Jason Todd was not having a very good day.
First, he woke up freezing because Dick had stolen all the blankets.
Sometimes it was cute, and it didn't happen all the time, so Jason let it slide since Dick had a rough night on patrol the previous evening. He especially shoved his annoyance aside since, when he went to tug some of the covers back, Dick turned over and channeled his inner octopus by wrapping around Jason.
It was certainly one way to keep warm.
Second, after fully climbing out of bed, Jason found that Duke, fucking Duke of all people, ate the last of Alfred's cinnamon rolls before he could get one.
Rookie mistake. It was a big household by that point with a lot of people going in and out at any given moment since Bruce basically had a revolving door of adopted children, children-adjacent, and good family friends. So, Jason gritted his teeth and settled for some fruit salad and toast. Still delicious, even if he was really wanting a cinnamon roll. He was also able to steal a bite of Dick's, so little victories.
Third, when he tried getting a hold of both of them, Roy and Kori were busy doing who the hell knew what. Probably fucking, but whatever. They didn't answer. Jason had other friends.
No, he didn't.
Fourth, the Demon Brat decided it would be fun to attack him the moment he went down to the Batcave. Jason just wanted to check in on the leads and trails he'd been keeping an eye on, not get attacked by a former child assassin.
But ugh, alright, he let Damian have his brief fun of 'play' fighting since Tim was busy in the study with college shit, Dick was shopping with Alfred, Cass and Steph went out somewhere, Duke was on patrol since it was still light out, and Bruce wasn't exactly fun.
Fifth, Bruce was being his usual uppity, asshole, 'stop killing', disappointed Dad StareTM self.
Fine. Jason could deal. It wasn't the worst thing in the world for BatDad to be a douche and treat Jason as though he would crack and go on a killing spree. Jason could ignore it rather easily at that point, even if it was fucking annoying and made him want to punch Bruce. But he didn't because then Dick and Alfred would be disappointed.
Sixth, while on patrol around Crime Alley, Jason found one of the worst kinds of people alive, one of the kinds of criminals he hated the absolute most with every fiber of his being—a child predator.
He found it very easy to hit the scumbag upside the head with a nearby two-by-four and let the kid that was about to be harmed run away. He may have added in an extra, unnecessary but satisfying hit against the man's knee just for good measure. The only thing that wasn't satisfying about it was the man was unconscious from the initial hit against the head, so he didn't feel the pain of his knee shattering.
Not terrible as there would be plenty of pain for when the man woke up. Delayed gratification.
Seventh, as Jason strung up the shitbag by his feet to let the cops, or namely Gordon, deal with the fucker, one of Replacement's favorite Vine's got stuck in his head.
"What's worse than a rapist? Boom."
"A child."
"No—"
Ugh, shut up. He'd heard it too many damn times. And of course, Replacement loved to show it to Jason the most because Jason showed his care and concern for children far more emphatically than the others did. He admitted it was funny the first few times, but shit, they were going on about thirty-four times by that point, and that was just when Jason started counting. Like, get a new Vine to quote or something. Not that there would be anything new about the Vine since it was Vine, but at least it would be new to Jason.
Actually, if Tim started playing that one about 'God and anime' every time Damian walked into the room, it'd be the most hilarious shit ever, but anyway, Jason moved on and continued with his patrol route, hoping for a quiet rest of the night or for someone he could take his frustrations out on since having loud, mind-blowing sex with Dick while spending the weekend at the manor wasn't really an option.
But then finally, to top off Jason's terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day at number eight, Dick disappeared.
And Tim, but mostly Dick. Replacement would be fine. He survived Jason's murder spree after all. It was Dickiebird Jason was really worried about. The man didn't have the best self-preservation instincts considering he was a sassy smart-ass who didn't know when to shut up in bad situations.
So, when Jason got a brief, cut-off distress call from Dick at two in the morning as Jason was channeling the Batfamily tradition of being a gargoyle, he rushed to the rescue, but he was too late. When he got to Dick's location, no one was there.
There was a sign of a struggle with blood on the floor and destroyed scaffolding, but nothing else. No sign of Dick. No sign of gang or villain activity. And again, no sign of his fucking boyfriend.
