Well, well, well. Eh heh. Guess I couldn't, after the small success of Nevarmore, keep away from the Elseworlds premise.
To be honest this is Teen Titans again, like Nevarmore, crossed slightly with Batman: The Animated Series – and indeed, given the setting of this particular Elseworlds, this takes maybe more of a nod from the latter than the former, despite being in the Teen Titans section. That said, it is not in the wrong section, it is just based more heavily on TAS in regard to costume, settings, props, etc.
It is also, admittedly, slightly based on an episode of Batman: The Animated Series. I am not going to say which one until the end, although those of you familiar with Batman: TAS and/or this episode will probably work out which it is before I reveal it.
Once again, Robin-centric. I know, I'm boring. But look at the pen-name. I am obliged. Obliged, I tell you.
Also, given the storyline, it is most fitting that it be focused around Robin.
But yeah, I am becoming predictable.
One more thing to note – the narrative style switches from third person (he, she, they) to first person (I, we, me) during the chapters. I don't know why I decided to do that – I just did, and I like it, so…
Enjoy, I guess.
Blinds
Everything starts with something.
Some past event. Some deed. Some secret.
Sometimes even a wish.
As for all this…
Me?
It started with a case.
TT
It's the strangest thing.
When I open my eyes, I see a room I swear I've never seen before in my life. And yet, at the same time, I know it. I know it like the back of my hand.
When I look to my left, I know I'm going to see a bedside cabinet, on the surface of which is a lamp, a packet of cigarettes, a folded newspaper and a battered tin alarm clock.
And when I look, there they are.
I don't feel any different. At least not physically. And… not even mentally, really.
But something is different.
This place – this room – feels wrong. Alien.
And yet why does it feel so familiar too? The things in it – they're all mine. I know they are; and what's more, I know where they all are.
I sit up. I'm in bed, bare-chested. It's dark – a dark I recognize. The kind that is infringed on by a slender grid of harsh yellow light, courtesy of a combination of window blinds and street lights. It's thrown across the entire room.
I recognize this.
Guess I didn't shut the blinds properly.
I flick on the lamp. Reach for the cigarettes. Get a book of matches from the drawer of the cabinet, where I know they will be, and get out of bed.
It's cold; but I know there's a flannel robe hooked over one of the bed posts. I pull it on, leaving it loose as I go to the window.
Pushing back the blinds is reassuring.
There is my city. My city. Same as always.
I can hear a siren in the distance. Nothing new there.
Yeah. My city.
I strike a match and light up a cigarette.
Since when do I smoke?
…Since always.
Nothing's changed. Everything is the same.
So why this odd feeling? Why these images? Why these names and faces? Some I know, and some I do not. Friends and enemies manifested onto the characters I have seemingly created.
I watch the smoke curl in the yellow slats of light; and smile.
No, this is all right. This is all original.
Must have just been that dream I had.
TT
The dream itself was a fantastical one; vivid, wonderful, so… real.
He could not recall exactly when he had experienced it – most likely that night, since it was disorientating him right now. Making him wonder if his true existence was… well, true.
But of course, his wild dream… Which was more realistic? Waking up in bed in an apartment in Downtown Gotham to find you hadn't shut your blinds properly; or waking up in bed in a ten-storey tower shaped like a "T" to find your wardrobe full of capes, masks and green spandex pants?
That was amongst the things he had dreamt of. He had dreamt of that existence – of himself out of shirts and ties and hats, replacing them with an outfit that was, if nothing else, entirely the opposite. He had dreamt of a heritage – of a man dressed as a bat; of his parents, circus performers, falling to their deaths in a fabricated "accident". He had dreamt of this tower, a haven of technology unlike any he had ever seen before. He dreamt of a team – a team that he led. A team comprised of the most wonderful and monstrous people. An alien. A shape-shifter. A witch. A half-robotic hybrid. He dreamt of others – of evil-doers. A magician. A British invader. A long-haired youth on a motorbike. A monster that was half-man, half-spider.
A girl who had sought to destroy them.
A man in a mask.
Some faces he recognized. He had created these creatures – or some of them, at least – out of the people he knew. Friends. Superiors. Enemies.
But strangest of all was the technology and the history his mind had conjured up. The robot man had been beyond imagination, as had the computer…
Computer.
That was a new word.
Well, the vehicles. There had been a car. A "T-car". And a submarine. And a motorbike; a beautiful red motorbike. Gadgets and weapons – a retractable fighting staff. A little hand-held device called a "communicator", like a portable telephone.
Sure, they had walkie-talkie things now, but those communicators… They weren't quite on the same level.
