I get a bad rap. An unfair one, I think.
People get told I'm crazy, as if crazy is some black and white thing you can just define instead of a nebulous, intangible ball of string you need someone like me to untangle… anyway, people get told I'm crazy and they think Looney Tunes.
That's just not true. I can be as calm, as rational, as patient as the next guy… provided the next guy can become sexually aroused by depictions of ax murder.
So, whatever my faults are, at least give me some credit. I can wait just as long as any sane man. Longer. Sanity has to strive to survive. Madness is the natural state to which all mankind can gleefully descend. It is, in the end, the only true survival mechanism in existence.
15. Stargazing
Tim pulled Cass away before she could do any more damage. "That's enough!" he yelled, heedless of the fact that she could take him apart in a few seconds.
"It's okay, Tim," Steph said, getting up and wincing as she touched the bruise Cass had left on her. "She's just doing her job. Training us to work as a unit."
"You'll rip your stitches," Tim insisted.
The scar on the right side of Steph's face, extending from temple to chin, was the actual point where the red-hot blade had been in direct contact with skin. It was all that was left of the burn scars after months of surgical repair work. The doctors had said that one more surgery would be required to remove it completely, but for now they were still waiting for the scar tissue to clear or form or some such thing. Tim figured Steph was determined to get rid of Arkham before she got rid of the scar.
Steph pushed a lock of sweat-dampened hair out of her eyes. "Alfie can patch me up. C'mon, let's do this. One more."
Tim let go of Cass. "You don't have to be so rough on her."
Cass brought up her escrima sticks. "I care too much not to," she said, fixing Tim with a stare he could've sworn was hostile.
Robin and Batgirl sparred with each other and Tim tried his best not to worry.
Tomorrow, he and Steph would perform their "final exam."
Trying to take down Cass together.
The air of the satellite Batcave was damp and humid, the heat from the pounding summer sun running down into the cavern like rainwater. They were in the training area, the largest area of the cave save for the garage which bordered on the abandoned subway tunnel used as an entrance. In contrast to the Batcave under Wayne Manor, Cass' cave was tight and claustrophobic. In places you had to crouch down to get where you were going.
"This is going to hurt," Tim warned.
"Just get it over with," Steph replied.
Working as efficiently as Alfred had taught him, Tim quickly tightened one of the loosened stitches. Steph winced and then sighed in relief when he finished. Drake wiped his bloodied fingers off on his shirt.
"Your mother," Steph said, lying back on top of the holographic projector she had been sitting on, "must hate that shirt. You always bring it home with sweat, blood, bat guano…"
"If it offends you so much, I could get rid of it…"
Steph sat up to fix Tim with a stare. "Make it so."
Peeling off his shirt, Tim lay down next to Steph. The metal of the projector made a little gasp of protest settling in under the new weight, but held firm. They sat silently for a minute, staring up at the stalactites.
"Seems this has been our life for as long as I can remember," Steph mused. "The fear, the waiting, the endless preparation. Like we've got the Sword of Damascus hanging over our head."
"Damocles," Tim gently corrected.
"I just wish we could have one night where we didn't have to worry about who's going to be Robin or whether the surgery will work or if we're going to die or a million other things. Just… one… night…" She rolled over to face Tim.
"I made something for you."
Tim rolled to the side and began punching commands into the switchboard on the side of the projector.
"Tim…?"
"Just lie back down and wait a minute… okay, there!"
The projector buzzed to life and suddenly a glittering starscape appeared above them. Tim lay back down next to Steph as she gazed in wonder at the simulated night sky.
"I've… I've never seen it like this before. Without the clouds or the… the pollution…" Steph said, wonderment choking her voice.
"As a kid, I always loved the idea that wherever you went, the same stars were above you. No matter how far apart friends or family were, the night sky was still the same. No matter what happens, we'll still have the stars."
"Tim?"
"Yeah?"
Steph rolled over and rested her head on Tim's chest. "Would it really be so bad if we made love? Tonight, right now, under the stars… or as close to it as we can get in Gotham? I know the scar is distracting."
"It's not about the scar, Steph," Tim said, pulling off Steph's wig. She'd grown out her natural hair into a short pageboy do in the last few months and he ran his fingers through it affectionately. "It's about the fact that we don't need to. We're still going to be here after we bring Arkham in."
"But Tim, what if we…"
"Neither of us. Are going. To die. Now, do you trust me?"
Steph kissed his chest. "I trust you. Do me a favor, though."
"Anything."
"Don't have any nightmares tonight."
It was a remarkably easy request to accommodate, considering Tim never had any nightmares when he was in Steph's arms. Or wouldn't have, if Cass hadn't chosen that moment to step out of the elevator. Tim gave her a hairy eyeball as she walked to the computer console, Steph abstaining with an amused expression.