Jason looked around the entire warehouse as he tried to get Dick on comms and contacted Bruce and Barbara, but they were having no such luck either on top of not being able to find Tim either who apparently had a similar experience on the other side of Gotham.
As a sense of despair and fury built inside of Jason, a small piece of paper popped up in front of him, floating through the air, taunting him.
Jason wouldn't rest until he brought Dick home.
It was arguably the worst day of Kon's life.
Okay, maybe it was a mild exaggeration as there had been plenty of stressful and harmful days ever since he had been found and taken from the stupid test tube he had been grown in by Cadmus, but it was definitely up there. Top five for sure.
Between his Superboy duties, Jon and Clark getting on his nerves, unending college classes, and homework (why was he even going to college anyway?), he was feeling done with the day before mid-noon. He just wanted to go home, pass out for the evening, and hope that the next day would be a better day. Then the moment he got him, he flopped onto his bed, not bothering to take off his suit as he shoved his face into his pillow.
But then, after the sun dipped below the horizon, the mood of the day started to look up in the form of one Timothy Drake.
The last thing he thought would happen would be him forming a romantic attachment to a genius billionaire vigilante, but there he was receiving a goofy text from the biggest dork he knew and had absolutely fallen head over heels for. Kon didn't fight the smile gracing his lips as he looked up from his pillow to read Tim's text.
3 Shirt Stealer: wanna come ovr :)))
And really, how could Kon say no to that?
Kon jumped off his bed and had barely hit send on his reply text before flying out the window and making his way to Gotham.
It didn't take long for Kon to reach Wayne Manor, and due to his restless frustrations, he bypassed the front door, even though he knew Alfred might give him an earful later, and he went directly to Tim's window who let him inside the moment he spotted him.
Kon climbed into the room and asked with a grin, "So, what's on the agenda?"
"Patrol," Tim answered as he took Kon's hand.
Kon frowned as Tim guided him out of the bedroom. "You wanted me to come over for Bat patrol?"
"No," Tim dragged out with a fond exasperation in his tone. "I want to show you something, but it's while on patrol."
He decided not to ask more questions and simply followed Tim's lead down to the Batcave, especially since he didn't mind watching as Tim dressed in his Red Robin suit. Tim had to keep the domino mask on for identity reasons in the Red Robin suit, but he kept the whole cowl off for the time being, allowing Kon to see more of his face than he would have otherwise which he enjoyed more than his boyfriend's face being almost completely covered.
He also didn't mind holding onto Tim as they road his motorcycle to the southeastern end of Gotham. That was more of a perk than anything.
Maybe he'd have preferred to be cuddling him while watching a movie or getting his ass beat at video games by him, but the moment Tim used his grappling hook to bring them up to the top of a roof despite the fact that Kon could have simply flown them up there, Kon realized exactly what Tim wanted to show him, and it made him adore him even more.
In the sky above, through the gaps in clouds and over the light pollution from the city, the sky lit up with a streak of white light soon followed by another one.
A meteor shower. Tim brought him out for a meteor shower.
The absolute dork.
So Kon and Tim sat there on the dark roof leaning against each other as the meteor shower rained above them. The frustrating day had finally taken a turn to something better, something to be filed away into his favorite memories as Tim tucked his head into the crook of Kon's neck.
Tim's hair was soft against his skin, and Kon rubbed his cheek against Tim's head.
Then the universe decided to ruin it with a loud scream in the short distance. No one needed super-hearing to pinpoint it. And Kon knew Batman wouldn't hesitate to bust out his stash of Kryptonite bullets if Kon interfered with Tim's vigilante duties, so both boys were ready, willing, and able to come to the rescue of whoever needed it, even if it interfered with their little date.
Tim and Kon jumped up from their spots and hurried in the direction of the scream, Kon flying and Tim grappling until they reached the nearby dockyard.
Like the rest of Gotham, the dockyard was darker than any in Metropolis. Maybe it was the general lighting or the atmosphere, but in Kon's eyes, the only bright spot in Gotham was Tim. So, when they scouted out the dockyard and Tim was caught in the line of a magical blast, Kon panicked and leaped in front of him to shield him from the unknown magic.
He blacked out.
And when he came to, it was Batman and Robin standing over him with no sign of Tim Drake.
