Chapter 36

Dick sat on the swivel chair in front of the computer console in the Batcave, idly spinning around in the chair as he waited for his father. Bruce always got him in trouble for doing this, claiming it was childish, but it always helped him think.

He glanced up at the sudden squeal of wheels as the Batmobile screeched to a halt on the circular concrete slab beside the T-Ship.

"That chair squeaks for weeks after you've been here," Batman told him , heaving himself out of the Batmobile.

Dick grinned. "Just giving you something to remember me by."

Batman raised an eyebrow at him, before pulling off his cowl. "I trust your friends are settling in well?" Bruce said, heading for the console.

Dick vacated the seat and leant against the console. "They'll be living it up for a while. Thanks for letting us stay for Christmas. I know you've very busy."

Bruce grunted. "It's not often that you actually ask for anything. Makes it difficult to say no." He frowned at the brown paper package sitting on the console before him. "What's this?"

Dick embarrassed himself by blushing. "Something I thought you ought to have back."

"It's not going to explode on me is it?" Bruce asked as he carefully opened the package.

Dick scowled at him. "No."

Bruce frowned down at the contents of the package before looking up at Dick for an explanation.

He shrugged. "I have no rights to that. I'm grateful for everything you done for me, but Batman needs a Robin and I can't be that for you anymore. It doesn't mean that I won't come if you ever need it but I can't be your 'sidekick' anymore. My place is with the Titans, with Starfire. It's time for me to grow up, live my own life, rather than living with clipped wings."

"Very poetic. I take it you liked the Nightwing outfit."

Dick raised his eyebrows in surprise. "You knew?"

"Alfred is my butler, Dick, of course I knew. Starfire has good taste. I think it suits you."

"Thanks." He eyed Bruce carefully. "You're not mad?"

Bruce raised an eyebrow. "Why would I be? I thought you outgrew Robin a long time ago. I'm surprised after your little episode earlier this year that you didn't change sooner. The next generation of heroes needs a good leader and a sidekick can never truly be that. Robin will always be known as my sidekick, Nightwing is his own hero and a strong leader. Barbara was a little disappointed however."

Dick grunted, rather touched by what his father had said.

"I still get to ground you when you do something stupid. Any recent exploits you care to tell me about?"

Dick squinted at Bruce. "You've been hacking into the Titan computer again, haven't you? What'd you read?"

"It's a little disconcerting when the entire Titans Network is activated, by Cyborg, nonetheless. I was concerned and I'm a little disappointed that you didn't contact me when the Citadel took members of your team. I could have helped."

"There wasn't time."

Bruce looked at him blandly. "Really? There was enough time to gather the Titan Network, but not enough time to call your father?"

"All right, fine," Dick snapped. "I didn't want you there. It was something that I needed to do and I knew you would try and take control."

"I see," Bruce said evenly. "At least you're being honest about it." He sighed. "Sometimes the measure of a man can be taken by how he does something, not what he does. You led them into battle, you took no casualties and you rescued all of your team. I can't say that if I'd been there it would have been any different. How is Starfire coping?"

Dick squinted at his father. "What, exactly, did you read?"

"That during your last xhandal battle… how'd that all go by the way?"

Dick shrugged. "I won the right to marry her by Tamaranian standards."

"Congratulations. As I was saying, during your last battle there were a series of explosions and you were hit by with knockout drug. Starfire, Raven and Beast Boy were captured during the confusion. Cyborg assembled the Titans and woke you and with the help of a Titan named Herald, you stormed the Citadel. Big nasty battle, in which Starfire's sister eventually joined. Now, here's where it gets a little hazy in the report. I'm guessing this Bumblebee didn't really know what the hell happened. Starfire had been given a drug to make her into a weapon of sorts and just when things were starting to go bad for you, she showed up, knocked down a wall and killed two Citadelians. Mass panic within the Titans, they flee and you stay behind to retrieve Starfire. You take her back to Tamaran and she's under some other effect of the drug now, turns bright green and goes off to die. Except she doesn't somehow. Bumblebee wasn't specific."

Dick frowned. "I'm gonna have to talk to Bumblebee, I think."

"Care to elaborate?"

Dick sighed. "Promise you'll hear me all the way through? No judging Starfire or her behavior?"

Bruce frowned at him. "That bad, huh?"

Dick nodded and looked down at his feet so he wouldn't have to see his father's face. "Tamaranian women have this thing called morn'lo. It's the only time they can conceive and from what I gather it's something like a cat in heat. They become impassioned. The Citadel developed a drug that taps into that, multiplying it tenfold, so the woman can no longer think about anything else but mating with the closest available male. The drug is designed to kill the woman at the end, burn them up with the green energy they have inside. They gave it to Starfire, they wanted her to service them until she died."