There had been a television. A television practically the size of a theatre screen. A television in full crystal clear color, with a thousand channels.
And a "games console". A Gamestation. He recalled playing on it, in his dream. It was like nothing he had ever seen in his life – and yet, in his dream, he had taken it for granted. Like it was no big deal.
Circular discs called CDs that played music without all the hiss and crackle of the radio.
Oh, and what music…
Not the swinging Big Band. No crooning. No, this wasn't Glenn Miller, or Frank Sinatra.
He couldn't recall it exactly now – and that made sense to him. How should it be that he would remember music composed in his dreams?
But Glenn Miller it had not been.
He remembered it all so clearly, and yet… He could not conceive its reality.
Just a dream.
Oh, but what a dream.
And what a world. What an existence.
Not that his own embittered him. Not at all.
After all…
He was doing what he had always wanted.
TT
A suit, a fedora, a cup of black coffee and a cab ride later transformed him from the disorientated dreamer, yearning for a life which didn't exist, into…
"Good morning, detective."
Nodding his reply, Detective Dick Grayson pushed open the door to the GCPD's 38th Division.
The Department of Criminal Intelligence.
His friend and partner, Detective Victor Stone, was already at his desk, tuning the radio; paperwork laid out before him.
Dick approached the desk and leaned over it. After a moment's pause, he said but one word;
"Cyborg."
Detective Stone looked up sharply.
"What?"
The younger detective was studying him silently – in his mind superimposing the metal and circuitry of his dream over his friend's body.
The robot-man's identity had, by now, occurred to him.
Cyborg had been none other than Victor Stone.
He shook his head and sat down, shrugging off his jacket.
"Nothing. Sorry."
"Cyborg" eyed him worriedly.
"Robin? You okay, man?"
This time it was Dick's turn to sharply raise his head.
"Robin." He said the two-syllable word slowly and deliberately. "That isn't my name."
"Well, no." Vic looked puzzled. "It's a nickname. Remember?"
"I…" Robin removed his hat and rubbed at his temples. "Yes, I suppose… that's right."
"Of course it's right." Detective Stone's gaze was still wary. "You sure you're okay this morning?"
"I'm fine. I'll be fine." Robin dragged his fingers down his face. "I'm just… tired, I guess."
"It's Monday morning. You just had the weekend."
"Mm."
"And Cyborg?" Vic stressed it. "Is that even a word?"
"Look, just forget I said it." Detective Grayson folded his arms on the desk, having recollection of a case; that case… "What about Blood?"
"That's a homicide. You know that's Bullock's job."
"Ugh." Robin rolled his eyes. "Bullock. How'd he end up in Homicide, anyway?"
"No idea." Vic pushed across a cream manila folder full of paperwork. "Not like we haven't our fair share here, so don't complain."
"I guess. I mean… there's about six departments involved with that case, right?"
"Right." Detective Stone got up and headed towards the coffee machine. "Want some coffee?"
"Sure."
Robin fooled with the radio himself while Vic made the coffee and brought it back.
"As I was saying…" He took the radio and replaced it in Robin's hand with a cup of black coffee. "Due to the nature and circumstance of the killing, there have been a lot of departments involved. We've got enough right here linked up to it, but since he was shot, that makes it a homicide, which gives Bullock and the rest of his department the most freedom over it."
"Right." Robin took a sip of his coffee. "But it was over drugs."
"Uh huh. That brings the Narcotics team in."
Robin smiled faintly to himself at that – Detective Roy Harper down in Narcotics was a slacker and the amount of work the Blood case had brought in for him hadn't amused him one bit.
"I'm sure he's having a field day down there." Vic grinned. "Meantime, since we can almost definitely assume this had some connection to organized crime, it's our job to figure out exactly how this outcome… well, happened."
"I wrote up a preliminary theory on Friday."
"Mm. Yeah. I got it. I made a few little amendments. Gar said Crime Scene Investigation had come up with some more stuff we should know about."
"Oh?" Robin raised his coffee cup again. "Run through it for me, as it now stands."
"Alright, well… An infamous and notorious gang boss, known primarily as one Brother Blood, has always thus far eluded capture by the GCPD. He's been out there for years and we've never been able to get him. His most recent hit up was a large underground drugs racket, raking in thousands of dollars selling stolen and smuggled drugs. We can only assume at this point that he did, however, upset someone even higher up the chain than him. On the night of Thursday 4th November, 1948 – making it last Thursday – gunshots were heard near Crime Alley, and nearby uniformed officers were notified. They discovered Blood dead at the scene and the area was cordoned off. The autopsy has proven that he died via a total of nine bullets, fired from a .38 Magnum. His three known accomplices, known as the HIVE, have been taken into custody."
