Phew! Sorry it's been so long since the last (and first…and only) one shot in the series. I'm working on a chaptered story at the mo (Birds of a Feather, if you're interested), and ideas for this prompt can be surprisingly difficult to work through. (I began work on another idea that never did quite work out; maybe I'll return to it later and try again.) But! I took a break from my other story to write this one-shot. It made me cry. I'm hoping it's as good a read for you guys as it was for me. :p Let me know what you think! Feedback is useful, especially for this one-shot collection. Into this collection go any challenging ideas that I think would be difficult to write; last time I tried comedy (which I feel inept at), and this time I've tried horror/tragedy…something sad-ish…which is also very challenging for me. As such, any feedback whatsoever is most helpful. Tell me what works, what doesn't, what confused you, what made you cry (if anything)!

Also! If anybody has requests or ideas for this prompt (that is, the prompt "What does Dick do with his allowance?"), I'd love to hear them! Don't worry, this chapter doesn't mean that Dick will not have any allowance to do anything with for a while, and I don't mind writing out of chronological order. So, no matter what your idea is shuttle it along! I won't necessarily write every or any idea, but I'd really love to write a request or be inspired by one. It sounds fun! Pleeeeeaaaase, send me ideas!

Anyway, here's the new one. Enjoy!

- Lux

~~Chapter Rating: T (for dangerous stuffs/brushes with death/high tension and one mild swear word; no adult situations, violence, substance abuse, or the like; my ratings tend to be conservative)~~

Ninth Life, Second Chance

Batman perched three stories above street level on one of Gotham's many questionably tasteful gargoyles as he surveyed the streets of downtown through binoculars. They were not questionably tasteful in his eyes, but Hal Jordan had pointed out in one of his many random rambles that Gotham being full of gothic style architecture was just too bad of a pun. Batman had bluntly pointed out that the gargoyles were not simple architecture but a long-standing promise from the city's founding fathers. He'd been forced to ignore the rolled eyes he received in response. Robin, though, had been there to hear that one, and the word-play-loving fiend had never been able to look at the looming statues the same way again, one of the many things Batman held against the Lantern.

It had been a quiet night, one of a few, for which he was thankful. Too many quiet nights and you began to feel that the city was going to explode at any moment with its particular brand of mania, but the quiet was welcome right now. Robin was struggling.

He was thirteen now, newly thirteen, and despite all advice against it Batman had been thinking for some time now that he should formally introduce his partner to the Justice League and begin to bring him in. Personally, he agreed with those who advised against introducing Robin to the League, but certain other developments were putting pressure on his partner and, therefore, on him. Robin's career as a sidekick and partner had inspired others to take sidekicks of their own, or at times inspired kids to butt in and become sidekicks on their own.

Batman might have held off a few more years on Robin's introduction despite his partner's good work, but these other sidekicks were all older than Robin. Other League members with sidekicks had already begun talking about how best to introduce them to the League. There was a very real danger of these sidekicks being introduced to the League before Robin if Batman continued to wait, and that simply wasn't acceptable. He knew Robin saw it coming too and could see the strain it was putting on him; these days, his drive to improve was approaching unhealthy levels, while the knowledge that in reality there wasn't much he could do to make up for his youth wore down his normally untouchable positivity.

As much as technicalities like who got into the League first shouldn't have mattered when it came to this line of work, Batman knew that sometimes they just did. His partner had earned this and didn't deserve to have some new kid get to it before he did just because of his age. Dick couldn't help that his life had gone to hell at such an early age. Batman may not have wanted to do it just yet, but he did want to reward Dick for his hard work before someone less deserving took his place.

Just when Batman had started to think Robin was ready, though, events took the turn they always did in Gotham. A mission went wrong, for Robin very wrong. His partner was a little emotionally derailed right now, which made it a bad time to tell the League Robin was ready. The only saving grace was that the weight of depression hanging over Dick right now had him entirely distracted from his worries about the League. It wasn't exactly a good trade.

Batman didn't sigh as these thoughts rolled through his mind for the hundredth time that night, because Batman doesn't sigh. But he wanted to. He looked away from the streets below to check on his partner. His eyes narrowed behind his cowl: Robin was nowhere to be seen. While there was little way that Robin could have been abducted from right beside him without him hearing, it still wasn't like Robin to run off without telling him first.

Scratch that.

It was completely like Robin to run off without telling him first. It was just that Robin didn't usually move from his side unless it was for one of their well-oiled maneuvers, and Robin was trained to never be the first to move except under orders to.

Batman returned to surveying the streets, this time urgently looking for anything that might have grabbed his partner's attention. Even if Robin was currently distracted from his drive to become good enough for a League introduction, the days when that had been his partner's obsession were not so long gone that Batman had forgotten how touchy his partner could be if he questioned his decisions in the field. Batman wanted to avoid calling Robin on the comms to ask where he'd gone and why if he could.

The streets had been entirely peaceful just a moment ago, but you know what they say about watched pots. Something had indeed boiled over in an alleyway just across the street in the short time Batman hadn't been looking. A young woman was being assaulted. Batman assumed for now that it was a mugging, because the attacker looked sober and the victim was dressed in a well-tailored pant-suit but was overweight and on the ugly side. That wasn't a very politically correct thought and Batman knew that, but it was one of those which, while unfair, was usually accurate. The woman need never know he'd thought that, and she need never lose her wallet if he acted quickly.

Batman jumped, spreading his cape to slow his descent. If he had fired his grappling gun from the three story height he had been perched on to the one story height of the building across the street, it would not have been a gentle landing. Instead, he waited until he was just above the one story height, mid-way across the street now, before firing. He swung into the alleyway and landed just in front of the attacker and his intended victim. He could have swung into the attacker himself, but he didn't want to break the man if he didn't have to and much of the time the image of the Batman was enough to do the job.

His image was enough this time. The bright lights of the downtown streets were at his back, making him look as dark as a black hole looming in the brilliance. The man may have been sober, but fear kept him from moving like it. He practically crippled himself as he clumsily tried to turn and run. Batman was on him and cuffing him before the young woman had even gotten her wits together enough to squeak for help. He checked her visually for any injury or shock, then scanned the area to make sure that someone had noticed and was calling the police for the attacker's ride to the station. As he did so, he also scanned for Robin.

Batman had been sure this mugging had been what had distracted him, but his partner was still nowhere to be seen. Batman stepped out onto the street to get a better view and checked down the street in both directions. People backed away to give him room. They took pictures, but the flash from camera phones did not inhibit his vision as they were only brave enough to snap a photo when he wasn't looking their way. Still, he saw nothing. He'd raised his hand to his ear to give up and call Robin over the comm when he saw a little ripple in the darkness on the roof he'd just leapt from, the telltale sign of a cape. All that and the boy was right back where they'd started.

Batman's frustrated growl had the added benefit of clearing the area for him as pedestrians backed hurriedly away from him. He grappled back to his original perch where he did indeed find Robin sitting, on the safety of the rooftop instead of on a gargoyle, with his back to him.

"What was that, Robin?" Batman growled.

Robin's head jerked up, almost as though he hadn't even noticed Batman landing there, and he looked back over his shoulder. He didn't turn around though, and Batman was confused by the oddly ashamed look on his face.

"Sorry . . ." Robin said, looking, for once, like he had nothing else to say for himself.

"Sorry doesn't begin to cover it," Batman said, still stern but voice quieter than before. "You know better than to disappear like that." Normally, their teamwork was excellent, and it felt odd to be scolding Robin for something so basic.

"Yeah, I know," Robin said quickly. "Sorry. I meant to come right back, but you weren't up here."

Batman frowned. "Coming right back doesn't make up for running off on your own, and I wasn't up here because I was doing my job. Alone. Because my partner was missing. Where did you go?"

