Work Text:
Knock-Knock-Knock
Tim withheld an instinctive groan.
The knock on the bedroom door wasn’t unexpected or even unwelcome, but the infinite seeming stretch between the bed and the door made his aches twinge just at the thought of moving.
“Just let yourself in,” Tim said to the ceiling, knowing Kon would be able to hear him without raising his voice. “I’m not getting up.”
There was the telltale click of the lock flipping and the displacement of air that came from the door swinging open. The door clicked shut again after Kon entered the room, and the soft padding of his footsteps approached the bed where Tim was laying like a corpse.
“Why are you still in your suit?”
Tim pried one weary eyelid open to stare at Kon looming over him. His curls were damp. A playtendo console Bart had gotten bored of was clutched in one hand. He wore flannel pajama pants and a sweatshirt that had belonged to Wally once before being lent to Dick then stolen by Tim then reappropriated by Kon.
A ragged sigh rushed out of Tim and even that hurt. Breathing hurt. Blinking hurt. “I can’t get it off,” he admitted, defeated.
Kon quirked an eyebrow. “Why not?”
“The bed won’t let me go. I have to lie here and never move again.”
Melodramatic? Perhaps. But Tim was sore from his toenails to his hair follicles. His kidneys and arteries and fucking optic nerves were sore. The past week had chewed Tim up and spit him out into a trash compactor. A collection of lawsuits at WE had kept him chained to his desk for a torturous series of 12 hour days that lasted just long enough for his body to catch on to the fact that he wasn’t doing the stretches formulated specifically to prevent him from feeling as tight as he did at that moment. And as garnishment, the past 2 days had been chock full of rigorous physical activity breaking up an international and super illegal sport hunting group that had a penchant for endangered animals.
And Tim had spent the last 4 hours of that mission trapped in a dog cage that couldn’t have been more than 3 feet cubed.
So, yeah. He never wanted to move again.
Kon snorted. “So, what, you’re just gonna sleep in your body armor?” The question was punctuated by poke to Tim’s chest plate.
“Maybe.”
“Gross.”
“Such is life.”
Tim had closed his eyes again, but he could feel Kon rolling his eyes.
“C’mon, Snow White, you need to shower. You still smell like a zoo.”
Uncompromising hands wrapped around his wrists and hauled Tim to his feet against his will. He let out the most pitiful whine he was capable of which did not sway Kon at all, the monster. The momentum of it carried his whole feeble body forward until almost all of his weight was held up by a broad chest. He relished the press of Kon’s collarbone into his cheek.
“Stop being dramatic,” Kon chided him, sounding more amused than anything else.
“You’re the worst,” Tim grumbled into the skin-warmed cotton his face was buried in.
“You love me,” Kon shot back, and, well, he couldn’t argue with that.
This was a well-worn routine of theirs, set into motion after every fast-paced, action-packed mission. After however long of working with a team 24/7, Kon always sought out company, like he needed to be gradually weaned off the constant human interaction. And fortunately for both of them, Kon was one of the only people Tim could be around without ever getting tired or sick of him.
Tim sighed, long and defeated. “Okay, but, legitimately, I don’t think I can get my suit off by myself.”
“Timothy Drake!” Kon gasped in a scandalized tone. “Are you asking me to disrobe you?”
“Shut up,” Tim said, burying his face in Kon’s chest. “This is humiliating.”
“You say that like I don’t already know what a dork you are.”
“Says the guy who cried like a baby during the season finale of Wendy.”
“And who's the loser who spent his Friday night holding me while I cried like a baby?”
“...touché.”
At some point during their banter, Kon had released Tim’s wrists and moved on to the clasps that kept his cape fastened to his shoulders. The touch wasn’t even heavy enough to feel it through the fabric, but Kon worked his magic, making the pieces come apart.
The cape fell, pooling on the floor around their feet. A weight was, quite literally, lifted from Tim’s shoulders.
Bit by bit, Kon disassembled his armor, the tendrils of his TTK wiggling into the nonexistent groves of all the traps and buckles, pushing until all the individual segments were scattered on the carpet. Bit by bit, Tim became lighter, held steady by Kon’s body.
“Those are gonna be a bitch to put back together later,” Tim said, gazing uncaringly down at all the machinery that would be impossible for anyone else to tamper with without getting electrocuted.
“That’s a funny way of saying, ‘Thank you so much for taking care of my useless ass, you’re so kind and generous and perfect and anyone would be lucky to have you.’”
