I was re-reading this today and I noticed some mistakes, so I made some revisions. Added a few minor lines. Etc.

Obviously I don't own the characters.

There is a hand pushing the cowl back, and it is his hand, and the boy's cowl. The cowl itself is important; it pays homage without imitation, like the boy does. He calls this dark haired one a boy because it is convenient, but in fact, this one never really was a child.

Tim's wide eyes burn when exposed, wild blue pools set in a deep well of exhaustion . When he cards his hands through thick black hair, Tim moans, when he kisses Tim's dry lips part easily.

The rest of Tim's family can't see how broken their youngest has become. Or they see it and feel helpless against one as dark as this.

Uniforms part, scars are exposed.

The boys is riddled with scars. Ugly ridged scar tissue maps the history of his adolescence. Slade can read the brave stories of wars waged and battles fought in these lines. Fought proudly, like a soldier, like Slade himself would have. The boy's body is poetry, even when he only speaks in prose.

On the boys skin Slade can taste the salt of sweat, the copper of other peoples blood. His breath pants with the trace of carbon, of smoke and burning buildings, his discarded uniform still bears the distant scent of tear gas and gun powder. Slade's senses are overwhelmed with the violence contained within this one.

The kid cries out, but he never screams, Slade would do anything to hear that scream, but he knows he never will. Not with this one, not the prodigal.

When Red Robin reaches for the cowl, Slade knows it's over. The younger man holds it in his hands for a moment, contemplative. Slade sees in his bright blue eyes that he could call the kid back to bed, and the kid would come. That he could call the kid to his side and the kid would follow. When the cowl douses those bright blue fires, the moment has passed and another bird has flown from Slade's grasp.

"Why'd you come here tonight kid?" Slade asks, still lounged in the bed, sheet draped across him.

"I thought I needed a surrogate" Red Robin replied from the window sill before he slipped silently into the night.