Work Text:
The loud speaker overhead lets him know that he’s got another four stops, but he’s pretty sure they haven’t moved an inch in ten minutes.
Tim’s sitting on the train, attempting to get to the office on time despite the lack of sleep he got following a case the night before, and scrolling through the emails on his phone. At least Tam is less likely to kill him if he’s up to speed on his day when he finally starts it.
He’s groaning as his eyes catch on the subject line but it's around the same moment that the whole train car lurches forward. Tim is sure he’s gotten some looks from the people around him, but when have people ever chosen to look at him as though he were normal?
Annoyingly, Tim’s got another calendar appointment from Vlad Masters in his inbox. Tim could have sworn that he had set up an outlook ‘rule’ to automatically reject those but… Great. This one was a forward by a board member.
And it's going to be a whole day of meetings is what it looks like.
Whatever PR campaign that the DalvCo CEO had been running with his board members had been incredibly successful. Left and right Tim is having to dodge the guy’s invites and creepy insistence that they would get along great at whatever popular venue of the week.
Normally, Tim would send off his generic cancellation notice, polite but firm, but there appears to be no end in sight from this guy. Tim would have to tackle the problem head on, and actually tell him (in corporate HR approved speak) to fuck off in a way he might actually hear it.
The reality is that Tim is Red Robin, a trained detective, and he knows for a fact that mixing Wayne Enterprises with a single cent of DalvCo money would mean catastrophic failure. Tim hadn’t seen paper trails that messy since he was five years old and created a new identity to purchase cold medicine online. (It had worked though.)
Lots of important companies had come into contracts with the one and only Vlad Masters, and nearly all of them had dissipated into shells following their complete and total take over. Tim was well acquainted with hostile takeovers, he’d like to make such a move every now and then, and he was certainly not a fool.
His thumb hovers over the decline button for several moments, but finally, he hits accept. A 2 o’clock appointment appears on his calendar. Tim holds himself back from groaning, and he readies himself to get off the train. Standing up and pushing his way towards the door, Tim can tell that his work phone is vibrating with notifications, but they can wait until he has a cup of coffee and a larger screen in front of him.
Emerging to the top of the train station with minimal shoving by Gotham’s commuting population, the sprinkle of rain hits the top of his head like a premonition for the day. Being unprepared wouldn’t serve him well, umbrella or otherwise, and the thought stays in his mind another moment longer while he crosses the street.
Tim tries to shake the strange feeling, but as he walks into his office and past the security guards, it's like the silence has become pin drop. That was certainly… strange. Ugh. A new magic user or someone must be in town on Justice League business. Or a new villain. Gotham was built for tougher stuff, not a single staff member batted an eye at the goosebump manifesting sensation.
He gets to the elevator and begins pulling off his outer flannel jacket to replace it with the nice tailored suit jacket he’d stashed away in his backpack. He ran a hand through his hair and straightened a tie (also from his backpack, he had approximately four ready at any given time) around his neck.
The feeling of discomfort didn’t leave him as he rode the elevator up to his office on a mid-level floor and grinned nervously at Tam Fox. She was glaring at him and looked ready to chew his head off, a treatment he’d gotten many times for being late. Before he’d gotten the chance to offer a weak apology
“What did you do?” She all but hisses at him in a whispered tone.
“Uh? I took the train and it stalled between platforms for like-”
“Not that! Whatever you’ve been up to-” She fixed him a look that clearly meant Red Robin business related “- we’ve been having serious side effects.”
The lights flickered overhead, the room seemed to get colder, and it was as though Duke were fucking with the shadows.
…Strange.
“I haven’t done anything to deserve this.”
“I know this, and I love you.” She grits out, ire in her eyes, “But things got seriously creepy around here once we got the follow up email.”
“Follow up email? For the one Thomsen and Jerkens sent over?” Tim clarifies, pulling forward the name from the top of his inbox a few moments ago.
“No. The new one, from your acceptance of the 2 O’clock.” Tam rolls her eyes.
Tim pulls his lips into a straight line and marches past Tam into his office. She no doubt is rolling her eyes again, but Tim is starting up his laptop and signing into his many layers of encryption when he can smell coffee being brewed.
