Cuckoo Bird 4

“Alright, have a good day.” Tim handed the clipboard back to a stone-faced delivery guy and took the package from Miss Fox back to his lair. He got a glass of water on the way down and then went about reproducing the experiment that Tam asked for. 

She wouldn't give him details. But from the instructions and reported results, Tim was pretty sure that some employee had misrepresented their process. To what end, he didn't know. He was just the science guy, not a detective guy. 

Although if he had to guess he'd say that they had switched out a needed chemical to hide that the supply was lower than recorded. There could be a lot of reasons to do that. Maybe they’d made a mistake in inventorying or when ordering supplies. Maybe they had used it by mistake in a legitimate experiment. Maybe they had used it deliberately in an unapproved experiment. Or heck, maybe they had just sold it because they thought it wouldn’t be noticed and they were sweating whole buckets when it came up.

Tim idly churned through his five separate theories at once, plotting out how he would start eliminating possibilities. What was the most efficient way to do it? It helped that Miss Tam apparently knew who had conducted this failed experiment and there was therefore only one likely suspect. Of course, it was never impossible that they were covering up for someone else or being blackmailed or otherwise influenced to hide the initial crime or error. 

Tim added two more possible approaches to his mental index.

But whatever. That wasn't his business. He shook those thoughts off as he went through the steps.

Tim happily went about science, recreating a corrosive liquid that would supposedly eat through reinforced metal. He had to make the Wayne tech protective coating for the metal as well to do the experiment properly. When he finished that he carefully dipped metal sheets in it and set them to drip dry. Then he turned back to the acid project. 

Supposedly, the acid had been a failure. Tim thought it should work. Apparently Tam did, too. 

The screens around the room all went black. He wasn't even using them but it was a hard thing to miss in your peripheral vision. 

Tim groaned. “What now?” He asked the room. He clanged a piece of metal to the tabletop. “I am trying to finish this.”

Had he tripped some kind of security protection? Maybe they had all gone to sleep without getting a password at spaced intervals?

To be perfectly clear, Tim did not expect any kind of response.

Therefore he was startled halfway out of his skin when a female laugh came barrelling out of the speakers of the largest mounted screen. 

He crossed his arms in a sulk.

“Tim?” She asked, after she caught her breath. “You're tiny.” 

His face was catastrophically cranky. It was a perfect replica of Janet Drake discovering after she had formatted her latest paper in Chicago Style that the publication required the savagery of MLA formatting.

She laughed again. It ended with a hiccup. 

‘Whoever this is, she can see me. She must be someone who knows me if I gave her that kind of access.’

“I'm not sure we're friends,” Tim announced, because it was time to face the facts: these people all knew a version of him, and that Tim was bigger. At least like, three inches. “I'm aware that I am small. I am working on it.” He glowered at the computer she seemed to be using.

It would take what, two years top for a major growth spurt? They could just chew bubblegum until then.

“Is that what you're doing now?” 

Tim sighed. “No, I'm doing something for Tam,” he admitted. He scrubbed at his face with a hand. “Probably a good time for a break.” He started to tidy up.

“Yeah, so, I guess I can tell Dick that you haven't been kidnapped by lions or whatever it is he's talking about,” the lady said. The line turned to static for a second, then back just as quickly. “You, uh, need some help?” 

“Absolutely not.” Tim shook his head in a sharp, decisive Jack Drake movement. “I don't need to be babied.” He didn’t know or really care who these people were, but he was doing perfectly well without them coming into his apartment lair.

“...I can see why you think you're in danger of it.” She snorted again. “Unblock Dick, please, he's got delicate feelings and I think we both have plans for tonight that don't involve him scaling your walls to find a way in.”

“....I'll unblock him,” Tim took the L gracefully. “I appreciate your silence on this matter.” 

She snorted again. “Sorry.” She didn't sound very sorry. “It's just- your little businessman voice is so funny. I'm sorry, Tim.” 

He looked up at the ceiling for patience. 

“Oracle out.” 

All the screens returned to normal. Tim let out a big long sigh and went back upstairs, taking his empty water class with him. At least he had a name, right? Oracle. He'd gotten a call from Oracle. 

He mentally arranged the facts as he trudged up the stairs.

Fact one: he had replaced a Tim, who was Tim Drake-Wayne. Drake-Wayne had to be fundamentally the same Tim as he was, given that both Tam and Oracle had immediately recognized him and apparently thought he was a de-aged version of the same Tim. Presumably that Tim was in his life, absolutely killing it in the 6th grade.

Fact two: Tim D-W was a vigilante.

Fact three: That was really cool. Vigilante justice was a cool thing to get into and now that he knew it was viable as a career path, Tim was going to start looking into it.