"Right." Robin nodded thoughtfully, taking in the information as though it was new to him – and yet having recollection of a knowledge of everything that Detective Stone had mentioned. "So what we still don't know are the two most important factors – who, and why."
"Well, just a guess… But I would think our answer for "why" would be money."
"Mm." Robin nodded in agreement. "I suppose. What else is there to benefit from selling drugs?"
"Exactly. Even so…" Vic sighed. "At the moment, the only suspects we got are those HIVE kids, and it's not looking at the moment like they did it. Any of them. They all got solid alibis and they all match up. 'Sides, seems to me like they were far too afraid of Blood to try anything against him."
"What about a gun trace?"
"Last I heard, they were doing something about that. Still, that's a common gun, the .38 – it could be a matter of months and months before they find it."
"By which point, the perp coulda gotten rid of it." Detective Grayson examined his coffee, swilling it around the cup. "Why can't all criminals be like the Joker?"
"What, that psycho clown who poisons people with that freaky laughing gas?" Vic looked alarmed. "Why'd you say that?"
"Agh, you know what I mean." Robin looked at his partner through splayed fingers. "Because of that laughing gas… you always know it's him."
"Oh. Yeah." Vic nodded. "It would be nice if they all left calling cards. But, since they don't…"
"We got our work cut out for us."
"Mm. Well, since we're Criminal Intelligence, it is kinda our job to figure out who these wacks are." Detective Stone snapped his fingers at the folder. "We got about fifty others like that, stuffed full of dirt. I'm willing to bet you twenty bucks that our perp is staring us right in the face. I mean, we probably got pages and pages on 'em; we just don't know it's them."
"Yet."
Vic grinned.
"Well put, well put…"
The taller detective began to distractedly search through his pockets, eventually surfacing with a packet of cigarettes and a lighter.
Him too…
Robin frowned. Put down his coffee.
Vic saw his fingertips go to his forehead, as though he was suffering from a headache.
"You sure you're alright there, Dick?"
"Y-yeah." Robin looked up. "Could I have one? Please?"
"Sure." Vic offered him the packet, then handed him the lighter.
His hands were shaking just a little – making him a miss a few times before he finally got it lit. On snapping the lighter shut and handing it back, Robin distractedly took it out of his mouth without even drawing on it.
"Cyborg-" He started.
"Victor." Vic leaned over the desk. "Victor. Why do you keep calling me that? That word? Cyborg?"
"I'm sorry." Robin took a deep breath, examining his cigarette. "Victor." He looked up again. "Vic, I know this is dumb, but… humor me. How long have I been… smoking?"
Detective Stone shrugged.
"Ever since I can remember. Why, you thinking about quitting?"
"Y-no. I don't know." Robin distractedly put the cigarette in his mouth again, drawing on it; as Victor slid a glass ashtray across the desk, puffing away on his own.
He watched Robin close his eyes as he inhaled and then breathed out the smoke, as though he was savoring it.
He opened his eyes again.
"It's so… odd. Because. Because I don't want to smoke this." He looked at the cigarette in his fingers with distaste. "It's a disgusting habit."
"You've never said that before."
"No. Because I've never really felt it before."
"Why the sudden change of heart?"
"I…" Robin's voice was distant as he fixed his gaze on the blazing orange end of the little fiery stick. "…I don't know. Like I said, it's just so odd, because I don't remember… I don't remember taking it up. Yet, I feel like I should be smoking, even though I don't really… want to, and don't really remember doing it before now, even though I must have, since you just said I've done it before, and there were some on my bedside table, and…"
"Well, if that's how you feel, why'd you ask for one?" Vic snapped waspishly. "Wasting my damn cigarettes…"
"Because…"
Robin looked around the office. The décor was typical of the decade – dark, plain, with blinds at the windows and a pale, coffee-stained carpet. There were a few posters around – Lauren Bacall, Rita Hayworth. Vic's trench was over a chair; Robin's own was on a hook, left over the weekend. This was their office, Vic Stone's and his – it said their names on the door in gilt paint.
DEPT. 38
CRIMINAL INTELLIGENCE
DET. VICTOR STONE AND DET. RICHARD GRAYSON
Funny, that. It was not beyond his recollection to know that he and Vic were the only two detectives in the whole of the Gotham City Police Department employed in the Criminal Intelligence unit. That was them – Criminal Intelligence. Two detectives in an office on the very top floor of the precinct building, surrounded by file upon file on Gotham's Most Wanted. It was their job to ferret out information on primarily gang crime, but since they were technically the "record keepers" around here, often they found themselves the key component to the final piece of a case. For within the hundreds upon hundreds of hand-written and typed sheets alike in this office, they had the whos, whats, wheres, whens and whys of just about every crime ever committed in this city, and the criminals that had committed them.
