aerofae

[aerofae]

Giggle Bats (Angst AU) - Snippet 2

AU context here

Tim.

Bruce didn't know what to do about Tim.

It pained him to admit—which is why he never did to anyone but Leslie—but it was the truth. Each one of the boys had been through Hell. Each one carried the burden of traumas heavy enough to bring even the most war-torn veteran to their knees; let alone children (all under the age of seventeen at that). Death, torture, starvation—enough to drive anyone beyond mad. And in Tim's case, he feared that the boy was mad.

In the months that the boys had been living in Wayne Manor they've made such awe inspiring progress. Jason had made himself comfortable both in the library and under Alfred's wing in the kitchen. Dick was learning to manage his anger and to take time for himself (even though he and Bruce still had moments of parental power struggle from time to time). Dick had even enrolled in school, setting a promising example for the others (Jason was ready to join at the beginning of next semester and Damian was nervous but excited over the idea of Kindergarten next fall). Damian was learning that it was okay to just be a kid. But Tim? Bruce didn't know how to reach Tim.

Tim never fought over going to therapy. He kept up with his journal just as Leslie had asked. He came to (most) meals and put in an effort to prove he had eaten at least half his plate. The whole family was learning sign language so that he could communicate without causing more damage to his throttled vocal cords (and he was learning fast). But otherwise? Tim was—Tim was just there. Always watching. Always keeping to himself. Always with that blank look in his eyes and face devoid of emotion. Bruce wanted to say he was observing. He remembered the Tim Drake of this universe being a curious, far-too-adventurous-for-his-own-good child. A child unafraid to sneak away from his parents at Wayne Manor galas to break into the library and rifle through the ancient books (Bruce had let him keep a particularly aged book on criminology, too impressed by the boy's knowledge, stealth, and audacity to take it back when he caught him). Bruce now regretted not taking the time to get to know his neighbors and their curious son. Maybe he could have learned something from his timeline's Tim that would help break the boy's Joker induced trance. Any guidance Bruce could have learned was buried within the the Drake plot of Gotham Cemetery.

“Tim?” Bruce knocked carefully on the door. There were a number of rules within the manor. Two of the top-most rules were no locks, no closed doors. Not yet at least. The emotions and conditioned instincts of the boys were simply too risky still. The last thing he needed was for one of them to sneak out to the city on their own for whatever reason. He had sensors on each one of their windows of course, but he knew better than to doubt their training. Any one of them (Damian included) could easily bypass the sensors one way or another. An open door policy gave Bruce peace of mind. He could check-in on them easily and make sure they were still in their beds at night (if they weren't in his or each other's). There were exception of course, but overall door were kept open. Even Bruce's. Tim's breaking of this rule was enough to put Bruce's anxiety on edge.

Bruce knocked again, a little louder this time. “Tim,” he spoke gently through the door, “I'm coming in, okay?” Bruce twisted the knob and was relieved that the door opened with no resistance.

Bruce poked his head partway in first, looking to the bed. No Tim. Just the neatly made and tucked sheets Alfred had fixed this morning. Bruce opened the door enough to step inside. “Tim? Damian said you stole his markers. You're not in any trouble, bud. I just want to...” His words trailed at the sound of a sniffle, “... talk... to you...”

He followed the sound of the whimpers. Whimpers mixed with painful stifles of laughter—a sound Bruce was tragically familiar with now. He found Tim curled up around his arm in the en suite bathroom. Damian's markers were scattered across the floor and sink. Most notable with the uncapped black marker that Tim had tried (but failed) to scribble out his mirror with. The marks and smears it left on the counter suggested the marker had been thrown down in a fit of frustration. The mirror was a concern to bring up to Leslie of course, but not as pressing as the concern Bruce had for the boy's manic protection of his arm. Tim had it pressed so tightly between his legs and chest that it was concealed entirely. Fearing that Tim was applying pressure to a wound, Bruce quickly got on the floor beside him and scooped Tim into his lap.

“It's okay. You're okay, Tim. Everything's okay. Deep breath. Deeep breath...” Bruce's heart pounded as he rocked the boy gently in his arms. Tim's sobs gave way to a fit of wheezing, manic laughter; then back again to wails of agonized sadness. Fits like this were what made Bruce concerned that he wasn't equipped to handle Tim's needs—but he had promised Jason. Swore to Jason. No hospitals, no wards—nothing remotely resembling Arkham in any way—just home and family.

