Dick Grayson

Gotham Academy

Thursday, September 27th, 2012

"…and the homework should be posted on Blackboard already. Actually, let me check if it's actually up or if this website is being impossible again."

"What are you doing this weekend?" Bette leans across Artemis' desk while Mr. Torcado turns around to fight with his computer. I snort. It's not up yet, and it's going to take him at least five minutes to figure that out. We've got ten minutes until he gives up completely, and the bell's going to ring in seven. Artemis shrugs.

"Probably nothing. I might go visit my uncle."

"The one in Star City?" Bette asks.

Artemis nods, copying the last equation off the board before looking up.

Wow. She's really committing to the Green Arrow's niece thing.

"That's so far," Bette frowns, "Especially just for a weekend."

"I was actually just there with Bruce for a Queen Industries fundraiser. Star's a really fun city, you know, as long as you're not hanging out with Oliver Queen," I smile innocently and Artemis's eyes widen like her cover's been blown.

"I'm not! Hanging with Oliver Queen, obviously," she backpedals, glaring at me while pretending not to. If she ever finds out my identity, she'll kill me for this, but for now this is too good to pass up.

"Too bad," Babs whacks me in the arm, "It'd be nice if someone besides Dick could name drop for once."

"Babs! I'm just kidding. Ollie's a nice guy," I shake my head in fake embarrassment, "Sorry, that's not even remotely relevant to you and your uncle. What part of Star does he live in?"

"I don't know. It's a couple blocks from the train station," Artemis shrugs, trying to hide the blush spreading across her face, "Anyways, what are you doing, Bette?"

"I'm going to see Taylor Swift!" Bette beams.

"What?!" Nick finally looks up from his phone.

"No way! You got tickets?" Babs demands, "I thought they sold out in five minutes!"

"Well, my dad is friends with the guy who owns the venue, so he pulled some strings!"

Artemis blinks, "You guys do know how you sound, right?"

Bette nods her head in acknowledgement, "Okay, yes, but… I'm not going to turn away Taylor Swift tickets."

She says it like it's the most obvious thing in the world and Artemis gives her a not-so-subtle side-eye. The bell rings, interrupting an awkward standoff but leading to a super awkward goodbye and Artemis practically stomping out of the room. Babs and I look at each other. She frowns and tilts her head at Artemis. I nod.

"Hey Bette, did you still want to carpool to practice next week?" Babs asks, giving me time to catch Artemis alone.

"Artemis!" I call. She turns back.

"Did I forget something?"

"No. Just wanted to walk with you."

"Where's Babs?" She raises an eyebrow suspiciously.

I make a face.

"She and Bette ditched me to talk gymnastics. Like gymnastics could ever be better than acrobatics."

"That's a pretty hard stance."

I shrug, tugging on my backpack straps as we turn the corner, "Hey, I'm an acrobat. Anything they can do, I could do when I was five."

"Riiiight."

I almost stop walking. When Bruce first adopted me, everywhere I went, people called me a charity case or a circus freak. Anyone who's trying to be an asshole still calls me that. But it's weird that there are still people who don't know any of that.

Artemis is my friend, but when she looks at me as a civilian, she just sees money.

"I get it," I tell her. She rolls her eyes.

"Sure you do, Mr. My-Dad-Is-Literally-A-Billionaire."

"Artemis, I grew up in a circus. My parents were trapeze artists," I pause, "We were poor."

The words feel bitter on my tongue. I hate that it feels like I should be ashamed of.

"Oh," she looks down, reaching for the railing as we hit the stairs, "I just can't get used to it."

"Yeah…"

We fall into step in a huge group of students escaping school for the day. The sound of eighty kids talking bounces off the confined walls of the stairwell, masking our conversation.

"Don't get me wrong, Bette is so nice and sweet, but she's just… entitled. You know? She doesn't even realize how much she has."

"Yup."

"Do you get used to it?"

I think about the fancy parties and the constant trips to islands and vineyards and how Bruce pours money into back into the city through Wayne Industries and also into Batman's tech.

"Eventually. But it's not about suddenly having all the money anyone could ever want. It's the people. In the circus, people would literally give you the clothes off their back. You helped however you could. The thing that's hard to get used to is that a lot of people here always put themselves first."