The Five Ws. Like a newspaper story.
Except the guys in their "stories" were getting the book thrown at them rather than being in it, so to speak.
So the point was that he could recall all of that – he knew this much.
He knew the whos, whats, wheres, whens and whys concerning all this.
But as for the smoking…
"Because… It doesn't feel right not to. Everything. This atmosphere…" Robin gestured around the office vaguely, leaving a coil of wispy smoke to trail the movement of his hand. "…It makes me feel like I should be smoking."
Robin looked at his partner helplessly.
"You don't understand."
"No, I don't," Vic agreed blithely. He didn't seem too distressed, rather more interested in his own cigarette. "Mmm. Well. I don't know why you're complaining – that's some good tobacco."
"Smoking's bad for your health."
Vic laughed.
"Don't be stupid."
"It's true," Robin insisted. "It's linked to cancer and all sorts."
"Says who?"
Robin paused.
That was a point.
Who had said?
He didn't recall hearing it anywhere. Reading it anyway. Seeing it anywhere.
"I…"
Vic grinned.
"Riiiiight. Okay, Dick – you just stay there and get up on with some work. I'm going to go call Arkham."
"Ah ha." Robin intoned it irritably. "Okay, I realize I'm acting a little strangely today…"
Vic snorted.
"A little?"
"Okay, a lot. I'm sorry. I just… I had this dream last night, and I… I know this sounds really dumb, but it's left me so… I dunno, confused. I mean, I'm having trouble distinguishing between it and… well, this."
"Real life?" Vic offered, finally sitting opposite him.
"Maybe." Robin stubbed out his half-finished cigarette and put his face in his hands – the loss of the cigarette much to Detective Stone's chagrin. "It just seemed so real to me."
"Wishful thinking?"
"I wouldn't say so. I mean, it was pretty neat and all, and it might be interesting to experience that kind of lifestyle properly, but I can't say I'd want to trade, exactly."
"And what was this dream, exactly?" Vic ventured, leaning a little across the desk.
"Well…" Detective Grayson looked up at him again. "…You were in it."
"I was?"
Robin nodded.
"Yeah. And me too. And, uh… ah, it'll come to me in a minute. And we… just…"
"We what?"
"Um…" Robin kneaded his forehead with his knuckles. "Promise you're not gonna laugh."
"Hey, you got my word."
"Okay, well… we were, uh… superheroes, I guess."
Vic snorted across the other side of the desk and Robin looked up murderously.
"You promised not to laugh!"
Vic gave a few hiccoughing giggles.
"I'm sorry…" He snickered again. "But you're serious? Superheroes? Like those comics they publish now?"
Robin didn't answer for a moment.
"Yeah, I guess…"
"Ah, that's rich…"
"It's not funny."
"Alright, alright, I'm sorry. I promised not to laugh and I broke my promise." Vic scratched at his neck above his shirt collar uncomfortably. "Okay, lay it on me, then. What kind of superheroes were we? What did we do? What were our names?"
"Well…" Robin felt a sudden need for his cigarette again and salvaged it from the ashtray – Vic handed him the lighter with a grin glued to his face. "We didn't live here. We lived in this city called Jump City, in this big tower thing."
"Big tower thing?" Vic repeated tonelessly.
"Uh huh. It was called… uh, Titans Tower."
"Mm." Vic nodded appreciatively at the alliterative patterning. "Nice name. Any reason for it?"
"Well, sure. We were a team. There were five of us. We were called the Teen Titans."
Vic managed to suppress another snort, instead watching his partner fidget nervously with his cigarette.
This dream of his had certainly affected him, that was for sure. Vic hoped he wouldn't be so unraveled for long, especially not with the Blood case looming over their heads like this.
Perhaps talking it out would do him a favor or two.
"Okay, well, you said there were five of us. You and me, that makes two. Who were the other three?"
"Well, you were… this half-robot guy." Robin took another deep breath – then countered it with an inhalation on his cigarette. "This guy called Cyborg."
Vic's eyebrow arched.
"So that's why…"
"Yeah."
"What cool powers did I have?"
"Well, you were super-strong. And you had all these built-in gadgets, like a proton cannon in your arm and a torch and things like that. I mean, I think it was in the future or something, because it was so… different. We had a huge television, all in color. And all your gadgets were… well, nothing like anything we have now."
