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A/N: Enjoy and please review

Chapter Two – Tim

Tim glanced up from where he had been reading his physics book for the test later in the week just in time to see his (new, so new the ink wasn't dry on the custody papers yet) brother go walking by his bedroom door. Not that that was really unusual lately - Damian had been spending a lot of time in the attic for whatever reason. Tim honestly didn't care that much what his brother was doing, so long as Damian left him alone while he was doing it. It wasn't that he hated the kid - he'd tried to be friendly, but the brat just threw up an ice wall and Tim only had so much room for punishment. So he tried to pretend that Damian didn't exist.

But this was the sixth time in the last half hour that Damian had walked by his room (three going into the attic, three going back from the attic) and now Tim was curious. So he wandered down the hall to Damian's room just in time to watch him reverently place an old model car on his bookshelf.

Tim knows that car - an impala, black ("because black is the only color an impala can be baby bird, duh") - and he moves forward swiftly, plucking the car off the shelf. Damian turns to him with an angry cry, but Tim doesn't care. Because this was his car.

"Where did you get this?" Tim doesn't bother to control his tone, suddenly inexplicably angry. Damian presses his lips together and Tim valiantly resists the urge to hit him. "I asked you a question, you little troll. Where did you get this?"

"It's mine, Drake!" Damian's voice is shrill with anger, but Tim ignores that. "Give it back!"

"I helped make this, it's mine!" And Tim has never shouted that loud since Damian joined their messed up family, so his younger brother is shocked into silence. "I helped make it. It's - It's mine, Damian. Where did you get it?"

Tim really isn't sure how to describe the look that crosses Damian's face at that particular moment. Anger and guilt and curiosity and longing and then his face is back to that blank mask that Tim has also perfected and drives everyone else crazy. They just don't know how to read it right, that's all, but Tim does. Because he knows about walls and expectations that Dick and Bruce don't understand, despite their efforts.

"Damian." Tim manages to get his voice under control. "Where. Did. You. Get. This. Car?" Mostly. But he hadn't seen this car –not since he was ten and everything went to hell.

"You helped to assemble this?" Damian's pointing finger indicates the "this" fairly well. "So you know who Jason Todd is?"

Tim's hands tighten involuntarily around the car at the question. His older brother's name hasn't been mentioned under this roof for nearly seven years. Not since...not since what Tim thinks of as "The Incident", capital letters and everything. Bruce refuses to acknowledge that he even still has a son in between his oldest and third oldest. Dick has followed in his adopted father's footsteps and Alfred...Tim doesn't mention Jason to him, ever, because he can't stand the pure sorrow and regret that crosses the elderly man's face at the mention of the name.

"Yes. I knew Jason - or thought I did anyway." Damian scowls at the cryptic answer, but Tim really can't bring himself care. Jason...Jason is a complicated mess that is never going to get better. Will never have the chance to get better, now.

"That is unhelpful, Drake. Why does he have a bedroom in the attic if no one acknowledges his existence?" Tim is shocked - he had assumed that Bruce would have cleaned the room out while he and Dick had been in the hospital, but apparently not. Tim had never gone up into the attic after his return home and Dick would have had no reason to go up those stairs - he had his own apartment now and was rarely around.

Tim turned and darted down the hall, towards the attic, Damian hot on his heels, and took the stairs two at a time. He's across the wide open space and in the little bedroom before Damian can try and stop him. The threshold is as far as he gets before he's assaulted by memories.

"What the hell do you want, kid?" Jason is lying on his bed, staring at the ceiling. Tim has no idea how he knew that Tim was even there, because he knows how to be quiet, how not to draw attention to himself. Tim shifts nervously, not sure how to address this older brother - Dick is easy, all smiles and hugs - but this brother...

"I'm sorry!" It's the only thing he can think of to say. Jason finally turns his head far enough to actually look at him and Tim flinches from the anger he can see there. "I'm sorry! I didn't mean to take your place! I can leave!"

Tim knows he looks like he's about ready to cry, but he took this boy's spot and took his family. And now the boy is back and Tim isn't sure that he should stay, because that would mean he was An Inconvenience and that is Something That You Do Not Do. Jason sighs and swings his legs over the side of the bed, sitting up and giving Tim an inscrutable look.

"And where the fuck would you go kid?" Tim's eyes widen at the vulgarity - because You Do Not Curse. Jason sounds honestly curious and Tim quickly answers.

"I'd, I'd go live with Mrs. Mac. She'd take care of me."

Jason sighs again and runs a hand through his hair. "Kid, you don't have to leave, alright? Just...I...Dammit. Come here."