Opening his email, he immediately sees what she’s talking about.
“ Dear Mr. Tim Drake-Wayne,
It has come to our attention that you’ve accepted a meeting request from this account. On behalf of the entire Midwest, we advise that you, under no circumstances, come into contact with or speak to the CEO of DalvCo Vlad Masters. He is underhanded and utilizes untraceable tactics to procure deals. We have reason to believe you may be targeted in the next few days and hope that you are able to take steps for your own safety to avoid Vlad Masters at all costs.
Sincerely, 👑 "
Tim can’t help himself but burst out laughing. Tam returns to his office, and placing a steaming cup of coffee on his desk, gives him a look to let him know he’s on thin ice.
“Sorry, it’s just, what a great automatic email. Someone clearly fucking hates this guy and-”
Then Tim considers it for a moment.
“-and all of our board members would have received the same auto reply when booking time with him. God, I swear half of this board just needs to die already.” Tim muttered under his breath for that last thought but Tam caught it.
“Inheritance.” Tam deadpans.
“Death by minimal word count.” Tim chuckles in reply.
“Reply to the email, cancel the appointment or do something. I want this paranormal shit to stop.” Tam firmly replies as she stares him down, and Tim can’t exactly fault her. The office straight up looks like it’s been put through a ‘Exorcist’ filter.
Has the room gotten even colder?
Tim politely sends his correspondence.
“To those concerned in the Midwest,
This meeting is brief and informative in nature, please note that no deals are brokered over a single thirty minute window. However, we hear your concerns and will weigh them adequately in future conversations.
All the best,
Tim Drake-Wayne”
And after sending, he’d hoped for at least something to happen. However the sepia filter altering his perception of the room remained, and it didn’t appear to get any warmer. Tim took a sip from his mug, and the steaming hot cup had all but turned to ice.
Tim decided today was a good day to be a fan of iced coffee… and began promptly tracing back the origins of the email. Sure, it had been sent from Master’s official account, but that meant nothing. Tim didn’t exactly have Bat-tech on his vanilla-work laptop, but tracing this email would hardly require it.
He sets to work and is down to a few neighborhoods in a small Illinois town by the time Tam buzzes through his intercom that he’s late for his first meeting.
He’s down to a few specific houses by the time he’s logged in to that meeting, heard what the VP was saying about needing support in his region and delegated some funds to the team of the employee out on medical leave (as well as a bonus fund to that employee).
2TooFast2TooFine was the screen name… So it was clearly Tucker Foley. Software engineer with a degree from Northwestern in Chicago, working for his own start-up in a cybersecurity based PDA company. Huh.
Tim is in his third meeting of the day when he realizes that Mr. Foley likely wanted to be found as the source of the email. It had taken some effort, sure, and Tim was no normal detective when it came to cyber tracing, but it was an obvious and clear dead end. That typically didn’t happen unless it was requested.
“Tucker Foley,
Thank you for your recent correspondence.
All the best,
Tim Drake-Wayne”
The guy wanted to be found, so Tim was sure to let him know that he had been. It was checkers, not chess, but perhaps it would help with the haunting. Tam had sent him a chat message in their last virtual meeting that he needed to get it resolved.
Turns out, his email was a mistake.
“Tim, what the hell did you order?” Tam’s angry voice appeared over his intercom. It had been a minute so… Stretching his legs to walk into the front desk space she occupied, he could tell exactly what she meant.
The place was filled to the brim with boxes.
“Uh, I didn’t order anything to come to the office. Have you opened any-”
“Obviously I’ve opened some. They’re all empty.” She informed him, frustration obvious.
“Huh. Well, we should send out a notice to any relocating employees to come pick up boxes if they need them.” Tim reached for a solution as fast as his brain could allow but Tam clearly wasn’t having it.
“You need to reverse whatever you’ve done.”
“All I’ve done is actually show up to my meetings and manage my own emails for the first time in four days.” Tim deflects back.
“And for four days I didn’t have creepy vibes in the office or unending amounts of boxes showing up!”
“If I had a solution I would have done something already!”
“BEWARE!” An ominous, albeit enthusiastic, voice echoed through the hallways.