Artemis snorts, "Okay, I see that."

"Don't let it get to you. Most of the people here really are nice. And I know Bette can be a little oblivious sometimes but she's a good friend. That's what Babs says, at least," I grin.

"Thanks, Grayson. You're not… as bad as I thought."

"High praise, Crock. You can call me Dick."

"I'd really prefer not to."

"Oh, get over yourself."

"I'll think about it."

We part ways at the bottom of the stairs.

"I'll see you soon," I wave. Not that she knows I mean, "see you at the Cave in a few hours."

"Bye, Dick," Artemis says, grimacing when she realizes she used my name without thinking. Then she pauses. Finally, she shrugs. Cool. Guess we're officially on a first name basis.

I check my watch. It's 2:50. That means I have plenty of time before training tonight, and since I don't have a lot of homework… maybe I'll convince Batman to come on an early patrol before I zeta to the Cave.

"Why are we here again?" I drum my fingers against the roof's retaining wall and I can practically see Batman's eye twitching under the mask with every new tap.

"Scoping out a lead. Like I told you before," he answers gruffly.

"Okay, but here? Really?" I raise an eyebrow. Batman ignores me, so I poke at him again, "Your lead just happens to be on a diamond supplier that a certain cat lady likes to frequent?"

"Don't you have training soon?"

I roll my eyes. He never rises to the bait anymore, even if he knows I'm right. Stupid Catwoman, cutting a perfectly good patrol short. Then again, I check my holocomputer and Batman's right. I gotta go.

"Night, Batman."

Batman grunts in response.

I hit the rooftops, running and grappling across the Gotham skyline towards the nearest Zeta tube. I see the phone booth and drop down behind it. The Zeta records indicate no activity tonight, so if Artemis is coming for training she hasn't shown up yet.

I duck behind the booth and wait.

Luckily, it doesn't take more than two minutes, three minutes tops before she gets here.

"Artemis?" I grin, stepping out of the shadows. She gasps and turns, eyes wide.

"Robin! I, uh…"

"Wow, fancy seeing you here, in Gotham City. Batman's city. You know, instead of Star City, where your Uncle Green Arrow lives!"

Artemis blushes bright red and starts stammering something about her cousin and a spelling bee, and it takes all the self-control I have not to ask if that cousin is Green Arrow's kid. I've teased her about Uncle Ollie enough for today.

Finally, she has enough and snaps, "Alright, whatever. Let's just go to the cave."

I hold my hands up placatingly.

"You know I'm kidding, Arty. We're always happy to have you here in Gotham. Well at least, I am. Better watch out for…" I trail off, lifting my fingers to my head to mime Bat ears.

"Don't call me that," Artemis rolls her eyes, "Now get in the stupid box or we're gonna be late."

I shrug and push open the telephone box doors, closing them behind me. The scanner whirrs to life and announces, "Recognized: Robin, B-01."

The world disappears in a flash of light before the cave reappears. Everything is fine for about a second and a half, and then a fireball hurtles towards my head.

"—in!"

Something's pushing me. It hurts. Everything hurts.

"—bin!"

Dizzy.

Pain! Sharp, hard pressure hits and a million things hit me at once.

"Robin!" Artemis shrieks, hands over my ribcage.

Coughs erupt out of my lungs, water spilling out. A hand slaps my back, forcing the rest of the water out. I gasp for air, coughing and clawing at empty air.

"He's breathing!" Artemis exclaims, voice overflowing with sheer relief.

I take a few deep breaths and smile at her.

"Way to get traught."

Artemis smiles back like she's about to start crying from sheer relief. She helps me sit up, and even though the world spins, I'm okay. I nod at her dizzily, looking around the cave. Superboy and Kid Flash are still encased in metal, but they're both awake.

"Is he okay?" Kid Flash shouts, and Artemis nods so fast it gives me whiplash.

"He's okay!" she shouts back.

I see Aqualad leaning over Miss Martian and I grab Artemis's wrist.

"Is she okay?"

"Yeah, yeah, she's fine! She woke up a second before you did."

"What happened?"

