A/N: Thanks, JokerFan2011 and Batman Dude, for your compliments and encouragement. I have a close family member who is "worried" about me because of my stories. In fact, there are several that I have not shown to this person because it would increase his/her concern. It does make it difficult for me to feel completely okay with what I write and I will probably always have doubts. Anyway, after that confession, thanks again for your encouragement! :)
Thanks, Blas, for the review. I thought it sounded kind of silly but it was the only way I could think of to get Batman back to Alfred without revealing his identity. ;-) So, I'm glad you liked it!
Chapter 10:
While Kirik was checking on Robin and beginning to work on his final trap, Bruce Wayne's faithful butler was still struggling with Batman. Finally, Alfred had decided to forcefully make the man rest. An anti-anti-sedative Bat-pill, along with a healthy dose of Bat-sedative, had been mixed in with the small amount of pain-reducing Bat-medicine that Batman had allowed the butler to give him. The hero was fast asleep, lying on his stomach with a large pack of Bat-ice on his bare back, which was being held in place by the Bat-wrap encircling his torso.
Although the wooden club had landed on just his upper back, the extended lack of Bat-ice, coupled with the harsh treatment it had received during the fight, had caused the bruising to overcome Batman's entire back. It looked like a large piece of coal speckled with clumps of squashed blueberries. There was swelling right between the shoulder blades and Alfred knew it was going to take at least a week for Batman's muscles to return to full strength. Longer, if he had to fight again while rescuing Robin. So much time was being lost and every second spent resting or healing, although it was necessary, was another second closer to the demise of the younger hero.
Alfred was checking the stitches on Batman's right arm when an idea popped into his mind. He glanced over at the metal wastebasket by the Bat-computer; it was still full. It took him eight steps to get there and, after picking it up, seven more to get to the Bat-analyzer. The butler wasn't sure how to categorize the papers so he started with the obvious: place of captivity. Thirty random crime reports were pulled out of the trashcan and Alfred began making piles. Warehouses – twelve, houses – six, vehicles – eight, boats – three and a…treehouse?! He chose the largest pile first and slowly typed each victim's name into the Bat-analyzer with the main category of "warehouse". The familiar whirring sound began and Alfred waited impatiently. The 'ding' was followed by an index card sliding out of the exit slot. That was followed by a gasp of surprise from a wide-eyed butler who had just felt a spark of hope light a small fire in his heart.
He had to be sure before he could tell Batman, though, so Alfred did the same thing with the other four categories. The same result, every time, and the butler was shocked that they hadn't thought of this before. It should have been obvious; Kirik was a specialist and they should have figured this out a long time ago!
Batman chose that moment to begin stirring and Alfred went to his side. The butler wanted to disclose every piece of information right then and there but he knew the hero needed time to wake up and clear his head.
"Whaaaaa you do me?" Batman slurred sleepily and Alfred smiled slightly.
"You were exhausted, sir. I merely helped you rest."
"Robin!" Batman unexpectedly shouted as his eyes flew open. The remains of the Bat-sedative slipped from his system and he glared fiercely at his faithful butler.
"Robin," he repeated accusingly and Alfred sighed.
"You need your strength, Master Batman, in order to rescue Master Robin. The only reason you can move right now," Alfred commented as Batman forced himself to sit up, "is because you have been sleeping long enough to allow the Bat-ice to do its job."
The Caped Crusader was now on his feet, leaning against the edge of the table and trying to shake the cobwebs out of his brain. His hands slowly rose up and he began massaging his temples. Bat-ice, he could feel a large pack on his back and he moved his hands to his waist. Alfred immediately stopped the right hand that was beginning to open the Bat-wrap.
"I will put you out again, sir, if you attempt to take that off," Alfred was polite but firm. "If, however, you agree to leave the bandages on, I will tell you what I have discovered."
"Discovered?" Batman's tone was confused but the word implied something important.
"Do you agree, Master Batman? Do you promise to leave everything the way it is so you can continue to heal?"
Lifting his arms away from his body, Batman nodded.
"Good. You need to sit down," Alfred stated as he led the slightly unsteady hero over to the Bat-analyzer. After situating the man comfortably in the chair, the butler picked up the five index cards that had come out of the machine.
"I want to hear your thoughts before I offer my own conclusions," Alfred remarked. "So, for now, I'm going to give you only the facts that I received from the Bat-analyzer. I separated the crime reports by 'place of captivity' and compared each case in a certain category with the other ones in the same group. We'll start with the results I received when I submitted 'warehouse' as the main category."
Alfred cleared his throat slightly before continuing. "Victim number one worked in a warehouse until a horrific accident sidelined him for almost a year. Victim number two lived in an old, abandoned warehouse for three years because he and his family had nowhere else to stay. Victim number three witnessed an extremely violent fight between two of her relatives while helping them move into a warehouse to grow their shared business. Victim number four had a son who was the office manager in a warehouse when a disgruntled employee went off the handle and the son was killed. Victim number five…" Alfred paused when he saw the contemplative look on his older charge's face. "Do I need to continue, sir?"
