#and Tim does sorta try and establish himself as a friend/mentor to Jay/Dami

[redrobin-detective]

It really confuses me how all the reviews on After Death are like “yeah you go Tim! Get out of there! Self care!” Like the complete opposite tone of what I was intending. I wrote when I was blisteringly hurt and angry after being ghosted not once but twice by my coworkers to present a project I’d worked hard on. I was mad and I wanted to write a tragedy to project that grief. 

Because that’s what I see that story as, a tragedy. I can’t read it over without feeling that grief and anger coming back. Tim is convinced he is unwanted and completely severs ties to the Batfam. In one sense it is better for him, lowering the stress and expectations but he directly states he would rather live alone than to only have half affection and that is... not a great state? Tim doesn’t do well by himself so in the short term it may be a relief its the start of what I predict to be a downward spiral of Tim flying solo without a net.

Bruce allows it because he thinks its what Tim wants, doesn’t really understand that he’s supposed to fight for his kids. He and Tim have always had a somewhat distant partnership, there always was some paper thin layer that prevented them from fully embracing as parent and child. Bruce is devastated, Tim is depressed and they let each other go bc they’re so similar they cant see the mutual cries for help.

Dick is not handling the situation well. He doesn’t cope well with loss and had been so busy with helping Dami and Jason that he let Tim slip out of his mind. Not to mention he’s still feeling the aftershocks of the Battle for the Cowl and was more than inclined to give Tim his space only to realize it was too much. Now once again he’s looking up and Tim is already gone and the bridge he always intended to build has turned into a chasm he can’t hope to cross.

Dami is feeling immense guilt, sorta correctly identifying his previous bad behavior as being responsible for driving Tim away. Distance has given Tim some clarity and he really does his best to soothe Damian but it’s not going to do much for Dami’s guilt. He drove his predecessor out of the family, had in fact become so comfortable with degrading and dismissing Tim that Dami is now questioning all of his forward progress in a way that’s really gonna haunt him.

And Jay, Jason is the only one with enough outside perspective to see this all coming. The other Bats are definitely resentful at Jason (and also Alf) for not bringing the issue up sooner even though it’s not up to them to tell the Bats to care for one of their own. Jason really does admire Tim for breaking away but will soon see the spiderweb of cracks its going to cause in the overall health of the family. He tries to establish a bond with Tim as a friend and not a brother until it becomes too awkward to ignore all the stuff that went down.

This is a Bad End AU, one written in anger and from an at the moment desire to cut off all the people I had worked so hard for with no reward. I’m glad people liked it and that people interpreted it well it’s just so fascinating to me because I just read it and feel such a heavy loss.