"Torpedo hit you," Artemis takes a deep breath to steady herself, "I thought you drowned. I pretended to give myself up, and I had one shot. Got the EMP going, it worked just like you said."

I smile at her and try to say something reassuring, but my head throbs and the world spins violently.

"I'm going to pass out now," I mutter.

Wayne Manor

3 am

My arms are shaking even though they're pulled tight around my legs. The night sky through the window is just starting to lighten; dawn isn't for another two hours but it's still light enough to pick out the branches on the trees outside. Normally when I can't sleep, I climb out onto the roof through the upper living room window, but not tonight. I've never been afraid of falling, but I can't trust my body not to fail me the way it did today.

Red Torpedo never should have gotten the jump on me. My friends were counting on me and I failed them. If it wasn't for Artemis, we wouldn't have gotten out alive. Wally and Kaldur and M'gann and Conner… they would have died because of me.

The tidal wave crashing into me hasn't stopped playing over and over in my mind and I've tried to figure out what went wrong. I know the answer, no matter how much I hate it.

It was my fault. I should have been better.

I'm supposed to be better than this.

I don't know how to work with people less experienced than me. This team… I was so excited about it, but I shouldn't be on it. They're better off… and way safer without me.

I forget how they think on missions. I know what my objective is, and I forget that they aren't Batman. They won't take the lead if I do the scouting, and they won't pick up the slack when I make a mistake. Instead, my mistakes make their jobs impossible. When I do my ninja thing- or whatever Wally calls it-, they have no idea where I'm going or where I am, while Batman would already be three steps ahead.

I trust them to watch my back when they aren't, and I get in the way when they actually know what they're doing.

I acted the only way I could. I've been fighting crime for long enough that I know how to stay focused when the world is crashing around me. I've been trained by Batman and by Slade for life-or-death situations. But today, I was so scared for Wally and my friends that I couldn't focus. I was too slow, time and time again. The Reds almost caught us so many times, and beyond thinking of a way to communicate with them, I had no plan.

I couldn't let Artemis know that, though. If I told her, "Get traught or get dead," then showed her how scared I was, she'd never have been able to pull herself together. But maybe if I had, she would have had my back when I tried to install the EMP.

I shouldn't have trusted her. Or maybe I should have, maybe I was right to, because she saved us all in the end.

But I let us down. I didn't see Red Torpedo. I should have been paying more attention, I should have been faster installing the EMP, I should have been faster moving out of the way of the tidal wave, I should have held my breath long enough to stay conscious instead of passing out…

I should have… I should have been… I should be better.

I can't be on a team with them. They're superheroes with actual powers, and I'm just a kid who's in over my head. They depend on me every time we go on a mission. They put their lives in my hands and I can't… I'm not good enough to keep them safe.

I don't know how to be on a team.

When I work with Batman, we're a seamless duo. I know how he fights and thinks, and he knows me just as well. He can adapt to a situation and he can pick up the slack when I flip the wrong way.

Slade, even with his demand for perfection, is easy to work with too. He knows what I'm going to do before I do it, and he never misses a beat when we have to change the plan. He takes the lead, tells me what to do and it works. Fighting alongside Slade makes me feel… invincible in a way that not even Batman can do.

Even those team-ups with Wally and Roy were better. We watched out for each other and we trusted each other to have our backs. Sure, it wasn't as good as working with our mentors, but it was fun and we were safer in numbers.

But the team… we haven't worked together long enough to know how each other fight or think, what our strengths and weaknesses are. We just do our best not to die, and that's not good enough. Kaldur is trying his best, but he can't do everything, and I'm not good enough to lead other people and pull my own weight. I just can't do it.

I lean my head back against the wall. Quick inhale, long exhale. The corner of my lip curls up in disgust.

I let my team down. I couldn't save them. I failed. Not to mention the fact that I almost drowned on top of leaving all my friends to their demise, and abandoning an insecure former assassin to defeat two super-villain-androids by herself. And then, just when we thought we were safe, we were betrayed all over again. We were all helpless against Red Tornado's attack.

That stupid robot!

This wasn't supposed to happen. Slade promised he would help me so that I never had to be helpless again. All the lying, the sneaking out, the training, it was all for nothing. It was useless.

