Title: 'Til the break of day (4800 words) Fandom: DCU (Teen Titans v3) Summary: Kon lands on the roof of the Titans Tower. Pairing: Tim/Kon Rating: Adult. Content some readers may find perturbing. Notes: For Zee for her birthday. Inspired by Mallory Klohn's story Life Lived Like a Mentos Commercial, which is one of the few Sentinel stories I remember reading when I was a wee fangirl. It is hysterically amusing. I only hope that I have done it some small measure of homage here. Friday, 19:07:43 PDT Kon lands on the roof of the Titans Tower. He takes a deep breath of the sea air. It's been a long week, what with the history test, the math test he bombed, Clark making disappointed faces at him, and Toyman trying to overthrow Wal-Mart. For once, he agreed with Toyman. On the way to San Francisco, he got a song in his head, which is worse than in-flight movies can ever be. He goes into the Tower to look for Tim or Bart or somebody, anyone to talk to so that the song will go away. The first person he finds is Cassie. She gives him a big kiss on the cheek that he's not sure he deserves, because the stuff he was thinking about in between trying to get the song out of his head had a lot to do with Tim and not so much with her. "Hi, Conner!" she says, and he has to do a quick check for his glasses. She gives him a big hug. She smells like sunshine and her breasts feel really good against him. Then he gives her that little finger-gun salute she used to think was cute and says, "I got you, babe." She doesn't need to know he's only saying it because he can't get the damn song out of his head. She laughs and says, "Yeah, you, too. Kory wants to talk to us about our local image." "I'd rather hang out with you any day," he says, knowing he doesn't have a choice. "Yeah, but we'd better go." Kory is in General Koriand'r mode by the time they make it to the briefing room, and she narrows her eyes at them. "It's important for the inhabitants of San Francisco to believe that we are trustworthy and stable as a team." "We are," Tim says, and Kon gives him a thumbs-up. But then he says, "Well, at least as much as the original Titans ever were." Bart looks up from the three Gameboys spread in front of him and says, "Plus a much higher percentage of us wear pants." "Pants are irrelevant," Vic says. Gar laughs and says, "That's why you're not our spin doctor, Vic." "Most of the Titans wore pants when I joined," Raven says, swirling her cape. Bart looks up again and says, "I meant the original Titans. Robin, Aqualad, Kid Flash, Wonder Girl." He grins. "Kid Flash was the only one with any fashion sense." "Hey," Cassie says, tossing her lasso over his head. "We resemble that remark." Kory clears her throat. "In any case, we need to avoid appearing childish at all costs." "Right," Kon says, leaning back in his chair and making it twirl on one leg. "So the first order of business is how to not have Klarion bumbumbum the Witch Boy turn everybody else into screaming brats. Again." "Klarion what?" Speedy asks. Tim shakes his head. "Irrelevant and unlikely, as well as unavoidable. What we need to do is think about how to act -- in public, at least -- as though we know what we're doing." Kon laughs. "Right, like that's going to work." Tim frowns. So does Kory. "We have to do our best, Superboy," Kory says, and she puts a lot of emphasis on his codename so Kon knows she's mad. He doesn't have to hear Tim say anything to know he is, too. Everybody else works on brainstorming ways to act like grownups while Kon tries to not use his heat vision on the table, his shoes, the floor, or the marker board Kory gets out. He's too busy thinking about how to apologize to Tim without actually apologizing to think about how to act grown up. Plus, he's only just starting to be good at acting like a normal teenager. Acting like a mature teenager is way out of his league. But he's not about to say that. Instead, he gets up partway through the meeting and says, "I gotta go," not specifying where or for how long, and just doesn't go back. Somebody knocks on his door half an hour later. Kon is lying on his bed melting little holes in a piece of glass with his hand behind it to protect the ceiling. "Yeah?" Tim comes in and closes the door