Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/1049631.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Graphic_Depictions_Of_Violence, Major_Character_Death, Rape/Non-Con,
      Underage
  Category:
      Gen
  Fandom:
      A_Song_of_Ice_and_Fire_-_George_R._R._Martin
  Relationship:
      Sandor_Clegane/Sansa_Stark
  Character:
      Varamyr_Sixskins, Sansa_Stark, Sandor_Clegane, Bran_Stark, Hodor
  Additional Tags:
      Horror, Survival_Horror, Warging, Skinchanging, Torture, Cannibalism,
      Murder, Alternate_Universe, POV_Male_Character
  Stats:
      Published: 2013-11-18 Words: 4564
****** Linger ******
by Helholden
Summary
     A desperate and dying man watches as a group travels North towards
     the Wall, the very place he had recently escaped from, but he is
     dying . . . and he needs a new body to survive.
Notes
     Author’s Notes: This is a complete Alternate Universe from multiple
     canon events. I think of it an alternate beginning to “A Dance with
     Dragons” with Bran and Hodor, Sansa, and Sandor Clegane having
     followed different paths to wind up together and heading towards the
     Wall to meet Jon. Backstory doesn't really matter, and there are no
     book spoilers. This is, plain and simple, a horror story. I wanted to
     showcase how even a fic with horrible subjects could exhibit
     qualities that give it merit. It will be dark, uncomfortable, and
     downright messed up, but I'm very happy with the ending and how it
     turned out overall. If you expect a happy ending and a clean fic,
     turn back now.
                                     * * *
 
Through the white wood, his eyes watched them. Their figures shucked through
tufts of snow, feet trudging hopelessly towards the Wall. The group was walking
towards it, but he had run away from it. The crows had given all of the
wildlings passage beneath the Wall to the other side after the battle has been
lost. Varamyr had crossed the gate with them, but he had stolen provisions from
the stock they were handing out to the wildlings for his journey southward.
However, he was running low. He needed to eat. They had food. They had sturdy
cloaks. They had means for building a fire each night, and so he watched them
and waited because they had a direwolf, too.
 
The direwolf stalking their trail reminded him of the turncloak crow Jon Snow’s
direwolf. Snow’s beast had been a great animal, its fur as white as pristine
snow freshly fallen from the sky and the red eyes of a hunter. This one was
smaller with silver dappled grey fur and yellow eyes. They carried a cripple
boy with them, and his companion was an overly large but senseless man who
repeated nothing but one word over and over again. The girl was young but
beautiful with auburn hair, and her companion was the strongest and most
fearsome of the company. He walked with a lame leg, but a lame leg was better
than a lame brain.
 
Abomination, a voice whispered to him in the back of his mind. Abomination had
been Haggon’s favorite word in his life. Everything had been an abomination to
Haggon. The man had loved his rules too much. It had held back his power. It
was abomination to eat human flesh. Abomination. It was an abomination to mate
with a wolf while in a wolf’s skin. Abomination. The worst abomination of them
all was to force oneself into the body of another man. Abomination,Haggon said
even in his death, abomination, abomination.
 
Haggon had been afraid of his power, though. Varamyr was not afraid of it. He
reveled in it.
 
He accepted it.
 
Varamyr knew what awaited them at the Wall. He had to make his move before they
got any closer. He dared not travel too close to them with that direwolf of
theirs in tow. Varamyr had smelled the scent of warg on turncloak crow Snow,
but he smelled it on the child and the girl as well. Neither of them was
trained in the gift, but they were wargs. Another skinchanger could always
smell one. He wondered day and night which one of them controlled the direwolf,
but the direwolf showed no signs of favoritism. He guarded the entire pack.
 
As nighttime fell and the company took shelter in an abandoned hovel, Varamyr
watched as they built a fire. The girl went inside to make her bed. The two men
and the boy stayed outside, the cripple in a wheelbarrow.
 
One Eye was nearby, prowling the trees. Varamyr watched as the direwolf slunk
off into the trees in the opposite direction. He goes to hunt, Varamyr thought.
As he hunts, so I will.
 
Varamyr waited in the biting cold, shivering, physically weak, and dying. He
knew he was dying. He could feel it. It was there, deep in his bones. His mind
was strong, though. He could take the big man with the lame leg. Hours passed,
and all but one fell to sleep. The companion of the cripple boy had fallen
asleep on the side of the hovel, leaning against the wall between two stacks of
firewood, which must have served as shelter against the wind. The cripple boy
was in his wheelbarrow by the fire, and the big man was the only one left
awake. Varamyr watched as the big man stood up, stalking off into the trees.
 
He had to make his move now.
 
Varamyr unsheathed his knife. He crept forward towards the hovel as shadows
danced around the grounds from the flickering flames. He would take care of the
larger companion first. As he drew closer, he raised the knife. It glimmered in
the faint moonlight above, catching silver in the dark, before he drove it
straight into the windpipe of the large man.
 
His eyes shot open, panicked and confused at what was happening. Large hands
grappled for purchase, but found none. His mouth opened to scream, but no sound
save gurgling came out as warm blood poured freely down Varamyr’s hands. He
watched the light leave the man’s eyes as his body fell limp against the wall,
and then he withdrew the blade from the man’s throat.
 
Next, it was the boy.
 
Varamyr crept up from behind and sliced his throat, drawing the knife so deep
as to sever the windpipe. He wanted no screams to echo off into the night. It
was essential to take the big man with the lame leg by surprise, or he might
not have the strength to overpower him. The girl was sleeping inside the hovel.
His wolf, One Eye, prowled in a circle around their den.
 
Varamyr was starving. He needed to eat. He quickly searched their corpses for
food, but found none. Agitation crept up into his bones, and he ground his
teeth together. His stomach cramped painfully from being empty for so long. It
was a wonder it did not eat itself.
 
He froze like his wolf, listening. Heavy footsteps were drawing near.
 
The man returns.
 
The wildlings believed in wargs. The wildlings knew they were real. A wildling
would put up a better fight than any man south of the Wall. Varamyr knew this,
and still he was wary.
 
He moved himself into the shadows next to the rundown hovel. He would take the
man in unawares if he was to have his best chance. Varamyr saw him appear
around the corner, walking towards the open fire. Quick, Varamyr thought,
before he realizes something is wrong.
 
Varamyr summoned every ounce of strength inside of him to leap from his own
body, his consciousness rising into the air like a spectral form, and forced
himself inside of the man.
 