All that was left was a piece of paper clenched tightly in Batman's grip. After reading it, Kon narrowly avoided burning it with a ferocious, anger-filled gaze.
Kon would get Tim back even if it was the last thing he did.
Dick loved falling almost as much as he loved flying.
The wind in his hair. The weightless feeling in his gut. The tension leaving his limbs. The clarity of mind. It had taken him time to grow re-accustomed to it after what had happened when he was young, but it was in his bones. He loved it all. He loved the absolute freedom and independence that came with the free fall.
Except at that moment.
The flash of blue light clouded his vision and jerked his body into a swirling vortex of nausea and bodily strain then dumped his body over a familiar city skyline.
He didn't have very long to get out of the predicament as he fell through the air, plummeting toward the ground. As he twisted in the air to reach for an escrima stick, Dick's eyes landed on Tim falling with him, but his eyes were closed, a bloody cut on his forehead likely the source of his unconsciousness. Dick's goal immediately switched from saving himself to protecting his brother.
Grabbing one of his sticks, he used the grapple to grab Tim from the air and pull him closer, hugging him against his body before resetting the grapple and shooting it toward a roof.
The familiar jerk of the grapple changing the direction of his body was a welcome feeling until he lost his grip from the sudden heavy tension and momentum of two bodies free-falling over a hundred feet. But it worked to change their course from landing on a crowded street another hundred feet below to instead landing hard on a nearby rooftop.
The escrima stick fell as he prioritized taking the rough hit over Tim, and they rolled to a stop next to each other, the weapon clattering nearby as it landed and the grapple line rescinded.
Dick groaned in pain as he shifted onto his side, but he did his best to ignore it in favor of shuffling closer to Tim. Checking his pulse, Dick breathed a sigh of relief to learn his brother is alive, his pulse running strong. He was just knocked out, though that was a problem in its own right.
Tim was unconscious, bleeding from a cut on his head, and had other unknown injuries. Dick was glad to see the cowl tucked into his yellow belt, so at least he still had it with him, but why Tim wasn't wearing it and instead was only wearing the domino mask, he wasn't sure. He could ask once Tim woke up.
For now, Dick had to figure out where they were, why they were there, who the hell sent them there, and why it was the two of them. Dick hadn't been patrolling with Tim that evening. He had been patrolling Steph's usual route to give her a few nights off while nursing a broken arm. Tim, however, had wanted to show Kon a meteor shower in a sickly-sweet romantic gesture that made him jealous he hadn't thought of it for Jason.
Dick pushed himself up into a seated position while hugging one arm over his painful ribs. Based on the inordinate amount of pain radiating around his chest and across his back every time he moved or even breathed, he had to have broken something. The way his ankle was throbbing gave him even more bad news on top of the blood dripping from his nose and busted lip.
The call he made to Jason flared in his memory, and he hoped Jason was safe back in Gotham.
Flicking his gaze around the rooftop, Dick had a vague familiarity with the skyline, easily recognizing the Empire State Building, the Chrysler Building, and Rockefeller Center, which indicated they were in New York City, but there were a few others that certainly hadn't been in Manhattan the last time Dick had been. One was an angular skyscraper with a brightly lit white and blue A on the side on top of what should have been the MetLife Building, and two blocks away from that in what should have been the JPMorgan Headquarters stood a taller, less layered, more streamlined building. He also couldn't spot Titans Tower in any direction he looked.
There were more differences that Dick could sit there and pinpoint, but a bout of nausea ran him through, and he turned away from Tim to expunge his stomach's contents, pain wracking through his body as he convulsed.
When it emptied, Dick rolled onto his back and stared up at the sky. He didn't want to move. Just for a few minutes while he gathered his bearings and figured out what to do next. He forced himself to at the very least activate his comms, despite his body screaming at him, to try and get someone on the channels, but no voices came through. It was just him speaking into the void with no one listening.
Dick knew one thing for certain: this wasn't the New York he knew. Gotham was more than a state away. That shitty blast of magical light had dumped them somewhere far, far away from home.
His eyes were about to drift closed, just for a few minutes as he took a breather is what he kept telling himself, but the sound of mechanical whirring filled his ears, and all thoughts of rest dissipated.
It didn't matter where they were or why, Dick would protect Tim with his life.