Tim leaned back just enough to catch Kon’s eye. Fluttering his eyelashes, and pouring as much excessive sweetness and faux innocence into his voice as possible, he parroted back, “ Thank you, Kon. You’re so kind and generous and wonderful and perfect and amazing, and anyone would be so lucky to have you taking care of their useless ass.”
Kon pinched his hip just hard enough to make him squawk. “Brat.”
When there was nothing left except for his boxers, Kon asked, “Do you think you can get your underwear off on your own, or is this about to turn into a really bad porno?”
“I’m offended at the implication that any porno I’d be in would be bad.”
“My sincerest apologies.” With nothing left to pick at, Kon’s hands slid up his shoulders, warm and soft and firm. Then, without any warning, they spun him around and shoved him towards the bathroom. “Now go shower. And don’t fall asleep in there.”
“No promises,” Tim mumbled on his way to the bathroom, stopping at the dresser to grab a pair of boxers and a t-shirt to change into.
As requested, Tim managed to not pass out in the shower, but it was a close call. The second hot water was beating into all his sore spots, he wanted nothing more than to sit on the floor and boil himself like a lobster. It was only the promise of his precious memory-foam mattress that got him through the motions of washing and rinsing.
Once out of the shower, it took an amount of time that Tim would never admit to to wrestle himself into the clean clothes. And if parts of him were still dripping wet because it was impossible to reach everywhere the towel needed to go, well, that was his business.
With all the vitality of a 150 year old tortoise, Tim ventured out of the bathroom.
And shuffled slowly over to where his suit was piled on the ground…
And ignored Kon’s searing gaze as he bent over, holding his breath to avoid vocalizing his pain…
He grabbed a good portion of the suit…
And stayed there a moment, bracing himself before…
Slowly…
Achingly…
Pulling himself back up to a standing position-
“Jesus Christ,” Kon exclaimed from his place propped up against the headboard. “This is like watching someone get teeth pulled.”
He rolled out of the bed and walked over to Tim only to bat the pile of clothes out of his arms.
Tim made an offended noise, but before he could demand an explanation, Kon was pushing him towards the bed.
“I can’t watch this anymore. Lie down.”
“What?”
An uncompromising finger pointed at the bed. “Get on the bed. Face down.”
“What happened to this not turning into a bad porno?”
Kon gave him a severely unimpressed look.
“Alright, alright,” Tim conceded. “I’m getting on the bed, ass up, as instructed.”
And he did. With minimal complaint, Tim managed to crawl onto his perfect, wonderful mattress, kicking the rumpled blankets down towards the foot of the bed. The pillow was almost soft enough to make him forget the crick in his neck. The sheets were almost silky enough to forget about the patchwork quilt of scrapes on the outside of his left calf. Tim was almost comfortable enough not to care when the mattress dipped and two thick thighs settled on either side of his hips, a familiar weight settling just below his ass.
Almost.
“Umm, hello?”
“Where’s your lube?” Kon asked, like that was a totally normal question to ask your best friend and not something that made his brain shoot off sparks then blue-screen.
Was Kon actually going to fuck him? Was this about to turn into a bad porno? Or, perhaps, a good porno?
Would he mind if it did?
“ What?” Tim tried to prop himself up on his elbows so he could turn and look Kon in the eye, but aborted the movement when his spine started screaming at him for it.
Kon flicked his ear. “Relax, I’m not gonna fuck you. I’m assuming you don’t have massage oils on hand, so where is your lube?”
ERROR 404 Tim.exe has stopped working.
“What- I’m not- I don’t-”
“C’mon, don’t make me x-ray your room.”
“...in the lamp,” Tim admitted, half into the pillow.
“ In the lamp?” Kon parroted, incredulous.
Tim heaved a great sigh. “The lamp has a false bottom.”
There was a shifting of weight and a telltale clicking noise before Kon snorted, settling back into place on his thighs. “Only you would keep your lube in a fake lamp. If I x-ray the alarm clock, am I gonna find condoms?”
“Okay, it’s not a fake lamp, it’s a real lamp that just so happens to have a hidden storage compartment. And for your information, I keep my condoms in a secure location where they won’t be exposed to heat from a light bulb.”
“...”
Tim shifted, unnerved by Conner’s sudden silence.
“Kon?”
“Oh my god, there actually are condoms in your alarm clock!”
His face flamed as Kon howled with laughter, far too entertained by his innovative methods of concealing illicit goods.
“Shut up.” Tim glowered and kicked up, his heel making contact with Kon’s back to no avail.
Kon’s cackles gradually tapered into the occasional chuckle. Tim got the sense he was wiping tears of laughter out of his eyes. “Ah, Tim, you crack me up, man.”
“I think I’d rather be a bad porno right now.”