“No doctor is going to use him as a case study,” Jason had said, “He's not some prize winning research paper! He's my brother! He needs us not them!”

The words echoed in Bruce's mind as he continued to rock Tim in his arms. Us not them. Us not them!

Bruce kissed the top of Tim's green haired head. “It's okay, Baby Bird, it's okay. Take some deep breaths for me. In and out, okay? In and out—here, follow me. Ready? In—and out. In—and out. Good. Good. See, you're getting it. In and out. In and out.” Bruce patiently guided Tim through the fit until his breathing became less frantic and the sporadic fits of laughter gave way entirely to whimpers. Eventually, the stiffness of Tim's body would begin to subside and the boy would sink his weight into Bruce, exhausted. “There you go. Keep breathing, Baby Bird. Keep breathing. I'm going to look at your arm, okay? I just want to make sure you're not hurt.”

There was no resistance. No fight at all as Bruce carefully pulled Tim's arm back from his chest. Bruce had braced himself for blood—some type of wound. Hell maybe even a burn—but when he had finally managed to see what Tim had done—with Damian's markers... “Oh... Oh, Tim...”

There was no trance behind Tim's eyes. There was no numbed silence of emotion on his face. What Bruce saw for the first time since taking Tim in—it was agony. Raw agony. A cruel mixture of sadness, grief, injustice, and everything in between. Bruce's first glance of the boy who had surely been just as inquisitive and adventurous—just as bright and brilliantly minded as his Drake boy had been—the boy he had been too late to save. Tim was there. Tim Drake was there in his eyes, begging to be seen. Begging to be rescued.

“I-I want to be normal again!” Tim croaked through his tears and mutilated vocal cords. “I-I just want to be—normal—a-again!”

Bruce understood now. It pained him to no end.

There, on Tim's arm... The skin that the Joker had bleached ghost white—Tim had taken the marker closest to his former skin tone and had tried to scribble it in.

[aerofae]

Giggle Bats (Angst AU) - Snippet 1

AU Context Here

Bruce's hand stilled mid crank of the wrench. Entirely caught off guard, his gaze lifted in the direction of the teen. “What did you just call it?” He hoped his tone wasn't too sharp. It crushed him every time Dick flinched, but the words had left him before he could remember to lighten the gruffness. He was so used to it being just Alfred and himself here, and Alfred always knew when his words were laced with anger versus genuine bewilderment—even though they sounded fairly alike.

“Hm?” Dick poked his head out from behind the computer, seemingly unfazed by the question. "The Batmobile?"

“The... Batmobile?” Bruce repeated the absurd title back to Dick.

It took a moment for the dots to connect in Dick's mind. Yes, the Batmobile. The Dark Knight's trusty steed. The harbinger of a rough night to come for every crook in Gotham from petty thief to mob boss. Surely this Bruce—“Oh shit, that's right! You've never had a Robin!”

Dick pushed against the desk so that the chair would wheel further into Bruce's direct line of sight, dragging his IV pole along with him (aided by a nudge from Alfred's foot). “That is the Batmobile.” He explained with an amused grin. “This,” Dick gestured to the computer, “is the Batcomputer.” Dick then grabbed one of the broken Batarangs from the desk, giving it a flourishing gesture. “Batarang!”

Bruce was lost. Utterly lost. Dick could feel the giddiness rising within him.

“It usually starts with me,” he explained. “A joke at first, but it sticks pretty quick. Almost everything has Bat in front of it. Officially and unofficially.” Dick leaned back into the computer chair—Batcomputer Batchair—rolling his eyes up to the ceiling as he recalled the various names he had heard versions of himself and his siblings use over the years. He counted each on a finger. “Batbelt. Batcape. Batjet. Batbike. Batglare.” Dick paused to gauge Bruce's reaction—bewildered silence. The teen's grin threatened to give-way to laughter. “What do you call it?”

Bruce's jaw had hung open. His brow was furrowed. “The car.”

“On the contrary, Sir.” Alfred hummed his own amusement. “I do believe that Gotham has begun to refer to it as the Bat-Car.”