It was a fight unlike any fight he had faced before, even those he had
undertaken with his shadowcat who used to go half-mad from it. She always
fought him to the bone, hard and wild and resentful of his intrusions. This was
worse. The man did not scream or holler, but the shock of it brought out a
guttural sound in him, which echoed off the woodland surrounding them.
Varamyr’s old skin had fallen limp to the ground, devoid of life. He was now in
the man’s body, but the man was fighting him to the core. Varamyr sought to
gain control, striving against the man’s consciousness in one form. They
collided into the side of the hovel as the man wrenched back violently, and
Varamyr felt heavy hands grasp at his head, gripping hard. No words were said
out loud, but the man released a guttural howl into the night through their
shared mouth. Spasms overtook his body. In their fight his body lost balance,
the legs collapsing beneath them, bringing them both to the ground.
 
It was then that the young woman came outside from within the hovel, wrapped in
fur cloak with a look of fear in her eyes. She saw them, and Varamyr saw her.
His eyes locked on her pretty features, flushed cheeks, red hair, and bright
blue eyes, and the strife inside of his head suddenly fell silent.
 
In the moment of silence, Varamyr took over.
 
I have won.
 
The girl continued to stare at him. Her mouth was open in shock. She took a
step forward, though it was hesitant, and then another. “My lord?” she asked
softly, her voice wavering at the attempt.
 
He stared at her for a moment. Then, he said, “I’m not your lord.”
 
His voice came out deep and raspy like the sound of steel grating against
stone. However, it was the right thing to say. The girl noticeably loosened up,
and a soft smile dared to curl up the corner of her mouth. Out of the corner of
her vision, she noticed his former lifeless body slumped against the side of
the hovel. Her pretty mouth gasped, and she took a step away.
 
“I killed him,” Varamyr said in his new voice. “He . . . killed the others.”
 
A look of horror entered the girl’s eyes, and she quickly turned her head
towards the boy in the wheelbarrow. She rushed to his side, hands flying to her
mouth to cover it as tears spilled from her eyes in the glow of the firelight.
The girl did not scream or holler, but she stood there in shock before sobs
overtook her body. She bent down, lifting the boy’s head to cradle it in her
arms. Varamyr watched her in silence, pushing himself back to his feet.
 
This was a powerful body, a strong body.
 
In his victory of triumph and spilt blood, Varamyr stared at the young woman. A
new desire coursed through his veins, not entirely of his own making. This man
had wanted her. This man had desired her. Varamyr felt it as it mixed in with
his bloodlust. It had been so long since he had had a proper woman.
 
Too long, in fact.
 
Varamyr approached her side slowly, laying his hand on her arm. “Come now,” he
said in this deep voice, grating and rough. “There’s nothing you can do. We
must get inside and stay warm for the night. Tomorrow, we move again.”
 
“He is my brother,” she choked out. “I cannot leave him like this—”
 
Varamyr wrenched her away from the dead boy. He did not care if the crippled
boy was her brother. He did not care if she wanted to cry all night about it.
She could weep until her eyes were red and sore and her nose full of snot. He
did not care.
 
In her protests and struggles, he dragged her inside of the hovel.
 
He pushed her to the ground on a makeshift bed of furs she had made to sleep
upon, and the girl curled into herself like a babe and cried some more. Despite
her cries, he could not quell the want that burned in his belly. If he was some
lord and she a chambermaid, he could have her without a fight. She would not
refuse him, not even in her agony.
 
Varamyr knelt on the ground beside her on one knee. She was lying on her side,
but he urged her onto her back. She did not seem to register him much until he
placed his hands on her knees, spreading them open. She scooted herself away
from him, then, twisting her legs from his grasp. Her sobs subsided long enough
to be replaced with a silent look of shock and fear mixed with confusion. The
girl stared at him as if she did not recognize him anymore.
 
She was right, of course. He was a different man now.
 
“Don’t fight me, girl,” he told her gruffly. “You might even like it.”
 
He snatched her leg again, and she was so paralyzed with fear that she did not
move but to breathe. She did not fight him as Varamyr dragged her back to him,
hiking up the layers of her dress in the process. Whether it was silent
submission or the realization that she could not physically fight him, he
didn’t much care. He pushed it up further to get it out of the way and settled
himself between her legs. This new body was powerful, even with a lame leg, and
his shadow loomed over her face in the darkness, shrouding her tearful
expression.
 
Every muscle of her body was as rigid as a tree as he slid his hand over her
thigh and up her leg to the sweet spot in the center beneath her smallclothes.
His fingers were cold and callused, but he touched her with them, anyway. He
felt nothing, no reaction from her, no wetness to show she liked it, so he
removed his fingers. He was not going to waste his time if it did nothing.
Varamyr opened his breeches and freed himself, using quick strokes to ready
himself for her. In the dark he noticed her head was turned away from him, her
eyes glazed and far away.
 
Pulling the strings on her smallclothes, he pushed them out of the way. He spat
on his hand, rubbed it over the tip of his cock, and positioned himself at her
entrance. When he pushed into her, she was as tight as a maid. By her youth
alone, he might have suspected her to be one. As he took her maiden’s gift from
her, her silence was broken with a whimper. He sunk himself deeper, and she was
warm and tight but as dry as a desert. He began thrusting with slow strokes to
make it easier for himself. He was not concerned about her or the tears in her
eyes, only with possessing her and spending his seed inside of her.
 
The maid’s body betrayed her, and he soon found it easier to fuck her as she
became slick. He sped up his thrusts, faster and harder until he lost himself
in the motions. He came not long after, not bothering to pull out. His heart
was racing, and the cold air became noticeable again. The small reprieve was
already gone, and her eyes were purposefully shut, her lips sealed in a tight
line.
 
He removed himself, rolling over to the area beside her, and fixed his
breeches. The girl was paralyzed next to him, so much so that she didn’t even
bother to pull her dress back down; he had to do it, and then he put a strong
arm around her middle and pulled her close. Not to comfort her, though. It was
cold outside. Snow filled the land. Her body would provide him warmth, and he
was going to use it.
 
“Get some sleep,” he said—in that same unfamiliar raspy voice. He pulled one of
the furs over them to give them further shelter against the cold in that hovel.
She did not protest. Silence befell her, and it remained until he fell asleep.
 
When he awoke in the morning to an early dawn, Varamyr smelled blood on the
air. He got up from the makeshift bed and went outside, seeing a blood red
trail stretching across the snow—the trail of a dragged body. In the distance
he saw his wolf, One Eye, feasting on the remains of what looked like a small
human.
 
Varamyr glanced at the wheelbarrow. The cripple boy’s body was missing from it.
 
Suddenly angry, Varamyr stalked off to the packs laying against the hovel that
the group had been carrying with them for their journey. He tore into the
sacks, searching for food. Even in this new body, his stomach rumbled with
hunger and pains shot through his belly like knives in his guts. He needed to
eat. Why was he so hungry? He considered warging into his wolf, One Eye, and
feasting on the boy with him. All of the meat would go into One Eye’s belly,
though, not his. He would still be hungry, and if he didn’t eat, he would still
die.
 