"Oh . . ." Robin said, facing forward again. "Just down the street a ways to that convenience store."

Batman stepped forward, trying to remember not to snap at the boy. He put a hand on his partner's shoulder and leaned over him. "What are you hiding?" His hand tightened comfortingly on his partner's shoulder when he saw what he had in his lap. "Oh," he said simply.

Robin had his arms and one side of his cape wrapped protectively around a medium-sized, soggy cardboard box. Inside, there was a kitten so tiny and filthy it could barely be distinguished from the cardboard. When Batman looked his partner in the eyes, the boy was actually glaring at him. Batman's quick, well-trained eyes immediately picked up on other things too. Robin's breathing was just slightly fast, and despite the fact that he was sitting flat on his butt he was coiling himself subconsciously into a defensive position. He was upset and obviously felt that Batman was going to make him hand over the feline. Batman moved around him and took his hand away from his shoulder to try to give him space to relax.

"We can take that to a shelter before we move on with patrol," Batman said. Trying to be more sympathetic than usual, he added, "There's no sense in leaving it out."

"No, I . . ." Robin struggled with his words again. "I was actually thinking of a little more permanent help."

Batman, for once, did sigh. "Robin, we are not taking that cat home. I'm sorry. We're not. I will be happy to take it to a shelter. I'll even find a way to get in touch with Catwoman, if you want, but we're not taking it."

Robin hugged the box a little closer, crushing the corners just slightly. The cat inside didn't even seem to notice. "I don't want to keep it! Just until it's healthy."

Batman shook his head. "I'm not sure, but I think that's the oldest trick in the book. You'll convince me to let you have it 'just until it's healthy', and then you think it'll just weasel its way into house and home and I won't make you get rid of it."

Robin actually looked a little hurt. "No, I really mean it," he said quietly. "I want to give it away when it's healthy. To her. You know, just to say . . ." Robin looked back down at the cat, swallowing hard, then noticed that he was crushing the box and backed off of it almost in a panic.

Unfortunately, Batman knew exactly what and who Robin meant.

Nine days before, on a Friday night, Batman and Robin intercepted an emergency dispatch call to a fire in an apartment complex. The two didn't usually answer calls like that unless their presence would make a difference or foul play was expected. So far, it sounded like this was a small, easily containable house fire, but Robin wanted to go anyway. It was late, near the end of their patrol on a mostly quiet night, and the complex was just a few blocks away from Dick's friend Barbara's home. Although the fire was nowhere near her home, Robin felt the need to make sure nothing terribly bad came of the accident in his friend's neighborhood. Batman indulged him; he knew Barbara's father, Jim Gordon, would appreciate the check-in, and Batman had few real opportunities to repay the commissioner's efforts in their unofficial partnership against Gotham's criminal underbelly.

The plan for assisting in cases of fire fighting and rescues was different than in other cases. The fire trucks had already arrived, so Batman parked the Batmobile away from them to leave them room to do their job. Then, the two got out and simply approached the fire chief and stood there. They didn't say anything; they knew the chief knew they were there and that he didn't need distractions. They also knew that the firemen were well aware that Batman and Robin knew how to handle a blaze the same way they did.

Over the years, Batman in particular had even pulled off some rescues that the firemen would not have been able to themselves, and, unlike the police, they had the freedom, and perhaps the simplicity, to respect him for it. In cases like these, Batman and Robin could stand next to the city's unmasked heroes comfortable in the knowledge that they were welcome and would be immediately called upon to help if there were anything they could do.

Several minutes of evacuation passed. Everything looked orderly. The fire was being so well contained in the interior apartment it was blazing in that it couldn't even be seen from the outside. Most of the residents now standing outside in pajamas and bathrobes were sleepily maligning their complex's maintenance for testing the fire alarms in the middle of the night.

Normally, you'd say that's when things started to go wrong, but where fires are involved things don't start to go wrong – they just go wrong. Abruptly and often explosively.

"Batman!" the fire chief yelled over the surrounding action. Robin followed along too as Batman stepped forward. Frankly, Robin himself was very rarely called by name or even spoken to by authorities, but he had learned a long time ago that this was more because he was seen as an extension of the Batman than because they didn't want his help. Whether he liked being seen that way or not was irrelevant.

"There was a girl in the apartment we didn't know was there," the fire chief said, diving straight into what he needed. "She opened a window trying to escape the fire and created a backdraft. We'd grab her, but she went out the window and we can't find her. We have to handle the fire."

Batman leapt right through the front door of the building without a word or even a nod. Robin usually felt the need to be personable when Batman wasn't, but there was a time and place for that and this wasn't it. He followed right on Batman's heels.

This was an odd apartment complex for the area. The neighborhood was nice enough, safe, but didn't pretend to be any nicer than it was. These apartments had been nice once, had fallen quite a few rungs to not nice at all, and now pretended to be as nice as they once were. The complex boasted amenities it couldn't keep up and was full of tenants who couldn't really keep up - with life, rent, you name it – but pretended to anyway. It did have one thing nothing else in the area did, though. The entire complex wrapped its rectangular way around a large courtyard with a fountain, gardens, barbecue grills, and everything you could want for a community lawn. Of course, none of it was particularly well kept. The gardens were overgrown, the fountain was more full of algae than water and was probably a mosquito hazard the few weeks in the year when it was hot, and only one of the barbecue grills was really usable. Looking for another complex with a large courtyard, though, would take you all the way to some of the most high-end rentals in the city. It automatically upped the value on these apartments no matter its condition.

This courtyard was the reason a young girl was able to create a backdraft through a window in an interior apartment. The front entrance, where Batman and Robin went in, faced a door to the courtyard directly across the antiquated, ostentatious lobby. They ran straight through and were immediately able to spot the burning apartment, a first floor unit which did indeed have a window to the courtyard. The firemen were handling it, and it didn't look like the flames would spread beyond that apartment. On the other hand, as the two cautiously approached, they didn't see much evidence of the girl.

The yard, which was probably once actual grass, had been covered in dirt and gravel, seemingly for ease of upkeep. Under the window, the dirt and gravel were disturbed, most likely from when the girl leapt out of it, but then there was nothing.

"Hello?" Robin called out loudly, scanning the area carefully as he searched for movement. There was none, no answer either. They split up and continued scanning the area for any clue as to where she'd gone, Batman walking out into the yard a little ways and Robin looking more closely at the area just around the window.

"Is she maybe a very little girl?" Robin asked suddenly, interrupting Batman's inspection of an old, entirely climbable tree. Batman turned to him and looked where Robin was pointing. There was a grated hole in the wall a few yards to the left of the window, or it would have been grated if the grate weren't on the ground next to it, and the dirt was a little scuffed in the entrance. These holes could sometimes be found at the bases of the walls of old buildings like this one and led into the space between the ground and the building's floor. They tended to be too small for even a child to get into, grate or no grate, but this one was a little broken down like everything else here, a little crumbly at the edges, and was just large enough to possibly admit a very petite little girl. Robin bent down to the hole and yelled into it. "Hi, Batman and Robin here! Are you in there?" he said. Kids tended to react best if they announced who they were, even if it sounded silly. He heard a little shuffling and a muffled voice.

"She's in there," he said, turning to Batman, "but she's way back there, I think. I can't see her, and I don't know if she's coming." He cocked his head into the opening trying to get both his mouth and an ear in there and tried again. It smelled muskily of dirt inside. "Hey, there! Can you come this way? Everything's fine now!" It was only mostly true, but he wanted her to come out. This time the answer was louder, but he still couldn't make out much. He made out a "wait" pretty clearly, though.

"I don't think she's coming out," Robin said as Batman knelt next to him pulling out the tiny laser tool he often used to delicately get into things small tool. Batman used it to score the bricks around the hole, then he pulled sharply on them to break them free and widen the hole just enough for Robin to wiggle in and under. Robin nodded, already knowing where this was going. He started to take off his cape, but Batman stopped him.

