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Okay, part II and enter Young Justice!
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Dick looked up. A steady, uneven clomping sound was echoing around the Cave, and he couldn't think what could be making it. Pursing his lips, he spun on the chair in front of the computer and looked out across the flat Cave floor.
p"Tadaa,"
pHe grinned slightly. Tim was leaning on one of his bo staffs, leg still in a pot and arm in a sling but looking a lot better. "All the way across the Cave. I deserve a medal."
p"What're you doing?" Dick asked.
p"I'm bored, so I came to reply to all of these." Tim waved a handful of paper. "Cassie emails me every hour on the hour to ask me what to do and Bruce keeps printing them out to give to me. I'm snowed in back there. I think he thinks it's funny."
p"Yeah, well, he always could use a sense of humour transplant." Dick moved off the chair so Tim could sit down and ceremoniously drop the paper into the waste paper basket.
p"Did you ever have this much trouble with the Titans?"
pDick considered it. "We never had Impulse," he said eventually, and Tim sighed.
p"I really dread to think what my inbox looks like," he said glumly.
p"I'll leave you to it. Good luck!"
p"Yeah, thanks for all your help." Tim muttered, typing awkwardly with one hand. "Stupid Young stupid Justice. This is going to take hours."

pcenter***/center p

Bruce doesn't approve of this, but you should have iseen/i the pictures of Happy Harbor Cassie sent me. It did bring up some interesting questions, such as how exactly one gets cheese spray on the ceiling, or how much effort it takes to ground Oreos that deeply into carpet. One thing I do know for sure is I am not going to clean it up.
pWhy can I see myself having to clean it up?
pDick drops me off - driving one handed is more than a little hard, especially when I still have to limp around with a staff and - don't tell Dick - have a tendancy to pass out at inopportune moments. I suppose I might have been better off if I hadn't walked three kilometres on my leg, but there wasn't a lot of choice in the circumstances. I stare at the mouth of the cave with a pit opening in my stomach. This is going to be hideous. I look back at Dick and he's ilaughing/i. All I can do is pull a face, take a deep breath and walk in.
p"Gah!"
pOkay. First we'll open a window. I lean out and take a few deep breaths of air, and as my sling bounces off the glass I give another little yelp of frustration. Right. I can see myself going home in a very ratty mood today.
pAs I finally find some curtains to open I pin Superboy in the dusty ray of light. He stops like a rabbit caught in the headlights. "I can see you, Kon." I snap. "If you make one more step for that door I'll brain you with a batarang."
pHe stops and leans against the wall guiltily. "What the heck happened here?" I say. "Come to think of it, do I want to know?"
pHe coughs, scuffs the floor. "Girls were having a pyjama party. Me and Bart didn't know, honest. We just came by and - uh - got into a bit of a fight with them."
p"Okay," I look at the broken furniture. "Fine. The cheese on the ceiling?"
p"I was kinda hoping you wouldn't see that."
pi"Kon,"/i
p"Bart did it."
p"Hey!"
p"Ahah!"
p"Oops."
pThey're both cornered now and they know it. "I'm going to find the girls. You two are going to start cleaning all of this up right now."
p"You're not the boss of me," Kon mutters.
p"And I'm thankful every day that I'm not," I really don't have the patience for this right now. My arm's hurting me again, I'm still feeling tired and queasy and it really does stink in here. "Just do it or the place'll smell like this forever."
pBart shoves a mop into his hands - neither of us noticed him fetching them; we tend not to when we start squabbling. I wish I didn't get into a fight with Kon every time I see him, but he really is infuriating.
p"Why aren't iyou/i helping?" he mutters, swinging the mop over his shoulder and scowling.
p"One, I didn't make the mess. Two, I ican't/i."
pI step out of the darkness to the side of the window. I know I look a mess. I have an interesting scar on my left temple where my head hit the ground really, ireally/i hard, one arm's still sling-bound and I'm limping heavily, as well as being pale and generally ill-looking. I'm glad of the mask, even if it is a nuisance to get on one-handed. I can see their expressions very clearly, stunned, but I know I'm covered. I shake my head. "I'm going for the girls. Start cleaning."
