The line was long at the checkpoint and Tim was reminded of the time he, Ives, and Callie had taken a road trip to Mexico. Only security had been nowhere near that tight. There was a thirty-foot-tall fence around the city, the top decorated with festive barb wire, and Tim could see generator houses stretching into the horizon, providing power to electrify the fence.
Bludhaven had changed a lot since the last time Tim had been there.
Then again, he'd changed a lot too, so maybe they were even.
As he got closer and closer to the checkpoint, Tim found himself wondering if he really had it in him to be a killer. He'd been trying to avoid the question, but the closer he got to Bludhaven the more fixed it became in his mind. On the air trip it had been a hum, on the bus ride a klaxon, and now it was a burst of machine-gun fire in his ear. Kill Jason to bring back Cass. Wasn't an easy question. Whenever someone talked about revenge in movies, the stock answer was always "It won't bring them back." But this time it really would.
Not that Jason had anything to do with her death. That might make it easier. Maybe.
He was now third in line. Still time to turn back, run away, get on with his life, forget the whole thing and pick up the pieces of his life…
And what?
Second in line.
If he could go back in time and kill Black Mask before that monster got his hands on Steph, would he do it? Could he do it?
As Tim stepped up to the checkpoint, he realized the answer was yes. The answer had always been yes. He'd do it and he wouldn't think twice.
His stomach hurt all of a sudden.
He reached the checkpoint and held up his ID to the National Guardsman on duty. It wasn't that hard for him to hack his way to the top of the list of aid workers, not after borrowing some power from Oracle's computers. Using his own name was easier than making up a new identity. It was also another of those Robin/Tim Drake convergences he had used to be so phobic about avoiding, but back then he had possessed a life worth keeping secret.
The Way It Was
"This is stupid," Robin says, keeping his eyes very closely fixed on the radar screen.
"What? Batman's finally letting you use the Batplane and you need to get some good piloting experience." In the backseat, Steph crosses her legs and picks a piece of lint off her shoulder. "Besides, you said we should visit Nightwing more often."
"Bludhaven isn't like Gotham. It's more dangerous."
"Dangerous schmangerous. They don't have the Joker or the Penguin or… or… Orca, do they?"
Robin can't resist taking his eyes off the controls for a second. "Orca? That's the best you can come up with?"
The Batplane suddenly dips a bit, engines sputtering before coming back to full efficiency.
"What happened?" Steph demands, checking around for a parachute and pulling on her mask even though there was no one to see her face at thirty-five-thousand feet up (not that this stopped Tim from keeping his mask on).
"I think a bird got sucked into the turbines?" Robin answers, switching power to one of the auxiliary turbines to compensate.
Steph instantly covers her already-masked mouth with two gloved hands. "Oh my God! Is it dead?"
"Unless it's a Kryptonian bird, I think that's a pretty safe bet."
"Ooooh," Steph slumps her head against the canopy. "That's horrible! That's awful! We're bird-killers!"
"It's just a bird, Steph."
Steph continues looking out the cockpit despondently. "Bird's just minding its own business until us big stinky humans come into its airspace and run it down. Poor little guy…"
The Way It Is Now
Tim salved his conscience by pitching in with some of the relief efforts. It's taken a year, but a third of the city has been reclaimed, scrubbed of the lingering radiation left behind by the Teen Titans' abbreviated clean-up effort and cleared of rubble. Bodies rotting in the streets for months on end had made the city a vacation spot for millions of pathogens, so disease control is first priority.
Tim only knows first aid and what little he picked up from watching Leslie work, but it's enough to get by. He hands out shots until they run out of syringes and there's so many people remaining that Tim understands the scandal a few months back about reusing needles. So what if a few people catch an STD now if they stop oozing fluids out of open sores?
That night, Drake slipped under the protective fence and into the city proper. Reaffirming the entire Batfamily's faith in inhumanity, there are some who's best interest was to keep Bludhaven toxic. The Society made billions pandering to the wasteland, smuggling out those who could afford to pay (and thus unleashing the soup of new contagions Chemo had kickstarted into the general public) or those who could "work off" their debt in post-modern slavery, as well as smuggling in contraband and price-gorging "luxury items" like food and water. The UN pitched in some, but it was a joke of political correctness. They handed out more condoms than they did rations.