Varamyr threw down the pack in his hands, its contents spilling over the snow.
Clothes, cups, bowls, and books. Useless items, all of them. He would be able
to use none of them to quell his need for food. He stalked into the hovel on
his lame leg, leaning past the open doorway.
 
“Where is the food?” Varamyr shouted at the sleeping girl. She jolted in her
sleep, turning her head and opening her eyes, though she pulled the furs higher
to her neck. She looked at him again as if she did not know him, fear and
confusion and pain written across her face as last night’s events no doubt came
back to her.
 
“It’s gone,” she answered, almost choking on the words. “It’s been gone, my . .
. my lord. You’ve . . . you’ve known that.”
 
Varamyr wanted to snarl like a wolf. “I told you,” he spat, “I’m not your
lord.”
 
The girl flinched, looking away.
 
“Get up,” he ordered, “and start a fire.”
 
No food, he thought. No food. What was he to do with no food? The girl slowly
got up from where she lay, gathering the blankets and furs together. Varamyr
left the hovel. It took him a moment to realize it, but there was a sword
hanging at his side. He pulled the blade from its scabbard, staring at the
sharp steel. He tested his thumb against it. It drew blood, ruby red upon a
silver gleam.
 
Varamyr looked up towards the end of the hovel. The stacks of firewood. The fat
man’s body.
 
He walked around the hovel, finding the fat man’s corpse still there. The cold
had preserved him overnight, so there was no stink. The man was not yet
rotting. Varamyr lifted his sword, and he came down hard, severing the left arm
from the dead man’s body. Any meat was good meat, and Varamyr had eaten human
flesh before.
 
He stripped off the cloth, chopped off the hand, and then he took his time to
skin the arm. It would be the easiest part of the body to use. He got up to
grab some of the bowls before returning to crouch beside the body, and sitting
down upon the ground, Varamyr began to cut the meat off of the bone and discard
the fat. There was a lot of it, too. He heard the crackling sounds of a fire,
his ears perking up. Pausing briefly, Varamyr listened to the blissful sound.
 
When he came back around with the meat, the girl was crouched on the ground.
 
“Did you bury my brother, my—” the girl cut herself off before she could finish
her sentence, but Varamyr knew what she had meant to say.
 
“No,” he replied gruffly, setting up the meat on a spit, “the wolves got to him
overnight.”
 
The girl gasped. Varamyr paused to look at her. She had risen from the ground,
her hands tight as iron shackles at her sides. She was staring at the meat, her
face growing pale. “Where is his body?” she asked him, and it was almost a
demand. “Where did that meat come from?”
 
“His body is over there,” Varamyr said casually, pointing in the direction of
the bloodstained trail. “This meat came from the fat one. He has plenty to keep
us fed. I’ll carve more later. After we’ve eaten.”
 
Her face paled even more. Her hands flew to her mouth. The girl looked off in
the direction of the bloody trail, and then she tore off like a mad thing as if
she meant to interrupt One Eye and his snack. Varamyr watched her go. He
thought to stop her. She would make a fine bed-warming companion for the
nights, but if she was as disobedient as this all of the time, he would grow
tired of her quickly. He let her run, and tended to the meat as it roasted
above the fire.
 
By the time the meat was cooked to a slight crisp and dribbling with juice, the
girl had not returned. Varamyr had not heard her cry, so he did not know if she
was dead or if she had just run off. She would not last long in the wilderness
on her own, though. The girl should have stayed with him. He would have kept
her fed and protected. It had been foolish of her to run off like that, and all
for a dead brother.
 
He had a brother once, and his brother was dead, too.
 
Varamyr plucked one of the sticks from the spit, biting into the juicy meat. It
was good, and it satisfied the aches within his stomach. As he tore into the
meat, the pain subsided until it was almost gone. Juice spilt from the corner
of his mouth, dribbling down his chin.
 
As he took one more bite of the meat, a great jaw clamped onto his side and
sunk its teeth into his flesh, dragging him away from the fire. Varamyr cried
out, and the wolf released him, backing away far enough to bare its bloody
teeth at him. Big yellow eyes, burning with rage.
 
Looking beyond the direwolf, Varamyr saw the redheaded girl. She stood there,
hands clenched tightly at her sides, her face as white as snow.
 
“Who are you?” she asked him. Though her tone was soft and ladylike, he heard a
firm demand in her request.
 
“What do you mean, who am I—”
 
He screamed as the girl’s eyes went white, and the direwolf lunged at him
again, biting his arm and yanking at it. A searing pain shot through his
muscles up his arm to his shoulder. The direwolf let go, growling as it backed
away again.
 
He wondered if he still had his power.
 
Varamyr tried to enter the mind of direwolf, but it was no use. His old power
of skinchanging died with his old body. This man had not that gift, but the
girl . . .
 
He had smelled it on her. She had the gift. She was a warg.
 
And the boy, too, but he’s dead.
 
Varamyr looked over at his old body, still slumped against the hovel and frozen
over like the fat man by the logs. His old body wasn’t frozen into solid ice,
but it was chilled enough to preservation. Varamyr stared at his old self. He
had been small and weak, even as an adult. Lump, they had called him once. Lump
until he had given himself the name of Varamyr Sixskins. He would have been
nothing if not for his power, if not for his gift. It had made him everything.
 
. . . And now it was gone. It had left this world with his body, a feeble and
small body slumped against an abandoned hovel in the middle of nowhere.
 
“That’s me,” he said in his raspy voice, looking at his old self. “I was
following you for days. I meant to take this man’s body. I was dying. I needed
to survive, and I did. I’m a skinchanger. Like you. We’re one and the same,
girl. I can help you get to where you’re going. You need me.”
 
She stared at him, trembling.
 
Her eyes went white again, and the direwolf drew closer. Varamyr remembered the
sword at his side, and he thought to grab it, but he knew the direwolf would
lunge before he could use it. Suddenly, the direwolf bit at the hilt and
removed the sword with its teeth, dragging the blade across the snow to the
girl. Her eyes had turned blue again, and she bent over to pick it up.
 
As Varamyr stared at the shining blade, the direwolf lunged again, tearing at
his flesh here and there and everywhere until Varamyr was screaming at the sky
in agony. When the direwolf pulled his teeth away, Varamyr could feel the blood
soaking through his clothes. It seeped into the cloth with warmth as a dizzying
feeling overcame his mind. He was in pain, so much pain, and he could not make
it stop.
 