“That’s above my salary to deal with.” Tam says aloud in a snap, and marches back over to her desk. TIm follows behind her, ignoring the strange warning and stranger boxes.
“...So we send out the email about people picking up boxes if they need them and I move the meeting with Vlad Masters. Between those two actions, hopefully we can make some progress.” Tim grumbles the plan and Tam barely nods her head to acknowledge him.
The 2 O’clock becomes a Friday at 10am appointment.
Tim gives it a moment, and deciding that he can put more effort towards Tam’s quality of life balance, shortens the meeting to 15 minutes.
The strange horror like filter that stretches the shadow’s doesn’t budge an inch, but the boxes being collected by employees don’t reappear.
Great. Now it’s Friday’s problem, and therefore a Future version of Tim will need to deal with it. Tam seems to disagree with his methods, but she doesn’t add anything other than a few extra project specific meetings to his day, so she can’t be that mad at him.
____
It’s Friday at 9:43am that Tim realizes how much he hates his past self. And not even the version of him that had been so ruined by grief that attempted to clone his best friend. No, Tim hates his corporate past self. More than his cringe worthy middle school yearbook photos.
Tam has just let him know that the front entrance computers are all oozing green slime. This is also how Tim comes to learn that Vlad Masters has arrived on site and is refusing to follow security protocols.
Looking at his watch, it’s now 9:45am and the wealth of each second the vintage hands tick by tell him to put on his best Janet impression and get it over with. 30 minutes from now and he’ll never have to deal with this midwestern screwball ever again.
Still… When green ooze comes into play, it’s typically best to call in Jason.
He gives him a ring, and is sent to voicemail as predicted. Jason never answered his calls, but Tim knows that like anyone in this family will want to hear what he has to say in the message.
“ Hey, Green ooze stuff is happening at main campus right now. Seems like your cup of tea considering the place has been minorly haunted for the last week. I have a 10am but if you want to come by after that would be great .” is all Tim manages before making it to the elevator bay and letting himself down to the first floor.
Tam had been sending him angry eyes about this whole predicament, and he knows that since Monday she’s been in correspondence with Pru.
It’s 9:51am by the time that he makes eye contact with Vlad Masters, and the dude is as creepy as his emails. It also informs Tim that he definitely met this dude at a gala back in the day, and he definitely didn’t pass the vibe check then either.
“Hey Guys, this is Vlad Masters, he can come with me.” Tim approaches the Security Guards who are continuing to explain that no machinery was allowed in the building. “Vlad, it’s just a prototype you’re bringing up, correct?” Tim peers back at the man.
“Of course it is, these buffoons wouldn’t understand proprietary if it-” Vla’s voice is indignant and Tim thinks for a moment that he should be filming it for a Karen-style tik tok.
“We hire only the best at Wayne Enterprises Mr. Masters.” Tim cuts him off on behalf of his staff, “But why don’t you come with me, we only have a short window to talk after all.”
Walking away, he can see the guards give Vlad another once over, before getting out of the way. Vlad looks a little too prideful about walking past them- So Tim takes a turn from the elevator bay for a quick stop at the company coffee cart.
“They serve hot or iced coffee” Tim says over his shoulder, “And my assistant limits what I’m allowed to have in a day, so if you’ll excuse me, I’ll be drinking this in the elevator on our way up.”
Vlad is making a statement about the youth but Tim mostly filters it out, he’s grown used to these kinds of interactions. Green ooze and security issues aside, this is pretty typical of his interactions with other CEOs.
The diversion works, and Tim drinks the whole iced drink by the time they reach his mid level floor.
“Not the penthouse?” Vlad seems annoyed as he observes it.
“Rogues love to break in through the top floor.” Tim sighs, hating that he’s probably sharing this information with a rogue, “It gets annoying to pay height fee’s for window replacements.”
“A cost saving venture then, commendable but certainly not necessary for a corporation like Wayne Enterprises.” Vlad scoffs.
“We live within our means to maintain an endowment for the city.” Tim tilts his head towards the direction of his door, Tam is now standing at her desk and holding him a folder to take on his way in.
Once he’s behind his desk he peeks it open to read the small sticky note that says “ Jason called, he’s on his way. Mentioned having a hunch about VM.”
