A Note from the Authors: This new chapter's longer than the others have been, which sort of explains the delay between updates! Sorry! Enjoy!


Chapter 6

"A Step Behind the Game"

The leader of the Teen Titans blinked slowly, trying to regain his bearings. It took a moment to sink in, but one flick of the eyes told him last night had indeed happened. And judging from the smile on Starfire's sleeping face, it had happened well. Robin whistled a bit to himself, attempting in vain to recall every pleasurable second of the evening. He wondered vaguely if he should perhaps dress and go, so as not to arouse the suspicions of the others, but his body told him leaving right now would not be a smart thing to do. And the body does know its needs…

The sun was slowly pouring through the window, or maybe the glowing orbs were waking up as well…either way the room was brightening and Star was stirring. Before fully awakening, she reached out and her hand landed on his arm. Her pretty green eyes fluttered open and she smiled at him, "You are still here," she said, sliding closer to him and kissing his cheek, "I am glad…did you sleep well?"

"You could say that."

She leaned her head on his shoulder and hugged him. "You had better leave soon…the others will probably not understand…"

Robin nodded and got up to search for his clothing. Normally he would have felt very awkward doing this in front of Star, but considering the circumstances they both now faced, it was alright with him. It took him less than a minute to gather his things up and get changed rather sloppily, "Maybe I'll see you again tonight," he told her, smiling. Robin slowly walked over to where Starfire had been watching him and leaned down, gently kissing her on the lips, "Don't forget to come down and eat breakfast soon."

"I will join you shortly," she said, getting to her feet, a sheet wrapped loosely around her, "after I take a shower. Try not to miss me."

"Might be hard…"

"Than I will have to be extra fast," she said, kissing him once more and then nudging him towards the door, "Now go on! And remember…" she pretended to zip her lips shut, and then winked.

He gave her the 'thumbs-up' sign and depart, hands now in his pockets. Today was going to be a good day…

* * *

The morning was awkward to say the least, seeing as four out of the five Titans were now involved in "secret" relationships, but had never been very good at being subtle. Robin and Starfire were flirtier that ever, touching each other "accidentally" at every possible opportunity. Beast Boy was acting almost too calm, and had even adopted a sort of suave-secret-agent-type attitude that had to be a worse give-away than anything else. Even Raven found herself slipping now and then and smiling in plain sight (after which she would of course deny it and glower menacingly and mutter about the idiocy of the universe, among other things). Cyborg, at his wits end at having to endure all the ridiculousness, retreated to his garage before lunch, claiming his cars were a better source of intelligent conversation than the other members of his team ("What'd he mean, 'his' team?" Robin asked indignantly).

* * *

Evening dawned on the city casually and quietly, just as every other day had. A shady looking character was leaning against one of the street walls downtown, slowly puffing on a cigarette. The man nervously looked down at his stolen Rolex, keeping close track of the time. Hitachi Corp would be closing soon. In five minutes and 37- no, 36 seconds to be exact. He was a well-built, courageous man, but this mission would be difficult. A cold wind whipped down the worn walkway, causing the man to pull his knitted hat back over his reddening ears. He sighed, then threw his cigarette down and squashed it flat. The door a block down wasn't hard to reach. Unlike the expensive, well kept building he and his men were going to hit in a short while, this edifice wasn't a pretty sight for the eyes.

The woman waiting for him at a musty table in the center of the room, surrounded by her homegrown plants, certainly was, especially after hours of getting a stiff back against that rough brick wall. He took another few steps forward, not wanting to get to close. Too many rumors floated around this one, "Ms. Ivy?" he inquired, hoping that he wasn't interrupting anything, "It's just about closing time, ma'am."

Poison Ivy looked up from her plants and smiled. "Excellent. Is everyone in position?" she asked. Working with a multitude of people was not her style, but at the moment, she was happy to let Penguin do the organizing. She's never worked with anyone but Harley Quinn before, and it was an interesting thing to sit back and watch for a change.

The thug nodded, "An' those black orb-things the Penguin wanted stashed around are all in the spots he said." He wasn't sure what the strange devices had been when they were delivered (and still wasn't), but in this work it was usually best not to ask too many questions.

"Perfect," she said, rising from her seat, and picking a flip-up cell-phone up off the table and hit a speed dial button, "We're on in five, Penguin. Everything's set. Where are you?" she spoke into it.

"In my personal helicopter," came the bird man's stuffy reply, though it was somewhat muffled by the sound of the aircraft's spinning blades, "Should you manage to pull this off, Ivy, you can consider our partnership a done deal." He adjusted his top hat atop his cranium, seated in moderate comfort in the back seat of the vehicle. The way his luck had been going as of late, Cobblepot wasn't getting his hopes up any further than need be for this operation.

