I Would Totally Write This. Actually, I Think I Will. I'm Gonna Write This After Watching The Thing.

HI SO UM I CAME UP WITH AN AU…..

Tim: … I did what we’re told to do. I got an adult. The adult just didn’t listen. What else was I supposed to do Jason?

Jason and Tim are arguing, Jason brings up how Tim stole his mantle

Tim, yelling: I did what I was supposed to do!! I got an adult! It's not my fault the adult wouldn't help! I had to take matters into my own hands, I will not be shamed for that! If you want to be mad at someone? Don't be mad at me. Or Bruce. Or Alfred. You wanna be mad at someone? Be mad at Dick Grayson, because when I saw that Batman was falling apart at the seams, I went straight to him! I asked him to help, when Batman was going to tear Gotham apart, piece by piece, in his grief, I BEGGED Dick to help, and he said no, so I had to step up because otherwise no one would.

Jason, not angry anymore: Wh- Tim, you were, you were 13! It wasn't your job to fix a grown man, you didn't have to be the one to save him...

Tim: Then why didn't anyone help!!

Jason: Tim...

Tim: why didn't anyone help?

The horror Tim feels when Jack starts randomly showing up at the cave and helicoptering. Tim has vague recollections of having to constantly hide his phone when he was at boarding school because teachers would randomly pop in, talk to their phone, snap a picture, and leave again because of Jacks need to make sure his babies okay.

i know the fandom likes to make Jack out to be a terrible dad but i personally enjoy to imagine him as a man who's just not that smart, but tries his best.

Tim, like six years old, angry that he wasn't allowed desert before dinner: I hate you! I wish lived on my own and never saw you or Mommy again!

Jack, tearing up and booking flight tickets: Okay kiddo, love you.

Janet, giving birth: AAAAARGH. LOOK AT WHAT YOU'VE DONE TO ME, YOU COWARDLY BITCH. YOU'RE THE ONE WHO WANTS A BABY SO BAD, YOU SHOULD BE GIVING BIRTH!

Jack, tearing up and booking gender reassignment surgery: Okay darling, love you.

Nurse, glancing at his phone: You.. you know that surgery wont make you able to carry a child right?

Jack: Yes it will, it gives me a vagina!

Nurse: ...you know you need a uterus to actually carry the baby right?

Jack: What the fuck is a uterus? WAIT I CAN SEE THE BABYS HEAD OH MY GOSH JANET DEAR YOU'RE DOING SO WELL!

Tim, age 15: Dad, i'm glad you're trying to be better now but... Why did you and mom neglect me for so long?

Jack: You told us too! I wanted to raise you, i was a stay at home dad, but you said i was horrible and that you wanted to live on your own!

Tim: ...

Jack: Obviously that was irresponsible so we sent you to boarding school, but we only visited a few times a year to respect your boundaries. I would send you back, but I was in a coma so i'm allowed to be a little selfish and spend time with my baby.

Dick: Didn't your dad just wake up from a coma? And he's already got a girlfriend? No offense but-

Tim: My mom told him to.

Dick: Timmy, sometimes men lie-

Tim: No, literally, it was in her will. She literally told him that if she died first, he had to get a new partner, because she knew he'd die alone without her.

Dick: What...

Tim: Also, i was the one who chose Dana. She's great! Mom said I had to pick a blonde because yellow is his favourite colour.

Tim: Dad, why is the only picture of Mom you have framed one of her in a bikini? Do you not have any others?

Jack: I do, i have hundreds! But this was taken on the day she proposed to me! Well, i have more from that day, but they're not safe for little eyes.

Tim: Thats both the most romantic and disgusting thing i've ever heard.

Jack, puling out a picture of Janet sobbing and very obviously screaming: I have this picture of her on my bedside table though, its from when she found out she was pregnant with you! Two of the best days of my life!