"Leave it on," he said. "There shouldn't be much for it to get hooked on, and it can still protect you from heat." He pushed Robin's shoulders down as his signal to get going.

Robin wriggled his head and shoulders into the hole, then lay flat on his belly in the cool dirt and army crawled the rest of his body in. It was very dark down there, but there seemed to be a little light up ahead. He figured that maybe the girl had thought to bring one and crawled laboriously towards it. The soft light showed walls of trash built up in the small space a few yards in, probably left by vermin over many years, and these forced him to take a well-defined path. They trapped in the smell of smoke that got stronger the further in he crawled, but on the asterous side they meant the girl could only have gone on certain defined routes too, either the way he was going or the opposite way.

On the not asterous side, the trapped smoke meant he needed to find the girl and get her out fast. Even if the fire was in hand, smoke inhalation wouldn't be good for her. Robin just hoped that following the light had been the right choice. He reached awkwardly around to his belt and shifted his body weight to the side so that he could reach his rebreather. Then he repeated the shifting until he could get it over his nose and mouth. He'd pass it on to the girl when he found her.

"Hey, where'd you go?" Robin called out, trying to sound as friendly as possible. It was hard to get much volume in this position, though, and with his rebreather muffling everything he said. The small voice called back to him, but he still couldn't really make heads or tails of what she was saying. At least he could tell he was crawling in the right direction.

Turning to the right a little to avoid running into a trash wall, Robin found he could now make out a small silhouette against the glowing light he was following. Either the crawling was slow going or the girl was crawling away from him. He tried to crawl faster, but it felt like he was making no forward progress getting to her. Somehow she always seemed just as far ahead of him as before. Pretty soon, he also realized that the light was coming from above them and glowed too much to be a flashlight. The firemen thought they had the fire in hand, but they must not have realized that it was coming down through the floors. Not good for the complex's chances, and not good for the girl's either. He was glad Batman had made him keep his cape, but as he pulled himself along under the glow it was still steamy. Even with his rebreather on, his imagination conjured up the smell of smoke mixed with the heated musk of the dirt.

Suddenly, it was like he was right on top of the girl.

The girl crawling around under her apartment with far more ease than her intended savior was a spindly little Indian girl. She was so tiny and dark-skinned, and dressed in dark clothes on top of that, that she had looked like she was far away when she was actually closer to him than he'd thought. Robin figured she was also young enough to have a very thick accent, explaining why he couldn't understand her. That, and the smoke probably wasn't doing her any good either.

She paused in her scrambling, spidery crawl to talk franticly to him and jab a finger off to their left. Robin caught his name in whatever she said, something that sounded like "kick it", and a nearly hysterical "please". Yep, definitely had an accent, and he wasn't sure she could really understand him either. Asterous. She eventually dissolved into a coughing fit.

"Um," Robin said, trying to work out what she might be saying. "We need to get back outside." He tried to gesture toward the exit with his head. "Outside, ok?" He wriggled around to get his rebreather off again, struggling not to cough at the influx of air that smelled just like he'd imagined it would but worse, and mimed putting it on to her. "Can you put this on?" He had to fight for her attention because she was so focused on whatever she was pointing at, but, when he thought he had it, he held the rebreather out to her.

She blinked at the rebreather confusedly, but didn't take it. It only served to distract her for a moment from her panicked pointing. She then quickly picked up her babbling and pointing again, completely ignoring what he was trying to get her to do.

"Um," Robin said again. "Can you get this on first? Then we'll talk?" She just kept chattering away, and some of Robin's thorough attempt to look happy and not worried fell away. He frowned as he considered what to do. The rebreather needed to be on her face whether she was going to put it there or not, and then she needed to get out of this hole whether she wanted to or not.

Robin pretended for a moment like he was interested in wherever she was pointing. He had no idea why she was telling him to "kick it", whatever "it" was, but he just wanted her to feel unthreatened and that whatever she was saying was being acknowledged as he moved closer to and behind her. It worked. When he was close enough to her, he reached around her and placed the rebreather on her face himself. He left his hands there to restrain her if she tried to take it off or thrash or who knew what, but she didn't. Again, she was distracted by it a moment, then immediately took up her pointing and babbling again. He was starting to worry about what she could be so focused on pointing out to him, but for now that was a better reaction than he'd hoped for and he needed to get her to start crawling out.

Robin tried to guide her toward the exit and coax her at the same time. "Ok, we're going outside. Got it? Outside?" He gently, but firmly, guided her body until it was turned in the correct direction. This faced her in the complete opposite direction of whatever she was pointing at and definitely got her attention. The headache he was already nursing from smoke inhalation was not helped by her shrieking. There was a lot of yelling about kicking it, please, but Robin still had no idea what that meant. He struggled with her for a moment as she started to kick and flail at him, but he was worried she was going to kick the apartment floor above her and weaken the slowly burning floor. It was already so hot down there; they needed to leave, not get buried under burning flooring.

"Okay, okay, stop!" Robin said, letting go of her. "Kick what? I'll kick it; you go." He started scooting in the direction she had been pointing to reassure her that he was going. "You go outside! Outside, ok?" He stopped and waited for her to reassure him that she understood.

"Kick it, please?" she said, wide black eyes glaring at him fiercely.

"Yeah, I'll go kick it," Robin reassured her. "You go outside." He undid his cape and draped it over her, so that she'd have its heat protection as she crawled. "Outside. I'll kick it."

At this, Robin finally saw what he'd been hoping for all along. The girl completely relaxed, although tears were now running down her dirty face, smiled, and started crawling back the way they had both come. He didn't bother telling her that Batman was waiting for her outside. Some kids found Batman scary, and he did not want to risk finding out this girl was one of them. Robin watched the girl for a moment to be sure she kept going, then turned in the direction she had been pointing and tried to see if anything was there. It didn't look like it, but she'd been so insistent.

"Batman," Robin said huskily, reaching up to his comm. He paused to clear his throat. "The girl is coming to you. Does the fire chief know the fire is burning through the floor?"

"I'll tell him," Batman said. "We probably need you to deal with the kid."

"I'm not coming just yet," Robin said, crawling a little further in and still straining to see anything. Where he was positioned, the glow was behind him, making it harder to see into the shadows. "She made me promise to look for something."

"Something?" Batman said. "Or someone?"

"Don't know," Robin said. He stopped to cough, swallowing heavily to try to keep his voice. "She has an accent, and I couldn't tell. But she was really insistent."

Batman didn't need to tell him that he needed to find the other person, if there was one, and get out fast, so he didn't.

Robin kept crawling until he was on the other side of the hottest area of flooring, and gave one last look around. He doubted seriously that there was another conscious person in here or they would have brought attention to themselves while Robin was calling out to the girl or while the girl was shrieking her throat raw. That didn't mean there wasn't anyone unconscious down here, but he wasn't seeing anyone. He was so focused on looking for signs of a human being down there, that when he started scooting back around, coughing as he went, to face the exit again he almost missed it. Underneath the sound of his coughing, the fire, and the firemen fighting the fire, there actually was a noise, a very small one.

It just wasn't a human noise.

He turned back again and pulled out a pen light, shining it into the darkness where no fire was glowing through the floor above. Two glowing, green spots shone back at him from off to his right. A cat. It was mewling incessantly at him. He had to assume that this was what the girl had been so worked up over, possibly even why she'd come down here in the first place. He could work out why on earth she wanted him to kick it later. Right now, he had a problem.