pAnd then I have to limp out of the room. I wish I'd left this till later, at least until I could walk properly. It's humiliating. Dick won't tell me what he said happened to me, anyway. Knowing Dick he told them an elephant sat on me. I really don't know if I can face them right now. How come the earth only opens under me when I really don't want it to?
pThe girls are in the gym, which is less of a wreck than the rest of the cave. You don't want to know what it looked like in the showers. So I just turn on a bat-voice from the shadows and growl, "Main chamber. Now. Bring dusters."
pI watch the stampede run past and then sigh and hobble after them. This stinks. Everyone was a little out of my league here before I lost the use of two limbs, and now I just feel - useless. It's not going to be a fun day.
pBecause one arm's in a sling and the other's occupied with my makeshift crutch, I really can't do anything. By now I'm also convinced Sir Edmund didn't die in the fall, so I can't help wondering what shape he's in. He didn't have anyone to fetch him before he froze to death. Maybe he did. He always seems to have henchmen by the dozen.
pWhen I enter everyone's already cleaning furiously. I wonder if they're joking or if they really are scared of me, sometimes. One thing I know is I'll never be in Batman's freakiness league. I stand in the doorway for a while, leaning on it slightly, feeling more and more drowsy. Bruce really is gonna be mad when he finds out. If there was some way to show him how much this place reeks I'm sure he'd understand.
pI turn away and wander through the cave, looking for a room they didn't trash. I eventually find a sofa buried in magazines but otherwise unharmed, shake them off it and collapse, too tired even to notice the apple cores on the cushions.
pcenter***/center p

I jerk awake to find my neck's killing me and worry for a second before I realise it's because I'm lying in a very uncomfortable position. I raise my head blearily and try to think where I am. I wrinkle my nose as I catch the smell and everything comes back. I sit up in time for everyone to tumble in, marching in rough step, and salute with a motley arsenal of feather dusters, mops and sweeping brushes.
p "All correct and in order, sir." Kon says, stamping his foot. I try to make myself look at him but it's hard to keep my eyes open, so I just lean back and speak with my eyes closed.
p "You cleaned the cheese off the ceiling."
p "Yup."
p "Got the chocolate off the windows."
p "Uh-huh."
p "Scraped the paint out of the showers."
p "You know about the showers?"
p "I'll know if you just shoved everything under the table,"
p "We didn't, mom."
p I wish he hadn't said that. I manage to force one eye open and give him half a glare, but Cassie suddenly breaks into a giant grin. "I'm so glad you're back!"
p Considering where I could be right now - i.e. under a few hundred tons of ice five thousand miles from home - I'm quite glad I'm back, too.
p "And," Bart says proudly, "we're inot/i going to ask about what happened." Kon kicks him in the leg without moving his gaze, staring into the middle-distance, at all.
p Bart rubs his leg. "What was that for?" he snaps.
p Cassie sighs. "Sorry, Rob. Nightwing said you might not want to talk about it so just don't ask, but-" I can see her eyes flicker to the sling. Considering what Dick could have told them, I got off easy.
p I shake my head. "iThis/i I got falling off a cliff. It's how I got to be on the cliff that I don't really want to think about."
p "You fell of a cliff?" Impulse looks very surprised, as if this shouldn't be a problem at all and he falls off cliffs all the time. "There aren't any cliffs in Gotham."
p "I wasn't in Gotham." I'm feeling way too tired for this right now. "I was in the Himalayas and got caught in an avalanche. Sort of." I can't really think how to explain it without telling the whole story, or at least I can't think how to now. "And I'm not really meant to be here. Batman doesn't know I'm up yet. I only came because it looked like you were all about to kill each other."
p "It wasn't that bad," Secret says quietly. "We just missed you. And no-one would tell us what had happened, so we worried."
p "You think iyou/i worried," I mutter. I know I'm being really moody but I feel weird, and I'm still bruised everywhere and in quite a lot of pain. No-one else is relaxing at all, and that just makes me tense up even more.
p I pause curiously, because the room's beginning to swim, and next thing I know I'm kneeling on the floor with Kon holding me up. I blink at him blearily and he says quietly, "You okay, man?"
p I nod slowly and try to sit back but my leg complains at me so I fall sideways, where Bart's already built up a wall of pillows in preparation. "'nkyou," I mumble. I feel really, really stupid.
