Chapter 6:

"Cryptic Messages"

Rest and relaxation was what the doctor ordered, but Dick Grayson was not the kind of person to stay out of the action for long. But since he couldn't be in the action, he could at the very least read about it with occurrence reports from the rest of the Batfamily. Alfred had brought over an iPad. Bruce thought it was best that Dick was caught up on recent events.

As rotten luck would have it, the old man, had come within minutes of Dick and Barbara taking a shower, and he caught them. Exposing them, like two young adults playing around. Suffice it to say, Barbara was more than embarrassed. Dick managed to finish up on his own and a nurse was brought it to help with the rest.

Dick's eyes blurred for a moment as he looked at the iPad screen. It wasn't because of his eyes, but he felt tired. He was alone in his room. Barbara and Alfred had left to take in a meal in the hospital lounge and kitchen. He didn't care much for hospital food, so he asked them to bring him back something. Barbara said she would bring him back a salad now that he had to watch his weight.

His head bobbed, his eyes blinked. He was tired, so he put the iPad down—Who tried to kill me?—was his immediate thought as he rested back on the pillow, and then began to dream.

He was suddenly thrusted back to his days at Spyral and found himself surrounded within a complex maze of structures that had no defining markings, where he was hunting a killer. His partner was somewhere else and he found himself alone. With a gun in hand, he carefully surveyed the area until he was attacked by a series of small biogenetic creatures—munchkins—creatures similar to that in the movie the Wizard of Oz. They lunged at him and he had to keep batting them away.

Then when he wasn't looking, Grayson was swatted across the back of the head, knocking him down. He dropped his gun and one of the munchkin's picked it up. When he turned, he came face-to-face with a man whom he thought he had killed a long time ago: Blockbuster, the crime lord of Bludhaven. The muscular, grotesque looking man grinned innately. All of sudden, a smaller, thinner man, with blonde hair came from behind him, a man whom he'd thought Dick would never see again. He was a minute criminal, and nothing like his betters, but he had been a formidable foe in his own rite. His name was—Dick had to take a moment to remember his name, it didn't immediately come to him.

"Greetings, hero, how pleasant it is to see you again, or rather not see you, with your face blurred out by that most wonderful technology supplied by Spyral," the apt sounding villain said. Spyral used technology to mask the identity of their agents, it was better than a mask. But later the hypno-implants used to generate such an effect was discovered to wreak havoc with its user, causing reparable brain damage and hallucinations.

When he finally remembered the man's name, Dick was confused to see him here. But this was not the man he and his partner had been hunting. "Arthur Brown, Cluemaster, what the devil are you doing here? And I thought you were dead?" he said to Blockbuster. "Word had it the hero vigilante named Nightwing finally put an end to your tyranny in the city of Bludhaven," he tried to sound coy, because he was Agent 37 at the moment and not Nightwing.

"Don't play dumb," Brown said. "We're not really here, you're dreaming. We're representations of your unconscious working out a problem that you can't decipher. When you fell asleep in your hospital bed, the last thing you thought about was who tried to kill you. Dreams are a way for the brain to fit the pieces of the puzzle together to come to a reasonable conclusion, albeit in abstract form, and for then the subconsciousness to pick at to bring it to the surface. But you won't remember us after you awake."

"Thank god, I always found you annoying. At least the Riddler had style, you were nothing but a carbon copy. But I have to say Stephane, your daughter, was a pretty cool Batgirl. But let me put the immediate issue into perspective: You, Brown, represent the riddle, per se, and Blockbuster represents the wall that has been put before me because of his vast size?"

"Excellent deduction," Brown said. "But that is your own conclusion based on the apparent clues and information honed."

"If I'm to take that into account, then I need to follow the clues given to me and brake through the barrier of deceit."

"Yes, but you don't have all the pieces yet, so nothing will make sense right now. You need to continue digging."

Grayson was handed back his gun by one of the munchkins, but then it turned into the test tube with the two implants inside that the doctor had removed from his head. Suddenly, every single munchkin began to run around him, as if chasing each other, until he was surrounded by a blurry whirlwind—the mystery of it surrounding him.

He then looked up, and saw a man in the shadows standing on one of the undefined walls, looking down at him. He was faceless, his form silhouetted by an unknown light. Was this the person behind all this? Of course the person would be faceless and dark, Dick didn't know who it was. But he knew there was some devious master plot to kill him, everything pointed to such. It was almost cliche, but true. But who, and why? Did this person represent the "mastermind" of this whole plot?

Suddenly, the man raised his hand into the air and lightning erupted from it.

Dick Grayson gasped and sat up in bed. Barbara was now sitting in a chair next to his bed, reading the iPad. He breathed out hard and she stood, went to his side. "What is it, Dick? Are you okay? Did you have a nightmare?"

Dick blinked his eyes. "Sort of, but it wasn't a night terror, it was more like—" The dream was quickly fading and he put a hand to his head. He recited off a few words: "Clue, wall, lightning," then it was gone. He plopped his head back in his pillow. "I feel the intensity of the dream, yet the details are fading."

"That's how most dreams are," she explained. "It may come back to you."

Dick looked around the room. "Where's Alfred?"

