Wayne Manor:
Dick had made a decision, one that nobody else in this house was going to like. But Batman was in trouble and he couldn't just leave the man to die!
No matter what.
The ten-year-old had gone through all his dresser drawers and was now sifting through the clothes in his closet. If he was going to do this, he had to protect Batman's identity. Which meant he needed at least some kind of mask. But all he had found so far was…nothing. He had absolutely nothing that would cover his face.
Then he had an idea. Alfred kept a small basket filled with scraps of material in the laundry room. Maybe there was something in there. All he needed was something that could wrap around his head. He could cut holes for his eyes, nose and mouth if it was big enough.
Dick raced down the stairs and stopped at the bottom, listening carefully for any unusual sounds. Alfred was probably still in the Batcave so the ten-year-old ran to the laundry room. The basket was on a shelf and the boy began rooting around, searching for something satisfactory.
After several minutes, he found it. There were no scraps big enough to cover even his small face. But there was a strip of black that was long enough to wrap around his head. Batman only covered his eyes and the top of his nose with his cowl. So, that must mean that the eyes were the most important thing to cover.
Grabbing some scissors, Dick carefully measured then cut out two holes in the black material. He wrapped it around his head, testing it, and was relieved that he could easily see. Now, for transportation.
The only thing Dick had was his bike. He couldn't drive a car and he obviously couldn't ask Alfred for help. So, stuffing his new mask in his pocket, the ten-year-old quickly and quietly went to the garage and retrieved his bike. Thirty minutes later he entered the Gotham City limits.
Dick was breathing hard, his legs were tired and his ribs were aching. But he still had to make it to the theater, which was a few miles south of his current location. Knowing he couldn't ride straight up to the theater as Dick Grayson and then put on his mask, the boy decided to find a place to stash his bike and then approach the theater from the back.
He took off again, using unobtrusive side streets as much as possible, and arrived at the back of a diner that was a mile and a half away from the theater. Dick shoved his bike behind a dumpster, as far back as it would go, then began carefully searching the surrounding area with his observant eyes.
There were no open windows or doors, no kids playing in the alley, no prying eyes peering through cloudy glass. Dick dropped down and slid behind the dumpster. He pulled the strip of black out of his pocket and wrapped it around his head. Carefully, he gazed around again then stood up and began walking in the direction of the theater.
It took him another twenty minutes to get there. His leg muscles felt like they were on fire. Dick was strong, but nearly forty minutes on a bike and another twenty of half-jogging half-walking was taking its toll. The muscles in his torso were protesting, also, but the ten-year-old pushed on. Batman needed help.
The area around the theater seemed to be deserted. Dick crouched behind a grocery store right across the street and carefully examined everything, just as he had behind the diner. There were no people strolling down the sidewalks, no movement or sounds from any of the stores lining the streets.
He noticed the Batmobile, parallel parked right in front of the theater entrance. Dick stood up, took one last glance around, then sprinted around the building to the back of the theater. The Mustang that Scarecrow had been driving was parked there but the villain was nowhere to be seen.
Dick knew all about Scarecrow and he really hoped that the man had decided to hop in the car of either Mr. Freeze or Poison Ivy. And he really, really hoped that they were all gone, leaving Batman to die in their trap. But he couldn't be sure, so he had to be cautious.
The ten-year-old's ribs loudly protested as he slid against the wall toward the back door. Pushing the pain to the back of his mind, Dick grabbed the handle and quietly twisted until the door opened. No sounds, no people. He slipped inside.
He wanted to just race around the place, yelling for Batman, but forced himself to remain silent as he crept down the short hallway. Dick's heart was beating rapidly and he was having a hard time controlling his breathing. Fear and exhaustion and pain were taking over his body but Batman was in trouble.
"Let's just go!" a loud voice demanded. "He's as good as dead, we don't need to check on him!"
Dick pressed himself against a wall and carefully turned his head toward the sound. Apparently, the three villains had decided to return. The ten-year-old had, from the Batcave, watched them leave. But Mr. Freeze was leaning against a pillar, Poison Ivy was petting something that Dick couldn't see, and Scarecrow was pacing.
"He's strong," Mr. Freeze continued, "and we can't just stay here all day waiting for him to beat himself to death! We have to get to the power station before nightfall if we want our plan to work!"
Dick's eyes widened. How were they getting Batman to beat himself to death?
"Fine, we'll leave for now but come back tonight, after our plan is in motion," Scarecrow grumbled, hating that he was compromising with someone else. "We need absolute proof of his death. Gotham City will beg for mercy once they see the evidence."
"Fine," Mr. Freeze echoed in the same tone. "We can't go out the front. It looks deserted out there, but that doesn't mean there's nobody watching."
