Chpt. XXXVI: Robin

Dick woke up to a sudden knock at his bedroom door. Dick rose up from his sheets, unsure of whether the knocking was part of a dream or not. Dick glanced out towards the window. It was still dark out. He glanced down at his phone & examined the time. It was 5:00 AM.

Dick tried to recall the night before. His head was throbbing. Maybe the knocking was really in his head & not the door. He was drinking last night; Dick knew that much. He was upset over Rachel & Kori & the guys leaving the night before. He drank & wallowed in self-pity. Then…

The caves.

Dick shook his head in the bed. The caves...the computer...the car...the Bat. It was all a dream, wasn't it? The Batman never chased Dick down, right? Dick couldn't tell the memories from his dreams. It all seemed to be one & the same. How much of it was he dreaming?

Dick wiped his face with his hands & took a deep breath. The caves were in Bruce Wayne's office. Bruce Wayne...was the Batman. That much was clear. The Batmobile, the GCPD archives, all of it. Alfred attacking Dick...that was real. Dick ran away in the Batmobile, but the Batman chased him across town. The Batman...Bruce...saved Dick from a few thugs. Bruce killed one of them. At least...Dick thought so. There was a lot of blood.

Bruce ended up explaining to Dick why he had become the Batman. He was trying to protect the city & do what others wouldn't be able to do in order to save the city. He donned the mask in order to provoke a certain fear in criminals...almost like a predator frightening his prey. Dick had asked Bruce to help him become a hero to fight Nolan Drake.

"Dick," Bruce called from the other side of his bedroom door. "Wake up."

Dick groaned. "Okay," he grunted as he rolled out of the bed. "I'm gonna shower."

Bruce opened Dick's door & stepped inside. He was wearing slim joggers & an Under Amour shirt & some black running shoes. Were they Yeezy Ultra Boosts…? "We're running for two hours," Bruce said. "No shower just yet."

That's what Dick's entire day consisted of: running 15 miles from 5:00 AM to 7:00 AM. Bruce & Dick returned home to eat breakfast, & after a short while, they began to train in Bruce's gym. First, they practiced Judo. Bruce wanted Dick to be able to conduct self-defense against a larger opponent. They did this for several hours, & ended with one hour of cardio. The next day was similar. Dick woke up at 5:00 to run, & ate breakfast at 7:00. After breakfast, they changed Judo to Jujitsu for a few hours, then the remaining hour was weight lifting & conditioning. The routine continued regularly for a week, with running 15 miles every morning, training in some martial art form with Bruce, & then either cardio or weight lifting. There was a day in which Dick didn't lift weights or do cardio, but instead, Bruce & Dick did yoga. Dick enjoyed that. He didn't question any of the training. Dick knew it was what he needed to become what the city needed him to be.

On the 8th day, Dick ran up to Bruce in their early morning run. "Do you normally run 15 miles?" Dick asked.

"Yeah," Bruce grunted in between breaths.

Dick nodded, following alongside Bruce down the trail laid out across the property. "What makes you think that this isn't too much for me?"

Bruce smirked. "Because if it was, you would've stopped a week ago."

Dick scoffed. He wasn't wrong. Dick would have given up so long ago. However, he wasn't just any kid. He had pushed himself to his peak strength & skill in combat & acrobatics. He could manage a few jogs in the afternoon.

Dick began to jog backwards beside Bruce. "Wanna race?" he taunted.

Bruce turned to Dick, continuing his jog. "What?"

Dick smirked. "Do you wanna-" & just as he was about to finish his sentence, he tripped on a log & fell onto his bottom.

Bruce stopped in his place & turned to help Dick up. "Be mindful of your surroundings."

Dick dodged the bandage-wrapped punch, side-stepping to the right & throwing a left hooked punch at Bruce in the gym. Bruce stumbled back & quickly regained his footing, swing a kick up to Dick's head. Dick blocked the kick with his forearm & swung another kick back at Bruce, connecting his foot to Bruce's skull. Bruce stepped back & reached for his head, blinking roughly.

Dick panicked. He stepped towards Bruce, concerned. "Did I get you bad?" Dick asked with genuine care.

Bruce shook his head. "It's fine," he groaned. Bruce kneeled down, rubbing his temple, then shot upwards, throwing an upright swing below Dick's jaw. Dick fell hard, rocking back & rolling on his side.

