Title: Thigmotropism Fandom: DCU (Nightwing) Pairing: Dick/Tim Rating: Suitable for adults Summary: A propensity to react, in which contact with a solid or rigid surface is the orienting factor. Notes: The timeline here is nothing if not nebulous. This bunny is from Te, and Jamjar provided great commentary. Disclaimer: If they were mine, they would have a lot more physical contact like this. It's well after four in the morning, and it's time to go home, but Robin is still embarrassed when Nightwing catches him yawning. "The 'haven can really take it out of you," he says, and ruffles Robin's hair with that loving condescension that passes for a hug. Robin makes a face at him, playing out the part of younger brother. "I'm fine, really." It's bad enough that he's showing signs of tiredness without Nightwing pointing them out. Nightwing shakes his head. "Sure you are. I saw you fluff that landing, two buildings back." Robin winces, but tries to keep it off his face. "When do you have to be home?" Robin shrugs. "I'm staying at Steve's place, tonight, as far as my parents know. And his phone number is one of Oracle's." Nightwing grins, and Robin bites the inside of his cheek. That's been a reflexive response since he was ten. It doesn't work as well as it used to; the mild pain doesn't stop his heart from speeding up, but it does remind him not to let his expression change. It's a delicate balance between ignoring Dick and responding too much. So Nightwing's "You look like you could use a massage," complete with wriggling fingers, is enough to make Robin nearly fall off the roof. He is tired, and Nightwing is an inveterate flirt. It should be easier to deal with than this. "I told you, I'm fine." Nightwing raises an eyebrow at him. "Come on, Robin. You don't have to be B -- Batman. You can crash on my couch. Besides, it'll give me a chance to practice. I haven't worked on anyone's back in a while." A voice in Robin's head, or, maybe, his crotch, suspects that maybe Nightwing means it. It's a dangerous possibility, and an unlikely one. His judgment is being affected by sleep deprivation, perhaps. Robin bites his cheek again, harder, and backs it up with the mental image of Bea Arthur naked. It helps. A little. But it doesn't help him say no, because the voice is still there, saying, 'What if?' "All right. If you insist." "I do." Nightwing leaps off the roof, graceful and perfect, and Robin, as always, has no choice but to follow him. On the way, he wonders how tired Nightwing has to be before it visibly affects his form, and whether that's genetic or a result of training. When they get back to Dick's apartment, they take their masks off. Dick finds Tim a blanket and a pillow, and tosses them on the couch. He looks stern and brotherly -- which is, for Dick, as flirtatious as a grin. "Sit down." Too much time on the Titans treating everyone as family makes Dick's bedside manner distinctly odd. Tim tries the innocent kid card again. He blinks at Dick and makes himself yawn to see if it's contagious. "Aren't you going to bed?" Dick suppresses an answering yawn and makes an annoyed face. Too much family-that-isn't, and too many younger-siblings-that-weren't, have given him some resistance to this game. He's still flirting, and he runs his hand over Tim's shoulders to underscore that. "You're tense as hell. Get on the couch." Tim wrinkles his nose. "You've already heard about my childhood." Dick tickles the back of his neck and pushes him toward the couch. "Let me work on your shoulders." Tim would rather have a shower and some time alone to work off the adrenaline of a night of fighting and watching Dick, but even if this is flirting, he's tense. A massage might actually do some good. He takes off his cape and kneels on the couch facing the back, trying to find the best height. Dick starts with his neck muscles, his hands firm and sure. Not for the first time, Tim appreciates the hell out of manual dexterity, but it's a little too close, this late at night, even for team-family. Dick keeps brushing against his back. It was bad enough to watch Dick without feeling him, too. After a few minutes, when he can really straighten his neck again, Tim pulls away, ignoring his still-tense back muscles and putting on a grateful smile. "Thanks. That really helped." Dick thumps him in the shoulder and frowns at him. Uncle Nightwing is nowhere near as intimidating as Daddy Batman, but he's working on it. Tim is aware of his own particular susceptibility here. It doesn't help him resist the command voice. "Take your tunic off. I'm not done with you yet, but I can't do much through the armor." "I should go to sleep." Tim yawns again, even though the tactic failed the first time. "Please?" Dick looks like he's the one getting a rubdown. He's so wistful. He needs his team, clearly. Or his family, if that's someone else. The 'haven hasn't been kind to him, and he's probably lonely. Dick does need people. And If it's for practice, then Tim can take it. He'll think about Antarctica and crime scenes if he has to. While he's marshaling his thoughts, Dick says, "You need this." It's also true, though he's not going to be any more