I knew it was over when the soundman said I wish we were still in June. [open]

[overlyprecocious]

Who: Tim Drake overlyprecocious + whoever else
What: July catch-all
When: July, maybe late June
Where: Descendant attic safehouse, Central City, maybe other places
Content Warnings: none yet



attic safehouse | open to those with access

Technically speaking, Tim doesn't need to be using the safehouse like he is, but Jason has a good thing going with a hideaway that (hopefully) the Alliance isn't aware of yet. It's nice to be able to visit and be somewhere that Fantastic's goons don't know about, which is why he's dropping in tonight. Once he does the basic stuff - in this case, making sure the area still looks secure, has a good supply of emergency food, and locating Sleeper's hidden chocolate stash so he can tuck away a few new bars with it - he settles in with his laptop to chill and definitely not doomscroll current news to see how much worse Fantastic's making the country lately.

Central City at Night, Bullying the Guards | open to anyone

Robin doesn't usually fly alone officially, and when he is on his own he's somewhat more likely to be in surveillance mode, not fighting. It's how he was taught back home, where Robin is almost always accompanied by Batman, Nightwing, and/or Batgirl, or working with the Team. He's not trained to be a solo act.

He just happens to be one tonight, when he finds some of Fantastic's guards hassling some kid who may or may not even be Starfallen, who even knows? Robin's not letting that stand, regardless. And the good news is, their power dampeners barely affect him, given that his abilities are barely combative in nature and he's used to fighting powerless. So one moment, they're being assholes with a little taste of power, and the next, they're getting their asses kicked by a fourteen-year-old with a bo staff.

"Just wondering, did you read about the goons following fascist ideologies as a kid and think, that's gonna be me?"

Comments

[demigoth]

“Okay.”

Nico’s quiet for a moment. Then he elbows Tim in the side. “Stop being dumb. People like you. You’re pretty cool, even if you want to be a cat.”

[overlyprecocious]

“It was just an interesting experience! I didn’t want to be a cat forever! And it was temporary!”

He’s never living that down, is he.

[demigoth]

“My stepmother turned me into a dandelion. It was not an interesting experience.”

Sorry not sorry, Tim. Nico likes being a humanoid.

[overlyprecocious]

Blink.

Blink blink.

“How did you - were you still conscious?”

How does that even work?!

[demigoth]

Nico shrugs. These things happen sometimes. “Not the same way as normal. I felt sunny and leafy. It sucked.”

[overlyprecocious]

“That’s… awful?” It’s hard to conceptualize, honestly, but he gets that it was bad for Nico. “I don’t know, being a cat was kinda neat. But I’d also heard about it happening so I knew I wasn’t going to be stuck like that.”

[demigoth]

That earns a chuckle, and Nico shakes his head. “I wouldn’t call it awful? It’s normal in -

“Okay, maybe it’s not normal in my world, but it’s within the spectrum of normal for demigods. Triptolemus turned me into a corn plant and I dreamed about popcorn.”

He only ever tells the fun stories, on the rare occasions he talks about home. “You shouldn’t waste awful on being temporarily flora. What would you call the really bad stuff if you did?”

[overlyprecocious]

"Terrible? Horrifying? Trauma-inducing? I bet I could think of some more synonyms."

It's still really hard to conceptualize being turned into a plant, though that does track with what he knows of Greek mythology.

[demigoth]

“Those sound pretty awful to me.” Get it? Nico plays it straight, for a joke.

[overlyprecocious]

"Atrocious, even," says Dick Grayson's protégé. He can fire back puns and synonyms all day, Nico.

[demigoth]

“I still say it wasn’t awful, and I’m the one who turned into a plant.”

There’s worse things that they can do to you. “They turned me back. The gods are like that, if they’re not really angry.”

[overlyprecocious]

"Still sucks."

Parents can be hard to predict, but Tim absolutely cannot imagine what it would be like if Jack and Janet had the ability to turn him into plantlife on top of everything else. Nightmare material.

[demigoth]

“Yeah, it does.” Nico won’t argue that it sucks, but there doesn’t seem much to say about it. “So why are you here? I know he said you can, but I’ve never seen you here. Is everything okay?”