Tim moves cautiously closer as Jason pulls a box off of a shelf, stopping a good five feet from the larger boy. Jason looks up and rolls his eyes, beckoning him closer. "You ever made a model car before?"

Tim shook his head and Jason offered him a small grin – it's not a happy grin, really, but Tim likes it better than the sideways glares and narrowed eyes. "Well, come here, then, baby bird, and I'll show you."

Tim has no idea where the nickname had suddenly come from, but…it's nice. He's never had a real nickname before. So is the next hour and a half that Jason spends helping him put together the model, patiently answering Tim's questions about the car and models in general.

"Drake!" Tim comes out of the trip down memory lane to see Damian glaring at him, arms crossed over his chest. "How do you know this Jason Todd? Why has father never mentioned him?"

"He's our brother and he...he did something and dad's never forgiven him. I don't even know if he's still alive." Tim doesn't bother to point out that Bruce hasn't been home for more than four days out of the past three weeks since Damian has come to stay with them. So there wasn't really any time to tell him anything.

"Well, I want to know." Damian makes the statement a demand and Tim glares at him, the arrogance of the statement grating on his nerves.

"And I want to have a flying car. Disappointment abounds." Then the little troll smirks at him.

"And I can actually have my want become a reality, Drake. How hard can it be to find one person?"

Tim is sorely tempted to let the brat find out, but resists the urge. Jason was willing to reach out to him...maybe he can reach out to Damian with this. As a peace offering or truce. Or at least a cease fire from the little snips and verbal cuts that they've begun taking at each other. Tim is self aware enough to know that eventually the verbal spars will graduate into physical ones as Damian grows. And Tim has had enough fighting in the family.

"Do you want help?" Damian almost refuses, Tim can tell, but the boy manages a tight nod. Tim accepts that. After all, baby steps. Everything starts with reaching out and baby steps.

It takes Tim a week to figure out that Jason is even still alive – because Jason Todd is not exactly an uncommon name. Tim does most of the research for this part, not wanting – not ready – to explain to Damian what had happened to rip their family apart. Damian, for his part, is patient and doesn't go prying behind Tim's back (Tim is surprised and grateful. It would be easy enough, after all, to find what Damian wants to know in old newspaper articles).

"He was in the Marines – he was honorably discharged last year." The announcement is made over a dinner of grilled cheese and tomato soup, something that Tim can cook well reliably. Alfred had come and gone yesterday, making sure the two of them had enough food and that they hadn't descended into squalor. Which the older man seemed to think was an always present danger – but Tim is neat and Damian is neat enough for a ten year old, so the house is never really dirty, dirty. Just well used.

"Where did he go after that?" Tim shrugs at the question and continues as Damian opens his mouth to complain, "I'm not sure – it's not like the military keeps those records." And it had been a pain for Tim to figure that Jason had even been discharged last year…and that had been when Tim had known what service Jason had been in. He didn't want to think about the nightmare it would have been if he had had to search through all six services.

"Father would –" Tim cuts him off with a sharp hand gesture and Damian glowers at him. Tim doesn't care, at the moment, knowing that bring Bruce into this would result in nothing more than an edict to stop looking.

"We are not involving dad in this." Damian looks ready to protest, but Tim doesn't give him the chance. "He'll make us stop and then he might get us a babysitter to make sure we don't keep looking."

Both boys shudder at the thought of actually have to answer to an adult all of the time. As it is, Alfred comes by for a few hours a few times a week and Dick has a tendency to just drop by whenever he felt like it. The only constant adult in Tim's life had been Mrs. Mac, a sweet elderly lady that had continued to check on him after he had moved in with Bruce – but she had died four years ago. And Damian had only had a constantly revolving train of tutors that came and went with regular frequency. Neither boy was sure what they would do with an adult that was always around.

So it takes Tim another month before he narrows down the Jason Peter Todd (age 24, former Marine, Staff Sergeant, blood type AB) to two possibilities. One lives out in California and the other lives in Gotham City, near The Narrows.

"So? Are we going to determine if it's him or not?" Tim is torn between wanting to see Jason again (the memories from when Jason came back and before everything happened are nice) and deleting the information and forgetting he had ever had it. Damian scowls at the lack of an answer and lightly kicks Tim in the shin to get his attention.

"Yeah. Just let me…yeah. After school." Because if they wait any longer, Tim is going to back out (he's never as brave as he likes to act. Anything he does involves hours of agonizing followed by gritting his teeth and treating it like he would a splinter – pull and get it over with as quickly as possible) and that would not be acceptable. Not to Damian and certainly not to him.

A/N: please review