I really want an AU where Cody dies trying to kill Vader because he thinks Vader killed Obi-wan (he knows without a doubt that Obi-wan Kenobi High General of the Republic and Jedi Council Member did not die on Utapau after all) and wakes up on Melida/Daan just in time to save Obi-wan in a fight and have a minor breakdown when he realizes this tiny jedi cadet is his General and also bleeding.

He also absolutely refuses to let the kid leave without him. He’s seconds from trying to claim Mandalorian adoption rights if Jinn fights him on it but he also doesn’t actually know Mandalorian adoption rights outside of the fact that they exist so they’re definitely a Hail Mary he isn’t willing to try until last second. 

Jinn wants him to leave and the Council lets him stay because “they think he is a rock for Padawan Kenobi to rely on while they investigate what has occurred.” Cody of course takes this to mean he should just do whatever his now tiny General wants and it begins with training him in half-a-dozen different forms of hand to hand and also ensuring he can shoot with at least the accuracy Cody expected from shinies. 

Jack wants to get him tested for better help. Janet says she doesn’t want their son put in a psych ward. In the end Janet wins when Tim smiles serenely and threatens to end Jack’s bloodline with him.

Good parents Janet and Jack Drake put Tim through those child safety courses where they teach kids how to protect themselves in case someone tries to kidnap them.

The issue is that Tim is a feral little gremlin of a child with a very strong understanding of public personas and knows to keep his feralness behind closed doors or where no one can see him. So in front of all the parents and instructors Tim keeps letting himself be too easily shoved into this car because he’s out in public and he’s supposed to be polite.

Jacks not having it. He’s not about to have his son shown up by little Suzy with the blond curly pigtails who screams like a banshee and kicks hard enough to end family lines.

“Tim,” he says pulling his 6/7 year old son to the side. “If you can go the rest of this session without letting them shove you in that car once, I will buy you whatever camera you want.”

“Plus accessories?”

“Anything you want.” Tim smiles in that oh so familiar way that swore chaos upon you and your kin and from where she was sitting Janet sighs, sending a text to their lawyer.

The next round is a free for all. Tim is cussing them out in Russians, then french, then possibly ancient Egyptian? (“who taught him how to cuss like that?” Jack asks while Janet hides turns her head to hide her smile). He’s punching, kicking, and there’s definitely biting involved. Somehow Tim managed to twist his way onto the instructors shoulders and has him in a child sized chokehold.

Needless to say, Tim gets that camera and then some. The Drakes happily pay for the instructors medical bill (just a mild sprain and a dislocated shoulder) and thank them for teaching their son the importance of not being kidnapped.

There’s a standing agreement between Jack and his son. Every time Tim avoids being kidnapped he gets some kind of new camera something. It’s to a point where Tim has a reputation in Gotham among the underworld as unkidnappable (not that it stopped people from trying).

Of course over the years Tim’s parents stuck him in multiple martial arts classes (on Tim’s request. This boy wants those camera’s) so more times than less he knocks out his assailants, takes a selfie with their unconscious bodies, and sends proof of avoidance to his parents alongside a link to whatever equipment he wanted.

This is all well and good until Tim becomes Robin. It shows up…I want to say three times that really stand out. The first time is with Ivy. Tim’s been hit with something that leaves him somewhat disoriented, but he’d trained for this. He’ll be fine. Ain’t no rogue getting him to a secondary location no siree. So he goes full feral mode and manages to knock out Ivy. To which he immediate pulls out his phone, takes a selfie, and sends it to his parents with a link because it’s habit and he might be concussed.

Within 24hrs the Drakes are standing at Bruce’s door with questions and also that new Camera lens Tim requested. Tim is hiding his face in his hands completely embarrassed because he does not remember sending his parents the selfie of him posing in full Robin gear with an unconscious Ivy behind him, but here we are. (The Drakes expect regular injury reports and also hash out a deal for Tim to stay at the manor whenever they have to travel. Also Tim’s grades have to stay up and he’s not allowed out during finals).