"Don't mind me," Cass said as she sat down.
The computer turned on and she pressed an icon on the touch screen. "The quick brown fox ran after the lazy dog," a computerized voice enunciated, which bore a remarkable resemblance to Oracle's voice. Apparently, Tim mused, Barbara had developed a Majel Roddenberry complex.
"Ummm… you mind… giving us a little privacy?" Tim asked as Steph snickered endlessly.
"It is my cave," Cass pointed out, typing in a series of commands on the keyboard. The computer read her writing.
"Da quik brwn fox ranne after da laze dawg."
Cass scowled.
"Tim, give her some help," Steph said.
"What? Why me?"
"It is her cave."
"Ugh."
Tim got up and Steph jumped on his back, riding piggyback on him as he went to help Cass with her literary lessons.
There should be a law, Tim thought, about having to hold down your girlfriend's leg while she stretched and then not being able to have sex with her.
"So," Steph asked, enjoying Tim's consternation about watching the muscles of her thighs work under the skin, "have you told your dad that, in a very short amount of time, you're going to be going about fighting a psychotic killer?"
"Have you told your mother?"
"…touché."
Steph stretched forward to touch the toes of the foot Tim was holding, giving him a look down her shirt.
"Limber," Tim said.
"I can't believe I never thought of doing this back when I was trying to snag you."
"Back when?"
"Smartass."
That's when they noticed Cass standing before them. She was stripped to her exercise clothes, a tight gi that still had bloodstains on it from their last exercise. Tim was stripped to the waist and Steph wore her Robin suit, albeit unbuttoned and with most of the armor padding taken off for ease of movement.
Cass tossed them two sets of escrima sticks. Tim caught them and handed one pair to Steph, who whirled them in her hands like a drummer in a rock band.
"Ready?" Cass asked.
"No," Steph said.
"She's kidding. Let's go!"
It was a train wreck.
Tim waded in, about to try to get at Cass' weaknesses and wear her down like a boxer in a prizefight, when Steph charged in, sticks swinging. Cass fended her off with the escrima stick in one hand while blocking Tim's attacks with the one in the other. In short order, Cass had tricked Tim into knocking Steph down with an accidental blow to the head and retaliated with a series of shots to Tim's gut, dropping him to the floor, breathless.
"I think," Tim said, the side of his face mashed against the exercise mat, "that she goes easier on you."
Steph stared at Tim. "I'd really like, sometime, for you to explain your concept of 'easier'. I do not think it approaches our Earth definition of the word."
16. Ain't We A Pair?
Tim sat down on an empty crate and breathed in, chest hitching up and down like he was undergoing an asthma attack. Steph laid down on her back and ignored the swelling where Tim hit her.
"Sorry about that," Tim said, and worried about the part of him that wasn't.
"S'okay." She stood up, hovering in the median distance of his eyesight like a wraith. "We keep getting in each other's way. Maybe it's not supposed to be like this. Maybe it just isn't meant to work out…"
"Things aren't meant to be anything but what they are." Tim stood up too, a kind of burning in his eyes that Steph couldn't tell and neither could he. "If they don't work out, it's because we don't make them work out. Come here." Steph did, slowly, and Tim put his arms around her. "I need this. Don't you?"
Steph buried her face in his chest and shook her head. "I used to think so, but I don't." She pulled away, leaving tearstains on his torso. "But I want this."
"Then maybe it's time we stop trying to control each other. My style's more precise, more tactical, more planned, more finesse. Yours is more street, more improvisational, more… angry."
"I've got more to be angry about."
"So instead of trying to fit into one style, why don't we play to our strengths?"
Steph nodded. "We stick to what we each do best."
Tim came in, escrima sticks whirling like a hurricane. Cass switched both her sticks to one hand, doubling the strength, and blocked his attacks, one hand furiously windmilling as he mercilessly advanced on her. Cass had just managed to dispatch him with a knife-hand to the throat when Steph moved in, escrima sticks swinging like two baseball bats, one high, one low. Cass blocked the first one, aimed at her head, but the second one slipped through and slammed her in the ribs, causing her to slide backwards on her heels.
That's when Tim got an idea. He threw both of his sticks to Steph, who grabbed them, duplicating Cass' doubling up, and went wild. Cass switched to akimbo sticks, but the first swing she blocked nearly knocked the club out of her hand. Each blow was packed with rage and energy, battering away at her defenses like a storm against the shore.
When Tim stepped in with a hurricane kick that sent Cass to the ground, it was all over. Steph tossed one handful of escrima sticks over her shoulder to Tim, who twisted them in his hands like Keith Moon.
Cass held out her hand and Steph helped her up.
"We're done. There is nothing more you can learn."
