AUTHOR'S NOTE: So every time I go away from FFN for a while, I forget just how inconvenient and stubborn its UX is. Sorry about any moments of formatting weirdness, and for any lack of information regarding story details! This story is also posted on Ao3 and it's a direct continuation of the Museum Mishap story I've already posted here. The series is more complete on Ao3 right now, but I intend to post everything from there over here and vice versa.

Chapter Two: Rule #2 – But Don't Be Afraid to Ask

It's the end of a long, frustrating week, dragging at the end of a long, frustrating month, and Tim is starting to contemplate the pros and cons of upping his coffee consumption rate. The list of benefits is quite substantial, but the one glaring con is enough to make him hesitate: if he suddenly needs to put more coffee on his grocery orders, Mrs Simz will notice and will tells his parents who will suddenly discover that their twelve year old son is drinking coffee at all and will more than likely put a stop to it.

Which is something Tim is fairly certain he could not actually survive.

So, no more coffee. For now. Probably.

Still debatable.

Tim massages his temples – forcing his eyes closed for a moment, getting them off the dim glow of the screen they've been fixed on for the last… five hours.

Maybe he should take a break.

But not a coffee break. Because reasons. That he just went over.

Frack.

Okay. Break time.

Tim pushes back from the computer with a painful, physical reluctance.

The problem he's working on is important – it's part of Batman's latest case, an investigation into the new destructive force slinking into the city. It's a strange new drug and Tim understands why GCPD thought it might be a disease, at first… There's something about it that's – not quite alive, exactly, but organic.

Not like any kind of bacteria, but almost like a virus.

It is simply… mindboggling.

Tim can't tell how it was produced, or even what compounds it contains are exactly – granted, his only samples are from a few day-old smears of blood collected after the capes and cops had abandoned the scenes where the bodies had dropped.

But people are dying from this mysterious substance and Tim can't even tell why.

The chemistry doesn't make any sense. At all.

The blood samples he's collected are both slightly radio-active and entirely inert, simultaneously. Highly combustible when exposed to energy and oxygen and the unique plasma proteins and platelets found in blood. And speaking of blood, it attaches itself so securely to the aspects of human blood that it, like a virus, it actually changes the genetic make-up of the cells and plasma proteins to which it clings.

Tim doesn't understand how it works.

Or why people are dying.

It absorbs so fully into the human biochemistry that it seems like it shouldn't affect the host at all… perhaps it could act like a steroid, briefly – the street kind, anabolic-androgenic steroids, rather than like corticosteroids – providing a boost to muscle performance and production, but over a prolonged development rather than an immediate stress response. But other than that… it doesn't seem like it should be doing much of anything.

It does change the chemistry of the body, which would probably affect the physiology of it as well, and perhaps that alone is enough to explain the organ failure.

Blood exposed to the chemical glows faintly green, like phosphorus and it contains enough quinine to fluoresce brilliantly at exposure to ultraviolet light. And fresh blood exposed to contaminated blood bubbles and hisses with a reaction as the virus-like substance … eats through part of the fresh blood's natural elements. Whatever happens in that reaction contaminates the fresh blood to the point that it too fluoresces, and with repeated exposure to the contaminated blood, even fresh blood can be coaxed to glow under its own power.

It's eerie and kind of terrifying, if Tim is honest.

He doesn't understand it. Knows that he needs to if he's going to be any help with solving this case – with providing Batman with the information he needs to get the drug off the street, get the dealers behind bars, get the victims some sort of antidote… or at least an emollient, some form of treatment, be it palliative or a genuine cure.

Tim knows he needs to understand, knows just as well that staring stupidly at the same screen with no new data after five hours and a night entirely without sleep isn't going to help him understand. He knows that throwing energy at something that's not helpful is useless.

But it still hurts to push away from his desk.

Time wobbles slightly as he stands. His head feels light and spin-y.

His ears are ringing.

No.

Wait.

That's his doorbell.

It works, and people use it sometimes.

Well, two people use it.

Well, one person who occasionally brings his adoptive older brother.

