Tim was simultaneously arguing with people over Batman on Tumblr and researching a murder that had happened near (or possibly in, the reports weren't clear) one of his old high schools. It probably wasn't anything that needed the attention of Red Robin, but he'd always had a hard time letting go of his past.

The last school murder he'd investigated hadn't gone great, so maybe he needed to even up the score.

He was dragging all the relevant information into one file when his doorbell rang. When he opened up the security footage that showed the outside of his front door, he shifted a little, becoming more alert, attentive.

He got up quicker than he should have and for maybe a second and a half felt dizzy, but it went away soon enough. He didn't quite sprint to the door as he did a fast-paced shuffle over. He was only wearing an oversized shirt and undersized shorts, but he didn't think she would mind much.

Then again, he didn't even really know her that well anymore. Had he ever?

"Suzie," he said as he opened the door. He didn't have a chance to correct himself before she answered.

"Greta," she said. Her voice was small and raspy, though it was stronger than it had once been. "But it's okay. I still call you Robin in my mind sometimes… but you have a new name now, I think?"

"Uh, yeah," Tim responded, stepping aside to let her in. "You came all the way to Gotham, um… you didn't say anything. I could've paid for your transportation… did you fly?"

"Not quite," Greta said in something of a sigh. She followed him over to a sitting area that he didn't really use much. "Your apartment is… nice," she told him, probably more out of courtesy than anything else.

"Thanks," Tim said, again out of courtesy. He really wasn't sure what to say to Greta — it had been so long since he'd talked to her that he could barely remember the last time he'd seen her. He'd figured after a certain point that she was just done with him. He could definitely understand that.

"Do you, um… want anything to eat?" he asked. What he should've asked was 'what are you doing here', but being so direct maybe wasn't the best idea. Even if she wasn't a superpowered ghost anymore, her glares and hurt looks still stung.

"Sure." Greta put her knees up and crossed her feet. "Sorry if I'm intruding."

"It's fine," Tim said, walking over to the kitchen. There wasn't much actual food, but there were at least snacks suitable for a friend coming over. Not suitable for someone living off them, but still. "Uh… I have fruit snacks and graham crackers."

"I'll have fruit snacks," Greta said. "Less messy."

Tim nodded and grabbed a few packets. He dropped them on the table in front of Greta and sat in the chair beside her. "So… do you need something?"

"Um, yes," Greta said. "Maybe. I need advice, and I always thought of you as… the advice guy, I guess. Because you always seemed so much smarter than everyone else on our team. I… miss that, a little. Young Justice. Us all being friends."

"Yeah…" Tim grazed his teeth over his bottom lip. "What do you need advice about, Greta?"

"Well…" Greta sighed deeply and put out her hands, fingers laced together. She was wearing a rather large ring, with a gray stone on it. "The spirits have been… talking to me."

Tim blinked. "Sorry?"

"I think I told you guys about how I was a warder — guiding spirits into the abyss, being the… portal, from the mortal world to the limbo. You've even been inside me — I mean, not me, but the abyss, I mean. Hal, Spectre, told me about it first, and I'd just began to understand what I was meant to do when… well, Doug turned me into a normal human girl. A living normal human girl."

"Right," Tim said. He frowned and leaned forward slightly. "You, um, you know his name isn't actually Doug, right? He's called Darkseid. Anyway — the spirits are talking to you? What do you mean by that?"

"I was meant to be… a link. Between the mortal and spirit world. But when I came back to life, that — it stopped. And I was glad for it. I never really wanted to do that. I never wanted to be dead. But recently, I've been having dreams, falling asleep in class, I even blacked out while I was, uh, hanging with Cissie earlier."

"What kind of dreams?" Tim asked. He wasn't an expert on the mystical side of things, nor on death, but he wasa detective (though the name left a bad taste in his mouth nowadays).

"I couldn't understand them at first," Greta said. "It was just… darkness. Darkness and voices, but the voices weren't speaking English. I kept seeing my death, the electricity, over and over, so I thought they were just nightmares. About Billy, you know. I still have them."

"Yeah," Tim said, when she paused for a second. "I have dreams… I haven't died, but. You know."

Greta sighed again. She looked… deeply troubled. Not like she was usually the most spunky person around. "Yeah…" she whispered. "I know. But anyway, the more dreams I had, the more I was able to understand them. I didn't want to understand them… I tried to not sleep, but I just passed out, and when I tried energy drinks and coffee, I just spaced out and had visions instead." She shook her head. "It was awful."

"Um, sounds awful," Tim said. "What exactly were you drinking?"

"The more dreams I had, the more I understood them, like I said," Greta continued, seeming to ignore him. "I started to get the voices… what they were saying, I mean. They were upset. At me. I… they thought I abandoned them. I guess I did. They kept saying… I had to return to them. Be a warder again."

"And you don't want to be," Tim assumed. "What are you asking me?"

Greta ripped open the packet of fruit snacks. "I need to know… should I be a warder again? Because it seems like the world really needs one, from what they've told me… but I don't want to die. I don't want to die at all."

"It's… your choice," Tim said hesitantly. "Your life. But do you really need to die to do it? To be a warder, I mean. Is it something only the dead can do?"

Greta frowned. "I don't know," she admitted. "I can't exactly ask them. All they do is send me messages, like transmissions — it's not a two way thing."

"You should find a way to talk to them, then," Tim said. "I can contact some sorcerers and people with connections to the… abyss? If you want?"

