AUTHOR'S NOTE: This takes place in the same universe as The Worst Things In Life, and is set chronologically after. I recommend reading that story first, but it's not exactly necessary. There are a few references to it, though, so for a better reading experience you should read that first.

Tim was struggling.

Not that that was any surprise, but it was crucial not to be struggling at that very moment, so he struggled against his struggling.

He stopped on the rooftop to catch his breath. In front of him, Batman's shadow was already two buildings away. Tim clutched his ribs, bruised from the earlier fight with Killer Croc.

He'd said he was okay, and he was. It was just getting rather difficult to catch up.

"Robin?" Batman's voice growled into his ear. "Are you alright?"

"Fine!" Show no weakness. "I'm fine, Br- Batman. I'll catch up soon."

He tried to clear his mind about how the other Robins would have caught up fine, and continued to run across the red brick tiles. In his slightly dazed state, however, he caught his foot on a loose rock and tripped.

Now, tripping on a rooftop was definitely not the best idea, but he was so close to the edge already and the air whipped his face and-

"Whoa there!"

Tim caught his breath and clung on to the arm that had gripped his cape. He practically attacked the man that had saved him.

"Rob," Nightwing laughed, "you really have gotten stronger."

"Dick! Oh, I mean, Nightwing!" Tim buried his face in his predecessor's shoulder.

"It's good to see you too," Dick said lightly.

Slowly, he drew Robin away from the edge. "You're injured."

"It's nothing, it's just-"

"That's not going to work on me." Dick flicked Tim on the forehead. "You never have anything to prove, Tim. You never will."

"I know, but-"

"Robin?" The comm flared to life. "Robin, come in. Where are you?"

"Um..." Robin didn't have time to say anything else before Nightwing gently removed the piece from his ear.

"Hey, Bruce," he said into the comm.

A few choking sounds were the only reply.

"Don't mind if I borrow Robin for a bit, do you?"

"Dick, I-"

"Okay, thanks, bye!"

Nightwing quickly turned the piece off and returned it to Tim. Nobody had ever really told him what had happened between the first Robin and his mentor, but it was like a vacuum, sucking everything into the silence between. He wondered, not for the first time, how nearly a decade of partnership crumbled so easily.

Someone must have screwed up. Big time.

"You need to 'borrow me'?" Tim inquired.

Dick grinned. "Don't worry, baby bird, it's nothing terrible. Just wanted to spend time with you."

"Really?" Tim looked at Nightwing, fully. He had grown taller since Tim had last seen him, and it looked like he was attempting to grow a mullet. (Tim was ambivalent about that.) On his back he wore a rucksack, and a sudden hope seized Tim like a stroke.

"Are you... are you coming back?" he half-whispered hopefully.

The twitch of Dick's mouth alone was enough for Tim to know the answer. "Tim," he started, like he always did, "there's just so much to do at Blud-"

"It's okay, I didn't- I didn't think so." He desperately tried to change the subject. "You have- you have something for us to do?"

Dick's face suddenly lit up. "Right! I do! C'mon, Tim, let's go to the highest building in Gotham!"

"Why?"

"You'll see."

Tim's heart ached slightly at the thought that, at the end of whatever this was, he'd have to say goodbye again. But for now, he supposed, he'd have to pretend that he wasn't leaving.

But boy would he have some explaining to do with Bruce.

"Please don't tell me this is what I think it is."

Dick ignored him and continued setting up. Tim folded his arms, wind whipping about his hair. He shuddered slightly and clutched at his cape.

"Are you cold?" Dick asked, pausing from his work.

"Don't- don't change the subject!" Robin exhaled. "Why on earth are we picnicking on the top of Wayne Enterprises?!"

"Because I'm hungry, Timmy! And Alfred tells me you never eat enough!"

"Well, Alfred's wro... Alfred's..." Tim sighed. All of the Batfamily knew that Alfred being wrong was simply an impossibility. And if you did manage to utter such a thing, there was no guarantee that you would live through the night.

"Then sit," Dick coaxed. "You like chicken sandwiches, right?"

Robin sucked in his lower lip. He briefly imagined Batman swooping in to witness the sight of them eating a picnic on the top of his building, but he pushed it out of his mind.

