Cassandra Cain dropped onto the couch beside her siblings as they heard angry shouts coming from another room. "Are they still fighting?"

"Yes. They've been going on for ten minutes." Stephanie replied.

Jason hissed impressed. "Not even the worst fight that happened between the old man and dickhead lasted this long."

"How do they not get tired of fighting every day?" asked Tim in amazement, who received a shrug from everyone in response.

"Yet there's nothing we can do about it." stated Cass sadly.

"If Dick and Alfred can't do it, it means there's nothing we can do but wait for it to work itself out." tried to comfort Tim.

Soon after, they heard a door slam violently on the upper floor.

Jason turned to his younger brother. "Sure, it will work itself out when suddenly the Joker becomes the best person in the whole fucking universe."

"You know there's no need to be so sarcastic Jay."

"That's just the way I am, sue me replacement." he shrugged.

"Please don't start one of your squabbles, Damian and Bruce are enough already." groaned Stephanie annoyed.

"You should hear the fights between Damian, Tim, Jason and Dick all at once. They're hilarious." chuckled Cass.

"Trust me I've heard them already. It was traumatic." she pretended to shiver.

"This is how you have to act as brothers: constantly teasing each other." commented Jason with a smirk.

"You called us brothers! Wait till I tell Dick that!" teased Timothy.

The elder lost the smirk and looked at him grimly. "You wouldn't dare."

"Really?"

"Really."

"Now I'll send him a message telling him what you said, he'll find an excuse to leave work and he'll come here only to hug you."

Cassandra rolled her eyes with a small, affectionate smile. "And here we go again." she muttered.

Jason narrowed his eyes at his younger brother. "You're just mad because you don't win against me in a training session."

Tim chuckled. "Only in your dreams could you beat me."

Stephanie closed her eyes and sighed.

I anticipate a severe headache.

Seven dark figures moved through the shadows of Gotham City.

"Remember the mission?" growled Batman.

Red Hood rolled his eyes. "Of course. We still aren't the same age as you old man."

He received a deadly bat-glare and smiled amusedly.

"We have to go into the old abandoned lab, shoot down every man, take custody of the mad scientist worthy of a TV show, and force him to tell us what his weapon does. Nothing more, nothing less." spoke Spoiler boredly.

"I was slightly surprised when I found out that the best detective in the world has no idea what this weapon is." reflected Red Robin.

"Tsk." scoffed Robin.

Batman turned to him and narrowed his eyes menacingly. "What was that, Robin?"

"Not now." muttered Black Bat. Batwoman put a hand on her shoulder in sympathy.

Robin straightened his posture. "Nothing, Batman."

He looked at him for a few more seconds before nodding abruptly. Without further words, he swooped down, smashing through the window and into the lab, followed by his partners.

"Nightwing was right about Batman being very dramatic." muttered the second Robin as he pulled out his guns (loaded with rubber bullets that hurt like hell. Tim can attest to that).

In front of them stood about 30 armed men.

Red Robin smiled, picking up his extendable bo stick. "It's showtime!"

And so the fight began.

Red Hood shot several opponents as he approached them knocking them out in seconds with a short hand-to-hand fight.

Robin ducked while avoiding a punch and retaliated with a knee to the chest followed by a roundhouse kick. He picked up six batarangs and threw them disarming them.

Black Bat threw an elbow to a thug's face followed by a leg sweep as she ducked and, catching the man's arm, knocked him violently to the ground in front of her.

Spoiler blocked a kick and threw a right hook at the opponent followed by a kick to the chest, flinging him away.

Batwoman rolled while avoiding several bullets and, with a smooth move, disarmed a thug. She feinted to the right and then punched him in the face, breaking his nose. She ignored the two gunmen behind her and ran to Red Hood, who had her back while shooting the two.

Red Hood, sensing Batwoman's intentions, nodded at her. The woman jumped onto the vigilante's shoulders and used the momentum to launch several batarangs. As she swooped down, she kicked first one criminal and then another, effectively knocking them out.

Red Robin rotated his staff in front of him and broke the jaw of the man in front of him. He then turned 180 degrees and landed several blows on the three gunmen.