In the two-thirds left to be reclaimed, the only law was the law of the jungle. Warlords carved up neighborhoods, still caught up in a civil war spawned by the power vacuum Blockbuster's death had left. Tim knew one of the warlords well, if only be reputation. Tarantula had been awaiting transfer to a federal prison when Chemo hit. Since then, she'd carved out a sizable following as "the Prophet of the Nightwing." It made Tim want to laugh and cry at the same time.
Tarantula and Jason shared something of the same M.O. Tarantula had banded together a gang during the old Gotham underworld war for protection. Jason had done much the same from what Bruce's files had said. He'd started up his own criminal consortium, not as "toxic" as those he claimed to oppose, and slaughtered everyone who wouldn't join him or pay protection money or follow his rules. After Vesper Fairchild's death, Tim had worried that Bruce was going too far into Batman. Looking at Jason now, Tim knew he didn't know the meaning of "too far." Considering Jason's moonlighting as Nightwing in New York (Nightwing's files on the incident were as cryptic as Dick himself had become. Tim wished Nightwing was back with the Titans. Being with the Outsiders had changed him.), it only made sense for him to use his newfound "credibility" to link up with Tarantula, if Oracle's data-mining showing him to be in Bludhaven could be believed.
It was thin, practically anorexic, but it was all Tim had to go on. He wanted Jason to find him, but JT would be suspicious if Tim made it too easy. That's where his old friend in the false bottom of his suitcase came in…
The Way Things Were
Steph is the one stepping out of the shower, but Cass' short hair is wet. Both of their faces are flushed and Tim knew that if he checked Cass' body, he would find bite marks. He knows this because he has bite marks from last night. Not hard enough to draw blood, just a soft nibble.
"Tim, hey!" Steph says with such brightness it's impossible to tell she was eating out her girlfriend a minute ago. "Give me a minute to get ready and we'll be on our way."
She steps into her room to get dressed, leaving Cass and Tim alone. Tim wonders if this is an attempt to make them mend fences and almost laughs at the thought. The two stare at each other warily. Either could force Steph to make a decision, to stop the unconventional ménage ala trois and pick one of them, but both are too afraid of who she'll pick. They're both mature for their age, too damn mature to veer into "the doggone girl is mine" territory. So they start a little small talk that is in reality quite large talk. They converse almost entirely in subtext these days.
"Leg still bothering you?" Tim inquires politely. You really think you can satisfy her, little girl? Tim always goes straight to the visceral in matters of sex. He learned it from Dick.
"Other one works fine." If I couldn't, why would she come to me? Then Cass makes a little smile that says and if you could, why would she come to me?
"I busted up my knee once, back on one of me and Steph's 'adventure dates.' Hurt like hell." I saw her first.
"Important thing is to let it heal." Don't make this harder than it has to be.
"That can be hard sometimes. It's easy to open up old wounds." It would be a lot easier if you would stop shoving your tongue up my girlfriend.
"That's a necessary risk in our line of work." You don't like it? Tough.
"You're right. But if it hurts too much, sometimes it's best to just walk way." When I want her, I'll take her.
"Sometimes it is." Try it.
Then Steph steps out of her room dressed to the nines and Cass and Tim momentarily forget the secret-that-is-not-a-secret-but-must-rem ain-a-secret to stare at the woman they both love.
"Well, c'mon Tim, we outie. See you later Steph."
As Tim walks out the door with her, leaving Cass in the darkness, both the vigilantes are thinking the same thing. If only I didn't love her so much.
The Way Things Are Now
Tim walked straight into Tarantula's territory and didn't look back.
He'd never been a master of disguise, not since the heyday of "Mr. Sarcastic," but he'd picked up a few make-up tips from Alfred and he was reasonably sure that if he happened to run into a fellow Brentwood inmate, he would escape recognition. Hopefully.