Dick glared up at Bruce in anger. "Bruce," Dick growled.

Bruce smirked & stretched his hand out for Dick to grasp. "Never let yourself get distracted, kid."

Dick rolled his eyes & grabbed Bruce's arm, pulling him onto the ground. Bruce fell forward, but managed a roll. As Bruce got back up, Dick leaped onto Bruce's back & clung on. Bruce reached up & tossed Dick off of Bruce's back, but Dick flipped in the air, spinning in a somersault & landed right on his feet like a cat & shot a kick straight into Bruce's gut. Bruce fell onto his knees, groaning.

Dick watched Bruce & studied his facial expression. It was a genuinely pained face. Dick had actually hurt Bruce.

Bruce gasped & looked up at Dick. He eyed the young boy up & down, grinning softly. "Where'd you learn how to do that?"

Dick shrugged. "The Flying Graysons," Dick responded. "Dad insisted that I performed that flip when I needed to improvise."

Bruce nodded to himself. "You could teach me few things."

Dick arched his eyebrow & snickered softly. He stood up & walked to a nearby bench & wiped his sweaty forehead with a dry towel. He felt his mouth stretch to a smile. He felt he would smile for the rest of the day.

The training had gone on for roughly two weeks. Dick had started to become impatient. He was itching to get back onto the field again. He was itching to take Nolan Drake down, once & for all. But Bruce didn't have enough intel on the matter. They hadn't exactly pinpointed any recent activity from Nolan. It was as though he had disappeared. Dick was getting paranoid.

Bruce assured Dick that he would look into anything that the GCPD managed to dig up. Dick decided to let Bruce conduct his detective work & focus on whatever he could at the manor. While Bruce was away, working as the Batman, Dick stayed down in the Batcave to see what he could do from behind the computer.

Dick sat on the large chair & stared up at the big computer screen. Dick struggled to decide where to start looking. He had a super computer at his disposal. He could probably search any location & manage to hack into some sort of database & pick up any facial recognition. After all, this was Bruce's technology. It HAD to be worth the money.

Suddenly, a thought traced across Dick's mind. He searched for the facial recognition database & clicked on it. A blank search bar appeared.

Dick hesitated to press at the keyboard. He wanted to be sure he wanted to do it. He took a deep breath & began clicking at the board. Once he had typed in the name, he clicked the "ENTER" key. Dick looked up at the screen & watched as a simulated Earth appeared. The program began to zoom in close on the United States, then closer to the Northeast corner of the country, then close to Gotham City, then downtown, when finally, it honed in on the GCPD. As the satellite image rendered into a high-resolution image, Dick began to see the red blotch shift to a bright red haired girl with pale skin & bright blue eyes. She had managed to glance upward at the sky, for some reason. Dick smiled. She was carrying her book bags, pressing them up against her chest, as though she felt that those enlightening books would escape her grasp. She wore her schoolgirl uniform, with the white button up top & plaid skirt. Dick felt his heart race. Barbara was one of the most beautiful girls he had ever seen. And he missed her.

Dick shut his eyes tight, fighting the urge to let a tear roll down his cheek. Dick took a deep breath. He knew what he had to do. He needed to stop Nolan Drake.

Dick erased Barbara's name & began to tap away at the keyboard. He typed in Nolan Drake's name & clicked the "ENTER" key. Dick waited as the screen began to generate another image, but this was an image during the night. It was taken at night on a traffic camera. Dick recognized the street. It was a few blocks down from the Iceberg Lounge. Nolan Drake was in an old black muscle car, riding shotgun alongside a younger boy behind the wheel. The boy wore a dark red shirt, almost maroon. He was pale & had dark slicked hair. Dick thought he recognized the boy. He may have just been one of Nolan's goons from the Underground.

Dick clicked on the license plate of the car that Nolan was driving in & the system immediately began scanning the license, cross referencing it along with any other registered vehicles in Gotham. Finally, a file from the GCPD appeared on screen. It belonged to a Willis Todd. The man was a small time criminal, being arrested for petty crimes such as theft & car jacking. His file showed that he had ties to a few mobster gangs, & was even tied with the ex-district attorney Harvey Dent, who was now known as the crime lord Two-Face. The man died roughly three years ago.

With a name to go with the license of the vehicle, Dick could very well be able to track down the car, along with Nolan Drake himself.