Greta considered this. "Yeah," she said slowly. "Do you have anyone… are people still mad at me for the thing with Doug — Darkseid? I don't want to... " she sighed.

"I think I have someone in mind."

"Of course," Raven said. "She's here now?"

"Yes," Tim said, leading his teammate to the room Greta was staying in. "She's really nervous. I guess you can probably feel that."

"I can," Raven confirmed, pushing open the door. "Greta. I understand you need to speak with the spirits of the abyss?"

Greta was sitting cross legged on the floor. The room was one of the unused bedrooms for visitors, and only had a bed with no sheets or pillows and one table. It served their purposes, though.

"Yeah," Greta said. "You're Raven?"

"Yes." Raven drifted into a floating lotus position. "I'm going to establish a link to the spirit's realm. If you want, I can bring Tim… Red Robin in as well. Having a link to the mortal world would help, seeing as the both of us are not quite attached to it. Not like he is."

Greta visibly swallowed. "I do," she said, glancing over to Tim. "If that's okay?"

"Of course it is," Tim said. "I said I'd always be there for you, Greta. Even if we've grown apart… I want to help you."

Greta's eyes flitted open wider. "Thank you," she said. She looked at Raven. "You, too."

"It's nothing," Raven said. "I'm happy to help you. I'm… I sense that you're looking to atone, for things you've done in the past. I can relate to that. I'll do what I can for you in our meeting place, Greta, but remember that this is about you and it is your choice."

Greta nodded. "I'm ready," she told Raven.

Raven took a moment to watch Greta and then nodded, eyes beginning to glow. The room went quiet, and Tim felt his heart rate begin to slow, something that often happened when Raven was drawing energy and emotion from others. Slowly the light seemed to fade, until Tim was surrounded in complete darkness.

He was, he knew, entering a space between the abyss and the living world. He would have been scared and inconsolable if not for Raven's influence. The last time he'd been brought into the abyss, he'd nearly died, or maybe he'd wanted to die — it seemed like more of the same in his head.

Blue and white lights began to pop up, illuminating a scene in front of him. Greta, floating, still in the cross-legged position she'd been in on the bed. Raven was opposite her, in the air with her eyes screwed shut. She took a breath as she opened them, and her light almost blinded Tim for a second before it died down.

Greta looked around, looking startled. "This is different," she started, "than I'm used to. What is this place?"

"This is a meeting place," Raven said. Her voice seemed even breathier than usual. "This is a place where I meditate. It is just on the edge of the abyss, an anchor to the mortal world. It… calms me, but it may not calm you. Everyone feels differently in this place."

"I don't know," Greta said. "But it's not scary. How do we contact the spirits?"

The change in her tone surprised Tim, but if it shook Raven, she did nothing to show that. Greta was suddenly more alert, more confident. She was so small – she'd grown since the last time he'd seen her, but she was still barely above five feet – but Tim was forcefully reminded of how much power she'd once wielded.

"Call out to them," Raven said. "In your mind or otherwise. I can sense their power in you. They will hear."

Greta took a breath and closed her eyes. Her hands were linked together by three of her fingers. It took minutes for her open her eyes again.

Tim could hear wind, now, but the longer and harder he listened, the less it sounded like wind and the more it sounded like... voices. Whispering voices, dozens of them, maybe hundreds. In the back of his mind, he could feel something like terror, but Raven's presence thankfully eroded that away.

He was so grateful for her. Even if she was kind of creepy.

Tim could hear, just barely, a voice, saying — "You need to return to us, warder," and then Greta stiffened, just slightly, as if she'd been shocked with just a jolt of static.

"She's having a vision," Raven murmured. "But I don't know what. If she gets in too deep…"

Secret — she wasn't Greta any longer, not really — began to shake, slightly at first, and then her whole body was shivering. Her hands were now clenched into fists, and her face was frozen in an alarmed stare. She wasn't looking at anything, but she reacted nonetheless.

"I see," she whispered. "But I don't have my powers anymore. How can I be a warder without them?"

The voice surrounded them, a raspy, broken thing: "We can return your powers to you."

Greta looked scared.

"I don't want to die," she said, almost pleading. "Please don't let me die. Please don't kill me again."

The room was quiet for a while, disturbingly so. Finally one voice, stronger than all the voices before, spoke up.

"You are the void between worlds," it said. "You can live and die at the same time. Be alive and be dead, warder. Just be."

Greta didn't get a chance to speak before she stopped floating and fell, back into the darkness and disappeared.

"No," Raven said. "You need to call her back here, Tim. She'll be lost to the abyss–"

"Greta," Tim said, and then, louder, "Hey,Greta."

And he woke up.

It was dark in the room, though not completely devoid of light as it had been when the ritual began. The sky outside the windows was dark — how long had it been?

"We're back," Raven said. "I… Greta. How are you feeling?"

Greta was staring at her hands, eyes unfocused. "Greta," she repeated. "No… right now… call me Secret."

"I swear I haven't seen Greta in ages," Bart said. "How's she doing?"

"I'm not really sure," Tim admitted. "It was… weird. And awkward. And weird. Even before Raven took us to… wherever she took us to, it was weird. Greta ate, like, half my gummy fruits."

Kon snorted. "That'swhat you're focused on?"

Tim shrugged. "It's weird seeing her eat," he explained. "She didn't do that when she was, well, dead."

Bart sighed thoughtfully and leaned back. "Lots has changed," he said.

"Yeah," Tim said. "Lots."