Another Way

By Alekto

Chapter 4

"Dicky! Time to get up."

"Jus' another five minutes, Mom," I mumbled in automatic reply before my mind managed to catch up with what I'd just said.

Mom was dead. She'd died long ago along with my Father back when I was nine years old, but it had been her voice I'd heard telling me to get up.

And that was impossible. Wasn't it?

I opened my eyes to the shaded interior of the trailer where I'd spent the first years of my life. It was as I remembered, although now everything looked smaller somehow. Draped over a nearby chair I could see my Nightwing costume ready to put on. From outside I could make out the cheery music of a calliope above the casual chatter of people walking by.

"Come on, Dicky, hurry up" came my Mother's voice again. "We've got a big night this evening. It sounds like half of Gotham's going to be here."

I suddenly knew with horrible certainty which night she was talking about. It had given me nightmares for years. I scrambled out of bed and grabbed my Mother's arm as she headed out the trailer door. "You can't go on this evening. You mustn't, either of you. You just can't," I said desperately, the words sounding even to my own ears like the plea of a frightened child.

She smiled as if I'd said nothing more urgent that a vague comment on the state of the weather. With disconcerting ease she released the death grip I had on her arm. "Don't be long, now. Remember it's a big night tonight," she reminded as she left.

In the background the calliope's cheerful tune seemed to have taken on a note of mocking.

"Mother!" I called out frantically as I ran to catch up with her. To my eyes she was no more than strolling but somehow by the time I caught up to her we were in the ring, and she was about to start her climb to the trapeze platform high above. The calliope was much louder now, its notes ringing out above the hubbub of a Big Top that appeared to have become suddenly packed to the brim with the great and the good of Gotham City.

"You're finally dressed and ready! Good!" my Mother said warmly. "You know, I always said that costume suited you." I glanced down to see that I was clothed in Nightwing's distinctive black and arctic blue.

I paused, looked around in confusion. My Mother had never seen Nightwing, and for that matter, I had to wonder when exactly *had* I got dressed?

When I turned back my Mother was gone from where she'd been standing, then I heard the appreciative 'oohs' and 'aahs' of the crowd and looked upward to see my parents beginning their act on the trapeze.

It didn't make sense. I was sure I couldn't have looked away for more than a few seconds. My gaze followed them as they went into their act.

"Oh God, no. Please, not again," I murmured, helplessly watching their last moments as I had done in countless nightmares that had haunted in the years since I'd first seen this last performance of theirs.

A fanfare and gale of maniacal laughter from the calliope dragged my gaze to the clown who was sat at the keyboard. He turned to me as he played, and in the glow of the lights tracing my parents' aerial dance I could make out his pasty white skin, green hair and the sadistically eager manic grin etched across his features. The calliope's blare was now impossibly loud, sliding past any semblance of being simply music and into the kind of noise so strong as have an almost physical force. A throb of pain started in my head, in time with the noise, in time with my heart beat, but above it all I could still hear the laughter.

The sense of helplessness I felt receded in a wash of anger at the sound of the laughter and the sight of that grin. It wasn't going to happen again. Not this time. Not if *I* had anything to do with it. There was no way I was going to give that mad bastard the satisfaction of their deaths.

It was just that right then I wasn't sure whether I was referring to Boss Zucco or the Joker, but somehow, it didn't seem to really matter.

I tried to shout, to try one more time to warn my parents, but any sound I might have made was drowned out by the calliope's din, so I did the only thing left to do and started to climb towards them.

The simple action of climbing soon became mechanical: one hand above the other, one foot above the other. Higher and higher towards the roof. It began to feel like I'd been climbing for hours. The ring and the crowd had long ago faded into the surrounding dark. All that was left was the terrible sound, so loud that I seemed to be able to feel it in my bones and pounding in my head, the laughter that mocked my growing exhaustion, and the ladder stretching away above and below.

Eventually the pace slowed and finally I could go no further. My limbs shook with effort and it became as much as I could do to cling to the ladder. I hung there, suspended in darkness, panting for breath.

"Giving up so soon?" a voice behind me taunted, and with difficulty I twisted around enough to see the Joker, incongruously wearing Zucco's suit, lounging comfortably, apparently in mid air. "Bats wouldn't have given up so easily, but then you're not a patch on him, are you."

Despite my efforts, memories and old feelings of inferiority surfaced: the times Bruce had had to rescue his partner - Robin, the Boy Hostage; my later getting fired from role; Bruce's choice of Jean Paul Valley -Azrael- over me to be Batman after Bruce was hurt fighting Bane. I glowered at him, a half-hearted denial of the truth of his accusation. "This isn't real," I finally ground out. "Just another one of your sick mind games. None of it's real."

It can't be real. Please God, don't let it be real. I can't watch them die again.

"Not real?" the Joker threw back with a moue of disappointment and matching shrug of seeming acquiescence. Then the familiar, wide mocking grin returned to his face. "Then seeing this won't upset you at all then, will it?" he completed, gesturing above me with a laugh.