"Each one had a stressful experience in a warehouse and each one was found in a warehouse," Batman murmured thoughtfully.
"So you see the connection, sir," Alfred replied. "Out of the thirty reports that I fed into the Bat-analyzer, all thirty of them came back with the same connection. Kirik is a professional and does his research. He knows, sir…he knows where to take his captives. A memory is a strong thing that can be manipulated easily, if done correctly."
"But Robin has so many horrible memories, how would the man know which one to choose?" Batman asked.
"That's very true, sir. He has seen a lot of injuries and death in his young life. But where, sir, would you go if you wanted Master Robin to be taken back to his most traumatic memory?"
"The circus, obviously," Batman responded immediately.
"But that, sir, happened to Dick Grayson, not Robin," came the wise reply.
There was a long pause. Robin had been through a lot in his three years of being a hero: saving innocent lives, being kidnapped by so many different villains, fighting the bad guys even when he was hurt, protecting the citizens of Gotham City. He had gone up against Joker, Two-Face, Catwoman, Conall, Riddler, False Face, Kirik and the list went on. There were so many places with bad memories: the circus, the factory with the buzz saw, the lab with the tunnel, too many warehouses to count, the lighthouse….
"The lighthouse!" Batman exclaimed. "His first time being kidnapped, Joker took him to the lighthouse!"
"True," Alfred agreed, "but do you think that was the worst part of that experience for him?"
Another pause, shorter this time. "The warehouse?" the hero whispered, almost to himself.
"I agree," the butler replied quietly. "Have you ever been in that area of town, near that section of warehouses and not seen his eyes grow slightly wider and his body tense?"
Batman jumped out of the chair, startling Alfred when he grabbed the butler into a hug. "Why didn't we see this before?!" he shouted as he quickly released the man and ripped the Bat-wrap off his own torso. The pack of Bat-ice dropped heavily to the ground and Batman sprinted to the Bat-changing area. Swiftly exiting with a new Bat-suit on, he growled loudly, "Why didn't we see this before?"
Shaking his head, Alfred replied, "I don't know, sir, but do you think we should be focused on answering that question right now?"
The answer was the sound of the Batmobile's engine roaring to life and the vehicle was gone before the butler could even finish his thought.
"Please be careful, sir," Alfred said quietly.
"Seven eighty-two," Batman stated furiously as the Batmobile raced through the streets of Gotham. "How could you even know about that?!" Thoughts began rushing through the man's brain. "Of course – maximum security, Joker, egotistic villains. And it's my fault! Of all the idiotic things to say: hey, my teenage partner is unbreakable! Anybody want to take a shot at him? First one to break him wins a prize!" Now Batman was snarling sarcastically at himself and was actually wishing that Kirik preferred physical pain. Robin could survive broken bones and blood loss and severe bodily injuries; he had proven that over and over.
"Professional," the hero spat mockingly. "Professional idiot. If that man thinks he can tear Robin apart and live to brag about it…" Batman trailed off as he entered the area of Gotham City that housed a certain group of warehouses that a certain Boy Wonder hated to be around.
Hang on, Robin.
Alfred and Batman were connecting puzzle pieces and Kirik was grabbing supplies. The villain knew he needed to hurry. Batman had been knocked out but the hero was strong and smart and would go after his former sidekick as soon as he figured everything out. Kirik had done his research – Batman would look up the villain's "name" and find the crime reports. It might take a while but eventually the intelligent man would discover the link and come for Robin.
He knew he wouldn't have time to cement everything together; the u-bolts and nuts would have to do. Kirik also knew that he would have to leave the hero's feet on the ground. Hopefully that wouldn't matter; hopefully the man would still be stuck forever. The bolts had to be much longer than the previous ones – they had to go through a warehouse wall, not just a wooden one. His setup was taking too long and Kirik was getting nervous. Everything had to be ready before Batman arrived. The roaring engine was approaching and the villain clenched his jaw in frustration. It wasn't perfect but it would have to do.
This was a trap; it was obviously a trap. Kirik was a genius; that, too, was obvious. Batman climbed out of the Batmobile and stalked to the door of warehouse number seven eighty-two. Pausing before he entered, the hero took a deep breath and prepared himself to see his young partner lying broken on the floor. Then he flung the door open, strode into the room and his world went black.
Twenty minutes later, Batman awoke with a severe headache. The first thing he saw was the grinning face of the younger Roddy Cooptrup. He also realized that he was in a dangerous situation: u-bolts with the nuts on the other side of the wall. The one trap from which he hadn't figured out how to escape. The one time in his entire crime-fighting career that he had actually needed help from someone other than Robin or Alfred.