Tim reached the top and made a mental note to enroll in some martial arts classes when he got back home. If he had potential to fight crime, of course he was going to do that. He unblocked Dick: oh no, Dick Wayne. He'd blocked Robin. He felt mortified. It was so obvious in retrospect. He put the phone down on the table, stomach twisting in social agony. Sure, Robin was really cringe and weird! But he was Robin. He deserved Tim’s patience and understanding.

The phone immediately lit up under a barrage of messages. It buzzed for a minute straight.

The regret gradually bled out over the course of the excruciatingly long seconds it took for all of Dick’s messages to land. Tim opened them and sent an eye roll emoji without reading anything. Robin should be less annoying if he didn't want to be blocked. Perhaps he would learn something from this about appropriate boundaries and conversation. 

That done, Tim tossed the phone aside. Dick couldn’t panic too much if he knew that Tim was in good health and supposedly reading his messages. Tim could deal with all of Dick’s big silly feelings later.

He clambered onto the counter to search through for anything that would make a good lunch. 

“... I'm terrible,” Tim complained in disbelief. It was hard to admit that a version of him apparently just, what, didn't eat? He stuck his head fully into the cupboard as if there might be something good at the back. “This sucks!” 

Alright. Something had to be done. Tim decisively climbed down, using an open drawer as a step. He shut it with his heels and then went in search of a wallet. He needed a credit card and to find a delivery service for groceries.

He was going to act on faith that big Tim D-W wasn't going to ruin his life, even though he was a loser. Tim was doing a great job keeping Tim D-W’s life afloat. That merited some payment. 

He converted that payment into a huge order to a grocery delivery service. He referenced Tam’s package to get the address. 

The order was simple: fruits, breakfast meat, lots of bakery bread, and sandwich fillings. He was going to have tuna salad with cucumber and lettuce. He was going to learn to make egg salad. Optimistically, he even added melty cheese to the order and a can of tomato soup mix: grilled cheese couldn't be that hard, right?

He rounded off the order with lots of individually packaged drinks: milk and juice boxes, cans of grape Zesti, and hot cocoa powder. 

…”This is so exciting,” Tim said to his empty apartment. His. In a very real and meaningful way, it was his apartment. He was totally unsupervised. Something felt momentous about it. Sure, it had always been Tim’s apartment, but he hadn’t known that. He took a shuddery inhalation. He loved it here. He was so happy. He was going to have to send his parents a postcard from here.

The phone buzzed again. When he picked it up it said, “Jason.” 

Tim blue screened. Tim dropped the credit card with a clatter. It disappeared under the table and he didn't even think to look for it.

Jason. Omigod, Jason. Jason was a person who existed. He'd forgotten.

All the pieces came together in a beautiful flash of light. He wasn't in a troubled huge age-difference relationship with Bruce (21 year difference) or Dick (9 year difference) . He'd gotten married to Jason Wayne, the kid that Bruce had brought home like a day ago according to the Gotham Gazette. (3 year difference: within normal distribution.)

The phone was still ringing. Tim picked it up with numb fingers. “Hello?” 

“Hey, Timbers,” said a male voice. It was low, rough, and impatient. “You freaked Dickiebird out and he's been squawking at me all day. Tell me how many pieces you're in.” 

Tim looked down at his body. “Just the one,” he said, voice coming out breathy. It felt like his being was floating outside his body. Wow. This was his boy- no, husband? Holy moly. He couldn't cope with that, he had to stick with boyfriend. He bit his lip. He had to make a good impression.

“...You sound about 10 years old there,” Jason said. He didn't hide his amusement. “You been huffing helium, babybird?” 

Tim went bright red. Painfully red. His face was on fire. 

Jason took his silence as a response. “Alright, alright, keep your clothes on. You're home sick. Explains why you weren't out.”

Tim slapped his hands on his face and tried not to hyperventilate. 

“I wasn't calling for Dick, don't get it twisted.” Jason cleared his throat, tone a little odd. “I picked up on something - I think one of my ongoing cases dips into your patrol area. You gonna come out tonight?” 

“...No,” Tim said. 

Jason cursed, but he didn't sound mad about it. “Fair enough,” he muttered. “Uh, think you could do some surveillance for me?” 

Tim nodded. Then he felt dumb and cleared his throat. “Yeah.” 

…He felt even dumber. What should he say? This was his boyfriend, even if this was a different Tim’s life. The stakes were so high. He had never wanted anyone to like him more. 

Jason rattled off an address. It, like everything Jason had said, was going to live inside Tim’s head forever in perfect clarity. “Thanks,” he added after, a bit begrudgingly. “This guy's real fucking sick, been making human sausage.” 

Tim… wasn't sure exactly what that meant, but it sounded really bad. “I'll do my best,” he promised. 

“Yeah…” Jason trailed off. “Maybe you should take a nap, some meds. That's a terrible hoarse throat. Don't kick your own ass on my account, okay?” 

“Okay,” Tim helplessly echoed, and hung up. 

He had to sit there for a while recalibrating.