thegoshdarn | (no subject)

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smol tim is smol

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Ever since Tim worked out (a) worked out Batman and Robin's identity and (b) realized that she could sneak out of the house at night without anyone noticing, she has a system. She keeps a bag packed with her camera, a bottle of water, and some snacks in case she gets hungry, and she has a set of dark-colored clothes, a nice warm jacket and shoes with a lot of grip for running around Gotham. When she gets to go out depends on who's at home with her that night. Tonight is really easy, because her parents are in the city but at a big party, and usually they go right to bed when they get home without checking on her.

She's gotten really good at analyzing patrol patterns based on current crime rates and past patrol routes. Bruce Wayne is supposed to be at the party tonight, so she heads to one of the most likely places Robin is going to go to tonight.

It's colder than she expected tonight, but that's okay. Tim finds herself a snug, semi-hidden place on a fire escape and settles in with her legs pulled up to her chest for warmth. All she has to do now is wait.

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She shrugs. "I can go on my own." Robin has important things to do! More important than taking her places.

"Would it be okay if I came with you?" he asks gently "I wouldn't want anything to happen to you on the way..."

She blinks at him, like she either isn't sure what could possibly happen to her on the way or just isn't used to people insisting on going places with her.

Or maybe it's just that he's Robin and really, there are more important things for him to do than to follow some kid around. "Um. Okay. If you want."

"Of course! Hey, got to make sure my biggest fan is safe, right?" it's not that she's actually said she's a fan, but given that she's been following them around taking pictures he assumes that's the reason.

Straightening up, he holds out a hand to her "You ready to go?"

After she carefully tucks her camera way, she takes his hand. "Okay."

Home, apparently, is one of the more upscale neighborhoods of Gotham. She leads him to a nice-looking townhouse where, judging from the lack of lights on, no one's home. Or at least, no one's waiting up for her.

"Is anybody home?" he frowns, looking over the unlit windows, wondering if she'd been left home alone. It was clear at the very least she'd been left poorly supervised, and that was bad enough.

"Uh-uh." She hadn't expected them back for a few hours, at least. There's plenty of time, since Robin made her go home early.

She digs the house key out of her pocket. "I'll be okay on my own now."

"Before you go... Do you get to come out and take pictures a lot? Do your parents ever know?" he asks thoughtfully, he knows he's seen her a few times now, he can't help but wonder how often she's left so unattended. He didn't really believe there was actually someone in there.

When in doubt: mumble. "...no...?"

Is he going to tell them? She's not sure what they'd do if they knew.

He hesitates, not sure how to proceed. He wants to push more, get more information and find out just how neglected she is. She seems perfectly well-adjusted but he still can't help but worry.

"...Tim, I'm really worried you're going to get hurt, and if you're out and about and you get hurt your parents aren't going to know about it, so it's really dangerous," he explains to her, as seriously as possible, "If I promise to come visit you, can you promise not to come looking for us again?" This way, he could keep an eye on her situation.

She glances down at her camera. On the one hand, if she promises not to go looking for them, she won't get to take pictures. But Robin might come visit her, at least a couple times, if he remembers.

And she's not sure she can say no to him, cause. Robin. "...okay." But she doesn't sound happy about it.

(And then if he forgets, she could go out again. Conditional promises.)

"I'll swing by and visit you next week, okay?" he says, holding out his little finger to her "Pinky promise?"

He toys with the idea of giving her something, but there's very little he carries that isn't a weapon of some kind, and he doesn't want to give her anything that might be studied, just in case she really isn't just doing this for fun.

After a moment's thinking about it, he grins.

"And we can take a picture together before you go, okay?"

She holds out her pinky for him. "Pinky promise."

And then. AND THEN. Something behind her eyes might have just exploded with glee. "Okay!"

He links their pinky fingers together for the promise and then shuffles round so he's closer to her, wrapping an arm around her shoulders.

"Okay, you want to take it?"

"Okay." It won't be as good as her usuals because she can't see, but she beams for the camera.

This one is going with her first picture of Dick, definitely. "Thank you."

He leans in close so the camera definitely gets them both, flashing a grin.

"You are welcome. I'll see you soon, okay?" he gives her a quick hug before letting her go, staying to watch until she gets inside.

True to her word, Tim doesn't go out looking for Batman and Robin. But, that doesn't mean she abandons her photography trips entirely. There isn't much for her to do when school's not in session, after all. Her parents are theoretically home, but most of the time, they don't really spend much time with her and get irritated when she interrupts them.

But Gotham provides a lot of opportunities for a tiny photographer, which is how she stumbles on the plan of the Cluemaster's, completely by accident. (Well. Mostly by accident. She might have followed a little bit when she recognized him.) He meets with a couple other guys, and she maybe kind of hides within earshot to find out what they're planning. And she might record the conversation.