"That must have been hard on you both."

Dick gave a vague nod. "Thing is, it backfired on them. She was able to turn the desire into anger. Escaped from the prison that contained her, Raven and Beast Boy and managed to fight her way through to us. She saw me and the anger shifted to..." He dropped his eyes, embarrassed to be discussing this. "Erm… once the drug had worn off, she started glowing, like Bumblebee said and went off so that the explosion didn't take the rest of us out too. But see, Starfire isn't like the rest of the Tamaranians. She can control the energy inside and make them into star bolts. Even though she fully expected to die, she created a massive one and managed to save herself."

"They do say that cats have nine lives," Bruce commented.

Dick looked at him sideways. "I suppose you'd know."

Bruce cuffed him. "Whelp." He was silent for a moment. "She killed a lot more than two, didn't she?"

"Look, Bruce," Dick protectively snapped. "She's been through enough right now. I don't need you looking down on her for something she had no control over. I know our goddamn no kill policy. Do you think this is easy for me? Do you think this is easy for her? She was their slave for three years, one of them tried to rape her at fourteen, they killed her brother and then they force fed her this drug. It was either destroy or submit and personally I'm glad she didn't submit."

Bruce simply looked at him, his expression hard.

"She's a fucking warrior. What she did is acceptable in her culture, it's celebrated. Galfore told me they are going to be singing her praises for generations to come. Koriand'r, the savior of Tamaran, granddaughter of the great Guand'r. And she's hurting so bad cause she knows Earth heroes don't kill, something we've ingrained into her. She thought her friends would turn from her, she thought I would turn from her. She could have allowed that explosion kill her, but she didn't, she chose to stay, chose to try and deal with what she did. She's the bravest, kindest, strongest person I've ever met. We know she had no control over her actions. I don't care what she did, Raven doesn't care and Beast Boy doesn't care. That's all that matters."

Bruce continued to stare.

"Don't make me choose. Please Dad, let it go."

Bruce was silent for a long moment, before he nodded sharply. "The 'dad' card. All right, fine, I won't delve into it any more. It's no wonder you didn't call me. Just… if you think Starfire needs it, I know a few good psychiatrists."

Dick scoffed. "Dated more like."

Bruce stared at him. "When did you become so sassy?"

"I learned from the best."

Bruce waved his hand dismissively. "The offer applies to you too."

"Don't need it."

"You're hiding behind your worry for her, sooner or later you're going to have to deal with what happened too."

"Don't. Need. It." Dick repeated through clenched teeth.

Bruce frowned. "Whatever, now bugger off. I have work to do." He pulled on his cowl once more and Dick knew he was all business again. His father was a strange man, he loved to joke around and have fun, but only when the cowl was off. When it was on, he was this whole other person, all business and discipline and keeping your head in the game. And the scary thing was, Kori had begun to see the same personality traits arising in him.

He sighed and pushed himself off the console he was leaning against, heading for the stairs.

"Dick," Batman called after him and Dick paused at the foot of the stairs. "I'm glad she's okay."

Dick's hand clenched on the rail of the stairs. He wanted to scream that Starfire was not okay. She wasn't eating, she wasn't sleeping and she had these terrible nightmares when she did. She hadn't flown. She couldn't get to her orange cliffs in her mind by herself. She was retreating further and further behind this wall that he couldn't reach past and she was either unable or unwilling to breech it herself. He wanted to scream that the others were blind, they couldn't see her slipping away from them. They couldn't see the fake-ness behind her smile; they couldn't hear the soft tremble in her laughter.

But this pretend Starfire she presented didn't fool him. Not one bit. But she'd tried, she'd allowed him to make love with her and he had seen the vagueness in her eyes and it had hurt. He wanted to scream that he was better at wearing masks than she was and he would never let her know how much she had hurt him with that one action. Hurt so bad that he'd wanted to scream and never stop. He wanted his Starfire back and he would fight tooth and nail to see her return, if only he knew how.

But he couldn't say these things to his father. Because he knew if he started, so would the tears and a part of him remembered one of the first lessons that Bruce had taught him.

So he said the only thing he could, the only acceptable answer for the son of Bruce Wayne. "Me too," he mumbled and continued up the stairs.

TTTTT

Dick lay on his stomach on his bed, kicking the pillow with his feet while he waited for Kori. He'd already showered and dressed in his pajamas for bed and, knowing that Kori liked to take that little bit longer in her bedtime routine, decided to read for a while.

They'd had an uneventful dinner with Bruce and the Titans had been given an outline of which Charity events they would be expected to attend. Garfield had been quite thrilled to discover that there was an Animal Rights event scheduled.