"He left to do some errands since you were sleeping when we came back; I brought you a salad, see" —Dick rolled his eyes, and said cereal would be better— "And when you're up to it, we'll start working on those love handles and some core strength exercises. I want to see those tight abs and cute little tushee in all its glory again."

"We were about to, if Alfred didn't horn in on our fun."

They both laughed.

The door had only been a quarter shut when a male nurse came into the room rolling what looked to be food trolley. "Supplementary meal, Mr. Grayson," the strong looking man said. "Orders by the doctor. He says you need to keep up your strength."
"I hope it's better than this salad?"

The man rolled the trolley close to the bed with a food plate covered. Suddenly, the nurse grabbed the cover off the plate and pulled out a large knife, then tried to stab Grayson in bed. Dick reacted quickly and rolled to the side and out, using the bed as a barrier, as the male nurse sliced through the air. Barbara was also a target.

Pushing the bed, the man used it to pin Dick to the vent just underneath the window sill, then thrusted the blade towards Dick's face. Dick avoided it, dodged again, and tried to push back against the bed. The man was exceptionally strong, using his lower body to hold the bed in place, while using his knife to attack, also attempting to grab Dick with the other hand.

Barbara then entered the fray and delivered a high kick to the attacker's back. The impact was hardly felt, but he did turn his attention to her. That was a mistake. The sudden distraction gave Dick purchase to push the bed forward and flip it over. Then he joined Barbara in the open.

"And what's this all about?" Dick demanded.

"Complements from an old friend, and he says to tell you, he has not forgotten your betrayal," the attacker said. Then, quite suddenly, the male nurse slit his own throat, dropped, and died on room floor. Blood flowed from the cut, his eyes open to death.

Barbara went to get an orderly as Dick stood there, looking at the dead man. "Betrayal? Now what the hell does that mean?"

When the police came, Dick and Barbara gave reports, but why the man attacked Dick remained unknown.

x x x

When word got to Damian about an assassination attempt on Grayson in the hospital, the first thing he wanted to do was race back to Gotham from Bludhaven and become Grayson's personal bodyguard, but he was told not come back. Dick was safe with Barbara. The hospital wanted to place a police officer outside Dick's hospital room, but Dick didn't want to draw any unwanted attention. He was speaking with Grayson on his cell.

"Bloody incompetence!"

"Don't get too worked up, kiddo. The man was a professional assassin, for a young buck," Grayson said, over the phone. "But another why was just added to the mount of whys that we're still trying to figure out. He said something about betrayal, and complements from an old friend, but someone knows I'm here, and they want to kill me. But it could be for a number of reasons."

"Which means you're in danger! You should be moved to the Manor," Damian said strongly. "I'm sure Pennyworth can look after you. He's taken care of all of us when we've gotta sick; he's got a good bedside manner."

"Barbara is an excellent bodyguard, she can take care of me," Dick said.

"I'm sure she can, both in the conventional and the biblical sense."

"Hey, watch your mouth," Dick scolded.

Tt

Damian settled himself down, which wasn't easy to do, and then he told Grayson about Todd being in Bludhaven, and that he was part of some new police task force against the drug cartels that were trying to gain a foot hold in the city. Dick figured as much. "Jason's done his fill of drugs, so he knows what to look for, and he knows the ins-and-outs of cartels, so he sounds like the perfect man for the job." He just hoped Arsenal didn't get involved or there'll may be a relapse. Roy Harper had gotten involved in drugs and it took Wally Wast, Kid Flash, to knock some sense into him. "Did they approach him for the job?"

"Yup, and apparently he's been impressive. He's also hunting down clues for anything related to Crane's newest 'Fear Germ'."

"Well, good luck to him. Knowing Jason, he can teach the BPD a thing or two about the cartels. Oops! Mother Hen's back, time to say goodbye. And he's giving me that face he always does when he's asserting his authority. He wants me to hang up."

"Yeah, I know that face. Don't mess with Pennyworth. Talk to you later." Damian ended the call and then breathed a little easier. He was out on patrol in Bludhaven and it was quiet, standing on the rooftop of a six story apartment complex, his hair whipping in the cool wind. He was glad Grayson was okay. Everyone kept in contact with one another, so went to dial Todd and tell him the good news, then call it a day, when suddenly he was attacked by a hooded dark figure in a long shroud. Damian took a direct hit and went crashing onto the roof, sliding a few meters before being stopped by a ventilation duct. Looking back, the attacker looked like the archetype grim reaper. His face was hidden in darkness and the storm clouds that were brewing above didn't help matters, masking pretty much everything else. He could also be wearing a mask to hide is identity.

"And who the hell are you supposed to be?" Nightwing Junior got to his feet. "Halloween's over, time to return the costume."

The Grim Reaper pointed at Nightwing Junior with what looked like a boney finger. Lightning suddenly coursed the sky, thunder crashed and boomed. Damian wasn't normally startled, but he suddenly jumped, and for a split moment, shut his eyes—the light overwhelming the sensors of his mask. The second he opened them back up, his attacker was gone. He searched the roof, over every edge, but the man dressed as death had vanished.

"Now what the hell was that all about?"

It began to rain, so he shot a tether line out, and left to return back to his home base of operations, WingCo.

To be continued…