10:13 PM Robin

My name is Tim Drake and, other than the fact that I'm one-fourth of a team of vigilantes, I'm a pretty typical eighteen year-old. I enjoy video games, attend college online, watch reality TV, and date when I have the time—don't really have much time, though. I mean I clearly don't live a typical teenage life, being Robin and all—that takes up a lot of free time. Robin did major surgery to my life, now everything's different.

Three years ago—before I lost my mother to cancer—Bruce Wayne showed up on my doorstep out of the blue and offered to pay all of my mother's medical bills. On top of that, he wanted to pay all of my family's living expenses as well as my schooling. It was like a dream come true—a miracle. My dad broke-down crying, completely overwhelmed by Mr. Wayne's generosity. Dad had been working three jobs trying to keep us afloat with the rising medical costs but with Mr. Wayne's help, he was able to devote more time to being with my mother through her recovery. Mr. Wayne didn't ask for anything in return, either. Even when my mother passed in spite of all the treatment, Mr. Wayne continued to help me and my father financially. Before that day, I never believed in something-for-nothing.

Mr. Wayne changed that belief.

I discovered later that the reason that Mr. Wayne had come to our aid was because I had come to his first.

One night, my buddy was hosting the getty-to-end-all-getties (Getty is short for get-together for all the old-heads that aren't cool enough to update once in a while). I'm not sure how he managed to fit so many people into that small tenement but it was one hell of a good time; half random-party and half celebration for me taking the regional-championship for my age group in the MMA circuit. I wasn't the most popular kid in school, but I sure was the most popular kid that night. Suddenly, every girl that never paid me any attention on normal days treated me like a celebrity. Not sure if it was because I was labeled the best cage-fighter in the region or if it was because they pitied my bruised and swollen face. Whatever the reason, it felt good. Unfortunately, I had to cut my night short because my dad told me I needed to be home by midnight so we could go visit my mother in the hospital the next morning. Too bad too, because I really hit it off with this girl named Stephanie Brown. She was a year younger than me and was from a much nicer area of a Gotham—a Downtown girl who went to St. Phillip Christian Academy of South Hinkley. It was a private school with a reputation for really hot gymnasts and volleyball players; Stephanie was both.

I spent so much time talking to her, in fact, that I had lost track of time and realized that I was going to be late getting home. We traded numbers and then I split, jogging to the train station. My dad was going to be livid that I was going to be late but Stephanie's number was worth the ass-chewing. Besides, my old man was a push-over. His anger was all for show. He'd forget that he was angry at me the next day and by lunch I'd have back whatever privileges he decided to take. So I planned to call Stephanie that evening and see if she was down to see a movie or something.

I was on the station ramp by myself waiting for the train and that was making me a bit paranoid. I knew better than to go anywhere in Gotham without a crew, but none of my boys wanted to leave the party. So that left me to fend for myself. I could fight, that was no doubt. Thing is: no gangster in Gotham believed in a fair fight and neither did the urban legends. And Gotham was full of gangsters and urban legends. The news rotated nonstop stories of gangland drive-by shootings or urban legends mauling unfortunate souls. I didn't need to be a victim of either if I could help it.

I remember hearing a scraping sound coming down the stairs of the station. My heart began to bang against the inside of my ribcage. I prayed that it was some homeless guy being obnoxious and not any of the local predators. Who ran this side of town, anyway? Lennox Ave Mobsters? No, they didn't come north of the causeway. Had to be the DoLo Rollers; they were extra goonish—and for no reason. At least I could have talked my way out of drama with Lennox, I didn't know any of the DoLos. There'd be no chance of me worming my way out of anything with them. I was going to end up a bloody smear on a Gotham boulevard. Not how I hoped my night would end, especially after things went so dope at Felix's getty. I looked around the station for a quick exit. There were no others. There was only one way in and one way out.

I could hear the roar of the next train coming down the tunnel. Maybe I'd make the train before things had a chance to get messy. It was going to be tight. If I didn't make the train before they got down here, I would at least put up a fight, I wasn't going to go out like a punk. I swallowed hard.

A shadow spilled onto the ramp from the stairs. It was like nothing I'd ever seen—like something off of FEARnet. The shadow was long and barely human with horns growing out of what seemed like a head and it grew as it slithered across the platform to my feet like spilled ink. It was attached to a huge monster of a creature, all black and shadowy, blotted out by the streetlight at the top of the steps. It was like a gargoyle, staring at me hungrily. It stumbled several paces off the last step and fell to the floor with a thud. And, it just lied in heap like a dying animal.

My train arrived.

I didn't move.

