Blood Borne
Notes: Ibid.
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Cass finds him when he leaves. Sliding into step with him almost immediately as he walks to his car. She's carrying a duffle that has her uniform and gear already in it, and Tim waits until the tower is falling away in the rearview mirror before speaking. "Do you need anything from the Manor?"
"No, you have everything we need," she replies and her eyes are fixed on the streets they're passing through as he turns to his apartment. Tim lets her study and read the people even though he knows she has to have a good read on the city already. It rarely takes her more than a few minutes to reacquaint herself with the people every time she returns.
"They're, hm, apprehensive," Cass eventually says, rolling the word over in her mouth like she's slowly tasting it and agreeing with the meaning as she says it. She's talking about more than just the strangers walking the streets though when her eyes cut back to him. "You're not."
"No," not any more than he usually is. "People aren't their parents," and Tim thinks about Kon, Steph, and Rose. He thinks about every other person he knows who has parents that do things they don't approve of. Who have parents they've worked hard at to show the world they are not like them at all.
He thinks about Cass, and darts his eyes over toward her at a stoplight.
She's smiling. Easy and like she expected nothing less from him. Tim wonders what she's been reading in the others since she got back. He has a pretty good idea what Bruce is thinking, maybe Dick too.
"It's not bad," Cass assures him. "I know they just worry the most."
"They don't mean it," Tim says even though she doesn't need the assurance from him. He mentally makes a note to say something to Alfred later though, because it's easy to forget where Cass came from. Who brought her up. Easy to think she has always been part of the family from the very beginning. She used to scare him, more than just a bit, but Tim can't imagine not being able to call her his sister now.
"Thank you," Cass says and her fingers are light against his arm for a few blocks.
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Tim doesn't think that Cass has ever really faced Poison Ivy before, or if she has he just doesn't know about it. Cass doesn't flinch from the vines uncurling from the trunks of the trees to reach out for her. She does step back from them though, not letting them touch her at all.
"A word, Ivy?" Tim requests. Keeping his tone polite and holding his hands open and out. Ivy will respond in kind or she won't respond at all. She's one of the few villains who doesn't respond with aggression to a peaceful approach. Usually.
The park is quiet and still. It's been almost a year since anyone confirmed a sighting of her in Robinson Park, but this section is still firmly off limits to people. Tim's gambling that she's actually even here, and it pays off when he sees the green tint of her eyes staring back at him a split second before she melts out of the shadows.
"You'll want more than a word," the vines stop trying to reach for Cass and curl back around the trees they came from. A few snake across the ground to curl around Ivy's calves. "You always do."
"Usually," Tim smiles ruefully and keeps his arms down and lax. It's hard to remember to keep his guard on his face down too. Ivy always has responded best to complete honesty. Something that has gotten harder to get her to acknowledge as he gets older, and she slowly stops viewing him as a child. Tim knows it won't be long before she refuses to indulge him when he asks to talk. Which is a shame because that means he's going to have to somehow coach Damian into talking to the woman, and all of Tim's thoughts on that possibility end in fire and man-eating plants raging out of control. "I'm just looking for a little information."
"About this mythical child?"
"Honestly? If you have anything on them I haven't already heard I'd love to hear it," Tim says and Cass' head tilts in the corner of his eye, but he doesn't look away from Ivy to gauge what she's thinking right now. "I just want to know when Harley is going to tell him."
Because if you want to know anything about Joker you ask Harley, and if you want to know anything about Harley you ask Ivy. The strange almost three-way relationship between them is mind-boggling at times, and Tim's mostly stopped trying to pick apart how it works and just accepted it to save himself a few headaches.
Ivy frowns and it puts dark green lines in her face as her eyes go distant. Thinking about what she might say, or maybe even asking because Harley hasn't been seen since the dustup at the Iceberg Lounge.
"She won't," Ivy eventually says, quiet certainty lacing her voice for all that it seems like she's just coming to this conclusion herself right now.
"She won't," Tim repeats and knows his doubt leaks through from the way her eyes narrow before she decides she's more amused than angered.
"No, Harley won't say a word to him. Not about this," Ivy says as she starts to melt back into the shadows. Not asking if he has any further questions. She's done with this conversation. "It's other people you will have to worry about."
"It always is," Tim says and gets a high laugh before she's gone.
"She thinks that is true. So do you," Cass says as they leave the park. Her voice soft over the comm lines in thought as the street blurs past them. She weaves through the light traffic dangerously on her bike. Somewhere between Dick's utter insanity, and Jason's utter recklessness when it comes to riding. "You were. Honest? Open? With her."
"It gets results," Tim replies. Her puzzlement obvious now. "It's not easy for me to do that."
"Not anymore," Cass agrees. She takes a sharp turn and her head turns farther than it needs to in that split second so that Tim knows she's looking at him.
"I've learned better," there's no bitterness in his voice, because Tim's ruthlessly trained himself out of that tell, but Cass has never needed verbal cues to follow.
"You've learned more," Cass corrects and takes a familiar path that Tim doesn't need to think about to follow. "Not better, just more."
She doesn't talk again as they head towards Oracle and Tim chews over those words for a bit unsure if he agrees with them or not.
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