Batman easily blocked one punch and threw the thug to his left, striking another. He threw a hard uppercut, a roundhouse kick, a right hook and in a few more moves subdued a dozen men.

In the end only one criminal remained standing and he was very pale.

And he was sweating.

And he was shaking.

And he was swallowing several times.

Yes in short, you get the picture.

Batman walked up to him, followed by his partners, and lifted him by the collar of his shirt. "Don't make me repeat myself twice. Where is Christopher McCauley?" he growled dangerously.

"That's second part of the job I prefer." commented Red Hood as the man stammered his reply.

"And the first?" asked Spoiler.

"Obviously beating up criminals. It's obvious the answer, Spoiler." replied Robin as the girl frowned.

"See, the boy does get it." said Jason as he stretched an arm across the shoulders of the younger boy who quickly shrugged him off. "Demon brat." he muttered.

"Follow me." growled Batman after knocking the man down.

After walking down a couple of corridors and easily taking down some guards, the seven vigilantes arrived in front of a door marked "DO NOT DISTURB!"

Batman kicked through the door, jerking a middle-aged man, white coat and glasses falling on his nose.

"I said it was typical for a TV show." mumbled Spoiler.

"Nah, he's more movie than TV series." commented Batwoman.

The seven vigilantes stiffened as Christopher took an unfamiliar weapon and pointed it at them. "D-don't step forward or I'll shoot!"

"Man you don't want to do that at all. I don't know if you realized it but in front of you are seven vigilantes who could literally make your life a living Hell if you make a few wrong moves." declared Red Hood with a mischievous smirk.

Apparently the scientist had a death wish since he did not follow the vigilante's advice and a laser beam came out of the gun directed at the first person he saw, namely Black Bat.

The girl easily dodged the beam but did not realize that her younger brother was behind her.

Robin's eyes went wide when he saw the laser beam suddenly enter his line of sight. Not even his vast training in the League of Assassins would have been able to help him avoid the shot.

He was surprised when he felt a well-armored body push him to the side. As he made contact with the ground, he turned his head to the side only to see Batman, his father, get hit by the ray.

There was an explosion of white light and everyone present had to close their eyes because of too much light. When they opened them again, the vigilantes visibly stiffened when nothing was left in Batman's place but his cape.

Robin, for the first time in his life, gasped in shock. He kept looking at the spot where a few seconds earlier he had stood, hoping that Batman would reappear out of the blue.

It never did.

Even the scientist was shocked, looking at his weapon as if it were the most precious thing in the world.

The first to awaken from his shocked state was Red Hood who growled dangerously and, with impressive speed, pinned Christopher to the wall disarming him and pointing a gun at him. "Tell me what the fuck you did to Batman or I swear to God I'll pull the trigger!"

He had the audacity to smile. "Although it will hurt like hell the bullets are rubber. You don't scare me, kid."

The second Robin narrowed his eyes menacingly. Keeping him pinned to the wall with one hand, he stowed the gun with the other only to pick up another. He pointed it at the side window and fired.

A shot resounded loudly in the room followed immediately by the breaking of the glass.

That gun was loaded with real bullets. Hood pointed the weapon at the man's head.

At this point the scientist whitened. "Y-you're not going to kill me! Everyone k-knows that bats don't k-kill!"

"Well, I don't see the Bat anywhere. So either you tell me what the fuck that gun does or I'm going to kill you. Besides," he leaned closer to the man and smiled madly, scaring him to death. "I've already killed, so it's not like another victim is going to weigh that heavily on my conscience. Do severed heads ring a bell?"

"All right! All right! I'll say everything!" the former Robin nodded but did not release his grip. "The gun is not a weapon that physically wounds but it is a teleportation weapon."

"Teleportation?" repeated Black Bat still shaken.

"Yes, teleportation."

"How can you teleport a person without precise coordinates?" asked Red Robin suspiciously.

"The weapon is connected to my computer." he pointed with his head to the laptop on the small table to the right. "Just set the coordinates on a recent application I managed to create and you're done!" he declared, clearly proud of himself.

"So Batman could be anywhere in the world?" asked Batwoman, and the man nodded.

