Hey there! Have another chapter! I don't know how long this is going to be just yet, but I don't want to make it too long. I'll try not to make too many chapters because I have other story ideas that I want to move on to as well!

A big thanks to all reviewers, PMers and all those who favourited and followed! :D

Anyways, here are the replies to your reviews (and just something to be noted, I've recently registered to be a beta, so if any of you guys need me don't hesitate to ask!):

Yuu101cutie: You're welcome! I completely thought that Batman needed a punch, so really it just had to be done! And don't worry, the Team are going to keep a close eye on Robin for now xx

randomkitty101: Dang is correct. Serious. ( ^,^)

StarGirl26: I know, I felt better after I wrote Robin punching Batman too! And Tony Zucco is the worst. But then again, without him there'd be no Robin... Hmm. :D Food for thought.

bookchomper101: Haha thanks, glad you're enjoying it! I'll update ASAP. Also, side note here, Boyce Avenue!? Instant respect – always a good jam ;)

Guest (same guest as before!): Thanks! And yes, Batman's Batman. So he always has a reason! I hope you enjoy this next chapter too :D

Right then! Without further ado, please enjoy this next chapter!

Thanks a lot, Varishi x

What had Batman meant 'after you'? Did Tony Zucco know that Robin was Richard Grayson? The Team didn't even know that so how could that be possible? There weren't enough details to satisfy him and he knew that he would get nothing out of Batman until he moved locations. But the thing was, Robin couldn't see the point in moving – surely the Cave was the safest place for him to be right now. The ninja noticed that Batman was looking at him hard, as though trying to solve some sort of complex equation, but instead of looking away like any other on the team would have, Robin met his eyes unguardedly. Then he thought, unless Batman meant to lock him up in the Bat-cave until he took care of the matter. Wait, Batman couldn't possibly mean to store him away like some sort of porcelain ornament whilst he went out and brought Zucco in, could he?

Batman, while all of these worried thoughts whizzed through Robin's head, was staring evenly at his protégé. But in all honesty, he was completely taken aback. Robin had punched him. Okay, so today was the anniversary of a horrible day in history for the kid, and he was bound to be a little unstable in his emotions, but Batman – no, Bruce – had managed to upset his ward to the point of feeling that he needed to be violent towards him. He'd had no idea of what Robin had been feeling. In fact, Robin never spoke about his feelings and Bruce supposed that the habit was completely down to him. He had never encouraged showing emotion, either at home or on the job, if anything he had always discouraged showing weakness. But he had meant weakness; weakness and emotion were two very different things.

The rest of the Team glanced anxiously between Robin and Batman. Both bats were on their feet and staring one another down. After the new information that Tony Zucco, the man responsible for Robin's parents' deaths, was after their youngest they had felt a flare of anger. But Robin had hardly reacted at all, he seemed shocked but that was all they could say about the boy. Batman still seemed struck with amazement that Robin had punched him (a brilliant right hook, by the way, in Wally's opinion) and was looking as though he was thinking through what he had done to upset his protégé.

Then, as though coming to his senses, Batman seemed to snap back into his usual steely focus and addressed Robin once again, but in a strangely soft voice this time. A voice totally unfamiliar to the Team. He tried again, "Robin, the safest place for you is at the Bat-cave. Just let me protect you there, and I'll bring him to justice."

"No." Robin said flatly, his hands clenched into fists at his sides. Once again, the thirteen-year-old's mentor looked dumb-founded, and once again tears sprung to Robin's eyes as he realised the extent of Batman's lack of faith in him. M' Gann could feel clearly the betrayal that Robin was experiencing and she almost felt like intervening in their argument. But she knew that it was not her place, and so she remained silent. Watching, much like the others, with wide and inspired eyes as this small, young hero stood up to someone as legendary and intimidating as the Batman.