"My car's in the back anyway," Scarecrow growled.
"We can't all fit in that tiny thing!"
"Find your own ride then!"
"Boys, boys," Poison Ivy said serenely. "Let's not argue and prove Batman correct. There must be something around here that's big enough for all of us. We're in a street lined with stores, let's just steal something."
"We can't all go wandering around looking for a vehicle to steal! And, like I said before, people could be watching!"
"You boys wait out back, I'll do the stealing. Anyone who is watching will leave me alone. I'm 'just' a woman, right?" the villainess said with a sly smile.
Dick suddenly realized that they were coming toward him. He glanced around and discovered that there were no counters to hide behind and no rooms to hide in. Slightly frantic, he slid along the wall toward the back exit. Right by the door there was a tiny alcove. It was engulfed in shadows but would probably light up as soon as the door opened. However, he didn't really have a choice.
Sliding into the recess, Dick dropped to a crouch and tried to make himself as small as possible. The villains walked right past him and out the door. But Scarecrow paused and glanced back. He had a strange feeling that something wasn't right.
"I'll be right back," he called to the other two.
Turning right instead of left at the end of the hall, Scarecrow strode to the basement door. In the shadows right in front of the door, he placed a second vial of his strong gas. Then he turned around and headed back the way he had come. Without hesitating, the villain walked out the door and joined Mr. Freeze at the back corner of the building.
The light had gone just over his head and Dick was relieved. But then Scarecrow had turned around and the boy was sure he was about to be discovered. Instead, he watched as the villain walked down the hall, turned right, and came back four seconds later. The man walked out the door, the ten-year-old counted to twenty and then stood up.
He really didn't want to wait around and see if the villains were coming back. Poison Ivy was stealing a car, which meant the men were waiting somewhere outside. So, Dick raced down the hall and turned right. There was a door right in front of him clearly marked Employees Only in large letters. Under there, in much smaller letters, was the word Basement.
Dick stepped forward and grabbed the door handle. The sound of breaking glass was muffled by the carpet, so the ten-year-old had no idea that he had just inadvertently made it harder for himself to complete his objective.
Batman had stopped struggling, he was too tired to continue. But Dick was still dying, over and over, and there was nothing the hero could do to stop it. Some of the ice at the top had melted, leaving a small river of reddened water sliding down the front of the block. Batman's lips were blue and he couldn't feel his body.
Suddenly, a bright light filled the room and a figure came down the stairs. The shadow morphed into a small, very familiar body and Batman's eyes widened slightly.
"Batman!" Dick gasped, shocked at what he was seeing.
The hero was in ice but the main thing the ten-year-old saw was the blood. It was sliding down Batman's head in every direction, spreading around the ice and dripping onto the floor. Dick stopped in front of his guardian and stared into his dark-blue eyes. They were unfocused and the pupils were dilated.
"You have a concussion," the boy whispered. "They're coming back tonight, let's get you out of here."
"D…Dick?" Batman asked softly, confusion filling his voice.
"Um…"
The boy paused. What if someone was listening? No matter what meant no matter what.
"No, it's, um…Robin!"
It had been the first thing that had entered his mind and he had already used it once. Using it again made perfect sense.
"Robin?" the man asked, his voice still full of confusion and now outlined with skepticism. "I don't…"
"Just relax, we have to focus on getting you out of here."
"He's dead," Batman sighed mournfully. "I didn't save him, my fault, he's dead."
"Who?" Robin asked.
"Dick. Dick Grayson. He was only ten and now he's dead," the Caped Crusader explained sorrowfully.
"Okaaaaaaay, um, where's your utility belt?"
The words had shaken him up but Robin was determined to get them out of here.
"I'll never see him again," Batman said sadly. "Too young, he was too young to die, it's all my fault!"
The words turned into mumbled sounds and Robin shook his head. He grabbed Batman's face, grimacing at all the blood, and tilted it down.
"Look at me," the boy commanded. "Right here, look at my eyes!"
It took several long seconds but Batman finally stared into the light-blue eyes of his, unbeknownst to him, ten-year-old ward.
"We can talk about Dick later. Right now, we need to get you out of this ice. Where is your utility belt?"
"On my waist. Do you not know who I am? I'm Batman, and my utility belt is always around my waist. Can't you see it?"
"Gosh darn it, Batman, focus! It's not on your waist and you're in a block of ice. You're losing blood and probably consciousness soon so stay with me. Did they take it?!"
"What? Who? Take what? Who are you?"
Robin was about to reply when he noticed something shining in his peripheral vision. Glancing to his right, he saw the distinctive yellow utility belt hanging from the ceiling. It was almost twenty feet in the air.