The opium den used to be a bar, Hogan's Alley. Now, judging by the two bruisers at the door, it was a gang hive. One of Jason's big no-nos was dealing to kids. Let's see who's really running the show…
Tim stepped towards the door and the bruisers ran together like a set of double doors in fifty big and tall. "Beat it, kid."
"My money's as good as anyone else's."
"No kids allowed," the other goon helpfully chimed in.
Tim smiled. This called for another "Robin/Tim Drake convergence."
Jason Todd lay in bed and wondered if what he was doing was wrong.
The sex probably wasn't wrong. Pretending to be Nightwing, that was give or take. The killing he was a little concerned about, though.
He'd really only killed bad people, people he was absolutely sure were dirty. No collateral damage, no innocent bystanders, none of what Batman was worried about.
But lately, for no real reason, he'd taken to using a crowbar to bash their brains in. He used to do it from a distance, with guns and explosives, but now he got close enough to feel their blood splatter on him, to smell their fear. Did that make him crazy?
He'd named the crowbar Bruce. He didn't know why.
Sometimes, when he was dreaming, memories drifted through. Maybe memories of the time with Talia before he went in the Pit, maybe not. He remembered… pain. And fire. And more pain. And over and over again, his not-memories drilled the same lesson in his head.
There was something terribly wrong with the world and he was the only one who could fix it.
"What's wrong, querido?" Catalina asked. Jason smiled and ran the pads of two fingers up her spine. She never talked about her past and she never asked about his, which was probably why they were lovers now. All he knew was that she used to be Dickie-wing's woman and now she was his. Cool beans.
"Bad dreams. Bad memories. Trying to decide what's worse."
"Memories," Catalina said, rubbing his chest and smiling in that uniquely melancholy way that wasn't quite happy but that was quite real, which was why she only did it for him. "Dreams fade away over time."
Jason tried to think back to when he and Bruce had been best friends, fighting the good fight, doing the right thing and never doubting the righteousness of their cause.
"So do memories."
The Way It Used To Be
Jason tried really hard to remember who was asleep in the bed next to him.
It was one of the difficulties of adapting to "respectable" life. On the streets, a quick hump on a mattress on the floor and you were done. But in Wayne manor, it was all about relationships and shit like that. He could just duck out, that would be one way to avoid it, but since she was staying here too, inevitably she would find him and then he'd have to explain both why he had left and why he couldn't remember her name.
Julia Remarque. That was it. Alfie's daughter. Jason was pretty sure that if Alfred caught them together, if he hadn't already with his damn omnipresent… Britishness… thing, he'd slip arsenic into Jason's tea. Which was yet another reason not to drink tea, but…
"What are you thinking about?" Julie asked in that Oxford accent of hers.
"Just you, dear," Jason said, smiling, but not in the way he did on the street. That, only Bruce saw. Sometimes.
The Way It Has To Be
Tim didn't partake of any of the hookahs in the Alley, but the incense hanging overhead was probably enough to get enough of a buzz off of if he wasn't using Lady Shiva's focusing technique to stay sober. Sitting down at what used to be the bar, he slipped a matchstick into his mouth and waited.
Pretty soon, the two bruisers reappeared with reinforcements, faces already swollen. One pointed at him and pretty soon he was surrounded. They were good. He hadn't even guessed that some of the guys were bouncers until they stepped forward.
"What do you want, kid, besides a quick death?"
Tim tried not to laugh at the straight line. Obviously, David Mamet wasn't contributing to their dialogue. "I'm looking for work. Paying work."
"That so?" It was the biggest one talking to him. Tim could take him, if it came to that. The trick was not letting it come to that, since that was an easy way to spook Jason deeper into hiding. "What's your name, kid?"
"Matches," Tim said, pushing his sunglasses up to further obscure his watering eyes. "Matches Malone."
The lieutenant barged into Tarantula's bedroom with an air of panic about him. He'd been a bus driver in his previous life, before Chemo. Now he was loyal enough (and unambitious enough) to serve in "Nightwing's" army. Catalina, as usual, made no attempt to conceal her nudity as Lieutenant Bus Driver delivered the news.
"Sir, ma'am, we've got a new recruit. Big-time fighter from out of town. Goes by the name of Matches…"
"Malone?" Jason interjected, sitting up.