The cat was hiding in some of the debris of the trash wall about three yards away. The wall still hemmed him in so that he had only one and, for all intents and purposes, narrow way to the exit. He wouldn't be able to skirt the burning floor above him. He'd have to pass under it, and that with what would quite possibly be a very uncooperative animal. On top of that, he had to crawl all the way over to it first, and hope it even let him touch it.

Robin paused just a moment, then started crawling in toward the cat. He knew he could be making a big mistake, but Batman now knew the floor was burning and had probably told the fire chief. He had promised the girl that he would bring the cat out, or at least he assumed that's what he had promised, and he was going to at least try. Thankfully, the cat stayed still and just meowed at him as he crawled closer. There was no way he would have been able to chase the cat if it had spooked.

"Easy, kitty," Robin said slowly, his voice sounding like little more than a whisper as he tried not to cough and scare the cat. Its massive grey body hunkered down and watched the approaching gloved hand, but it was a long-haired cat and Robin got his hands in its fur as soon as his hand was close enough, just to be safe. Still, the cat didn't try to bolt. He hoped this meant it would remain compliant as he tried to drag it along in an army crawl. He pulled the cat to his side slowly. Fortunately, there was just enough room for him to angle onto his left side a little and hold the cat close to his chest with his right arm. He'd have to pull along with just his left.

Robin started his now one-army crawl . . . get it? One arm? One army? He tried not to laugh as it would just make it harder to regulate his breathing in this smoke and growing heat. Besides, he had a sneaking suspicion that that pun had not numbered among his most clever. Lack of oxygen was getting to him and making his head spin on top of the ache, and he gritted his teeth against the errant thoughts spinning jokes in his head while he tried to concentrate. Now was not the time for puns. The cat stopped meowing and started chirping at him. It wasn't a sound he'd ever heard a cat make so he couldn't be sure, but it didn't sound upset so he hoped this wasn't the signal that this feline was about to make like Catwoman and claw the hand that tried to save him. Another bad joke. Focus.

When he came close to the place where the floor above was hottest, he tried to suck in a decent breath and hold it. He knew that heat could harm his lungs just as easily as smoke, and he was fresh out of protection from either. As he passed under the flames above, he hugged the chirping cat farther under his chest to try to shield it from the oven of heat as much as possible. He was keenly aware that the small animal, although actually a large one as far as cats went, really needed the protection even more than he did and that it would be all too easy for the cat to bake. Heh. Easy bake. This time he didn't spare the thought to berate himself for the random vision of himself and a cat stuffed inside a tiny, pink oven. He wished he hadn't thought of it, though. It wasn't actually a funny image.

When he'd passed the worst of the heat, Robin dared to release his breath and take a new one. He really had to at that point, but taking it still felt like being punished for a terrible mistake. The air burned and scratched down his throat and set him coughing dryly while trying not to jostle the cat too much. In the haze of not being able to breathe, he closed his eyes tightly against the wracking coughs and the heat and used the sounds around him to focus. Underneath the noise of his own coughs, the cat was still chirping. Over the sounds of his own coughs, the noise of the men fighting the fire above him was deafening. He finally managed to get a little of his breath back by burying his face in the cat's furry head, the only part of it he could reach with it tucked under him. It didn't eliminate the smoke or the heat, but it gave him another smell to breathe in to cut through the smoke and the smell of heated, old dirt. Then, a new sound tore through his focus – a dull creak and a sharp crack.

Robin screamed. It was a reflex reaction he should have kept in because he was wasting air again, but he couldn't help it. His face buried in fur, he didn't see it happen, and he didn't understand what had happened at first. All he knew was that he was burning and crushed under a weight that wouldn't let him breathe. After a moment he finally understood that the floor must have caved in on him from above, and now there was no getting out.

The first thing his brain did when it kicked back into gear was stop him screaming. He didn't know why he needed to stop yet, but he needed to. The next thing his brain told him was that the fire wasn't the immediate problem; the debris on top of him wasn't burning. The heat that felt like it was charbroiling him was actually from the rush of fire that had raged through the under-apartment space when the fire had broken through and hit oxygen. But he was still going to die if nothing changed soon. None of this air was breathable; it was too hot. Oh, that was why he needed to stop screaming. And he was going nowhere with the floor piled on top of him just waiting to catch fire.

He buried his face into the cat's fur again taking comfort in its small noises. It was mewling now, not chirping, and its voice was small, but it was something to concentrate on while he tried not to think about how much he needed to breathe and how his hair was probably on fire and how his suit was going to roast him alive like a foil-wrapped potato in a campfire and how much he needed to breathe and how his hair was probably on fire and how his suit was going to roast him alive like a – . . . abruptly, he felt painfully cold. He would have gasped if he could have.

It took him several moments working through the pain to realize he'd been hit with water – cold, fire – dousing water. He tried to lift his head out of the mud and found he couldn't; some part of the collapsed floor must have been holding it down, but through the pain of burns and sudden cold he couldn't really tell. Maybe he just couldn't muster the energy. At the very least, he tried to lift the cat's head up out of the water. Batman's voice came over his comm, but he didn't manage to wrangle his thoughts into something resembling focus in time to catch what he'd said. Robin tried and failed to get his left arm around to his ear to activate his comm to answer, but Batman tried again immediately anyway.

"Robin, status report," Batman said. There was no way for Robin to really answer, and he wasn't sure he could speak well anyway. Or even if he should try. Through the haze in his head, he thought he remembered Batman having the equipment to monitor his vitals, and he hoped that would be enough to reassure him that he was alive and going to stay that way. At least, Robin figured he was going to stay that way. He was more than a little squashed and there was mud getting in his nose, but he could still breathe carefully through his mouth. Small breaths only; the air quality was still a problem.

"Robin, if you can hear me, the fire is out, I've had them turn off the water, and we're working our way to you now," Batman said, coming over the comm again. "If at any time you can signal your exact location for us, do."

That confused Robin a little. He thought he remembered that Batman could find him using his utility belt. Not that it mattered. He couldn't signal anyone of anything. Panic tried to settle in and his brain started fishing for something to distract him with. In the dark, some lingering embers burned on the underside of the debris and cast enough light for him to see, but there was nothing to look at. It was suddenly very quiet too with the fire no longer raging and the firefighters no longer dousing flames with their hoses. He suddenly noticed that the cat wasn't mewling at him. Good, it needed to conserve its breath too. He gently rubbed the fluff of the feline's head where he was holding it above the muck, having finally finding something to be distracted by. The fur was so soft, even when dirty. The girl had to have kept him scrupulously brushed, maybe even bathed. He'd believe it were possible with a cat this docile.

"Sorry, kitty," Robin whispered. Actually, it was more like he just moved his lips and exhaled weakly, because he knew beyond any doubt that if he tried to talk he'd just start coughing again. He definitely did not want to shift any of the debris around him more than necessary, and he wasn't sure how comfortable coughing could be under all that weight. "I don't guess you can breathe too well either, huh? Not feeling the aster. 'Ppreciate you being so cooperative, though. I've rescued some middle aged men, real scumbags too, with less guts than you."

"Robin, we're going to start removing debris around you now," Batman said, not over the comm this time but somewhere above him and to his right. "If you can't talk, maybe you can press the distress button in your belt if we move something we shouldn't."

Robin nodded silently, painfully, to himself. He couldn't actually reach his belt in the position he was in, but he wasn't all that worried. "Not a problem," he breathed to the cat. "He's not going to move something he shouldn't." He could see the light of a flashlight start to sift through as debris to his left was moved. He was suddenly worried about something shifting and landing on his face, so he wormed his chin around a bit until he could tuck it down to his chest, looking straight down at the smoky grey cat. He fleetingly wondered if it was really that color or just covered in ashes. He decided it was more likely to be covered in dirt than ashes, so grey had to be the right fur color. Then he smiled to himself at a cat saved from a fire having a grey coat.

Then he saw a patch of color amidst the grey.