The second time is probably with the joker. There’s an Arkham breakout and Joker escapes and does manage to get Tim. The Bats are out in full force looking for him when a message pings in their group chat. It’s a selfie of Tim, looking worse for wear with a somewhat foggy look in his eyes, but theirs a feral smile in his face and a probably unconscious and not dead joker in the background.

“Talk shit get hit.” He’d messaged followed by a ping of his exact coordinates.

The most recent and most memorable happened post time stream shenanigans. Ra’s is a little too obsessed with Tim and Tim is just a little too sleep deprived to play along with the pseudo immortals mind games. When asked Tim will admit to remembering nothing, but the proof is in the family chat.

“Get good.” Followed by a selfie of Tim hugging what was probably a mug of coffee but behind him were at least 4 ninja’s and Ra’s Al Ghul himself slumped unconscious looking like they’d been attacked by a wild animal.

“Also I’m on a boat in the middle of Gotham Harbor can someone come pick me up plsssssss.”

Ra’s comes to Gotham for his heir. Mid-speech he squints at Damian(Danny) and goes ‘not my heir?’ With entire confusion. Danny responds with insult and lunges. Ra’s keeps alternating between names for the entire fight in an attempt to get assistance from Talia.

…he doesn’t get it lol

DPxDC Al Ghul Twins, Only Not Really

I have this vague idea that I might or might not turn into a fic, but it's been in my head for weeks now.

So Bad Ending with Fentons happens, after which Danny is traumatized beyond repair. Sam and Tucker find him, and for the lack of any other possible solutions, yeet him in the Zone and destroy the portal. Clockwork finds him, and Danny, desperate for a safe place, time to rest and heal, and afraid of becoming Dan, asks him for help. Clockwork obliges and tells him he will take care of everything and for Danny to sleep and not worry about anything.

"It's going to be okay," Clockwork tells him, "You will wake up, and all this will feel like a distant dream."

So Danny sleeps. The trick is, he doesn't sleep for a day or two - Clockwork, together with Frostbite and Nocturn, put him into something equivalent to medical coma. And then, Clockwork finds a dimension where no one's ever heard of Danny, Amity Park, GIW, and everything else, and he hides Danny in there.

Danny sleeps for three centuries, in depth of the mountains where no one can find or bother him. Yet, his mere presence in the world causes some ectoplasm to start accumulating around him - he is the Ghost King, after all.

He sleeps under Nanda Parbat.

When he wakes, his past life with Fentons really does feel distant and foggy. He remembers it, but it's like a childhood memory: the details have faded away, the faces have become blurry, and it doesn't hurt anymore. He doesn't forget anything, but it becomes... less important. Less meaningful.

But the first thing he feels just a few minutes after he wakes is a soul. A soul of a child, crying in pain, and its lifeless body being submerged into Danny's ectoplasm (Lazarus Pits have all come from Danny's excess ecto over the years of his sleep, so he can feel them and he can control them to an extent, albeit Ra's has really badly polluted them over the years).

Danny is a hero, that didn't change even after his very long sleep. So he tries to help, but in the process, he accidentally gets roped into the Pit, since a) it's corrupted ecto, b) he has zero ide what he's doing, c) he is the Ghost King and he might put more power in it than he intended, d) he just woke up, cut him some slack.

Talia, who put Damian's body into the Pit, is very damn surprised when two Damians emerge, and that's putting it lightly.

At least they are both very much alive.

Tim marches up to Ra’s demanding that ‘you tell me where MY Bat is or so help me I will CONSUME YOU! You stupid, fucking MT. DEW level monster!’

Monster!Tim Coraline AU Idea

This idea would not leave me alone.

It’s a cross between a meta!/magic!Tim au and a Coraline au.

Before I get into it, I feel like I should explain.  I was on a bit of an Eldritch!Batfamily and Cryptid!Batfamily kick.  Then I found a collection of supernatural Tim aus.  Then I stumbled across a Coraline au.  There’s probably also some inspiration in there from vampire au fics.