"That's right, sir, how did you…"
"What… does he look like?"
They put a hood over him and that was okay, because he was making it up as he went along. Tim knew he should have a plan. He knew he should be having a big existential moral crisis right about now, fretting and anguishing about what Bruce would think, doubting himself, questioning himself, but the truth was he just didn't have time for it. He didn't feel angry at what he had to do or sorry about it, he just felt empty inside. More and more, his time with Bruce and Dad and… and Steph felt like a dream world, with Bludhaven the reality. He wanted Cass back. He wanted to make a difference, even if it was just to one person. He wanted to hold someone and please God, let it be real…
When they took the hood off, Jason was there, right there. Tim didn't even have time to take in his surroundings before the shocks hit. He was down on his knees, gasping for air in so little time Bruce would disown him… if Bruce were his father. Was Bruce his father? It had all seemed so clear before…
"Like that?" Jason sneered as his men tied Tim to a wooden support beam. "Chemo's gift played a little hell with the good citizens of Bludhaven's body chemistry. My friend with the electric personality is one of the results. Hector, take the boys and get yourself a beer. You've earned it."
"Hector" got the drift. He and Jason's thugs cleared out, leaving the two Robins alone. They were in a warehouse, a vast empty warehouse. Tim had a peculiar sense of déjà vu and realized with a sense of horror that Jason had died somewhere just like this.
Jason was sitting on a suitcase, studying the lines of Tim's body as if trying to reconcile it with something… or someone else. Finally, he stood up and Tim really wished he had a plan.
"We're not so different, you and I," Jason said, walking up next to Tim. Drake smelt liquor on his breath. "And I'm not talking about the Robin thing. Who knows? Something zigs where it should zagged and it could've been you out on the streets. I wonder if you'd look down your nose at me with such judgment in your eyes if you'd been through what I'd been through."
Tim acted as fearlessly as he wasn't, just like he'd been taught. "So you had it bad. You think my life's been a picnic? But that's no excuse… for what we've done."
Throwing his head back to laugh for a moment, Jason quickly brought his attention back to Tim. "Oh really? And what have we done?"
His head sagging downward to stare at his feet, Tim saw no reason not to admit the truth. "Played God. Took life and death into our own hands and made a mockery of it. We deserve this. But not those we love. Please, Jason. Go back before it's too late."
Jason's eyes fluttered closed and he took a sharp breath like he was experiencing an unpleasant memory. "Go back to what? I'm the one who doesn't have a home, remember?" He circled around Tim, pulling at the ropes half-heartedly. "You see, we're both orphans of the Bat. Abandoned, cast aside because we did what youth is supposed to do. Develop ideals that improve on our elders. You, me, Dickie-wing, even big black Bats, we've been so immersed in clearing the deadwood that we haven't been able to see the forest through the trees. What good is there in killing a few measly criminals when the politicians who create them run around unchecked?"
Suddenly Jason was right there in Tim's face, breath hot against Tim's lips. "Join me. Together we can… I don't know, but it'll be fun. I'll even help you avenge your beloved Steph."
Tim spat in his face.
"Don't even mention her name."
Jason wiped the spittle from his face and Tim saw the darkness that Bruce had spoken of growing inside Jason, only now it was full-grown and terrible to behold. Quivering with rage and hatred, Jason went to the suitcase and opened it. He withdrew a long black crowbar.
"Don't sweat it, Timmy," Jason said, making a few practice swings like a baseball player stepping up to bat, "it's just a dream. You're not really Robin, you know. You're just another emo kid who's parents don't spend enough time with him, dreaming up a little fantasy where you're the big man. In a few minutes you're going to wake up to your comfy upper-middle-class bed with parents who love you. But not just yet."
The first blow felt like every hit Tim had ever taken, every punch and kick and fall, all of them… put together. It knocked the wind out of his lungs and made him see stars bursting behind his eyelids.
The second was like the first one.
The third heralded itself with a cracking noise that could only have been his ribs.
On the fourth, Tim cried out.
The Way It Can Never Be Again
"I'm really sorry," Tim says for the millionth time as he pulls the bullet out. He had reason to be sorry, as he put it in there.