There was a soft click as a door opened. "Well, it's about-" Dick playfully began until he looked up. "-time…" he trailed off.

"I'm sorry," a soft voice said. "If I'd know you were expecting me I would've been a lot quicker."

Dick got to his feet, staring at the person at the door in shock. "Babs, what are you doing here? Not that it isn't great to see you and all, but-" he flicked his eyes toward the hidden door, "you probably shouldn't be here."

Barbara flicked her red hair over her shoulder, pulling off her white coat and placing it on the nearest sofa. She wore a white shirt and blue tailored pants beneath the coat. "Like Bruce would really give us time for a proper greeting, we'd be straight into training." She looked him up and down and smiled. "You've gotten cuter, Dick, I missed you. You don't call, you don't write, what's a girl to do?"

"And you think coming into my room at night is the answer? That door was locked." His narrowed his eyes at her, following her every movement closely as she walked through the room toward him.

"And it's locked again. He did teach us how to pick locks, I don't know why you bothered."

Dick smothered a groan. He didn't need this right now, not when Kori was going to be here any moment. "What do you want, Babs?"

She sidled up to him. "Does a girl need an excuse to visit her boyfriend?"

Dick sighed. "We're no longer dating remember? You're the one who said long distance relationships never work."

"We never, really, broke up, you know. Besides, we can always try harder." She grabbed him behind the neck and pulled him in for a kiss. He was immobilized in shock for a moment as her lips touched his before he grabbed her shoulders and shoved her away.

Barbara stumbled backward, a surprised look on her face.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing?" he snarled angrily. "You are not my girlfriend. You haven't been for a very long time. And I don't know where you got the idea you could waltz in here and try and make things work between us now. You're too late. I have a fiancée."

Barbara went red with anger and embarrassment. "What? And when exactly were you planning on telling me this?"

"You haven't exactly been an easy person to get hold of either, Babs. Besides, it's none of your business anymore."

She looked flabbergasted. "But... you and I belong together. Batgirl and Robin. We're a team."

"I have a team. And I'm no longer Robin. You were the one who decided to end it. This is crap, Babs. You can't come in here and expect things to be the same."

"I don't expect things to be the same," she snapped at him. "But does this... floozy know all your deepest darkest secrets like I do? Does she know what you do in the dark? Does she know who you are when you put on the mask? Face it, Dick, we've all been there, civilians never understand-"

Dick clenched his hands into fists. "Get out of my room."

"All right, fine." She stalked back across the room and picked up her coat. "But when this girl finds out, when this girl can't handle the truth, don't come crying to me."

"Wasn't planning on it."

Barbara slammed the door behind her and Dick ran a hand through his hair. "Fuck."

He glanced up at the secret passageway, glad that Kori hadn't decided to come then, when a terrifying thought ran through him. He scrambled across the room, finding that the door was already open a crack. He slipped his fingers through, sliding the door open.

Kori stood there looking very vulnerable in her pink pajamas.

"Star," he breathed and she launched herself at him, wrapping her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist. The secret passageway opened up directly opposite the bed. There was no way that she hadn't seen and heard everything that had been going on in the room. "Oh Star, I'm so sorry." He put his hands behind her legs to carry her weight and took her over to the bed. He lay her down gently, bending over her since she hadn't let go of his neck or waist. "Star?"

"I am sorry, Richard," she said in a small voice, dropping her head to the pillow. "I did not mean to do the dropping of the eaves."

Dick's breath hitched. "You're not upset?"

"Not with you," she gave him a sad smile and shook her head. "I am very angry at her for presuming that you would still feel for her. I have been in your mind, seen her in your dreams. I know exactly how you feel about her. I do not feel threatened. I am saddened for you, as you wished to remember her fondly."

Dick frowned. "Last time a girl took an interest in me, you attacked her."

Kori paled. "You would prefer that I attack her like I did Kitten?"

Yes… yes he would have preferred that, because that would mean his Starfire was coming back, but he couldn't tell her that. "Well, no. But… I'm sorry I never told you about her. I should have, right from the beginning. I didn't realise I had dreams about her. I don't love her, I love you."

"You would not have gone through the xhandal if you did not love me. Too much has happened to me recently to be upset over something simple like this." She sighed and wiggled underneath him. "I suspect I will be angrier at her in the morning. I am tired, can we not do the making out and sleep?"

He gave her a sad smile and lowered himself onto her. "Sure, Star, whatever you say."

TTTTT

A green lizard snuck under the door to Garfield's room before scurrying along the edge where the floor joined the walls. He paused to blink up and down the empty corridor before slipping under Rachel's door.

"About time," the half-demon muttered from where she was curled up on the sofa, a cup of hot chocolate nestled in her hands. She floated the book she had been reading over to the bedside table.

