Disclaimer: All characters are copyright of DC. No monetary profit is being made from the writing or distribution of this fic.

Important Information: This fic assumes you have read and are familiar with the events in Madness Whispers Sweetly. While this is not exactly an alternate ending, because it assumes some characters present in the previous fic never existed and others were never cursed among other discrepancies, it does rely heavily on the same storyline.

Chapter 1

From Destruction

"There's so much destruction." Tim gripped the railing and couldn't help but despair a little, as he always did at the end of the day when dusk turned the broken, jutting shards of the city red and then forbidding black. He'd seen the pictures, the images of the city when it had been whole, spires stretching toward the heavens. Once, it had been powerful. Once, it had dared to scrape the sky. None of that remained now. Looking out across the horizon, much of it had been torn apart, destroyed by a people gone mad or ravaged by fire and looters and decay. Now, all he could see when he stood on the balcony and stared out at the land was a city razed, broken down to its basest of parts, slowly recovering from the madness that had gripped it.

There was so much work to do.

"Some destruction is necessary." Ra's stepped up behind him, hands coming to rest on his shoulders, robes brushing his skin. Tim shivered, turning his head to look at the man behind him. "Sometimes the old and diseased must be excised so it won't strangle the strong, new growth." Tim was a part of this new world, something Ra's was protecting. If it hadn't been implied, Tim could feel it in the grip of strong hands still at his shoulders. Ra's had told him about the old world—about the rot that had slowly infested its underbelly, eating away until it was ready to collapse from its own weight. He'd seen those pictures too: the bodies lying like refuse in the gutter, people huddled in squalor, babies left in dumpsters. Ra's had brought people together after the chaos when he'd destroyed the source of the madness. He'd unified them, given them hope, helped them rebuild, protected them. Tim only wanted to do as much.

Ra's gestured, drawing his attention back to the ruins.

"Why do we have destruction, Timothy?" Timothy. Only Ra's ever called him that.

"So we can start over."

"Yes," Ra's practically purred, pleased. The man's hands fell away as he turned to go, taking the warmth with him. Night had fallen some time ago and it was chilly on the balcony.

Looking over the city one last time, at the scattered lights breaking up the gloom, on the verge of following Ra's, Tim just caught a flicker of movement on one of the crumbling rooftops below. Quickly he turned back, staring curiously down into the shadows so many floors away. There was someone there, silhouetted on the edge of the roof, standing tall and immobile now. Tim squinted, willing the darkness to sharpen, trying to make out more distinguishable shapes. He shifted just a hair to the right and suddenly the light reflected off eyes staring up at him.

Tim jerked back, surprised, both at being seen so far above and at the way everything seemed to drop out from under him when their eyes met. He grasped at the railing for support, steadying himself and looking again for the figure below. This time though, no bright flicker of eyes met his. The figure was gone. The shadows were empty.

"Timothy?" Ra's called, somewhere inside, and Tim gave up, turning reluctantly to follow the man he admired more than any other.

"Coming!"

Ra's had given him a home, after all, and a purpose. Raised him like a son. Saved him from the beasts who'd killed his parents. He owed the man everything.

"What are you working on?" Ra's crossed curiously to the boy's side when he found Timothy at the marble-covered, mahogany desk the next day, surrounded by sheets of paper. He put a hand on the boy's shoulder and Timothy leaned back obligingly so he could see the neatly scrawled notes he'd written up.

"Plans to clear more land. We were almost short on food last winter and more people come every year."

Ra's looked them over for a minute, but they were immaculate as usual. The boy's work barely needed supervising at all. If he'd been anyone else, Ra's would have long since given him some of the task teams to order about, but well, some things were too important to let out of his sight. This one in particular… If there was one thing he could not afford to lose, it was Timothy.

The boy looked up at him—looked up to him—blue eyes sharp, waiting, and Ra's couldn't help the swell of satisfaction he felt every time those eyes sought him for acceptance or advice. Without the corrupting influence of the Detective, he'd proven much more receptive.

"Well done. I'll pass it on." He started to turn away, but Timothy shot up, leaning forward earnestly.

"I'd like to take charge of it myself." Because the boy didn't understand the critical part he played already, or how easily everything could fall apart if something happened to him. Because he was made for more than this, whether he remembered or not, and the restrictions Ra's had placed on him were undoubtedly irksome.

"That's impossible."

"Why?" Timothy's grip firmed on the back of the chair, free hand gesturing fervently toward the broken horizon. "I could do so much more out there helping people with my own hands." He could. Ra's had seen it, and he wasn't going to let the boy do anything that might make him remember.

