A/N It's been such a long time for me to get into the habit of writing regularly, that I think I might need to do something potentially extreme to really get back into those better techniques that I started to see in myself. This chapter may not be what people are expecting after the last one, but I've had the basic outline of this entire story since before I wrote the first chapter. I still think the framework works, so I'm going forward.
Disclaimer – If I own the Teen Titans, then whales are made of cheese.
A Year In The Life – May – Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few. (Winston Churchill)
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In what can only be called the most galling of circumstances, it was cloudy. The bright sun that had been promised the day before seemed to be hiding. Robin detested days like this. It was neither sunny nor raining, neither hot nor cold, and neither summer nor winter. One of those wretched days that can't make up its mind on what kind of day it ought to be.
It was bad enough with what day it was for the weather to have ended up like this on top of everything else. It was the most frustrating of holidays for him, and like the weather it couldn't make up its mind to be good or bad.
Memorial Day had always been a touchy subject for superheroes. They would put their lives on the line, just like any of the other fallen honored on the day, but the public had less sympathy for them. They had powers, why did they deserve the same recognition as those who risked more with less?
But for Robin it was intensely more personal because he wasn't merely someone who felt slighted for the work he did, but because of the friends and allies he'd lost. Their contributions deserved mention even if it wasn't to the public at large; they deserved that solemn nod of recognition.
It had been a difficult decision when he'd been asked to speak for the annual gathering of Titans the world over. He may have helped organize the group, but others ran it now while he continued to protect his city. And when they had come to him and asked him to share something on a day that most of their number really didn't understand yet, he had needed time to know whether or not it was something he could really do.
In writing the speech he'd done a lot of research; research was what he always did when he had a problem he didn't know how to handle. The origin of the day and the first celebration of it were trivial for his purposes, but it helped him start to understand the intent of the day. Why it had been created and what it had come to mean mattered deeply. Helping all these…kids understand was not going to be easy, but was important.
That Robin understood and even agreed with the general population about who was more important didn't help, but maybe it would keep him pointed in the right direction.
With trepidation he finished his walk up into the building and onto the stage. His thoughts turned to his mentor as he waited for the event to begin. He thought of the countless hours of training they did, coupled with constant reminders of how much failure could cost them. Bruce hadn't liked the idea of a child risking the same things he was and probably hoped Robin would back out of the deal.
Not a chance. There was too much stubbornness in him; too much anger that needed direction and focus. Sure, it was an unconventional method for letting go of all that hate, pointing it at those who deserved, but it had worked. Probably because by the time he was ready to start going out with Batman, most of the anger was gone, replaced by skill, discipline, and a firm moral code.
The Titans from all over the world weren't like him. As far as he knew, he was the only one with no powers whatsoever, and yet so many of them looked to him for leadership, guidance, and example. It was daunting. Being Batman's student was easy – all you had to do was refuse to quit. Being seen as his equal to so many others was almost impossible. He didn't deserve it.
They needed to understand this one day and they needed to know why the rest of the world wouldn't care if they did, but that it mattered all the same. Bruce could do it, Robin wasn't as sure of himself and definitely wasn't as good a speaker.
But that didn't matter, because his name was being announced to polite applause and it was time to see if what he wanted to say was going to make them angry or actually get through to them and make them see the day for what it was.
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"Good afternoon. I was asked to speak to you today about Memorial Day. I was told that I was asked because my team knows what its like to lose a member, to lose a comrade in arms. But I think I have better things to talk to you about today.
"The country in which we are in sets aside this day in May to honor those who have lost their lives in armed combat and the service of their country. Many of you here today are not natives to this land, but know that we use this same day to honor those among us who have similarly fallen. I think that is a good, and right thing to do, but it's not what I'm going to talk about.
"Instead I want to focus on why the people of this country, and of many other countries with similar days of remembrance would choose to ignore our loses on such days.
"The simple answer is because we have things they don't and so their loses look greater and more noble to the common man.
"The hard answer is that we are less deserving. We don't put ourselves in the same kinds of risk. We don't work for the same kinds of rewards. We are honored and praised with nearly every victory. They are honored and praised only in death. We are better armed, better protected, and better funded, yet they fight their good fight.
"They press forward in the face of oppressive forces. They lay down their lives, knowing that death is likely, in the hopes that their sacrifice means another won't need to.
"I gladly honor them, knowing that the work we do means they have things worth fighting for. We're the neighborhood watch; they're the ones who make sure we still have neighborhoods.
"We honor them through our sacrifices and the few of us who have succumbed to that same mortality join their ranks in least of ways, in that of death in service.
"Do not feel slighted by the public ignoring our fallen for this one day. Instead feel slighted every time they forget those brave men and women for the rest of the year while they praise us.
"In closing I would like to read the names of those who have fallen in recent years so that we may observe a moment of respectful silence for them. The world forgets them for this one day, and as on many other days, we will carry what the world can't.
Now at the end of his speech Robin found his voice leave him for the first time during the day. He truly felt the words he had spoken and they stirred deeps emotions within him, but now he needed to read a list of names. Names of people he knew, respected, and loved as brothers and sisters. He steadied himself and began.
"Edward Alan Bloomberg
Tara Markov
Courtney Mason
Ryan Choi
Grant Albert Emerson
Andre Twist
Thank you."
…
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It's a very short chapter, but it's also a tricky subject. How do you show superheroes honoring their dead on the day that makes the most sense for them to do so without cheapening the real men and women who died serving their country? In the end I shot for something that deflected the fictitious deaths away from the real ones while still trying to remain respectful of both. Let me know how I did.
All of the names are DC superheroes that have died in the last three or four years in the comics plus Terra. It's not all of them, but it serves its purpose.