p "What ihappened/i?" Secret whispers.
pI try to focus on to a stationary point of the room but nothing's holding still. For one horrible moment I think I'm going to hurl. It passes.
p"I just black out every now and then," I say quietly, and roll onto my back to make the big push back to my feet. "Got hit on the head by a few things."
p"Like what?"
p"Several tons of ice, actually. Besides, I've been ill. I should be fine again in a few minutes.
pBut I have a feeling I won't be, because the walls are closing in and it's so hot breathing isn't an option.
pcenter***/center p
I struggle back into consciousness slowly, and then try to take stock of my surroundings. I'm still lying on the floor in one of the rec rooms, half-on and half-off a pile of assorted cushions, but now there's a checked blanket over me. I wonder where they got that from, but then I remember it's Impulse we're dealing with and it's better not to ask.
p"What time is it?" I mumble, pushing myself up on one arm. I hate passing out. I've lost all track of time.
pCassie's the only one who's remembered a watch. "Just gone five. It's about half an hour since you blacked out."
pThat's an improvement on my previous time of three days, anyway. "Oh," I say quietly. Bruce will definitely have missed me by now, and Dick can't cover for me for long. Invalids don't get up and wander off, usually. I hope he's not too mad.
pCassie helps me up but my broken arm bounces off the sofa and I drop to my knees again, hugging my arm and shivering. Now it's too cold. I so do not need this right now. "I think I'd better call Batman," I say weakly.
pKon shakes his head. "We've already had the call from his highness. You're not going anywhere."
pI try to think what this means, but my head won't stop buzzing to let me think. Eventually, I give up. "What?"
p"Nightwing called," Cassie says gently. "He said they'd - uh - "discussed" it and half your problem is stress. So maybe you should stay here for a while."
p"He thinks this place is iless/i stressful?" I don't believe this.
p"We did try to talk him out of it," Secret says. "We don't know anything about looking after sick people."
p"For God's sake," I mutter. "I'm not an invalid. I just have - dizzy spells."
p"Half hour long dizzy spells."
p"Oh, shut up, Kon." I lean against the sofa and wipe my hair out of my eyes with my good hand. I feel really clammy and cold, and can't seem to stop shivering. "This stinks. I hate being sick."
p"Don't we all?" Cassie mutters. Impulse shoves a thermometer into my mouth and I consider spitting it out but I don't know if I can summon the strength for that, so I just glare at them all.
p"It's not our fault this happened," Secret says gently.
pOkay, now I feel bad. I deflate even more. "Sorry, guys. I've just had a bad week is all." I say quietly.
pI don't know if they'll understand what I mean. Kon might - he's been through a heck of a lot - and Bart has matured a little. Secret's certainly had more than her share of problems. Cassie . . . she takes the whole superhero thing a little lightly. I know something's going to burst her bubble sooner or later, but I wish it wouldn't. I entered the whole thing on a pretty low note, so I never had any hopes in the first place . . .
p"So," Cassie says. "Do you want anything?"
pI can't think. "To go to sleep," I say eventually.
pBart grabs the thermometer and peers at it curiously. "Is that good?" he asks, showing it to me. I groan.
p"Okay." Kon picks him up by the scruff of his neck. "We'll go now. Call if you need anything."
pI wait until the door's closed. It's quite comfortably dark in here, and I take the mask off to rub my eyes. I really do feel awful. I also don't know why Bruce is making me stay here. Some sort of bizarre punishment for coming here in the first place? I burrow down in the pillows and try not to think about my throbbing head or aching arm. At least it doesn't smell any more. I yawn sleepily, and within moments I'm gone again.
pcenter***/center p
Horrible dream. I can't seem to shake the thought of Sir Edmund Dorrance's eyes burning out. It makes me queasy just to think about it.
pI wake up and can't think where I am for a moment, disorientated by the dream. There's a weight on my head which I recognise after a moment as a hand, but I'm still too weak to find out whose. I look blearily into the darkness. Feels nice, actually. Makes me wish mom was still alive worse than ever. Eventually I try to raise my head.
pSecret brushes the hair out of my face and smiles at me. "Sorry to wake you," she murmurs. "You just looked very sad."
