He’s right, they’ve never trained for something like that. Hell, she doesn’t really know what to say, or how to help. But she knows Dana wants to die, that much is obvious. “I…” she’s starting, and then running her fingers through her hair. “Tim, first things first, you can always ask for help. We’re family, we’re here for you, okay? Have you tried talking to her? I… I don’t want to… it just sounds like she doesn’t want to… you know… live. And maybe if you show that you’re there for her and maybe I can go over and talk to her. I can look into therapists and see what we can do to help her. There has to be something, right?” Her fingers are flying over the keys, already looking for several therapists and looking for any information she can about suicide.
All of a sudden, Tim feels his age. He feels seventeen, a teenager who’s just lost his only previously living parent, whose stepmother is just out of reach. And he doesn’t know what to do. He turns his eyes towards Babs again, imploring and a little lost. “I don’t know what to do.”
Her eyebrows are furrowing in concern and she’s frowning. “Are… what’s wrong?” She doesn’t know how to approach this, and she feels helpless and stupid, and she’s mad at herself, but she knows she has to be there for Tim.
Tim doesn’t answer for a long moment, frowning as he is and tapping his pen against the desk until that starts to get to him too and he twists his hands together instead. Breathe in. Out. Fine. Okay. He could do this. Except everything was not okay and he could not do this. Not alone. “I don’t know,” he eventually drags out, expression guarded as he glances across at her. “I’m not good at the--...inside stuff. If she was putting on a mask and seeking vengeance for his killer I could understand it but she’s just--...not. She won’t eat. What’m I supposed to do, tip her head back and hold her nose and drip soup down her throat? She’ll barely talk either, it’s so quiet, and I can’t stop thinking that someone’s gonna come in and hurt her when I’m not there and it’s making me check the perimeter more but that’s fine, or it’d be fine if I knew that she’d put up a fight or something. Babs, you’re probably the least questionable character I know, what do I do? I know...I shouldn’t have to ask for help but I don’t know what to do. We never trained for the total breakdown of a legal guardian.”
“Well, because you said that the things you enjoy are what make your life. I was just curious about the things you enjoyed, since mine is kind of boring,” she shrugged and then paused. “Although… I do occasionally sing karaoke. But nobody knows that about me; not even the people I’m closest to.”
“Well, I know about it now. I mean, I’m not gonna tell anybody though, I don’t think they’d believe me. Like that thing in Brooklyn Nine Nine where Captain Holt’s doing a hula hooping class and he tells Jake and then deletes the pictures because nobody’ll believe Jake if he tells them? But anyways, I think it’s less that our activities make our lives and more...they’re...what allow us to have a life. Like, less that they constitute our lives and more that they enable our lives, does that make sense? So your karaoke gives you the capacity for life-having.”
Tim’s bouncing his leg and tapping his pen against the textbook, chewing at his lower lip as she catches his attention, whence he looks up. “Uh. Yeah. No. I mean--” He’s hesitating, unwilling to admit that maybe he Doesn’t Quite Got This. “It’s...fine. It’s Dana. She’s not-- I don’t know. She’s not okay.”
She was getting through to him. She could feel it; the ache of grief in his chest for a loss for which he was uncertain of how he felt. Wanda offered him a small, sympathetic smile and simply sat next to him for a moment. She’d considered physical contact, but she felt it may cross a line. He was expressing his emotions in a manner he’d never done before. It was difficult not to be emotional as well; not as a result of her mutant ability, but because it reminded her so very much of Pietro. “I’m very sorry,” Wanda finally broke her silence.
Tim shook his head, lifting a hand to push the tear from his face. What would Bruce think? He was a grown person, he wasn’t a child, he wasn’t supposed to be crying. What would his dad think? Nothing much, if he was being honest. The man always had been the type to let the kid cry it out, until the kid just stopped trying. He’d stopped trying. He’d learned to control his feelings, he thought. He’d thought. People died all the time. He’d seen it before. Watched it happen even, in Gotham. And while it had been hard at first, he’d never shed a tear. What kind of hero was he trying to be if he reacted differently to his family being killed than to others being killed? “Don’t be sorry,” he murmured eventually. “You didn’t know him. You didn’t kill him.”
She tapped her pen against the table and then pointed it at him with a sunny smile on her face. “Exactly,” she replied, “excellent points, Mr. Drake. Mr. Ramon can suck it. So, because we know my life’s all about my work, is it too personal if I ask what yours is all about?”
Tim gnawed at his lip, frowning at his textbook without reading it. Eventually, he gave up, closing it over with a groan. What the heck was he supposed to do?
She frowned. This wasn’t what she meant at all. In order to demonstrate, Wanda dropped down to her knees at the site of the burial. She directed her eyes upward at Tim for a moment before focusing on the tombstone before her. “Hello, sir. I did not know you, but I can sense as though you passed suddenly. I’m very sorry to hear that; my parents were killed suddenly as well. They’re at peace, and I’m sure you are too, but your son needs to know this too.” She peered up at Tim and invited him to sit down with her.