Tim holds back his sigh, and instead sharpens his look towards Vlad who has taken his seat across from Tim’s own. The man looks a bit perturbed.
“Have you operated within the midwest before?” He sounds like he holds a genuine curiosity.
“Either one of my last names will tell you that I’ve lived a very New England life.” Tim replies, “But if you’re curious about having met before, we have once. A gala in the winter oh, four or five years ago. I had much longer hair then.”
God he missed his long hair, it truly wasn’t fair that Dick could go back to a mullet but his friends roast him about being an e-boy if he tries the same.
“I see, well Timothy, I’m glad you’ve come to your senses about discussing how DalvCo can merge within the Wayne ecosystem-”
“It’s Drake-Wayne.” Tim cut him off as quickly as he heard the man say it, but Vlad seemed to want to ignore him.
“Hm?” He has that genuine creep look again.
“I do not go by Timothy.” Tim replied, cool but serious.
“Do you not?”
“No. And I have no ambitions to operate within the Midwest. Unless you are impeeding in Wayne Enterprise territory, I think you’d be better off summarizing your pitch.”
“The Drake’s never lived in the Midwest?”
“This is not a personal interview.” Tim was a second away from glaring.
“And I am not a reporter-”
“Excellent. So the purpose of the next 10 minutes that you have to discuss with me is what exactly?”
“- DalvCo is expanding its business and will need to merge with Wayne-”
“Denied. Now, what else did you have to discuss?” Tim didn’t wait to hear the end of his statement before denying him.
“You are not hearing me-” His voice rose, more aggressive this time and the walls seemed to shake. It almost looked as if his eyes were turning red.
“That’s because you’re discussing nonsense. Wayne Enterprises is a Gotham made and a Gotham serving company. Nothing will be changing about that fact for hundreds and hundreds of years to come.” Tim spoke clearly, and as if he were bored by the now very threatening look on Vlad’s face. But he knew that Bart confirmed Wayne Enterprises was still up and running in the future so, yeah, he was a little cocky about it.
“Your insolence is not appreciated Daniel-” The man seemed to spit out without much further thought.
“That’s not my name.” Tim replied and that seemed to set the man off, a wind flew through the small office from seemingly nowhere. Vlad seemed to be floating in his seat and his eyes were certainly glowing red at this point.
“Are you trying to do some kind of parlor trick?” Tim scoffs, showing his honest frustration for once, “Even Lex knows he needs to pull out full pyrotechnics to make a point to me.”
“You’re going to sign over Wayne Enterprises to DalvCo.” The man bit out, and Tim could tell he had fangs at this point.
“You are delusional.” Tim replied back as calmly and sincerely as possible. He had a suspicion that all his training against mind control with Martian Manhunter was coming in handy.
Vlad was about to say something else, but Tim made a show of checking his watch on his wrist, and then adding, “And you’re out of time. Please make your way out Mr. Masters, or I’ll have you escorted by Ms. Fox.”
In a blinding transformation, Vlad was now looking more like a vampire than a human and floating in the air as he yelled at Tim. Again, typically karen CEO language, no material that was really new.
Tim decided that he might as well grab his collapsible bo staff from its spot attached on the underside of his desk. Vlad was shouting at him still about the company so at least he hadn’t launched into any other villain like conversation (taking over the world stuff would mean needing to press the bat panic button and he really didn’t want to deal with Bruce today).
It helped that Jason then walked in and took a shot at the guy- Turns out that Vlad Masters can become immaterial and bullets fly through him.
“Mother fucker-” Jason yelled out but was silenced as Vlad rushed down… And then clearly attempted to take bodily possession of Jason.
The annoying part is that it was looking like he was going to be successful. Tim groaned, pulled out his emergency knock out dart (something he kept well supplied in his office) (he’d already used three of them). Just when Jason seemed to be taken over, Tim shot the dart and watched as Vlad took green eyed control of Jason.
“You don't seriously think that taking possession of my brother is going to broker you a deal.” Tim deadpanned.
“It might if I begin to walk him out your window.” Vlad’s voice coming out of Jason was… Weird. But also better than the modulator setting that Jason had on his helmet. Maybe a new modification could be made.