“Careful what you wish for.”
A small click and subtle squelch were all the warning Tim got before two warm, slick hands slipped under the hem of his shirt and glided upwards, spreading the lube over his skin. It struck him then that Kon fully intended to give him a massage. Like, lots-of-skin-contact, hands-on-his-body, undeniably-intimate massage.
Just as that realization sunk in, it was chased away by the irrefutable pleasure the touch brought. It felt good. When the air met his freshly moistened skin, a brief chill caressed his skin, only to be replaced by the heat of Kon’s palms. They smoothed up and down, not yet digging in, just getting him all oiled up. Firm fingers smoothed over his ribs and shoulder blades, rucking the loose material of his t-shirt so far up he might as well have not been wearing it.
Tim couldn’t help the dreamy sigh that escaped him.
Kon’s hands slid down his sides until they rested just above the waistband of his boxers. His thumbs rubbed circles into his lower back, a tease of the gratification that was sure to come.
“Tim?” Kon’s voice startled him out of his reverie.
“Hmm?”
“I asked you a question.”
Oh.
He was already down bad.
“Where does it hurt the worst?” Kon repeated patiently.
Tim blinked lazily. “Umm. Everywhere.”
The thumbs dug into his lower back harder and Tim fought back a whimper.
“That’s not helpful,” Kon said, sounding amused.
“Uhh, my back?”
The resulting silence communicated exactly how unhelpful that answer was.
“My spine, I mean,” Tim rectified. “Especially in the middle.”
“Good boy,” Kon said.
Tim took that response and tucked it into the filing cabinet in his head labeled CAUTION: DO NOT OPEN. CONTAINS UNCOMFORTABLE REALIZATIONS.
Kon’s hands migrated upwards and came to rest between his shoulder blades, the heels of his hands placed just on either side of his spine while his fingers stretched out towards his arms. Then, Conner leaned forward, putting more of his weight on Tim’s back, pushing until tightness grew, until the tension became unbearable and the pain became blinding, bolts of agony racing through his core, more and more until he couldn’t breathe, until-
po-POP
The sound that left Tim when his back cracked was more obscene than any he’d ever made during actual sex.
Sweet, glorious relief flooded his system, washing out a good portion of the lingering tightness.
“How’s that feel?” Kon asked, appropriately smug.
“I’m in love with you,” Tim eloquently responded.
“That’s what all the boys say.”
“Do my lower back,” Tim begged.
Kon obliged, hands moving back down and applying pressure again until more pop s filled the room.
“Oh, fuuuck,” he moaned. He felt like a ball of bread dough getting the air punched out of it. Kon hadn’t even gotten to the proper massaging portion of this endeavor and he was already putty. In that moment, Kon could have asked for anything, from the contents of his bank account to his hand in marriage, and Tim would’ve agreed. Anything to stay in the blissful bubble Kon had put him in.
Kon formed fists and began digging his knuckles into his lumbar muscles, turning them from sheetrock to clay, and turning the rest of Tim from a rusty Tin Man to a doped up Dorothy passed out in the poppy field. He gradually worked his way up, coaxing all the leftover strain from Tim’s back bit by bit. His thumbs squeezed away the tautness that clung around his thoracic vertebrae. The heels of his hands palpated Tim’s obliques until they could have been stretched out like a rubber band.
Every moment of contact was pure bliss. Tim never wanted it to end.
“How are you so good at this?” he said half into his pillow while Kon ground the back of his ribcage into dust.
“Anita taught me everything I know, and you know how good she is with her hands.”
“Mmm.”
Between the cushion of the mattress and the comforting weight of Conner’s body, Tim didn’t think it was possible for him to move ever again. Until the evil little knot hiding just above his left scapula got prodded by Kon’s questing fingertips.
“ Ow!” His whole body seized at the sudden jolt of pain, reigniting all the other dormant aches in his arms and legs and neck and organs and bones.
“Yikes,” Conner said, feeling out the lump in his muscle. “You’ve got a real monster knot here.”
“No kidding,” Tim gritted out.
“Okay, just relax.”
“ You relax.”
“I’m gonna try something. Don’t freak out.”
“If I had a dollar for every time you said that, I’d - ooh.”
The pads of Kon’s fingers drifted featherlight over his skin, smooth enough not to catch on the ridges of his scars. At first, Tim thought it was heat he felt radiating from them, but then the feeling got deeper.
It was the strangest sensation, like normal pressure except instead of on his skin, it was under his skin. It was the feeling of a caress all around the tight little bundle of nerves giving him hell. There was a set of hands massaging him, and then another completely separate set of hands massaging him. From the inside. It was an utterly bizarre feeling, and Tim couldn’t decide whether he loved it or hated it.