behind himself. "Are you all right?" Kon puts down his melty piece of glass and sits up. He knows he's slouching and he totally doesn't care. Clark would be ashamed to be seen with him. "Whatever," he says. "I just -- I'm not a grownup yet." "We have to appear dependable," Tim says. "Even if we're not, necessarily, all that mature." "It's right there in my name, though," Kon says. "The first name I ever had -- Superboy. Not Superteen or Supergrowinglad. Superboy. I don't know what the hell people expect from me." Tim sits on the edge of his bed. He's wearing full Robin costume, which he often does even in the Tower. Sometimes Kon doesn't even notice it anymore. "Just because it's your name doesn't mean it has to be true. I'm Robin -- but I'm not Robin like the other Robins were." Kon shrugs again. "Yeah, and I'm not Superboy like Clark was. Clark swears up and down he never flunked a trigonometry test in his life." "That doesn't have anything to do with being Superboy," Tim says impatiently. Something in Kon's brain made a note that impatient Robin means pick on Robin, years ago. When he realized he had a giant crush on Robin, impatient Robin turned into something more like Robin to flirt with. "Maybe not." He's not feeling all that flirty. More impatient. Tim's right there, giving him this grouchy look like the kids in the front of the class who never get points off for using the wrong formula, ever. Like there's nothing Kon could ever do to impress him. "Maybe this doesn't, either," he says, and he reaches with his TTK through the bed into Tim's cape and pulls him over sideways in a kind of a hop and kisses him. Tim splutters and pushes him away. "You're dating Cassie." Kon feels the way too hearty dinner Mrs. Kent made him eat before he left turning into Kryptonite in his gut. "I know. I -- I like you, Tim." Tim's getting up, out of TTK reach even if Kon was enough of an asshole to grab him again. "Maybe you need to talk to her about this. Work things out. We're teammates." "I know. I know. I fucking know!" Kon punches the wall and leaves a hell of a dent. "What's so wrong about wanting you?" Tim shakes his head, going blank and bland like he's in the field. "We need to appear mature, Kon. This isn't going to cut it," he says, and lets himself out. Kon uses all the curse words he picked up from the Ravers and locks himself in his room. He doesn't fall asleep until he's managed to give himself a decent second degree burn with heat vision on most of his torso, with "You suck!" picked out in third degree across his chest. It hurts like hell, but he knows it'll be healed by morning. Friday, 19:07:43 PDT Kon lands on the roof of the Titans Tower singing, "There ain't no hill or mountain we can't climb" to himself. He stumbles when he does because the last thing he remembers is falling asleep in his room at the Tower with massive burns, but his chest feels fine and he's fully dressed. When he gives himself a pinch, it hurts. "Weird," he says out loud. He goes inside to look for Tim and ask him if there's been anything weird going on lately, because even if Tim's still pissed at him about the inappropriate kiss, he won't refuse to answer that kind of question. Instead, he finds Cassie, who says, "Hi, Conner!" He rubs his hand over his nose -- no glasses, and she's still calling him that, what the hell? -- and interrupts her attempt to hug him by saying, "Cassie, we -- we gotta see other people." She freezes and stares at him. "What?" "I -- I'm kinda in love with Tim," he says, and he can see the glitter of war gods past in her eyes right before she decks him. He wakes up in the infirmary with Bart sitting by his bed, standing by his bed, running on a treadmill at the foot of the bed, and reading a stack of books. "Boy, are you dumb," Bart says. "Didn't you ever read anything about how to interact with women?" He hands Kon Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus and says, "This is really crappy pop psychology, but at the level where you're functioning, you'd better start simple." "Thanks," Kon says, putting a hand to his aching head. "As a clue -- don't date people of the opposite sex if you think you might be gay." Kon groans and pulls the pillow over his head. "I'm not