Suddenly, the direwolf snatched his arm with its jaw again, yanking him upright
onto his knees. Varamyr obeyed, sitting upright, though he slumped forward. He
could not hold himself entirely up. He could feel the warmth leaving him along
with the blood from his wounds, a numbness pervading throughout his limbs.
 
“Did you kill my brother, Bran?” she asked this time, and her voice sounded so
far away—almost like an echo through the trees.
 
Varamyr closed his eyes, his head swaying. “Yes,” he admitted.
 
“And Hodor?”
 
“Yes,” Varamyr conceded once again.
 
Then, he felt it. The point of the blade pressing hard into his chest, into the
area right above his heart. Varamyr opened his eyes, staring down at the silver
gleam of polished metal with a distorted reflection of a ruined face staring
back at him. It was a man with half of his face burned away, greasy dark hair,
and fierce eyes.
 
Slowly, Varamyr raised his eyes to the girl.
 
Despite those slim-fingered hands holding the blade above his heart, the girl
was trembling from head to toe. There were tears in her eyes to match the
silver of the blade, and though she held her chin high, her bottom lip could
not be still for her nerves.
 
“Sandor,” she whispered softly, “are you in there still?”
 
Varamyr almost scoffed at her. He almost answered her with No, I’m the only one
here, but that wasn’t true. With skinchanging, possessing new skin never meant
ridding it of its former consciousness. Just like taking over the skin of a
wolf or a bear or a shadowcat never emptied the animal of its formal self.
Varamyr wasn’t the only one possessing this body.
 
This Sandor was still inside.
 
Varamyr felt his mouth twisting, his body quake. A searing pain tore through
his flesh and bone as a push shoved him backwards within his own mind. A spasm
wracked his muscles, and he was there, in the background like a caged prisoner,
but with no control over his mouth or limb.
 
“Do you remember where the heart is?” he felt his mouth ask in a low, tremulous
voice, but it wasn’t him speaking.
 
Her eyes welled up with tears, spilling over onto her pale pink cheeks. Biting
on her bottom lip, she nodded her head.
 
“Do it,” his mouth hissed at her, but again, it wasn’t him speaking.
 
Varamyr pushed with all of his might back to the surface, soaring up as if a
fish through water to leap into the sky, and he did. He broke to the surface
just long enough for his eyes to fly open at the realization of what was about
to happen to him.
 
“No,” he said forcefully, “don’t—”
 
But she drove the blade home, clean through jerkin and into his heart. Varamyr
gasped at the shock, staring back at her as her tears continued to fall and her
face twisted with pain. He saw in those eyes, for one brief moment, love as she
looked at him, but that love was not for Varamyr.
 
She wrenched the blade from his heart, and Varamyr lost his balance, falling to
the cold, soft ground beneath him. The snow cushioned his fall, but it seeped
out of him the last bit of warmth he had felt in life, leaving him with nothing
but the empty sense of air.
 
Slowly, he swirled away, floating upwards in a cloud of white mist. He watched
below as the direwolf licked the girl’s blade clean. She walked towards the
hovel, collecting things of use and wrapping herself in the largest fur. She
even took the dead man’s sword belt and put it about her waist, sliding the
sword into it.
 
And then, she began to walk away, the direwolf prowling about her side. Their
bodies vanished into the white snowdrift beyond the trees.
 
Up ahead in the distance, the Wall gleamed with the sun’s newly fallen rays.
 
 
Please drop_by_the_archive_and_comment to let the author know if you enjoyed
their work!
oy? He knows that the crackle of viridian animosity
will seize control of him again after all of this is over, but right now, he
can muster nothing but a dumbfounded awe at how receptive, how affectionate Tim
is being, and a deep cavernous guilt at being exactly the sort of person Ivy
thought he was.
Despite the impulse to drop Tim like he’s a red-hot brand, Jason crouches and
sets him onto the mattress with a care he didn’t know he possessed. He smooths
back damp curls of the boy’s bangs in silent apology as he pulls away, doing
his best to ignore the way Tim’s whine tilts up at the end in desperation.
Almost fear.
“I’ll be back in a minute,” he mumbles, and staggers off to the bathroom to
throw up.
 