"I'll expect you to pick me up after I've acquired my charge," she said, "See you then." She hung up the phone and put it in a small black bag also on the table. "Let's go." Slinging the bag over one shoulder, she sashayed passed the thug towards the door.

* * *

Starfire stopped just outside the training room that evening, lingering in the doorway, watching Robin grapple with the training bots (a gift from the Justice League after a team-up about a year ago). He looked so handsome and raw, his T-shirt sticking to his chest with perspiration, each hand wrapped in tape that was fraying at the edged. She sighed, leaning against the doorframe, so happy that he loved her.

As the last robot fell and the repair-bot floated out to rebuild them, she clapped loudly. "Very nice," she said, "You're time is improving greatly."

Robin wiped sweat from his brow, smiling. It was a habit that seemed hard to break now for some reason, "Thanks."

"I have come to let you know that Cyborg has ordered pizza and he says it will be arriving soon," she recited, "and that we are invited to join him in eating it if we can act like normal beings. Do you think we can manage that?" she finished jokingly.

"Might be hard…will Beast Boy be there?"

"I think he is invited, yes," she nodded, grinning.

"Then I guess Cyborg'll be awful disappointed," Robin told her, walking over and kissing her gently on the lips.

She took his hand, "Perhaps we could try anyway?"

He opened his mouth to reply that it seemed pretty pointless, but at that moment the Titan's alarm sounded, blaring loudly through the entire tower. Instantly the pair ran for the partitioned costume room next to the garage, where they found Raven and Beast Boy already suiting up.

"Does anyone here have any idea what this is about?" Robin asked, tying his mask onto his head, making his eyes appear as if completely white.

"Or why some ass decided to interrupt Pizza Night?" Cyborg said, sauntering gloomily into the room.

"It's a report of a break-in at the Hitachi Chemical Plant down town," Raven said, fastening her cloak around her shoulders.

"It's about time we got a call," Beast Boy said, pulling his boots on, "Thing's have been gettin' too boring around here."

"You'd rather there be crime than peace?" Robin asked, looking over at his changeling friend. Sometimes things got out too out of proportion in the 'hero' mentality. Though it always made him nervous, Batman always told Robin to appreciate the peace times. The people were what was most important, so when they were able to know that they had a safe place to live and raise their children, a hero knew he was doing his job. Even in peace times.

"Well…when you put it that way…" Beast Boy said embarrassedly.

"Maybe you should learn when to think before you open your mouth," Raven told him, coming over into the boy's section, "Now let's get going."

"Yes," Starfire said, "Let us hope that this can be settled quickly and without much violence."

"Ohhhh, if some jerk decided that Pizza Night was a good night to break into a chemical plant, you better believe there's gonna be some violence!" Cyborg said angrily.

In a matter of seconds, the garage door slid open and the T-Car took off down the driveway, as the Titans rushed to the scene of crime.

* * *

"Careful with the goods, boys," Ivy said into her cell phone, reminding the men that were loading down a truck with crate after crate of chemicals, while she watched from the shadows across the street. A roar of engines made her turn and she smiled at the approaching headlights. 'Right on schedule,' she thought, then said into the phone, "They're here. Get ready – and remember the plan."

"Of course, Ms. Ivy," came a gruff voice back over the line. She hung up the phone and placed it back in her bag, stepping back further into the shadows.

The headlights of the T-Car brightened as it approached the illegal operation. Several of the men tried to ignore this new development, some shielded their eyes, and the rest all began to pull out their guns.

The car stopped in the middle of the road, creating a blockade of its own, as the five teens leapt out, with Robin in the lead. "Alright, whatever you're planning stops right here," he told the thugs, as the team got into battle formation.

The man with the cell phone in his hand quickly shoved it into the pocket of his coat, then turned to face the group of do-gooders, "Go home, kids. No one has to get hurt here, but there's always that chance." He motioned softly to the muscles behind him, all of which raised their pistols towards the Teen Titans.

Cyborg grinned demonically, "Yeah, somebody's gonna get hurt, but it ain't gonna be us!"

"Titans – go!" Robin cried and they all ran forward.

The henchmen they were running towards opened fire, bullets polluting the area like a poison. The leader of the Teen Titans felt a great push of powerful air rush past him, and looked down to find a slight tear in his sleeve. These guys weren't kidding around. With a mighty leap, he cleared the 'commander' of this outfit and delivered a roundhouse kick to the man trying to load carts behind him. The crate toppled out of the unconscious man's hands, landing hard on the ground. Though the tough wooden box didn't break, it was obvious by the sound of shattering glass that the contents had. He took a step backwards, away from a putrid smelling green liquid that was slowly advancing from the container.