"What do you mean 'no'?" Batman demanded with an edge of frustration in his voice that turned his words into growls. He crossed his arms and regarded his ward coolly, maybe he didn't understand properly. A few choice questions should clear up what exactly was going on in Robin's mind; well, that was the theory anyway. Batman continued, softening his voice again, "You understand the danger you're in?"

Robin nodded firmly and then scowled when he saw Bruce's eyebrow rise behind his cowl in wonder. Batman truly didn't understand what Robin was thinking, but Robin knew this all too well and decided to explain himself, "I understand the danger perfectly well. What hurts me is that you're going to expect me to sit around and wait until you bring Zucco in yourself. Maybe I understand the danger to me, but do you understand the danger to yourself?"

On hearing what his ward had to say, Batman understood a little clearer. But the thing was there was no room for debate. Zucco wasn't openly after him, he was after Robin. So it made perfect sense for Batman to leave the young acrobat in a protected place whilst he went out to take care of things. There was no need to risk Robin's life. Nodding his head, Batman clenched his jaw and prepared for the storm that was coming after what he had to say next, "I understand the danger and accept it. There is no room for discussion, you will come with me to the Bat-cave and you will stay put until I come back."

Even after Robin had openly displayed how he felt about Batman leaving to pursue such a dangerous opponent, Batman had simply shut him down again. Robin had even subverted the idea that he was worried that Batman would get hurt and leave him just like his parents had five years ago. But Batman's face remained cold and stony and even Connor seemed slightly annoyed at the dark knight's clear dismissal of Robin's feelings. Robin's mouth hung open, speechless at his mentor's heartlessness. Bruce had always seemed so caring and in-tune with his feelings. But today he was disregarding them in a way that was out of character for even Batman.

The truth was, Bruce hated having to push his ward's feelings aside like that. If there was more time, he would be more than happy to pull up and chair and talk to him about anything he wanted, about everything he wanted. But today Tony Zucco was running around making threats against his boy, and the fastest way to get Robin out of the Cave in Happy Harbour and into the Cave in Gotham was to order him to go there. If Batman asserted his intentions hard enough, then Robin would give up trying to argue with him and simply follow his orders – it had been that way in the past after all. But of course it wasn't just Robin and Batman in that room, the whole Young Justice team were there and gawping between the two bats as though they were acting out some sort of performance.

"If you're going to leave Robin all alone in a cave while you go out fighting, then we're going to come and keep him company." Connor – surprisingly – said. It wasn't a question, it was a statement. But seeing the tiny, almost invisible smile appear on Robin's face, Batman knew that if he allowed the Team to go with his ward to the Bat-cave, then Robin would go willingly: and that was what Batman needed right then. Connor then followed up with another excellent point that made his decision final, "Besides, we could serve as your sort of last defence system."

The rest of the Team, Robin included despite his fresh new-found dislike for his 'partner', crossed their fingers metaphorically that Batman would allow it. Meanwhile, Batman was feeling more and more on edge with every passing minute because Robin hadn't been moved to the Bat-cave yet and he was worried. Like every other parent would be in this situation, the dark knight was scared for his young ward. So, with a irritated sigh, Batman gave a curt nod of his consent and told M'Gann to get her Bio-ship ready, there was no way six teenagers would fit in the Bat-mobile. With a relieved smile that she would be able to keep a further eye on Robin in his time of imminent danger, M'Gann happily obliged the bat.

After a few short moments, Connor signalled to the others to make their way to the Bio-ship. The others simply assumed that M'Gann had contacted him through mind-link. After all, the two did share a more profound emotional bond than any of the others did to M'Gann. So, the Young Justice team made their way hastily to the Bio-ship. Batman and Robin waited behind for a moment, Robin staring at Batman with hurt eyes and Batman gazing back with emotionless ones – no, wait. Was that an apologetic look under there? Either way, even looking at his mentor broke Robin's particularly fragile heart so instead of allowing Batman a moment to explain himself further, Robin stomped after his team penitently.