So, Tim isn't exactly surprised to see Jason when he opens the door, but it's more that he's not surprised to see it's Jason behind the door… he's still surprised that there's anyone at the door to begin with – Jason is the only candidate, statistically speaking, but that still does nothing to explain why Jason is there.

A black bag of some sort – insulated by the look of it – is shoved into his face, taking up his entire range of vision.

"I brought food."

Tim blinks.

Food.

He's pretty sure he's eaten recently.

But he can't remember what he ate… so maybe not.

The lunch bag nudges at his shoulder, pushing him slightly to one side so Jason can slip inside and out of the frigid damp of late March.

Tim closes the door behind him to keep the heat in. He locks the door too, knowing that to do otherwise, in a rich, secluded part of Gotham is just a stupid way to tempt fate.

Jason's just standing in his foyer – Jason Peter Todd, ward of Bruce Wayne, current Robin, natural bad-ass – Tim still hasn't quite managed to make his brain accept that it's possible he's kinda sorta friends-ish with the teenage vigilante. Or that they're neighbors – well, as close as one can be to neighbors when estates large enough to house nature reserves separate the two mansions – or that they could have any reason to interact at all.

"You got any video games?"

Jason's question is sudden – totally unexpected.

Supposing Tim had managed to formulate any kind of guess as to why Jason was at his door, the question easily blows away any possibility he could've even been kinda close to right.

Tim nods.

To answer Jason's question: he has all the video games.

Jack and Janet Drake might be rather absent parents, but they're conscientious in their own way. They understand how important it is for children to have social interaction and how much that interaction relies on shared media interests and affiliations. So any piece of fandom or media platform or anything that's made a top ten pop culture list in the last five years – since Tim reached an age where he was capable of forging genuinely formative and in-depth relationships – is in the media room they've created for him.

He's never played any of the games, or watched any of the movies, or read any of the books… but he's appreciated the gesture, skimmed the summaries.

"Lead the way, baby bird," Jason prompts, jarring Tim from his thoughts.

A beat passes before Tim processes the words – connects them to the expectation of action. Eventually, he manages to get his feet to move and leads Jason downstairs to the media room stocked with whatever Jason could possibly want.

Jason is aptly awed.

Tim is pleased – and his appreciation is renewed for his parents' decision to provide him with the tools to interact with his peers.

"Dude. You have everything," Jason manages, having been still and silent with wide eyes since Tim first opened the media room's cabinet door.

"Yeah, kinda," Tim replies, feeling irrationally smug.

That giddy smugness goes away when Jason frowns. "It's all still in cellophane."

"Yeah… kinda…" Tim repeats.

Tim's eyes fall to the carpet – focus on Jason's feet, notice that he's standing… funny.

Jason kneels to investigate the repertoire of games Tim has available – he holds back the groan, but Tim reads it in the tension of his jaw, and he sees the jolting movement as he falls the last few inches instead of a controlled descent.

Tim's been doing a lot of reading on the topic of body language. He's not a natural, but he's a quick study and he can identify traits – link them to the statistically common causes as noted in his books. He can't read Jason, but he can create a list of observations. And while he doesn't know Jason well enough to interpret those observations, he can connect the more obvious dots in the data he collects.

"You're hurt."

Jason pauses – not freezes like Tim offended him or anything – but he stops skimming over the title selection in Tim's cabinet as he asks, "What's that you're mumbling back there?"

"You're hurt," Tim repeats, louder.

This time, Jason freezes. Looks back at Tim with a slow motion that gives nothing away about his pain, or the lack thereof he clearly wanted to make convincing.

"I'm sore, Timmers," Jason counters. "There's a difference. Even your average parkour enthusiast gets a bit run down trying to train new tricks."

Tim frowns. "There aren't any bugs in here," he says, watching Jason carefully.

Tim knows the Bat is worried about what he knows – about how much he knows. His name had been attached to rumors about someone knowing Batman and Robin's secret identities and he's found half a dozen bugs littered around his house since the rumors settled – the Bat's way of checking up to ensure that the rumor was, and still is, nothing but hearsay.

"I don't care if he's listening," Jason growls. His tone is… wrong. Not quite bitter, or directly wounded, exactly, but jaded? Hurt. Like it's not just his body that's sore. "I'm fine."