"Timothy," Ra's started in something like fond exasperation, "ever since I rescued you from the monsters who killed your parents, I've thought of you as my own. It would put my mind at ease if you'd stay here where my guards can keep you safe."

Timothy frowned, displeased, but he didn't pursue the matter, and that seemed… a little too easy, especially from someone so strong willed. This wasn't the end of the argument. Nevertheless, when Ra's turned away this time, attention caught by the agitated hissing of one of the demons, there was no further move to stop him.

Tim perched in the dark along the roof of one of the houses that had been reconstructed just earlier that week, proud of the work that had been done. Garbed completely in the black uniform he'd borrowed from one of Ra's' men, he blended deftly into the shadows. Ra's would not have approved had he known. The man preferred to keep him out of the general public, only allowed to help from behind the scenes or during the handful of times the man could accompany him personally. Sneaking out on nights Ra's was gone was the only way to see the city, to breathe it in and feel the grit of it beneath his shoes.

He liked to see the progress they were making too. Not that he didn't trust the men who reported to Ra's, but it was another thing to see it and walk through it himself and know that something good had been accomplished: another little piece of the city cleaned up and working again. Sometimes, if he was lucky, he could sit on a roof and listen to the content chatter of the family inside through an open window. Those instances always felt the most satisfactory.

Not tonight.

Motion caught his attention and he spun to watch a man in a patch-worked coat step up to the backdoor of a little shop, jamming a twisted piece of metal into the crack between the wooden frame and the door.

"Stealing's against the law," Tim hissed, as he dropped down from the roof, sweeping the man's legs out from under him with a low kick. All the work they'd done, all the progress they'd made to give these people homes, food, clothing, and still they tried to steal from one another like animals. "You know the punishment." Pinning the man's arm to the ground with a black-clad boot, he drew the katana at his back with a resonating sching of cold metal, holding it high. It was one of the many weapons Ra's insisted he know how to use.

The man spat, thrashing, contorted face reflected in the cold metal of the blade poised above him.

At the last second though, before he could complete the swing of the sword, something clamped hard around Tim's wrist.

"You don't want to be doing that, kid." Tim blinked to find his wrist pinned between strong fingers, still held above his head. The man who'd somehow snuck up on him was wearing a stylized red domino mask, a brown jacket and denim jeans. There was something about him, something about the strong lines of his face perhaps or his imposing stature (he towered over Tim), something that drew the eye, made it hard to look away.

Tim stared, caught not so much by the man's impressive height or the surprise of having been snuck up on—an impressive feat in itself—but by the strange, disorienting familiarity of the man. It wasn't anyone he recognized, but he would have sworn before Ra's that they'd met before.

"Let me go." Tim tugged on his captured hand, unnerved by how quickly this stranger had gotten into his head. That was dangerous. He couldn't dredge up any fear though. Only wariness.

Under his foot, the would-be thief's bravado had given out, and he reach out to the handsome stranger for help. The stranger eyed him a second, mouth turning down disdainfully, before his attention turned back to Tim.

"If I let go, what will you do?"

"Would you like to find out?" Tim asked archly. For a minute the man only regarded him, expression hidden by the mask. Whatever issue he contemplated though, it didn't take long. Before Tim could get impatient, the man released him with a grunt.

Free, Tim completed the strike he'd been stopped from earlier, plunging the katana into the ground a hair to the right of the man's head, satisfied with the wide-eyed whine it tore from his shaking prisoner. Tim dropped into a crouch so he could whisper warningly, one hand still on the hilt of the katana.

"If I catch you again, I'll turn you over to Ra's. You know what he does to thieves, yes?" In response, the man's eyes rolled up into his head. Tim hummed, satisfied. Scaring them was good enough. He'd never been fond of Ra's' totalitarian tactics—a trait the man seemed to find both annoying and amusing at times.

Beside him, the stranger's mouth had quirked into the beginning of a sharp grin, apparently approving.

"You should leave the city," Tim told him, straightening from his crouch to face the man. "If Ra's finds you— Hey!" The stranger's fingers unraveled the black wrapping covering Tim's face with one deft jerk, revealing his tousled black hair and sharply contrasting pale skin. It was too much to hope the thin shadows would hide him. There were too many people who knew his face, who'd seen him beside Ra's. But the stranger didn't show any surprise, fingers reaching out and curling around the back of Tim's neck before he could duck into denser darkness. Seeing Tim revealed, the hard set of the man's features softened, that was all.

"Does Ra's know you're out here?"