“Go for it, Jason’s survived worse.” Tim retorted. He still grabbed his bow staff and began to prepare himself for a fight.
Vlad was starting to monologue again but it was obvious that the dart was working, Jason was face first on his carpet in little under a minute.
Amazingly, the second Jason went under, the wind dissipated and the other weird environmental stuff ended.
Tim hadn’t left his desk and he didn’t really plan on it.
Hitting his intercom button, he called out to Tam.
“Hey, so Vlad possessed Jason a second ago. Got’m with a knock out dart but could you see if he has an emergency contact listed?” Tim asked.
“I’ll look into that now.” Tam cooly replied, not questioning anything Tim had to say at this point.
TIm decided that another email to the checkers-not-chess guy might be helpful. It took him a few moments of searching but eventually he found the email again.
“ Dear Tucker Foley,
Does Mr. Masters happen to have an emergency contact? He took bodily possession of a sibling of mine and I’ve rendered them unconscious. Please feel free to pass this on to whoever might be most inclined to exorcize him from my brother and from my office.
Thank you and best wishes,
Tim Drake Wayne.”
Tim sent off the email and promptly checked his stash of darts. He’d be able to keep his behemoth of a brother unconscious for another few hours at least.
Taking just enough time to drag Jason’s body behind his desk and reset the clutter that Vlad’s dramatic wind had made in the office, Tim then also let Tam know that he was ready for his 10:30 meeting.
“Mr. Peabody, welcome in, please excuse my brother napping behind me. You know how it can be with the missus.” Tim looked sorry while he implied that Jason was in the dog house with some non-existent wife. It wasn’t as if making up family members wasn’t Tim’s MO.
Peabody didn't say anything about it, and began to show Tim some of the budget predictions for the marketing department for the next three quarters. Finally, someone who wanted to do actual business!
His meeting then carried into another with a guy from their tech sales team, specifically the phone sector. Tim redrugged Jason. And then another with a sales guy from their tech team, specifically their gaming devices. Tim had a short lunch and watched a video Kon had sent him on Red Pandas. And then another finance guy about their newest philanthropy, and so on and so forth.
It wasn’t until 3:35 that Tim got a call over intercom from Tam that someone had come for Vlad.
This was great because Jason was starting to stir and Tim really didn’t want to use his last dart on him. He could, but then he’d be without any in the office and really that just a contingency away from a problem.
“ I’ll send him in now, and I’ll be grabbing you a cup of coffee.” Tam said it and it made Tim’s skin crawl. She would never ‘grab him a cup of coffee’, it's why they turned it into a code for something unexpected happening. But hadn’t the unexpected already occurred?
Tim braced himself for whoever was going to walk through the door, only to roll his eyes at the sight of a clone.
“Seriously?” Tim and the clone said simultaneously, neither looking amused.
“Hey man, I’m just here to pick up Vlad and go, I mean I’m sorry you’re finding out about being a clone this way but-” They guys voice wasn’t as gravelly as Tim’s own, but Tim had a scared neck to explain that much. Was this clone possibly a bit taller than him?
“You think I’m the clone?” Tim replied, probably a bit more loose than he should be.
“Uh, yeah, Vlad’s kind of obsessed with my Mom and I’ve got a ton of baby photos.” The guy rolled his eyes, but promptly had them back on Tim with an evaluating lens.
“I’ve got my own obsessed admirers, and also baby photos throughout the years. Are you sure you’re not the clone?” Tim questions back.
“I mean, yeah, like 100% sure, but this is too weird for it not to be another cloning scenario.” The not-clone-clone shrugs his shoulders, but now looks back at Jason who is starting to stir. Tim catches the use of another and puts a mental pin on it.
“Vlad possessed my sibling, you wouldn’t happen to know how to deal with that, would you?” Tim asks him and the guy looks annoyed again.
“Yeah, I got Vlad’s bullshit on lock. Didn’t you get the automatic email?” The clone scoffed.
“It was informative, but unfortunately you underestimate how obnoxious a company board of trustees are in my decision making. I’d put it off for as long as possible.” Tim admitted the truth, nothing really too informative about it.