It didn’t really jell until the idea occurred to me of a scene where some frightened villain asks Tim “What kind of monster are you?” and Tim says “The hungry kind.”

...

The idea is that somewhere back along the way, Tim’s family tree includes some kind of supernatural creature which may or may not have been an eldritch entity.

The supernatural heritage allows Tim to acquire abilities from other entities he has defeated, and Gotham is absolutely full of the supernatural if you pay attention.

Of course, Tim’s power isn’t all sunshine and rainbows.  It actually comes packaged with some pretty nasty side effects.

One of those side effects is perpetual Hunger.  Tim is always Hungry.  There is no way to stop it.  He eats enough to stay healthy, but he still feels Hunger at all times.  Increasing his food intake will not help and will screw up his metabolism and cause him to need more for normal function.  If this was allowed to spiral out of control it could eventually reach a point where he was physically unable to eat the amount of food he needed to function and starved to death on a full stomach. 

Fixing it is stupid hard because this particular sort of magical inheritance is really fucking inconvenient.  And, of course, whatever is up with his biology also makes him insanely susceptible to addiction, so no coffee for him unless he wants caffeine withdrawal symptoms all the time for however long it takes to fix that.  The constant Hunger also makes it difficult to get enough sleep.  Have you ever tried to go to sleep on an empty stomach?  Not easy, was it?  Imagine that every night.

The Hunger is fairly central to the nature of the magic.  Whatever supernatural entity he’s descended from, it is the Hungry kind.  The ritual of defeating another supernatural entity, taking a bit of the defeated entity’s power, and incorporating it into himself serves as a sort of metaphorical devouring, (and metaphors matter more to magic than they do to normal biology).  That’s why he’s able to gain power and abilities from defeated foes. 

...

Tim’s relationship with his parents is complicated.  His supernatural heritage comes from his mother’s side of the family.  She did her best to teach him about it and how to cope with it, but a lot of knowledge was lost over the generations due to persecution forcing those like them into hiding more than once.  There may have been a few individuals who spiraled out of control and caused small-scale famines before losing their lives.  It only takes a few cases for people to decide that a specific category of people is simply not worth the risk of having around.  Janet always referred to herself and Tim (as well as anyone else sharing the condition) as “those afflicted with Gluttony.”  This is the closest they have to a name for the condition.

One of the important things Janet Drake teaches her son is to pursue his passions.  It is incredibly important for individuals like them to have things outside the self that they can draw satisfaction and fulfilment from, things that keep them going in the face of the relentless Hunger.  This is what leads Tim to his night-time photography of Gotham, and eventually to his fascination with the Bats. 

Janet’s passions are archeology and travel.  Unfortunately, traveling from dig site to dig site is not a particularly stable or safe environment to raise a child in.  She needs to do these things to remain in good health.  Without her external coping mechanisms, she could start spiraling.  If she starts spiraling, it might trigger her son to start spiraling too because children in their developmental years are delicate, and this type of hereditary magic is fucking inconvenient (there might be ways of managing things that make it easier to live with, but between the knowledge lost and the risks that come with experimentation, they don’t have much info on how anything works).  She comes home as much as she can without the risk of compromising both their health.

She also taught Tim how to calculate appropriate portion sizes based on nutritional data so as not to screw up his metabolism, and how to fix it if he does mess up.  She also stayed and managed the process the first time it happened because the process of returning the metabolism of one afflicted with Gluttony to normal after it’s gotten out of hand is difficult and unpleasant and Tim wasn’t old enough to handle it by himself.  The nanny that had overfed him hadn’t been malicious or unreasonable, she’d just been operating on the assumption that he had standard human biology.  It took months to get Tim healthy again.  It took several hefty bribes to keep things under wraps.  Janet doesn’t know if there are still people out there hunting their kind, but she’s not willing to risk it.

