It takes time, because of course it takes time. There are little mouths to feed, little hands to wash, little heads to pat, little feet to tickle, and little torsos to hug. Even if the kids hadn't been there, Tim would've needed time to plan his own rescue.

Granted, though, if the kids hadn't been there, Tim probably wouldn't have been about to plan his own rescue at all.

One day, when Ra's is there checking on the kids' "progress," Tim casually mentions that the kids might benefit from more ways to do art. Tim carefully frames it as a chance to teach "the heirs" more fine motor skills and visual perception. He also couches it in a mild sense of longing for his own photography equipment. He gives a sigh here, a glance there, and a couple of mentions of a specific brand and model of video camera throughout, a very deliberately specific brand and model.

Tim goes to bed hopeful. When he wakes up, Sandy and Ian are already rapidly tearing through the packaging of several boxes while Sonny "watches" with his eyes mostly closed in sleep and Char tries to stop them or at least slow them down.

And that's that. The videography equipment has been obtained.

Tim lets the kids mess around with it for a long time. It's loud and chaotic and headache-inducing and wonderful. Once they've each had a good turn, Tim takes the camera and does a bit of his own messing around.

That takes time too. Between quiet times, nap times, and bed times, along with any other moment he can spare, Tim works with the camera. It's quite a process. The kiddie equipment isn't nearly the advanced level of tech that Tim's used to working with, or, well, he used to be used to working with. That's another factor, too. Since waking up in the Gilded Cage, Tim's basically only done tech work alongside the magic Ra's uses. It takes time to resharpen his tech skills until they're up to the task.

Time, time, time.

Each time the kids go to bed, even with the camera to work on, Tim isn't usually too far behind. Being the single father of four is exhausting. But he doesn't always fall asleep as quickly as they do, staring at the ceiling and hoping. Finally, he'll always fall asleep.

Or at least, he usually falls asleep. This time, though, he's wide awake for what has to be an hour. Eventually, he pulls himself out of bed and tip-toes away from the bed corner of the Gilded Cage.

Settling in the corner by the empty cloning chambers, Tim pulls the curtain to cover any sounds he makes. Then he gets to work.

"Trying again," Tim mutters to himself, tweaking one last wire. He's linked up the camera to the cloning chambers and parts of basically every other piece of technology he's wheedled out of Ra's the whole time: several bits from the microwave, parts of the space heater and the fan, lots of pieces from the smart fridge, and so on. "Here we go."

He hits the video camera's "on" button and sits back, fiddling with a few spare wires. If the power light goes on, he will have successfully entered the Batcomputer's system and set up to leave a video message. It'll have to be brief; if it works the way Tim thinks it will, he'll burn through the system's batteries in under a minute of accessing the Batcomputer.

The entire set-up whirs to life. It hums. It buzzes. It crackles a little, giving off a light smell of rusty smoke.

And down toward the bottom of the set-up, the power light blinks on.

"There," Tim says, breathing out heavily as he looks up at the camera, trying not to panic, trying not to celebrate, trying not to get ahead of himself. "I think that's it. Okay. Here goes."

Tim swallows hard. "If you're watching this? Hi. It's me. Surprise, I'm not dead!"

He thinks for a moment, relief and doubt and a dozen other feelings warring to be expressed. "At least, I assume that's a surprise. Who knows, maybe you know I'm alive and you've been searching for me, or maybe you know I'm alive and you gave up by now, or maybe-"

Tim hears his own voice trail off. He pauses for the briefest of seconds to gather himself.

"I don't know," Tim admits, surging forward. "But anyway. I'm alive and I'm here. Wherever here is."

Pausing, Tim glances around at the Gilded Cage. "I mean, it's the Gilded Cage. It is what it is. I just don't know where exactly it is. My talks with Ra's aren't exactly big on geography or-"

That's when he notices the video camera part starting to tilt forward. Catching it, he eases it back up to capture his face properly. ""Right, yeah, focus. Okay. Well, I'm alive. Ra's al Ghul kidnapped me and faked my death. He's been holding me here, wherever here is again, for the last…"

Tim shakes his head. "I think it's been a year by now? It's not easy to tell, but I think it's been at least a year."

He hopes it's been a year. Not because he'd like to be in the Gilded Cage any longer than necessary, or really at all, but because he's been explaining how calendars and aging work for normal people to the kids. "It better have been at least a year, or else I've been lying about what birthdays mean."

Reminding himself to stay on track, Tim says, "But whatever. If I'm wrong, I'll fix it. Cross that bridge when we all get to it and all that. The point is, I've been trying this whole time to contact you and I think I finally did it. So. Yay for me, I guess. And yay for stupid noisy toys that have working video and internet capabilities respectively."

That's when he notices he's been drifting off in thought. His gaze is directed at the power button again, which is still glowing some, but only flickering now.

"Moving on," Tim says, glancing back up at the video camera. "I'm alive, I'm wherever Ra's al Ghul put me, and I'm asking you to come get me."

From somewhere beyond the curtain, and Tim hopes it's from the bed corner, a quiet yawn hits Tim's ears.

"Come get us," Tim corrects himself, berating himself for not centering the kids. He hasn't even mentioned them! But he's running out of time rapidly, so he wraps it up. "Yeah. Right. Anyway, I'm probably almost out of battery, so I'm sending this along. I'll see you soon, I hope. Tim out."

Stopping the recording, he presses the button designated to send and save the video. Holding his breath, Tim looks to the microwave display screen.

"DONE," it reads.

Tim breaths out a long sigh and hangs his head.

In the next moment, the power button light blinks out.