My eyes automatically followed the gesture and scant yards away I saw my parents on the trapeze as the wires that had been half cut through finally snapped. I saw the fear and horrified realisation on their faces as they began to fall.

"NOOOOO!" I screamed, as helpless to save them now as I had been then.

"What now, Boy Blunder?" the Joker taunted between gales of laughter. "What now? Wait for Bats to rescue you? Again?"

Anger overwhelmed reason and with a strength born of rage I launched myself at him, fingers reaching for his throat. I had no plan of attack. I just wanted to silence the laughter. He grabbed my wrists mid leap in a grip that was like steel. I struggled, twisting and turning, but couldn't escape.

"No, don't," I protested faintly, wearily, aware now as I hadn't been before of how much I hurt. My head ached mercilessly, matched by a stabbing flare of agony from my side as I gasped for breath. I closed my eyes, fighting the wash of pain and nausea.

"Hush, Dick. Sh! It's all going to be okay," a voice soothed, quieting the mad laughter. Female. Not the Joker. Not my Mother, but vaguely familiar none the less. I could hear tears behind the words that seemed to hold a plea rather than a promise of safety.

I knew that voice. My mind finally dredged up the wanted information. "Sarah?" I asked, wondering whether the weak, scratchy voice that had asked the question could in fact have been mine.

The disoriented semiconscious fog I'd been trapped in began to recede and memory drifted back. Sarah Howard: bank teller. Greg Petersen: bank teller, Sarah's fiancé, and now, casualty. Then I remembered the robbery, my attempt to halt it, Marty's return with Sarah as hostage, getting hit from behind and then nothing. Just nightmares.

I opened an eye. I would have opened both but the other felt crusted over. Dried blood, I guessed, and wondered just how long it was that I'd been out. I tried to bring my hand up to my face in automatic response to trace the extent of the injury, but my hands were handcuffed once more behind my back. With the one eye that worked I tried to look around, but everything was blurred. As I forced myself to focus on people their images split, doubling or tripling as I watched. Damn. Concussion was really not what I needed.

Okay Grayson, I thought, time to stop lying on the floor so sit up and start getting a proper idea of the situation. I started trying to sit up on my own, but a hiss of pain I couldn't suppress escaped to warn Sarah of my intent.

"Don't move," she urged, holding me down with alarming ease. "You're too badly hurt."

Oh? When? That sort of thing I'd normally remember, I figured.

She must have caught my frown. "They carried on kicking you and hitting you even after you went down," she explained dully, as if any extremes of emotion had been long wrung from her voice.

I lay there a moment, considering, then looked back at her. "Help me sit up," I asked firmly.

She gazed at me with the sort of expression that women seemed to have developed for the sole purpose of directing it at men who, despite their advice, insist on doing something incredibly foolhardy. I'd seen it enough from Babs to be able to recognise it without difficulty. In the end, Sarah offered a faint shrug and helped lever me into a sitting position, propped up against the wall.

Just that simple action gave me ample warning of how hurt I was. The pain in my side that blazed agony at every breath was certainly a broken rib, maybe more than one. I couldn't tell for sure, or if there were any internal injuries. As far as I was concerned, everything just hurt. Add in the concussion, and I knew that realistically, sitting up was not among the most sensible of ideas. Then again, as most of the people who know me can attest: I manage 'stubborn' far better than I do 'sensible'.

I sat there for some minutes, waiting for the pain and the nausea to sink back to more manageable levels. The other hostages were watching me, either openly wary of what I might do or just watching me sidelong. Carl and Marty were lounging comfortably on leather chairs that must have been brought from one of the bank's offices. Vinnie was lying down, apparently still out. My gaze tracked to another supine form, its head covered by a coat. Greg. It had to be. It couldn't be anyone else. Damn. I turned back to Sarah. "I... I'm sorry. I didn't mean for this... If I hadn't..."

"He bled out," she murmured. "They wouldn't let a doctor in to see him, not after you... well, you know."

My fault. His death was my fault. I'd screwed up, and he'd paid the price for my screw up. I should have done something different, anything different. What the hell was the point of being a cop, being Nightwing, if I couldn't even stop a man dying in front of me?

"They set another deadline for their demands," Sarah went on, her voice devoid of emotion as if she no longer cared what happened to her. "A bus to the airport for them and their hostages by seven o'clock tonight, or they'll shoot someone. I don't think they can know about Greg yet."

I had to agree with her. When hostages started dying tended to be the trigger for when the cops opted for sending in SWAT teams rather than rely on negotiation. I was surprised that the cops hadn't seemed to have got a better line than they had on what was going on inside the bank, or maybe they had and they were just waiting for the right moment to act.

I looked up at the wall clock, managing with an effort to bring it into focus long enough to read the time. It was a quarter past six, and outside I could see it was growing darker. We'd been in the bank all day, and I must have been unconscious for hours. I looked through the faint gaps in the shutters at the gathering dusk.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw Sarah looking at me. "What is it?" she asked softly.

I wanted to answer, to reassure her that everything would be okay, that help was on the way.

Because I knew that bats came out at night.

To be continued...