What are we supposed to do now? How are we supposed to deal with knowing that the enemy could ambush us at any time and we'll be sitting ducks? The League couldn't reach us. Mount Justice was supposed to be safe but how will it ever be safe again? Will we ever feel safe again?

When was the last time I ever really felt safe?

I close my eyes.

That's easy. I was eight years old, climbing up the ladder to join my parents on the trapeze.

My life started going to shit when Tony Zucco murdered my parents and it has never stopped. Every time I think something is getting better, life reminds me that I don't get to have good things.

Now, everything I do is just another mistake, and I don't have the slightest clue about what to do now.

Gotham Academy

Friday, September 28th, 2012

"Does this stuff even count as pizza?" Josh asks, holding up the offending slice. He makes a face as the cheese peels off and flops down onto the plate. Bette makes a choked sound and pushes his plate away from her. Josh takes this as a cue to shake the remains of the pizza dramatically, "I mean, seriously! This is cardboard and melted cheese!"

Babs laughs and pokes the pile of cheese with a plastic spoon, "Yum! So appetizing!"

She slides her bag over so I have enough room to set my tray down. I toss my backpack on the ground and sit. Bette's friend Nick looks up from his Caesar salad and waves at me.

"This food is honestly disturbing! You'd think at a school this expensive, they'd at least be able to afford something edible. See, at least Dick has the right idea," Josh points at my lunch.

I try to grin and make some kind of joke about how the food should be a little more turbed, but Artemis is sitting next to Josh, head buried in her calculus homework. Instead, I shrug, "Pb&j is always a safe bet."

"If you're feeling adventurous, you could always try the sketchy sushi," Babs grins.

"I'm not spending nine dollars on something that might poison me!" Josh exclaims, looking scandalized.

Artemis slams her math book shut and looks up angrily, "Or, you could stop complaining about the food and just be grateful that you're at a school where they actually have enough to feed everyone."

Everyone goes quiet. Nick looks down at the table and scratches his hair.

"Are… you okay, Artemis?" Bette asks, her voice thick with worry.

"Yeah. I'm just…" she pauses. The haunted look in her eyes matches mine, "I had a bad night."

I look away so she can't see the shiver running down my spine. I owe her my life. I wonder if she's ever saved anyone before. It's scarier than being saved, because afterwards, you have all the time in the world to think about how close you were to failing, how close someone else was to dying because of your mistakes.

When I look up, Bette has a hand on Artemis's arm and is whispering something to her. Everyone else is trying to restart the conversation and give them privacy.

"So… your brother's visiting soon, right?" Babs asks Nick.

"Yeah. His band has a gig in New York so we're all going to go with him."

"That's so cool! What does he play?"

"He's the vocals. I can show you a video clip if you want."

"Yeah!"

While Nick pulls out his phone and entertains Babs and Josh, I pick at my sandwich. My stomach lets out a growl even though there's a cold pit in the middle of my chest.

I realize I've been staring into space when Artemis looks at me and our eyes lock. She looks exhausted and the bags under her eyes are even darker than mine.

I should run over to her and give her a hug and tell her she did everything she could and none of it was her fault and thank her because she saved my life and all our friends' too. But I can't. She doesn't know who I really am, and I'm still not allowed to tell her.

Something cold and prickly presses into my arm and I jump.

"You good, Dick?"

Using dramatics to cover the fact that she completely caught me off guard, I let my head fall forwards and whine, "I'm tired."

Babs lets out a hum of agreement and takes a bite of something crunchy, "Take a nap before calc. We have like twenty minutes."

"You'd forget to wake me up," I mumble, head buried in my arms.

"Oh yeah. I do forget sometimes."

I lift my head up so I can roll my eyes at her. She responds my sticking something in my face.

"Celery?"

Shit!

I almost fall off the bench as I push myself away from the potentially deadly vegetable. I never want to eat a piece of celery ever again, knowing what Slade can use it for. Not now, not ever.

"No way! Get that thing away from me!"

"You're so weird," Babs laughs, shaking her head.

"Hey, some guy just died from an allergy attack."

"To celery?" Josh asks.

Crap why did I say that? Crap crap crap what if they get suspicious? Why did I say that?! It's not like it's the kind of thing a normal kid would know about for any reason whatsoever! Shit!