enthusiastic out loud than, "Yeah, I guess so." Tim thinks January and blood and braces himself for some comment about teenage boys and their inappropriate responses to practically anything. He more than deserves it. But Dick doesn't say anything when he takes his tunic and gauntlets off. Tim really needs a shower. Dick just says, "That's better," and digs his fingers into Tim's shoulder muscles. His calluses and the texture of his uniform fabric make Tim shiver. This is better than fraternal/teammate dancing around; this is better than long walks on the beach could ever be. Tim sighs and leans into the touch. Dick chuckles; he knows this game, even if he doesn't usually get Tim to play this long. "You okay?" Tim's afraid his voice would sound off, so he nods. Dick moves his hands farther down Tim's back, around his sides, and it tickles. Tim twitches. "Not like that." Dick stills his hands, but he doesn't back off. He smells familiar, like fighting and sweat and everything dangerous. His voice is soft and a little tentative, like he can't decide whether to tease Tim or take the flirting up a notch. "Why not?" Having to think, having to react in this game or outside of it, is potentially worse than the erection that still refuses to subside. It won't, with Dick's voice in his ear. Tim grits his teeth. "That tickles." He can feel Dick's grin, of course. He's winning. Why shouldn't he smile? "Oh, really? This tickles?" He drags his fingers across Tim's sides again. Tim can make himself not yelp, and not turn around and punch Dick, but he can't hold still. "Just don't." "You can't afford the vulnerability, Robin," Dick says, half smug and half Batman. "You need to overcome this. Where else are you ticklish?" "Nowhere." "Don't lie to me, Boy Wonder," Dick says, and the way he trails his fingers up Tim's spine is infuriating. That Tim can't, can't make himself not react just makes the whole thing worse. This is too ridiculous to be flirting, maybe. If he couldn't hear Dick laughing and if he didn't know the Titans and if -- It's still part of the game, to make Tim twist and wriggle. He doesn't know how far Dick will take this, though. "Stop it." Dick's fingertips brush his lower back, too softly, too much to take, and Tim has to turn around and glare at him. It's a vulnerable position, and damn embarrassing, but at least he can block Dick. "Don't." "Sorry," and the lie is just as transparent as Tim's 'nowhere.' He's got a teasing glint in his eyes, and he reaches for Tim's side again. Tim's a little relieved by that; at least this is just a kid's game instead of some seduction technique from Tamaran. But it's no less frustrating for that. Tim catches his wrists and looks as intimidating as he can while he's red in the face and hard. "I said, don't." Dick blinks at him, gives him a once-over, and sits on the couch next to him. "You need to relax." Stopping the game by forfeiting doesn't feel anything like a victory. It's not fair to just refuse to play. "I'm fine," Tim insists. He should really just go home. Dick raises an eyebrow at him and starts rubbing his shoulder again, switching from teasing to teammate as easily as breathing. "You can't do as much when you're tense as you can when you're relaxed. And at least here, you can talk to me." The teasing, at least, was annoying enough to keep Tim from wanting him desperately. Now that he's stopped, it's distracting as hell. Tim shrugs his hand off and reaches for his shirt. "You're not helping. I'm going home. It's easier to relax in a familiar bed." "Well, you could do that," Dick says, giving him a measuring look. Tim's still trying to figure out whether to brace himself for flirting or tickling or a massage when Dick kisses him. After all that flirting, Tim isn't sure why he's still surprised. But Dick always flirts, and this is a new development. Tim kisses him back before he has a chance to change his mind, tangling his fingers in Dick's hair. He tastes like coffee and smells like a long patrol. It's perfect. Probably this is just Dick reacting to a teammate who needs support, same as he would to anyone. Probably, except he's throwing himself into it with as much gusto as he would jump into a fight. Dick pulls Tim onto his lap and keeps kissing him until Tim starts to suspect that it might have been Dick's idea in the first place. The litany of names is still there: Kory, Barbara, Helena, and all the rest, without a hint of the possibility of this. He may have flirted with, well, everyone, but Tim thought he had the full score. Add another note to the file, anyway. The longer it goes on, the more real it has to be, with Dick's hands tracing his scars, not tickling at all, now. There's a hardness against his thigh that isn't just armor. "Dick," Tim says. He's appalled to find himself stuttering. Dick smiles at him a little, which means that all is right with the world in some fundamental way that Tim can't define to himself even when he's not all tangled up in Dick. "You still need to relax," Dick says, and he's not teasing anymore. "Give me a second," he adds, shifting away. Tim braces himself for fraternal platonic pretending nothing happened. They can