"Of course he does!" Tim lied, bristling at the stranger's disregard for his warning, the liberties he was taking (no one had ever touched him so openly—Ra's would have fed them to his demons), but the man's mouth curved smugly, knowingly, calling him out.

"So many incarnations, and you haven't changed at all. Still a liar." Tim trembled under the thumb stroking low against the base of his throat, the knowledge of him this man possessed. The fingers wrapped around his neck were gentle but strong as bars.

"What…" Tim licked his lips, tried to get the world to steady. "What are you talking about?"

"Don't you remember anything?" The gentle stroking of those fingers was coaxing now, the man examining him intently from behind that mask.

"I don't even know your name!"

"No." The man's voice was a growl. "No, you do know my name, Tim. I know you do. You remembered last time. You can do it again." The grip on his neck tightened briefly—not threateningly, not painfully, just a reassuring pressure—before those strong fingers returned to their stroking, thumb smoothing over the pulse-point distractingly. There was something intense about the man, something demanding. Something familiar.

Against all odds, there was a name on the tip of Tim's tongue. He tried to swallow it down—the absurdity of it—but the stranger seemed to know. The hand that had been curled around the back of his neck slid to his chin, thumb digging into the cleft there a little, pulling at his lip, opening his mouth.

"Say it."

But Tim balked. This was ridiculous. He would've remembered if he'd met anyone dressed like this man before, and Ra's was so restrictive anyway. He definitely would've remember the feel of the man's hands—no, he did remember, and the man wasn't going to let him go without admitting it.

"Say it."

"Jason!" It was a gasp that rattled him. He didn't know where it came from, and he trembled under the unexplainable knowledge of it, wide-eyed and spooked.

"Yes," and now the man's other hand was on his face, like he just couldn't hold back anymore, and maybe the strong grip of fingertips curled against Tim's cheek was some kind of reward to match the hard smile pulling at the man's lips. The grip of those hands changed then, framing his face, and Jason stepped closer, nose brushing Tim's forehead, breathing him in. "Yes. Say it again."

"Jason." Tim's fingers caught at the man's elbows, digging into that leather jacket for purchase, for something to hang onto, because the world was lurching sickeningly. It felt like things were falling apart, falling away on all sides, and he could only stand there, wide eyed and so very confused by it all.

"What are you..." He swallowed, trying to push the words out and still keep the nausea down. "What are you doing to me?" He tried to push away from Jason, away from the source, and stumbled on still shaky legs, Jason's quick grasp at his elbow the only thing keeping him upright.

"The memories were disorienting last time too," Jason said, apologetically, and that made even less sense. Tim frowned at him, waiting for everything to finish steadying, but just then the black fingers of shadows stirred, crawling unnaturally across the street toward them, and the stranger released him completely with a growl. Both of them turned toward the new menace.

"Demons," Tim whispered, annoyed, but when he turned back, the man was already gone.

Jason wanted nothing more than to pick Tim up and haul him bodily back to the manor, to just thieve him away in the night, to heck with the fact that Tim would fight him every step of the way, still loyal to a monster masquerading as a man.

He snarled in the darkness, baring white teeth at the lost opportunity. How many times had he stood on the rooftops below and stared up at the tower—what had once been an All Seasons Hotel overlooking Central Park, the only building to survive the destruction thanks to Ra's' occupancy at the time. How many times had he seen the light spilling from the top floor and stood there, senses straining against the distance for a glimpse, a broken sentence, anything he could keep of Tim's. Now he'd had the kid practically in his arms, had gotten to hear his own name in that confused voice—and oh, he was certain he could have gotten more out of the kid—nothing separating them, fully capable of dragging him home, where he'd be safe at last, and he couldn't. His hands twitched with the need to pull the kid against his side and fight off Ra's' minions tooth and nail, to not let them have a single scrap of his brother ever again.

Instead, he watched the demons sweep up beside Tim, ushering the frustrated boy back towards the tower, back to whatever penance he faced. Jason watched, and he let it happen, teeth clenched and nails digging into his palms until blood dripped from his knuckles onto the rooftop under his boots.

"Again, Timothy?" Ra's knelt across from him, resplendent as always in flowing emerald robes, edged gold. He held the air of a tired parent. "Must I assign you more vigilant guards?"

"You already had one of your demons following me or they wouldn't have found me so quickly." Tim still wore the black uniform in which he'd been caught, clinging to this last act of defiance. Not that he'd meant to disobey Ra's, but that he wasn't ashamed of trying to do something more to help.

"Apparently it was necessary, since you seem determined to throw yourself into danger."

"I can hold my own."

"It's not your ability I doubt." For a minute, Ra's' lips quirked into something of a sharp smile. The man knew perfectly well what he was capable of. He'd trained him.

