Tim's whole summer basically felt like the week before he took the S.A.T. in high school. Every day, Tim would wake up at five to get in his morning workout, then he'd be forced by Alfred to eat a healthy breakfast, as Tim would be staying at the Manor over the summer. Then it was cram, cram, cram. He started with History of Magic and all the books he'd gotten to explore wizarding culture, which all stuck in his head without much repetition due to how naturally interesting he found everything. Dumbledore had sent Tim a list of topics that were studied in each grade, so all Tim had to do was study the first four years of material well enough that he could pass a series of tests, and then, if he in some miracle of planning had extra time left over, he could get a head start on the fifth-year material.
Tim learned all sorts of things within the first week of studying. Names of famous wizards, the history of the British wizard government, the Ministry of Magic, terminology used in wizarding households (non-wizards were called Muggles, wizards born to other wizards were known as purebloods, Merlin was a common expletive comparable to using the Lord's name in vain), and so many little things about wizarding technology (electricity and magic did not mix, apparently, which would make using his devices at school way more difficult that he'd anticipated).
Hogwarts: A History turned out to be a great buy, as it really prepped Tim for what he was about to enter into, that is, utter chaos. Houses, Quidditch, illegal duels—it only made Tim more excited about the mission.
Tim made sure all of his friends knew about the first time he was going to perform magic so that they could all collectively geek out over it. The second Sunday of June found Kon-El, Bart Allen, Cassie Sandsmark, Sebastian Ives, and all of Tim's siblings gathered in a circle amongst the Manor's topiary, watching eagerly as Tim bent over one of his textbooks for grade-one charmswork. They all watched with bated breath as Tim lifted up his wand and performed a sort of loop-the-loop motion as he said, "Lumos!" and pointed his wand at Damian.
Nothing happened save for Damian immediately crouching into a defensive stance and hissing, "Why would you point that blasted thing at me, Drake? Are you trying to kill me?"
Tim deliberately chose to not inform Damian of the intended purpose of the spell, which was simply to create light, and decided to revel in his brothers sudden unease.
He shrugged at Damian's protests. "Maybe, maybe not." Damian then proceeded to tackle Tim, yank his wand away from him, and chuck it towards the pool. Luckily, Bart zoomed over and caught it before it could make contact with the water.
Tim finally got it on the fourth try, and his "Lumos!" produced a white light centered on the top of his wand.
Ives cheered from Tim's right. "Noice!"
Damian rolled his eyes. "Oh, please. I could do it in one." He gestured for Tim to hand him the wand and textbook.
"You…do realize that you have to be magical in order to perform spells, right, Damian?" Tim said slowly, reluctantly handing his materials over to his younger brother.
Damian rolled his eyes. "No, duh, Drake. Luckily, I do possess some manner of magical blood in my veins, which is more than you can say for yourself." At the others' blank stares, Damian sighed, "It's the Lazarus water, it's ancient magic."
Jason's eyes lit up. "Wait, does that mean I can do magic, too?"
"Perhaps." Damian looked up from the book, waved his wand, and announced, "Lumos!" To Tim's great frustration, a slightly dimmer light started to emit from the tip of his wand.
Damian smirked amidst everyone's shocked expressions, and he tossed the wand back to Tim. "And that's how it's done."
This was followed by a solid half-hour of everyone taking turns trying to cast the Wand-Lighting Charm. Some of them, like Kon and Dick, took multiple tries only to give up upon seeing no visible response, but Cassie and Jason both successfully managed to make the wand flicker after their sixth or seventh try. Duke somehow managed to make every part of his body except for the wand glow, which was more likely a result of his metahuman abilities versus any actual latent magical abilities inside of him.