gay." "That's not what Cassie said. Really loudly. At Tim." Bart's talking from all over the room. He must be kind of antsy. "Well, that'll be great for our image in San Francisco," Kon says bitterly. Bart steals his pillow and gives him a curious look. "That's what today's meeting was about. How'd you know?" Kon shakes his head and sees dark splotches from the pain. "Never mind." "Anyway," Bart says, "Cassie says she's going to Themiscyra, and Tim says you're not cheating on her with him, and Cassie says she doesn't care, she's going anyway. And Tim says he's not involved with you at all, and Cassie says Bats can doctor the camera system to cover anything up, and then they really started fighting." Kon grabs the pillow back with TTK. "Damn. How long was I out?" Bart looks at the clock. "About half an hour. Subjectively if you're me, about a month. Subjectively if you're Tim, probably about a year. He's been waiting to talk to you." "Shit. Shit, shit, shit." Kon hides behind the pillow. Tim comes in, quietly. "Hey," he says, keeping his voice low. "I brought you a rainbow garter. Like you used to have on your uniform, only more topical." "I'm not gay," Kon says again. "It works just as well for bisexuality," Tim says, "or the trendy word is 'queer.'" "I'm not gay." Bart shakes his head. "I'll just let myself out." He zips out the door. "Cassie said you said you're in love with me." Kon presses the pillow against his face and tries to remember how long it would take him to asphyxiate, and if Tim knows the answer to that. "Maybe," he admits after a minute. "You couldn't have found a way to break it to her that didn't completely wreck the team?" Tim punches Kon in the arm in that way where he's pulling it enough to not hurt himself, but going fast enough that Kon feels it. "Kory says she doesn't want you on the team anymore, Cassie's abandoning Man's World, and Vic and Gar think you need to get out more." "My nose is broken," Kon says. "Speedy and Raven agree that you brought that on yourself." Tim sighs. Kon peeks over the pillow at him. "Do you hate me?" Tim raises an eyebrow at him. "I'm not going to date you 'til you've had your rebound recovery period, because you are obviously not dealing with the end of this relationship with Cassie very well." Kon rolls over onto his face and squishes his nose. It makes his eyes water, but he's not sure he's not crying anyway. "How long is that in the Bat-love-manual?" Tim sighs again. "I'll call you when it's over. You'd better stay on the farm -- and study your trig. When we called the Kents to tell them what happened, Mr. Kent was pretty irritated about your grades." "I hate my life so fucking much." Kon beats his head on the pillow and manages to knock himself out with the pain. Friday, 19:07:43 PDT Kon lands on the roof of the Titans Tower and says, "Oh, no, not again." He takes off again and heads for the ocean, where he manages to find a couple of boats running drugs. The dealers are really pissed off at him when he drags them to the SFPD, but he figures that being tough on drugs is good for the Titans image, even if he isn't supposed to know that's on the agenda for the weekend. More importantly, it takes an hour to deal with all of it, so he totally misses talking to Cassie before the briefing. When he finally gets in, stinking of the sea, the first person he spots is Tim, all in his Robin suit. "Did you get lost?" he says, nostrils flaring as he sniffs. "I didn't think there was sea between here and Kansas." "I was thinking. A lot," Kon says, and even if most of that happened on parts of Friday evenings that haven't happened yet -- or maybe anymore, the paradox is getting to him -- it's still true. "And I think I'm going to have to break up with Cassie." Tim barely twitches when he says it, but Kon knows it's a problem because the next thing Tim says is "Come to my room and tell me about it." Tim's room is the best-secured place in the Tower. He tosses Kon a Zesti and sits crosslegged on his bed. "Okay. What's up?" Kon doesn't mention the time loop he's apparently caught in, or anything else about the time he kissed Tim and the time he tried to tell Cassie already. He says, "It's just not working out. We're such good friends, and -- we should've stayed that way. I -- I love her. I totally do. But -- friends, you know?" Tim nods a little. "I get it, yeah." "And I kind of want to -- date other people." Kon twists the tab on his Zesti back and forth until it comes off. Tim raises an eyebrow at him. "Okay." If Tim hadn't flipped out so bad the last time Kon kissed him, he'd go for it right now, but he doesn't trust himself to get it right. "You don't think she'll kill me, do you?" Tim smiles tightly. "Do it carefully, and it'll probably be okay." Kon sighs and feels all the pains he hasn't got right now. "Yeah. Thanks." Tim pats his shoulder and gets up. "Honesty's the best policy, Kon." Kon laughs, getting up too, and feels a little sick. "Sure, Alvin. Whatever." He walks out the door of Tim's room. Friday, 19:07:43 PDT Kon lands on the roof of the Titans Tower. "What the fucking fuck?" He goes into Kory's garden, in the part where nobody's supposed to be without hazmat gear, and grabs some flowers. He gives one to Cassie when she hugs him and tucks one behind Tim's ear and tosses the other one at the briefing. Pollen gets all over everyone. Ten minutes later Tim's pushing him down on his knees and kicking his legs apart and fucking him hard and desperate, almost so fast he can't watch Cassie's face while Kory licks her pussy and she screams and screams. Friday, 19:07:43 PDT Kon lands on the roof of the Titans Tower. He takes off again and breaks into a jewelry store at superspeed. He takes the boxes into Tim's room and waits for the briefing to finish, amusing himself by going through Tim's magazines. No porn. The poor guy. When Tim comes in, Kon goes down on one knee and says, "Run away to Canada with me." "What?" Tim says. Kon gives him a ring. "I love you, man." "I didn't know you were --" "I'm not. Not just gay, anyway," Kon says. "Then go propose to Cassie," Tim says, and walks out. Friday, 19:07:43 PDT Kon lands on the roof of the Titans Tower. He finds Cassie and in the middle of the hug says, "I think we should get Tim to have a threesome with us." She laughs and says, "You think he's cute?" "Yeah. Yeah, I do." "Cool," she says, and it's not that much later that Tim's licking her nipples -- carefully, scientifically. Nothing is as good as pushing into her ass and feeling Tim in her, too, shivering and so close and so real. Cassie moans when she comes and Kon can't stop himself from shouting. Tim just gasps like he's surprised. Friday, 19:07:43 PDT Kon lands on the roof of the Titans Tower. It takes him thirty seconds to find Bart. He says, "I'm in love with Tim, and he doesn't want me, and I just can't take it anymore." Bart looks up at him with those freaky gold eyes and says, "Yeah? Me, too." And then they're kissing and tangled together and only TTK can really hold Bart when he starts vibrating, and only that kind of vibration can really make Kon feel him. "I wish you were him," one of them says, on the edge of orgasm. "Yeah, I know. I know." Friday, 19:07:43 PDT Kon lands on the roof of the Titans Tower and finds Tim and takes him to Smallville, where Clark is surprised to see him but very nice for a guy who was yelling about trigonometry. Mrs. Kent feeds Tim corn on the cob and Mr. Kent shows him the farm. When the moon rises, they go for a walk, and Kon says, "I think I'm in love with you." Tim squeezes his hand and says, "I think I knew that." "What're we gonna tell Cassie?" Tim smiles ruefully. "We'll figure it out. We're not the first Titans with romantic issues." Friday, 19:07:43 PDT Kon lands on the roof of the Titans Tower and picks Tim up out of his room and says, "I need to do this," and when he peels Tim's tights off in midair, Tim just groans and thrusts into his mouth. Friday, 19:07:43 PDT Kon lands on the roof of the Titans Tower and pins Tim against the wall of his bedroom and sucks him off fast, then slow, then fast again until Tim's shaking and saying, "Kon, god, don't ever stop." Friday, 19:07:43 PDT Kon lands on the roof of the Titans Tower and it only takes a little TTK to strip Tim naked and hold him on his bed while Kon whispers the filthiest things he can think of and he knows that somewhere Batman's got it all on video but right now he's got Tim's ass spread under his hands