"Then what?"

"There's been another attack." As quickly as the shadow of a smile had come, it was gone, smoothed into steely resolve.

Tim didn't have to ask who was responsible. There was only one man Ra's took so seriously.

"The Detective." Despite everything Ra's had done to provide structure to a world gone mad, despite all the efforts to rebuild—organizing people, building shelters, gathering food—there were still enemies. The Detective, in particular, plagued them constantly. Neither the man nor his allies ever stole food—in fact, they'd often attacked and terrorized those who tried—never took anything valuable at all, but they'd repeatedly sabotaged Ra's' attempts to discipline thieves and even attacked him directly.

Tim didn't understand what Ra's had done to upset them.

"I want to help," he tried again, holding out his hands palm up, beseechingly. It wasn't bravado—not any belief that he could suddenly fix what Ra's apparently couldn't—but rather, he couldn't shake the feeling that if he could just meet with them…

"You are too important."

"I could be more important. I could talk to them."

"You undervalue yourself. You aren't a pawn to throw at the feet of enemy forces."

Tim sighed, sitting back, and tried another track.

"Why does he attack you?"

Ra's chuckled, a dark sound, and reached out suddenly for Tim's arm, drawing it toward him, extending it the way he might have if showing Tim something important in training. "Some time ago I took something from him." There had been a time—so very long ago, when Tim had first come to live with Ra's—that the man's touch had frightened him, leaving him with vague nightmares and distant pain and nausea. Ra's had been persistent though, hands falling reassuringly on his shoulders when he'd shied away, and eventually the nightmares had faded, leaving only the man and the warmth of sturdy hands Tim trusted more than any other.

"It must have been something important."

"It was. Something he cared for very much. He has never forgiven me for the loss." The man's eyes on him were starkly possessive, and Tim pulled back, flustered when Ra's looked at him like that. He couldn't pull completely out of the man's firm hold though, and Ra's' grip only tightened warningly, the fingers of one hand pinching his palm and the other sliding up to grip his elbow bracingly. Then the man's eyes met his, fierce and hard, slicing into him. "These aren't men like us. They can beguile you with a look. They can get inside your mind." Tim nodded numbly, taken by the gravity of the man's grim demeanor, and Ra's' grip finally eased a little, assured that the importance of his warning had gotten through. Still, he didn't completely let go, holding on for one last reassurance.

"Promise me you will never go looking for them."

Tim squirmed uncomfortably, not willing to let the subject go, but the man's very presence demanded obedience, pulling the promise out of him.

"Yes, austad."

As it turned out, Tim didn't need to go looking for them at all.

It happened at the Accounting, practically the next day. Ra's had let Tim come because the man was planning to move forward with his plan for clearing more land, because he trusted the men present, and because it was in the tower, albeit one of the lower floors, well within the safety of its walls. Tim had taken his seat on Ra's' right, in one of the nondescript white chairs that surrounded the glass table, mirroring the other men already present. Of course, there was nothing nondescript about the silks Ra's had him in again, bright enough to brand him as the man's favored ("They must know your place," Ra's had murmured), ostentatious in a way that always made Tim wish oddly for a mask. Still, he knew the men assembled, had been allowed to work with some of them within the tower, and everything had appeared to be the beginning of a completely boring, normal meeting: Ra's demanding an accounting of the progress made and assigning new divisions of labor.

It was. Until the doors flung open and several men strode in, their features concealed behind masks, gate liquid and angry.

Tim was on his feet instantly, standing tall and strong in the face of the intrusion, prepared to protect Ra's, even though the man's demons were already reacting, rising from the thin shadows under chairs and tables and stands of ferns. The men at the table were slower to react, scrambling belatedly to the walls to get out of the way, recognizing trouble.

Judging by the things he'd heard about them, Tim had expected the Detective and his allies to be monsters: inhuman creatures that feasted on warm blood and wrought destruction with the strength of a dozen men. But they weren't. They were commanding. Perfect.

"Ra's! This is the last—" The man in the front, the largest and most intimidating, started to growl, only to stop short when his masked gaze fell on Tim, the anger draining away into wonder. "Tim." He mouthed the name, but he didn't get any further.

Ra's had stood by then, resolute and undeterred, and pulled Tim against his side before Tim could even think to jump between them, arm sliding possessively around him. Tim might have protested that, but all his attention was for the transfixing intruders.

He hadn't expected them to be so… beautiful. Ethereal black hair and pale skin. They moved as fast as the demons. The slimmer one at the Detective's side held his arms out, beseeching, like a siren, transfixing in his beauty, calling to him.