"Great," he mumbled.
"NO!" Batman abruptly yelled. "No, it's happening again! I'm sorry, Dick, I'm so sorry!"
Robin stared at the man, stunned at the sudden change. Batman's eyes were wide and fear was racing through them. The boy put the pieces together – Scarecrow, fear gas, the hallucination of a dead ten-year-old and a concussion.
Batman was struggling again and his head almost slipped out of Robin's hands.
"Stop!" the boy yelled. "You're going to hurt yourself more!"
But the man didn't stop and Robin decided he would have to make it stop. And there was only one way to do that. Well, a combination of two things.
The boy lifted his mask and then, reluctant but not having time to dwell on it, slapped his guardian.
"Calm down," he commanded. "It's me, I'm here, I'm fine and I need you to stop struggling."
The slap worked, Batman stopped moving, but removing the mask didn't.
"No, you're not here," the man whispered mournfully. "You're not here."
Growling, Dick put the mask back on and said, "Don't move. I'm going to get your utility belt and then I'm going to get you out of this. But I can't go do that if you're going to bang your head around and hurt yourself even more. So just shut up and don't move. Please," he added as an afterthought.
Batman remained silent so Robin let go of his head. The man didn't move so Robin began searching the room, looking for a ladder or something else that would help him get twenty feet in the air. There was no ladder, but there were some crates on the opposite side of the room.
Robin ran over and tried to pick one up. It was too heavy, which didn't surprise him, so he began pushing. After fifteen long and exhausting minutes, the boy had all the crates sitting underneath the utility belt. Then he realized that there was no way he was going to be able to stack them on top of each other.
"Idiot, such a waste of time," he mumbled, berating himself. "Thought you were supposed to be smart."
Climbing on the tallest crate, Robin jumped up. He didn't even come close to reaching the utility belt and he wasn't surprised. But, he did notice the beam that was only two feet above the belt. If he could get up there, he could reach it from above.
"Keep not moving," he threw at Batman before racing to the stairs. "I'll be right back."
He was so focused on his objective that he failed to notice the green gas floating in the air. As he ran through the door, Robin did notice an unusual smell, but he immediately dismissed it as unimportant.
Two doors down was a door labeled Roof. Throwing it open, Robin sprinted up the stairs and came out, not surprisingly, on the roof. He had no experience doing something like this but he did the first thing that popped into his mind. Turning around, he found the ventilation shaft, removed the grate and climbed in.
Robin was getting dizzy but he decided it was just from exhaustion and the pain in both his ribs and his legs. The small tunnel he was crawling through looked like it was shrinking. It was dark and Robin was finding it difficult to breathe. He was in a coffin, he could feel it. He was in the ground, in a coffin and people were throwing dirt on top of him. The boy stopped and pounded his hands on the metal.
"I'm in here, I'm alive, HELP!" he screamed.
The sounds echoed around, racing through the shaft and out the vents scattered throughout the theater.
"What?!" a deep voice exclaimed from right underneath him.
Robin heard the word, recognized the voice, shook his head, and took a shallow breath. He looked down; he was right over the basement, three feet above the beam that was two feet above the utility belt.
He was dying, there was no oxygen, people were throwing dirt, he was dying. The boy pounded on the metal again and was surprised when a piece of it fell to the ground. Robin had unknowingly stopped over the grate and was now able to stick his head through the opening.
The air was fresh. He wasn't dying, he was at a theater and Batman was way down on the ground and he was Dick and he was rescuing the hero. No, Robin, he was Robin.
The ten-year-old climbed out of the vent, carefully settling himself on the beam before letting go of the metal just above him. It creaked and groaned and then shook slightly. Robin took a deep breath and draped himself over the beam on his stomach. His torso was hanging over the edge closest to the utility belt, and his legs were dangling off the other side. Every movement by him caused a similar movement from the beam. He tried to ignore it, but it was a little unnerving.
It was moving, everything was moving and nothing was moving correctly. Wires were breaking and people were screaming and his parents were falling. Falling, falling so far to the ground. When they landed they began painting red pictures on the dirt. No, not paint, blood.
"Nononononononono," Robin moaned, the gas creating very real hallucinations.
He tried to scramble down the ladder, but for some reason he couldn't find the rungs with his feet. There was a bar hanging in front of him so he decided to grab it and swing to the other platform, where there would definitely be a ladder to climb down. The bar was yellow, that was weird, but it was still a swinging bar.
So, the ten-year-old grabbed Batman's utility belt and arched his back. His legs went up and over his head while his torso screamed at him. Robin was now hanging twenty feet in the air, and the only thing keeping him from crashing to the ground was the strength of Batman's utility belt.