The wrench slipped from Bruce's hand, falling with a series of mocking clanks and clatters as it bounced its way through the overly complicated engine. This was enough to finally permit himself to laugh—a foreign sound and feeling. One he felt he hadn't experienced in God knew how long. Months? Years? Dick was soon doubled over with the laughter. The motions made his stitches nag in protest, but the euphoria was too good and too overdue to stop. Dick laughed. He laughed and laughed until he began to cry. Once the crying started, the sobs were quick to follow. Almost instantaneously. One extreme to the other, both he hadn't let himself feel for too long. Too too long. All this time—all these years—he had been surviving. He had been keeping his brothers in line. He had been listening to their stories of their Bruce's. Their Batman's. Their memories. Their joy filled moments and years of Robin. Their lives as Bruce Wayne's children. A life Dick never knew, but had heard and witnessed time and time again. Always from the outside. Always longing. Always longing.

–

Bruce had sat in silent support while Dick cried himself into trembling exhaustion. He didn't know Dick's pain, not fully. But he knew heart break. He knew what it was like to watch others live the life he wanted more than anything. Parents to hold him. Laughter to be shared. Bruce couldn't fix the pain of Dick's past any more than he could fix his own—but he'd do whatever was within his power to see that Dick's pain ended here. No more universe hoping. No more slaughters. No more longing for a proper, safe home. Bruce swore it to himself as he laid Dick carefully back into his bed.

Bruce tucked the teen in, careful of his arm as to not tangle or pull on the IV cords. Once he was satisfied that Dick would be warm and comfortable for the night, Bruce sat carefully on the edge of the bed. “You know,” he spoke softly, running a hand through Dick's shaggy hair, “Batmobile isn't such a bad name after all. Do you think it'll catch on here?”

“Guaranteed.” Dick smiled. It was an exhausted and broken smile, but the most genuine Bruce had ever seen from the teen.

[aerofae]

Angst AU

So let me tell you guys about my favorite angst (yet still fluffy at times) AU. Fair warning: lots of angst and macabre and the overall splatter punk vibes when it comes to actually writing it out (I'm writing a fic in bits and pieces).

The Bat Who Laughs... Stick with me. He's not the main focus but is the big bad.

In his popping in and out of alternate universes, he's slowly been collecting what he sees as the perfect alternatives to his the family he had killed after being Joker-fied. He's cycled through a few different versions of the boys, but we're going to talk about his final group.

Dick (roughly 16) has been there the longest. He was trained to be a Talon after his parents were murdered, having been kidnapped by Cobb during all the commotion. When Batman finally found the missing Grayson boy, the BWL swooped in to claim him (killing both Cobb and this universe's Batman in the process)

Jason (around 14) is the third Jason the BWL has had under his wing. In this Jason's timeline, he was also beaten within an inch of his life by the Joker, but Batman made it just in time to take the impact of the bomb in place of his ward. Alfred did everything he could to keep Jason from following the same path Bruce had in vengeance, but Red Hood was well underway when the BWL decided to give him a shot.

Tim is the second Tim. You guessed it, Joker Junior. The first Tim (14, same as Jason) was “too old” and “too independent” for the BWL. Too much like Tim still (he had been found and was recovering when the BWL stole him). New Tim (around 11) is younger and freshly pulled from the vat of Ace Chemicals. Freshly broken, the perfect puppet (or so the BWL thinks).

Damian (7) has been with the BWL the second longest. The BWL's original Damian (the one that had twisted and conformed to the BWL's morals) had died in combat (against another Damian—go figure). It took the BWL a while to come around to replacing him, but when he did he had been compelled to take a toddler aged version straight from Talia's arms. Damian is oddly coddled compared to his brothers. He doesn't go on missions with them. He barely even trains. He's essentially just a kid being forced to watch his found brothers go through Hell universe after universe after universe. Naturally, he's very close with Dick who essentially is raising him in place of the BWL.

But the twist is that in their universe hoping (where the boys have been front line against their counterparts), they come across a Bruce who eventually rescues them. By complete accident at first of course, and with much confusion. Consider this Bruce a year five or so Batman, a little broken in but not quite versed in the concept of parallel universe's actually being real. Pre Justice League, but Gotham for sure knows who Batman is. In his universe Dick Grayson had died with his parents, Jason Todd was a finally identified John Doe found beaten to death in in the Narrows, Tim Drake was collateral damage in a hit gone wrong, and Damian Wayne was nonexistent—so who exactly where these kids? Why did their DNA and finger prints match with the dead? Who the fuck was Damian Wayne?

Anyway, I'mma be posting some stuff about them. Little snippets and slice of life moments. I don't have a rp partner anymore (TLDR, we were dating and it didn't work out) so Tumblr is now subject to my AU.. Enjoy :)