Chapter Text
Jason woke up feeling nothing out of the ordinary. Horribly exhausted, groggy, and cranky as all hell.
Groaning, he sat up and clumsily scooted to the side of the bed, his still sleep-addled brain failing to register both the unfamiliar room and the strange newfound lightness with which his body moved. He noticed something was off only when his face hit the floor after a failed attempt to stand up, his knees suddenly buckling and his hands too slow to catch his flailing body.
"Goddammit!"
Grumbling, he slowly got to his feet, for some odd reason unable to move his limbs without actively thinking about it. Only after he stood up did he finally notice his surroundings.
An uncharacteristically messy room for him, with papers strewn about, and a variety of suits hanging in the closet. Jason always made a point to tidy up even in the worst of times. Something that helps him feel more in control of his surroundings. Just last week he got an earful from Dick when he found out Jason decided to deep clean his room right after having a bullet wound in his abdomen stitched up instead of resting. (It wasn't his fault he couldn't sleep in a messy room! Blame his weird brain!)
His eyes shifted down as he brought his hands up to his abdomen. Where'd that bullet wound go? And were his legs always this short? And since when were there scars in those spots on these hands… these hands… not his hands. It clicked. Jason sprinted to what he assumed was the bathroom, fumbled around to switch on the lights, and lo and behold, none other than the face of Timothy Jackson Drake stared back at him in the mirror.
He gripped the counter tightly. "…fuuuck me."
Jason wasn't new to the strange and supernatural. He came back from the dead for fuck's sake. Waking up in a different person's body could be considered perfectly normal in his line of work. Waking up in the body of someone you definitely haven't been developing feelings for was something entirely different.
His grip on the counter loosened as he stared at Tim's soft freckled cheeks, bright blue eyes, and sharp nose, once again awestruck at the harmonious features. Tim was, for all intents and purposes, beautiful.
As his eyes trailed down to the long jagged scar across Tim's pale neck, any and all warm feelings he had were replaced with cold, unrelenting guilt. He reached a hand up and gingerly traced the scar from left to right. Over the years he had thought deeply of how Tim must have felt. How much pain he must have endured. But being face to face with the scar forced a flurry of new feelings through his heart. Despair, anger, sadness, relief, happiness, unease, and grief shot through his mind in a flash. He felt simultaneously guilty for his actions and happy for how far their relationship had come since.
Despite their rocky past, he and Tim had gotten quite close in recent months, opting to patrol together when possible and even hanging out after patrol sometimes. Sure it was mostly them shooting the shit over subpar diner food, but it meant something to Jason. Something about their dynamic just worked.
To him, Tim was witty and kind and just and reliable and extremely intelligent and all the things Jason wasn't. To Tim, Jason was… well, Jason wasn't entirely sure what he was to Tim. But if you'd asked him four years ago if he thought he'd ever come to admire Tim Drake, he probably would've cussed you out after a swift kick to the ribs, no hesitation. Now, after he has apologized on several occasions (despite knowing no amount of apologies would ever be enough), and after Tim has accepted those apologies (despite knowing he'd never really forget the fear and anguish he felt that day in the Tower), the two of them cautiously dance the line between acquaintances and friends.
Shutting off the lights and wandering out of the bathroom, Jason, completely unaffected by the actual supernatural element of the situation, plopped himself down on Tim's desk chair and began to contemplate as he fiddled with a Rubik's cube he'd found.
He wondered why he'd felt so at ease waking up in Tim's room and why he hadn't instantly recognized something was wrong. It didn't occur to him how much he let his guard down around Tim. If he'd woken up in Tim's body, where had Tim gone? Was someone else in his body and Tim in that other person's body? Or was it just him and Tim badly re-enacting Freaky Friday like a pair of idiots? What would Tim think if he woke up in Jason's body? What does Tim think of Jason in general? It is even fair for Jason to have (alleged!) feelings for someone he's hurt so badly in the past?
He was startled out of his thoughts when Tim's phone rang.
Dropping the Rubik's cube, he walked toward the bed and dug around to find Tim's phone tangled up in the sheets. On the screen, he was greeted with an image of his own blurry face (zoomed in image from an old photo they'd taken at the manor) and "JT" floating underneath it as he picked up the phone. He didn't have time to process why he felt so giddy at the basic photo and low-effort nickname Tim gave him as he hit the green button.
"Yello. JT speaking~"
His previous questions about Tim's whereabouts were quickly answered as a familiar voice rang out clearly over the line.
"Jason… what the hell did you do."