"Robin! Duck!" came Cyborg's voice behind him and he did so, just as two thugs sailed over his head and into the back of the trailer.

"Nice one, Cy," Robin said, and then ran off to stop the few men who were still attempting to load the truck.

A short distance away, Raven was absorbing a hail of bullets with black energy, letting them fall harmlessly to the ground. Once her set of attackers were out of ammo, she dropped the spell and flew at them. With a spin-kick, she took out the first two and then engaged the second pair in a quick-paced hand-to-hand bout. She caught one pair of fists, only to be struck in the side of the head by another. Furious at herself for getting hit, she wrapped her hands around the first man's wrists, lifted him up and flung him into the second man, sending them both careening off into the green mist that was strangely rising around them all. "What is that stuff…?" she asked, lashing out and kicking another thug as he came at her.

"Got me," Beast Boy told her. He waited and watched as one of the men came running at him, 'I love this part.' With a snap, he transformed himself into a Grizzly Bear, and stared down at the man, who slowed his approach in fear. Beast Boy roared loudly, sending the man scampering away towards the few remaining member of his group left standing. The changeling returned to normal, cracking his knuckles and grinning from ear-to-ear at Raven.

"Behind you," she said dully.

"Huh?" he asked, turning. With a yelp, he jumped out of the way as another thug went hurtling past him, compliments of Cyborg.

A short distance off, Starfire was matching energy blasts for bullets, catching them and incinerating them before they could reach her. She floated down lower as the men realized they'd run out of bullets, "I do not want to hurt you," she told them, eyes glowing green, "But I see no other way." Apparently angered, one of the men rushed forward and grabbed her foot, yanking hard and pulling her down. She let out a small cry of surprise as a second grabbed her other leg and pulled as well. "Let me go!" she cried, sending energy blasts down at them both, knocking them away. But the more she knocked back, the more that seemed to come towards her.

A tremendous blue blast of energy knocked away at least half a dozen fully grown men. From a short distance away, Cyborg blew smoke from the top of his left arm (which had become a laser cannon now), "Ya'll need to learn not ta pick on people. It ain't appreciated."

Starfire gave him a grateful thumbs-up and the two of them hurried off to continue their assault.

Back by the truck, Robin was still trying to prevent the men from loading it up. But the green smog was getting thicker and making it harder to see. As he punched out one man and looked for another, he didn't even notice their leader sneaking up behind him. Before he even knew what hit him, the man clubbed him over the back of the head and he stumbled forward, stars bursting behind his eyes, towards an alleyway.

A pair of slender hands caught him before he hit the ground and his face bumped up against a full bosom. He breathed a small sigh of relief, "Thanks."

"My pleasure, little bird," said a sultry voice he had not heard in years.

His eyes widened as he looked up into the face of Poison Ivy. "No…"

She smiled, "Didn't think you'd be seeing me again, did you, Robin?"

Instinctively, he turned to run, "STAR-mmpphhh!" Before he could scream the whole name, Ivy's hand clamped a rag over his mouth and his vision blurred. Within seconds, the chloroform had taken complete affect and he crumpled in her arms, unconscious.

Ivy shifted him so that one of his arms was draped over her shoulder and held him around the waist. With her free hand she pulled her cell phone out of her bag and said, "I've got him. Now get me outta here."

Almost instantly, a rope ladder with a thug hanging onto it was lowered behind her. She handed Robin over to him and then grabbed hold of the ladder as it rose quickly up to the Penguin's helicopter. Inside, the thug set Robin down across a back seat and Ivy sat down next to him, putting his head in her lap and stroking his hair. "Not a bad catch, if I do say so myself," she said, grinning up at the Penguin.

Oswald returned her smiled. "Not bad at all, Ms. Isley," he told her, and then turned to the pilot, "Take us out of here."

As the helicopter turned towards the open night sky, Ivy pulled out her cell phone one more time, "Tell your men to fall back. We've got what we came for. And try to be quick about it. We don't need you all lingering there when the cops finally decide to show up."

* * *

Out on the street, the men moved as one, picking themselves up quickly (while not acting like they were obviously retreating) and piling themselves into the back of the tractor trailer. As they shut to door and drove away, Cyborg moved towards the T-Car. "Come on! We can't let 'em get away!"

"Wait!" Star cried, "Where is Robin?"

Beast Boy jerked a thumb off to his left, "He's right over there." They turned and sure enough Robin was standing a few yards away…fighting off air in a series of patterned moves. "Huh???" Beast Boy said, jogging over to the figure and waving a hand through it, "A hologram??"

"There's another one over there," Raven gestured off to the right where yet another Robin was battling air, "And there," in the northern direction was yet another one.

Cyborg clenched his fists angrily, "They must have him, come on!"

