fic: Colors run prime (1/?)
Title: Colors run prime (1/?)
Author: ayzilia
Fandom: DCU
Paring: Tim/Kon
Rating: R, for language
Word Count: 1,628
Summary: In the wake of the Wayne-Kryptonian Treaty, Tim and Kon struggle to adjust their dreams, prejudices, and expectations to fit into the scope of their new life together. A/N: This follows My kind is not your kind. Read that first for clarity’s sake. For sanity’s sake? Also, title from the song “Whirring” by The Joy Formidable.
Disclaimer: Not mine. All belongs to DC Comics.
Kon stopped, exhaled, and slowly turned to face down the door. Just an ordinary oak wood door. Solid, sturdy, with a simple round door knob and some sort of glossy finish. Once, there had been a panel of frosted glass with the painted name of some editor set into it, but in deference to its new purpose as the door to a bedroom suite rather than an office suite, inlaid wood had replaced the silhouette window. In any case, Kon could probably make the thing buckle in two with a flick of his finger. Or cut it in two with his heat vision. Theoretically, window or not, he could see through it with one blink and his x-ray vision. Quite frankly, no rational reason existed for this door to look so very intimidating, menacing, or impenetrable. Except, of course, for the fact that it was Tim’s door.
Timothy Drake. His husband for all of one week.
Kon squared his shoulders and raised his hand to knock on the door that had closed neatly in his face when he’d led Tim up here after the reception and hadn’t, to Kon’s knowledge, opened since… regardless of Kon’s daily cajoling. Just before his knuckles connected, Tim’s even voice sounded from within.
“What do you want Kon?”
Kon started. Well, that was sotra freaky. How did he do that? Like, every freaking time? Kon quickly dropped his hand and tried to remember why exactly he’d come here again… oh yeah.
“Lois said dinner will be here in ten minutes. Clark’s flying in some of Ma Kent’s home-cooking,” Kon reported with a grin, half nerves, half excitement at the prospect of apple pie. Of Tim’s face when he tried Ma’s apple pie. Would his eyes go wide with surprise or flutter closed in ecstasy? Kon’s grin grew wider. He waited. No response.
He cleared his throat awkwardly and brought his hands to his hips. The silence dragged on. Kon’s eyes flicked restlessly across the door. Really, some response-any response-would be, yah know, civil.
Kon felt his temper flare and his smile falter; he was worthy of some sort of response, reply, indication of existence…
Then again, who knew how exactly things worked with human families? Or maybe even just with the Bats? Apparently, they weirded out other humans-considered freaky even by human standards. Maybe by their (freaky Bat) social contract, Kon shouldn’t expect a response? Or maybe Kon was supposed to keep talking? Did Tim think he hadn’t finished his thought or something? Maybe Kon hadn’t been clear? What else did Tim need to know?
“Dude!” Kon tried, “You don’t know what kinda treat that is! Ma’s cooking is the best!”
His enthusiasm disappeared into the black hole void of Tim’s side of the conversation with nothing to mark its brief cheerful passing. Kon felt his face twisting into something incredulous. Seriously! What the hell? What did he have to do? Spring into a handstand?
“You should really come out and eat with us,” Kon offered, but his frustration snaked around his words, twisting them into more of an order.
“No, thank you,” Tim answered in a tone so neutral it made beige look neon. “I’m fine.”
Ok, that’s it! End of rope.
“You’ve been shut up in this room for days man!” Kon did not quite shout, “I don’t have cooties ya know!”
“I’m aware.”
Then what the hell? Kon raked a hand through what he could of his clipped hair and stared, lost, at Tim’s door.
“I don’t understand!” he protested, “Seriously, dude, you at least have to come out for food and water!”
“Alfred sent a care package,” Tim answered calmly.
“You can’t possibly live on your butler’s energy bars!” Kon actually threw up his hands in aggravation. In the silence he could hear Tim’s nonverbal “Watch me” sharp and loud. He winced and tried again, “C’mon man. We can’t be that bad…”
Nothing.
Kon took that to mean Tim’s opinion on the matter differed. A frustrated huff exploded from Kon’s chest. He clenched his jaw and very purposefully did not beat down the door. Rather, after pulling in a deep breath and holding it for just one short second, Kon quite calmly (with the greatest of restraint) placed his hand on the door knob. Slowly, firmly, curled his fingers around the smooth metal curve.