pI feel it. I'm also shivering again. I ihate/i being sick. "What time is it?" I mumble. I must sound obsessed, but I like knowing when it is and I'm totally disorientated right now.
p"I don't know. I can go check."
p"Doesn't matter." I think I'll just go back to sleep anyway. I'm sure it's good for me. Anyway, I don't care. I'm tired and hurting and cranky. I settle down again, but I can't relax. I never can when other people are around. After a few minutes Secret assumes I'm asleep again and leaves, just misting through the door cracks, and I hunch into a ball. Can't seem to get warm. Something fluorescent green winks in the darkness and I struggle to focus on it. The clock on the video, flashing midnight over and over again. Stupid thing. First thing tomorrow, I'm setting it properly.
pThere's an explosion of noise from outside and a chorus of shushes. I sigh. Sounds like Kon and Bart bickering. Kon just isn't patient enough to deal with Impulse. I sit up and wrap the blanket around myself, still shaking. I can't get back to sleep like this anyway. I'll freeze to death. Somehow it feels colder than iactually/i freezing in the mountains . . .
pI stagger to my feet and limp to the door, which I open a crack to get my bearings. By the sound of it, everyone's gathered in the main chamber. I sneak past, as the heaving Twister pile collapses on Bart with a wail, and into the kitchen.
pWhat I really want is some comfort food like Alfred makes when we're ill or in a bad mood. But this is Young Justice's kitchen we're talking about, and all I find is a packet of stale digestives and one bottle of milk that isn't quite off. I can't face anything cold so I heat up the milk - still wrapped in the blanket and feeling very sorry for myself - and dip the biscuits in it until they turn to mush. It always makes Dick puke when I eat them like that. I don't like warm milk, actually. Too cold to care. When I've finished I just fold my arms awkwardly on the table and fall asleep there.
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I come to slowly and find, immediately in front of me, a pair of enormous yellow eyes. I fall back with a horrified, "Gah!" and Bart falls backwards off his stool with a yell. Secret's head appears around the doorway and I know I'm not going to get any more sleep now. The light filtering through the windows is almost horizontal, so it must be very early still.
p"Jeeze, Bart." I mutter, rubbing my eyes. I left the mask in the rec room. I can get it later. Secret smiles slightly and vanishes again. I wonder what day it is, and work forwards from my three-day sleep. That was Tuesday. Wednesday I spent in and out of sleep. Thursday I got a great big pile of emails and knew I had to do something, arrived at Happy Harbor on Friday, so that means-
pI groan. It's dawn on Saturday. I get a whole day of Young Justice. Whoop-de-doo.
pHead throbbing, I shuffle out of the kitchen feeling very old for a fifteen year old, and peer into the main chamber. Cassie's asleep in a tent in the far corner - tents indoors, I think. They must've used them to get around Cassie's mom. Kon's sitting at the table nursing a cup of coffee and looking as if he's trekked through Hell and back. He glances up at me. "Bart woke us at the crack of dawn by rolling over and collapsing the tent," he croaks. "Hear it?"
pI shake my head and find a chair - I don't care whose, I'm tired - to collapse into. "Whoah. You must've been really gone. Made enough noise to wake the dead."
p"Did not," Bart scowls as he zips into the room.
pKon does a waily impression of Bart. "Oh no, the slime-alien's got me! Aaaah!"
pBart sniffs. "I was having a nightmare. Anyway, you made enough noise when it fell on you."
pI'm suddenly very glad I spent the night in the kitchen. But I also can't help chuckling as the squabbling passes back and forth and then Cassie wakes up and yells at them. I'm feeling very detached from all of this, like it's a TV programme. Now that'd be an interesting sitcom.
pThe computer starts beeping and I look at it wearily before plodding over. "It's Batman," I say, seeing the transmitter. The room clears instantly. I flick the visuals on and Dick's early-morning face blinks at me.
p"Hey," he says, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. "D'you think I need a shave?"
pI count to ten. "You called just to ask me that or -?"
p"Nah. Just wondering if you're alright."
p"Dick," I hiss, "you cannot leave me here. I'm not well enough to deal with this yet."
p"I know. Babs hacked into the security cameras and we've been watching two of your little friends try to kill each other for the past thirty minutes. Do they do that often?"
