I thought I'd let you get a glimpse of Young Justice again. Oh no! Now you'll have to wait another day to find out what happened to Tim.

Bruce sat in front of the computer, dark circles under his eyes. Idly, he typed away, not exactly focused on what he was doing. His thoughts were elsewhere, to a deeper and darker crevice within his mind. He didn't hear the footsteps until they were nearly behind him.

"Are you making any progress?" a soft voice inquired, stopping behind his chair.

"No." Bruce answered.

"It's okay, Bruce, we'll get him back. You said the League was working on the device, right?" Barbara tried to muster a small smile.

"They aren't making any progress, either."

"I thought you said they were nearly finished building it."

"Building the device isn't the problem. It's making it work." Bruce's voice turned cold. "There are an infinite number of alternate universes and dimensions. There's no lead, no clue on where he is."

Barbara slumped, her half smile returning to its grim frown. Bruce was silent, but after a moment he spoke.

"Then there's the possibility he's already dead."

"What?" Barbara snapped her head up and her eyes narrowed. "Stop talking like that. He's your son—"

"He's not my son." Bruce interrupted. "I never adopted him, he never called me father, and I never treated him like my own flesh and blood."

"That doesn't mean he's not family." Barbara shot back. "Dick's the closest thing you've got other than Alfred."

"I chased him away."

There was something in Bruce's voice Barbara hadn't heard before. She couldn't place a word on it, but she knew it was something akin to heartbreak. Gathering a bit of inspiration from a conversation with Alfred a few days before, she quoted the old butler.

"So go find him." Barbara pulled on her cowl. "Let's go take down Clayface and start sending out an SOS signal. Dick's a twerp, but he's a twerp with a super computer that never leaves his side. He'll pick it up."

Bruce didn't say anything, instead pulling up his own cowl. Barbara was right, not that he'd admit it. He'd been so focused on trying to decode the program that made the portal in the first place, that he'd forgotten to think about doing something to contact Dick in the meantime.

He could only hope Dick would pick up. If Dick could pick up.

Superboy slammed his fist against the interior of Megan's bioship. Nothing. They'd found no lead, no one who could even guess as to how to hop dimensions. Their only lead was the very man who did it and he wasn't speaking. Not even under threat of death or torture.

The man himself was a mystery. He had an obsession with rabbits; hundreds of pictures stored in various pockets of his large brown coat. No one understood why and the man never said a word to anyone. Not since the very night of Robin's disappearance.

"Ho ho! There goes the bird! Through the window and into beyond! What a day, what a night! Now the bird takes an unintentional flight!" the man laughed, cackled as if to imitate the Joker.

Batman's fist slammed into the man's jaw as Kid Flash rushed to the quickly dissipating portal. He didn't make it in time, and dropped to his knees on the pavement. He wasn't fast enough, and it killed him. Superboy roared and went to greet this newcomer with his own two fists, but Batman's dark cape kept him away.

"Where is he?" Batman snarled, anger escalating into something dangerous.

That was it. The stranger was done talking and smiled a rotten smile.

They'd brought him in for questioning, and even when J'onn had read his mind, he'd only discovered little of what's happened to the youngest of Young Justice. Their only lead was the device that created the portal in the first place. Everyone's top priority was to find out how to use it.

It was a one way trip, J'onn had informed. What goes in doesn't come out the same way. They would most likely have to replicate the device and switch its interior backwards to create a wormhole back to this dimension.

It'd been six months. Six months with no sign of ever getting Robin back. M'gann sighed, willing her bioship to repair itself, and it did.

"Superboy, I'm frustrated too, but please stop hurting the ship."

"We're getting nowhere!" Superboy shouted back.

"Do you want to give up?" She asked, no hint of the happy M'gann they'd all come to know. "We can go home."

Connor stared at her for a minute, trying to reign in his anger. He'd become calmer, more subdued. "Let's go home. I want to see if Wally's made any progress."

"Good idea." She answered, changing course. "It's been a while, and I was starting to wonder myself."