“Can we not have this conversation though a door?” he pleaded. Really this would be so much easier to hammer out if he could just see Tim’s face. Could reach out and shake his uptight shoulders loose. Hell, could just reach out. Period. Simple. Kon started to turn the handle, “Look man-aaaaAAAAAAAAH!”
The world whited out.
~*~
Kon sluggishly blinked consciousness back into focus. Bright colors, warm or smooth or rough textures, jagged and solid shapes all reoriented themselves in Kon’s brain, spinning before settling and snapping into place. Sorta. Almost. His brain still felt all swirly.
Kara knelt over him, her face surprised and her mouth twitching oddly…
Kon groaned and tried to sit up.
“Oh! Oh my… Are you ok?” Kara asked, before she lost her struggle with her facial muscles and a grin slipped out past her control. How she managed to look sympathetic and apologetic with laughter in her eyes and that smile Kon had no clue. He blinked again and focused instead on her question.
“Uh, yah,” he managed to answer. That seemed true enough. He felt ok-ish. Just…he shook his head slightly hoping to help everything settle further. Maybe actually start making sense. He scrunched up his face as he took stock of his body. “Tingles. Um?”
“I warned you not to try that Kon!”
Tim’s voice. Still mostly even, but now laced with… something. Couldn’t be concern. Slightly muffled. Still on the other side of his door?
Kon finally looked past Kara (now stifling giggles) and observed the small pile of debris he sat in and the hole punched in the wall before him, through which he could make out the hallway and Tim’s still steadfastly closed door. Kon blinked again as the truth coalesced in his mind. Tim had booby trapped his door. With electricity. Sneaky bastard.
“Some honeymoon period,” Kon muttered as he stumbled to his feet. Shook out his arms and rolled his shoulders. “Fuck.”
He blurrily stumbled through the new entrance to the vacant room across from Tim’s suite to the soundtrack of Kara’s now outright laughter and stalked down the hall to change his shirt. Lois would kill him if he showed up to dinner expecting to eat covered in wood splinters and dry wall dust and with holes marring his t-shirt. Fuck.
~*~
Almost nothing-and really Tim couldn’t even think without qualifiers because as soon as he started with absolutes a more extreme example would materialize-could twist the knife of his new reality more than Kon attempting to open his door without waiting for permission. These people didn’t understand him at all. Didn’t see his most fundamental…Of course he had added extra security features to his door. At this point in his life he didn’t even think about if he should; he just thought about how. The measures he took, they were necessary. To keep danger out (slow its entrance) and to allow him some sliver of peace of mind. No way could he settle down for even minimal hours of sleep with just a simple mechanical lock between him and the rest of the world. Anywhere he went (not that Bruce let him out of Gotham more than a handful of times, at least not until this)-first task: set security measures. How did Kon not… how could he be so naïve?
And damn Kon for making Tim feel defensive and guilty about a habit so intrinsic to him.
Setting security measures… that’s just what he did.
And what he’d had time to set up in the last few days weren’t even all that hard to bypass. Dick would have found a way around them in approximately four seconds. Bruce even less time (if only because Bruce wouldn’t spare the energy to flip or quip along the way).
But that was the essence of the point. His family could find a way in, because they knew him, and knew how he thought. Those who didn’t know him… that’s who those security measures were designed to keep out.
At this point in time, that included Kon.
But then, if Tim never allowed Kon an opportunity to learn to know him…
So the question, to Tim’s mind, became: did he want Kon to know him?
Tim sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. The healthy course of action here would be to permit, or even encourage, a close relationship between himself and Kon. Rationally-realistically-Tim knew, for his mental and emotional health, he had to develop connections here in his new (not his home) environment. Tim tensed against an internal shudder of anxiety. Rationally… screw that. He wanted to stay in this safe little cocoon. Be a hermit and anti-social and whatever else the outside world felt compelled to call him.
Tim rubbed his forehead and then dropped his hand back onto his desk.
He had promised Dick he would try. That he’d give Kon and him a chance.
Tim sighed heavily and stood. He stared, frozen, for a long moment looking down (not consciously taking in much of anything) at the constant stream of data scrolling across his laptop screen. Then he turned to face his closet.
He couldn’t close himself off. He had to try. And Alfred raised him better than to go to dinner in sweats and one of Dick’s baggy hand-me-down t-shirts.