Batman looked on after his protégé sadly; things had gone a whole lot worse than he had anticipated. But still, after all of this was over, he would have plenty of time to explain everything. Just then it had seemed as though he was incapable of finding the correct words, he was an intelligent man and yet he was basically incapable of speaking in a diplomatic way back there. He quickly shook his head and strode confidently towards the Bio-ship, concentrating on the matter at hand. He would drop his ward off at the Bat-cave and leave him under its protection and then track Zucco down and do whatever he had to in order to protect Robin.

When he arrived, the Young Justice team were already strapped in and ready to go and Batman couldn't help but notice that Robin had placed himself in the seat that was the furthest away from the last vacant seat that he would fill. With a soft sigh, Batman entered and sat in the empty seat with a flinch as the seatbelt fastened itself around him. With that, M'Gann announced the ship's takeoff and then got up to walk over to Batman who looked as though he was procrastinating over something – presumably Robin given recent events.

"I don't know where your Bat-cave is, and I thought that you would like to keep it confidential, and so would you like to steer the ship?" M'Gann asked with a smile on her face. Batman turned to her and responded with only a nod. No wonder Robin found it difficult to feel appreciated if this was the way his mentor acted all the time. Uncle J'onn only ever showed M'Gann the deepest affection and gave the most useful, but gentle, of guidance. Robin appeared to have been deprived of that. So, when Batman had been released and was about to head to the captain's chair, M'Gann whispered in his ear as he passed, "Perhaps Robin would appreciate a more loving approach."

Batman's eyes widened at the Martian's words. What gave her the right to butt in to his life anyway? What did she mean 'a more loving approach'? Batman did love Robin, and he did have a hard time expressing it (even a pat on the head was awkward to him) but he had always assumed that Robin had known that he was loved. Had Robin said something to the Martian? Batman frowned in thought as he sat down at the controls and began to steer the ship in the direction of the Bat-cave. After he had entered the right co-ordinates, Batman glanced at the back of his ward's head out of concern.

The journey to the Bat-cave was altogether rather uneventful. Wally argued the whole time with Artemis about all sorts of silly things that really didn't matter at all. Connor and M'Gann spoke in hushed voices with Kaldur dropping the occasional word in here and there. The Team seemed generally quite comfortable in each other's company, but none of them allowed the silence between Robin and his mentor to go unnoticed. It was surreal enough having Batman aboard the ship, but the silence just made the experience frightening. Robin was sat staring blankly ahead of him at a wall, and Wally knew that he was probably thinking about his family and about Batman's apparent lack of trust in him. Batman however was staring unbrokenly at the back of Robin's head, probably puzzling over M'Gann's words.

After roughly an hour's flight, the Bio-ship came in to land, there was a loud sound on the roof for a moment, but then it was gone. The Young Justice team did wonder about what the sound was, but soon dismissed it when they felt the ship meet the ground. Robin didn't need to worry about the sound; he knew that it was the waterfall that hid the Cave's entrance. The Bio-ship morphed an exit on M'Gann's command and the junior heroes accompanied by a senior left the ship. Everyone, excluding Batman and Robin, gawped at the area around them with wide eyes. The technology was on a whole other level, the Cave itself was breath-taking and the overall fear factor of the place just screamed that it belonged to Batman.

The Young Justice team stared around at the Bat-cave in awe and Wally's eyes shone as he looked around at all of the buttons that he could press. But before he could speed off to push every button he could find and pull every lever, Batman gave him a warning glare that told him that if he broke anything, then Batman would break him. As it happened, Artemis seemed to be giving him that same look. Connor looked unimpressed on the outside, but on the inside even he couldn't deny that everything around him was cool. Especially the large plane-looking thing that was sat over to the left. Kaldur and M'Gann, however, were speaking to each other in low voices about the still obvious tension between Batman and Robin.

