Dick fiddled with the switches and levers lining the wall of the Batcave. Or, soon to be named Batcave. He sighed with a small smile, remembering how he had run around the cave giving everything a bat-prefix. Bat-mobile, bat-cave, bat-grapple, bat-arang… he even thought about naming himself Batboy, but Robin seemed more appropriate in the end.
He glanced at the clock at the bottom of the Batcomputer. They'd be at the police station by now, trying to explain how Zucco did it. Gordon trying to console yet another victim of Gotham's corruption. He didn't know where else to go so he had just returned home. Home… That kid's in for a Hell of a shock…
Dick sat in Batman's chair waiting. Waiting for this night to end for the second time. His heart had slowed incredibly, making him feel almost comatose. It was as if time had decided to drag out his pain and halt entirely. What have I done? Dick prayed to whatever god or gods that would hear him and begged for there to be fate. For him to have something else to blame for his parent's death other than himself. If it was his fate to be Robin, then what happened tonight wasn't his fault, he only aided fate in its mission. If one's fate was, on the other hand, dictated by one's actions, then Dick had nobody to blame; not Zucco, not Haley, not even Batman for the predicament he now found himself. How can you make that choice? Who lives and who dies… especially when it's the lives of the people you… shit, it's about time I left. Dick stood, his head rushing and his body tingling. Time to go. A roaring rush of noise and a now welcomed blinding light enveloped him once more as Dick was flung forward in time, finally escaping the past.
Dick was standing exactly where he had been just a few moments before, only now he knew he wasn't alone. Footsteps and excited chatter echoed down to the cave from the mansion entrance and he knew they would be down soon. Dick silently crouched behind the Batcomputer, carefully avoiding the sudden drop into the abyss below as he crept along the back of the machinery and situated himself carefully.
Dick grinned hearing a voice so very familiar and yet entirely alien. "C'mon Batman! I got my suit on and everything!"
"It's a school night, Dick. Don't you have a test tomorrow?" Dick heard Bruce say while buttons were clicked on the keyboard.
"Tsst, yeah, in math! Easy stuff…I don't have to be awake for that!"
"Dick," Bruce's voice was firm but patient and Dick couldn't believe how gentle it sounded. He realized Bruce hadn't been so 'fatherly' in years. Losing sons and friends has hardened him… probably me too…
Dick heard the boy sigh, defeated. "Alright, but I want a cookie." Dick had to stifle a chuckle. I am adorable.
Bruce chuckled softly, "Deal. I think Alfred just made some. Goodnight, Dick. I'll see you tomorrow."
"Goodnight, Bruce!" and with that, the young aerialist bounded back up the stone steps and disappeared back inside the manor. Dick waited for Batman to don the cowl but he was anything but patient. It had been years since Dick had last tried to hide behind the Batcomputer and suffice it to say, he wasn't as small as he used to be. He thought he heard Bruce stand and move to the Batmobile, but it hadn't been soon enough as Dick's foot slipped and a stone was sent cascading down the cavern, making as much noise as possible as if the stone had had some secret vendetta against the young hero. Dick grimaced and would have laughed had it not been counter to his goal. He waited a moment more, the cave was silent.
"Are you just going to stay back there and keep pretending I didn't hear that, or are you stuck?" Batman's growl permeated the silence and Dick picked up on the ounce of humor in his tone. He sighed, defeated.
"No, I'm comin' out…" Dick inched his way back around to the front of the computer. He stretched his back and grinned sheepishly up at the cowl-less Batman.
Bruce had his arms crossed and his face expressed a bemused anticipation. "Nice outfit."
Dick laughed but froze and made to hide when he heard a boy's voice call down, "I can't find my elephant!"
Bruce turned to the stairs to respond, "Alfred washed it, try the laundry room!" The Dark Knight turned his attention back to the familiar intruder but was startled to see him hiding behind a boulder a couple feet away.
Dick popped his head around to make sure that the kid wasn't in the cave, then stepped out from behind the giant rock. I don't remember seeing myself.
"Nice kid," Dick commented.
Bruce regarded him for a moment before walking past him and typing away on the keyboard, evidently adding last minute information on a case he was working.
"I know who you are," Bruce said calmly, still entering data. Dick's heart jumped. There was no way Bruce could know who he was, but Dick quickly recognized Bruce's method of discussing emotional matters and realized he in fact did know. Bruce would always busy himself with mundane tasks, such as entering data into files or sharpening Batarangs, whenever they talked about topics a little heavier than who had escaped from Arkham. It took Dick a long time to understand Bruce wasn't just ignoring him and now he found the façade almost endearing. That is, if one can find anything about the Caped Crusader 'endearing'.
Dick folded his arms and moved to rest against the metal desktop beside his former and present mentor. "Sure," he started. "I'm the guy that whooped your ass in an alley."
Bruce stopped typing for a moment to give Dick a sidelong glare, but Dick found the humor in his eye and assumed he was in the clear. Bruce turned back to the monitor. "I was a kid then."