He made his legs carry him across the room.
Next Part
Author: ayzilia
Fandom: DCU
Paring: Tim/Kon
Rating: R, for language
Word Count: 1,628
Summary: In the wake of the Wayne-Kryptonian Treaty, Tim and Kon struggle to adjust their dreams, prejudices, and expectations to fit into the scope of their new life together. A/N: This follows My kind is not your kind. Read that first for clarity’s sake. For sanity’s sake? Also, title from the song “Whirring” by The Joy Formidable.
Disclaimer: Not mine. All belongs to DC Comics.
Kon stopped, exhaled, and slowly turned to face down the door. Just an ordinary oak wood door. Solid, sturdy, with a simple round door knob and some sort of glossy finish. Once, there had been a panel of frosted glass with the painted name of some editor set into it, but in deference to its new purpose as the door to a bedroom suite rather than an office suite, inlaid wood had replaced the silhouette window. In any case, Kon could probably make the thing buckle in two with a flick of his finger. Or cut it in two with his heat vision. Theoretically, window or not, he could see through it with one blink and his x-ray vision. Quite frankly, no rational reason existed for this door to look so very intimidating, menacing, or impenetrable. Except, of course, for the fact that it was Tim’s door.
Timothy Drake. His husband for all of one week.
Kon squared his shoulders and raised his hand to knock on the door that had closed neatly in his face when he’d led Tim up here after the reception and hadn’t, to Kon’s knowledge, opened since… regardless of Kon’s daily cajoling. Just before his knuckles connected, Tim’s even voice sounded from within.
“What do you want Kon?”
Kon started. Well, that was sotra freaky. How did he do that? Like, every freaking time? Kon quickly dropped his hand and tried to remember why exactly he’d come here again… oh yeah.
“Lois said dinner will be here in ten minutes. Clark’s flying in some of Ma Kent’s home-cooking,” Kon reported with a grin, half nerves, half excitement at the prospect of apple pie. Of Tim’s face when he tried Ma’s apple pie. Would his eyes go wide with surprise or flutter closed in ecstasy? Kon’s grin grew wider. He waited. No response.
He cleared his throat awkwardly and brought his hands to his hips. The silence dragged on. Kon’s eyes flicked restlessly across the door. Really, some response-any response-would be, yah know, civil.
Kon felt his temper flare and his smile falter; he was worthy of some sort of response, reply, indication of existence…
Then again, who knew how exactly things worked with human families? Or maybe even just with the Bats? Apparently, they weirded out other humans-considered freaky even by human standards. Maybe by their (freaky Bat) social contract, Kon shouldn’t expect a response? Or maybe Kon was supposed to keep talking? Did Tim think he hadn’t finished his thought or something? Maybe Kon hadn’t been clear? What else did Tim need to know?
“Dude!” Kon tried, “You don’t know what kinda treat that is! Ma’s cooking is the best!”
His enthusiasm disappeared into the black hole void of Tim’s side of the conversation with nothing to mark its brief cheerful passing. Kon felt his face twisting into something incredulous. Seriously! What the hell? What did he have to do? Spring into a handstand?
“You should really come out and eat with us,” Kon offered, but his frustration snaked around his words, twisting them into more of an order.
“No, thank you,” Tim answered in a tone so neutral it made beige look neon. “I’m fine.”
Ok, that’s it! End of rope.
“You’ve been shut up in this room for days man!” Kon did not quite shout, “I don’t have cooties ya know!”
“I’m aware.”
Then what the hell? Kon raked a hand through what he could of his clipped hair and stared, lost, at Tim’s door.
“I don’t understand!” he protested, “Seriously, dude, you at least have to come out for food and water!”
“Alfred sent a care package,” Tim answered calmly.
“You can’t possibly live on your butler’s energy bars!” Kon actually threw up his hands in aggravation. In the silence he could hear Tim’s nonverbal “Watch me” sharp and loud. He winced and tried again, “C’mon man. We can’t be that bad…”
Nothing.
Kon took that to mean Tim’s opinion on the matter differed. A frustrated huff exploded from Kon’s chest. He clenched his jaw and very purposefully did not beat down the door. Rather, after pulling in a deep breath and holding it for just one short second, Kon quite calmly (with the greatest of restraint) placed his hand on the door knob. Slowly, firmly, curled his fingers around the smooth metal curve.