He sat down on the blanket, which to his amusement was decorated with the Robin symbol.

"Just how much merchandise do you have?" he asked, fingering the threads with his gloves.

"As much as I can get," Dick replied. "Funnily enough, Robin is really popular with the kids."

Tim cocked his head and wondered briefly what it must have been like for Dick to take on the mantle. To forge your own identity, instead of being thrust onto a path where the golden standard and the cautionary tale had already trampled.

"Cookie?" Dick offered him a chocolate chip treat.

"I'm not really that hungry."

"Please?"

"Dick, I-" Tim was cut off by the sudden motion of the cookie being stuffed into his mouth.

"Mmmmhhh!" He chewed quickly, trying to keep from choking.

Dick smiled pleasantly, as if he hadn't almost killed him. "How is it? I know it's nowhere near as good as Alfred's, but-"

"It's fine," Tim coughed, as soon as he had forced it down his throat. "Just, next time, don't shove it in my mouth?"

"If you had eaten it willingly I wouldn't have had to," Dick pointed out.

Tim sighed and took a sandwich, absentmindedly nibbling on it. Below the streets were flooded with streetlights, yet somehow it still managed to be dark and frightening.

All the little children lost in the dark...

"Like the view?"

Tim startled. "What? Y-yeah. It's... something."

"Jason loved going high places." Tim's shoulders tensed at the mention of the name. "I guess, living on the streets, you never got to go up and fly. I wanted to show him that Gotham doesn't look ugly, not all the time..."

"Do you miss him?"

"What?"

Tim folded his hands in his lap and stared down at them. "Do you miss Jason?"

"Timmy," Dick laughed chokedly, "Jay's still alive."

"I mean... do you miss him as Robin?"

Dick turned his head to look at the opposite building. "What, you mean, before the warehouse?" Then, quietly, "of course I miss him. I miss it when he loved laughter, instead of hated it. When he wasn't afraid to do or say anything because before death was a child's nightmare. I miss... him."

There was a sudden scuffing sound behind Tim, like a shoe had nearly fallen off the roof. Both their heads turned immediately.

Jason gulped, freezing like a deer caught in headlights.

He raised a hand. "Hi."

Before anyone drew any conclusions, Jason was absolutely not following his replacement around, not at all.

He'd simply- coincidentally- had the same patrol route as Batman and Robin. And when Robin lagged behind, well- Jason was never that fast to begin with either.

And if he had heard the news of the Joker breaking out of Arkham, he would certainly not have had a table flipped over in extreme anger, or three hundred tubs of ice cream consumed. And he absolutely would not have followed Robin because of warehouses and crowbars and bombs and such.

And when Nightwing showed up, all blue and black and all, he did not follow them because he wanted to see his older brother and wanted to hug him or cry or do something sappy.

No, because all of this was just a big, huge coincidence.

"Jason!" Dick exclaimed, surprised, but then his face split into a wide grin. "Come on! Sit!"

"Whoa, actually, I was just leaving-"

"You were?" Dick raised an eyebrow. "And here I thought you made yourself known because you wanted to spend time with us!"

"Pshhhh." He totally did not do that. "I totally did not do that."

Dick pouted. "You have to sit with us," he pleaded, "or else I will tell the Bludhaven P.D that you were responsible for the drug smuggling, and get that picture of you at Steph's birthday party for the wanted posters."

"Seriously?!"

"And I'll say your name is Shaniqua Romano."

Jason threw his hands in the air. "Okay! Fine! What the hell, Dick!"

He grumbled and sat down on the blanket- Robins, seriously?- and clicked his guns onto safety. He never knew when he'd shoot one of the people sitting on the blanket.

Speaking of shooting people...

"Hi," a soft voice called to him.

Jason swallowed, trying hard not to respond. He could accept wanting to spend time with Nightwing, but Robin? Absolutely not.

Even if Robin had been the only one to visit him at Arkham, the only one to realise that maybe locking your family up in prison wasn't what was 'best for them'. Tim knew that. Dick learned that.

But, of course, Bruce was being his stubborn mule self and didn't bother to look in his direction.

"...Hi," he said begrudgingly.

Tim smiled slightly, and Jason's heart hurt all of a sudden. Stupid heart.