p"Only when they think I'm not looking. Sometimes when they're just in a bad mood. Sometimes they just want to drive me crazy."
p"Listen," Dick yawns and then continues, "I know it's not exactly a world of fun there, but Bruce thinks you'll recover better if you can stop worrying about the rest of the world. So you're stuck there until he says so."
p"I will die," I tell him bluntly. He nods.
p"I know. I can't talk him out of it though, and you're probably better off there. He's in a bit of a bad mood."
p"What is it this time?"
p"Batgirl got mixed up with the Ghost Dragons last night. She didn't break a nail, of course, but there's an entire street totally wrecked. He's fuming."
p"I'll bet." When I get stuck with the Dragons, usually it's me that gets wrecked. I don't have chance to think about the architecture. Lynx, Shiva, King Snake and Two Face I think bleakly. Just as long as they never think about teaming up I can maybe scrape through.
p"Just try to loosen up a little. Think of it as a holiday."
p"A holiday," I say flatly as I hear a crash from the kitchen. "Bad things always happen to me on my holidays."
pThe crash was a frying pan of eggs sliding off the stove. While Cassie tries to clean up the hot fat and yelps and Kon yells at Bart, I turn off the hob and use a tea towel to put the frying pan in the sink. The room's beginning to close in again so I wander off muttering to myself, "iHoliday/i. I'll give him holiday-"
pI almost walk straight through Secret. I step to the side for her. She's heading towards the kitchen with a concerned look on her face - probably because thick black smoke's now coming out of it. "Dampen a towel and throw it over," I shout after her.
pI can't handle this right now. I'm too sick and too tired to deal with my barmy friends. I go back into the rec room, not really in the right frame of mind to look for a bed or anything, find my mask under the mess of pillows and go back to sleep.
pcenter***/center p

"Still asleep?" Cassie said, looking up from her magazine and wrinkling her nose. "You're sure he's breathing?"
pSecret nodded glumly. "But he's not well. I wish we knew what to do with him."
p"iWhy/i would Batman dump him on us?" Kon said, glancing momentarily away from the television. "Surely he knows we'll end up killing him."
p"Kon!"
p"Well, we will." Kon muttered. "We don't know what to do and he's still running a scary-high fever. Bats must have some whacky reasoning behind ithis/i."
p"Maybe he's too busy," Bart said, making a tower out of checkers tiles.
pThey thought about it for a while. "He's definitely not the sort of person you'd want looking after you if you were sick," Cassie admitted.
p"I don't know," Secret murmured. "I mean, you'd know nothing could happen to you if he was there. And Robin really trusts him."
pCassie tapped the magazine off the arm of her chair and then stood up. "Where're you goin'?" Kon said.
p"To check on Robin. You might not be, but I'm really worried."
pNo-one followed her. She closed the door behind her and snuck to the empty rec room - empty, of course, except for one dozing vigilante. The shaft of light from the door fell on his still shape amid the messy pile of cushions and Cassie realised that when Batman found out about this he iwould/i kill them.
pShe stood uncertainly in the doorway, listening to his harsh, irregular breathing, but then he stirred and blinked, raising his head. She closed the door behind her carefully and he looked at her blearily.
p"Rob," she said sitting down in front of him, "I'm really sorry we're not doing better with this . . . I mean, it can't be much fun to be sick around us . . ."
pHe shook his head. "It's not your fault. I can't think why Batman dumped me on you anyway."
pShe ignored how croaky and dry his voice sounded. "What's wrong with you, anyway?"
p"It iwas/i pneumonia, but I can't seem to shake it. I think he was right," he said drowsily. "I'm just too stressed to get rid of it. I just keep thinking about -"
pHe groaned and put a hand over his eyes. "Just go back to the others, Cassie."
pShe bit her lip. "We do iwant/i to help you."
p"I've managed worse," he said bleakly. "I'll think of something. Just wish I wasn't so damn tired all the time . . ."
pShe left him to sleep again, but felt even more worried now than before.