“Right, sure. I mean, I don’t know how you found Tuck’s email but that helped, so I won’t roast you too badly.” The clone squatted down in front of Jason. What surprised Tim, was when his clone reached within his chest with his hand and pulled out a full sized thermos.
“Magic trick?” Tim proposed, not sure if his clones’ answer would be something Tim would need to meet with Constantine over.
“Death came with extra storage.” His clone nonchalantly adds, but pokes at Jason as he says so.
“Jason didn’t get extra storage space after his death.” Tim declared, offering one truth in equal exchange. It was risky, given that this was a clone, but something was strange about him in a way that was entirely unique. A strangeness you don't get in a test tube, or so Kon would say.
“Ugh, glad you said that, we’re going to need to get Vlad out the normal way then.” The clone sighed, “Any chance you can wake the big guy?”
“It’s less violent to just give the medication a minute to wear off.” Tim replies, “What’s your name?”
“Danny Fenton, well, the last name is changing but you can call me Danny.”
“Getting Married?” Tim inquired.
“Disowning my family.” Danny deadpans.
“Immediate or extended?”
“Parents. I also have a sister, but she’s changing her last name too. We’ll match each other… Your name is hyphenated.” Danny says the final point with intrigue.
“I was adopted by my mentor after both of my parents had passed.” There's no reason to lie about it, any tabloid article would fact check it, and it's not like he’s going to call Bruce his dad.
“That’s…cool.” Danny didn’t seem to know where to take the conversation, and Tim can’t really blame him.
“Had its moments. Vlad called me Daniel at some point, I guess he connected the dots before we were introduced.”
“This fricking fruitloop better have some answers.” Danny immediately exasperated, then nudged Jason with his foot. It seemed productive, Jason was now muttering louder and louder as he tried to regain consciousness.
“He pestered me about midwest operations and if my biological parents spent time in the midwest. I don’t think he’s going to try and claim ownership of my creation.” Tim shared and it looked like it gave Danny genuine pause.
“Well, one of us could be adopted.” Danny reasoned.
Tim sat in a moment of reflection. If this was a clone, how dangerous could the information be to share? If it was a sibling, how much would they benefit from hearing the truth? Did it really matter?
“My parents didn’t want to be parents. If they’d had twins, I wouldn’t put it past them to give away what they would see as a burden.” Tim decided to share. It felt like personal information to give, to admit such a weakness and speak ill of the dead but, it was true. Danny’s mouth flattened into a straight line, like he was considering the information more earnestly than he’d wanted to be.
Tim was familiar with the look via the photos his friends took when pranking him.
“My parents… Loved me. I had a happy childhood.” Danny sounded
“Madddddie-” Vlad’s voice erupted out of Jason.
“Thats… Good. I’m glad you had that.” Tim says but decides to back the conversation over to the original point, “You said Another cloning incident? So you know of other clones?”
“Vlad’s not a very ethical guy.” Danny seems to be waiting for said unethical man to appear any minute.
“He certainly would have the means.” Tim could remember seeing DalvCo in the stack of stock portfolios he’d looked at last week. “You didn’t die at the hand of your clone did you?”
“...No?” Danny looks uncomfortable, so Tim is probably not far off.
“It happened to a brother of mine, just thought I’d ask.”
“This big guy was cloned?” Danny was in a bit of disbelief.
“Different brother.” Tim shrugged.
“So you have one brother that died and came back from the dead, and another who was murdered by a clone.”
“He got better.” Tim adds and watches his clone/brother become completely flabbergasted.
“Shit, maybe we are brothers! Clearly dying isn’t part of our genetic code!” Danny laughs but the look of bewilderment doesn’t leave him.
“They’re adopted siblings but, yeah, it’s something our family just deals with then. Other families only get to have a favorite sports team to bond them.”
“I’ll root for any team other than the packers.”
“I’ll get you a jersey for the Gotham Knights before you leave-”
“YOU WON’T BE GOING ANYWHERE UNTIL I-” Vlad flew into the visual world again, his vampiric look crazed, and Jason seemingly back up and ready to fight. Danny threw and landed a punch in the middle of his threat.