I just stood there and took the whole thing in. A part of me said forget what I was seeing and get on the train, nothing good would come out of it. An even bigger part of me said investigate (Who am I to violate instinct?). I inched up to it, noticing that it was bleeding. It lifted its head as I got close, its blood dripping in a pool right beneath its barely human face.

Even though I knew better than to get closer—after all, this was how people got murdered in slasher movies—I did anyway. I've always been more curious than cautious; I had to get a better look at...

Oh. My. God.

It's Batman.

11:27PM Robin

My mouth was dry. All the moisture had gone to my hands. I opened and closed my fingers trying to dry them as I stood there figuring out what I should do next. This wasn't some awkward sighting that you pull out your camera-phone, snap a shot, and then post it online—this was the Batman. He was all over the TV all the time. The police said he was to be considered armed and extremely dangerous, talk shows said that he was either a lunatic or a hero, and documentaries and ghost hunters said that he was supernatural. The mayor had a special police group that did nothing but hunt the Batman. The majority of the gangbangers I knew were terrified of him even though most of them claimed they weren't. Legend had it that if you said his name five times in the mirror, he'd appear behind you and gut you. I didn't believe that last part; I never was into the whole urban legend horror thing. But this was for real and suddenly I was at the door of belief.

I kept my distance as I walked around him towards the stairs keeping him in my sight. He was crawling—dragging himself was more like it—away from the stairs painting a weak brushstroke of blood on the floor. As I reached the first step, something inside me told me that what I was about to do was wrong; I couldn't just leave him here to die. Suppose this really wasn't Batman but some poor fool in a costume (I supposed the chances of that were more likely than him actually being Batman) that was ambushed by the local crazies and he was now here in front of me dying and I just let it happen. I wouldn't be able to live with myself.

I turned back around. "B-Batman?"

He didn't respond. He muttered something like ocular or article a few times.

"Batman? My name's Tim. Um, I can help you—give you first aid or something." No I couldn't, I didn't know anything thing about first aid.

Then I noticed more people coming near the steps. Judging by the sounds of their howling they were after Batman. Hell, they were probably the ones that injured the poor guy. Oh man, I hope they didn't try to murk me too (sigh...murk means kill).

I backed away from the staircase as six men descended onto the platform. They looked at Batman. "Oh shit! You really did get him, Bryce!" one said in a nasal voice. "You freaking banged-on the Bat!" Then they noticed me not too far to Batman's right.

The large Asian man to the rear of the group pointed at me. "What the hell is this? Get the kid the hell outta here."

Two of the six came towards me. I sized them up: I was taller and denser than they. They didn't seem to be in great shape and I didn't see any of the common scars that most fighters had. I also had the reach advantage. I could take these two by surprise but I didn't know how I was going to beat the other four. Besides, what if they were strapped (that's another way of saying armed)? What was I saying? Of course they were strapped. They did, after all, shoot the guy in the bat suit. I know fighting these guys seemed beyond crazy but I doubted that they were going to let me get away alive. And, I couldn't just let them kill this guy. Ugh...dammit.

"C'mere, kid. We wanna talk to you."

I put on the game-face that I used in the moments before tournaments to try to make the other fighters feel like I wasn't intimidated when, in fact, I was shivering in my shoes. "Don't put your hands on me if you want to keep them," I said. I was so dead.

"This motherf—" the closer of the two started to say as he looked back at the others, all of them shooting him equally egotistical looks. "Kid, I will splatter your shit all over this train station. I don't give a rat's ass how old you are."

He reached out for me. I can't say that I remember exactly what happened next but I do remember kicking him and then punching the second guy before power slamming him onto the concrete. I mounted him and punched him the face several times. The other guys pulled me from their buddy and threw me to the ground. Hard.

Still full of adrenaline, I sat up immediately and found myself looking down the barrel of the big Asian guy's pistol. "Don't move," he said. "You got alot of heart, wouldn't want that to go to waste. I didn't come here to kill you, I came to kill the kook in the bat costume. Don't make me put a hole in your head, too. "

"He fudkin' brode mah nose!" the one I had mounted screamed. I must have hit more than I thought.

"Well, then you kill him. I'm gonna pull the mask off of this bat-creep." The Asian guy shrugged. "Sorry, kid. I liked you. He doesn't."

The second guy walked up to me, blood streaming down his face and a piece of bone peeking out from his nostril, and raised the gun to my head. He cursed at me for several seconds explaining that no one hits him and lives. The Asian guy told him to hurry up.

Suddenly, the entire platform went black and they all started screaming—shooting, too.

11:40PM Robin