Tim watched her as she knelt in front of his dead dad and started talking to the tombstone. It was a small, dignified stone, with just ‘Jack Drake - Father, Husband’ and his birth-death years inscribed on it. He’d never been a father to him. But that didn’t mean he wasn’t his dad. It was for that reason, and the sharp ache of loss in his chest, that he sat down too, cross-legged and with his knees pulled up to his chest. He put his chin on his knee. He closed his eyes for a long moment. He’d never learned to share his emotions, nor to even deal with them, and it was for that reason that he stayed silent as a tear slid down his cheek.
Wanda nodded. She understood the confusion which came with grief; the loss of her parents as well as the manifestation of her powers brought about a lot of mixed emotions. She glanced down at the small monument and then peered over at the young man next to her. “Maybe talk to him? Your true emotions may reveal themselves then,” she suggested.
“...My dad’s dead body is decomposing under the earth. It probably smells like rotting body by now. All that’s left of him is rotting skin cells and some phlegm probably. Maybe some hairs in his pillows. DNA doesn’t count. He’s dead.”
“Is not just a funeral,” Wanda replied, the grief practically palpable from this young man, “the point is to try to bring peace the last time you will be seeing them. You really feel disguising how you feel is the best way to do this?”
“Nothing, darling, I have others. Are you sure you’re alright? I can escort you home or somewhere you trust, if you’d like. To make sure you don’t… uh, run into another lamp post,” she says, with a smile.
tl;dr: Babs notices something strange at Tim’s apartment while he’s on patrol, and lets him know. It’s a robbery, and he tries to get home as fast as he can. It isn’t fast enough, and both Babs and Tim witness the death of his father, Babs through surveillance and Tim through being covered in his blood and being sad about it.
Babs takes a deep sip of her coffee, before skimming through her feeds once more. Just a quick check on everyone. She knows Tim and Dick are out Birbing, so she's just making sure things are good on the home front. She almost skips right past Tim's house, because everything should be fine, but wait, what was that? She's clicking back and her eyebrows are furrowing. That doesn't look normal. She's clicking around some more, checking different feeds and then she's clicking on her headset, connecting to Tim. "Timmy, hey, stop whatever you're doing and check out home, okay? You need directions for the quickest way back?"
Timmy crouches on the parapet of a rooftop, his cape billowing out behind him and his Red Robin cowl pulled down over his eyes as he surveys the city he's grown to call home. The curfew doesn't affect everybody. It should, but it doesn't, and the alleys are pulsing with crime and more crime. He's preparing to swing down to break up an assault but all of that goes out of his head as soon as Babs is talking in his ear and his heart skips a beat. "What is it?" he asks as his hand goes to the pouch in which he keeps his pho-- He doesn't have his phone. He must have forgotten it when he went out tonight. Crap. "Oracle, what's going on?" Red Robin straightens up, not committing to turning home yet, not with so much time left on his patrol.
Babs is already looking for the nearest police car, because she's not sure how this is going to go. Hopefully they'll get scared or something, but she's not sure. And it's just Tim's father at home, but she's sure the thugs already knew it. "Two guys entering through the front door. I don't think your father has noticed yet. But he will in just a few seconds. Tim, I'm going to notify the police, but you need to get over there. Now."
Timmy feels his heart sink to his toes as he stares at the assault going on in the alley, already bending his knees, preparing to get down there and break it up. But his breath catches in his throat and he's pretty sure Babs can hear it, and he's immediately running numbers, trying to calculate odds and probabilities as he turns. "I'm on my way. Do you have audio?" Red Robin abandons the assault and the streets as his feet carry him home, almost of their own accord.
Babs ' first reaction is to just automatically send a message to the station, but no, she can't do that, she has to act like it's normal. "Okay, and yes, I do." Well, now she does, but she's not going to give the audio to Tim, it'll just scare him." Remember to change quickly, okay? And I'm switching over while I'm calling the police. I'll just be a moment." And then she's switching the headset so she can call 911, acting like a concerned neighbor and rattling off the directions to them. She's watching the feed and switching back and forth between that and the police cars. And once that's done, she's switching back to Tim. "You'll get there before the police will. Just by a little bit," she informs Tim, her fingers anxiously tapping against the arm rest of her chair. God, she wishes she could do something other than just watch.
Timmy lets out a concerned noise, the anxiety that's been bubbling inside his throat and stomach for the whole day making his stomach churn and his throat burn. "What's going on? You called the police, what's going on? Dana has a work thing tonight, she won't be back, it's just Dad there. Ba-- Oracle?" He can see his apartment from here, albeit a speck in the distance and his eyes are scanning the streets, looking for someone, anything that might be an indicator of the goings on at his home.