Before anyone could think any further though, Batman called them all over. The dark knight had already lost an hour and a bit getting Robin to the safety of the Bat-cave, and now he really wanted to just get back out there and get Tony Zucco back in custody as soon as he possibly could. When the Batman had raised his voice to get the Team to gather around and take his orders, they had happily obliged. All but Robin. Robin remained out of the circle with his back turned on his mentor. Batman felt a stab at his heart at the clear rejection he was receiving; he wanted nothing more than to explain to his ward that he was only treating him differently today because he didn't want him to get hurt by the same man who had murdered his parents five years ago. There was no sign of Robin joining them, so instead of making matters worse by trying to force him to listen, Batman just continued.

"It's late, so I would suggest trying to get some rest," Batman started. Artemis gave a sigh of relief; being the only human other than Robin she was exhausted. It was late, way past midnight, and she needed her sleep or her usual temper would be nothing in comparison to what was coming. Batman then turned his attention to Robin who was stood taking deep heavy breaths – probably trying to control his emotions, "That means you too Robin, get some sleep. I, in the mean time, am going to go after Zucco. I will keep you notified."

With that last comment, Robin spun around wildly with his eyebrows furrowed into a harsh frown. At his sides were two clenched fists with white knuckles and you could tell by looking at his face that he was clenching his jaw hard. Batman blinked in surprise as Robin shouted again, "So that's it? You're going to leave me here and catch that bastard yourself?" Batman frowned and snapped Robin's name at the curse word. But Robin couldn't hear Batman; he was in a total blind fury. He started to stomp towards Batman, no one quite knowing his intentions. To be perfectly honest, Robin didn't really know what he was doing either, all he knew was that he was upset and angry.

Worried that Robin might attack Batman again, Wally sped over and tugged on his young friend's arm to stop him in his tracks. With a pleading look, Wally managed to convey everything that he was thinking to Robin and the acrobat visibly calmed significantly. Batman gave a short nod at Wally in thanks, but Wally did not return any pleasantries, he was too worried about Robin and frankly, too annoyed with Batman. Usually Batman was far more understanding of his protégé, but today Zucco had clouded Batman's judgement. Even Wally thought that going after Zucco alone was a bad idea. But hey, it was Batman's city and he didn't dare argue with Batman: that was Robin's job.

Batman didn't know what to do; he wasn't sure whether he should say anything else or whether he should do anything. So instead of worrying about it any further and wasting more time, he simply turned and left in silence. He would begin his pursuit of Zucco immediately, the sooner that was taken care of, the sooner he could take care of the broken relationship between himself and his ward. But even as he was leaving, he could feel Robin's distraught eyes on his back.

After Batman was out of sight, the team fixed their eyes on their youngest member, he was shaking. But whether it was in anger or in sadness was unknown to any of them. Wally let go of Robin's arm now and smiled sympathetically at him. M'Gann was beginning to get dizzy at the amount of different things that were going through Robin's mind so she made a special effort to block out Robin's thoughts and feelings. But that was a task in itself. Interrupting the silence, Artemis clapped her hands together loudly and began to walk over to the comfortable sofa area at the far right side of the Bat-cave. It was never there before as far as Robin remembered, so he wondered when exactly that had made an appearance. Artemis spoke as she headed for the seats, "Well. The man ordered us to sleep and I for one am going to do that."

"How can you sleep knowing that there's all of this cool stuff around us?" Wally asked incredulously, he crossed his arms across his chest and added, "Don't you want to know how all of this stuff works?" Artemis froze on the spot for a moment nodding as though she was considering what Wally had just said to her. But then she shrugged and continued walking towards the comfy chairs and the promise of sleep. Wally rolled his eyes, so what if she wanted to be boring. He wanted to check things out, that is, he had wanted to check things out until Robin gave him a pretty good attempt at a bat-glare.