Once she figures she's heard enough, she tries to sneak away. Or. She would, if it weren't for the fact that she hears the tell-tale sounds of a certain crimefighting duo enter the area, at which point she huddles up even tighter in her hiding place because nope nope nope not going out now.

The fight is unexpectedly quick, the bad guys seem more inclined to run away rather than actually fight, which is not completely rare but still a little unusual, and once it's over there's a brief discussion about what else they might be planning - until Dick spots a familiar huddled figure and frowns, making excuses with Batman about looking for clues (and hopefully it'll keep the older man busy for long enough that he can find out why Tim's actually here, but he has to admit that before long the jig will probably be up). Once Bruce has moved off, Dick heads over to Tim's hiding spot.

"I thought we had a deal?"

She lets out a little eep sound before uncurling from her protective huddle. "I wasn't looking for you! I just went out to take pictures!"

After a moment she offers up her camera for him to look at. In her defense, most of the last few days' worth of pictures are of pretty ordinary daytime Gotham sights. (Still no adults recurring in the pictures that could be a guardian accompanying her.) But the last few tell a brief story of Tim following the Cluemaster for a block or two, and the most recent file is video. He's going to want to look at that one.

"That's still dangerous, Tim," he says softly, even though he had to admit she hadn't actually broken the terms of their agreement. He takes the camera and flicks through the pictures as he speaks "Especially if you're going out on your own, you could..." he trails off on finding the video, glancing up at her before hitting play.

He watches a few seconds of it and then realises this is too important to keep avoiding spilling their little secret.

"...Batman? You should probably come see this..." he calls

She curls up again. Can she hide? Is it possible to make herself disappear with the power of her mind?

Cause. Batman.

"I thought it would help," she mumbles. "Um. To record it. I was gonna give it to you later."

When Batman came over, it was obvious for a moment that he thought Dick was talking about Tim's presence, which is probably why he frowned particularly deeply when Dick practically ignored Tim and pushed the camera towards him. Dick tried to look innocent for as long as possible, but Batman clearly wasn't having it.

Bruce lifted a hand, beckoning Dick to follow him, before turning and stalking a little way away. Wincing, Dick followed him and there was an obvious whispered argument happening. Neither of them raised their voices enough for Tim to catch anything of what they're saying, but it was clear that Dick was in a lot of trouble. He waved the camera at Batman insistently, trying to get him to focus on the important thing, and finally the older man took it and watched the video. A few minutes later, Dick returned and crouched down in front of Tim.

"Hey...so... you really can't come out and do this anymore, okay? And Batman wants to know a bit more information so he can check up on you, because we're worried about you..." and he knows she probably doesn't want to get her parents in trouble, but there isn't really any avoiding it now "but the video is really good, okay, and it's really helpful, so we're pleased with that."

She helped them? She helped them!

Unfortunately, the excitement over helping Batman and Robin is pretty short-lived because (a) Batman doesn't want her going out anymore, and (B) her parents. "I could just go home? I won't be, um, in the way anymore."

"It's not about getting in the way," he tells her as gently as possible "It's about you, remember? We don't want you to get hurt... " he also can't deny he's a little glad Bruce is going to get her parents looked into, because she is out and about far too often for them to be looking after her properly.

"Okay," she says, a little doubtfully.

But when Batman comes over to talk to her, she cooperates and even lets him borrow her camera for the evidence on it. He ends up sending Robin back to the Cave with it and taking Tim home personally so he can have a Chat with Jack and Janet Drake about keeping an eye on their daughter and not letting her wander around Gotham unaccompanied. For the moment, he leaves it at that, with the intent to see how Mr. and Mrs. Drake change their parenting. (Maybe dig into things a little more, if he doesn't like what he sees.)

After he leaves, Tim is treated to a lecture on Not Embarrassing The Family because Batman, Batman had to come to their house to deal with her, and really, they thought Tim was better, more mature than that.

Since they can't afford to keep an eye on her every second of the day but think it's kind of ridiculous to hire a nanny to do it for them when she's right there, they compromise by locking her in her room when they're not with her. (As something of an afterthought, they inform her that it's a Grounding and she has Lost Their Trust, but Tim's kind of worried about that. She's never been Grounded before, but in books and things there was usually a set time limit on it, and this seems to be more of an indefinite arrangement.)

It's not that bad. She has an adjoining bathroom, and there's lots of books and toys and a computer with lots of child-lock controls on it that she can use for a set amount of time. She misses her camera, but there isn't really a lot she could take pictures of in her room, anyway. Plus, she goes places with her parents a couple times for meetings so that's kind of neat, even if they're kind of annoyed they have to bring her along and it's really, really boring.

At least her windows aren't locked, partly because it didn't occur to her parents that she could try to climb out them and partly because there's not a lot of ways a kid her age without any tools could get out through them without breaking something. She was having trouble sleeping tonight, so she opened one of them a little to let in some air and decided to read one of her books until she gets sleepy.