Magic was actually a lot easier than Tim had expected. Maybe he was just used to more challenging projects, but magic was really just a combination of doing the right wand-movement and pronouncing the spell correctly. It was like learning to play a new piece of music, except no one was sitting next to you with a metronome forcing you to go faster and faster. Tim got through the first and second-year Charms and Transfiguration fairly quickly, along with the practical and theoretical portions of Defense Against the Dark Arts. Potions and Herbology were more difficult, as Tim didn't have the necessary materials to actually brew a Cure for Boils or pot a Mandrake. For now, he would just have to read up on as much as possible and wing it on examination day.
In getting to know the wizarding world better, Tim ended up subscribing to The Daily Prophet, Britain's primary news outlet. He found everything going on politically quite fascinating, from the Harry-Potter-and-Albus-Dumbledore smear campaign (come on, no one was buying it, were they?) to the legislations on Animagi loosening (Tim wondered how the wizarding world would react to one person being able to transform into basically any animal and had a quick laugh imagining what it would be like bringing Garfield Logan to school with him). The one disadvantage was that the wizarding world, who could teleport at will, decided to use owls of all creatures to serve as their postage system, meaning that Tim got all of his news about a week late. It was around this time that Tim began looking more into the idea of blending electronics and magic, reading up on what exactly the barriers around Hogwarts were and how they prevented certain electromagnetic frequencies from entering or exiting. It didn't help that the solutions given to him in books were that it was 'old, complicated spellwork' and that it was 'an intricate and highly advanced combination of charms.' Wizards seemed perfectly content to chalk up anything they didn't quite understand to 'magic.' The scientist inside Tim seethed.
Halfway through July, Tim received a letter from an old great horned owl that was clearly not prepared for the trip home.
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry
Dear Mr. Drake-Wayne,
A date and location for your magical aptitude test has been set. Your presence will be required in order to transfer into a higher grade.
Date: July 23rd at 9 o'clock A.M.
Location: London, England
A Portkey will be delivered to you before the exam begins. For security, the exact location will not be disclosed through owl post. Please bring your wand. All other supplies will be provided.
This test will take approximately six hours to complete. In the middle, a half-hour break will be provided. You are not allowed to leave the premises during this time, so be sure to bring a lunch with you. A qualified proctor from the Wizarding Examinations Authority will be present for your exam. His/her name shall not be disclosed.
Yours sincerely,
Minerva McGonagall
Minerva McGonagall
Deputy Headmistress
So he had a concrete date now. Tim started studying double-time, skipping meals and sleep and water until Alfred would come into his room and force him to take breaks, or Cass would run into his room, pick him up off of his desk chair, and literally throw him into bed.
"Sleep," she would order him, and, like hypnosis, Tim would wake up a good seven or eight hours later, feeling much more aware of his surroundings and less likely to drink another three Red Bulls. She and Steph and Dick also organized that entirely unnecessary birthday party for Tim that included such highlights as Bart gifting Tim a coupon for one free backrub, Jason arranging the birthday candles to look like a frowny-face, and Bruce buying Tim a watch that probably cost as much as one of the cars that was parked outside the manor (excluding Dick's minivan and Jason's motorcycle).
When exam day rolled around, Tim slept through his alarm, having gone to bed at midnight the night previous knowing full well that the exam started at four in the morning by Gotham's time zone. Curse time zones and their ability to rob Tim of his precious sleep. If it weren't for the saint known as Alfred Pennyworth, who woke Tim up and had already prepared an omelet for Tim, ironing his collared shirt while Tim practically shoved the food down his own throat, Tim would have probably completely skipped out on the exam. Just as Tim was stuffing his wand into his messenger bag, an owl arrived bearing a small cardboard package. Inside, there was a wooden hair pin and a small note card that said that this Portkey was set to go off at three-fifty. Tim was rather shocked at how prompt this bird was, seeing as it had to have taken at least a week to get here if it was indeed flying from Hogwarts. Tim looked down at his watch to check what time it was—
—and then he was falling, falling, and god, was he nauseous, why was it spinning so much—
It was only due to his years of training that Tim was able to land as smoothly as he did, even while feeling like he wanted to dry heave right there and then. It felt like the first time he'd ever used the Justice League's zeta tube system. Tim found himself in a small clearing surrounded by trees within which sat a modest camping popup. In front of said trailer was a tall woman wearing a long, floral dress with a matching headscarf.
