A/N: Short, freestanding drabble.

Christmas Mission

Robin was not on a roof, for once, but in a tree, studying the movement of the people in the Gotham City park. It was already dark, but the park glistened with fairy lights. Those didn't make it easier to see as much as creating darker shadows, though. He was only here to spend Christmas with Bruce and Alfred, but as there had been whispers of the Joker planting a bomb somewhere in the park, a quiet 23'rd of December had turned into a frantic hunt for the clown.

Robin had actually already been in the city center when Bruce had called. Under the guise of going Christmas shopping, he had spent a few hours in a hotel room with a certain mercenary. Not that Batman knew, of course. Hell no. Slade was only passing through on the way somewhere and they had decided to meet up. The man had brought gifts. Toys. So many toys. Robin had been almost worn out when the Dark Knight had interrupted things, and after that he of course left in a hurry. Slade had tried to stop him, shouting something after him, but the insatiable man just had to wait until after New Years, dammit!

Even though these thoughts were flashing through the teen's mind he didn't lose focus for a second. They wanted the park to be emptied, but Gordon was away on holiday and his stand in didn't take the threat seriously, so here they were, in a park full of people enjoying everything from skating to buying hot chocolate to taking rides in the horse drawn carriages. Those were adorned with garlands, red bows and bells. The horses looked a bit embarrassed, but maybe it was just the sound that was annoying them. It was mostly couples and sometimes families taking rides and the teen smirked at the thought of doing the same with Slade. The man would probably implode. Suddenly he saw something, a movement where there shouldn't be one. A huge lit-up decoration in the shape of oversized presents stacked on top of each other were off to one side. It was fenced off, of course, so kids wouldn't climb it, but Robin was sure he had seen someone there.

"Batman, pile of gifts, south side!" he said, the microphone on his collar picking it up.

"I'm on it!" he heard in his ear.

He jumped down himself and started running. He groaned as he did, and pressed a hand to his stomach. He didn't think he had eaten something too bad lately, but he needed this to be over quickly. Very quickly.

He saw Batman closing in from the other direction. Suddenly, however, the man was gone. The teen was close by at that point and soon discovered that the man simply had slipped. In horse dung.

"You better hope no one was filming that," the teen snickered as the man rejoined the race. "Phew, Alfred is going to hose you down outside before he lets you into the cave."

"Focus, Robin," the man, who would probably never laugh at the situation, barked.

"Smell's distracting," the teen grinned and then veered off as he had just spotted a dark-clad man try to run.

Robin loved the chase, more than he wanted to admit, but it was a short one. He simply shot his grapple hook in front of the man and made him fall over. A moment later he had been properly tied up and the clown mask he was wearing pulled off.

"That's one of the Joker's men, I recognize him," Batman growled.

"Merry Christmas in jail, clown," Robin smirked down on him.

The man gave them a crazy grin. "Won't matter in ten minutes, batty boy," he giggled.

"The bomb!" Robin hissed, but Batman was already moving.

They found it quickly, it was disguised as a present like the others, but not quite similar enough when you knew what you were looking for.

"Need help?" Robin asked, having dragged the prisoner with him.

"I got it. But if I know the Joker, he'll be around. He'd want front row seats to what's happening. Judging by the amount of C4 he'd want to be quite a distance away, though. Try to find him. Don't engage unless it looks like he's leaving."

"On it," the teen said and was off again, taking to the trees. He soon had other pressing matters though. His stomach. He groaned. It was bad. Really bad. He cursed, knowing he'd risk everything if he gave in, but when he spotted a public restroom, he had to admit defeat. Luckily it was far away from the main events and empty. He snuck in quietly and got into a booth. He needed to be quick, and his body seemed to agree. He tried to hold back a groan as he did his business, and then he heard a 'plink'. He blinked. Plink? He took a look, and in the bowl lay quite a large plastic egg of the vibrating kind. He recognized it as one of several from a few hours ago. They had been connected with a sting. This one must have come off.

"The fuck?!" he hissed, but as the pressure now was gone, he was soon on the move again. No time to dwell.

He checked the buildings surrounding the park and on the roof of one of them he hit jackpot. The Joker, surrounded by some henchmen and with Harley hanging on his arm seemed to be enjoying a bit of a winter party of his own.

"Found him," Robin reported.

"Bomb defused. Where?" Batman asked.

Robin gave him the address.

"On my way. I'm going to be on the opposite side from you. Sending the Batmobile on auto as distraction."

"Good idea," the teen admitted.

A moment later the car screeched around the corner. The Joker and his men of course noticed and the festive mood was gone. They didn't know it was empty, however, and that they were about to be cut off from two directions. A split second later the car computer had to veer away from some people crossing the road and then havoc ensued. As far as Robin had time to see, the car got stuck with a tire in an open manhole, but the computer still tried to get it to go to the destination. The whole car spun around violently until the stuck wheel was torn to shreds.

"No way Bats is driving that!" the clown called out. "It's a trap! Get out!"

Batman and Robin both closed in on them, but the group didn't only have a big head start, they also, it turned out, had a chopper.

"Dammit," Batman growled as the thing whisked the clown away, out of reach.

"At least you disarmed the bomb," Robin said. "Let's call it a night. It's been a long, weird day, and it's Christmas."

"You going to stay home now and not sneak off to a hotel room with Deathstroke?"

"Hey!" Robin objected, going pale. He would get so much coal in his stocking this year …

TLDR:

Jingle bells, Batman smells

Robin laid an egg

The batmobile lost a wheel

And the Joker got away, hey

The End

A/N: I'm sorry.