It took a moment for him to comprehend what he was seeing, but only just. He completely skipped the confusion, the denial phase. He believed it all too quickly, and it stole the little breath he had left. Blood bubbled just over the cat's lips and onto its whiskers. It didn't breathe. Its eyes stared at him, wide open, huge blue ones. Robin's hand was carefully and gently cupping the cat's head and holding it up out of the muddy ground, but the fallen debris had slammed his shoulder into the cat's neck and held it there. He had crushed it to death.

Robin let his head relax and chin pull away from his chest, and the mud pushed up around his nostrils again. It seemed to rise higher this time. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he knew it wasn't deeper than before, that he was just panicking and that what he felt was merely lungs that refused to let him breathe coupled with tears making his face feel more drenched and drowning than it actually was. He squeezed his eyes shut and felt his chest try to shudder in a breath, but it was like his lungs knew he had no right to breathe. He tried and failed not to imagine his throat being crushed under the weight above him. The mud oozing around his mouth felt like blood to him, blood seeping up and out of his throat and pooling on his lips to congeal there. Just below his solar plexus that small area of torso where you can feel your own heartbeat if you're still enough was pressed into the ground, and he could feel his pulse pound steadily more slowly against the dirt. There was a cold seeping into him that had nothing to do with being drenched.

"Robin!" Batman's voice cut through the panic but couldn't drive it away. "I need you to take deeper breaths. Calm down and breathe. I'll count for you. In one, out two. In one, out two."

Batman kept counting. He had his comm back on, and his voice came through the air as well as straight through the device sitting in Robin's ear. But all Robin could think of was crushed windpipes and bloody mouths and no breaths left to count. Batman's call for him to breathe didn't make him breathe, but it did convert his quiet tears to sobs and as he sobbed he sucked in guilty gasps of air.

He didn't notice much when the firemen, and of course Batman, lifted him from under the debris. He was too focused on gently supporting the cat as he moved. He didn't notice much when he was given an oxygen mask and taken to an ambulance to receive first aid and be checked for lasting damage. He was too focused on carefully cradling the cat to his chest, protecting it like he had meant to.

He did notice when the little girl came bouncing up to the gurney he was laid out on, her mother in tow. She was happy. Bright white teeth shone out of her dark face where her smile showed them off. She was reaching up for her cat.

So that had been what she wanted after all. He turned his head a little more to the side, staring through burning eyes at her hands. She said it again – "kick it, kick it, please" –, and it finally clicked for his hazy mind what she had been saying. The giant cat's cheerful chirping noise replayed in his memory. "Cricket", not "kick it". Its name was Cricket.

He turned his face away again, closed his eyes tightly, and held onto the cat for all he was worth. He didn't want to let her have it back like this, but Batman gently pried Cricket away from his arms anyway and a moment later Robin was no longer the only one crying.

There was a cat in the Batmobile, and Batman's only hope was that Alfred would know what to do with it. He'd never had one himself or spent any time near them, Selina aside, but he knew dogs sometimes had big issues with cars and he was relieved the kitten Robin had insisted on keeping didn't seem to mind riding in one. Robin, on the other hand, looked once again on the brink of panic, constantly reaching into the box to check on the tiny, filthy creature.

"It's not doing anything," Robin finally said fretfully.

Yes, fretfully. Batman snuck a glance at him. It wasn't often his cock-sure partner acted fretful about anything. Even when it was clear to Batman that he was worried about something, Robin didn't act like it.

"That's a good thing," Batman said, frowning. "I guess it's not scared of the car."

"But what if it's just really sick?" Robin said, voice climbing a little.

Batman snuck another glance at Robin then focused back on the road. "I'm sure it is sick," he said. "It's hungry and wet and filthy. We'll do something about that when we get home."

"Well, can't we drive faster?" Robin said, glaring at the speedometer. The indicator light was hovering just over the 100 mph mark.

"The cat doesn't have a seatbelt," Batman said wryly. It wasn't beside the point; it bothered him a little that there was something in his vehicle that wouldn't be restrained in the event of an accident. Or attack. Cats could be crushed against windshields too, and this was a vehicular arsenal, a stealth tank, not a bicycle with a basket on the handlebars.

"Don't hit anything then," Robin said stubbornly.

Batman didn't have to look at him to know Robin was glaring at him now. His frown deepened, but he compromised. The indicator light climbed to 110 mph. He heard Robin huff at that small concession, but nothing else was said. Robin knew Batman was right, and Batman understood why Robin was so concerned. They were just going to have to hold their tempers until they got home and Robin could play mother bird, cat, whatever with someone who knew more about taking care of animals.

They had barely pulled into the Batmobile's parking space in the cave before Robin shot his hand out to press the button that would open the vehicle, and the roof was barely opened before he was trying to carefully crawl out of it.

"Alfred!" Robin yelled at the top of his lungs. He had a good set of pipes on him, and his voice careened through the whole cave. "Are you down here?"

"Master Dick, whatever is the matter?" Alfred called back, coming from around one of the cave's memorabilia items where he had apparently been cleaning judging by the duster in his hand. His face was drawn with concern, but it relaxed a little when he didn't see any obvious injuries on either of his charges.

"I have-" Robin began, still yelling, but then he stalled, seemingly realizing that whatever he had been about to say was going to sound silly. Eventually, he said it anyway at a slightly more appropriate volume. "I have a cat." He held the box out in front of him briefly, then immediately hugged it back to him. "Will you help me with it? I think it's sick."

Alfred shot Batman a look, but Batman, removing his cowl and pursing his lips, said nothing.

"Of course, Master Dick," Alfred said simply, barely having missed a beat. He was mostly aware of what was probably going on here, and he could ask Master Bruce to fill him in on the rest later. He removed his white gloves, tucked them into the waist of his trousers, and reached in to gently rub the kitten's head and back. He was careful not to frown as though he were worried, but he was. The poor creature was mostly fur, dirty fur at that, and very cold.

"First things first, let's get the little thing out of that box," Alfred said. His voice was matter-of-fact, almost snappy, but he knew that he needed to convince the boy that things were well in hand. "Just set the box down, and I'll have you take off your gloves, lift it out, and hold it to you."

Dick set the box down gingerly right where he was standing on the parking platform, and carefully reached in to gather the tiny scrap in both hands and hold it against his torso. In his haste, he skipped the removing his gloves part.

"I'll just take these," Alfred said as he took removed Dick's gloves for him and tucked them into his waistband alongside his own, helping Dick to support the cat while he did. "And if you'll just lift the wee thing a bit higher . . . there we are," he said, lifting Dick's hands to hold the cat just below his breast. "We'll just try to get it warm while I fetch a towel and some warm milk." He walked briskly away to get a towel from the locker and shower area of the cave.

Dick nodded, staring down at the cat. "You don't think it needs a bath, though? That could get it warm, and it could really use one." He glanced sidewise at Bruce who was just watching silently. Completely aside from the need for a bath, he was keenly aware that Bruce didn't want the cat in his house and had been trying desperately during the ride in the Batmobile to think of ways to make the animal's stay less objectionable.

Bruce saw the look and understood the thought behind it. "If Alfred thinks a bath should be later," Bruce said, smiling a little, "I can deal with there being a dirty animal in my house for a little while."

"Indeed, I should hope so, sir," Alfred said, lifting a brow at Bruce as he returned. "I'll be the one doing the cleaning in any case, not you, and there are very good reasons for saving the bath for later." Taking the towel, he carefully demonstrated for Dick how to briskly, but gently, rub the kitten with the towel. "It not only needs to be dry, but also warmed. If you keep this up for a little while, we can get some warmth into it quickly. As for the bath, my concern is that the poor little beast may be flea ridden. Depending on the number of fleas, trying to put a newly rescued animal through a thorough bath can cause the fleas to flock to as yet unbathed areas and cause serious damage or trauma to the animal." Alfred stopped to smile warmly at Dick to soften any worries that information might have caused. "It just means we'll have to wait until it's a bit more active and taken care of before we try the bath."