and pressed against his face and he couldn't care less. Friday, 19:07:43 PDT Kon lands on the roof of the Titans Tower. He smiles at Cassie and says, "Good to see you." He pats her on the back when she hugs him. She blinks at him and says, "Everything okay?" He shrugs a little. "I'm not sure." She gives him a rueful look. "Yeah, me neither. Hey -- you want to skip the briefing?" "Nah," he says, though he's been to it so many times now he's lost count. "We probably ought to go." She squeezes his hand. "You sure? I think -- I think we should talk." Kon looks at her -- she's not smiling all that brightly -- and says, "Sure, we can do that." The best thing about being able to fly is it makes getting away from other people really easy. They head up to cumulus level, not quite hand in hand, but close, before they hit a cruising speed where they can hear each other. "You just don't look happy, Kon," Cassie says. "Is it Kansas?" "It's everything," he says, and it's true. "I don't know how to be what I'm supposed to be in Kansas, I don't know how to be a superhero, and --" he gives her a crooked smile. "I don't know how to be a good boyfriend." "You're not doing that badly," she says, and squeezes his hand, "but I'm not doing that great at being a girlfriend either. It's hard only seeing you on weekends." "Yeah," he says. "Yeah, it really is." Cassie kisses his cheek. "Maybe we should back off for a while," she says. "There isn't really any one guy I'm interested in, but -- I want to be able to go out for coffee with somebody without feeling guilty." Kon has to hold himself back from making out with her -- he's done that about as often as he's gotten his hands around Tim's hips. "That's cool," he says, hardly daring to breathe in case she doesn't mean it. "As long as we're still friends." Cassie hugs him tightly. "I never want to lose you as a friend, Kon." "No. No, that's -- we're good." She smells beautiful, same as she always has. "Then -- sure. Whatever you need. Whatever space --" he doesn't have to work at it to look relieved. "It'll be easier this way." She nods and says, "I really love you -- as a friend. And a teammate." She squeezes his hand. "Gods, you're such a good guy." He can feel himself blush. "You're a great girl, too, Cassie." "Nah." She looks away, then back with a glint in her eye. "If I was, I wouldn't have stopped you from going to the briefing." "I bet Tim will tell us what we missed," Kon says. "Sure, and he'll be pissed at us for skipping out. Let's go." Tim gives them a quick rundown of what Kon already knows and it's really hard for Kon to sit through the recitation one more damn time, but when he's done, Cassie says, "Thanks! I'll go brainstorm a couple things," and heads for her room. That leaves Tim and Kon looking at each other in the hallway. Kon can't shake all his recent impossible memories of Tim -- holding him, touching him, fucking him until he screamed -- but none of them are entirely real, here. "I have a problem," Kon says. "Can we -- in your room?" Tim nods, the way he usually does when Kon asks that way, and they end up with Tim on his bed, legs crossed, and Kon pacing. He could just throw Tim back on the bed and get his clothes off in a heartbeat, but -- he could get somewhere else, too. "I'm stuck," Kon says. "I've started this evening over I can't remember how many times, and no matter what I do, what I say, I can't wake up tomorrow morning and have it be anything but this evening again." He runs his hand through his hair. "And I thought it was something to do with you, because I have a huge-ass crush on you, but we've done everything but get married, and it didn't fix anything. And sometimes Cassie knew and she was fine with it, and sometimes she didn't, but now -- I never really got her to be the first person to say she'd break up with me, and I -- I guess that's progress." He looks at Tim, who's got his lenses white and impenetrable. "I'm sick of it. I've been sick of it for probably subjective months now, and I just want to do something else." "Huh," Tim says. "And no one remembers this but you?" Kon shakes his head. "Not at all, as far as I can tell." "That's problematic," Tim says. "When does the time loop restart?" "I'm like Cinderella," Kon