✧･:* ❀ *:･✧
 
The blankets beneath Tim are rough, thick wool meant for insulation and not
comfort. The sensation against his sensitive skin is just enough to keep him
occupied, focused on the scratch as he wriggles. He misses the strong heat of
Jason’s presence, how he lifted him like he weighed nothing. He could be
manhandled into doing anything and he’d be powerless to stop it. The thought
sends a delicious shiver through him and he savors it, feeling drunk, feeling
fragile and vulnerable in a way he hasn’t in a long time. Set out like a
platter of treats waiting to be consumed, and oh, how he wants to be consumed,
to be owned. The air around him is too empty, he needs to be crushed beneath a
heavy body, to be so thoroughly fucked he loses awareness of everything else.
Gravity, physics, his very identity, all shoved out of the way for that moment
of ego-free bliss.
He keens into the empty room, hands roving his chest and stomach in his
impatience. He still doesn’t grab hold of his erection, wants to come with
Jason buried deep inside him, with teeth in his neck and his legs slung over
those wide, beefy shoulders. He’s shivering again, losing focus fast. He’s
vaguely aware of his hips bucking feebly upward, the pantomime of what he wants
better than lying still and impatient.
He has no idea how long it takes before Jason returns, but the moment the man
enters the room Tim is arching his back and moaning, “Fuck me,” half command,
half plea. Jason, gloriously nude and hung and holding a bottle of lotion,
staggers to a stop. “God, no, come here,” Tim sobs, finally, finally reaching
between his legs, past his already-tight balls, to plunge a finger into
himself. He just manages the tip, can’t get much more in without any kind of
lubrication outside of his sweat, but it’s enough to draw Jason back to him,
which is all he ever wanted in the first place.
“Hey, no, I’m not… I’m not gonna do that, here, just… be patient?” Jason’s
voice falters, hands touching Tim’s thighs and stomach light and fleeting as
butterflies. Tim bites his lip, massaging his fingertip against his hole as he
waits. He’ll be good, so good. Jason will have to fuck him as hard as he needs
it. 
What he doesn’t expect is Jason to coat his fingers with lotion and go for his
OWN ass, carefully prodding like he’s performing a delicate operation. Tim’s
heart feels too close to the surface, his ribs a xylophone for the percussive
beat. Jason’s tongue sticks out of his mouth in concentration, just a smidge.
Warmth pools down Tim’s spine and settles in his belly.
It doesn’t take long before Jason is thrusting three fingers into himself,
twisting his wrist for a better stretch; it’s obvious this is not his first
time doing it. Tim watches in amazement at the practiced motions, the muscle
memory playing out in pornographic display just for him.
Despite the buildup, Tim still jolts when Jason straddles him carefully, hands
against his shoulders with no weight behind them. “Is this okay?” he asks, a
small voice that doesn’t fit his big frame. Tim nods, unable to speak, and
Jason grasps him gently with one hand and guides him toward his stretched hole.
All coherent thought flits to the furthest reaches of Tim’s mind as the man
sits, slowly sheathing Tim’s cock inside his body without pause. Jason clenches
around him, breathing steady harsh breaths through his nose. He’s almost
unbearably tight. Tears spring to Tim’s eyes and he holds onto Jason’s hips to
keep himself grounded in this moment.
“Shhh, I got you,” Jason rasps, palm splayed on his sternum, tilted toward his
heart. He hadn’t realized it until Jason’s hand is pressing on his lungs that
he’d been whining, low and throaty, more a noise of pain than anything else.
Tim’s pulse is going haywire, thrumming through his bones like a thoroughbred’s
beating hooves against fresh earth. He feels the same primal urge to move, to
both pull away from this vice around him squeezing him to the point of agony,
but also to push deeper. He’s not nearly deep enough even with Jason’s ass
squarely against his pubic bone. He ends up writhing beneath Jason, trying his
hardest to get some kind of friction or relief.
“Shhhh,” Jason says again, lifting a few inches off of him and leaning down to
press a gentle kiss to his mouth. He rolls his hips backward, pushing Tim back
inside him. Tim whines against his lips. “It’s okay, baby bird. I got you.”
The rhythm Jason starts is slow and torturous. Tim continues to buck beneath
him, breathing heavy and vocal, but Jason doesn’t let it affect his sensual
rise and fall. Somewhere deep in Tim’s mind, behind all the desperate feral
need, he wonders how many times Jason’s done this before. He’s not just making
it feel good, he’s putting on a show, rolling his hips and letting the motion
follow up to his spine. His eyes pin Tim to the bed just as effectively as the
single hand on his chest. Jason’s other hand is in his hair, fingers clenching
and unclenching around the streak of white. He keeps eye contact, a seering
gaze that goes right through Tim, the man’s pupils blown so wide they look more
green than blue. 
Tim forgets how to breathe. The hand in Jason’s hair withdraws and moves down
to card into Tim’s sweaty bangs, thumb ghosting over his eyebrow. “I wonder if
you’ll remember this,” Jason murmurs as he continues his maddeningly-slow ride.
“Probably better if you don’t.” He leans in and kisses Tim again, the barest
press of lips. Tim growls at him and bites at his mouth before he pulls away.
“M’not gonna forget,” he snarls, hands back on Jason’s hips so he can force the
man to go faster, to let him push in harder, deeper. “Jay, please. Stop
teasing.”
Jason quirks a half-smile down at him and says, “As you wish, princess,” and
then he’s riding hard, slamming down on him with his eyes shut and his eyebrows
furrowed. He chews his bottom lip between his teeth, swallowing moans before
they can escape his throat. Tim watches him the best as he can, enraptured and
struggling to keep his eyes open. 
Every nerve ending in his lower body feels like it’s on fire, building to
engulf everything in an inferno. Tim digs his thumbs into Jason and holds on,
panting out wordless pleas as the flames rise, billowing out and up to lick at
his spine, the base of his neck. “Jay,” he breathes past the smoke swirling in
his head, in his lungs. Jason leans down and captures his mouth, slowing for a
moment for it as if unable to multitask. Tim’s skin crackles and sparks and he
slides his hands up Jason’s sides to the back of his neck, burying his fingers
in the black curls at the base. Tim nips at Jason’s mouth until it opens. Their
tongues slide together and Tim can’t stop the satisfied rumble in his chest or
the slow roll of his hips upward. Jason keens, small and vulnerable. Tim
thrusts a little harder, hands sliding back down to his hips.
“Timothy,” Jason whispers like a benediction, breath hot against his neck. Tim
holds Jason’s hips down so he can fuck upward as hard and fast as he can,
chasing the curl of flame higher until it overwhelms him and he bites the meat
of Jason’s shoulder, everything whiting out as he comes buried deep inside the
other man.
As he finds himself settled again in his body, the haze of sex and pollen
drifting away from where it had clung against his temples, Tim becomes aware of
two things: one, that Jason Peter Todd, second Robin and current Red Hood,
known murderer and asshole, is still sitting impaled on his cock. Two, Jason’s
hard, but stone-still, breathing 4-7-8 with his eyes closed. His eyelashes are
fluttering against his cheeks.
Tim reaches out and brushes his fingers against Jason’s abs, stroking the hair
just to the right of his jutting erection. Jason’s stomach trembles but doesn’t
respond otherwise, breathing pattern uninterrupted. Without the pollen giving
him singular focus, he’s not sure what to do, exactly. Why isn’t he moving? It
can’t be out of a sense of kindness for Tim’s recently-spent self. Jason
doesn’t care about him, and he’s so hard he’s leaking. How he’s keeping his
calm is anyone’s guess.
“Jason?” he says, and realizes he doesn’t know what else to say. He’s lying on
a scratchy blanket on a mattress on the floor of a cruddy downtown apartment,
balls-deep in someone he thought hated his guts. The other man is kind of
heavy, actually. Tim can’t really feel his thighs anymore. He squirms a little
and Jason continues impersonating a statue, and that’s it. Tim can’t handle
this. He starts laughing.
Jason cracks an eye open, raising one eyebrow and staring down at him like Tim
is misbehaving in synagogue and not lying there with his dick up a butt. He
laughs even harder, the air pulling out of his lungs squeaky and silent.
“What the fuck are you laughing about,” Jason grouses in a tight voice.
“What are we doing?” Tim cries between gasps. “What are you doing?”
Jason’s fingers, still on Tim’s sternum, curl a little, uncertain. “If you’re
lucid now, I can leave.” Tim shakes his head, grabs Jason’s wrist and drags the
hand to his face so he can nuzzle at it, laughter winding down into a giggle.
“You haven’t come,” Tim says against the callused palm.
Jason plucks his hand away from Tim’s lips and shakes his head. “I was just
helping you out. If it’s worked out of you, I’m leaving.” His voice is pinched,
labored. He’s not making eye contact, shifting his knees so he can lift himself
up. He gets about two inches up before Tim is coordinated enough to grab his
hips and push him back down roughly. His eyes screw shut and he cranes his face
toward the ceiling, muscles cording as he swallows a whimper. The rings of
muscle around Tim squeeze painfully tight around him.
“Oh,” Tim breathes. Getting hard for the third time in an hour is probably not
good for him, and it hurts as his body tries, but the good kind of hurt, like
the ache after a rigorous patrol. “I wanna…” He swallows, wets his lips, tries
again. “I want you to come.”
Jason peeks at him again, less an irate Jewish grandmother and more a
cautiously optimistic stray dog waiting to see if the offering of food is
legitimate. Tim pets the man’s thighs awkwardly and wishes he wasn’t so new at
this. The men in porn always seem to have a confidence in themselves that Tim
can’t even begin to grasp at now. “But, umm, maybe we switch positions?” He
tries to hold eye contact with Jason’s single open eye and it’s nearly
impossible. He closes his eyes and breathes deep instead, centering himself.
“My legs are asleep.”
“Well let go’a me and I can get off your damn legs,” Jason says without fire.
Tim pulls his hands away and doesn’t know where to put them; they land on
either side of his face against the pillow and he feels particularly vulnerable
as Jason lifts slow until Tim isn’t inside him anymore. Cum dribbles out of the
loose hole and down his thick, muscular thigh. Tim watches with rapt attention,
wishing he wasn’t too chickenshit to lap it up.
Jason apparently notices, because a dry raspy laugh curls out of him and he
says softly, “See something you like?”
There’s something genuine and connected about this moment between them, an
emotional intimacy that should take years of camaraderie to achieve and not
merely hours of drugged sex. Tim briefly wonders if this is all some kind of
crazy hallucination, courtesy of the pollen. “Don’t you hate me?” he asks, no
idea how he’s supposed to tell if this is real life.
“Yeah.” The smile accompanying his answer is crooked, affectionate, a little
bit cocky. Tim might be in love, he might have been in love this whole time and
purposefully ignored it to avoid the heartache of his Robin not feeling the
same way. “Hey,” Jason says, the smile dropping off his face to be replaced
with furrowed brows and a gentle hand against Tim’s jawline, “What’s up?”
Tim realizes, belatedly, that he’s crying. “Sorry,” he says for unfathomable
reasons. A blunt thumb wipes away a tear with surprising tenderness. “I don’t
know why I’m doing this.”
“Shh.” Lips follow his thumb, tiny kisses peppered over Tim’s cheeks. “Prob’ly
your hormones are confused. It’s okay, baby bird, I’m here.”
Tim can’t breathe. He covers Jason’s hand, still on his jaw, with his own,
fighting to get his lungs to accept the warm air swirling between them. Jason’s
pressed to his side, erection a hot slick line against Tim’s thigh, but he
stays still in a frankly insane display of self-control. Tim is wildly
uncertain, but aches with want, so different from the animalistic need driving
him before. This one squeezes his heart like a ripe fruit, its juices staining
his insides with sticky confusion.
“Will you…,” he starts, peering up at Jason between slitted eyes, like the man
won’t be able to see into him if less of his irises are visible, “if it’s
okay…”
Jason strokes Tim’s sweaty bangs out of his face patiently and says nothing,
waiting for the end to the question.
He squeezes his eyes shut again and lets it out before he can psyche himself
out of it. “I want you inside me.”
 
