@aspectorofthemoon ; starter call
‘ stay hidden , tim . be patient , tim . we’re sorry , tim . ’
he’s tired of it . being trapped in a universe that’s not his own is bad enough without the patronizing of the batfamily , the sympathic gazes and the hurt that he reads from every one of them , all wondering how he could have fallen like this in another universe , what could have been done to make him this way ( well , almost all - his double seems to understand treading a dark path , doesn’t question it the way the others do , just watches him with reserved suspicion ) . but shikra is tired . he’s done sitting in the manor he left behind years ago , the one whose halls are only images in nightmares and whose inhabitants feel like faded reflections of people he didn’t want to see again .
you’ve gotta love modern technology , he thinks , the kind that lets him press a palm to red robin’s bike and unlock it , engine revving beneath him as he pulls the mask he’d swiped from someone’s locker up to cover his mouth and nose , hiding enough of his face not to be identified as tim drake , before peeling out into the gotham night . he can’t work , but he can train , in so much as punching a few thugs in the face and working out his anger can be called training . he’s in his own world out there , fists flying more often than his staff , the crack of bone beneath his hands settling some of the frustration at his situation .
when someone comes up behind him , he almost expects a bat , whirling around with his staff extended , whistling through the night air to point at their head and not wavering an inch even when he’s confronted with an unfamiliar figure . the only person he knows that bedecks his costume with a moon is decidedly darker , and this one doesn’t hold themself like m at all . “ and who the hell are you . ”