Robin managed to travel relatively uneventfully for almost a week. He kept to the road for the most part, pulling over into towns only to get food and train and exercise each day to keep in shape. He stopped in the woods or a park at night, built a fire, and slept outside with nothing but a sleeping bag. He purposely avoided anywhere he had ever been or might run into anybody he knew. He wanted to be alone. If he hadn't already taken the adolescent run-away-from-home-to-find-himself journey, when he moved to Jump City and became a Titan, he would have enjoyed the adventure. Two things, however, made it the lowest time of his life.

First, there was there was the mission itself. A manhunt for some lowlife criminal would have been exhilarating for the bold hero. Not this. There was little to distract him from his dark thoughts on his arch nemesis now. All day he waited for his rival to finally show his face, tried to feign being off his guard, made it obvious he was completely alone, and surreptitiously but thoroughly checked every door he opened and every object he touched for a camera, a microphone, something that Slade used to know all his movements, all the time. Absolutely nothing happened; the only result of his constant vigilance and increasing impatience and suspense was that the adrenaline consumed all his energy by the end of each day. During the intervals of total exhaustion, he'd be overcome by guilt instead as he reminded himself that it was these longings for a fight that had caused him to be susceptible to Slade's illusion in the first place.

But if he wasn't thinking about Slade, he could only think about one other thing: the friends that he missed, that he let down, that he had scared and hurt, that he had abandoned for this dangerous obsession. He hadn't felt so lonely since Slade had forced him into being his sidekick, blackmailing him with the Titans' lives. The loneliness always led him to grow angry at himself for being such a coward and, next, frightened that he found friendship such a weakness. The hero part of him tried to remind himself that it was his emotions that made him one of the good guys, but the teenaged boy side of him was strongly ashamed of them. In the end, he'd overworked his nerves for nothing because he still missed them and dreaded their thoughts toward him now, regardless.

It was only when his emotions, coupled with the slowly dulling pain of his injuries, made him very physically sick that he would drive into a town for pit stops. His only interactions with people were chiefly of buying gasoline and food. The only strangers who tried to initiate conversation with him were teenage girls. He always guiltlessly walked away like they weren't there; he didn't have the time or the mood for anything but staying strong and on the watch. There had been a few times when he almost enjoyed himself when he'd noticed an emergency like a robbery, fire, or accident and stepped in to help. For Robin, chances to help others were a blessed return to normalcy. Not that he ever lingered for the cops or cameras but leapt, swung, or drove away as soon as possible. Too bad his excitement was quickly engulfed in homesickness as he remembered his similar, earlier days as a hero. It was unfathomable but true that he could actually feel worse than when he was waiting for the ax to fall or sorry for leaving his team when he thought, "What would he think if he saw me now?"

A week passed after he left town, and Robin still had not received the smallest sign or signal from Slade. He had every confidence that Slade could not leave him alone, but he suddenly doubted whether he would ever face him to fight. Surely he knew how the silent treatment tortured Robin more than the physical pain from his last battle. His anger finally ebbed as he felt slightly discouraged, which was mentally safer but emotionally worse, for him. He noticed he was approaching the city limits of a town and decided now would be a good time to pull over, despite that it was still rather early in the morning. He idly read the sign "Welcome to Amity Park", and his thoughts paused. That name sounded familiar. He hadn't been here before, had he? No, it must have been from some movie, maybe. He rode on, not bothering to waste the mental energy even to take in any scenery.

Robin followed the same routine he had for days. He parked his bike at the first fast food restaurant he saw, undaunted by the fact that its name was "Nasty Burger", ate, and filled his canteen with fresh water, loaded his utility belt with some explosive disks and other gadgets, mumbling to himself "hah, wishful thinking", and set off for a run. He tried to pay attention to his surroundings to distract him, but he passed mostly houses. Amity Park came off as a pretty small, boring town to someone who had lived all his life in big cities. The only thing that was even able to earn a second-look was a house with what looked like a factory on its roof, a factory made of metal scraps thrown together by someone with bad motor skills. Robin raised an eyebrow, whispered, "Weird," and turned around the corner.