Janet may not know about the aspect of the family magic that lets them gain powers from defeating other entities.  It’s possible that she was holding off on explaining this until he was older and more ready for the responsibility of multiple superpowers.  It’s also possible that the knowledge got lost somewhere along the way and Janet didn’t discover it herself because she didn’t spend her childhood running around Gotham at night and was more the sort of person who would stay home and read when she had trouble sleeping.

...

Tim discovers his ability to gain abilities from defeating other supernatural things fairly early on.  The type of defeat can vary, but it has to be something of significance.  A fight will work for most, but there are other particular challenges that will work for specific cases.

The first things a young Tim is able to beat are these small things, invisible to most, that gain power from learning secrets.  What that power is used for, I couldn’t tell you.  They don’t seem to do much other than sneak around and learn secrets.  Tim doesn’t know if there’s a proper name for these things or not, but he calls them Secret Hunters.  They are absolutely everywhere in Gotham. 

Secret Hunters are invisible to most, but Tim is able to see them.  It might be because of his own supernatural nature, or it might be something else entirely.  If it’s hereditary it must have skipped his parents’ generation.  Neither of them seem to be able to see them.  Tim gains improved stealth and a sense for when something is hidden from catching Secret Hunters until they wise up and start avoiding him.  (Catching them works in place of a fight because secret hunters primarily operate on stealth and evasion.)

He can’t just magically know secrets, but he can tell when there is a secret.  (He still figured out Batman’s and Robin’s secret identities on his own merit.  The most this ability would have done is alert him to the fact that they had secret identities if that hadn’t already been obvious from the fact that they were wearing masks.)

He also gets various other abilities from other things he encounters while scrambling all over Gotham at night.  Nearly doesn’t get out of some of the scrapes he gets himself into.  He gains the ability to cut with his fingernails as if they were razors from something that nearly killed him.  He gains the ability to climb like a goat from a Jersey Devil.  Etc.

...

At some point, Tim is targeted by a beldam.  He doesn’t get the kind of warnings that Coraline does, but his ability to sense secrets lets him know that the Beldam is hiding something, and any child raised in any part of Gotham knows to be suspicious of things that seem too good to be true.  Tim doesn’t have a convenient seeing stone from the neighbor, but he does have the advantage of his own supernatural nature which the Beldam doesn’t know about.

Tim finds a button-eyed doll that looks like him after his parents leave on yet another trip, and thinks it’s a gift they meant to give him before leaving.  They do often bring interesting souvenirs.  It wouldn’t be at all unusual for them to find an artist who sews dolls to look like people and have one made based on pictures of him.  Later on, he discovers the key. 

This Beldam is older and more powerful than the one from Coraline.  She has more power and more past victims to work with, so she’s able to make a larger, more populated world. 

Oh by the way, I head-canon that the Other versions of people in the Other world are actually past victims of the Other Mother, remade and dressed up for whatever role she has them play.  The three ghosts were just the three most recent and not fully processed for use yet.  That’s why the Others are able to act against her sometimes (Other Wybie saving Coraline from the mirror, Other Father tossing the eye to Coraline) or say things she doesn’t want them too (Other Father says “so sharp you won’t feel a thing” and Other Mother kicks him under the table).

The Other Mother doesn’t know all that Tim knows, so the Other World has inconsistencies like Other Batman and Other Robin sitting across the table from Other Bruce and Other Jason.  She doesn’t know they’re the same people.  She just knows that they’re all important to Tim.  She also tries to tell him to “eat as much as he wants” when his real mother was the one to explain the dangers of attempting to eat to fullness for people with their condition.

There isn’t a cat to warn Tim but he doesn’t need it.  He can sense hidden intentions in everything, and he’s fully capable of uncovering the hidden secrets himself. 

Tim doesn’t have a cat, but he does have Other Robin, who might have been made from whatever remained of someone close to one of the people mirrored in the Other World made for Tim.  He doesn’t remember his life, but somehow he feels incredibly motivated to help a boy who cares dearly for whoever and is willing to let him know that they're living a good life out there in the real world.