"Timothy Drake-Wayne?" she asked as he approached. Tim nodded and held out a hand, which she graciously accepted. "My name is Professor Ozer, and I'll be your proctor for today."
"Thank you so much for having me," Tim told her with a slight bow of his head.
"The pleasure's all mine, Mr. Drake-Wayne." She turned around and stepped up to the screen door. "Right this way, right this way."
Tim had read up on Extension Charms (had even tried casting them unsuccessfully), but it was one thing to read about such a concept, and another thing entirely to walk into what one would expect to be a shabby little trailer and end up in what amounted to a small house. Theywere now in a long hallway with doors to Tim's left and right labeled 'Herbology,' 'Transfiguration/Charms,' and so on.
"We're going to begin with the written exams, and then we'll take a break and get on with the practicals. Make sense?"
Tim nodded, still in awe of his surroundings. "Sure, sure." Extension Charms. He had to learn Extension Charms.
The written exams flew by, Tim having no trouble recalling the dates of the seven goblin rebellions or the incantation for the Banishing Charm (Depulso). Tim ended up taking his lunch break an hour earlier than Ozer had suggested, taking the opportunity to sit outside in the fields and enjoy the sunlight. Unlike Bruce, Tim actually had a healthy appreciation of sunlight.
The practicals were when things really ramped up. Ozer led Tim into a portion of the house that reminded Tim of the Wayne Manor conservatory. It was a full-scale greenhouse, full of wriggling plants that Tim had only seen in books and humid as hell. Ozer started by having Tim walk around the room and identify every plant he could: aconite, moly, valerian, fluxweed; then there were the more exciting plants that Tim would classify as near-sentient: Leaping Toadstools, Venomous Tentacula, Bouncing Bulbs, Devil's Snare. As for the practical portion, Tim had to repot a Mandrake (seeing that little baby on the end was just weird, no way around it), dissect and identify the different portions of a Shrivelfig (it was really just like a normal fig), and demonstrate how one would fend off the attack of a Devil's Snare (apparently actually doing that was far too dangerous in this setting).
In the same room in which he'd done his written exams, Tim was made to perform increasingly more difficult transfigurations, one after another. It started simple, with a matches to needles and porcupines to pincushions, but Ozer continued to ramp up the difficulty until Tim had to transfigure a teapot into a tortoise, which Tim admittedly had a bit of trouble with. Tim wasn't sure if his failures were due to a lack of Transfiguration knowledge or the general discomfort he felt performing transfigurations on living animals, but he eventually managed to get that tortoise to show up.
He stayed in that room for his Charms exam, during which he performed a vast variety of spells and charms on a small rat that scurried about the room. It was as much a test of Tim's aim with his wand as it was the spells he was performing. Again, Tim was a little uncomfortable with performing charms on live subjects, but he still managed to make the little guy float, freeze mid-scurry, and zoom right into his hand, among other things.
Tim was then led to a large room, the centerpiece of which was a trio of small black cauldrons seated on little stools over piles of wood. On all sides of the classroom, bookshelves towered over Tim, stocked with ingredients in little glass pots with scoops and scales like he was in a grocery store. Tim had three potions to make, the recipes provided for him on the worktable to his left. If not for Jason drilling into Tim the importance of reading through the entire recipe when cooking ("Start boiling the water now, dipshit, that stuff takes time to happen!"), he probably would have failed this portion of the exam. As it was, Tim was able to start on the Antidote to Common Poisons and then work on the other two potions (a Shrinking Solution and a Pepperup Potion) while it brewed for half an hour. Sure, juicing the leeches made Tim want to throw up, and, sure, Tim had to pick up the rat spleen with a pair of tweezers so he wouldn't accidentally add too many, but he got the job done, all the while thinking of the rats that were probably now living their lives much like Tim, spleen-less and immunocompromised.