"Oh wait, I think heard about that," Bette says, reaching for her phone. After a second, she brightens and holds out her screen. The cold pit in my stomach tightens and I take a deep breath as quietly as I can.

"That's crazy!" Josh exclaims.

Artemis, curious despite her exhaustion, grabs the phone away and starts reading with a puzzled expression, "Apparently he got coffee at this hipster coffee place, and someone accidentally used celery water in the coffee machine."

"Who the hell puts celery water in a coffee machine?" Bette snorts.

"What if it wasn't an accident?!" Nick gasps theatrically. My heart races and for a second, my stomach drops like I fell off the bench again.

"Oh, come on," Bette pushes his hand off her lunch tray, stopping him from grabbing her Oreos.

Artemis frowns, looking at the article closer.

"What if it wasn't?" she mutters, her frown deepening.

Shit! Not good!

My palms are starting to sweat and I clear my throat nervously, "Uh… can we maybe not talk about this during lunch?"

Artemis looks at me in surprise, then her expression turns guilty, "Sorry."

Babs looks back and forth between us.

"…are you sure you guys are okay?"

I stare down at my half-eaten pb&j and my stomach churns, "I'm not hungry. I'll see you in class."

I grab my bag and head for the bathroom, barely noticing that Artemis is making a bee-line for the exit too. I close the stall door and bury my head in my hands.

My phone chirps once and I jump. That's Robin's phone. My non-superhero phones are always set to vibrate or silent.

I dig it out of my bag and open the message as fast as I can. The messaging app takes a few seconds to open, which sucks but there's no way to make the encryption faster. Or at least, no ways that won't take a huge amount of time and effort.

It's from Artemis in the team's group chat.

'Hey… anyone else kind of not want to go back to the cave today?'

My heart thuds and I almost choke with relief, but I don't want to be the first one to respond. One by one, everyone's icons drop to the bottom of the screen, showing that they've seen it. But apparently no one knows what to say either.

Kaldur starts typing, but he deletes whatever he was going to say.

Thank god for Wally, because he charged forwards with his usual grace and saved the day.

'Pizza? There's a place in Keystone'

'Yes!' M'gann responds immediately. I send a thumbs-up emoji. Everyone responds quickly after that, and no one feels the need to say anything else.

'Great. It's Pizza Corner on Second Street, one block from the zeta.'

Pizza Corner

Surprisingly, Wally is the only one there when I walk in. I guess Barry really is the reason they always run late. He waves me over to a circular booth way in the back where we'll all be able to talk in privacy. It's perfect.

"How did you find this place?" I ask, sliding into the seat next to him.

He rolls his eyes at me, "Come on, Dick. Like you don't know I've been to every single pizza place in the country. Well, state. Okay, city. Well… actually, yeah. State."

"Of course," I grin wryly, "How could I have possibly forgotten?"

"Guess there's just more important things on your mind," he jokes, but then the humor is gone. I put my chin in my hands and sigh.

"How are you doing?" he asks.

I snort.

"Crappy. I don't know," I lift my head up and look at him. His ginger hair, which is normally messy, looks like a tornado hit it. His green eyes look sunken into his skull, and his skin is pale, "Are you okay? You look… horrible."

"Wow, thanks," he leans back in the booth, his head knocking against the wall lightly, "I couldn't sleep at all last night, and I got twitchy if I stayed still for too long. I ended up running the entire eastern seaboard and back. Sort of forgot to eat."

I wince, "Hence the…" I point at his face, where the skin looks really sallow and pale.

"Yeah. Pizza should be out any minute though," his stomach lets out an enormous rumble and he looks miserable. I reach into my pocket, where Alfred cut the seams so I can reach into the utility belt under my sweatshirt. Batman restocked everything last night after… so I have a bunch of protein bars.

"Here," I toss one to him.

"You're the best."

He unwraps it and takes a huge bite, shaking his head.

"I don't know, Rob. I really thought we were ready for this gig, but last night? We were—I was useless. I didn't even have a chance to fight, and then WHAM! Third degree burns everywhere from being encased in molten steel. And you and Artemis, I thought… I thought we were all going to die. And where was the fucking League?"