Tim had seen Jason fall to melee assaults before- But typically those very rare situations were at the hand of Bane or other large arduous enemies. Not individuals that looked like himself but starved of the little nutrients he had.
But still, Jason his the floor loudly and suddenly Vlad is back in the room and trying to fight with Danny.
…Danny doesn’t look entirely human at this moment, his hair turning white at the temples and his eyes glowing a familiar green.
Lazarus water then. Death could only be escaped in so many ways, Tim should have figured his clones resurrection out earlier. Danny and Vlad were shouting at each other as they fought, ugly little snippets that almost sounded like a familial spat. Jason made it back onto his feet and had a look of unbridled anger in his eyes at the site.
Tim cleared his throat loudly and made a show of going to sit back down at his desk. It would help to have his bo staff, and he needed tensions to cool to make a full assessment (if it was even possible at this point).
“Is your clone in on this one or does he also need to go down?” Jason asks darkly, already cracking his knuckles and getting ready to jump in.
“Danny isn’t pa-” Tim starts but is cut off by Danny asking a pretty relatively important question,“Did you fucking clone me again?”
“That insolent child is no clone-” Vlad begins to insult.
“Great, glad that’s cleared up. You can both leave now.” Tim loudly announces to the room.
“You sure about that?” Jason questions while Vlad continues to sputter something.
“I’m going to ask you all to leave. You’ll need an appointment if you want any more of my time today.” Tim annunciates every word, leaving no room for interpretation.
“Come on Vlad, you heard him-” Danny states it simply enough but is still poised and ready for a fight. Tim see’s Danny reaching at his ribs again, grabbing the thermos once more while Vlad is fully posed looking at Tim.
“Timothy this company will be mine and you-” Vlad starts but he doesn’t get to finish, Danny’s already opened the strange thermos and Vlad is strangely pulled into it as though he had no mass. Its a strange sight, and Danny has a familiar look of annoyance shaping his features.
“...So you’re the clone then kid?” Jason asks. “Kind of fucked up if you’re already white haired.”
“I’m not a clone.” Danny replies, “Sorry you died, but seriously work on the attitude.”
“How the fuck do you know I died?”
“How the fuck was it so easy for Vlad to possess your spirit?” Danny fires back using a dumb tone, “Seriously not that hard to figure out.”
“I told him.” Tim sighed and Jason looked scandalized before turning on his clone in rage.
“Couldn’t let me have that could you.” Danny all but groaned, “But fine. I’m not the clone, he’s not the clone. I’m pretty sure that neither of us are going to give blood for a test-”
“So you’re just going to do… what exactly?”
“I mean, I live in illinois? So i’m going to head home?” Danny says it, like someone would tell a child that the sky is blue.
“You got here too fast to have come from illinois on a commercial flight.” Tim pauses to consider, even if he’d had a private plane… “How did you get here this quickly?”
“...Anyway my plan is just to go home, release Vlad on good behavior after a month or so of dissolving his unethical business contracts, and get back to my day job.” Danny deflects.
“What’s your day job?” Jason presses.
“ Aerospace Engineer.” Danny doesn’t hesitate to reply.
“Nature over Nurture.” Jason hums a little, turning to stare at Tim with his chin cradled by his index finger and thumb,”You were going to be a massive dork no matter where you grew up.”
“Right well, don’t try to impersonate me unless I pay you to do it, and uh, live a good life i guess.” Tim doesn’t mean to sound so dismissive, but clearly his clone is not interesting in uncovering their origin story at all. Tim’s going to look into it without his consent anyway, so whatever.
Maybe one day Tim will send him a dossier explaining how they came to be and some of the remaining Drake inheritance. (Not that much had remained, just that Tim was a particularly informed investor.)
“You’re cool with me just going then? I don’t need to like, sign, paperwork or anything?” Danny let his surprise be known.
“Are you Vlad’s Lawyer?”
“Obviously not.”
“Then the only thing you need to do is inform him that I’ll be collecting evidence and reporting him for financial crimes to the Bureau. See you around some time.” Tim dismisses him easily enough.
“...Right. See you around, uh, bye.” Danny hesitates, but shifting the thermos in his hands, he seems to agree.