“Can we not have this conversation though a door?” he pleaded. Really this would be so much easier to hammer out if he could just see Tim’s face. Could reach out and shake his uptight shoulders loose. Hell, could just reach out. Period. Simple. Kon started to turn the handle, “Look man-aaaaAAAAAAAAH!”
The world whited out.
~*~
Kon sluggishly blinked consciousness back into focus. Bright colors, warm or smooth or rough textures, jagged and solid shapes all reoriented themselves in Kon’s brain, spinning before settling and snapping into place. Sorta. Almost. His brain still felt all swirly.
Kara knelt over him, her face surprised and her mouth twitching oddly…
Kon groaned and tried to sit up.
“Oh! Oh my… Are you ok?” Kara asked, before she lost her struggle with her facial muscles and a grin slipped out past her control. How she managed to look sympathetic and apologetic with laughter in her eyes and that smile Kon had no clue. He blinked again and focused instead on her question.
“Uh, yah,” he managed to answer. That seemed true enough. He felt ok-ish. Just…he shook his head slightly hoping to help everything settle further. Maybe actually start making sense. He scrunched up his face as he took stock of his body. “Tingles. Um?”
“I warned you not to try that Kon!”
Tim’s voice. Still mostly even, but now laced with… something. Couldn’t be concern. Slightly muffled. Still on the other side of his door?
Kon finally looked past Kara (now stifling giggles) and observed the small pile of debris he sat in and the hole punched in the wall before him, through which he could make out the hallway and Tim’s still steadfastly closed door. Kon blinked again as the truth coalesced in his mind. Tim had booby trapped his door. With electricity. Sneaky bastard.
“Some honeymoon period,” Kon muttered as he stumbled to his feet. Shook out his arms and rolled his shoulders. “Fuck.”
He blurrily stumbled through the new entrance to the vacant room across from Tim’s suite to the soundtrack of Kara’s now outright laughter and stalked down the hall to change his shirt. Lois would kill him if he showed up to dinner expecting to eat covered in wood splinters and dry wall dust and with holes marring his t-shirt. Fuck.
~*~
Almost nothing-and really Tim couldn’t even think without qualifiers because as soon as he started with absolutes a more extreme example would materialize-could twist the knife of his new reality more than Kon attempting to open his door without waiting for permission. These people didn’t understand him at all. Didn’t see his most fundamental…Of course he had added extra security features to his door. At this point in his life he didn’t even think about if he should; he just thought about how. The measures he took, they were necessary. To keep danger out (slow its entrance) and to allow him some sliver of peace of mind. No way could he settle down for even minimal hours of sleep with just a simple mechanical lock between him and the rest of the world. Anywhere he went (not that Bruce let him out of Gotham more than a handful of times, at least not until this)-first task: set security measures. How did Kon not… how could he be so naïve?
And damn Kon for making Tim feel defensive and guilty about a habit so intrinsic to him.
Setting security measures… that’s just what he did.
And what he’d had time to set up in the last few days weren’t even all that hard to bypass. Dick would have found a way around them in approximately four seconds. Bruce even less time (if only because Bruce wouldn’t spare the energy to flip or quip along the way).
But that was the essence of the point. His family could find a way in, because they knew him, and knew how he thought. Those who didn’t know him… that’s who those security measures were designed to keep out.
At this point in time, that included Kon.
But then, if Tim never allowed Kon an opportunity to learn to know him…
So the question, to Tim’s mind, became: did he want Kon to know him?
Tim sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. The healthy course of action here would be to permit, or even encourage, a close relationship between himself and Kon. Rationally-realistically-Tim knew, for his mental and emotional health, he had to develop connections here in his new (not his home) environment. Tim tensed against an internal shudder of anxiety. Rationally… screw that. He wanted to stay in this safe little cocoon. Be a hermit and anti-social and whatever else the outside world felt compelled to call him.
Tim rubbed his forehead and then dropped his hand back onto his desk.
He had promised Dick he would try. That he’d give Kon and him a chance.
Tim sighed heavily and stood. He stared, frozen, for a long moment looking down (not consciously taking in much of anything) at the constant stream of data scrolling across his laptop screen. Then he turned to face his closet.
He couldn’t close himself off. He had to try. And Alfred raised him better than to go to dinner in sweats and one of Dick’s baggy hand-me-down t-shirts.
He made his legs carry him across the room.
Next Part