Vic was grinning.
"Sounds like my kind of thing."
Robin smiled sadly.
"Not really. You… well, Cyborg. He hated being the way he was. He said it made him feel like a freak."
"Oh." Vic didn't have any answer for that. "Oh," he said again.
"And there was this green kid. A shape-shifter, you know? He could become any animal he wanted."
"Name?"
"Uh… Beast Boy, I think."
"Any dames?"
"Uh huh. Two." Robin held up that amount of fingers to cement his point. "One was this alien princess, Starfire. Real stunner, with red hair and green eyes. She could fly and shoot this green energy stuff. Starbolts."
"Right." Vic was part interested, part highly amused – but he kept a straight face as he asked; "And the other?"
"Ah. Raven. She was the opposite. Smaller, dark hair and eyes. Bit of a creepy dame, to be honest, but she was nice enough. She had that thing, you know. Moving things with her mind. Telekinesis."
Robin paused.
"Hey, come to think of it, Roy was in it too."
"He was?"
"Uh-huh. An archer. Speedy, his name was."
"That all five?"
"Oh, no. No. Speedy wasn't part of the original Titans. He just sort of showed up now and again. No, Vic… Number five was me."
"Ah." Vic's eyebrow quirked. "Of course. You did say. So what were your amazing powers, then? All of the above? Super-strength? Immortality?"
"Um…" Robin frowned, looking at the desk's surface. "You know, I… I don't think I had any…"
Detective Stone blinked.
"You didn't?"
Robin shook his head, drawing on the cigarette that was rapidly burning away between his fingers.
"Then why were you on the team?"
"I… I could, you know, fight. Like really good."
"But you can do that anyway. It's part of the GCPD training."
"No, I mean… Martial arts. And acrobatics. Oh, and I had this stick thing. A retractable one."
"A retractable stick thing." Vic leaned his chin on his hand. "Wow. Sounds like you had it made."
"Shut up." Robin's eyes narrowed. "It might also interest you to know that… I was the leader."
Vic snorted.
"Right, great idea. Put the powerless guy in charge of a superhero team…"
"It wasn't like that. The whole thing… It was because… of this partner I had. Because of… Batman…"
"Isn't that a comic or something?" Vic responded dryly.
"No. Well, see… the oddest thing about that, you know… was that Batman. This Batman guy. He had another identity, as you do. You know, being a superhero and all. I mean, he wasn't born Batman."
"Yes, I guess that would make sense," Vic agreed.
"Well, his secret identity. Underneath it all, he was… he… was…"
"He was who?"
"Bruce Wayne." Robin said it quickly, becoming engrossed in his cigarette as Vic bugged out at him.
"Bruce Wayne?" He repeated. "You mean… the Bruce Wayne."
"Yeah."
"The Bruce Wayne, who is downstairs."
"Right."
"The Bruce Wayne, who is downstairs, in his office."
"Right."
"The Bruce Wayne, who is downstairs, in his office, doing his very important job of being Lieutenant-in-Chief."
"Right. Him. That Bruce Wayne."
Detective Stone burst out laughing.
Robin angrily stubbed out his cigarette a second time, getting up and going to the window to push back the blinds; Vic's peals of laughter following him across the room.
Trying his best to ignore him, Detective Dick Grayson instead turned his attention to Gotham City. It was a reasonably bright morning for November, giving him a good, clear view of the city he had dedicated his life to protecting.
In a trench and fedora as opposed to a cape and mask.
He leaned his forehead against the icy cold glass as Vic found his voice again;
"So you… you were… his partner. This Batman guy." Another snort of laughter. "Bruce… Wayne…"
"Yes. That's right." His voice was as cold as said glass.
"So who were you?"
"I'm sorry?"
"You. Your name. Batman and…?"
Dick looked across at him, both his expression and his voice suddenly so deadly serious that Victor Stone stopped laughing altogether.
"Robin."
TT
ZOMG, and the hardcore Batman: TAS fans have figured me out already, no doubt…
Yup yup, Robin is a bit crazy in this, and he gets crazier…
There are two reasons why Robin is referred to as "Robin" while Cyborg is "Vic". One… well, I'm not saying the first one yet. Two – Vic and Dick rhyme and it looked stupid.
There are also THREE reasons why it is set in specifically 1948. But I'll be sharing those as we go along and right now I'm not revealing any…
Characters showing up within the next two or three chapters: Beast Boy, Raven, Starfire, Terra, Speedy, Bullock, Bruce Wayne…
It's all good.
Hope you all likey so far.
RobinRocks xXx