Wally collapsed to the ground, staring up discontentedly at the sky. It was blue, bluer than any other day he'd seen. The sky was always bluer in the winter. It was a deep, almost hostile blue; nothing like the ocean, as untamable and wild as it was. The sky was open, a vast emptiness occasionally filled with bits and pieces of white fluff. On occasion it would cry, and on occasion it threw fits, blowing off steam in the form of roaring thunderstorms and gusts that sent trees crashing down.

The sky was far more human than Wally felt at the moment.

A hint of red caused him to frown and squint. The red splotch grew larger and larger until Wally recognized it as the bioship. Next thing he knew, a crater next to him signaled the arrival of Connor.

"Wally!" M'gann waved, hovering over him. "Are you okay? Why are you on the floor?"

"Tired." Wally answered. "What's up? Back from your trip?"

"Back from a waste of time." Connor grumbled. "Any progress?"

"Not even close. I'm faster, sure, but nowhere near as fast as I need to be." Wally didn't stand up, and after a minute, Connor dropped down next to him, staring up into the sky as well. "Uncle Barry is worried I'm going to end up jumping into the wrong place."

"At least you can work at something." M'gann sighed, sitting down on the other side of him. "We've been around the world and found no one who even thinks it's possible to jump dimensions. In fact, you're the closest thing we've got until Mr. Rabbit decides to talk."

"Don't even mention him, Megan." Wally growled. "He's not worth the carbon dioxide."

"Flash say anything about the device?"

"The device is almost built, but they haven't figured out how to work it yet. Not to mention they can't even pinpoint where Rob is." Wally closed his eyes. "I talked to Roy about a week ago, he's still pissed off and ready to kill Bats."

"Aren't you?" Connor growled back. "Isn't everyone?"

"It's tiring to be pissed at someone for so long." Wally answered. "I'm just… tired. Uncle Barry told me no one will forgive him until Rob does. Then it's over, and everything has to go back to normal or it'll tear Rob apart. Batman doesn't care, he's been hated before; but Rob thinks of Bats as a father, you know? He wouldn't be able to handle it."

"Never thought of that." Connor's growl turned into a soft rumbling. "I guess I just don't think as well as anyone."

"I don't think either, Connor." Wally opened his eyes back up. "I just run away."

"Let's stop talking about ourselves like this, okay?" M'gann forced a pained smile. "It hurts, and I don't know if I can handle all the negativity."

"Sorry, Megs." Wally sighed again.

"What do you think he's doing?" M'gann asked. "Right now, I mean."

"I have these dreams sometimes," Wally started, "and I don't like what I see."

"I have dreams too." Connor added. "He's laughing—always laughing at something. Sometimes it's me."

"I like that." M'gann smiled. "I'd like to think he's just laughing. It's a lot better than what I've been thinking of lately."

"He's cold and scared in my dreams. Sometimes I can hear him crying for help." Wally clenched his fists in the cold grass. "I can't even hear his laugh anymore."

"It's creepy." Connor assured. "It's loud and it echoes, almost mocking, but lighter."

Wally bolted upright when he heard it, and Connor did too, instantly on his feet. M'gann just smiled.

"Sorry, I just wanted you to hear it again."

Disappointment and anger filled him, but he squashed it back down. M'gann was just trying to help, Connor told himself. She didn't mean to give them false hope.

"Thanks, Megs. I remember it now."

"No, I'm sorry." M'gann bit her lip. "I usually retreat into memories of him when I'm feeling down. He's said a lot of great things to me. It encourages me, and I guess I just wanted to share a bit with you. I wasn't thinking that you wouldn't expect it and… sorry."

"What did he say?" Connor asked. "What did he say that was so great?"

"Do you want to hear it?" M'gann tilted her head and ran a hand through her long red hair.

"Yeah," Wally nodded his head. "yeah, Megs, that'd be nice."

M'gann nudged at their minds and together they retreated into happier times when their youngest teammate was laughing with them.