Tim and Steph watched her leave. "I'm gonna take that as a compliment."
17. Reasons
It hurt inside his head.
Okay, so it could be a headache, but it isn't.
One moment Tim would be looking at Steph and thinking about how lovely her smile is, the next he would be thinking about how she would look if a train ran over her and it wasn't fair, the thoughts weren't his…
If he could kill something. Just once. Then it would be better. Then the voices would go away… or at least he would be able to hear them clearly.
Well, if he had to kill someone to get the voices out of his head, it might as well be Arkham.
Tim picked at his food. Steamed broccoli and pork chops. Even death row inmates got better last meals. His mother and father were talking about work and he felt like yelling at them or kicking something over.
God, he missed Steph.
"Tim, are you alright? You look a little depressed," Dana said.
Tim faked a smile. He's gotten good at it. "It's nothing.
Arkham had to die because he laughed.
While he cut into Stephanie's cheek with that knife so hot it set her face on fire, he'd laughed. And he would've cut lower if Barbara hadn't stopped him.
No one got to do that to Stephanie Brown the Girl Wonder. No one.
Mrs. Brown knocked on the door to her daughter's room. It used to have all manner of wacky "keep out" type signs, but those seemed to have disappeared in the last few months.
"Come in!" Stephanie called from inside.
Crystal Brown opened the door and saw Steph sitting on her bed, headphones on, listening to her old Walkman.
"Steph, you didn't come down for dinner."
"Wasn't hungry."
"So… you've been up here all this time? Listening to your CDs?"
Steph smiled. "It just occurred to me that I really like this music and I haven't had time to listen to it in a while." She held up a CD jewel case, Chopin: The Piano Works. "You know, I wanted to be a concert pianist before I got… sidetracked."
"I remember, dear."
Steph stood up and pulled a small envelope from her back pocket, looking like she was trying very hard not to cry. "You know, if something… bad, ever happened to me… I'd like you to give this to my baby… God, I don't even know if it's a boy or a girl…"
Crystal hugged her. "I promise. This is about the riot, isn't it? You have to go help…"
"What riot?"
"It's all over the news. The inmates in Arkham are rioting, trying to break loose. It's like they've gone crazy all at once…"
18. Welcome Home
The old Arkham Asylum still clung to life, barely. The massive iron gates were rusted, the windows were boarded up, but unlike all the other derelict buildings nearby, it was untouched by graffiti.
Tim and Steph, dressed in their Robin costumes, stood outside the gates, Tim carrying a duffel bag full of explosives.
"He's out in the city. Stirring up his old friends. If we don't shut him down at the source…"
"He knows we're coming to kill him," Steph said. "He's been waiting for us all this time and now he's upping the stakes. Bastard."
"We get inside, you watch my back while I plant the explosives. Like Anita said, as soon as the place burns down, Arkham goes bye-bye."
"You'll plant the explosives?"
"I've received training in demolitions."
"Why didn't I get to learn how to blow things up?" Steph got a look from Tim. "Oh, right." She paused. "We are way too young for this, aren't we?"
"No. We aren't."
Tim clutched the bag to his chest tightly as they entered. There was a thin layer of dust over everything and debris from the ancient explosion was scattered everywhere. Passing under a reception sign that had halfway collapsed, they entered the reception area. Behind security fencing, the guard's station had been stripped of all electronics. It smelled slightly of ammonia and there was a bloodstain on the ceiling.
"We need to set these in the foundation or people could get hurt in the blast," Tim said.
"I suppose a napalm strike is out of the question?"
"Yeah, napalm's out of the question."
The doorway to the subbasement creaked as they opened it and Steph took a deep breath to steady her heart. The narrow stairwell was the original house, not the modern institution overlay that could've doubled for a high school. The walls were thick bricks and the stairs were wooden, rotting under their steps. Steph cleared a cobweb out of her hair, following in Tim's footprints.
Coming to the bottom of the steps, Tim quickly jimmied the lock and stepped inside. Again, a turn-of-the-century wooden hallway. The shadowy imprint of carpets still remained on the floor, and wallpaper still clung to the now-stripped-bare walls in some places.
Arkham was standing at the end of the hallway, lighter in one hand, knife in the other, running the flame over the blade. "Hello there. I've warmed things up for you. Welcome home, kiddies."
Tim stampeded forward, drawing his bo staff. "Stay behind me, Steph!"
Steph silently cursed his typical macho bullcrap when Tim suddenly came to a stop a few feet from Arkham. "What are you waiting for? Hit him!"
"Timothy, hand me the explosives."
Tim held out the duffel bag, which Arkham gently took from him.
"Now," Arkham said, flipping the knife out to catch it by the blade and offering it up to Tim. "Kill your girlfriend."
Tim took the knife and turned around, fire in his eyes.