✧･:* ❀ *:･✧
 
Jason is not a good person. He has done nothing to deserve this kind of devoted
submission, least of all from someone he essentially just raped. The boy beside
him - a boy, not a man, barely legal by New Jersey standards and certainly not
by federal - gazes up at him with lidded blue eyes, cheeks still shining with
tears, timid but not afraid.
“No,” he murmurs, hoping that will be enough for the kid. Predictably, it’s
not.
“Please,” Tim breathes, tilting his head toward Jason’s palm again like a
kitten seeking out affection. “I want it.” He peeks at Jason through fingers,
smiling shyly with a tiny quirk of his lips.
“I’ll remind you, since you were high as fuck earlier, I don’t have any
condoms.” He doesn’t really have sex anymore. He’s too busy, doesn’t trust
anyone enough to bring them back to his safehouses, doesn’t really associate
the act with anything positive. He has very little sexual experience that
wasn’t for cash or coerced.
Tim seems to struggle with that, eyebrows pulling together in the kind of
focused deliberation only a Bat could wield. They smooth out after a moment,
but Tim hides his face in Jason’s palm again, voice hardly above a whisper, “I
don’t mind if you get me a little messy.”
Fuck.
“Have you even done this before?” Something about the coyness with which Tim
isn’t quite looking at him makes his inexperience so obvious.
“Um, no.” Tim isn’t even attempting to look at him anymore. His face is
pressing into Jason’s hand like if he tries hard enough it’ll swallow him
whole.
“...Had you ever had sex before?” Jason dreads the answer, but he has to know.
“Can I plead the fifth on that?” It’s a mutter, a little defensive, a little
desperate.
He’s going to vomit again. “Are you saying I took your virginity while you were
flying like a kite?”
“It's a possibility.”
Time stands still a moment before Jason manages to scramble his way to his
feet, edging toward the door like a skittish buck. He needs to go lock himself
in the bathroom again and dry-heave until the bile burns his throat. Tim makes
a confused, hurt kind of noise and reaches a hand out toward him. “Where are
you going?” And goddamn, the kid’s already at a point where Jason leaving feels
like a betrayal, the emotional need bleeding out of his voice like that. 
“I never should’ve brought you here,” Jason coughs, feeling unsteady, the
tendons in his legs taut like the rope at a gallows. 
“Jay  – ”
He doesn’t linger, doesn’t give himself a chance to memorize the broken,
defenseless look on Tim’s face. He doesn’t even close the bathroom door as he
slams to his knees in front of the toilet and retches with a violence that
hurts, wringing out his stomach uselessly.
He nearly leaps out of his skin when a small hand presses between his shoulder
blades. “Don’t touch me,” he snarls, but the hand remains, rubbing tiny circles
on his trapezius.
“Jason, it’s okay,” Tim murmurs, comforting him, his fucking victim is
comforting HIM. Jason retches into the toilet again, abdominal muscles
squeezing hard, as if turning carbon guilt into sharp-edged diamond
consequence. He spits out the small amount of yellow bile his body managed to
force out of him, shuddering through his whole body at the bitter tang that
clings to his mouth. Tim continues as if he wasn’t interrupted, as if Jason
isn’t trying to hork up his organs. “I liked it. I liked it a lot.”
“You weren’t right, and I took advantage, don’t you fucking tell me it was
okay.”
The laugh chuffs out of Tim, breath puffing against his bicep. Tim’s cheek
follows as he settles beside Jason on the bathroom floor and leans in. “We
dress up in dorky costumes to fight crime. Are any of us ever ‘right’?” The
little shit even does the ironic quotation marks, one hand still on his back,
so he feels it like little claws. “It was sweet. Not how I usually imagine it
happening.”
Jason clutches the edges of the toilet bowl. Maybe the porcelain will keep him
steady, root him back to earth and stop the spinning in his head. “How’s that?”
he croaks.
 “How I imagine you whisking me away and having your dirty way with me?” Tim’s
face is pressed to his arm, still so shy despite the filth Jason knows is about
to come out of his pouty, boyish mouth. Jason can’t muster an answer outside of
a shaky deep breath, but it doesn’t matter. Tim’s lips move against his skin
anyway, murmuring so softly Jason feels like he has to read the shapes of his
words through touch alone. “You’re never gentle. You snatch me up from a
rooftop and sling me over your shoulder like I weigh nothing at all.”
Jason wonders if he knows he’s stroking down his back, playing with feather-
soft fingertips over a knotted bullet scar just to the right of his spine. “I
fight back, of course, but you’re stronger. You’re so much stronger.” His
breath hitches, his mouth opening against muscle in a farce of a kiss. Jason
isn’t breathing at all, the air trapped in his lungs like molten glass,
scalding hot.
“Can we,” Tim starts, wetting his lips without moving away, and the slick of
his saliva shouldn’t be so sexy, “can we go back to the bed? It’s not very
comfortable here.”
“Didn’t sound to me like your fantasy was all that comfy, Replacement,” Jason
says despite himself, but he eases his death-grip off of the bowl.
Tim pulls back, indignant. “I want you to wreck my ass, not cold bathroom
tile.” He freezes with a small squeak, flushing a brilliant robin-breast red,
as if his own words were too salacious for him to hear.
“This a new thing, or..?” Jason’s pretty sure he tried to kill the kid just
last week. It’s a little hard to track time, though. Everything runs together
in a blur, spikes of viscous green rage interrupting the languid spill of
corruption and human filth that keeps on coming like some kind of conveyer belt
at a fucked up factory of atrocities.
Tim shakes his head, offers Jason a hand as he stands. Jason doesn’t take it;
he doesn’t need any help rising to his feet, and he’s not sure he should be
touching the boy right now. He needs to get his head on straight again, get the
little punk in some clothes and on his way. “No,” Tim huffs, following Jason
out of the bathroom so close he stumbles over Jason’s heels, “it’s been pretty
much as long as I’ve known you exist.”
“So, right around when I introduced myself with a knife at your throat, right.
You sure do have logical and healthy reactions to trauma, kid.”
“God, Jason, don’t be such an ass, it was way earlier than that. Right around
when you became Robin." 
He pauses and the boy slams into his back, but instead of recoiling he wraps
his arms around Jason’s waist and holds on. “Weren’t you like, ten?”
“Okay,” Tim says to his spine, “so I wasn’t having sexually explicit thoughts
immediately, but I definitely already had a crush.”
“At ten.” This whole conversation is surreal. Jason stares down at Tim’s hands
where they are wrapped around his torso.
“I was a precocious kid, okay? I already knew I was queer by kindergarten.”
Maybe if Jason wiggles a few fingers under Tim’s arm when he’s distracted,
he’ll let go without noticing.
“How’d you work that one out?” Jason asks, only half-listening as he tries to
loosen Tim’s hold on him. The kid is held fast, fingernails curling to bite
into his hips.
“Uh, watching Robin Hood, mostly.” Tim’s forehead presses tighter to Jason’s
back and he suppresses a shiver, focusing instead on the words. 
“What, the Disney movie?” He’d seen that one a few times in his childhood;
Lena, the prostitute that lived next door, used to get him bootlegs of stuff
whenever she could. Robin Hood as a character was a little too painful for him
to handle; the dream of stealing from the rich and helping the poor was an
obvious fantasy in his world, one that left him with a bitter taste in his
mouth even as an eight-year-old.