Tim didn't know what to expect for his Defense Against the Dark Arts practical. Was someone going to be performing 'dark arts' at him against which he would have to 'defend?' Was he going to be identifying dark creatures? Ozer pulled him aside before they entered the next classroom.
"Now, Mr. Drake-Wayne," she said gently, placing a hand onto his shoulder. "If what happens in there is too much for you, I will take over. As long as you can properly demonstrate the necessary spells, I see no reason to fail you. Do you understand?"
Tim definitely did not understand.
"Yeah, sure," he said, because of course he did. Since when did Tim Drake-Wayne ever admit to being confused?
She nodded, taking his confirmation at face-value, and she let him enter first into the classroom. It was completely empty save for a single old carved wardrobe at the other end of the room that shook back and forth.
"What's—?"
"Alohomora," Ozer muttered, pointing at the locked closet, and then she took a step back. The rattling stopped at once. Was there a dark creature in there? Did Tim have to fight it?
"You have—one—new message." An automated voice rang throughout the room, pausing between words. "First—message—"
"Hey…uh…hey there…"
Tim's heart stopped.
"It's me…Dad."
That was Jack Drake's voice, that was Mr. Drake's voice, that was Dad's voice—
"You listening, Tim?"
Tim nodded, unable to move, though he yearned to get closer.
"Good. Then understand one thing: if you don't get here—"
'It's not your fault,' Tim mouthed silently as the words were spoken, his breath hitching.
" I need you to know this, Tim—it's not your fault. Okay? You didn't do this. "
"Y-y-you're lying," Tim whispered. "I did, I always have, it's always my fault…"
"I love you, Tim."
Tim had deleted the recordings one night years ago when he'd been in a bad place mentally (he was pretty sure it was when Bruce was lost in time, that was when his lowest episodes occurred), but he'd listened to it dozens of times after his father's funeral, just to hear the man's voice, even if he didn't believe his words.
"I love you just like your mother loves you."
Tim started crying.
" I just—I wanted to say how great it was today. Honest. Just—it was great. "
Tim shook his head back and forth, clutching his aching stomach with both arms.
" Anyway, if you have some time, make sure to watch the news tonight—yer old Dad's gonna finally make you proud— "
The recording stopped abruptly, shocking Tim out of his stupor. The closet swung open, and out fell the body of a middle-aged man in a collared shirt and slacks, a boomerang sticking out of its chest.
One part of Tim's brain was telling him that he knew what this was. The other part was telling him that he wanted to vomit. Tim stared at the body, drinking the image in. He'd seen it a hundred times before in his nightmares, the image was practically burned into his psyche.
So, where was the gun?
Tim wasn't sure why his brain fixated on that one detail (it was probably still going through shock), but it stuck. He'd seen this scene before, he knew this scene—where was the gun? His father was supposed to be holding a gun in his left hand, the one he'd used while trying to defend himself from Captain Boomerang.
This isn't my dad, Tim realized. It's—it's—
"Riddikulus!" Tim shouted, pointing at the corpse on the ground, but instead of changing into something more lighthearted (Tim wasn't even sure what he'd been hoping it'd change into), it morphed into the lifeless body of Tim's youngest brother, albeit without the arrows sticking out of it.
Tim threw up.
When Tim got home that evening, he shut himself in his room and locked the door, curling up into a ball on his bed and finally allowing himself the panic attack that he'd been so carefully staving off since he'd encountered that boggart. Somehow, he'd managed to convince Ozer that he could finish the rest of the exam (demonstrating a Knockback Jinx and a couple counter-curses), and she'd believed him enough for him to get through it all, only to arrive back home via Portkey and retreat to him room.
This wasn't Tim's first panic attack, not by a longshot. Unfortunately, recognizing the symptoms that signified Tim's particular brand of panic attack and stopping said panic attack were two completely different things. Sure, there was some part of Tim's brain that was aware that he was having a panic attack, but, for the most part, he just lay in his bed, trying to convince himself that he wasn't suffocating, willing his heart to stop pounding so harshly, hoping that his legs would start working so he could run somewhere— anywhere—to escape feeling this way.