Kaldur took the opportunity to step up as a leader, "I suggest we all go to sleep. It is as Batman said, he will keep us informed and we all need to rest. It has been a long day." The rest of the team nodded simply at Kaldur's words, accepting the suggestion as the best plan. But Robin hadn't wanted to hear those words; in fact he had dreaded those words. Robin knew perfectly well that if he went to sleep he would have a nightmare. It was hard to tell which nightmare, but the ending was always the same. He always watched them die, he always woke up shaking and crying and this time he couldn't rely on Bruce to help him through the rest of the night. But that was all an if, whether he would be able to get to sleep in the first place was a complete unknown.

So as the others settled into a comfortable position on the cushioned chairs, Robin just sat down and mentally prepared himself for a long night ahead. One of the worst parts of insomnia was the fact that from night until morning, you were left alone with your own thoughts. In situations such as this one, when there were other people around, you couldn't really even do anything else out of fear of waking them. So Robin was going to be left to dwell on his own thoughts for hours on end, and his thoughts were neither pleasant nor manageable.

After a while, Robin began to hear his Team's breathing getting heavier as they entered a stage of deep sleep, in some cases they began to snore softly. Not one of them stirred. While they slept, Robin remembered that this would make his second night in a row with absolutely no sleep. The night before that he had gotten around three hours of sleep, by the time the sun rose, Robin would definitely be aching everywhere and he would be even less able to focus properly than he had been that day. Even worse, he would probably grow more emotional. Between all of these thoughts, Robin thought about his family, his biological one. Once more the scene replayed itself in his head and he could do nothing to stop it, because it was permanently burnt into the back of his eyes. He buried his face in his arms and squeezed his eyes shut as their screams echoes in his ears and he felt his loss like it was brand new all over again.

Why did Zucco have to do it? Did he realise that he had killed an innocent family and orphaned a child? For years Robin had thought about the actual raw reasons that Tony Zucco could have had for killing his family, and for years he could think of nothing. There was no reason, Zucco needed no logic; it was just pure unabashed greed. These were the thoughts that Robin thought all night long, and as the night progressed Robin became more and more distressed and he felt closer and closer to breaking. But, just as he thought he had reached that point where he was in danger of losing the ability to enjoy life, the sun began to rise. It was that sunrise that showed Robin that the anniversary was finally well and truly over and it was a new day.

Robin got to his feet finally after hours and hours of sitting and listening to everyone else's peaceful sleeping, and stumbled when his vision was clouded by a sort of black fog passing over his eyes and making him dizzy for a moment before passing. He went straight to the entrance of the Bat-cave and watched as the water and sunlight mixed to create a beautiful rainbow. Just as he was starting to feel a vaguely familiar warmth that he used to know as happiness fill his heart, a sharp beeping sound starting to blare out from the main computer. So, wincing at the loud sound as he knew that it would wake his friends for sure, he walked in a disorientated manner towards the computer to receive the incoming message. Despite everything that had happened, Robin still hoped to see Batman safe. But the message held a whole other story.

"Master Robin, I'm afraid I carry bad news," Alfred's face popped up on the screen blurred out to protect his identity. Robin felt his stomach drop when he had mentioned 'bad news'. Robin was unsure whether he would be able to handle anymore 'bad news'. But still, although Alfred knew the kid was having a roughly couple of days lately, he still deserved to know everything and so he added, "I'm afraid I have lost contact with Batman. I believe him to be captured by Tony Zucco."

Robin's world went numb. Impossible.

Thanks for reading! Please review if you can, I love to read your feedback!

I have two more chapters planned after this, it might run into three. But I think that's a pretty good length... Right? Meh. I don't really know.

Hopefully, I'll have the chapters uploaded quickly because on the 27th I'm moving house all the way over to a different country. England. So yeah, it's all the way over the other side of the world so it'll take a good week for me to get everything back in order and get settled. Wish me luck with that!

Thanks again and don't forget to review!

Varishi x