"You're going to die, you know that, right?" he growled at the man standing in front of him.
Kirik rolled his eyes. "You and your little kid are exactly the same, both threatening to kill me." He suddenly released a loud, booming laugh and said, "Good luck!"
"I know who you are, Roddy," Batman snarled in reply and was pleased when the villain's eyes widened slightly.
"You're wrong, but also semi-correct," Kirik stated with a hint of distress in his voice. "I knew you would connect the dots but I didn't know you would come up with that name. Roddy," the villain spat out the name in disgust, "was my murderous father. But you already know that, don't you? You know you caught the wrong guy but you turned him in anyway!"
Shaking his head, Batman replied, "I wasn't wrong Ro…whatever your name is. You didn't, and still don't, know all the details that I do. There is nothing I can tell you now that will change your mind; I can see that. However, you deserve to know that your innocent father was killed by your uncle, Victor. I watched it happen; I was too late to stop it."
"You're LYING!" Kirik yelled and punched the hero in the face. "My father killed my mother and baby sister and you let him get away! My little sister was the best thing that ever happened to me and you didn't care that my father escaped! Now you'll know what it feels like to lose someone important to you; someone you are so proud of that you brag about him to everyone!"
Batman hadn't thought of that and his eyes narrowed as a trickle of blood slid down his left cheek. "You wanted Robin because you were unbeatable," the hero growled. "You couldn't resist because I called him unbreakable. This is about pride!"
"No," it was Kirik who growled this time. "Well, yes and no. It started out that way; nobody is unbreakable. However, when I finally realized what you mean to him and what he means to you, it became much more than my final triumph. Two birds with one stone," Kirik's voice was filled with rage. "An 'unbreakable' sidekick breaks and I get revenge on Batman, the 'hero' that let my sister's killer get away."
Where. Is. He?" Batman's voice was quiet but the words were enveloped in fury.
Kirik shrugged, "You'll never know and, even if you did, you can't escape from this trap to go rescue him. The only reason you are here now is because those two idiots I stupidly hired helped you get free. I'll tell you about him, though."
"I will escape and find him. You have underestimated both of us. Robin is strong; even if he broke I will bring him back. There is nothing, nothing, you can do to stop that!"
The villain continued as if Batman hadn't even spoken. "He's hanging from a ceiling with no way to get out of his bonds. His efforts have been valiant but there is nothing he can do to release himself. The defiance I saw in his eyes at the beginning has been replaced with emptiness. After all, he watched you die twice: there was a deathly explosion in a warehouse and then you received a bullet in the head after losing a fight. Trust me, that bullet was so close to your already bloody head that there is no reason for him to think you're alive. That glorious scene I played over and over for him. He stared at it all night and didn't respond to anything I said to him this morning. Your kid is gone, Batman, and you are both going to die knowing that you failed each other."
Batman's eyes had widened in dismay as he listened to the man speak. Robin thought he had died in the warehouse. Then hope would have filled his body when he saw Batman fighting the men in that house, only to be crushed to pieces when the hero was "shot in the head". There would be no hope this time because Robin knew that nobody could survive a bullet to the brain.
"Wait!" Kirik demanded when he saw a look of sorrow flash across the hero's face. "He's about to find out that somehow you survived the shot, only to be put in an inescapable trap. You and I both know that he'll remember how impossible it was to get out of this," the villain pointed to the four u-bolts.
"Hope – that emotion will race through him again! You're alive! He can see you, he can help you! All he has to do is escape! Eventually he will realize that he will never, ever, be able to free himself. Then he gets to watch you slowly waste away and he will know that it is all his fault. By losing to me, he has failed you."
"You are going to regret being born," Batman snarled, an undetectable trace of panic in his tone. "You've already accomplished your goal so leave. One of us will escape but, in the extremely unlikely event that we don't, we're both going to die anyway. So just go enjoy your retirement for as long as you can before you are the one who dies. Because I will find you after Robin and I are free and it will be very hard for me to control what happens the next time I see your face. You should run, Kirik, as fast as you can and as far away as you can."
The implied threat hung darkly in the short silence that followed and Kirik briefly thought about obeying the man. But he was confident that the "Dynamic Duo" would never find a way to escape so, rolling his eyes, the villain picked up a tripod and video camera. Quickly setting it up, he explained, "This connects to the television in Robin's tomb. He can see you but he won't be able to hear you. You can yell at him all you want but it will only make you lose your voice. Enjoy your last few days of life. Goodbye, Batman, for the third and final time!" Kirik strolled out of the warehouse, leaving the sound of his scornful laughter hanging in the air as he slammed the door.
Staring straight into the camera, Batman slowly mouthed the words:
"I will always come for you. Never give up."
Repeating the sentences over and over, the Caped Crusader began pushing against the bolts with all of his strength. There was always a way….