"Sorry," Garfield said as he shifted back to normal, his skin flickering from green to tan. He fixed his green dressing gown so that it sat correctly, retying the knot around his waist. "Cy was bugging me. Couldn't get away."

Rachel shrugged and pointed her head to another mug that sat beside her on a coffee table. "That's for you."

"Thanks," he said, picking it up, giving her a small kiss on the forehead and slouching down beside her.

She shifted on the sofa, turning around so that instead of leaning on the arm, her head was resting against his chest; her hands still curled around the mug.

He grinned and draped an arm over her, before he raised an eyebrow. "Pink bunny rabbit slippers?"

She grunted. "It's Dick's idea of a joke. Besides, my feet were cold."

He laughed. "I think they look great. I can't believe we're finally back here. We all needed a holiday."

Rachel made a small noise of agreement and took a sip of her hot chocolate. "It's too cold here."

"That's why it's called snuggle weather Rae," Garfield said with a devilish grin, before it slipped from him mouth. "Um, Rae… I've been meaning to ask you something."

"Yeah?"

"This… um… sleeping in the same bed thing… its really great and all and I don't know how I would have gotten through all this stuff that's happened without it… but… well… I was just wondering-"

"I'm not having sex with you, Garfield," she snapped, lifting her head off his chest to glare at him.

"No!" he cried hastily. "That's not what I meant! Honest!"

She narrowed her eyes as she regarded him.

"I was just wondering… well… um… I know you like to have your private space and all and I'm messy, but if I promise not to touch your stuff and keep my mess contained to my room, do you think that maybe… um…" He pulled on his ears, as he looked at Rachel's impassive face. "When we get back to the tower… we could… um… like, keep doing it?"

She raised an eyebrow at him. "You know, when you pull on your ears when you're wearing that ring, it's like you're yanking on thin air."

He blinked in surprise and released his ears. That wasn't the response he was looking for.

She gave him a small smile and lay her head back on his chest. "Yeah, we can keep doing it."

A smile bounced into life on his face. "Really?"

"To be honest, I don't think I can sleep without hearing you snore."

TTTTT

Kori woke to the sound of a shower running.

A sliver of light escaped the slightly open bathroom door.

She frowned, looking at the still darkened windows, before she glanced at the digital clock on Dick's side of the bed. The green light read 2.31.

Moving aside the blankets, she got out of bed and approached the bathroom door. Why did he feel the need to shower so late at night?

She peered through the sliver, catching sight of Dick in the shower. He was sitting on the floor in the corner of the shower, his head resting back against the wall, his eyes closed. His knees were bent before him and he was resting his elbows on them, his hands spread under the spray of the water as he caught the droplets.

She heard a sniffle over the sound of the running water and saw his hand move to brush away a streak of water that had appeared on his face. Another streak of water appeared on his other cheek and he moved his hand to wipe that one away too.

His chest heaved in a sigh and he blinked open red eyes, staring up at the roof for a moment before he dragged himself up.

Kori bolted back to the bed and dived under the covers, her heart breaking. He'd been crying. That Barbara had made him cry. Why hadn't he let her know how much Barbara had hurt him?

She shut her eyes and feigned sleep as he came out of the bathroom. He gave a sad sigh and snapped off the light before crawling back into bed with her. She waited for his arms to come around her but they never did.

"Oh, Star, where have you gone?" he whispered into the darkness.

Kori's eyes snapped open in fright. He hadn't been crying over Barbara. He'd been crying over her! But why? She hadn't gone anywhere, she was still right here. This is what he wanted, wasn't it? This is what he'd said when he was hugging Raven, that he wanted his Star back and she'd tried to give him what he wanted.

Oh X'hal, surely he didn't know, surely he didn't see. She'd tried so hard to appear as though she was recovering. But she should have known that what she'd done would affect him, would hurt him.

Perhaps this was why the fire inside him for her had disappeared. Why he would never kiss her with a passion, or place his hands on her breasts. Maybe she was losing him or maybe she was forcing him away. What if he knew what she had done and did not like it, but could not bring himself to break from her? Or worse, he was just waiting for the right moment to break from her.

What if the only reason he was still with her was because he was waiting and hoping for the warrior to return? Because he loved that part of her more? How long was he prepared to wait for something that was never coming back? Something that she could no longer even feel.

Perhaps it would be easier on her friends if she just let him go. If she left the Titans and never came back. They could get on with their lives and he would find someone else to love, someone who could give him everything he'd always wanted. He would hurt for a while, yes, but he was strong. He could recover.

She waited until his breathing deepened and he fell asleep before she slipped from the bed and sat by the window, watching the snowfall until morning came.