"You're really forgiven," Cass says with that irony she borrowed from Steph. Tim turns away as he throws the bullet away, because sometimes when he looks at her he sees blonde hair instead of black.
There's an elephant standing in the corner, but neither of them mention it.
"When was the first time?
"What?" The quizzical expression comes easily to Cass' face.
"You had sex. When was the first time you had sex?"
And the subtext is so thick between them that even words can't get through it.
"There was a girl." And Tim is already smiling faintly, even though he doesn't know just why. "She was… everything. So one night I ask Barbara. About boys… and girls. And she tells me. I take what I know and she's… there. And we were happy together."
"We were all happy," Tim says as he sits down next to her. "Me and Steph and you… and the girl," he quickly adds.
"And the girl," Cass confirms. "What about you… what was your first time?"
"It was… a girl. We were comparing scars, you know, bullet wounds, knife wounds, that kinda thing. She showed me her C-section scar, I showed her where Jason Todd slashed my throat. And we just kinda… merged." Tim takes in a deep breath that held in a sob. "Sometimes I wish we'd never left. That all this was just a bad dream. No. Not sometimes. All the time."
Cass reaches out and traces the scar on his throat with her customary grace, something in her touch suggesting that there was something beyond the physical, something ethereal that Tim couldn't even try to touch.
"Jason Todd," Cass whispers.
"It's alright. He won't hurt me anymore. We've come to an understanding."
The Way It Shouldn't Be
Jason reached forward and took Tim's pulse. He frowned. "You really disappoint me, you know that Drake? Grayson could've taken a dozen hits."
With his other hands, he shut Tim's eyelids for him.
The doorbell was insistent. Alfred's first thought was to how someone could breach the gates and other security systems to get to the door. Then he wondered if it was one of the boys, come back but in some dire straits. Perhaps young master Drake, finally returned from the hell he'd constructed for himself.
He was right, in a way. There was hell at the door.
"Hello, Alfred, I'd like a word with the vigilante of the house," Neron said, smiling.
Replacing the crowbar in his belt, Jason walked back to the suitcase. Inside was his special "going away present" for the pretender, right where he'd left it.
"It took me years to come back from the dead," he said to Tim's corpse, arming the explosive. "I'll give you five minutes. The same five minutes Joker gave me."
"Leave, Neron Demon-son," Alfred said in no uncertain terms. "You hold no dominion here. Or, to use the colloquialism, get thee behind me, Satan."
The other man gave off a sarcastic gasp of offense. "Me? Unwelcome? I laid the foundation for this place. How much violence has been conceived in these hallowed halls? There's practically a room set aside for me."
Suddenly, Neron seemed to look at the elderly valet with new eyes. "He really doesn't know who… what… you are, does he? Fascinating. I'd've thought you'd be taller, considering."
"What my master does or does not know will not grant you entry."
The other man shrugged. "Well, you'll have to pass on a message for me, won't you? I think that's well within the rules, even for a martinet like you. Just tell him to tune in to channel sixty-six if he wants to see Tim again. You'll do that for me, won't you?"
"I shall… but I will not like it."
Lady Shiva had always taught Tim that if a situation came around where your best bet was playing dead, it was probably best to go whole hog and die. Nonetheless, she had taught him the technique and goddamn if it hadn't come in handy.
The situation was bleak. Five minutes to get loose of his chains, defuse a bomb, and evade a psychopath.
If he was just Tim Drake, he would've given up.
But he was Robin the Boy goddamn Wonder.
From an almost safe distance, Jason stared at the warehouse. His watch told the tale for him.
00:08
00:07
It was unfortunate. Not that Tim would die, but that he would die in ignorance. Never realizing how foolheaded his surrogate father's crusade was.
00:06
00:05
That was what really got to Jason. Poor Tim would never get the chance to admit he was right. Oh well. He'd just assume that the little brat got the picture.
00:04
00:03
Resolutely, Jason began stomping on the rooftop like a kid waiting for the ball to drop on New Year's Eve.
"Two! One! KA-BOOOOOOM!" Jason spread his arms wide, heralding the explosion.