My hands clench into trembling fists and I realize how angry I am. No. Not angry, furious. The League told us the Cave was safe. They told us we would be protected there, and that they were keeping an eye out in case something went wrong.

It's not the League's fault that Red Tornado betrayed us.

But when we needed their help the most, they weren't there. If Artemis hadn't made that shot, the Reds would have killed us all, or taken us as hostages, and the League would have been too late to stop them. The League made us vulnerable, and then they didn't protect us.

And now we're the ones paying for their mistakes.

Wally takes another bite of the bar and chews with a sour expression. We both look up when the bell above the door rings and Artemis walks in. I wave her over and she sits next to Wally at the end of the booth. For once, they don't immediately start fighting with each other.

"I got four plain and three pepperoni," he tells her as he finishes inhaling the protein bar.

"What are the rest of us going to eat?" she teases, the smile on her face not reaching her eyes.

Holy trauma Batman. Yesterday really fucked us up.

Kaldur walks in a minute later, wearing a dark blue sweater in the same shade as mine. The three of us watch our normally confident, steadfast leader trudge his way towards the booth. His shoulders are slumped forwards and defeated. He tries to smile when he reaches us, but calling the expression a grimace would be generous. I move over as he slides into the center of the booth next to me, thinking of something I can say that doesn't have anything to do with this mess.

"We match," I say in the jumbled Atlantean-Surface mixed language we haven't used in years. Kaldur blinks, then looks down at his sweater to confirm it.

"Smart minds think the same," he answers in the same way.

"Chocolate cake is my favorite surface food."

"It is?" he asks in English. I'm not sure if he's more confused at my response or because he knows my favorite food is Alfred's raspberry chocolate chip pancakes.

I shrug, "That's all I can remember how to say. Well, that and 'fuck you, you barnacle infested pile of donkey shit and may your soul burn in the fiery wrath of hell until the depths of the oceans freeze over,' but that seemed kind of rude."

Kaldur laughs softly, and even though it has a kind of bitter edge, I give myself a point for it, "I admit that I don't remember why we decided such an expression was necessary."

"We probably just got bored."

"That would explain it."

He glances over at Wally and frowns, "You do not look well, my friend."

"Pot, kettle," Wally shoots back, but then he forces himself to relax, "I'll be fine after I eat."

The door opens again and M'gann and Conner walk in together. Nobody says anything about how tightly their hands are clasped together.

"Thank Mars you're all okay," M'gann says, like a weight lifted off her shoulders. Artemis pulls her onto the bench and into a hug.

"I'm glad you're okay, too. I was worried I was too late," she admits.

"It was an amazing shot," Conner tells her.

"Indeed," Kaldur agrees.

I was too unconscious to see it, but the odds were a million to one. Artemis flushes, looking down at the table. Nobody knows what to say next. I take a breath and say what we're all thinking.

"The cave was supposed to be safe. That was the whole point of hiding in plain sight. But it didn't work."

"They caught us with our guard down," Wally adds darkly, "So what do we do now?"

We all look at Kaldur.

"We need a way to alert the League if anything like this should ever happen again. Clearly, the cave's security is not infallible. Robin, I believe you could do something to fix that."

"I can try."

"We have been too patient, blindly waiting for the League to direct us. We must be more proactive. We need to familiarize ourselves with whoever we may face, so that we are prepared to exploit their weaknesses while protecting ours. I will ask the Batman to equip us all with emergency supplies. Rebreathers, fire-suppressants, back-up radios. Emergency beacons to contact the League in crucial situations."

"And what do we do about Tornado?" Conner asks.

"Regardless of what the League thinks, Tornado is one of ours. We will find him. Agreed?" Kaldur asks.

I look at Wally. Wally looks at Artemis. Artemis looks at M'gann. M'gann looks at Conner. Conner looks at me. We're all thinking the same thing.

"Agreed," M'gann says.

AN: Poor kids, being ambushed in your own home and then almost dying and then being betrayed by a trusted adult is a supremely traumatic thing to go through. I sure hope they can catch a break soon.

As always, thank you so much for reading! If you liked this chapter or you're enjoying the story, please leave me a review. It makes my day to see that people are enjoying it and I always appreciate new ideas! Thanks!