pcenter***/center p

My eyes flick open instantly and I go absolutely rigid. For a moment I lay perfectly still and try to work out what woke me up. Then I hear it again - a clattering sound. I narrow my eyes. That's not a Young Justice noise. If it was, there'd already be an argument about whose fault whatever was.
pI sit up slowly - my head feels a little like it's going to fall off and I worry it will, for a moment, before it occurs to me that it isn't likely to. What made the noise?
pNot Red Tornado. It sounded like something smashing and he's too careful to knock anything over. Besides, he isn't here. The second sound was like someone walking through whatever had been knocked over. I try to think who it could be. No-one I know's clumsy enough to walk through something they'd knocked over.
pUnless, I think wildly, they weren't clumsy. Unless they couldn't isee/i where the pieces had fallen.
pI think I'm going crazy. King Snake is not here, of all places. But - just in case -
pGetting to my feet is hard. If it is him, what'll I do? Call Batman. But Bruce won't get here for hours and I can't hold him off for five minutes like this.
pI pause with my hand on the doorhandle. He'll hear if I open it. No other choice, though. I turn it.
pThe cave is in deep darkness. I can hear snores coming from another room - sounds like my oh-so-careful watchers have fallen asleep. I don't begrudge them it. I've done nothing but for a week now.
pStarlite lenses on. I stand perfectly still for a moment to let myself adjust and then I ido/i see a dark shape in the main chamber, the meeting hall. I wish I could stop trembling. It occurs to me that he's going to kill me, but then - he dropped over the cliff as well. He might be just as battered. If he doesn't know I'm here maybe I can-
pA hand closes on my shoulder. For a second I think I'm going to faint with terror but then I know I have to do something. I spin around but a black-gloved hand catches my punch and a voice says gently, "It's us, Tim."
pA light comes on in the meeting hall and I see Dick - well, Nightwing - standing in a splayed pile of dented cans and comic books. "Jeeze, you kids leave a mess." he mutters. "I could've broken my leg, you know that? Oh. No offence."
p"None taken," I say weakly. I look up at Bruce. "You could've done it a different way. I was iterrified/i."
p"Sorry. We just came to see how you are."
pI shake my head wearily. "Don't feel any better. What if I never get rid of this? I don't want this forever, I can't-"
p"Timothy," Bruce says in his warning voice, "calm down."
p"Yeah. We have some news."
p"Good news?"
p"Just - news," Bruce says, and looks thoughtfully at Dick, who rolls his eyes.
p"Sir Edmund's back in his office. Leaving absolutely no evidence to trace anything recriminating back to him, of course."
pBruce looks at me carefully. "Are you alright?"
pI don't know how I am. I feel - numb. Empty. Not good or bad, just hollow.
p"Fine," I say weakly. "Just fine."
pcenter***/center p
I'm still awake when the others slouch into the meeting hall at about ten o' clock on Sunday morning. Surprise doesn't come close. "You're up early," Kon says guardedly.
pI've had a lot of thinking to do. Trying to work out what all this means. Bruce and Dick went home pretty quickly, but I didn't go back to sleep. I've been sitting here trying to wrap my head around what's happened this past week, and I think I'm finally there.
pOkay, here's the deal. Batman knew Sir Edmund survived the fall - you know Bruce; he just iknows/i things. He must've come to before me and wandered off, because he obviously had no idea where I or anything else was. Using his connections he could easily get back to his life.
pOnce Bruce saw I was up and about he wanted me out of Gotham fast, because King Snake knows how to find me there and he's pretty damn mad, I'd think. So he let me come to Happy Harbor and then carefully closed the doors behind me. Sir Edmund can't find me - he doesn't need to find Robin, after all; he knows Tim Drake's voice, and if I'm on my feet and I go back to my dad I'm still in danger - and, he hopes, I can relax enough to get rid of the revenge of the killer flu bug from hell. I can't, because I'm going out of my mind with worry. I don't know where he is. I don't know if he's alive and after me or dead and on my conscience.
pI ihate/i not knowing.
pBut now - now I feel as if a weight's been lifted from me. Broken bones will heal, and even though I'm fully aware that sooner or later he iwill/i catch up with me, it's not a major problem right now. It's too far away to worry about.
pY'know what? I feel like myself again.
p"You okay, Robin?" Cassie says, giving me a very scrutinous look. I return it with a grin, and I think she's startled.
p"Never better." I say, and I quite honestly mean it.
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