Tim was really good at ignoring things that he didn't want to think about.

He ignored the bruises, the nosebleeds, and the weight loss. He ignored it all-just kept pretending that it wasn't happening, because if there was one thing that Tim knew inside and out, it was denial. He hid in his apartment, avoided his friends, ignored his family, and lied to himself.

He practiced his denial with skill and precision . . . until Alfred quite calmly kidnapped him mid-case and drove him to a discreet doctor's appointment.

With positive diagnosis and potential time-frame now in hand, Tim had to admit that denial was little more than a stalling tactic. Not a particularly effective one, the young man would grant. Certainly foolish in hindsight as Bruce had pointed out when Alfred alerted Tim's guardian. Bruce had every right to be angry with Tim, every reason to flee the country on Batman, Inc. business. Tim was okay with that. He understood.

Bruce will come back the moment Tim's health slips even a little further.

No, Tim didn't need Jason's outrage on his behalf or Dick's reassurance that Bruce was looking for other treatment options. It was and wasn't true of course. Bruce would look, because Bruce can't let things go, but Tim and Bruce both knew there was nothing to find. Maybe if Tim had admitted to certain things months ago, but it was a waste of energy at this point.

Tim got a certain level of ironic amusement in knowing that even the Justice League couldn't save him now.

He took quiet glee in verbally destroying and forcibly ejecting the League representatives that came to Gotham in Bruce's absence to protest the explosive ending of Tim's last case, even if he had personally seethed over Jason's methods earlier that day. The League had no right to intervene in Gotham, no right to Tim's case or Tim's brother. The Red Hood was what he was, and Tim had been benched by all tangentially-related parties.

Tim was allowed to indulge in a little fury these days. No one, but Alfred would object to Tim's right to wallow in pain and misery.

Of course, Tim was just a little angry with Alfred for intervening. He resented the quiet way in which the butler assumed control over what little remained of Tim's life. So he made himself a difficult fulltime job by resisting medication and food and even fresh air. Alfred still managed to handle it with fathomless grace and loving sarcasm. The butler had willing allies in Dick and Jason to manhandle Tim as needed, and a strangely-compliant errand boy in Damian.

Damian, in his own emotionally-stunted and antagonistic way, was one of the hardest to lose. It was definitely the most drawn-out farewell, starting with the moment Tim stormed out of Alfred's car with the bad news resounding in his head. He didn't even get past the foyer without seeing the pathetic line-up of his 'brothers' waiting grimly.

They had known-or suspected at least. Every single one of them was in on Alfred's scheme and awaiting confirmation. Tim had given it to them in the bluntest fashion possible. Words have always been Red Robin's greatest weapons, and Tim was stretched so taut that this snap-so long in coming-was cathartic.

Telling them that he was going to die became a metaphor for everything that Tim had ever bottled up inside. It wasn't fair, but life wasn't fair.

Something that the Wayne/al Ghul heir still hadn't learned as the fairness complaint was the first thing that fell from the younger boy's lips in the silence that followed Tim's tirade.

"It is not fair." Followed shortly by: "You cannot die."

For a moment, that was the sweetest, emotionally-invested, age-appropriate comment that Damian had ever made, let alone one that concerned Tim. Stunned, Tim scrambled to formulate a response and failed.

Fortunately, Damian continued. "I will never defeat you properly if you die."

With the world now spinning persistently and properly on its axis, that comment was one for which Tim could create the perfect snappy comeback. "So let's suit up and hit the cave," he spat, advancing on Damian. "I'm probably sick enough that you can wipe the floor with me." Truth. It had been a bad day (week); Alfred never would have been able to pull this kind of stunt if Tim hadn't been having a bad day (week). "Let's go!"

At some point, Tim's feet left the ground as Jason hauled him upstairs and Dick diverted Damian's attention. An irritated protest still made it to Tim's ears.

"I did not mean it that way."

Tim never learned whether Damian ever sorted out what he did mean. The little brat found his way into Tim's room later that week and offered the Lazarus Pit. Which . . . no . . .

"It doesn't work like that," Tim had croaked, surprised by the offer. Not even Ra's would have suggested such a thing, but clearly Damian had less than a working knowledge regarding his own heritage. "I'm sick, but it's my own body attacking itself," he explained, somewhat surprised by his own patience. "The Pit might keep me alive, but it won't make this go away."

An eternal life with never-ending cancer? No thanks.

Then Tim had rolled over in bed, yanked a pillow close, and instructed Damian to go away.

Damian did, but it didn't last; the preteen was stubborn. He brought case-files upstairs for Tim's perspective. Tim promptly pulled strings to get Damian onto the Teen Titan's regular roster. Damian managed to return to Gotham every night, and read aloud to Tim-sometimes mission reports, sometimes Shakespeare.

Tim never quite managed to shake the impression that his exponentially deteriorating state was something of an experiment to the younger boy, but he wasn't sure if Damian was studying the effects of terminal illness or the mystery of Tim, himself, in the rapidly diminishing time allotted. Tim couldn't afford to be choosy; bad company was still company and Damian was a captive audience untainted by grief.