Jason clearly had thoughts he wanted to share, but was waiting until Danny walked out the door, weird thermos once again tucked away within his ribs.
“Tam, can you get Danny a Gotham Knights Jersey before he leaves?” Tim calls over the intercom, and he knows that Tam is mentally telling him to eat shit. At least he can guarantee that she’ll follow through on their coded language.
The doors to his office are closed but he can hear Tam intercepting Danny and asking him to walk with her down to the company store for a moment. Once both voices retreat, Jason speaks up.
“So a mind controlling, body possessing vampire brought a clone into your office and demanded the short sale of Wayne Enterprises?” Jason summarizes.
“Sure is a Friday.” Tim replies nonchalantly, already typing away at his computer. “Working for the weekend, am I right.” he deadpans.
“So Tam is probably going to make sure he’s bugged, you're tracing him down in case he has half a brain though, right?”
“He gave me his full name, state, occupation and lots of other little funfacts. Not to mention I already know hes acquainted with Tucker Foley, from the same state and probably same home town. It won’t be hard.” Tim isn’t looking at Jason, feeling seconds away from the information he was actually searching for.
“No wonder you were ready to let him go so early.” Jason sounds skeptical, which is the most reasonable thing he could sound like at the moment.
“Yep.” Tim gives him nothing, honing in on his target.
“Gunna tell your clone boyfriend about your clone brother?” Jason asks.
A couple of silent seconds go by, and then Tim raises his eyebrows and lets out a breath.
“Gunna tell him I have a twin.”
“ What ?”
“Gotham Hospital records, I was born at the same time as another baby that had unlisted parents, presumably Danny. So I was born with a twin that was given away in a closed adoption, and it looks as though I just found the medical record.” Tim turns his monitor to Jason, who is now staring in complete disbelief.
“Bullshit you found this so quickly-”
“Like we haven’t all got back doors into the hospitals we were born in-” Tim starts to roll his eyes.
“No we don’t. WHy do you- How are you just seeing this now if you’ve had a back door then, huh genius?” Jason is still in disbelief buts its very simple to Tim.
“My parents didn’t want me. Why would they have kept me if they already had the opportunity to get rid of me?” Tim explained it.
“Just sadistic assholes then.” Jason sighed.
“Narcissists.” Tim shrugged, and began printing out the documents.
“Well, we can put daffodils on their graves and all but your twin just walked out the door without this information-”
“Tam is circling back around with him any minute now.”
“You think-”
“Tim, I think Danny left something in your office, may we come in?” Tam’s voice came over the intercom.
“Yep, it’s on the printer by the door.” Tim replies cooly, pressing the button and releasing it quickly after he says it.
Tam and a very confused Danny walk into the office, only he has a Gotham Knights jersey over his one arm and a Wayne Enterprises baseball cap on his head.
“Congrats, you’re my biological brother. I’ll be emailing you the details to your Drake trust fund once i get it set up.”
“...you don’t have my email.” Danny says it like that’s the weird part of this exchange.
“Won’t take that long to look up.” Tim shruggs.
“What, did you have like a backdoor into a hospital’s medical records somehow?”
“Its not that hard to do.” Tim defends himself once again on the matter.
Danny is reading whats in his hands, shuffling between a few of the pages with an intensity on his face that Tim thought looked very much like Janet’s own serious reading face.
“Your sister is also allowed to change her name to Drake, if you consider it at all, and I would be happy to make sure she also gets some inheritance.”
“...this is too weird.” Danny groans.
“I think the spiritual possession and manifestation of physical objects from nowhere were both weirder experiences personally.” Tim kind of deflects.
“Are we brothers?” Danny is making eye contact with him now, sincerity drowning out all other emotions.
“Are you offering?” is really Tim’s only question.
“I mean, I don’t like in Gotham and I don’t want to live in Gotham-” Danny starts but Tim snorts.
“You have access to something that lets you speed travel, and you already said that you live in Illinois. What’s a flight.”
“...You know, weirder shit has happened to me.” Danny nods his head.
“I’ve gained siblings in less abrupt situations.” Tim nods his head.
“You both are so fucking strange.” Jason pipes up for the first time since Danny re-entered the room.