One problem.
There was no explosion.
"You arrogant little snot!" Jason roared into the empty air.
It wasn't like Alfred to ask him to take things on faith, Bruce mused. Still, he had nothing to lose by tuning in to the channel in question. It was probably just some psychology guru with some "relevant" psychobabble for the Bat…
"Tim!"
Jason's big mistake was in not frisking Tim when he had the chance. Tim still had a variety of weapons and tools on him, including the lockpick built into his watch and the radio communicator he'd used to hotwire the bomb. The communicator was the really big mistake, as Tim was lurking in the rafters, holding its twin in his hand as Jason stepped inside to see Tim gone and the bomb defused.
"Hey Jason!"
Jason looked up to see the brat wonder lurking in the rafters. That was his move, goddamnit!
"Deja voodoo," Tim said, pressing a button on his communicator.
That made the bomb go off.
Bruce could only bear to take his eyes off the television screen for a moment. "Alfred! Trace the signal, now!"
Jason staggered out of the clouds of dust kicked up by the explosion. He couldn't see Tim, couldn't see Robin, whoever the dead kid walking was… in anger that radiated out of him in huge seething waves, he screamed "You think that's enough to stop me! You don't know shit about fire! I've lived in it! I've bathed in it! What are you? Who the hell do you think you are!?"
There was a tapping noise.
There were footsteps.
And there, coming out of the swirling smoke, was Robin, his quarterstaff clicking against the ground.
"I'm the man you beat half to death and left for my friends to find bleeding on the floor. I'm the man whose throat you slit. I'm Robin the Boy Wonder."
His staff telescoped out to full length.
"And I'm going to kill you."
Bruce couldn't look away.
In one hand Jason held the kris dagger. In the other he held his crowbar. He crossed them in front of him.
"Bring it."
So Tim did.
Their weapons clashed against each other and the earth shook. A kick stung Tim's face and thunder rolled. Tim rolled the staff up his arm, deflecting a blow from the crowbar, then rocketed it up to break Jason's wrist, making him drop the dagger. It clattered to the floor and Jason gave a howl of rage that was more animal than man. The crowbar lashed out and caught Tim across the face, sending him corkscrewing through the air. Tim landed facedown and spat out blood just before Jason kneeled into him, pressing his knee into Tim's back.
The crowbar went under Tim's neck and was pulled up, slowly, steadily.
"Where do robins go when they die?" Jason sang, "they don't go to heaven where the angels fly."
"I saw an angel once."
Tim bent his knees back and wrapped his legs around Jason's throat, slamming him down to the floor. Jason choked, unable to breath past the shin plunging into his neck. So he went to the simple expenditure of bringing the crowbar down on Tim's knee. A bone bent in a way it was never meant to bend and Tim rolled away, holding his knee and crying in pain.
Jason stood up slowly, thwacking the crowbar rhythmically against his palm.
"That's how we did it back in my day! That's how we did in back on the streets!"
Tim pathetically lifted up his staff and prodded out with it, summoning up barely enough force to tap against Jason's chest. Jason laughed as the staff's tip harmlessly rebounded off his chest… before Tim pressed a hidden stud and a spike extended out of the end. With all his remaining strength, Robin drove it deep into Red Hood's heart.
"And that's how we do it now," Tim said through blood-stained teeth.
Jason looked down at the spear protruding out his chest in apparent disbelief. Then he chuckled a little, as if finally understanding a joke that had been bothering him. "Finally, you prove a worthy successor."
He slid down the length of the staff, his weight pulling him down, until he was lying next to Tim. Reaching out, he brushed a stray lock of hair back behind Tim's ear.
"See you in hell, kid… best of luck to you."
With that, Jason Todd died for the second time.
Bruce stared at the television screen for a long, long time and didn't say anything for an even longer time.
And somewhere far, far away but infinitesimally close, Neron laughed and laughed and laughed…
Tim pulled himself to his feet, supporting himself on his quarterstaff. He felt like hell and looked worse. And for a moment, he could swear he was something fluttering about Jason, something black and bird-like which nonetheless gave the impression that it had once been vital and full of life. Whatever that something was, it was snatched up by the other man, who had once more appeared with a stealth that would put Batman to shame.