Suddenly, there was a small mew from the little creature being vigorously rubbed. Dick sucked in a concerned breath and pulled the towel away. The kitten's eyes and face were screwed up in protest, but when Dick looked up at Alfred the man was still smiling.

"There we are," Alfred said. "Already perking up, the cheeky thing. Keep at it, Master Dick, and I'll go fetch that milk."

Dick nodded and watched him go. Then he took a breath and resumed rubbing some heat into the cat to intermittent mewls of distaste. This time he just smiled at the filthy scrap and trusted that Alfred knew what he was doing.

The next morning, Bruce took breakfast and coffee in his office. He had, at first, gone down to the dining room for breakfast, planning to check on how Dick had passed the night caring for his new charge, but Dick had been a no-show. Bruce had decided he might as well get some work done while he waited. He ended up getting quite a bit of work done.

It was nearly noon before anyone disturbed him. There was a quiet knock on his door which was not followed by any announcement of who was knocking. Must be Dick then. It was unlike him to be so quiet, but Alfred would never have knocked without announcing himself.

"Come in," Bruce said, stretching his arms in front of him and then leaning back in his chair comfortably. "How went the night playing cat-sitter?" he asked as Dick sidled carefully around the door. Bruce quirked a brow and shot his charge an odd look. Careful sidling being odd enough, Dick was still in his pajamas, and now he was closing the door behind him and remaining planted almost shyly in front of it. Bruce decided to just wait for his answer and ignore the odd behavior for now.

"Well, the cat's sleeping," Dick said, frowning. "For now. It hasn't been awake much actually, but Alfred says that's pretty normal."

"You, on the other hand, don't look like you've slept much," Bruce said, noting the circles under Dick's eyes, copious wrinkles in his pajamas, and extremely messy hair. Dick was a deep, calm sleeper usually and only looked like this when illness or bad dreams kept him awake and restless at night. He'd been waking up a mess a lot recently, but Bruce kept telling himself that there had been times in Dick's life that his sleep had been worse and he'd pulled through those alright.

Dick shrugged and tried to tug his pajama shirt straight. "I woke up to check on it during the night," he said.

Bruce simply nodded as though that were expected. Which it had been. "Did you get breakfast?"

"Lunch," Dick said. "I wasn't down in time for breakfast." He was starting to fidget now, a much more normal behavior. In the guise of Robin, and even outside of the house in the guise of Ward of Bruce Wayne, Dick had been well trained not to fidget, but with his high energy level he often did so while out of uniform and in the comfort of his home. It was usually a clear sign that he had something to say and was trying not to, but this time Bruce felt it was a sign he had something to say and wasn't sure how to get to it.

"That's a shame. Alfred made waffles today," Bruce said smiling and trying to put Dick at ease. It did seem to help. He watched Dick grin and say nothing. They both knew that if there was any day to miss breakfast it was definitely when Alfred made waffles. Neither of them were sure why – maybe it was because pancakes were more prevalent than waffles in England and were usually savory rather than sweet? –, but waffles seemed to be the one thing Alfred could not cook. They were dense. They were not always thoroughly cooked. They were at times a little rubbery. In short, they weren't good, but neither of them were ever going to admit to thinking that.

"Did you need something?" Bruce asked after a moment. He watched as Dick's grin withered into something sour, hovering awkwardly between a smile and a frown. "Sorry," he quickly added, "it just seemed like you'd be taking care of the thing," he paused to correct himself, "I mean the cat, instead of here if you didn't."

Dick let out a deep breath and straightened out his face. Well, everything, really. He straightened up and straightened his arms at his sides. Bruce, in response, sat up straighter in his chair. The Dick Grayson he was looking at now, pajamas aside, was the one he usually saw outside of the house where he needed to put on his ward to a billionaire businessman persona. Whatever Dick wanted to talk about, it was serious, and he wanted to be taken seriously.

"I did need something, actually," Dick said, confidently, evenly, but also in a leading way. This confirmed all Bruce's original thoughts; he recognized this voice. Bruce himself used it in the offices at Wayne Enterprises, with the League, and even quite often with Dick, in and out of uniform. Dick was attempting to lead the conversation in a favorable direction without putting any backs up, probably not even consciously. Bruce wanted to smile, but in the interest of respecting the boy he didn't. "I've hit a problem with taking care of the cat," Dick continued, "and I've been thinking about how best to handle it."

Bruce nodded encouragingly. That bit sounded rehearsed, but there was still time for the boy to grow into better negotiating skills. For now, what Dick needed was a little reassurance that he was being listened to.

"Alfred is going to take me out to get some things for the cat today, and what I want is to be able to get all the necessary basics for under a hundred dollars." Dick seemed to be finding his footing again amidst the facts and figures. "We've been really busy lately with finals at school and with our patrols being pretty full, so I haven't been spending much." That was misleading, Bruce thought; the fact was Dick hadn't been spending because he had been too obsessed with training and patrol to have any fun. "I've got enough saved over from previous months along with this month in allowance to pretty much cover that, if my estimation of how much things will cost is right." Here Dick paused again, watching Bruce as though for some sign that he knew where this was going. Bruce did; he nodded for him to continue.

"The problem is . . ." Dick began tentatively, "I don't want to give the girl an unhealthy . . ." He stopped again, frowning as he chose out his words more honestly. "I don't want to give the girl another cat that's going to die on her. I want to have a vet check it out and make sure it's healthy before I take it to her, and the problem is that I don't think I can afford that."

Bruce heard Dick huff a little sigh of relief when he'd finished getting that out and watched as he turned slightly pink in the face at admitting that. Dick usually didn't have to face the problem of not being able to "afford" something, not anymore, but he was clearly taking this as his personal project, emphasis on personal considering why he was doing it, and his inability to take care of it on his own was not only weighing on him but embarrassing him in a way he wasn't used to being embarrassed. This needed to be handled delicately. The more Bruce thought about it and watched Dick's embarrassment the more he realized he couldn't just take care of this issue himself. This was a kind of penance for Dick, and he wouldn't get the closure he needed if Bruce helped him too much. Bruce sighed too and smiled.

"So," Bruce said, "what are you thinking, then?"

"I was wondering," Dick said, then blinked, thought better of his words, and tried again with more confidence. "I would like to borrow money from you," he said, then added as though he couldn't help himself, "If that's ok."

Bruce pursed his lips thoughtfully. "I haven't owned and paid for a pet myself, but I did donate to a charity once that collected funds to help shelters afford veterinary services for ill animals rather than having to euthanize them. From what I remember, a simple check-up doesn't cost much at all, but vaccinations can cost a few hundred, spaying and neutering is more on top of that, and if the animal has serious health concerns the repeated visits and the care can cost another several hundred." He paused briefly to gauge Dick's reaction before concluding. "The estimation back then was that around $800 was necessary per sick small animal."

Dick frowned, and this time Bruce allowed himself a smile.

"A little animal can cost a lot," Bruce said. "You may not end up needing that much, though. Maybe your kitten isn't sickly, just a little undernourished. I'm thinking . . ." He leaned forward, folding his hands on his desk. "What if I didn't loan you the money? What if I gave you an advance on your allowance?"

Dick eyed him warily. He had perked up a little at the idea of not having to have the money loaned to him, but he was clearly trying to consider what this new option was and whether it was actually a better one. Bruce approved.

"I'm not sure I know exactly what that is," Dick finally admitted. "What's the difference?"