Looking over Jason, even with his new understanding of body language, tells Tim nothing. He simply isn't able to read the vigilante. He's looking so carefully for signs that Jason's hurt, Tim doesn't realize Jason's looking at him just as carefully – but with much keener eyes.

"Tim," Jason says, suddenly serious and careful and Robin. "What is that?"

Baffled Tim blinks.

"What is what?"

"That," Jason repeats. This time he taps two fingers to his wrist.

Tim's running his fingers through his hair – he realizes belatedly that it's his stress-response to the frustration of being unable to read Jason – and it's let his sleeve fall a few inches down his forearm. Exposing the bandage wrapped around his wrist.

The bandage he's apparently starting to bleed through. Again.
Frack.

Frack. Frack. Frack.

Tim pulls his hand down and clamps his off-hand around his wrist.

Which does absolutely nothing except expose the edge of the bandage around that wrist.

At least he's not bleeding though that one. Yet.

He's jittery and anxious and bouncing on the balls of his feet as Jason stares him down and okay maybe more coffee would've been a bad idea after all because Tim is buzzed up to his eyeballs and suddenly he feels all the caffeine he's ingested over the last 48 hours.

And Jason is still staring. Still frowning.

But he's closer now, close enough to put his hands on Tim's shoulders and physically hold him steady – at arm's length, but still close enough to make Tim feel like he has to look his hero in the eye. He tries to. Fails. Chews his lip and fixes his eyes on the zipper of Jason's dull red hoodie – sets his mind to wondering why a Wayne ward would be wearing something without some sign of money dripping from its label.

Breathe in. Breathe out.

Jason's talking to him.

Tim focuses on the words – parses them together into sentences.

"It's okay, Timmers, you're safe, you're solid, you're here," Jason's saying – the sort of calm, soothing nothings he's used time and again to comfort victims. "I'm real, you're safe, everything is fine." Bizarre nothings. Odd, disjointed. Helpful to derail his panic, but not quite what Tim expected from Robin.

No.

Not true.

It's exactly what he would expect from Robin.

If the victim in question isn't a victim of plain old violence, but a victim of drug violence.

Tim's hero thinks he's high.

Great.

Fabulous.

That's just perfect.

Tim considers swearing off coffee forever.

Flinches and rescinds the thought.

Somehow Tim's able to get his breathing under control – unsure exactly when it went so haywire – and he lets Jason lead him over to the couch, takes a seat.

Jason's hands migrate down his arms, from his shoulders to his elbows. They stay there, angled towards the wrists folded up between Tim's knees, but not going any closer than the tops of his forearms. Jason's crouched in front of him now, in front and off slightly to the side so he's not crowding Tim's space or forcing him to make eye contact.

"Now, Tim, can you help me with something, please?"

Tim frowns, nods, confused.

Jason nods too. "Good, Tim. Good job," he says, "Now, I'm not mad, and you're not in trouble, but I need you to tell me about those bandages. Okay?"

Tim is chewing on his lip again.

Words are hard when he needs to find a way not to sound crazy. He knows that he probably should've been working in a hermetically sealed environment, and that having open wounds around an unknown quasi-biological agent was probably a bad plan, but it's not like you can order an airlock and an IV kit when you put in the request for milk and eggs and coffee with the groceries. People ask questions when that stuff gets purchased. Babysitters do terrible things like make phone calls to parents.

And he's not even supposed to be working on the case anyway.

The police were very insistent on that point.

They gave him like four lollipops to keep him entertained until Detective Harvey Bullock could drive him home. Bullock gave condolences for the friend Tim had gone to GCPD to claim had been part of the OD epidemic, and another lollipop, and another warning not to investigate on his own. So Tim really isn't supposed to be doing this.

But his parents are in Peru until the end of next month and Tim knows he can help.

Jason's hand is suddenly covering his mouth and oh sweet science he's been saying all of that out loud, hasn't he?

Frack.

So much for not sounding crazy.

He sighs heavily, resigned to melting into the carpet at the earliest possible moment.