They all piled into the car, but a few moments of speeding in the direction the truck had gone turned up nothing. It had vanished. Cyborg pulled over to the side of the highway and pounded the steering wheel angrily.

"I do not understand…" Starfire said sadly, "What does this mean?"

"It means," Cyborg answered her, "that this whole thing was a set-up."

"They were after Robin the whole time," Raven said.

"But who were they?" Beast Boy asked.

"Who knows?" Cyborg shrugged.

"Robin has a lot of enemies," Raven said, "Most of whom we've never met."

"Are we not going to rescue him?" Star asked.

"There's no way of knowing where to start…" Raven answered, "We might as well go back to the Tower and do some research. Driving around aimlessly isn't going to find him."

Cyborg pounded the steering wheel again and then turned the T-Car back towards the Tower.

* * *

"Ivy, he's coming about. Let's see how well this bit of yours works."

Robin let a small moan escape his lips, the throbbing in his head now very hard to control. He blinked once or twice, trying to let his eyes adjust to the darkness. There was a single light in the room, shining down on a short, portly man in a suit. Another old familiar face, "Penguin!" he shouted, a gut reaction making his arm move down towards his belt. This attempted motion brought the teen hero a searing pain in his right arm. Chained to a wall, in a cage, "I'm not an animal, you know." Robin told his mentor's adversary, much more calmly.

"Then what do you call a Robin, boy?" Cobblepot asked him, his face twisting into a grin, "Don't bother struggling; No one knows you're here. Your 'teammates' didn't even notice your timely capture. Clueless, the lot of them. It's already apparent that you and your friends aren't even one tenth of what your master is. Such a simple trick, getting you to show; I'm sure the Batman would have seen it coming…"

It stung like a slap in the face. Robin clenched his teeth, determined not to show weakness of any kind. "What is it you want, Penguin? Am I just bait for him?? I'll tell you right now you're wasting your time – he won't come. He stopped bailing me out of things a long time ago."

The criminal mastermind chortled loudly, "And I learned never to bait the bat. He manages to fly out of traps better than any man alive. A trait I'm sure will not carry over to any of his miserable apprentices," Penguin adjusted his monocle again, sneering cruelly at the young man, "No, it was you we needed for this particular operation. So convenient, like you said, that Batman won't be interfering with us on your account. Makes life much easier, I must say."

"It certainly does," said Ivy, stepping into the light beside the bird man, dressed, not in the green leotard Robin remembered, but an outfit built out of black and green leather, which accented her curves just as well as the spandex used to. She stepped up to the cage, leaning in close to the bars, "So nice to see you again, handsome," she cooed, "Have you missed me?"

Robin's temper flared up, and he reacted before his mind told him that rash action would not be the wisest course right now. A second after impact, Robin licked his lips to wet them once again, the recent discharge of saliva having left his mouth dry.

Ivy's face grew hot and as she wiped the spit off of her cheek, Penguin's laughter echoed through the room. "Oh be quiet Oswald, and give me the syringe," she said, her seductive nature now thrown by the wayside.

"Careful now, Ms. Isley," Cobblepot told her, placing the long needle in her hand, once again all-business, "We don't want to kill him, after all."

"I know that," she said, squeezing the needle to make sure all the air was out of it, "I made the dosage a little less than what my calculations say it should be, just in case." She opened the front of the cage and stepped inside. "Now hold still," she told the young man, "This might hurt…I don't know. I've never tried it before." Without another word, she grabbed his arm, found the most prominent vein, and plunged the needle in.

Too much. Robin cried out in agony as unknown substances rushed into his system. He hung his head after several seconds, relieved of his hurting, "What…the hell…was that?"

Ivy smiled, handing the syringe back to Penguin, who had entered the cage behind her. "A special serum I developed while I was stuck in Arkham," she told him, stroking his head gently, "In a few hours, your brain will shut down almost completely. Everything will be gone – memories of your friends, your life, everything – except the basic survival instincts. And once that's complete, we'll see how strong those instincts are."

Robin's eyes widened, dread and despair spreading through him, "You're…you're lying!" It couldn't be true. The day after he and Starfire finally realized their feelings for one another, and he has to go off and get captured. Now he was going to forget all that? "You can't make me forget."

Penguin smiled, "Afraid, are we? I suppose I don't blame you. It sounds quite painful from what Ivy has told me." The man straightened his top hat and began to walk away, "Lock the door on your way out, Ms. Isley. Wild animals need not be wandering around the compound."

"Bye-bye little birdie," Ivy said, kissing his forehead, "We'll be back to check on you in few hours." Then she strolled out of the cage, bolting it shut as she left. She caught up with Penguin as a few thugs stationed themselves around the cage. "If all goes well, we can begin administering the serum to the other boys," she told him, "Robin will need someone to play with."