[overlyprecocious]

"Yeah, I'm okay. I just like to check it out every now and then. Plus, it's nice to get space from Dick sometimes? The apartment's pretty small."

It was a difficult enough adjustment going from living in his parents' properties basically alone to Wayne Manor with people paying attention to him. The apartment is even more of an adjustment.

[demigoth]

“I guess?” As much as Nico claims to like solitude, he misses bunking in the Hermes cabin and having people around consistently. Having Will around made the situation brighter for a few months.

“I think Hazel and me would stick together if she was here, but you don’t go around waking up hungry monsters so it’s different.” Tim is normal, and Nico’s a little jealous of that. Tim never has to start a sentence with ‘So then we got chased into a construction zone by indestructible cows.’ He came over because the apartment is small. No automatons. No mummies spewing quests.

Tim gets to be bored. What’s that like.

[overlyprecocious]

"My parents aren't really around much, so I was used to mostly having home to myself. It's still kinda weird to me to have people around, even when the place is bigger."

Like the Wayne Manor. Big enough that it's easy to find space if you need it. (#richkidproblems)

[demigoth]

That's normal, for the kids at camp. If they're lucky, they have a parent like Sally Jackson, who lets them live at home 9 months of the year and makes badass cookies.

"Are they musicians? Do they go on tour?" Like Will's mom. That's the only mortal example he has of a parent not being around much. His life only has a bird's eye view of normal so it looks like most other kids, even teenagers, have parents in the vicinity. "I have the cabin to myself most of the time at Camp Halfblood."

[overlyprecocious]

"They're archeologists. And they have a company, even if they mostly have other people run it. So they're really busy, and they spend most of the year at dig sites."

It's very normal, as far as Tim's concerned, even if other people (the Waynes) seem to think otherwise.

[demigoth]

"If your parents show up, I'm avoiding them," Nico says with a snicker. Oh, man. Archaeologists? And all the places that Nico's seen? They'd have a million questions. "I might accidentally slip and tell them where the Athena Parthenos is."

[overlyprecocious]

The face he makes at the idea of Jack and Janet showing up here is… interesting, definitely. Very much horrified. The face he makes at the idea of Jack and Janet showing up here is… interesting, definitely. Very much horrified.

(What if they did? How would he even handle that?!)

“I hope they wouldn’t,” he blurts out without thinking about it.

[demigoth]

Something is very clearly wrong, and Nico blinks a few times. He'd thought that it was something with his normal home here that was wrong, but Tim had reassured him.

Yet here he is, looking extremely worried about them showing up. Nico doesn't have a corollary for it. His dad is too powerful to get brought here, he thinks, and his mom... Nico would prefer alive and in danger to dead. He wouldn't mind more demigod kids around, but that's not the same as normal archaelogist parents.

"Because you want them somewhere safe?" The question is surprisingly gentle, because worried isn't really the right word for the look on Tim's face. It's more... scared.

[overlyprecocious]

Nico is kindly offering him a good excuse for why his reaction to the idea of his parents showing up was so strong, and he grasps at it gratefully. “Yeah. I mean, they don’t even stay in Gotham long enough to really be used to its weirdness. Here would be… bad.”

[demigoth]

Yeah, that doesn’t sit right with Nico. “But they leave you in Gotham with the weirdness with Jason and Dick?”

Families are supposed to stick together. When they can’t, okay, that can happen sometimes, but archaeologists have money, don’t they? From selling to museums and collectors. They can afford to bring Tim. And they’re adults and his parents, so it’s not like when Bianca left Nico… “Why would they do that?”

[overlyprecocious]

Tim takes a breath. Lets it out.

"Well, they have a lot of important stuff to do. And it wouldn't really be a good idea to be dragging a kid along on all their digs. It's not like I could help them."

It's just practical.

[demigoth]

Nico has a sense that Tim could use a hug. He knows that kind of breath, like a softer way of gritting your teeth and squaring your shoulders.

But to have to do that when he’s talking about his parents. When they’re alive and not gods that barely acknowledge their kids. “You’re their kid. That’s the important stuff to do. They’re not 3000 year old gods with hundreds of kids. You aren’t being attacked by monsters and putting them in danger. You’re quiet and you don’t take up space. Why shouldn’t you go?”

He’s bad at hugs, so. Words.