It made him feel all… tingly.
Tim tried to swear but all that came out was incomprehensible gibberish.
After swallowing, trying and failing to ignore the feeling, then swallowing again, he managed to garble out, “What- what is that?”
“TTK,” Kon answered brightly, like he wasn’t turning Tim’s brain into a bowl of soup. “How does it feel?” The invisible fingers inside his body turned upward so the knot was squeezed between them and the real ones. It ached, but in a way that made him want to flop over instead of tense up.
“ Weird.”
“Good weird or bad weird?”
“ Mmph.” Tim buried his face in his pillow and submitted himself to Kon’s palpitations.
In truth, Tim’s ambivalent response had more to do with the fact that the feeling was, in fact, good weird. Very good weird. A very specific type of good weird that Tim wouldn’t admit to on threat of death. He was perhaps more vulnerable than he’d ever been, and there wasn’t another person on the planet he would trust to have him in that position.
Tim submitted himself completely to Kon’s ministrations. There wasn’t a single thought flying through his marshmallow brain, every functioning synapses overrun by pure bliss. His head went somewhere soft and floaty, touch-drunk and more relaxed than he’d been in weeks.
He never wanted it to end.
All too soon, those big, warm, soft, perfect hands were leaving his back and Kon’s weight disappeared from his thighs.
“Noooo,” Tim whined as the scuffle of socks on carpet informed him that Kon was heading towards the bathroom. “Keep going.”
“If I keep going you’ll turn into ground meat,” Kon replied against the background of running water.
“Bold of you to assume I don’t want that.”
An amused hum was his only response. The sound of water stopped and after a few moments the side of the mattress dipped under added weight. A warm, wet cloth dragged down his spine, cleaning away the tacky remnants of the lube. The lingering moisture grew cold against the air, but it dried quickly, and then Kon was tugging the hem of his shirt back down.
“There you go, buddy.” Kon punctuated his statement with a pat on Tim’s back. “Maybe now you’ll stop shuffling around like an arthritic turtle.”
“Turtles live in the ocean,” Tim mumbled into his pillow, “So they don’t really shuffle. It’s tortoises you’re thinking of.”
Tim yelped when Kon pinched his thigh in retribution.
He continued to lay there like a bump on a log as Kon puddled around, turning off the overhead light and turning on the lamp before fluffing up a pile of pillows to lean back against next to Tim. He leaned down and pulled up the blankets over both their legs, then there was the tell-tale jingle of the playtendo powering up.
And then it was just comfortable silence, broken only by his own gentle breathing and the click of buttons. They were close enough that Tim could almost feel the constant heat that radiated from Kon. He could feel the ghost of his hands, the lingering afterglow from all the oxytocin. It had only been a minute and Tim could already feel himself going into touch withdrawals.
As subtly as he could, Tim took a deep breath, and on the exhale scooched a fraction of an inch closer.
Tim made to shift around like he was just getting comfy and managed another inch. The cotton of Kon’s sweatshirt brushed his bicep.
If he paced his shifting, he could avoid drawing any attention to his ulterior motives, and with a couple dozen more minuscule movements he could acquire just enough physical contact to satiate his primal urge for comfort without making a fool of himself-
“You know, if you want to cuddle, you can just ask.”
Tim froze at Kon’s blunt callout. Then, just to be contrary, he made a pointed move half a foot away.
Kon gave an unimpressed scoff, and that was all the warning Tim got before an iron grip encircled his arm and dragged him across the mattress until he was settled half on top of Kon, cheek pillowed on his chest.
He smelled like cinnamon mouthwash and cheap deodorant.
Tim abandoned his pride and snuggled into Kon’s side, wrapping an arm around his waist. He couldn’t help it; Kon was just so cozy, and Tim was so very, very tired. And doped up on physical contact. Really, he couldn’t be held responsible for his clinginess.
“Go to sleep,” Kon murmured into the top of his head. “I promise not to send any embarrassing pictures of you to the group chat while you’re asleep.”
“Liar,” Tim shot back, though, to be honest, even knowing the odds of his future humiliation wouldn’t be enough to move him from the warm, firm body he was pressed against.
“Go to sleep,” Kon said again.
Tim sighed and let himself drift off to the white noise of video game sound effects, Kon’s arms wrapped around him and propping his console up on Tim’s back.
And if he woke up the next morning to see a picture of himself unconscious, hair a mess and face buried in Kon’s tits? Well, at least he would be limber enough to chuck the lube-lamp at Kon’s head.