says. "I get 'til midnight, and then bam." "No matter what?" Tim asks. "As far as I can tell, yeah." Tim nods and says, "Well, if you're free tomorrow night, we should go out." Kon blinks at him and says, "You've never said that before." Tim smiles. "Good to know. Now let's get you to tomorrow." He calls Oracle at 20:36:12 and Batman at 20:42:28. Jason Blood calls back at 21:05:02 but Zatanna's doing a show in Idaho and she's just plain not available for another two hours. Tim warns Kory they're going to have company, but because it's Robin saying it, everything's okay. Jason Blood teleports in with this blond guy in a tan trenchcoat. Both of them talk funny and poke at Kon, then switch into another language he's never heard before and say things that make glowing lights hang in the air. Eventually the guy in the trenchcoat says, "Robin?" Tim nods. "Yes?" "You're still a virgin, mate?" Tim blushes and nods. "Yes." "But that's not it," Kon says, spluttering. "I fixed that before!" Tim blushes even worse. "It's part of the spell," Jason Blood says, raising an eyebrow at them. "He has to remain one." "Not a problem," Kon says, waving his hands. "No issue there! We're good to wait!" Tim presses his lips together. "I find it difficult to believe that that is all that is required." "No," the guy in the trench says, "but a lot of the other requirements have been fulfilled. The bird's out of the way, nobody's telling lies, nobody's being coerced --" he gives Tim a quick look. "Are you?" Tim shakes his head. "Not in the least." "Good," Jason Blood says. "Then apart from refraining from consummation, you must break bread together and plight your troth." Kon blinks. "What?" "He means don't screw, have dinner, and tell the boy you love him already," the other guy says, "and don't be all night about it, or you'll have to do this all again. Somebody out there has one hell of a grudge against you and a lot of firepower." "I don't know who," Kon says, but he thinks of the way Cassie looks when she's really, really pissed at him, and he's got a guess who it could be. "But thanks." "Oh, no worries," the guy says. "You'll just owe us a bit of a favor." "He will not," Jason Blood says, and bows to Robin. "My best wishes to you both, and to your mentor." "No favor?" the blond guy says, but he's fading out like a Polaroid backward. "Why not?" "A previous debt," Jason Blood says, fading too. "Besides, it would not do to draw Zeus's attention unduly." "Right, there, mate," are the last words they hear, followed only by a low whistle before all traces of the men are gone. Kon clears his throat. "Um." Tim puts a hand on his shoulder and says, "I'm not taking chances with technical virginity." Kon feels himself blush again. "Totally not what I was going to say. Um. I -- I love you." Tim's smile is softer than he's seen it in a month of Fridays. "I love you, too. Good thing, huh?" "Yeah," Kon says. "Yeah, it really is. Can I take you to dinner?" Tim kisses him lightly. "We have to go to dinner, remember? Let me get changed." "Sure," Kon says, grinning at him. "Then we can show San Francisco just how mature we can be." "Well-behaved," Tim says, holding up a finger. "The acting like grown-ups comes later." Kon wonders if he's going to blush every time between now and when they get to go through with it. "Yeah. No problem. I can remember that." Saturday, 08:23:48 PDT Kon wakes up with light in his eyes from an unfamiliar angle and someone's arm around his waist. It takes him a second to realize it's not Friday anymore. When he does, he turns over and kisses Tim awake. "We made it!" he says. Tim hugs him tightly. "We're late for breakfast." Kon laughs and kisses him again. Morning breath has never been so welcome. "You don't have to be a virgin anymore." Tim punches him in the shoulder. "You're just lucky I am one. And we'd better get up." "Do we have to?" Kon runs his hand down Tim's side. "You have no idea how much time I spent figuring out what you liked in bed." Tim shivers hard and rolls out of bed. "Show me tonight." Kon stares at him. "Jeez. I can see how you managed to stay a virgin." Tim throws his shirt at his face. "Not for much longer. Let's go."
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