These sorts of attacks usually lasted around ten minutes for Tim, so all he would have to do was lay here and wait until the panic subsided and he could get right back to pretending today never happened.
Easier said than done, really.
Tim's anxiety was peaking about six minutes in when there was a knock on his door and a snide voice snapped, "Drake, it's dinnertime. Pennyworth doesn't want to have to call you again."
Tim wanted to say something, to tell Damian that he was totally fine and that he hadn't just seen his corpse mere hours ago and couldn't get the image out of his head, but he kept choking on his words and instead decided to stay focused on breathing and hoped that Damian would just take the cue and—
The doorknob squeaked as the door opened. "I swear to God, Drake, if you're still—" Tim didn't exactly catch the rest of what Damian said, but one moment he was chiding Tim about something, and the next moment, his little brother was climbing onto his bed and grabbing his hand in his own.
"Drake," Damian said, in a tone far gentler than should have been possible from an ex-assassin, "you have to breathe, okay?"
"—can't—" Tim choked out, squeezing Damian's hand as tightly as he could. "—not—"
Damian carefully pried Tim's hand off of his own and picked it up by the wrist, stretching Tim's arm out so that his palm was now flat against Damian's chest.
"Feel my breathing," Damian told him quietly. "Breathe like I'm breathing." Tim's hand trembled, but he kept it pressed against his brother's chest and let it be pushed back and forth as the boy breathed in and out. It was…it was grounding.
Four minutes later, Tim lay on his bed, facing away from his brother, taking in lungfuls of air like he'd just surfaced from a deep-sea dive.
"Do—uh, do you want me to grab Richard?" Damian asked softly, sitting crisscross next to Tim. Tim shook his head. Dick wasn't the one he'd seen cold and dead on the ground.
"Oh." Damian sounded pretty surprised by this. "O-okay. Um, do you want me to go, then?" Tim shook his head again, reaching out behind him and grabbing Damian's leg, like he expected him to leave anyways.
"Do you want to talk about what triggered it?" Damian continued, reciting his questions off as if he was reading down a checklist.
It was another five minutes (interrupted briefly by Duke coming in to check in on Damian and Tim when neither of them had shown up for dinner) before Tim finally spoke.
"There's this creature called a boggart," Tim explained, his voice feeling hoarse despite having been silent for so long, "that transforms into your worst fears. I faced one in my exam." Beside him, Damian sucked in a breath.
"That's fucked up," Damian muttered.
"I heard the voicemail," he whispered. "The one from my dad before he was murdered. And then I saw his corpse." Tim let out a choked laugh, curling up tighter. "It wasn't even totally accurate, and it still made me sick. And—" Tim hesitated, not sure if he was really ready to reveal that to Damian. But he needed to say it before it ate away at him anymore. "A-and then it turned into—into your—into your corpse. From when you died."
Damian cleared his throat, almost nervously. "I-is my death a fear of yours?"
Tim wanted to laugh at this. "Of course it is, I'm afraid of a-all of you dying, yours is just the—the clearest in my mind. You know, since I—since we all s-saw it happen."
"Yes, I suppose that wouldn't exactly contribute positively to one's mental state," Damian commented, clearly trying to appear lighthearted about the whole thing.
Tim rolled over so that he was now facing Damian, who hurriedly turned away from obviously staring at Tim. "Sorry."
"What for?" Damian snapped, sounding angry for some reason. Tim realized that he was doing it again, that thing where he apologized without knowing why. Wren said that was the people-pleaser in him.
"I dunno," admitted Tim. "For keeping you from having dinner?" he suggested, phrasing it more like a question than anything else.
Damian made his trademark tutting noise. "Tt. That's ridiculous. If you're going to apologize, at least come up with a worthwhile excuse, Drake."