still be teammates, they can still flirt, and eventually Tim might even get tired of the memory. But no, Dick's just pulling his shirt off. He smells like sweat as much as Tim does, which isn't nearly as unattractive as it could be. There's something animal about it, as if even without words, names, identities, history, Tim would still have to run his hands over Dick's chest and finger his nipples. It makes it better that Dick says, "Tim," when he does it, and runs his hands down Tim's back. "Just try to relax," Tim says. Dick laughs and pushes him sideways onto the couch, then bends over him to lick his nipples. There's the sudden, unwelcome probability that he might come in his tights, which would be really inconvenient. "Wait, wait." It makes Dick look up, grinning. It's almost as if he doesn't realize that Tim doesn't need the flirting anymore. "You okay?" "Yes." Tim's stammering again, so he repeats it. "Yes. Just let me get out of my uniform." "No problem." He gives Tim a hand up and helps him out of the rest of his uniform, petting him at every opportunity. Tim shivers and feels goosebumps rise on his legs. "Does that tickle?" "No." It shouldn't feel daring to tuck his hand down Dick's tights, not when he's naked, but it does. "You should -- you should take these off." Dick leans into his palm, closing his eyes. "You talked me right into it. Out of it. Whatever." He shimmies out of his boots and leggings in a really impressively short period of time. It's not even close to the first time Tim has seen him naked at this distance, but now he has permission to stare, and even better, to touch. Apart from the urgent desire to have some kind of sex, right now, he could spend all day memorizing the way each of Dick's muscles feels when he moves. "Hey, Tim." Dick touches his cheek. "Are you sure you're okay?" There aren't words for how much more than okay Tim is, and he's not used to expressing himself through touch. This is the best opportunity he's had to practice, though, so he goes for it. It's weird to hug Dick, and it brings up the inescapable reality of all that skin-to-skin contact. Tim digs his fingers into his palms to counter what he can only think of as galvanic, or volcanic, skin response. He ends up bucking his hips against Dick's once, instead of the infinite number of times he really wants to. Dick tousles his hair and hugs him back. "It's okay," he says in Tim's ear. It's not, exactly. Mostly it's unfair that Dick smells as good as he does after a night of patrolling, and that he manages to feel like home and perfection and risk all at once. Tim should kiss him, or do something more to the point than petting his back, but before he can get it together, Dick says, "Sit down?" It's nothing he can resist with Dick nibbling his ear. He ends up on Dick's lap, leaning back against him, splay-legged and shivering. All that skin makes it hard to breathe or think. Every time he tries either, Dick strokes him again. He reaches back, runs his hand up Dick's leg, and says, "I should --" Dick chuckles in his ear and strokes him faster. "Just let go. I've got you, little brother." It makes Tim want to laugh and wince and hug Dick. He shudders hard, and Dick groans. "Like that. It's okay. Everything's okay." There's something important to say about that, but between one breath and the next, Tim loses track of what it is and comes in Dick's hand. He can feel himself blush. "Sorry," he says, not meaning it, and then, really, "Thanks." Dick mouths his neck. "Are you relaxed now?" "A little more, yes." The vast expanses of skin pressed against him are still getting to Tim and making his brain turn off, but he can't exactly complain. That would be the naked, kind of gay version of having his cake and eating it too. "Good." Dick runs his not-sticky hand through Tim's hair, petting his scalp as if they're not quite naked enough, not quite touching enough everywhere else. Tim sighs and tries to go with the relaxing thing. He can't run away, and Dick doesn't seem to be in as much of a hurry as it would make sense for him to be. Whatever he wants seems to involve a lot of touching. "Do you want to, um, go to bed?" Tim asks. It sounds euphemistic and redundant, so he says, "I mean --" "Get up, if you want." Dick lets him go, and Tim stands up. "We could go to bed again, sure." There are audible quotation marks. Dick's sense of humor is -- Dick. "It would be easier to sleep there than here." "If sleeping is what you had in mind," Dick says, and kisses him again. Tim makes another addition to his list of things to do for hours at a time, next time Dick is feeling familial. He hugs Dick, and he's almost getting used to how good that feels. "Maybe after a shower." "Sounds like a plan." Dick tousles his hair. Instead of ducking, Tim reaches up and messes his up, too. Dick tries -- well -- doesn't try all that hard to duck and get away. The movement ends in another kiss, firmly cementing Tim's association of hair-ruffling and kissing. He considers warning Dick that every time it happens, now, he'll think of the way hugging him feels. But from the tilt of his grin, he probably knows.
	Email the author DCU Story Index