"Okay," Jason says, carefully removing his hand. "Let's try this again. No story, no reasons, you're still not in trouble. Just tell me direct cause and effect. Why are both of your wrists bleeding?"

Oh.

Oh.

So Jason doesn't just think he's high. He thinks he's suicidal.

Frack.

Mortified, Tim thinks with a morbidly wry cast of humor that if he wasn't before he is now and sincerely wishes that he was physically capable of vaporizing into atoms. Tesla built a death ray. Tim decides he should look into it. Assuming he doesn't die of embarrassment first.

"Tim? Why are you bleeding?"

"I- uh.. I needed a sample of uncontaminated blood," Tim admits.

Jason takes a careful breath – steeling himself. "Why?"

"To test its interaction with the blood samples of people who've overdosed on whatever new drug is starting to gain ground on Gotham's streets," Tim explains.

Jason takes another careful breath. "You're working that case?"

"Kinda?"

Jason's eyes close briefly. He mutters something in Spanish.

Then he sighs. Pushes to his feet.

"Where's your fucking med kit?"

"Uh-" Tim starts to get up to show his guest around the house, but Jason shoves at his shoulder at just the right force and angle to send Tim falling back down to the cushions.

"Sit. Stay," he orders. He picks up the bag he'd brought, had set beside him when he'd started to investigate Tim's stash of games. Jason pushes it into Tim's hands, saying, "Just tell me where the med kit is and eat your fucking fruit thing."

"Bathroom on the ground floor. Up the stairs, down the hall to the right, third-uh fourth door on the left-hand side," Tim says, beginning to poke through the contents of the bag. "Med kit is in the cabinet under the sink."

Jason nods, replaying the directions in his head.

He moves to the door, pauses, points at Tim. "Stay."

"Fruit thing," Tim repeats, amiably – pulling out a mason jar filled with the yoghurt concoction Jason's brought over a few times before and a spoon to eat it with.

Jason's eyes narrow, suspicious, but he slinks out the door in pursuit of the first aid kit.

Tim's only gotten a few bites into his parfait when Jason returns with the spoils.

It only takes ten minutes for Jason to tend to the clean, careful cuts Tim made on the side of each wrist, edging on his forearms – right where the nerves are thinnest and most sparsely spread, which is why he was able to cut so deeply and why he's kept accidently knocking the wounds into things without noticing that he's jarred the injuries.

Jason's made him keep eating as his wrists were being worked on – chia parfait held between his knees, spoon in whichever hand wasn't being tended to. Mutters of how if he was ambidextrous to cut both wrists, he's ambidextrous enough to eat with both hands.

It's a true statement and Tim complies.

He's finished the parfait before Jason's finished with his wrists.

"That good?" Jason asks as he sets the med kit aside, nodding at the empty jar in Tim's lap. The corners of his smirk twitch when Tim nods. Proud. Jason made the parfait himself.

The empty jar is pulled from his hands – swapped out for the full one.

"Eat."

Tim frowns.

"But this one's yours."

"Says who? Eat."

"Eating does not magically heal lacerations," Tim protests.

Jason shrugs, "Doesn't hurt 'em either."

Tim pouts. He knows he does. He should be embarrassed.

But he's been mortified already one too many times today to care.

"What?"

Tim doesn't want another parfait.

He wants – but no, he's already been too much trouble for Jason to bother.

"What?"

Great. Now Jason sounds irritated.

He must flinch, or do something equally pathetic, because Jason huffs and tones his growl down to say, "If you want something, Timmers, speak the fuck up about it."

"Uh-"

"Yes?"

"Could you… uh, could you make that cheesy pasta thing with the garlic-y bread again? 'Cause that was… that was really good," Tim admits.

"Tortelini and parmesan bruschetta? You liked that one?"

Tim nods.

"You've got the stuff to make it?"

Tim nods again, more vigorously. He made sure to include everything he'd had in the kitchen before Jason made the thing on this recent grocery list. If he had what Jason needed then, he definitely has it now.

Jason sighs.

"Tell you what," he says, planting his hands on his hips. "I'll cook that for you if you give me a copy of the fucking data your shithead little stunt with the scalpel got you. Deal?"

Tim grins.

"Deal."