Tim just smiled at Damian, enjoying the fact that his littlest brother was very much alive and well and bickering with him. He knew he couldn't, but he wanted to live in this moment forever.
Minerva McGonagall wrote to Tim again a couple weeks later, congratulating him on demonstrating the necessary knowledge to officially transfer into Hogwarts' fifth-year studies, even Defense Against the Dark Arts, which Tim had been absolutely certain would be his downfall. Apparently, his written exam scores made up for the little fiasco that was the boggart encounter (which had taken a full three sessions with Wren to sort out emotionally).
The rest of the summer went by much quicker than anyone wanted. Dick had to head back to Blüdhaven at the end of July to start work again, but that meant that Tim still got to go on patrol with the majority of the Bats. He kind of took it for granted until the night of August 31 st, the day before he had to leave. Swinging around Gotham, listening to the mindless chatter on the radio, drinking Sundollars coffee with Steph, he had a moment's crisis when he realized that he wouldn't have this for nearly four months.
"I'm scared," Tim admitted, barely more than a whisper, while he sat on the edge of a roof next to his sister, Cass, who was decked out in her Black Bat gear. "I'm really scared, Cass." Her response was merely to nod and place a hand on Tim's shoulder.
Tim stared at the cars passing below him, the lights blurring in his lenses. "I've stocked up on my meds, I've gotten everything packed, but now that I'm this close…I'm afraid to take that final step. I'm—I'm afraid of being alone again. The last time I was by myself for a long time…well, it wasn't good. For anyone."
Cass tapped Tim's shoulder twice, so he turned to her to see what she had to say. Whenever she wanted to say something complicated or long, she opted to use ASL, which every Bat was fluent in. She understood spoken language now, after a lifetime of only reading people's body language, but there was something about putting sentences together with all the tenses and articles that was difficult for Cass. But it was no matter to Tim or the rest of his family. If his sister felt more comfortable using ASL, then the family would learn ASL.
"Why don't you try to find people who will help you not be alone?" she signed to him.
"I can't get emotionally attached to these people," Tim told her dejectedly. "That's just the nature of undercover missions."
"Then how about we send you a ton of letters?"
Tim shook his head. "I've done the calculations, Cass, it takes about a week for the average messenger owl to fly from here to London. That's two weeks between each letter."
"Phone?" Cass suggested, speaking up.
Tim sighed. "Electronics don't work at Hogwarts."
"That's never stopped you before," she pointed out.
Tim was about to open his mouth to reply to that when he finally understood what she was saying. "You want me to design a wizard phone that I can text you with?"
Cass shrugged. "You've done harder."
True. Tim had, in fact, done harder. He'd single-handedly blown up half of the League of Assassins' bases. He'd defeated his future self in combat. Hell, he'd escaped the clutches of a Kryptonian! Tim didn't want to bag, but if anyone could design a phone that worked around magic, it would be himself.
Tim called it a night early that evening and went to bed at what he considered a reasonable hour (one fifty-four) so that he could get up at three. The train to Hogwarts would leave at eleven (from Platform Nine and Three-Quarters, whatever the hell that was supposed to mean), but Tim had the distinct advantage of being able to zeta into London via the Justice League zeta system, so he had some time to spare, relatively speaking. This morning, Alfred had baked a large quiche, and Tim readily took a sizeable piece for himself. He was barely through his third bite when he heard the creak of someone coming down the stairs. Duke poked his head into the dining room.
"Quiche. Nice," he commented, yawning, and he nodded in Tim's direction as a greeting before disappearing into the kitchen and reappearing with a slice of his own quiche.
"Did someone say 'quiche?'" Jason said from the other side of the door, and he burst into and out of the dining room quicker than expected. "Hell yeah!" One by one, Tim's family, excluding Dick, showed up for breakfast, which was more than a little unusual, seeing as no one really ate meals at the same time on weekends, and they definitely didn't do so at three in the morning.
