Despite being the one to tell my niece the story of her parents, I still couldn't figure out half of the logic behind how they acted in their relationship. It took me years and years as it was to figure out what I already did figure out.
I had faced unspeakably terrifying things in my life. I solved crimes that had even puzzled the Batman. But no crime or mystery has ever been as difficult to solve as the love life of my sister, Rosella Grayson.
(1) Prophet is the same thing as Oracle; I just thought that Prophet sounded more like a guy version of Oracle.
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