Robin finally sat down on a bench on the sidewalk to catch his breath and have a drink of water half an hour later. "If only I could keep this up all day, I might be tired enough to miss out on any nightmares tonight," he said to himself. He talked to himself a lot lately, odd for the deep, quiet, thoughtful leader. "Once again, nothing," he went on as he carefully looked up and down the street for anything suspicious by force of habit. "I shouldn't be so surprised." Unfortunately, while he was fully on the lookout, focused on waiting for something big to happen, he heard a deafening noise, a single loud note, like an alarm. Robin instinctively jumped up and took the guard position, startled and focused, before he looked right across the street and saw a high school, students filing out to the picnic tables on the lawn. "A school bell. Get a grip on yourself, Boy Wonder. It was a school bell. … A school bell…" he repeated, with something like awe.

Without pausing to ask himself why, he strolled across the street for a closer look. The sight triggered something that had been buried inside for a long time. He watched hundreds of boys and girls his own age living inconceivably normal, peaceful lives without saying anything for awhile. Then, "I can't believe that used to be me. Spending half the day challenging my brain and showing off my skills, making new friends and meeting new girls, and the other half secretly saving the world." The old, double-life when he'd lived among civilians and had a secret identity had been so simple but still full of the adventure he craved. When he'd still been Dick Grayson half the time, he could enjoy the best of both worlds. Now, as he looked at what he'd been missing out on ever since he became a full-time Teen Titan, he suddenly missed his old life, his life before Slade. On the one hand, he would never trade being the leader and living on his own with his best friends for being the sidekick, taking orders from an adult again. Still, he suddenly missed the life of a high school student that could be chaotic and challenging but also just fun. The only fun he got as a Titan was always life threatening.

Part of Robin scolded him for being such a wimp. But his embarrassment wasn't as strong as his interest. It was a sunny but windy day; plenty of kids were eating outside but not enough to get overcrowded. Planning his course perfectly, he sprinted over to some thick bushes where no one was looking, ducked and somersaulted and grabbed a tree branch, and swung over to a second tree, higher up where he couldn't be seen even by a Hispanic girl and a tall, blond boy who were sitting directly below on the ground.

It was like sitting in the balcony of a theater. Watching it second-hand made up for missing it all, somewhat, too, just like watching an action movie odes for most people. Most of the conversations he heard were laughable, about sports, tests, and dates. If those had been his biggest problems, he would never complain again. One girl walking past immediately caught his eye, possibly due to her long mane of red hair. He heard her tell her companion, "They made you miss an R-rated movie- you'll live. When you have parents who are legally insane, then you'll get my sympathy. Do you have any tiny, remotely remote idea how awful it is living with parents like mine? I'd almost rather be an orphan."

"You deserve to be," Robin muttered. He suddenly got the furious urge to kick something hard that only Slade usually provoked in him.

Sitting at the table nearest him were three kids talking close together in low whispers like they were trying to avoid being overheard: a boy with stunningly bright blue eyes and raven black hair just like Robin's, an African-American boy with glasses and a red beret, and a girl with thick black hair, black boots, violet-tinted contacts, and an overall style that definitely reminded him of someone. Someone apparently said something they shouldn't have because the blue-eyed boy jumped up, screamed, "Okay! That does it! Just what are you getting at?" at his obviously bewildered friends. Then, as quickly as if someone flipped an off switch, all three of them fell silent and froze, except for their eyes which were darting in all directions, in a way Robin recognized only too well.

"What the…" but he trailed off as the boy abruptly ran from the table out of sight. His friends went back to their food, no, hurried back to it, like nothing out of the ordinary had happened. "Okay… that was strange." Robin was distracted by a rustle of movement to his right. The blond boy in a letter jacket was now standing up, tossing a football up and catching it a few times before waving good-bye to the girl. The posse he went back to looked at the two of them enviously. Robin couldn't find anything the least interesting or pretty about her, but he didn't have time to think before he saw a bright flash of light and heard an ear-splitting scream.