Tim wasn't actually sure what had caused them to all wake up in unison, that is, until he left the table with a mumbled, "I should probably head out now," and the entire group of people sitting at the table stood up with him. Cass practically vaulted over the table and tackled Tim in a hug.
"Bye, Tim," she grinned up at him, her face poking up from his chest. "I'll miss you."
Duke slung Tim into a side-hug. "Bye, Tim. Don't do anything stupid without telling me about it." Bruce shot Duke a look which the boy pointedly pretended he could not see.
"Send lots of letters, bro," Jason added, patting Tim's head like one would a large dug. Tim noticed that, during this exchange, Damian had disappeared. While not surprised, Tim was a little disappointed that the boy wasn't going to see him off.
Bruce silently slipped around Jason and gave Tim a big Bat-hug. "Stay safe, Tim."
"I will," Tim promised.
"No, you won't."
"No, I won't."
Jason smirked. "That's our boy!"
Tim was already halfway down the stairs to the Batcave when something small and deadly barreled into his side. Tim glanced down at Damian, who was holding his pet cat, Alfred (differentiable from Alfred Pennyworth only by the fact that Damian called one of them by his first name and one by his last name), in his hands along with a large duffel bag. Refusing to make eye contact with Tim, Damian opted only to hold out Alfred at arm's length in Tim's direction.
Tim wasn't really sure what Damian's game was. "Uh…"
"Take him, you imbecile," Damian hissed, his face flushing, and he shoved Alfred into Tim's hands.
Tim fumbled with the new load in his hands, but he managed to not drop it. "Where?"
"To Hogwarts, idiot. Take him to Hogwarts."
Tim was speechless for a beat. Damian wanted Tim to take care of one of his precious pets? When he was perfectly aware of the fact that Tim couldn't even take care of himself properly?
"Are you…sure…?" Tim asked slowly as Alfred snuggled into his sweater. He had to admit, the company would be nice when he was away from home. Tim scratched Alfred's head, and the cat leaned into the touch.
"Of course I'm sure, Drake, when am I not sure?" Damian snapped
"All the time," Tim suggested matter-of-factly. Damian rolled his eyes and more or less hurled the duffel bag at Tim, who barely managed to catch it and still keep Alfred in his arms.
"What's this supposed to be, Titus?" The bag did not nearly weigh as much as Damian's Great Dane, but it was still a distinct possibility in Tim's mind.
"It's the necessary supplies to care for Alfred, obviously."
"Ah. Okay then."
Damian nodded towards Tim's arm. "I see you're wearing your medical alert bracelet." Tim glanced down at his wrist. It was an odd thing for Damian to point out, seeing as Tim wore the thing around wherever he went, ever since Steph had converted it into a makeshift charm bracelet.
"Good. It would be troublesome if something were to happen to you while you were away from home."
The cat, the bracelet…Oh. Oh. Damian…he was worried about Tim. That certainly caught him off-guard. He hadn't expected such a blatant show of affection from Damian. His youngest brother was more the type to hide an unlabeled box in Tim's room filled with pain meds after seeing Tim get hurt on patrol. Shoving cats in Tim's face was new.
Tim wasn't sure how to respond except to nod and assure Damian that yes, he would take care of Alfred and, yes, he would take care of himself (or "wear his bracelet," if that was how Damian wanted to put it).
And that was the last time Tim saw his family for what would soon feel like a very, very long time.
You thought you'd have to wait awhile to see Tim's boggart, eh? It was a hard one to come up with, but we've seen Tim's fears before in comics, so I'd say this is pretty in-character for him.
Also, Cass using ASL is one of my favorite headcanons. Like all the non-English languages in my story, the ASL in my story does not follow ASL vocabulary or grammar correctly. It's just me writing in English and saying it's another language. There's gonna be quite a bit of that in this story. I italicize non-English dialogue, but, to be fair, I italicize a lot of things. I might have an addiction to italics...
CW: panic attacks, mutilated corpses