"Timmy!" It hurt to look at them—the keening crescendo of a headache, a ringing in his ears, a sort of disorientation—but he couldn't look away either.

Then Ra's' hand came down like a bar, plunging his vision into darkness.

"Don't look them in the eyes!" Tim nodded frantically, but Ra's was already shouting more orders. "Take Timothy! Keep him safe!"

"No!" Someone was shouting, words that bled into each other as the temperature suddenly spiked. Tim felt the fever-heat of the demons Ra's commanded swallow him, suck him down into that nowhere of choking cinders and burning things. He cried out as it enveloped him, clawing at the darkness. The demons' grip was firm though, as it always was, eagerly holding him tight, perhaps hoping that this time Ra's would give him to them entirely. Theirs to play with. He choked, thrashing against the perceived need for air, certain there was none as each gasp only sucked in more searing heat. Normally it was a punishment to be carried through the same space the demons inhabited—a punishment that never failed to earn Ra's instant obedience. Even if he was certain the man had intended it to be a protection this time, it didn't stop the sensation of endlessly suffocating, of burning alive but never dying.

He couldn't say how long he stayed there in that delirium, but when he finally came back to himself, it was sprawled in Ra's' lap, the man's hand running calming strokes down his heaving back, through the slits in the silk robe he wore. Tim blinked, wide eyed at the familiar beige room, now empty, and shuddered, grateful for that contact, for the grounding nature of it.

"What happened?" he asked, when he could get breath again, the cool air of the room filtering into his seared lungs. His eyes darted around, confused. What few things had been damaged in the scuffle had been swept away: one fern pot was obviously missing, along with several chairs. Ra's seemed largely at ease for having just been attacked, the hand on Tim's spine thoughtful.

"They couldn't get what they came for, so they left." Green eyes gazed down at Tim consideringly. They were on the floor, the man's robes splayed on the unornamented, beige carpet, but from the way he sat, he might as well have been in full command of the room.

Tim shuddered one last time and sat up, embarrassed by his position in Ra's' lap, embarrassed that he'd needed the connection, like he was five again, clinging to the man's robes because the demons scared him. He was strong. He could defend himself now. Ra's had made sure of it.

And the man had taken him out of the struggle before he'd even had a chance.

Tim frowned.

"I want to stay with you next time. I want to fight."

"Your blades cannot kill these men, dear Timothy." Ra's' hands moved to tamp down a few strands of unruly black hair like Tim really was five. "They are like demons." Tim flushed at the touch, embarrassed again, and settled back, momentarily put off, because Ra's knew exactly how capable he was, so if Ra's said this was beyond his abilities, it was. Still, he had yet to face a problem that couldn't be solved if he worked it the right way.

"Then…"

"No," Ra's interrupted.

"I didn't even…"

"You were going to ask me to teach you how to fight them." The man's smile was sharply fond—the fingers in Timothy's hair definitely soothing now. "Stay here. Be safe. Put my mind at ease." That was not the answer Tim wanted.

"It would ease your mind more if I could defend against them."

Ra's sighed instead of answering, and the silence stretched out unbearably for several minutes. Tim refused to let it get to him, staring unwaveringly back, and finally the man spoke.

"I can see you're determined." Ra's' fingers moved to his chin, tilting his head up to better search him with that penetrating green gaze. Tim often felt like that gaze could see into his soul. The man sighed again. "You're going to pursue this against my wishes."

"You know me too well, austad." His smile was unabashed.

"Perhaps…" Ra's paused, considering. "Perhaps there is one thing that could be done…"

Author Notes: Writing 5000 word chapters again. Shame on me. No wonder it takes so long to post. So here we are, nearly sixteen years after the end of the last story, with a Tim who has grown up alongside Ra's. I couldn't give up on this one concept from my last fic: What if Ra's didn't kill Tim, but exploited the situation to get Tim on his side and use him against Bruce? Except this story assumes that the previous six incarnations still occurred (am I counting those right?), the rest of the family still found out what was going on, and Ra's ultimately won the last round. I'm still debating whether or not Damian and Alfred are going to make any kind of appearance in this fic.

For anyone wondering what on earth I'm doing starting a new story, I have not given up on Persona, I am just totally blocked up on a conversation with Dick in ch. 5 and too tired of looking at it. And of course, writing is getting harder and harder.

Translation Notes: And I quote, "Austad (pronounce the dh like the 'th' in 'the') (female version=austadh) means 'teacher' and 'professor' and is also an honorific. For example, you might call your aged neighbor austad even though he's never been a teacher."