Dick didn't hesitate to act. Dick grabbed his phone & dialed Detective Gordon's number. He raised the phone up to his ear, waiting for the phone to stop ringing. After a few moments, the call was answered.

"Hey, pipe down over there!" Gordon called out to someone else. "Sorry, kid, things are hectic right now. We're preparing security for the State of the City Address this weekend. What's up?"

Dick grinned. "Jim, I think I have a lead on Nolan Drake's whereabouts."

"SHUT UP!" Jim called out to someone else in the police department. "Wait, you know where he is?"

"Yeah, I think so. I have a license plate of a car he was driving in a few weeks ago."

"A plate?" Jim repeated. "Wait, how?"

Dick sighed. "That night, when the Iceberg Lounge was shot up, Nolan Drake was there. A traffic camera caught him in a black muscle car. The car belongs to a dude named Willis Todd."

Jim grunted on the other line. "Yeah, Willis. I remember him. I arrested him tons of times. I think he's dead now."

Dick nodded. "If I send you the license plate, will you run it through your database & locate it for me?"

"Sure," Gordon said. "But you've gotta leave this to us, Dick."

"Jim, you know I can't do that."

There was a brief awkward moment of silence between the two. "You're a stubborn kid, Dick." Jim sighed. "You're just like Barbara."

Dick's heart stopped. He felt chills run down his spine, & his face grew warm. He wanted to ask, but didn't feel like it was the right moment. Dick hesitated, but he quickly decided he needed to. "How is Barbara, Jim?"

Jim was quiet for a brief moment. "She misses you, Grayson."

Dick nodded. He felt his eyes fill with water. He blinked tight, letting salty tears drip down his cheeks. "Tell her I miss her too. Tell her I miss her so much."

Jim was silent over the phone. Dick wondered if he had stepped over a line. "Look, Dick...she's really counting on you to come back to her. Whatever happens...don't go back to her as a broken man. Do what's right, & make sure you go back to her as a whole."

Dick nodded softly. He understood the detective perfectly. He wanted Dick to not kill Nolan Drake, & to be able to pick up where he left things with Barbara. Dick had every intention of returning back to Barbara once things had settled. He wanted nothing other than to just hold Barbara once more, & live a normal life. But something in Dick's gut told him that this wouldn't be as easy as he thought. Dick knew that a lot was at stake. He also knew that he may not have it in him to let Nolan Drake walk away.

"Okay, Jim," Dick said. "I'll make sure everything is alright before I come back to Barbara."

With that, Dick said his goodbye & hung up. He would wait for Jim to send Dick the coordinates to Willis Todd's car, & Dick would try to find Nolan Drake in that location. It should work.

Suddenly, Dick hear a roaring echo. Dick swiveled in the chair to find the Batman driving down the dark cave, approaching the center platform. As the car slowed down to a stop, the doors opened, revealing a maskless Bruce Wayne. "The State of the City Address," Bruce abruptly called out.

Dick stared back at Bruce as he approached the computer. "What?" Dick asked.

Bruce began to type away at the keyboard. "Dick, that's where Nolan's next attack is going to be. And I think this is it."

Dick's eyes grew wide open. "Wait, what do you mean, 'this is it?'"

Bruce took a deep breath & began to explain. "Alright. Nolan Drake's whole motive seems to be driven by his desire to fix the city. He wants to save it, but in order to save it, he has to destroy it. He was planning this ever since Old Gotham. He wanted to get topside, once he had enough weapons & men, & he was going to try to take over the city. Once his boys were flushed out, he took another approach. He used his partnership with Cobblepot to get ahold of his weapons, & orchestrated those attacks across town."

"Bruce, where are you going with this?" Dick asked. "This is stuff we already know."

"Here me out, Dick," Bruce insisted. He continued. "The Gotham City Academy & the coffee shop were both examples of what he would want to do. But according to eyewitnesses in the Iceberg Lounge, he didn't use the same kind of weapon he had used before."

"Right," Dck agreed. "No explosives. Just gas."

Bruce nodded. "Neurotoxins. They alter the chemistry within the brain, causing hallucinations as a minor effect, or long term effects such as schizophrenia, or even permanent brain damage, or even death."

Dick shook his head. "That explains the freaky shit I saw that night at the Lounge."