"It means that I give you a certain number of months' allowance in advance," Bruce said. "For example, right now. So that you can pay for the immediate expense of your cat's vet bills. Let's see . . . you get $50 a month in spending money, and you need, let's say, $800 just to be safe. That means I'd be giving you sixteen months of allowance right now." Dick's face said he wasn't sold on that idea, and Bruce nodded to him in agreement with this reaction. "Yeah, you don't get your allowance for those months then if I give it to you now, and that's a lot of months. But. It's not a loan, so, one, you don't have to pay me back and, two, no interest. Plus," he said, spreading his hands and smiling, "if you don't end up needing the full amount, you just keep what you didn't spend on the cat and make it last as long or as briefly as you see fit." Dick arched a brow quizzically at him. "Well, that's how advanced pay works," Bruce said, laughing, "so that's how it is. You can spend it how you want. It's your allowance, so the same rules as always apply. I'm just giving it to you early, that's all. So? What do you think?"

Dick thought on it a moment. "That . . . does sound better than a loan," he finally admitted.

"If it's better to you, you could just get half your normal allowance for thirty-two months," Bruce said, grinning.

Dick rolled his eyes. "I'll pass," he said. "I liked the first idea better. It's over with faster that way."

Bruce just nodded. "I'll tell Alfred to get you the money then," he said, smiling as his eyes flicked to the door where he already knew Alfred was waiting. "When were you planning on the first vet visit?"

"As soon as possible," Dick said. "Today. I already called."

Bruce grinned. "Before you knew you had the money?"

Dick just shrugged, turning slightly pink in the face again. "I just wanted to make sure they had an open appointment."

"Good thinking," Bruce said, nodding. "If that was all you needed, can you send in Alfred when you go? I'll go ahead and talk to him about it."

Dick nodded and slipped out of the office almost before Bruce saw him move. Almost. That ability to disappear gave criminals, and occasionally Alfred, a good bit of grief, but the trick was in distracting the watcher which didn't fool Batman's eyes. What it did do was confirm, once again, how out of sorts Dick was right now. Bruce could only hope that this cat would turn out perfectly healthy. Allowance aside, he didn't know how the boy would take it if the cat wasn't healthy enough to give away, or worse, needed to be put down.

Alfred stepped quietly into the office and shut the door behind him. Bruce smiled at him.

"I know you heard all of that," Bruce said not unkindly.

"My apologies, sir," Alfred said, not looking apologetic at all. "Master Dick's behavior has been worthy of concern this morning, to put it bluntly, and I fully admit to intentional eavesdropping."

Bruce just chuckled softly. "You call that putting it bluntly . . . I wanted to just give him the money. I wanted to just help, but somehow I didn't think that was the best thing for him in the long-run." His eyes seemed to search Alfred's for just a little reassurance that he'd made the right decision, and Alfred gave it to him, nodding.

"A good choice, sir," Alfred said, "although I completely understand. Master Dick needs to do this himself, and we can more than make up for our need to be more hands-off about the financial end of this with other forms of charity and understanding."

"And if the cat dies?" Bruce asked, slumping back into his chair. "What then?"

"Then we continue to rely on those other forms of charity and understanding, Master Bruce," Alfred said bluntly. "While remembering that this household has seen worse tragedies before. Far worse."

Bruce shook his head. "No, it hasn't. I know it's just a cat, but to Dick it means more than that."

"Oh, I understand, sir," Alfred said, sighing in frustration. "I do. I only mean to say there have been other times in this home when you, Master Dick, and even I have felt that we were responsible for a loss and that most of those times were regarding far greater losses. This house is no stranger to mere humans feeling that they ought to be able to save everyone, and we've lost worse than a cat here and there. No, Master Dick has felt responsible for losses far greater than a little girl's cat, even if right now it seems the two are very much the same. And he'll pull through, sir." He paused to return the sad smile Bruce gave him at that. "He always does."

A little more than a week found Batman parked in the Batmobile, in a neighborhood much less nice than the one in which that apartment complex had burned down, watching Robin walk across the street to the front door of a shoddy duplex to ring the doorbell. The cat had survived all ministrations admirably, it turned out, and was now ready to be placed in its new home. If all went well. Batman had gone through half a dozen unfavorable scenarios trying to plan for whatever might hit his well-meaning partner, and now all he could do was wait.

Robin had to ring the bell twice, and knock loudly, before anyone answered the door. He stood there awkwardly, his cape pulled around to hide the kitten in his arms. A harried-looking Indian woman answered and immediately looked horrified, stepping through the door and closing it behind her. He didn't remember much of anything that had happened after he'd been pulled from the fire, so Robin was operating on the assumption that this was the mother. The mother did not look happy to see him.

"Why are you here?" the woman asked, almost fiercely, but in much clearer English than her daughter spoke.

"I'm . . . sorry if I'm intruding-" Robin began only to be interrupted.

"You are!" the woman interjected, crossing her arms and glancing at the one small window in her new home that faced the street. "You are intruding! Please go. Please, before my daughter sees you."

Robin glanced toward the window too, suddenly aware of how it might affect a little girl to be reminded of the incident that had taken her home and her pet from her. He wanted to turn and run; he didn't want to be the reason that little girl ever had to think of that again. But, he took a deep breath to steel himself to at least try once before he left.

"I understand. I'll go," Robin said. "But I brought something for her, and I would like you to give it to her. You don't have to tell her I brought it-" Robin was interrupted again, this time by a mewl from underneath his cape. He watched as the mother's eyes widened in horror. He was ready at this point to just turn and leave, but the woman abruptly shook her head and went back inside. Now he wasn't sure what to do. So he stood there.

After a while, the door slowly opened again, and an older Indian woman, aged and wrinkled, shuffled carefully out of the door, peeking over her shoulder as she did so and quietly shutting the door behind her. Robin turned to leave before the woman started chasing him off, but instead stopped in his tracks as the old lady franticly motioned for him to stay. She spoke something to him in a whisper, but it didn't seem that she knew English. Robin had come prepared for that problem, and he carefully opened up his wrist computer, booting up a translator. The old woman stared at it with wide eyes as the holographic screen appeared above his glove.

"I'm sorry, what did you say?" Robin said carefully and clearly, then waited as the program repeated what he had said back in Hindustani. He was prepared to rifle through a few other languages from the region, but that didn't turn out to be necessary. The woman spoke this one. After a moment's hesitation, she spoke again, at some length, and when she had finished the translator repeated what she had said back to Robin in English.

"Please. My daughter only wishes to protect her little one. It has been very hard. But please do not go. My daughter, too, is hurt and she reacts in fear and concern. She does not know as I do. My little granddaughter needs healing, not protection. My daughter told me what gift you brought. Please, my little granddaughter is at the door, and I will bring her out to receive your gift. It will be good for her heart. Please, wait."

Robin took a breath and nodded. The grandmother turned and quietly opened the door for her granddaughter who emerged with small, tentative steps. Tonight, she was dressed in brightly colored clothes, not pajamas as it was still fairly early in the night. Her shirt was bright yellow and her pants bright blue. It was as though her family was so determined to bring vibrancy back into the girl's life that they dressed her in the brightest colors they could possibly find. Only, Robin wasn't sure how well it was working. The girl was sad and small. No colors, no matter how bright, could disguise that, and now that she was here in front of him he was glad he had scripted and practiced what he would say. He didn't know if he'd have been able to speak otherwise.

"This is for you," Robin said simply, finally pulling back his cape. The kitten was still so tiny that from behind his gloved hand where he kept the little animal pressed against his chest only the tips of its ears could be seen. He gently shifted his hand so that the little cat sat in his palm instead. It blinked green eyes at the world and mewed in protest. Robin couldn't help smiling. He still remembered when the kitten was so filthy it could blend in with cardboard, but now it was clean and its fur was long and bright orange. It had been given a little green collar to wear, but that was hard to see because the kitten was hunkering down into his palm for all it was worth.