Tim discovers the nature of the other world and sets out to free the souls trapped there.  He fights the Beldam will all the viciousness and desperation of someone who knows they’ve only got one shot.  He takes everything he can from this fight as he makes sure she won’t ever hurt anyone again.  He doesn’t stop until the beldam is well and truly dead.  Then he unravels Other Gotham and spills all of the souls out into the world where they can move on and rest.

This is how Tim learns to Sew.  He can’t make entire populated worlds like the beldam, but that’s mostly because he refuses to do what she did.  He can control things he’s made (though there’s limits on how much) and even see through buttons he’s sewn (onto cushions and such, he's not the Other Mother).  He also gets some minor illusory powers that let him make things look a bit brighter/nicer/cheerier than they are.  It takes quite some time before he’s comfortable with using these powers.  Trauma is a bitch like that.

Part of the reason this version of Tim was so desperate to do something about Batman losing it out of grief is because he already has Evil Batman trauma from Other Batman, and he doesn’t need that shit happening in real Gotham.

By this point Tim has a collection of powers that allow him to navigate the more dangerous parts of Gotham largely without fear.  Now he has to learn how to manage without using any that he isn’t one hundred percent certain he can sneak past Batman, which means he’ll have to divide his attention between learning from the training and not letting himself do things the supernatural way.  This is going to suck.

It does, in fact, suck.

Oh, it turns out some of the rogues are a bit supernatural.  He gains a bit of an intuitive understanding of the health of plants from Ivy.  He gains the ability to taste emotions from Scarecrow.  (Also, Johnathan Crane is a freaking weirdo, fear tastes like spoiled milk!)  The rogues with supernatural tendencies are freaking terrified of the new Robin because he always seems like he wants to freaking eat them.  The non-supernatural types don’t get it.

Eventually, Red hood breaks into Titan’s tower.  Tim, by this point, is very good at deciphering how supernatural entities work and is packing an extensive inventory of powers.  He realizes quickly that this is some kind of manipulative entity that feeds on rage and pain attached to an unwitting host.  When he realizes that the unknowing (and therefore unconsenting) host is Jason Todd, he tells the Lazarus Entity in no uncertain terms to give Jason back or perish.

Jason, who does not realize he has a malicious, mind-warping, supernatural parasite and believes there to be no one other than himself and Tim present, is understandably confused.

Tim decides that the Lazarus entity has had its chance and springs into action.

Jason is treated to the terrifying sight of just what Tim Drake is like when he’s not expending conscious effort on not being something out of a horror movie.  Suddenly he’s in the middle of a spider’s web and no matter how hard he tries to fight back everything around him is under the control of his opponent.  Furniture flies around on puppet strings.  Getting too close puts him in range of the freaking claws this kid apparently has!?  Trying to get away just leaves him caught in strings and the more he struggles the more entangled he becomes!  The new Robin is skittering and gliding around in a decidedly inhuman way. 

Jason honestly thinks he's going to die when he finds himself bound with Tim standing over him.  He passes out when Tim rips the Lazarus entity away from him and destroys it. 

Tim gains the ability to heal from defeating the Lazarus entity.

Jason is surprised and confused when he wakes up bundled in a handmade quilt with his head in Tim’s lap and a cool compress on his forehead, feeling sore but more well and whole than he has since before he died.

Jason later decides that his memories of the fight at Titans Tower must be some kind of weird fever dream caused by his body purging the last of the Lazarus Water from his system. It goes along with Tim's account of things.

According to Tim, Jason entered the tower, initiated a lock-down, and then collapsed on the floor. Then, Tim moved him closer to a wall where he was less likely to get stepped on than in the middle of the walkway and did his best to take care of him there because Jason was simply too large and heavy for him to carry all the way to the med bay by himself.