Bruce pulled up schematics of the City Hall building plans. "Yeah, you were most likely affected by it." Bruce sighed. "He's using a different weapon, now. The bioweapon must be a last minute decision that he made after his supply of the explosive solution was destroyed."

Dick glanced up at the computer screen, surveying the building plans. "So, in order to get the city's attention & save the city in his own sick little way, he plans to release the neurotoxins during the State of the City Address?"

Bruce looked down at Dick. "Bingo," he said.

Dick sighed. "It's this weekend, right?"

Bruce nodded. "Today is Thursday."

Dick let out a deep, frustrated breath. "Okay. We need a game plan, then."

Bruce stepped away from the computer & approached a nearby workbench. Dick stood up from the chair & followed Bruce. Bruce stood at the workbench & unraveled a blueprint for something. "What we need, Dick, is to get you a suit."

Dick raised an eyebrow. "What?"

"You've shown me that you're more than capable of keeping up with my work, Dick. Both on the field & in a deductive level. I really could use your help on this one, but in order for us to go all out in taking this guy down, I can't have you be recognized by the GCPD & have you arrested. You've gotta conceal your identity."

Dick looked up at Bruce, wearing his Batsuit from his neck down. The dark armor glistened in the bright lights above in the cave. Dick both admired the suit & feared it. "Bruce...you're a vigilante. I think I'd have more of an issue with the GCPD wearing a mask than just...going in & out, & taking Drake down."

Bruce shook his head. "I'm at a good place with the GCPD. I'm a consultant, in some ways. There's no issues with me working alongside them, & having you alongside me will grant you immunity, rather than you being seen as a kid acting above the law on his own."

Dick sighed. He glanced down at the armor. Dick had asked to become a hero...but he didn't want to lose himself in the process. He didn't want to become Bruce's soldier, fighting Bruce's war against the crime of Gotham.

Dick scoffed softly to himself. What was he talking about? He was already brought into the war. And losing himself? Dick had lost himself so long ago.

Dick cleared his throat. "Code name," he started. "I refuse to be given a dumb code name."

Bruce raised an eyebrow. "What do you consider dumb?"

"Batboy."

Bruce looked down at the blueprint. He ripped off the corner of the blueprint & crumbled it up, then tossed it aside. "No Batboy," he said, embarrassed.

Dick nodded. He took the blueprints from Bruce & began to survey them himself. It was an armored suit, & it resembled Bruce's Batsuit, only, it lacked the Bat insignia on the chest. "I like this," Dick said. "I'm glad this is bulletproof. I really do. I just...I don't see why I also need a cape."

Bruce nodded. "Believe me, the way we're going to be traversing the city, we'll need some aerodynamics on our side. The cape will help us glide through the air."

Dick shrugged. "I can kind of do that already," he mentioned softly. Suddenly, an idea hit him. "The circus," he said.

Bruce raised an eyebrow. "Wait, what?"

Dick looked up at Bruce. "This...what I'm about to do...I need to do this for my parents. I need to do this because of what happened to them. The consequences of this city's crime, SOMEONE needs to pay. And yes, I may have already gotten my revenge, but...that was not honorable. I need to honor them." Dick touched the suit with the tips of his fingers. "Red & yellow, just like our Flying Grayson suits were."

Bruce nodded. "Red & yellow...you got it."

Dick smiled. "And...the code name."

Bruce nodded. "Right. I can't exactly call you 'Dick' in the middle of a fight, now, can I?"

Dick rolled his eyes. He leaned against the workbench, looking down at the blueprint of the suit. He envisioned himself wearing the red & yellow suit, gliding across the skyline of Gotham. He imagined himself flying, like he did all those years ago underneath the circus tents. He thought about the times that made him happy, performing those majestic acrobatic stunts. He thought of the tragedy that took him away from that, & how he was alone at the orphanage. He thought of Cheyenne coming to that orphanage, reminding him that he was not alone. He thought of all of the good times he spent with her. One of his most fond memories with her was when he would rush to help her whenever she hurt herself in the playground. He always ran to get her a bandaid. One day, after Dick had gotten her a bandaid, Dick spotted a bird nearby. Dick loved to call to some birds, & they would occasionally respond to him. That day, the bird he called to flew to Dick. Dick showed off the red & yellow bird to Cheyenne. It made her smile.

"Robin," Dick whispered. "I'll be Robin."