The girl finally spoke in her stilted English, but this time Robin was focused on understanding and her words were spoken slowly and clearly.

"I do not want another cat," she said. "I had one. I do not want another."

Robin felt his heart threaten to sink down to his stomach, but behind the girl the grandmother nodded encouragingly at him and whispered urgently a word that he had heard from her several times already. He assumed it meant "please".

"I know," Robin said, swallowing hard and engaging the translator again just in case. "I know you don't want one. I know you don't need one. But this cat needs you. I remember your cat was very well behaved." He paused to clear his throat as his breath caught but then had to wait while the translator, thinking the pause meant he was finished speaking, repeated what he had said in Hindustani. "I remember that your cat had soft fur; it was very clean and happy. Trusting. I found this cat on the street, cold and hungry and sick. It needs a home where it will grow up well behaved and clean and happy." He waited for the translator again and then spoke the Hindustani word the grandmother, and even the mother in her own way, had used so often. "Please."

Together, Robin and the grandmother waited nervously, each for their own reasons, until finally the girl reached out to rub the miniscule kitten behind the ears. It shrank back from her at first, but quickly stretched up to enjoy the gentle touch. The grandmother beamed at the small progress, but Robin felt his chest grow tighter and his nervousness grow. Everything about this kitten was so different, so wrong, and he could see it in the girl's eyes and small frown: she didn't want a tiny orange kitten with a quiet, shy purr; she wanted her massive, grey cat with a happy chirp.

"I'm sorry," Robin said. The girl frowned up at him, not unkindly, just sadly. He swallowed back his tears and made himself breathe steadily, counting the breaths silently and remembering the bracing comfort Bruce's counting had brought him in his panic so much more recently than the fire now felt. He smiled kindly. "I can find another family for her. That's ok. I understand," he said, and he did. But suddenly so did the little girl.

Her fingers stopped their stroking, resting on the tiny cat's head. "Her?" she asked. "Girl cat?"

Robin nodded, taken by surprise again. "Yes. She's small, but older than she looks. The vet says she's a girl cat." The two waited while the translator repeated that in Hindustani, and a smile grew on the girl's face as she listened. This time she didn't bother with English, and Robin had to wait too to understand her reply. Cricket had been a boy. Apparently, he had come to this family as a very small kitten, too small to know that he would grow up a tomcat. The girl had been bound and determined that Cricket was a girl. In time, she'd been proven wrong to her great, but brief, disappointment.

It was a small thing, but it seemed enough. There were tears in the little girl's eyes now, but she was smiling at the tiny cat and holding out both hands to take her from him. Bruce had been afraid that Robin would grow attached to the kitten and that it would be hard to give it away, but nothing could have been farther from the truth.

Robin's heart felt lighter than it had ever felt since that Friday evening as he willingly, happily, handed over the orange scrap. He felt relief and he felt peace; he felt anything but reluctant or sad.

He wasn't sure when he left the porch or exactly how he ended up back in the Batmobile, riding away empty-handed. He had felt free, and he had acted on that freedom, leaving behind his worries as he left the girl behind with her new best friend for whom he was sure she would gladly go crawling beneath a burning house again if she had to. He left behind his horror and his guilt.

Or so he wished, but those were two things that still lingered and threatened to bring the ache back to his chest. Staring straight through the front windshield, his thoughts fingered the mental wounds he had been nursing since he had failed to save a small life and found them still sore. The horror and guilt. These were things he hadn't been able to face before, things he had run from in his mind, but now a swift panic set in that his just discovered relief and peace would turn back into horror and guilt if he didn't face it. That panic drove him to speak, to admit what he hadn't been able to until now.

"I know no one blames me for what happened," Robin practically blurted out. "I don't think even that family did."

Face as stoic as usual, Batman didn't move or even blink, but he heard. "But you blame yourself? There was nothing more you could have done."

Robin nodded frantically. "Yeah, I know. I mean, I blamed myself at first. It still really eats at me that . . . that maybe he would have lived if I hadn't fallen on him wrong, but, yeah, I guess I couldn't have done any more than I did."

Batman remained silent for a moment after that spiel. His partner was rambling, and that meant that eventually Robin would say what he wanted to. He just needed someone to listen. Batman didn't have to wait long.

"I just think that I should have paid more attention," Robin said, plowing ahead. Batman could hear the strain in his voice. "I didn't hear him for a while, and, you know, he was named for the sound he made, right? He made this chirping noise, and I just started panicking and I was talking to myself trying to calm down except I wasn't really talking out loud because I couldn't breathe so it was actually really quiet and –"

"Robin," Batman interrupted simply, derailing Robin's confusing explanation.

"I meant," Robin said, stopping to take a breath, "He stopped making any noise. At one point. And I was so panicked that all I could think of was calming myself down. I put my face in his fur to block out the smoke smell and talked to him to distract myself, and . . . I didn't even stop to notice that he wasn't breathing. He was dying, and I was too panicked to notice anything but myself. He died practically alone, because I was too distracted by . . . by myself. That's not –" Robin paused. "That's not what I was trained to do."

Batman knew that that last wasn't what Robin had wanted to say, and he understood the issue completely now. He didn't even need a moment to think about his answer to this particular heartache. He knew exactly what needed to be said.

"Cricket didn't die alone, Dick" Batman began, speaking firmly and purposefully calling both the cat and his partner by their own names. "You have to remember that your perspective and his were very different. The dead are never around to beat us up for our mistakes, so we tend to do that ourselves, beat ourselves up because we think we failed them more than we did." Batman paused, and silence filled the moment. He knew Robin would hear the truth in what he was saying but wouldn't buy it. He knew that because he himself had never truly taken any of this to heart either, no matter how many times Alfred had said it. But Dick at least needed to understand this, and unlike himself Dick had the kind of heart that could, the kind of heart that could forgive itself. He wasn't giving up until Dick understood.

Batman pulled into a dark alleyway, and the lights inside the Batmobile came on automatically in the dark, illuminating both faces in a soft, red light as Batman turned to face his partner.

"It was a cat, Dick. It didn't understand a word you said. It didn't understand any of what happened. What it did know was that it was dying. That it couldn't breathe, and it was scared." He watched Robin's lips press tightly together, admirably holding back tears. "And in that moment when the only thing it understood was how scared it was it felt you whispering to it, felt you holding it close, pressing your face into its fur. Dick, you have to stop thinking with your own pain and guilt. I promise you the cat did not feel alone when it died; it felt loved. It may not be the truth of what happened; you and I both know that, because we're humans and we understand too damn much for our own good." He put a comforting hand on Robin's shoulder and squeezed. Hard. Hard enough to make his partner squirm and look at him, still holding back tears. "The cat felt loved and comforted when it died. Not even humans can ask for better than that."

Robin took some time to compose himself, then quirked a shaky grin. "So the best pick-me-up you could come up with was, 'Ignorance is bliss'?" he said, attempting a joke. Batman smiled a little when Robin sniffled quietly, clearly trying not to draw attention to it.

"It sounded better the way I said it," Batman said, joking back as he pulled out onto the streets again.

Robin casually cleared his throat and rubbed at the mask around his eyes a little. Masks and tears didn't mix. "I'm thinking that dinner and a movie this weekend is a better pick-me-up."

"Are you paying?" Batman asked, chuckling.

Robin smiled softly. "I have a little of that advance left, but it's not much of a pick-me-up if I have to pay for everything. I pay for the movie; you pay for dinner?"

Batman nodded. "It's a deal."

Author's Notes

Ok, admit it; you saw the title and thought Catwoman would be in this one. :p Sorry!

By the by, it is canon that Alfred makes bad waffles. In the recent comics, Tim and Jason briefly reflect on that fact.