“That’s the one.”

“You’re aware he’s a fox.”

 “Yes. That’s not the point,” Tim says with a defensive tone that outmatches
the statement.
Jason snorts and cajoles, “You’re not one of those weird fuckers that gets off
on animal people, are you?”

“Can we please get back to my crush on you?” Finally, Tim lets go, stalking
toward the mattress without looking at him, and there’s really only one thing
that could mean.

“Oh my god, you are,” Jason chortles. He’s definitely saving this for future
blackmail material, or to whip out on Batman in a verbal spar to throw him off
guard so he can maybe land a punch in the bastard’s face.
Tim whirls on him and pokes a finger into his chest. “Jason! We are talking
about my enormous and storied infatuation with your dumb face right now!”
Jason smirks, advancing until Tim’s ankles hit the mattress and he stumbles and
falls. “Sorry, babe,” he says. “I don’t have a tail. I know that would be
ideal.”
“Screw you,” Tim says into the pillow, rolling over to hide himself.
“Been there, done that,” Jason snarks, suddenly super aware again of how naked
they both are. He shuffles over to the cardboard box that functions as his
dresser and digs out a pair of sweats and a t-shirt so he doesn’t feel so
exposed. “What’s your size, extra-extra-small?” 
“What?” Somehow, Tim’s already gotten his hair all tousled. Jason’s heart
squeezes; how the fuck could one person be so goddamn precious? How is this the
same kid that’s out kicking criminal ass every night? Instead of answering, he
holds up a shirt and raises an eyebrow. Tim flushes and ducks down into his
shoulders. “Uh, just small.”

 “Too bad,” Jason says a little roughly, tossing a random shirt in Tim’s
direction, “All’s I got are larges.”
Tim doesn’t put it on. Instead, he unfolds it and stares at the graphic. It was
in a roll, so Jason’s not sure what shirt it even is; it’s a black cotton tee
like pretty much every shirt he owns. What shirts does he even have stored
here? Fuck. 
“Why,” Tim says finally, turning the shirt around to face Jason, “do you have a
Sailor Moon shirt?”
“Are you seriously going to judge me over having a Sailor Moon shirt?” Jason
says. “Give it back, you’re not pure enough to wear it if you’re gonna make fun
of her.”
“No, no!” Tim says, scrambling to put it on. “I was just surprised. It’s
unexpected.”
“Fighting evil by moonlight? Winning love by daylight? Never running from a
real fight? She and I are real similar. I bet I’d rock the red sailor uniform.”
Tim grins. The shirt is so big it covers his lap. “Sounds like you should
switch careers. You clearly need to be a magical girl, no more of this drug
lord business.”
“Far as I remember,” Jason scoffs, “you don’t get paid much for saving the
world, but you sure as shit get paid protection money.” Somehow, Tim wearing
just the shirt feels more scandalous than leaving him naked. The shirt dwarfs
him, makes his age so much more obvious. He has a little smile on his face,
part wry, part fond. Jason wants to kiss it off of him.
He hates how much this evening has gotten away from him. 
“I don’t think there are any mahou shoujo anime where the girls get paid for
their work, but I could research it,” Tim says. “Or we could binge a bounty
hunter anime. Do you like Cowboy Bebop?”
“I… what now?” Jason blinks down at Tim, who has gotten comfortable in the
covers again. “I only understood like half of that. What the fuck is a Cowboy
Beep-bop? Better not be some furry bullshit you’re trying to foist on me.”
Tim gapes at him. “What the heck, how can you not know Cowboy Bebop?” He sits
back up, pointing an accusatory finger at Jason. “You don’t get a choice now.
We’re going to hole up this weekend and watch the entire first season.”