Spoiler brought a hand to his communicator. "Oracle, I want you to put me in touch with Batman."

"Wait a minute." replied the former Batgirl after a few seconds. "I can't get a hold of him. What happened?"

"He was hit by a teleportation weapon. He could literally be anywhere." replied Red Robin briefly.

"One moment I'll check his tracker." there was a pause as everyone waited anxiously for an answer. "That's impossible." she muttered to herself.

"What?" snapped Robin who still had not fully recovered.

The redhead ignored his outburst. "It's as if the tracker planted on Batman's suit ... was never planted. It's untraceable."

"Maybe it's broken?" speculated Black Bat.

"No. If it were literally in a thousand pieces I'd still be able to approximate to within a hundred kilometers the approximate area where it would be, although it might be useless. Instead I can't find anything." Oracle tried to keep calm but it was difficult.

"What are the latest coordinates set on the computer?" posed the Red Robin question to Christopher, still held back by the second Robin.

"The gun had not been tested yet. For all I know it may not even be a teleportation weapon but a destructive weapon." he admitted after hesitating for a moment.

"I don't trust you. Replacement, see if he is telling the truth." ordered Red Hood.

The third Robin nodded and took the scientist's computer. I easily hacked the device and, after a minute or so full of tension, he bit his lip and looked at his older brother with sadness and fear. "He's telling the truth." his voice almost cracked.

The 16 year old uttered a series of expletives that would have made Alfred faint.

"Uhm, guys?" came Oracle's unusually uncertain voice.

"Please tell me you found something." begged Batwoman.

"Well yes, but it's not positive."

"Great." muttered Robin sarcastically.

"What is it?" asked Black Bat as she tried to keep the urge to kill the scientist under control in the most painful way possible.

"Well, I've been trying to track Batman through space satellites and with every form of terrestrial technology and-" her voice trailed off.

"You didn't find anything did you?" asked dejectedly Spoiler.

Barbara took a deep breath and replied. "That's right. I'm 99% sure that Batman is nowhere to be found. Or at least on Earth."

"What do you mean at least on Earth? You mean he might have been teleported to another planet?" cried Red Robin hysterically, raising his arms in frustration.

"I'm not the one who invented the teleportation gun!" defended Oracle. Then she added, in a calmer voice. "There is good news, though: Batman's vital signs tracked by his suit have not varied and are stable."

Everyone breathed a mental sigh of relief.

At one point the scientist chuckled causing Red Hood to glare at him. "What's so funny, asshole?"

"I just realized I may have gotten rid of Batman for good!" everyone stiffened, not even wanting to think about that possibility but Mr. McCauley continued. "I can't wait to spread the news to all of Gotham!"

At this the vigilantes stiffened even more.

If word got out about Batman's disappearance/death...

Gotham would literally fall apart.

Red Hood growled dangerously and increased the pressure of the gun on the older man's head. "You won't say shit or I'll blow your fucking brains out! Understood?" he hissed menacingly.

The scientist gasped and nodded several times.

Then Batwoman asked the question that made everyone's eyes go wide. "Who's going to tell Nightwing? Or Agent A for that matter?"

Silence.

"Shit." exclaimed Red Robin.

Red Hood nodded in agreement with him. "Yeah, shit." he turned to the scientist. "Well, if I don't kill you Nightwing will. Everyone knows how the guy gets when one of his friends or family gets hurt, and you've practically made his father disappear into thin air." he spoke in a faux-compassionate tone.

"Shit, I'm dead!" whispered more than frightened Christopher.

"Yes, you are." nodded Black Bat.

Robin walked to his knees to slowly pick up the Batman's cape. He turned it over several times to see if there was any sort of clue but nothing: the mantle was spotless.

The boy would never admit it but inside he was an emotional turmoil. Fear, sadness, anger struck him deeply but never as deeply as guilt.

Would he ever see him again?

Would he ever see his father again?

It is true that he had known him and lived with him for more or less a year but the man was still his father.

And they were always in conflict.

He closed his eyes behind his mask and clenched cape into a fist.

No.

Batman would return and, until then, they would protect Gotham tooth and nail.