Timmy joined the chat
Babs lets out a long breath. "I think it's a robbery, Tim. Or something, I hope it's just that. I hope they won't do anything stupid. I was hoping they'd get spooked but I can't really flicker the lights on and off or something. And the TV is on, but that's not scaring them." She's antsy and she's anxious and god, she hopes Tim can think of something. And that either one of them doesn't get hurt. She almost reaches out to Dick, but he's busy at the moment, she can hear it. This is not good.
Timmy swallows back the rising bile in the back of his throat, forces himself to see clearly as he ups the pace even though it's making his legs ache. It doesn't matter. This is New York. Gotham was worse, but this is Manhattan, and it's not as if they live in a penthouse. "Twelve percent. Twelve percent, right? That's not all that high. Only twelve percent of home invasions involve firearms. He'll be fine. Only seven percent end in violence. It'll be fine. It's just stuff, and they're not gonna find anything that links to you guys. It'll be okay. Twelve percent is a low probability. It's unlikely."
Babs lets out a small sound of agreement. "You're right." But she's not sure. She's checking the feeds again and swallowing. The guys are shoving things into bags already, and she feels so helpless. And she hates it. "Just a little bit further. You're going to make it," she encourages him, keeping diligent watch between all the feeds she has up right now.
Timmy is close enough to see his window. "I'm almost there." He's close enough to hear the sirens approaching from a distance. Not close enough to stop the gunshot. That one he hears. And he falters, crashing down on the rooftop across from his apartment block with an almighty thud before he scrambles back up to his feet, his breaths coming in short. "No, no no no no no nononononononononononononononononono..." He can't move fast enough. But he lands on the fire escape outside his bedroom window and lifts the window, rolling in. "Dad?!" There's noise outside his room, muffled yelling, the sound of retreating footsteps.
Babs is the one to witness the gunshot. And everything leading up to it. She's staring in shock, until she realizes that Tim's still in uniform. "You're still in uniform. Tim, your uniform!" She's speaking urgently into his ear, eyes still on the forms in the feed. And then she's checking on the police car, which is just a minute away. She realizes that she may need to call for an ambulance and she quickly switches off to do so, trying to remain calm.
Timmy 's fingers can't move fast enough as he strips off his uniform, throwing it unceremoniously in the closet as he stumbles over the pyjama pants he's yanking on. He's still wearing the ear piece, tiny and subtle, barely even detectable, as his feet pound the floor out into the hall, where-- "Dad!" He runs and he slides across the laminate floor on his knees, blood already pooled and soaking his pyjama pants as he puts his hands on his father, pulls his head up to look him in the eye and can't get a focus, shoves his hands over where the blood concentration's the highest, his breathing ragged and pulled as his eyes cast over his father. "Dad-- Dad, can you hear me?! Dad!!"
Babs feels tears welling up in her eyes and she can't look at the feeds anymore. Once the ambulence is on it's way, too, she's switching back to talk to Tim. "Help is on it's way, Tim," she says, softly, just as the police officers pull up. Or well, wrangling up the thieves while the other heads inside. "I'm sorry, Tim..." is all she can say, fingers gripping her arm rests tightly.
Timmy can't find a pulse. He can't find a pulse. What's the procedure for not being able to find a pulse in a shooting victim? It can't be CPR; that would involve removing pressure on the bullet wound. He can't remember. What's the procedure? He can't-- "I ca-- I can't find a pulse. Dad. Dad, you ca-- What do I do? What do I do?" Feet appear in the periphery of his vision and Tim looks up, covered in blood with his eyes wide open. It's the police officer. "He won't-- I can't find a pulse, I'm applying pressure but I can't find a pulse and I don't think he's breathing, can you-- My stepmom's working, I don't know-- The number's on the fridge, I-- He can't be-- No-- No! No!" He's screaming now, the police officer dragging him away from his dad as paramedics descend and block his view of him, and he's screaming, and he's kicking out to try and get back to his dad. He can't be... But he is. And Tim goes limp. He should have run faster.
She’s not convinced. She pulls a handkerchief from her reticule, offering it out to him. “Here, darling,” she says, before stepping closer. “And yes, even so, it does look like it hurts.”
“Tha’k oo ma’am,” Tim smiles sheepishly around all the blood dripping from his nostrils and takes the handkerchief, tipping his head back and shoving the handkerchief against it. “’Sokay, ‘do. Was readi’g. What do I owe you for the...?” He gestures at the bloody mass of fabric.
Kate is a bit slower than he is, just a bit, shooting an arrow so she can follow after him and then lands on the rooftop next to him. “See, I know short cuts, though.”
Tim groans from the sidewalk, blinking at the lamppost which he’s just assaulted with his face while reading his summer reading on his phone. He can taste the thick, coppery taste of blood dripping down his nose and into his mouth, and sticks his tongue out to catch it before it wrecks his shirt before realising it’d be a better idea to just...put his free hand over his face and cup it around his nose and just beneath it. Oh. She’s talking to him. “M’fide--” he gets out, muffled by blood and hand. “Noseb’eed.”