"That doesn't mean much. You of all people should know kids can do a lot of damage," Dick said, regarding Bruce carefully.
"How's the future?" Bruce asked, nonchalantly.
Dick gave a sarcastic laugh, "You're testing me! You know I can't say anything." Bruce smiled, but kept typing. "I mean, you trained me better than that."
Bruce stopped typing again, his hands falling helplessly to the sides of the keyboard. His face was pained and he sighed deeply. Dick didn't say anything, allowing Bruce the time to gather his thoughts.
"So," Bruce started. "This whole thing," he looked up at Dick and the young hero was met with a glimmer of fear before Bruce had the chance to reign it back in. "You don't…?"
He's worried Robin will get hurt. Dick smiled, "I'm fine." Bruce nodded, relieved but still pained. He shook his head and glanced between Dick and the monitor, not knowing where to direct his next statement.
"You were there that night," Bruce began and Dick frowned, sending his attention directly to the cave floor. "Why didn't you save them?" Dick's throat felt raw and his stomach churned unpleasantly. The silence of the cave was broken only by the cheerful noises from the manor of a boy and his butler. Dick regarded the manor entrance, thoughtfully and sighed.
"Then who would be here to save you?" He asked quietly, dropping his gaze back to the floor.
Batman wasn't an incredibly patient man. Sure, he liked to preach to his robins about the virtue, but at the end of the day, he was just as unnerved by idiots as everyone else. Sometimes, even more so. This was one of those times.
"Batman, the Lanterns can't decide where this part of the ceiling goes."
"Batman, the Joker robbed Gotham City Bank an hour ago."
"Batman, Cyborg needs your encryption key to reboot the system."
"He's exhausted his power, should I try to pull him forward? I think I can do it again." Zatana asked, wringing her hands.
Batman growled. Today was not going so well. After trying to repair the superficial damage done by Darksied's invasion, Cyborg did some technical reconnaissance only to find the entire system had been fried. The essentials were still online such as the artificial gravity, oxygen and lights, but the rest was shot. Batman wasn't too worried about any lost information as he was constantly backing up any and all files from the Watchtower onto his personal Batcomputer, but the panic it caused was way more than he wanted to deal with at the moment.
"Just make sure you keep a lock on Nightwing," Batman said to Zatana who looked rather disappointed. He left the room before finding out if she would argue with him and sought out Cyborg. The metal man was in the control room, his own personal screens projected around him.
"Cyborg," Batman addressed. "How's the backup coming?"
The half-human continued his work and responded, almost irritated, "I don't know whether to thank you for making copies of everything on the Watchtower, or be very afraid. Either way, the transfer is making good time. I should have everything back to normal by the end of the day. It'll be finicky though, she ain't as stable as she was this morning." The technology on the satellite was somewhat of Cyborg's brain-child and it was painfully obvious that he was pretty pissed about it being messed up by Darksied. "I just keep running into security I somehow can't override, which really scares me." Cyborg said, glaring at Batman accusingly. Batman, without a word, took Cyborg's metal arm where he had been typing, and entered various passcodes to get by his security. "Thanks."
"Just make sure we get everything," Batman said, turning to leave the control room.
Of course, then Batman's day got worse. The Flash sped in full speed to the control room just as Plastic Man, carrying various large metal pieces of debris, extended himself across the room. The Flash clotheslined on the stretching hero and was flung directly into Cyborg, knocking him into an open compartment on the main computer into a mess of exposed wires.
"Cyborg!" Batman yelled but the noise of the metal man's screams and the frying of electricity drowned him out. The lights of the Watchtower flickered and Batman heard another scream, this time a woman's, coming from down the hall. The Watchtower blacked out, but was soon illuminated by the pinkish backup lights.
"Flash! Take care of Cyborg!" The speedster stood, rubbing his head, and began to help Victor back to his feet. He was going to be alright.
Batman rushed down the hall, his cape billowing behind him as he skirted to a halt in the room he had just left Zatana. He froze. The Hologram was gone and Zatana was lying unconscious on the floor. Zatara, still too weak to stand on his own from transporting Nightwing, was bending over in his chair, holding onto her hand. J'onn was still in a trance, unharmed, fortunately.
"What happened?" Batman growled at the older magician. Zatara shot him a look of disdain. Batman scooped up Zatana and placed her gently into a chair and turned back to the other man for an explanation.
"She was trying to bring Nightwing closer to us," already Batman didn't like where this was going. "Then, the computers and lights began to spark and –"
"And magic is highly conductive," Batman finished. Zatara nodded glumly. Zatana had been trying to help when she was shocked by a nearby outlet. "What about Nightwing?" Batman was losing his patience. As unhappy as he was that Zatana was hurt, none of this would have happened had she just listened to him. Now they had lost their magic connection to him, which took an exorbitant amount of magic to establish in the first place, and they also had no idea where he could have ended up.
Zatara was stung that his daughter's well-being was so easily cast aside, but he frowned nonetheless and replied, shaking his head, "I'm sorry."