"Hey, Timmy, did I tell you how Jay got arrested?"

"No," Tim said curiously. "He got arrested?..."

"I'm right here," Jason growled. "I have guns."

Dick winked. "Another time, then."

Maybe it was strange- Jason really didn't know- that the first time he'd felt normal in ages was sitting on a rooftop having a picnic with his replacement and his predecessor. The first time he hadn't felt dead, but felt like there was actually a chance at living again.

And somehow he knew that if before the Lazarus Pit they had told him that there would be just one moment like this, then he would've dived in, and it would have made all the pain and the blood worth it.

And it did.

"You're cold," Jason remarked, as Tim sneezed beside him.

"I'm not," Robin insisted. "Robin doesn't get cold."

Dick and Jason exchanged glances. Did insecurity issues come with the costume?

Jason shook his head and took off his jacket. It was a bit cold without it, sure, but he'd managed. He'd been to hell and back- he'd be damned if he couldn't take off a jacket in a mildly cold night and give it to someone who hadn't deserved everything else he'd gotten.

Tim's mask lenses widened. "No, Jason, really I'm not-"

"Put it on or I'll force it onto you," he threatened.

Tim muttered something under his breath about brothers and forcing and choking before taking the jacket reluctantly. There were a few awkward moments when Tim couldn't put on the jacket because of the cape, and Dick had to help him but he only succeeded in somehow pulling the cape over Tim's head. Lots of flailing and two tugs later, Tim had finally put on the jacket. The sleeves were too long and flapped about in the wind.

"Looks good on you," Jason quipped.

"Really?" There was an honest admiration to his voice that made Jason smile. "You should take it back. You'll get cold."

"Robin doesn't get cold," he rebutted, because he was Robin and though the Joker had tried to make him something else he'd always be, at least a part of him, Robin.

Looking up, Jason met Dick's eyes. Dick was smiling broadly, and Jason finally understood that Dick really had wanted to help him.

Maybe some people did actually care.

"...I'd better get back to the Batcave," Tim said slowly. "Bruce is probably wondering where I am."

He started to take off the jacket when Jason stopped him. "Keep it. I have spares," he added when he saw Tim's incredulous face. "Besides, tell me how the old man reacts to you wearing that thing."

"Okay," Tim said, smiling.

"Leaving so soon?" Dick sighed. "Guess I'm gonna have to stick around to see you more often, then."

"Y-you are?"

"Batman can throw himself down another well if he tries to stop me," Nightwing grinned.

Robin threw his arms around Nightwing, and Nightwing pulled Red Hood into it, and Jason wished they could stay there forever.

Maybe recruiting every orphan and stray child you found on the street wasn't so bad after all.

Besides, he'd be lying if he said he wanted it any other way.

"Alfred?"

"Yes, Master Wayne?"

Bruce returned from the shower, hair still dripping (to Alfred's only too obvious disapproval).

"Did Tim come in yet?"

Alfred nodded to the Batcomputer. "I believe you will find Master Timothy sleeping in his usual place. Shall I bring the blankets?"

"No, Alfred, I've got it," Bruce dismissed.

In his hand he held the communicator. He stared at it, remembering the conversation (if it could be called that at all) with Nightwing.

Dick... he hadn't seen him in ages.

Creeping down softly, he looked down at Tim's sleeping face. He smiled slightly, removing Robin's mask carefully. He started to remove the cape when a flash of brown startled him.

His breath hitched. It was Jason's- Red Hood's- jacket. Bruce stepped back, steadying his breathing. When it came to Jason, there was never enough room to breathe.

All of his sons (they were always his sons) were so close, almost in arm's reach. Yet he'd always let them slip away.

He draped a blanket over Tim's shoulder and sighed. At least they were coming together, finding each other, and maybe one day they wouldn't even need Bruce anymore. After all, things could be worse.

He could have had four children.

And there we go! I hope you enjoyed the story, and if you did, don't forget to like/follow/review! I really enjoy writing these, and I will probably make another story in this universe. By the way, I'm not sure in the comics when exactly Jason Todd was locked up in Arkham, but for the purposes of this universe let's say during Tim's tenure as Robin.

Thanks for reading!