Fortunately, the reactions of Steph and Jason balanced each other out. Steph had always been a believer in miracles, and Jason was married to his pessimistic ways.

Stephanie brought presents with every visit even though accumulating more possessions was pointless. Tim tried to talk her out of it-she was a starving college student, he was a dying heir to billions; shouldn't it be the other way around? Like many other lectures, Tim's words fell on deaf ears. His room began to overflow with stuffed animals and hand knit monstrosities.

It was worth it almost for the time that Steph managed to get the octopus-shaped hat on Damian's head.

Steph also brought college brochures with her because she was determined to dream for Tim whether he approved or not. These were even more futile than the presents, but the blonde persisted that Tim was too smart not to go. Steph chided him for being an irresponsible role model and following in the delinquent ways of all the Robins to come before him. Tim didn't remind her that Dick was the only one to actually drop out of college or point out that Damian should be okay, considering Steph was half-way to a degree and Jason had rescued one of the abandoned brochures from the trash.

Jason seemed to have done the emotionally healthy thing for once by expending all of his anger on the criminal element of Gotham and the biggest explosion ever condoned by Batman. With Tim's final case wrapped up in a spectacular fashion and a temporary lull in illegal activity, Jason turned to his true mentor-Alfred.

Tim could almost appreciate Jason's no-nonsense approach when the younger man wasn't caught up in being pissed at everyone involved in benching him over headaches, and a few measly pounds. Jason never asked how Tim was feeling or if he could do anything for Tim or would Tim like to join him at such-and-such activity?

No, Jason manhandled Tim out of bed every morning and enforced Alfred's decrees throughout the day. He erased evidence of tears without commentary, evicted Damian periodically, carted Tim around when he was too tired or too angry to function properly, and quietly cleaned up the vomit from an alcohol binge that even Tim was ashamed of. He hadn't even ratted Tim out to Alfred-at least not in Tim's hearing.

It was the sanest reaction, and somehow more comforting to Tim than any of the others.

The second-best reaction was Cass. She appeared in his room one evening, and just looked at him. Then she silently crawled into his bed. Tim curled around her, and for the hour between crises, Cass let him just be for a while. When offered a quiet farewell, she retreated with only a kiss on the cheek and the quiet instruction: "Be Tim." It gave him something to think about after she left to save the world, and because Tim-Robin-Tim was a man of action, he followed through.

So Tim forgave Alfred.

Of course, upon forgiving the butler, Tim returned to making Alfred's life difficult with a vengeance. He hauled himself out of bed in the mornings, and rearranged his medication schedule to his liking. Tim got himself down to the Cave and stuck his nose into every open case. He involved himself with Bruce's social calendar and bonded with Selina. He pressed Damian into his service as a spy, and antagonized him like the sort-of brothers they were in turn. He joined forces with Jason in an epic prank war against Dick and Damian, because Tim had lived in this house for the better part of four years and never indulged in the silly things like sliding down bannisters or harmless pranks.

Tim taught Damian how to hack Oracle's files, and appeased the wrathful redhead through offerings of gourmet coffee. He watched the Titans' training videos and sent Dick to help a new sidekick with their backflip. Tim bought flowers and had them anonymously delivered to Steph and Cass' apartments for their birthdays just as he had done every other year.

Tim began to take his motorcycle out around the grounds again even though that was on the list of things he wasn't allowed to do anymore. And though it sent Dick and Damian into fits, the bike was never locked away from Tim's reach. And while it wasn't an official case, Tim found the opportunity to talk-down Harley Quinn in a poorly-planned assault on the local grocery store where Jason had brought him to replace his newly-dyed pink toothbrush.

It wasn't that Tim was getting better, or that he didn't have bad days, because he wasn't and he did. There were days when getting out of bed didn't happen, and Tim listened to Alfred's directions. He slept a lot on the bad days, and allowed Dick to bundle him into the blanket that Steph had knit. Bad days were suffered through, and if Tim was granted a good day, then he got out of bed to start all over again because it was a personal triumph every night that Tim fell into bed in a state of exhaustion.

It was simply that as the days ticked by, Tim slept in later each day. His naps became longer, and then doubled. In the beginning, Tim had refused any form of pain relief out of anger. That had lasted a week before the constant ache wore him down, and now the dosage had been upped even further. Bad days seemed to never end, and Damian would turn off the DVD player in favor of letting Tim rest.

And on those rare good days, he got out of bed and ate all the food . . . because Tim was really good at ignoring things that he didn't want to think about.

Tim's denial was so firmly in place that it took a critical hit to crack the surface. When his doctor halved his remaining time unexpectedly, it stopped Tim cold. The anger and fear hadn't left quite the way Tim thought they had with his Cass-induced epiphany. They were still there, and now they were coiled tightly with exhaustion and sickness. His doctor recommended that Tim begin his good-byes.

Good-bye? Tim had no words for a good-bye fit for his family. No words for Steph who wouldn't want one, for Jason who wouldn't need one, for Damian who took his in the form of Tim's time and lessons every day. He had no words for Alfred who could not bear a good-bye, or Bruce who had devoted himself to avoiding any attempt.