 Jason crosses his arms defensively. “What if I don’t wanna?”
Tim’s finger wilts and his expression gets sad, delving into puppy-dog
territory Jason was sure only Dick had mastered. “But it’s really good. You’d
love it, I promise.”
Jason hates, hates, hates being manipulated emotionally. He’d trained himself
into reacting to Dick’s begging face with anger, but this is different, the
plaintive gaze from Tim looks genuine. There’s something tentative resting
between them, some kind of truce. Tim offering him forgiveness for his attempts
on his life as long as Jason forgives him for taking his place when he was
gone.
He doesn’t like it. Robin should have died with him. But his beef is with
Bruce, not this strangely captivating boy with too little self-preservation
who’s made a nest in his bed. Who, despite everything, is offering a hand out
in friendship. Companionship? Jason successfully derailed Tim from telling him
all the dirty thoughts he starred in, but the knowledge that he’s apparently
number one in the boy’s spank bank still whispers at him from the corners of
his mind. It’s terrifying, having that kind of power. Tim implied he’d let him
do anything to him, and Jason isn’t sure he should ever be given that kind of
trust. He hasn’t earned it, and he sure as hell hasn’t done much to give Tim
any modicum of confidence that he wouldn’t crush it given the chance.
Blue eyes continue to gaze at him with less-than-patient anticipation. Blue
like a robin’s egg, or maybe clear skies; they’re not icy flint like Bruce’s or
mediterranean lagoon like Dick’s. They’re flight and birds, innocent, earnest.
“I guess,” Jason finally allows, “but you need to go home now.” He needs space
to think, to process this change. Right now he’s a caged tiger, suffocating in
this forced sharing of his territory. Sluggishly aware of how easily this boy
in front of him could be turned to prey, how SIMPLE it would be to take a knife
to his throat now. But there’s a twinge of anxiety at that idea now. He won’t
be able to raise a hand against this baby bird ever again. Fuck Bruce for
taking him in, for picking someone who so easily got under his skin. He wonders
if it’s deliberate, if Bruce somehow had planned far enough ahead to consider
this possibility.  
“I don’t have pants,” Tim points out. “My costume is ruined at the moment.” He
says it with such a flat tone, a logical tone, but his cheeks still burn pink.
“Then I’ll lend you a pair,” Jason promises, itching with emotional
claustrophobia. “You’re not staying here.”
Tim rolls his eyes and off the bed. “I’ll need a bag or something to carry my
Robin stuff.” 
“Yeah,” Jason says, already digging in his box-drawer for some pants that might
fit Tim. He pulls out one with drawstrings and hopes they’ll tie tight enough.
He shoves them at the boy and doesn’t spare him a second look, stalking out to
the entryway storage closet to grab a paper Target bag from his stash.
When he gets back to the bedroom he’s relieved to find Tim in the pajama pants,
pixie boots on and tucked underneath to be less conspicuous. Tim raises an eye
at the Target bag but goes into the bathroom, and Jason can hear how carelessly
he’s shoving everything into it. Alfred must go crazy over this kid’s
messiness.
Tim comes back out of the bathroom a moment later, holding a fancy-looking cell
phone in one hand and the target bag in the other. “Gimme your number so I can
text you later.”
“Are you gonna give it to B?” Jason hedges.
Tim gives him a look that’s all bitchy teenager. “What do you think?”
“Well, don’t.” Jason picks at a cuticle and rattles off the number, one for a
burner phone because like hell is he giving Tim primary contact information,
but it still makes him feel equal parts anxious and fluttery. “Do you need a
ride or something?”
“Nah,” Tim says with a little smile, “I called an Uber.” 
“No clue what that is,” Jason says, feeling stupidly like an old man. He’s only
nineteen or thereabouts; he shouldn’t feel this old yet.
Tim laughs and the sound curls deep in Jason’s chest and settles there. “I’ll
have to explain the twenty-first century to you sometime,” he says with a wink.
Jason is frozen as he walks toward him and stands on his tip-toes to plant a
sloppy kiss on him.  
Just as quickly, he’s opened the window and is crouching on the sill, offering
a jaunty salute before he flips out of the building with a cheerful, “See you
Saturday!” 
Jason refuses to look out the window, refuses to watch his replacement waltz
out of his neighborhood. He curls up on the bed and refuses to acknowledge the
smell of sex clinging to the blankets, refuses to think about how pretty the
boy looked laid out for him on the mattress.
The one thing he doesn’t feel guilty focusing on: he’s still going to kick
Ivy’s ass for this. Just as soon as he figures out how much of a favor he’s
gonna owe her, too.
End Notes
     Some headcanons present:
     1. Tim is Jewish on his Mom’s side. There’s some fandom theories on
     this given the vandalizing of Janet’s grave with swastikas at one
     point, and variety is the spice of life so Tim is Jewish in my little
     version of the DCU, at least culturally.
     2. I am not really sure where it came from, but my girlfriend and I
     joke that Tim is a furry. I’m sure there was some logical progression
     to this decision but it’s lost to the sands of time (and shit memory
     - thanks fibromyalgia!). At least one of the Batfam needs to be a
     furry, and Tim's the one who definitely had a sexual attachment to
     Batman and Robin, so it only makes sense it would be him. Also true
     story, every one of my furry friends had their gay furry awakening
     via Disney’s Robin Hood. He’s one sexy fox, I guess!
     3. Introduction via knife to the throat is probably referring to
     Hush, which I know isn’t actually Jason (in some continuities??? Who
     knows, comics), but holding Tim captive with a knife to his throat is
     SUCH a sexier post-death meet cute compared to the actual first
     encounter, which I think is when Jason was a weirdo and had the Robin
     suit on under his Red Hood suit and ranted at Tim for a good twenty
     minutes about him replacing him before fighting him dramatically?
     Idk, knifeplay is hot, dramatic speeches full of ugly bitchy
     jealousy, not so much.
     4. The Batfandom puts Jason into a rapist role way more than makes
     any sense?? It’s pretty well-established canon that Jason hates
     rapists and abusers. He’d rather kill himself than stoop that low.
     This fic is basically taking the way Jay/Tim pollen fics usually go
     and flipping that on its head, with more PTSD-angst and constipated
     teenage bat emotions for everyone.
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