"I think… that concludes our deal," Tim said simply.
"Very well."
"…well?"
The other man looked around with exaggerated surprise. "Well!?"
In no mood for games, Tim growled "You said you'd bring her back to life."
"Yes, I did. And so I have."
"Then where is she?"
"Oh, Cass? That depends. Where'd you leave her?
Tim shook with terror as the implications of four simple words hit him. Springing into action, he picked up his cell-phone and made a call. As he dialed, he looked at Neron and said something many had said before, but none had meant more.
"I don't know how I'll do it. I don't know how long it will take. But I will find a way to destroy you. I swear it."
Neron just disappeared into the darkness.
The graveyard was cold and empty. Bart had been here once before, to visit his namesake. In the day. At night, it was a different story entirely.
"There," Kon said, pointing to a headstone. It read "Cassandra Cain, Beloved Daughter" and if Tim were around to see it he would laugh through his tears.
Touching the ground, Kon immediately ripped through six feet of earth to reveal a solid mahogany coffin. Distressingly, there were no screams coming from it, no pounding on the sides, no "Get me out of here!"
Kon ripped it open anyway.
Cass should have looked serene, she should have looked peaceful. The dead should have peace. Instead, her face was contorted with fear, her hands bloody from pounding against the casket.
Bart looked down at the corpse-turned-living-girl-turned-corpse and trembled.
"I'll get Robin. He'll know what to do."
But it was already too late.
Kon looked at the corpse. They'd been close once. Not lovers, not even close, but there had been… possibilities. Now Cass didn't have any possibilities left…
But that's not necessarily so… the voice whispered.
Kon had had many reactions to the voice. He'd suppressed it, succumbed to it, repressed it, harnessed it, ignored it… but he had never given himself over to it. Never… until now.
Placing his hand between her breasts, Kon reached out with his power and repeated to himself, like a mantra, "Lungs pump air, heart pumps blood, brain sends signals, body heat rises…"
Bart reappeared with Tim as Kon continued the telekinetic CPR.
"Oh God," Tim wept, falling to his knees, too tired to even try to maintain his customary stoicism. "What have I done?"
"Help me!" Kon yelled. "We can still save her!"
"We can't save anyone. I can't save anyone."
"Will somebody do something!?" Bart begged, looking frantically between Kon and Tim. "We can't just… she can't just be dead."
"Why can't you just give up on her?" Tim asked, looking down at Kon. "We can't change things. We can't make things the way they were."
"No, we can't," Kon agreed, infusing Cass with new life despite her dead body's wishes. "But that doesn't mean we just have to accept things the way they are."
Tim shook his head. "You can't bring her back."
"Don't give up on me. And don't give up on her." Despite his words, Kon pulled away from Cass for a moment, looking up at Tim with a pleading look in his eyes. "Please."
Tim fell down into the coffin, landing on his feet in a crouch.
"Yeah!" Kon shouted, taking hold of Cass once more.
Tim took Cass' hand in his. "Come back to me." He pressed his lips against hers and dear God, they were still warm…
Cass gasped. Cass coughed. And finally, Cass lived.
"Did anyone get the number of the bus that hit me?" she asked in her best deadpan.
"We can't go back," Cassie said, heels clicking on the stone floor. "Even though Kon was declared legally innocent, the Justice League is just waiting for him to slip up."
Tim looked around the cave. It was so much like the Batcave… yet so different. It really was true. You couldn't go home again.
"She's right," Cass said. "Tim has gone rogue. We show our faces in Gotham again, we're dead. Again."
Bart stretched and leaned back against a stalagmite. "Well, I'm sound as a pound. Kept my nose clean, not in trouble with the law at all…"
"Guilty by association," Tim snorted. "They're come after you to find out where we are. That goes for the girls too.
"I guess we're all we've got left," Kon said, looking up from his latest science project.
"So, what do we call ourselves?" Bart asked.
"You three, of all people, are going to ask that?" Cassie smiled a little. "We're young… and it's just us."