He hadn't needed words for Cass. That hour had been the silent exchange of "Hello, Good-bye," and "I love you" all wrapped together.

He'd written Steph a letter during the period of depression following his diagnosis, and would have burned it if not for the certainty that Steph would want it when he was gone. It would perhaps suffice. He'd leave it with Alfred, who would know after the fact whether to keep or burn the letter.

Tim wasn't brave enough to say good-bye to his friends, and that left him with one farewell-the hardest one of course, because of course Dick would want a good-bye. His brother had never gotten one from his parents, or from Jason and Bruce, or from his friend's too-young children. Dick probably needed a good-bye at this point.

Still in shock from the doctor's appointment, Tim let Jason and Alfred settle him on the sofa in the rec room. Tim let Steph divert Damian, and simply stared across the hall at the closed door of Bruce's study. He was still in shock when Dick came home from work, and appeared in the doorway with the knowledge written across his face.

Tim had to get it over with as fast as possible.

"I think this is the point where I'm supposed to tell you to take care of Damian. That you can't shut down after I die," Tim recited blankly. There had been an unspoken ban on movies with sad-endings in the last three months, but Tim had once lived in a tower with super-powered female teenagers. He knew how these scenes were supposed to go. "Does it make me a bad person if I don't like my replacement?" Tim thought that maybe it did; the little demon had been mostly tolerable lately.

"Absolutely not," Dick countered firmly, crossing the room to crouch in front of Tim. Tears were already spilling because Dick Grayson was not a man afraid to cry. His brother knew what part of the story this was. Maybe a few of those sad-ending movies had been watched on Dick's couch . . .

Dick was the first person to feel like family among the Bats. He was the first to befriend Tim, and it didn't hurt that Dick had been Tim's childhood hero both in and out of the Robin-suit. After a lifetime of being an only child, Tim hadn't been prepared for having an older brother.

Dick was an awesome older brother no matter what he and Jason pretended to save face.

Tim didn't want to share-and not just with Damian. There would be other Robins, other Batgirls, and Dick would befriend each of them the same way he had Tim. He would love each of them for who they were, and Tim begrudged every second of time that Dick would spend watching terrible movies or talking on the phone or putting back together broken Robins.

"I don't want to be replaced," he admitted candidly, studying the quilt over his lap. "I want to be special and never forgotten. And it's stupid, because I know that you won't forget me . . . but I don't like to share."

Dick snorted through his tears. "Really? Never would have guessed, Red Robin."

And Tim wasn't Red Robin anymore. Tim wasn't much of anything, but he had been once upon a time. He had been a hero, and that was probably the best thing that Tim could have ever done.

Dick squeezed Tim into a hug that was more meaningful than cautious and then settled on the sofa, pulling Tim half into his lap. "Damian will never be you no matter how hard he's currently trying," Dick murmured into Tim's hair. "No one can be you."

"I know that," Tim snapped, but kept his gaze downward because maybe Dick wasn't the only one teary-eyed. "I just don't want to lose my part of you by not being here to claim it."

"Don't be ridiculous, Timmy. If there's one thing we have learned from my many relationship woes, it's that Dick Grayson can and does love everyone. All at once. In a way that is not conducive to any one person's emotional well-being, I will admit, but love you, I do. You and Damian. Alfred and Bruce, Jason, Cass, Steph, Babs, Donna, Kory, Roy, Garth . . ."

Tim did his best to smother Dick with a throw pillow.

And he never did actually say 'Good-bye.'

Tim thought that maybe both Dick and he preferred it that way.

The whole matter of good-byes settled, Tim turned back to his denial like a comfortable pair of shoes worn long past fraying. One couldn't throw away something that fit so well. He just needed a few more good days . . .

. . . Tim did not get another good day.

So he made the best use of the bad ones he had. Dick was the best pillow during the day, and Steph brought cookies that Tim pretended to eat while Jason covered for him. Babs sent clever e-mails, and Cass sent trophies. Movies with Damian were watched on mute to spare his aching head, and Alfred stroked his hair with a soft touch while Bruce took to guarding Tim's sleep at night. He gave Damian the idea for a prank on the unsuspecting older brothers, and he broke the sad-ending rule with Dick and "The Notebook" just because he could.

On his last day, Tim suspected nothing. There was no innate knowledge, no magical sense of right (or wrong), and no special event happened to mark the occasion.

It was not a good day, but it was not a terrible one. He ate little, slept a great deal, and threw a pillow at Jason's head (it had collided with the older man's chest almost gently). He took the medication that Alfred offered him, and went to bed at the approved time with a generous eye-roll in Bruce's direction as his guardian took up the self-awarded post at his bedside.

His last three hours were spent asleep. Dick and Steph had not yet returned from patrol. Jason and Damian were asleep in their rooms, and Babs watched the security feed from across Gotham as always while Alfred dozed fitfully in the Cave.

But Bruce was at his bedside when Tim took his last breath, and there the Batman stayed with his Robin until morning came with people to be told.

"Do not go gentle into that good night.

Rage, rage against the dying of the light."

-Dylan Thomas; "Do Not Go Gentle Into that Good Night"