This is far more believable and less of a mind screw than what Jason remembers. Obviously this tiny, baby-faced kiddo who played nursemaid for a stranger who broke into the tower and now looks up at him with wide, starry eyes couldn't actually be the terrifying, predatory creature from the nightmare. It was all just a bad dream.

He's honestly glad he collapsed before he had time to do any harm. The poor kid will never have to know what Jason went there to do. Jason knows, though, and he'll do his damned best to make up for it. He may have flubbed first impressions, but he is going to be the best damn big brother that ever big brothered.

...

Tim might or might not go full on feral cryptid when Bruce is lost in the Timestream. I haven't decided. He will probably pick a fight with the Lazarus Pit much to the confusion and alarm of everyone around.

That’s all I’ve got so far.

Clone Wars: When the world ends

Fox watches as Coruscant burns, his men scrambling behind him as democracy falls to the dust. His hands tighten behind his back as he watches smoke rise from the Jedi Temple, a parallel to the smoke rising here in the Senate building.

The screams of Senators and screeching of speeders zooming by barely drowns out the cries that is clones and Jedi alike fighting off the protestors on the street.

Several Venators lift from the Jedi Temple, filled to the brim with younglings and clone cadets, guarded by at least two Jedi Masters and several Clone Commanders and Captains.

He stands amidst the Chancellor's office, his boss’ late body strewn across the floor. Anakin stares emptily at his friend's beheaded head and Fox wonders if he’s actually grieving the man or grieving himself.

Fox’ fingers clench around the comm that continues to relay the emergency alert across the GAR.

Thorn shouts evacuation orders in the background, grabbing Senators from the burning building.

Or at least the ones that he wants to help.

The Senators that have degraded his men and shouted insults and passed laws to make it harder for a clone to live, for a Jedi to stop fighting...

Well, when it's the end, what value do they hold to a clone who's loyalty is for their men and their Jedi?

Thorn turns his back, refusing his men the right to help them. He signals to Stone who open fires on them, pulling Padme and Bail towards the rescue speeders.

A chime echoes in the room, and Fox glances down to see it coming from his comm.

Marshall Commander Cody.

He answers.

"Where are you?" No greeting. No formalities.

Desperation coats his words and Fox wonders how much time they have left.

"We are on our way." Thorn has finished loading up the last of the speeders, while Thire runs back in to make sure no clones are left behind.

He comes back with only two shinies and Fox knows they are ready to evacuate the building.

"We don't have much longer. Our last ship is ready to deport. What's your ETA?"

Thorn waves them forward, jumping on to a speeder bike. He signs to Fox from below, and Fox answers. "T-minus 20 minutes.”

Anakin comes up next to him, his robotic hand creaking as it grips tight around the handle of his lightsaber.

"We will wait 25." Fox nods in acknowledgment, ready to hang up when Cody stops him. "Fox?" He stares down at Cody's concerned face. "We'll meet you here, right?"

Fox doesn't speak for a while, his eyes flicking up to the burning city around him. Anakin quietly snorts at the question and Fox can feel his gold eyes staring into the side of his temple.

"Yes," he lies. "Just look out for my armor." He hangs up before Cody can say anything more.

Thorn's armor is heavy on him, unfamiliar despite being the same size.

As he follows Anakin out of the office, red blade lighting the way, he can't help but wonder...

Are they the villains??

Tim, [pointing his staff at the human traffickers]: YOU ARE OUTGUNNED

Jason, [hyping him up]: WHAT?

Tim: OUTMANNED!

Jason: WHAT?!

Tim: OUTNUMBERED OUTPLANNED

Jason: PAY YOUR FUCKING TAXES!

Tim: PUT YOUR GUNS DOWN ON MY COMMAND

Jason: HAND EM OVER!!

Tim: THIS IS HAMILTON MY RIGHT HAND MAN!

Jason, [getting his guns out]: PWO PWO PWO PWO PWO-

Goons: *shaking* what the FUCK are Batman feeding his partners--